tatteredatlas

Writing

2010-12-22T12:55:00.002-05:00

Since I seem to enjoy constantly starting new blogs more than updating the ones I already have, I started a NEW & IMPROVED repository for drafts of poems.

And since it's easier to copy and paste verse than it is to write whole new blog posts, I have hopes that this little endeavor will persist a bit longer than previous tangents.

(I'll still use this site when/if I have more prose and images to broadcast along the optical fibers.)

Welcome to Buffalo

2010-08-25T19:41:00.003-04:00

I made it!

I'm nesting, connecting, etc. Trying to.

Some snapshots from the first few days.

Tofurkey welcome dinner! Thanks, Lynne and Brendan.

Rebecca and her roommate, Jeanna.

Rebecca in her room with a visiting youngster.

The new room. (Or, at least, one corner of it.)

Postcard

2010-07-05T14:12:00.004-04:00

I've made several posts in the past archiving some of the letters and postcards that turn up in my purchases from used bookstores. I found a nice postcard while in Buffalo a few weeks ago. Unlike some of my past finds, this seems to be a less dated artifact (sometime between 1996 and 2000, judging from the 26-pence postcard stamp).

Note the imprinted "K2" and the fainter "00" on the front image.

The circled, upside-down text in pencil reads "ATTRACTION TO THe ePHemeral." Maybe it's a coded message of some sort?

Dear Jo,

What a great vacation. Golf at the finest course in Ireland; great friends in Scotland; Waterford glass factory; sitting outside B & B's just watching the clouds roll by, and eating lots of great food. We did a little searching for our roots but couldn't find too much. You'll get this after I return—but I thought the scene would remind you a little of the Wild West.

See you soon!

Dan

Plaster Creek Spring Clean-Up

2010-05-01T19:36:00.007-04:00

West Michigan Environmental Action Council and Plaster Creek Watershed Working Group are teaming up on May 15 to cloak different parts of the creek with some much-needed care and attention.

Join a group of us for a fun afternoon in Marquette Park along an urban/mixed-industrial portion of the creek. There will be relaxed portions near the park as well as some tricky sections that the more sprightly among us can tackle with hip boots and maybe even waders!

We'll pick up trash and get to know a bit of the creek in all it's spring energy. The afternoon will end with a modest feast of tacos from a nearby local restaurant.

See below for a map of the area we'll be visiting, or check out some pictures from the clean-up last fall: http://tatteredatlas.blogspot.com/2009/11/plaster-creek-clean-up-photos.html

There are two options for meeting up with the group:

1) Meet at my house (352 College Ave SE) at 2:30 and carpool to the site.

2) Meet at Kimball Stadium of Marquette park at 3:00:

1352 Nagel Ave SW
Wyoming, MI 49509
[see Google map]

Email me at rweberling[at]gmail.com if you have any questions or suggestions. Hope to see you here or there!

Plaster Creek Clean-Up: Photos

2009-11-21T18:44:00.005-05:00

Some of the best photos from our afternoon on the creek are stuck on an uncooperative digital camera, but here's what was left over:

When I get the chance, I'll update this post with some thoughts and reflections on our experience.

Connecting

2009-11-19T21:11:00.003-05:00

One of the first lessons that has been reinforced by what I've been learning is the depth of connections that flow between people and places in our various natural, built, and modified environments. I remember one experience I had almost four years ago, right after the conclusion of my first year at college: the dorms had shut down for the summer, and I had chosen to spend a week on my own, wandering between friends' houses by whatever means that presented themselves (I had left my trusty Chrysler at home for that school year). After a few days of drifting, I found myself sun-napping in the sand on the beach in Holland, MI, right along the confluence of the Grand River as it flows past the quaint and gaudy tourist spots out into the Lake Michigan blue. I read and slept and pondered how deep the waters might be, and whether those sorts of hidden, deep things even mattered: "What beauty and life is caught up down there in the flux of change, decay, and growth?"

Resting and, eventually, standing on the beach that day ended up being one of the more bright and clear experiences I had during that sometimes rough "first-year" transition, and it has stuck with me——although, until recently, it seemed a sort of far-removed, otherworldly sort of memory. With what I've begun to discover, though, I now see the patterns that connect me where I am now with that distant day. And it's not just my own memory that circulates between then and now, but an actual body of water that runs between that watershed moment in my past and my current place in this world. Just a mile or so south of me, in fact, is the current that continues to pass from outside of the city to the confluence in Lake Michigan, where the sediment and trash and industrial waste-waters flow out towards the blue horizon of the lake.

A few weeks ago, I had the chance to get together with some friends and do an introductory clean-up project along a small stretch of Plaster Creek. Although our numbers were modest, the half-dozen of us that could make it out our gorgeous Saturday afternoon received a warm, autumnal introduction to the creek and, as was our intention, managed to harvest a fair bit of trash: about 8 trash bags of general litter and waste, some empty buckets, a hose, shopping carts, and a few other more bizarre items. We found that .

Another huge problem was the abundance of plastic bags that we found strung through the roots and grasses and branches along the banks, sometimes at knee-level or higher because of 1) the wind and 2) the creek's unhealthy propensity to flood with agricultural run-off (i.e., that E. coli stuff) and urban drainage. Nearly impossible to untangle, these synthetic pouches collect all sorts of secondary debris, disintegrate into even messier shreds, and stand out like tattered surrender flags where there should be plentiful riparian growth.

Plaster Creek: A Portentous Portrait

2009-11-16T23:32:00.006-05:00

As part of my increased attempts at "doing things," I've begun to take advantage of some of the resources and opportunities on offer from the stream projects sponsored by the West Michigan Environmental Action Council (WMEAC) and Calvin College's own Plater Creek Watershed Working Group. I've been learning some basics about the life of the stream and its interesting mesh of contexts (environmental, cultural, political, etc.). I've also been trying to get my feet wet, so to speak, in watershed issues as (I hope) a form of involvement that can continue and expand in the years to come, wherever I happen to be living.

---> click here for more maps

Plaster Creek is a more relatively minor part of the Grand River watershed, which is itself a more major player (about 13%) in the Lake Michigan drainage basin, draining approximately 5,572 square miles of west and central Michigan. The creek is considered one of the unhealthiest in the region, a title that is not hard to believe after a few brief encounters with its sudsy, odorous water and its often ill-used banks. Due to high E. coli levels from agricultural run-off outside of the city, Plaster Creek has been labeled unsafe for even partial immersion or casual contact, although this is unbeknownst to the many kids who play in its waters in summertime (as kids are supposed to do). Passing on through suburban housing developments and their strip malls, run-off from the expansive green- and blacktop of lawns and parking lots further pollutes and also destabilizes the flow of the creek (contributing to its unhealthy flood cycles). Finally, in urban residential and industrial areas, more run-off, excessive amounts of litter, and industrial pollutants make their contributions before the creek merges with the Grand River and the rest of the Great Lakes Region's water supply.

Wading through or walking along part of it, it stinks of all of the stuff about us and our so-called prosperity that we try to hide from ourselves. Many of the decisions that have effected the creek, dumping into it wherever convenient or adjusting it (with a backhoe) where it happens to be an inconvenience, make it a destructive force rather than a healthy source of dynamic creative and destruction. Piles of dead lawn topple into the mud as it undercuts its own reseeded and thus rootless banks. The water rises and falls at an unhealthy pace. The transformations that take place now lead to decreased carrying capacity and biodiversity. The Plaster Creek watershed, which includes both human and non-human forces, increasingly erodes and pollutes and degrades itself, which no one seems to mind as long as it stays hidden——tucked away from the subdivision by a landscaped barrier mound or behind a chain-link fence where only the homeless spend time.

I'll admit that this a rather bleak description of things and fails to mention some of the most positive and exciting parts of Plaster Creek's life. But that other side of things will have to wait for another post. I recognize the potential for rhetoric such as I've just offered to become part of an unhealthy and potentially dishonest "discourse of catastrophe." There is the chance that I might be playing into the sort of ideological recuperation that is at work in some mainstream Green propaganda. And yet, I have yet to see other approaches that avoid either apathy or elitism (related to what Timothy Morton has been calling "Beautiful Soul Syndrome"). I would like to imagine a strategic contribution——a contamination, if you will——that we can make to the sleight-of-hand environmental initiatives and policy adjustments championed by corporate publicity stunts or those public officials with vested interests. Riffing on Morton's thesis about Hegel and environmentalism, I wonder if the attitudes that we encode in our ideas and social movements——humility and care, for example——could be part of the change that is happening, even if they are bound up in beliefs and methods and systems (self-righteously jumping around, waving our hands to get the attention of the rich and powerful) that seem less than ideal. After all, it is this sort of emergency-portrait which I think most needs to be disclosed, both personally and collectively, as the vision which demands our hasty and wide-ranging response.

A Time For...

2009-10-30T13:55:00.005-04:00

I've never extended my domain in the blogosphere beyond the realm of personal anecdotes, travel updates, creative writing, or, occasionally, a brief review or two. I've certainly never used it to advocate for any sort of political or social cause, especially not with tacky, pre-fabricated slogans or images.

This post is an experiment otherwise.

I'm learning that, out of the many issues in this world that obviously call for our attention, it's sometimes necessary to pick and choose the ones that speak most clearly to our current experience and then to do what we can, even if that action is not what we would ideally prefer. The options that are available to us in regards to any issue, however shabby or incomplete, are nonetheless available to us as horizons of action and further learning. Perhaps more than I've realized in the past, virtue demands (along with truth, beauty, and our neighbors) an attention that is capable and willing to surpass just "looking" and engage our world with various forms of movement, whether this means speaking, making, sharing, destroying, or other modes of doing. So with that in mind, there's a chance I might be "doing some more things" with this blog in the future.

Open Ends

2009-08-13T15:44:00.004-04:00

People of the South Wind (Section 1 and 2)

1
One day Sun found a new canyon.
It hid for miles and ran far away,
then it went under a mountain. Now Sun
goes over but knows it is there. And that
is why Sun shines—it is always looking.
Be like the sun.

2
Your breath has a little shape—
you can see it cold days. Well,
every day it is like that, even in summer.
Well, your breath goes, a whole
army of little shapes. They are living
in the woods now and are your friends.
When you die—well, you go with
your last breath and find the others.
And in open places in the woods
all of you are together and happy.

- William Stafford

*

My 3-day Greyhound adventure with Rebecca turned out to be a slow and moderately enjoyable stretch of time and country. We played cards (I lost horribly) and ate PB & J and watched Freaks and Geeks and, the next thing I knew, we parted ways all the way "back east" in Cleveland, Ohio—farewell eastern Oregon, Salt Lake City, Denver, Omaha, and Chicago! Upon arrival, I ate lots of treats and slept for about 12 hours before beginning the just-as-strenuous adventure of sorting through all of my boxes of books (some of which received some water damage just 2 weeks before my return! poor cookbooks...) and helping my parents to clean and revamp sections of their crumbly house. It's nice to feel useful after so much indulgent time doing my own thing, drifting connectionless 'cross the continent. Plus, in a week or two, I should have earned enough moolah to cover my first month's rent! So (I'm telling myself), things seem to be looking up, or at least horizontal, for the time being. A normal pace and some everyday concerns will be good for me in the weeks and months to come. Living is living—sounds good to me!

Long Roads

2009-07-18T15:54:00.005-04:00

Yes.
Here we are.
The road ended, literally.
The sun set, then rose a little while later.
Music, quiet, water, and trees.
Staying the same place for more than 24 hours--strange?

I really wanted to make another post sometime before we reached our final destination... or, for all practical purposes, our ALMOST final destination. Amidst the mountains and the bike repairs and the final push, that obviously didn't happen.

I wanted to try to describe more fully all the wild and caring characters we met throughout the eastern half of North Dakota, the vast expanse of Montana, the Idaho panhandle, and, finally, Washington. I wanted to try to describe all of the scenery and landscape and environment we experienced, the varieties of trees and mountains and dirt, each conglomeration slightly different than the last. And, mostly, I wanted to try to hint at the connection between people and landscape that seemed so obvious while pedaling longitudinally, one mile at a time. There were the Spirit Lake, Fort Peck, and Blackfeet nations, the sudden change from dry plain to lush mountain valley, or the subtler changes that occur when you cross a seemingly arbitrary state border. There were the watershed moments, when the water literally flowed out from under our feet in opposite directions, toward the Pacific Ocean and the Hudson Bay and the Gulf of Mexico, all at the same time. Slugs littered the roadside west of the Northern Cascades. Tourists littered the roadsides (figuratively and literally) outside of Glacier National Park on America's Independence Day. Radically different forms of living dotted the highways and backroads we followed, even though what we mostly saw were the nests of one species, human beings (and only a rather homogenuous, unbelievably monochrome sample of that population!).

After approximately 7 weeks on the road, or nearby it, I have a much bigger picture of this land in which I and many other folks are attempting to dwell. We didn't get to cross any national walls into Canada, as we decided not to bring our passports, and there's an almost overwhelming mass of country that remains in this country, beyond just our narrow "Northern Tier" strip along Highway 2, Highway 20, and the Empire Builder railroad--let alone the rest of this continent, and the rest of this planet (we met one guy who is planning to cover most of this world on his bicycle over the course of the next 5 to 6 years). But since graduting from college back in May, I feel even more fully educated (and rested and resolved and piqued and restless) after being briefly immersed a little more fully in this land and its people. It was splendid, reassuring, and appalling, sometimes simultaneously. I felt more sure of my self, my body, and my identity than ever before, while at the same time I felt myself dissolving into the places, the histories, and the dreams of all that we passed over on our two spinning, threadbare tires. Needless to say, I still have a lot to process.

*

The sun sets for a long time here in Anacortes. It passes slowly behind the mountainous islands across Guemes Channel, and the whole sky is a wash of pink, blue, orange, green, and grey for hours, until nearly 11:00pm or so. We're staying with a bunch of other campers here for the music festival, scattered throughout the large and winding yard of some new friends. They are renting a sort of luxurious beach house built in 1970, with wood paneling and funky tile and some groovy porches looking out over all of downtown Anacortes to Cap Sante Overlook, and then across Fidalgo Bay to the snow-capped Mount Baker and, somewhere off in the distance, the Canadian border. With all the festival attendees gathered in the living room, snacking, exchanging stories, and what not, we feel a bit like the Brady Bunch on spring break. Other than that, we've been trying to see some of the scenic parts of town and nature without spending money. And, we've been trying to relax and read books and take care of practical things (laundry, etc.) without spending money. And, we're trying to find food without spending money. It's been fun. Last night, we saw 5 bands play in an old port warehouse right along the water. You could see the water rising and falling and sloshing through the gaps in the floorboards underneath our feet. Mirah played some beautiful songs, and then Phil Elverum led some friends througha boisterous and profound set of Mount Eerie songs (mostly new ones that I'd never heard before). This guy has an interesting relationship to his community and surroundings here in Anacortes, whether it be the birds or the rocks or the water or his friends. I've been thinking a lot lately about how his insights fit into what I want to write about in the future.

We've got the festival left today and tomorrow, and then, assuming we won't be able to hitch a ride down to Seattle (not everyone has pick-up trucks here, like they do in North Dakota!), we've decided to bicycle 55 miles down Whidbey Island (which means we get to see some scenic destinations, such as Deception Pass) and then take the ferry across to somewhere near Seattle, where Nate's friend will pick us up in her vehicle. Then, it will be on to Oregon and some dear people there. I'm excited to continue this wonderful time of quiet and excitement now that we're done bicycling... as long as the money keeps stretching or I find some way to earn a little cash.

I hope to use this digital space for some further contemplation in weeks and destinations ahead, now that we've quit our full-time job of bicycling and I'm, according to the money-lenders of this world, OFFICIALLY UNEMPLOYED.

On the Road Again

2009-06-22T20:50:00.002-04:00

Okay, okay, I guess that last post was kind of jumping the gun. It was the panicked preemption. But, the genius mechanic over at Val's Cyclery combined some old parts and found a way to fix up Nate's bike! And, they hardly charged him a thing, in spite of the rush job. Very nice.

Plus, we just met some folks at the Pangea House Community Collective, and they fed us grilled potatoes and corn on the cob and are letting us stay in their community center/music venue tonight. I just finished up playing some old favorites on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) they have here and I toasted some bread. Ah, toasters... what a luxury.

In a strange way, since we managed to hitch our way more than 150 mi. in less than 24 hours (thankfully, nearly 2/3 of the population of North Dakota drives a truck of some sort) and got the bike fixed in less then a few hours, we are actually a day ahead of schedule now. Praise the Lord. We leave Minot tomorrow morning, and then we should cross over into Montana in a couple of days. It seems that the landscape will only continue to flatten out and dry out up until we get to the Rockies in about 700 mi. We'll have to keep our canteens filled to the brim...

2009-06-22T15:21:00.002-04:00

We are here, in Minot, ND.

View Larger Map

A few days ago we passed our 1000-mile point, and now (with a little hitchiking), we are about halfway across the country. Yes, hitchiking... Nate's crank fell out of his bottom bracket about 150 miles back. We are currently waiting for the bike shop to get back to us about the fate of Nate's ride. Needless, to say, we're a bit nervous!

I guess to kill the time, here are a few more random photos (I'll try to get the rest up later) from my time in Minneapolis with Tory and Joke and up at the beautiful north shore of Lake Superior:

The Twin Cities and Tettegouche State Park

(At Silver Bay, we witnessed a world record attempt for the longest ATV parade, but Tory has those pictures.)

2009-06-12T14:53:00.004-04:00

Okay, so images:

The majority of the photos are cycling through in the little box to the right of this post. If you put your mouse over the box, you can scroll back or forward through the pictures. If you click on one of them, it will take you to Flickr where you can see bigger versions and perhaps a caption or description.

I guess the only problem is that not all of my photos are up there yet, and I can't get them to upload to Facebook. Blah blah blah. Technology wins again. Maybe I'll figure out how to make these things work better somewhere along the way.

more houseboats!

on the way down into Saint Paul

a building in the background

Week 1: Joliet/Chicago to Minneapolis

2009-06-11T01:28:00.002-04:00

Okay, so it was technically almost two weeks. But we could've done it just one. I swear.

The first few days were mostly spent learning the ropes, how to carry our stuff, pack and unpack, find camping spots, and interact with the people we'd meet. We started with enough food to last two weeks, but then realized that we were cycling past several grocery stores a day. We also were worried about where and how and when to camp each night, but that has turned out to be about the easiest part of the trip: so far (in the Midwest, at least), we've just been able to roll into about any town, meet some folks at the diner or pub or grocer, and then, if nothing else turns up, just set up our tent in the city park or on the outskirts. And once we started tracking up through the bluff and wetlands along the Mississippi, especially, we've had some lovely spots for camping. However, we have yet to deal with any significant precipitation. So far, whenever it's rained, we pull into a coffee shop or call it quits and hang out for the rest of the day in whatever little town we happen to find ourselves.

Oh, and getting into shape, too. That's been a big one. My legs strangely feel a bit muscular, and the wind and sun are gradually having effects on our skin and hair. For the first week or so, before turning north in Iowa, we'd get tan on only one side of our body (the left side, which faced the sun as we biked west). After our big haul last night, I'm starting to think we might be ready for trek westward. I guess the trip up to Minneapolis was a kind of trial run for this next leg of the journey. The same thing as we've been doing, only about 3.5 times as far and with a few mountain ranges thrown in. It's very exciting, but still a little bit terrifying to think about. Nate and I are going to put our heads together and figure out a lot of the the concrete details and practical stuff. We think we'll be able to lighten our load and plan our timeline a little bit better than stage one of the trip, since now we have some idea of how these things will all work out.

Anyways, Day 1 in Minneapolis was really nice. I slept in, did some laundry, then hung out with Joke and Tory for the rest of the day. I drank coffee and ate lots of food while catching up with Joke. Then we met up with Tory and sat on the beach of Lake Calhoun (I think?) for the rest of the evening. Oh, and then Tory and I made eggplant parmigiana and ate some mango sorbet from Trader Joe's. Yeah, lots of food. I guess that's not much different from when we're on the road, which usually involves either cycling while thinking about food and sleep or eating and sleeping while thinking about cycling. If I have any time the over the next couple of days, I'll try to post more details or describe some highlights from the first, introductory part of our expedition. Oh, and pictures from my new digital camera, too!

Until next time...

Breaking Away?

2009-05-09T16:47:00.003-04:00

So I'm headed away from both of my homes, at least for a little while. Bye-bye for now, Mansfield and Grand Rapids!

If I have time next week (after finals) or in Chicago, I might try to make a post that officially inaugurates Nate and my bike trip westward, provides some details, etc. For now, though, I'm setting things up to potentially update this blog via mobile phone while on the road. Maybe some pictures, too? Technology is crazy, and it sure has changed a lot even since a year or two ago, when I last paid attention to it.

Stay tuned!

Photogenetics

2008-08-13T15:19:00.005-04:00

Well, I developed the film from my semester in England and my Easter Break travels at the beginning of the summer, and now I am finally getting around to uploading these to the internet. It's a pretty messy collection, for now, but I hope to eventually arrange and edit them up to be a little bit nicer looking. Until then, you can check out the hodgepodge here:

http://picasaweb.google.com/tatteredatlas/York2008

Edinburgh Rocks

2008-05-13T10:36:00.006-04:00

I finally got around to scanning and editing the Polaroids from our trip to Scotland a couple of weekends back. We were only there for a Friday night, but that gave us enough opportunity to explore and get a taste of Edinburgh, which is perhaps one of my favorite cities in the UK. I was a bit biased, I'll admit, by the warm sunshine and blossoming of spring, but the city itself has a great vibe. The buildings and city layout have a unique mix of classical, Gothic, and post-modern elements, and with golden gorse-covered hills and cliffs on one side and the Firth of Forth on the other, it feels like an epic place to be a student or even just a tourist-pedestrian.

A highlight of the trip was our walk along the Salisbury cliffs outside the city and our scaling to the the top of Arthur's Seat on Friday evening. Likewise, the next morning, we took an enjoyable "philosophical walking tour" of Edinburgh, which pretty much meant tracking down the grave of David Hume (Scotland's most well-known philosopher) and the building named after him on the University of Edinburgh campus. Hume Tower, where the Edinburgh philosophy department is located, was empty due to it being Saturday morning, but we did a sort of non-hostile break-in (walking past reception and riding the elevator up) to the academic offices. We checked out their billboards, their course offerings, and I appropriated some information on the philosophy Honours program, just in case.

We finished things up with a tour of the unique new Scottish Parlaiment building, designed by Enric Miralles. The Scottish Parliament was reestablished in 1998, after nearly 300 years of unification with the English Parliament. The relationship between this two bodies is still in the process of being evaluated and provides, I think, a unique model of nation-statehood, especially with the Scottish Parliament's international outlook on things. And besides, the building is wicked cool--although at first I thought it was a bit tacky, as we walked through its asymmetrical, abstractly-modeled hallways and conference halls, I came to love it and almost felt like moving in. I never thought I'd say something so positive about anything related to politics.

THE PHOTOS:

| left: John's umbrella couldn't handle the wind atop Arthur's Seat
| right: re-enacting Creed music videos on the hike up

Spring Break in Polaroids

2008-04-21T17:14:00.009-04:00

I thought, now that one of my essays is done, that it was about time to post the first fruits of film from our travels. It's too expensive here to develop all the rolls of 35mm film I used, but maybe this week I'll get one done, you know, just to make sure they worked. Without further ado, then, 20 Polaroids in chronological order (click to expand):

| left: literary walk--near Charles Dickens' house (and T.S. Eliot's office and Virginia Woolf's house, etc.)
| right: St. Paul's Cathedral, looking foreboding

| left: sleet in Paris, in front of this tower thing
| right: Glamour Portrait #1: musical in front of some important building

| left: Glamour Portrait #2: John and Mallarmé at the book vendors along the Seine
| right: Glamour Portrait #3: Melody doing it Italian style

| left: group performance art at Centre Pompidou (choreography by Jenn and Mel)
| right: letter-writing and book-reading in Hotel Altona

| left: Glamour Portrait #4: Brad at Versailles
| right: last night in Paris: bad hotel, sleep deprivation, poor humour

| left: Hans-Morten's miniature guest loft in Sandefjord
| right: group shot in Bergen with Trine, Anne-Marte, and part of a stone admiral

| left: mid-hike, cold hands, overlooking foggy/rainy Bergen
| right: first morning in Reykjavik: ducks, ducks, ducks!

| left: Glamour Portrait #5: Sean, John, and Leif Ericson in front of Hallgrimskirkja ("Hallgrimur's Church")
| right: wind in the bell-tower of Hallgrimskirkja (I look like a troll from Norway) with Ana's apartment in the background

| left: John at Geysir hot springs
| right: my personal favorite--lounging in the moss beside boiling springs

| left: Sean peering over the ledge at Gullfoss
| right: first annual rock toss at a random crater

Goodbye Lava Fields, Hello Minster Bells

2008-04-08T14:13:00.007-04:00

It feels strange that a few hours ago (I guess 14 is more like it), John and I were wandering the pre-dawn streets of Reykjavik, lost on our quest to find the bus terminal and somehow led astray into some sort of shipyard. As the time of our flight drew nearer and we only seemed to be getting loster and loster, I flagged down a car for directions. In a wonderful turn of events, the driver of this car, a bouncer at a local club who was just getting off work, offered to give us a ride to the airport. He was very friendly, spoke excellent English, and even has a friend from Michigan. Without him, who knows where we'd be right now...

Our last two days in Iceland were tip-top, and progressed a little bit as follows: we ended up borrowing Sean's neighbors car for a trip through... the countryside? Well, whatever you call the brown grass and dramatic mountains with intermittent lava fields and craters, that's what we drove through. Our first stop was *ingvellir (I'm not sure how to make my Latin type the write characters), the site of Iceland's first legal and government meetings around 900 AD. There we walked through a rift valley along the mid-Atlantic Ridge, where the American and Eurasian tectonic plates converge. It was interesting to stand in a no-man's-land, not technically on either, or any, continent. After that it was off for Geysir and its surrounding field of boiling hot springs and bubbling cave-pools. Geysir itself, the second highest geyser and the namesake of all geysers, only actually functions during or immediately after volcanic eruptions, and so we had to settle for its smaller sibling, Strokkur.

After that, Sean let me take over driving for a while, and I had the pleasure of cruising past mountains and lava fields and farm houses in a snazzy little European auto. Or maybe it was an American model? I wasn't really paying attention to that, I guess; I just got a rush from driving for the first time since January. Our next stop was Gullfoss ("Golden Falls") on the river Hvitá. The falls are actually at a right angle from the turn of the river and disappear behind the cliff walls (especially with banks of snow and ice jutting out over the edges of the rock), making it seem as if the river simply disappears into a crack. But when we got up close, it felt a bit dizzying to be literally face-to-face with such a huge torrent of water. Away from the coast in Reykjavik, winter was still just beginning to recede, and so the mist and spray from the falls were a bit freezing. We scrambled around on some rocks and grass to take pictures, and then headed back to the car for our ride home. However, we passed a crater on the way--a collapsed magma chamber, as the sign explained it--and we felt compelled to stop and toss some igneous rocks towards the pond at the bottom of the pit. On the ride home, we listened to various Icelandic music to match the scenery and I balanced on the edge between rapt appreciation of the landscape and napping.

For our last day with Sean and Reykjavik, we took things easy, strolling around town, visiting shops but not buying things, and chatting in coffeeshops and restaurants. At one especially hip coffee shop, the ladies from the musical group Amiina stopped by. But they didn't seem to recognize us. I guess that's okay. We spent the majority of the evening post-dinner at another public pool, relaxing in the seawater pool or spring water or the steam room or the graduated hot tubs or the plain ol'... pool--whatever we fancied. After a few days of such leisurely evenings, I can see why a lot of Iceland people seem healthy and fresh, and why the city feels so safe. Maybe hot tubs are the best deterrents of violence? At any rate, I wouldn't mind if these sorts of public pools caught on in York or Grand Rapids.

I'll admit, I've done a little bit of splurging on food since getting back into the UK. I never thought England would feel cheap, but it's nice to buy a sandwich or a coffee without guilt (with less guilt, at least...). After nearly a month of being away from York, it was familiar but strange to return. We navigated around town effortlessly for a change, with the church bells ringing in our arrival. It felt, of course, like we had just left the day before, but I could see the passage of time in the daffodils blooming along the city walls or the progress of construction sites around the college here. It's nice to feel a little permanence and security again, and although I'm exhausted I got motivated with the help of a little coffee, unpacked my luggage, rearranged my room, and nested myself in for the next 5 weeks or so. Life would be great if it were not for the surplus of academic work waiting for me here. I calculated the amount of words I need to write in the next month but stopped from fear and anxiety at about 10,000. For now though, sleep-sleep-sleep.

Reykjavik, Clear and Blue

2008-04-05T20:40:00.004-04:00

After withering away for two days in a horrible but cheap hostel in London, John and I discovered (really, it was my fault) a ridiculous and by far the most expensive mistake of our travel experiences thus far. We showed up at the airport a day after our scheduled flight, and had to pay a small fortune to make it to our rendezvous with Sean. But, we're here, and we are enjoying the city, the language, the people, but not so much the high prices. Thankfully, it's a bit more affordable than Norway, but that's not saying much. We've been eating cheap food from 7-11, 10-11, and 11-11, and Sean's been getting us cheap Skyr and bread from his friends that work at bakeries. We try to enjoy the free and affordable experiences, like browsing the records at 12 Tonar, sitting on coffee shop porches, and looking through galleries, boutiques, and of course, tourist shops.

We've spent our first two days here wandering the shops of Laugavegur, the pedestrian paths around city hall and the University of Iceland, and the walkways along the harbor. Yesterday, we climbed the windy bell tower of Hallgrimskirkja, the highest man-made point in Iceland, and looked out over the city and ocean and natural scenery, and then at night went out to watch the drunk people wandering out of the clubs and bars just before sunrise. We've been trying to keep up our authentic Icelandic experience by spending substantial amounts of each day in the hot-spring heated public pools. Tonight, we progressed through the graduated hot tubs and ended up soaking in a small pool of sea water until the sun had set and the pool closed (around 10:OO PM now that spring is under way here). On the walk home, the Northern Lights were especially visible, and I had a bit of a stumbly walk home looking up at the sky and still feeling light-headed from our time at the pool.

Tomorrow, we're borrowing Sean's neighbors car and doing a driving tour to see a waterfall, the Geysir, the Blue Lagoon, the Continental Rift, etc. etc. Hopefully, there will be some lava fields and bubbling mud puddles along the way. The weather so far has been uncannily beautiful: relatively warm and sunny, sunny, sunny. Sean says the wind has even taken a break since we arrived. We've probably gotten more sun the past few days then the entire semester in England. Maybe this won't be the coldest, grayest, and rainiest spring break ever after all.

In A Nutshell: Sunny Sandefjord, Bergen Rain, A Waterfall!

2008-03-30T17:02:00.004-04:00

My commitment to blogging seems to have completely lapsed while in Norway. I guess we just had too beautiful and busy a time in Bergen to make time for the internet; or, more truthfully, I was just too lazy to keep up with things. But, we have now returned to what John calls "the hustle and bustle" of London for a brief spell before we go on to our final spring break destination, Iceland, and so I should be in the mood to do some posting. What follows is a revisit to our time in Norway. Hopefully, it will help me forget about my horrible surroundings here at the cheapest hostel in London. We've so far spent most of our time here sleeping.

Our first evening in Norway was spent with Hans-Morten and his wife and family in Sandefjord, which turned out to be an all-round wonderful experience. They made us dinner and coffee and gave us rides to our various transportation destinations. I think we got more sunshine in those few hours of walking around the harbor than we had gotten since Easter break began. We stayed up late talking to Hans-Morten and his wife about their kids and their boating adventures and politics and other things. The next morning, we left early for our cross-country train trip, which was to say the least, absolutely wonderful. I hadn't seen good stretches of mountains since last spring break, and I must say that Colorado has nothing on the snowy Norwegian peaks. I was tempted to jump out and join all the skiers that were taking the train ride with us, if only I had more than my sweater and hat to stay warm.

We made it to Bergen in time for supper, and Trine and Anne-Marte kindly met us at the station. It turns out that, along with Mari and Susanne, they had the whole evening planned out for us, with dinner and a concert to attend. We all ate together, and it felt like a reunion for us YSJ exchange students. It started snowing soon after our arrival, and a bit had accumulated by the time we left for our concert in a literally cave-like venue. The opening act wasn't all that enjoyable, but Truls and the Trees was definitely a step up. The venue itself was gorgeous, and walking home through the snow I felt a bit wet and cold but also a bit in love with Norway.

The rest of the weekend was a blur of coffee cups, sleeping in later than intended, and sporadic trips around town. Like in Paris, we mostly gave up the tourism game and just walked around, enjoying woolen products, markets, parks, old buildings and churches, and of course, the surrounding mountains and fjords. Especially since it was so expensive for us Americans, we tried to live cheaply. As a cup of coffee cost us about $5 and a pizza about $50, we decided to eat as much cheap cheese and bread as possible. Shopping in second-hand stores, though, we found some good deals, and I left Norway with nearly a complete outfit.

The day before Trine and Anne-Marte left for Ireland, we decided to hike up one of the seven surrounding mountains. As could be expected, it was freezing and rained the whole time. We got to the top too cold and wet to enjoy our picnic, but the sights were wonderful, and I guess our experience would qualify as an authentic Bergen hike. The next day, our last full 24 hours in Norway, we took the train to meet Susanne. She drove us through the mountains, which may have been even better than the train ride, and I got a bit carried away taking pictures. John and I were supposed to buy these awesome green jumpsuits from the farm-supply store, but they were a bit expensive, and so I decided to buy a t-shirt with the same logos attached along with wool socks and a hand-woven sweater from the second-hand shop. She then took us to visit her home village, which was beautiful. The sun came out again, and we stopped on bridges and back roads to enjoy the sites. Eventually, she pulled off next to a waterfall, and John and I scampered up over the rocks and moss like little boys, smiling and yelling and taking pictures while dusk just began to set in. It was a wonderful last evening experience! Susanne fed us porridge and put us up for the night, and we finally got to meet her fiancé, perhaps our first male Norwegian friend. The next, John and I showed up at the airport 6 hours too early (thanks to a type of mine), but after a rather boring afternoon, we made it back to our hub city of London to get some sleep before Iceland. We leave tomorrow! (Some guy just told us that Iceland is even more expensive than Norway... great...)

Snow Again

2008-03-26T09:26:00.004-04:00

I'm sitting in the airport at Torp Sandefjord eating Läkerol lemon candies from the duty-free shop. We managed to make our shoe-string of connections this morning (even the Ryanair flight was great--I believe the nicest plane people I've met yet) and made it from the streets of northern Paris at dawn to London for breakfast and now are in Norway for Lunch and the next few days. Our host Hans-Morten picks us up here in about an hour, after he gets off work, and then tomorrow morning we take the train cross-country to Bergen. Flying in, we got a glimpse of the coast scattered with islands and ice, and now the grass outside the terminal has a nice white blanket. It's the first snow I've seen since leaving GR in January. Lucky me, you say? I think I'm going to go build a snowman.

Vivez bien! (a day in reverse)

2008-03-24T20:39:00.001-04:00

We just checked into the Hotel Altona, near Gare du Nord. It's a bit of an "informal" racket they're running here, with overbooking rooms and shuffling people around. For tonight, a least, we have a new room with a gorgeous, clean, newly-remodeled bathroom, TV, and a balcony overlooking the street--I would say it's almost a suite. We'll have to see how the room we get transfered to tomorrow compares. We've spent the evening here since dinner relaxing on the balcony, writing letters, and brushing up on our French via a strange movie about French colonies (this instead of spending more money we don't have on a trip to the cinema). Tomorrow morning we're off for Versailles, La Basilique du Sacre Coeur in Montmartre, and already our last night in Paris. So soon! It's strange to think, though, that we're not even halfway through with our Easter break. It feels as if we've already experienced so much.

Earlier tonight was the decadent climax of our hedonistic time with Mel and Jenny, on the floor of Katherine's apartment. I believe the final summary of our meal included 5 types of cheese, 4 types of bread, 3 types of grapes, a gigantic deluxe salad, 2 kinds of fruit juice, and a desert of tea and 5 varieties of chocolate with sweet bread and caramel confiture. We all became somewhat euphoric by the end, and wine wasn't even needed for us to writhe on the floor. Mel and Jenny left to catch their train back to Rouens, so we cleaned up our mess and washed the dishes, which isn't such a chore when you pretend that you're living in a flat in Paris.

Our time the past few days at Josh and Katherine's was wonderful. Katherine seems to us the quintessential French woman, a journalist (perhaps?), a bit saucy but kind, intellectual, and a bit of a smoker. She lives with two black cats and her apartment is lined with books and potted plants, and our conversations were smattered with stories of her travels travels to the United States and Poland and her friends in Morocco. Before our feast on the floor, after we gave her our goodbye gift of flowers and a group Polaroid, she sat us down with peanuts and white wine for a final chat. Having this sort of laid-back inside glimpse into everyday life here makes it seem so feasible and reasonable to live here. It's been a much different experience than our time as tourists in London.

After all of our failed efforts to get into museums this weekend, we were finally met with success. Our afternoon was spent at Le Pompidou, the museum of modern art here in Paris, looking at paintings by Miro, Kandinsky, and Picasso, and an interesting collection of sculpture and videos. The building itself was great, too. J'aime l'art moderne et d'avant-garde. C'est très intérresante.

Paris, Je T'aime

2008-03-24T06:10:00.005-04:00

It's Monday morning after our first weekend in Paris. It's been a bit of a round-a-bout adventure (we keep showing up to museums and restaurants and monuments right as they are closing), but we've managed to see some of the sights so far. So far it's been cold and rainy, even hailing respectably-large chunks our first night. It seems that we're here for one of the last cold spells in France before spring sets in. Really, for all the bad wrap/rap(?) that England and London get for bad weather, Paris doesn't seem to be any better. This weekend in Paris felt a lot like cloudy GR, except the temperature and precipitation shift drastically every half hour.

Saturday morning we headed straight to the Eiffel Tower and then walked through the gardens there toward the military school. We criss-crossed back and forth across the Seine to see some of the more impressive buildings and then walked up the gardens to the Louvre. The rest of the evening we circled Notre Dame cathedral, browsed the shops on Ilse De Louis, and then wandered through the Latin quarter until getting a late sushi dinner.

Yesterday (Sunday), we slept in late and had an extended, deluxe breakfast of fruit, potatoes, toast, pastries, herring, and other treats thanks to our hosts Josh and Cathrine. We headed off to the Musee D-Orsay, but it was closed, so we scurried on over to attend evening Easter mass at Notre Dame. It was a beautiful service, but was strangely a bit of a spectacle with tourists crowding in and out of the building mid-service and snapping pictures during Communion. We then had more failed activities as we arrived at the Pompidou museum of modern art (it was closed) and then to a jazz club (the band played while we were eating dinner next door), but all in all it was a nice evening out. Josh, Melody, and our new friend Jen have been kind and parental tour guides, translating for us and navigating our underground journeys on the Metro.

Brad, John, and I are trying to decide how this compares to our time in London. I'm honestly kind of crazy about the place so far. I'm sure it's still my imagination running wild, but I feel somewhat at home here. At least, I'm drawn to the cafes and good food, the lines of gorgeous books lined up for sale along the river, the streets and buildings and overall vibe of the place. It's more my stle than the posh, refined, and clean haven that is London, and I think maybe London has more to offer to me than even London. We're heading off for some museums this morning. Hopefully, we will fare better than last night. Eventually, our tour guides will leave us, we will check into our own hotel room for a few nights, and it will be interesting to see how we survive on our own in sweet Pair-ee.

London in Summary: New Jerusalem or Whited Sepulchre?

2008-03-19T20:42:00.004-04:00

Just as yesterday I described the Westminster Abbey as a collage of British culture into a possibly religious image or icon, so the city of London is a very cosmopolitan medley, a microcosm of world culture, admittedly disproportionate but well-represented nonetheless.

I've kept snapping a steady ration of pictures, but not for this blog. Who knows when I'll get them developed, maybe sometime next summer?

The Cabinet War Rooms, a themed museum which visited yesterday, were dramaticized and made British-family-friendly enough to gloss over any horrors or questions concerning warfare. For instance, the attached bookstore featured play tanks and trinkets, as could be expected, but I saw no representation of what I would consider the reality of the situation, the reality of our world being at war. You would never see Vonnegut's "Slaughterhouse Five" in a gift shop like this.

Likewise, a good deal of monuments around the city, ornate and ancient, imply the story of British imperialism and what came (and continues to come) with it.

It's in no way a clear choice between William Blake's nationalistic utopian vision of Christ's England or Joseph Conrad's indictment of the darkness surrounding the Thames in Heart of Darkness, but perhaps some sort of reminder of the potential of both extremes in city and national life, in historic monuments and ecclesial stuctures, in all things of this world.

London: Day Two

2008-03-18T19:51:00.007-04:00

Today was another busy day, mostly playing the tourist game but hopefully escaping that into something more worthwhile. John and I started the day off a little bit earlier than the rest of the group (a miracle for me, I can assure you) in order to take a literary walk around the Bloomsbury neighbor in which we are staying. It was really just a nice stroll through the surrounding streets, squares, and gardens, with the added benefit of seeing such sites as T.S. Eliot's office, Virginia Woolf's childhood home, or one of Dickens' houses, often marked undramatically with a small plaque on the wall.

After this, we met up with the rest of the group to go to St. Paul's Cathedral. One of the tallest buildings in London, it was exhilarating but a bit exhausting to climb the more than 400 spiral-staircase steps up to the "whispering gallery" in the central dome (designed to transmit whispers along its curved, circular surface from one end of the walkway to the other) and the even higher outside galleries that overlook the city. Winding through the passageways and countless spiral staircases, I felt a bit like a tourist being led to slaughter, but it was worth it for the beautiful view. All this description fails to mention the incredibly lavish nature of the entire building, from the classical two-tiered pillars in the entryway to the murals, paintings, stonework, collage, and engravings on the interior. It's almost too rich and dense of a scene for me to be able to describe it, so suffice it to say it was an interesting contrast to some of the more austere abbeys and such that we've visited. I can see something in all this decoration that could turn people away. Anyways, we finished our visit here with a walk through the crypt to see memorials and tombs to Lord Horatio Nelson, Florence Nightingale, and William Blake.

After a tasty but expensive lunch at Pizza Express (mint-avocado salad and veggie pizza being a nice change from constant Indian cuisine), we were off to the London Tower. This site proved to be a bit of a disappointing headache. Perhaps the most touristy of our destinations thus far, the experience felt a bit empty and even annoying, which is a shame considering the structure is supposed to be the oldest standing fortification in Europe (from William the Conquerer in 1066) and that it has such a rich and dramatic history. After waiting through a long queue reminiscent of a US amusement park, we got to see the crown jewels of England, which may be the most extravagant and valuable collection of items I've ever witnessed. Surrounded by boisterous French elementary students and royal guards with machine guns, it all seemed a bit ridiculous in the bigger scheme of things. Perhaps that reveals my American, un-monarchical background, but the ethical status of such wealth (and the history, tradition, prestige, power, etc. that come with it) seems at least questionable to me. In the famed White Tower, London's historical armoury, was stockpiles of ancient guns and weapons. All this type of thing interested me little, and I got a bit claustrophobic amongst all the gawking bystanders, so I eventually found our group and persuaded John to flee with me across the river Thames to the Tate Modern art gallery.

We got some great pictures crossing the London Bridge and enjoyed a short walk through some of the quieter corners of downtown London. The Tate Modern is a fascinating structure in and of itself, standing along the river as some sort of ex-industrial warehouse structure. The visiting exhibit of Duchamp, Man Ray, and Picabia unfortunately cost 11 pounds (as with most museums and galleries in London, admission to the Tate Modern is free, which I think says a lot about the priorities of British culture, a lot of good, that is). However, we got to see the unique Turbine Hall space as well as the general collection of expressionist, surrealist, minimalist, vorticist, etc. etc. work. I think I most enjoyed seeing some more of Joan Miro's work, which has been a growing fascination for me since visiting the MOMA in New York an autumn or two ago. John and I left the Tate in time to catch the rush-hour underground train to the Westminster Abbey in order to attend the Archbishop of Canterbury's third and final Holy week lecture. I'm not sure I enjoyed or valued this one, on faith and history, as much as last night's, but the following question and answer time was very good indeed. John got his question answered first of all, so props to him.

I'm not used to doing so much during the day that I can't be bothered to have a good time after 9, but it feels good in a productive sort of way. Tonight, another well-needed sleep, and tomorrow, Oxford!

London: Day One

2008-03-18T19:48:00.002-04:00

Our first full day in London proved to be very eventful. We started things off at the Westminster Abbey, site of the coronations and burials of English monarchs for hundreds of years, as well as being a bit of a national graveyard. There I was able to rub shoulders with Chaucer, Darwin, Handel, and Queen Elizabeth, among others. Or at least, I got to see their graves/tombs. In the south wing of the nave, “poet’s corner” as they call it, we walked above Tennyson (we saw his school yesterday, today his final resting place), Coleridge, Dickens, Eliot, and dozens of others, as well as a variety of memorials to the likes of Shakespeare, Blake, and Gerard Manley Hopkins. On a whole, the church seems a pastiche of British culture: science, the arts, politics, aristocracy, and the cultural mind in general are all assembled beneath the stained glass and gothic detailing. I guess the question is whether this presence is a sort of corrupting infiltration of the church or a wrapping up of a whole society’s life into the sacramental tradition of a physical Church. That is, do the national monuments within the church indicate a less-than-sacred foundation for the building, or do these plaques and engravings catch the stained-glass light and somehow become washed in a rich, illuminating presence?

After the Abbey, we walked past Big Ben and the gorgeous buildings of Parlaiment to see the Cabinet War Rooms and Winston Churchill Museum, which provided an intimate, and therefore more interesting, look at the usually uninteresting (to me, at least) subject of humans killing one another. We headed down Whitehall, grabbing a relatively cheap but tasty sandwich for lunch, to the super-sizedTrafalgar Square--the British seem to have a thing for statues of dignified-looking males atop large pillars. After a whirlwind tour of the last 800 years of painting in the labryinthine wings of the British National Museum, John and I headed for the Blackwell publishing book outlet, being overwhelmed by the possible ways of blowing our food stipend. On the way back through Trafalgar Square, we tried to talk to a local, but somehow he talked at us instead of to us, asking if we had seen a play and mentioning something about getting a few “appropriatements” with which to engage some oppressive water, at which point we left this strange character alone and questioned our own sanity.

On our way to Buckingham Palace, we passed through a crowd of people centered around a rather out of place car parked before a movie theater. A spectator informed us that Prince Charles was about to make an appearance, so we waited around for a bit to catch our first physical glimpse of the British royal family. I snapped a few pictures (along with several hundred other camera flashes) in the silent 20 seconds it took for him to exit the building, wave to the crowd, and be off. Lucky us, stumbling into the path of royalty. Having the taste of monarchy fresh in our mouths, we decided to finish our walk down the mall to Buckingham Palace. St. James Park along the mall was quite inviting, with its fine-trimmed gardens and weeping willows, but the palace itself was a rather bland disappointment, literally grey and gated off from passers-by, except of course through small entryways guarded by heavily-armed police and the postcard-worthy royal guard.

I was pleased to learn last night that the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Most Reverend and Right Honourable Dr Rowan Williams, is delivering lectures at the Westminster Abbey for the first three days we are in town, it now being Holy week. Tonight’s lecture was on faith and politics. I don’t feel like summarizing or analyzing what he had to say, but suffice it to say that I was somewhat surprised, pleased, and ultimately encouraged to see someone of such religious and political prominence say the things that tonight he said. His lecture was nothing new or groundbreaking, but a solid overview of things that are near and dear to my own growing understanding of these issues. To hear such views represented in a semi-public, official church setting was, as Jamie later noted, a nice model of public intellectual engagement. Afterwards, we managed to shake the Archbishop’s hand, offer some obviously unnoteworthy expression of gratitude, and be on our way back to Pickwick Place.

Now I’m back in our room, sore again and more tired than yesterday. I guess we’ll see if I’m even still alive after three more weeks of this. Not so bad for our first 24 hours in London, though: Prince Charles, the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Chaucer. Tomorrow morning is the Bloomsbury literary walk and another full day of playing at tourism. Who knows what could happen?

Come on Cambridge, Pick it up Picadilly

2008-03-17T18:06:00.005-04:00

We had a grey, rainy day in Cambridge followed by a headache and a half of train transfers and transport cancellations. My knees and shoulders are a bit sore from being out of shape and carrying an overstuffed pack all day. Also, I pinched my finger in something and have one of those horrible little blood-blister things going on. Nonetheless, I'd say it was a worthwhile journey.

We ate lunch at an Indian place and then took a walking tour through King's, Queen's, and Trinity College. It was a bit touristy (admission gates at every college courtyard), but we got to see portraits and statues of King Henry, Isaac Newton, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Francis Bacon, etc. etc.--all alumni of the Cambridge institution. The buildings, courtyards, and stained glass were all exceptional. Many of the buildings were built before the Europeans even knew about the Americas: meeting halls from 500 years ago, fountains from the 1600s, a church from the 1100s (in use until a few years ago). We ended our tour in the downtown market, surrounded by a mix of international tourists armed with cameras and umbrellas alongside suave and cocky academic types. After purchasing avocados, we headed over to the University library to see their John Milton exhibit. It was nice to see first editions of his work, original manuscripts of poetry, and other artifacts, for example... William Wordworth's copy of Paradise Lost? Yeah, that will work for me just fine. We took a bit of a walk, finding the Orchard Tea Gardens to walk in the footsteps of Virginia Woolf and Wittgenstein. It was muddy, though, and hardly beautiful, other than the schizophrenic swans.

I hardly want to detail the following confusion and train mess-ups. A disreputable bum reported that someone somewhere jumped in front of a train and threw off the entire London train system--I suppose the factuality of that account will be verified or otherwise by the BBC tomorrow morning. Anyways, we're now checked in to the Pickwick Hall hostel, I believe near Bloomsbury. John, Brian, and I are sharing a room on the top floor (Brad counts 101 steps) equipped with sink, mini-fridge and microwave, plenty of space, and a decent garden view. The hostel has some nice recreational space, a full kitchen, and a decent mini-library. Not a bad location to spend our first week of Easter Break.

I'd say it's about time for bed.

A Departure, An Arrival

2008-03-16T10:13:00.001-04:00

It's Sunday afternoon. The sun is shining through my window, and the bells from the Minster are cascading off in the city center. I just finished a big load of laundry (my room is now a jungle of dripping clothes) and am trying to tie up some last-minute loose ends for our Easter break trip. Tomorrow morning we take the train to Cambridge for the day, then on London to settle in for the week. Our itinerary looks roughly like this:

Monday, March 17 - Friday, March 21: London area (Thursday in Oxford)
Saturday, March 22 - Wednesday, March 26: Paris
Wednesday, March 26: Torpe, Sandefjord (outside of Oslo)
Thursday, March 27 - Monday, April 1: Bergen
Monday, April 1 - Wednesday, April 3: back in London
Wednesday, April 3 - Tuesday, April 8: Reykjavik area

This being the first multi-country trip we've planned, I'm a bit worried about all of the practical things (like getting from Paris to London to Norway in one morning), but we'll be able to recover from such stressful moments during the train from Oslo to Bergen "over the roof of Norway." Or maybe Easter morning in Notre Dame? In the least, I'm excited that I managed to fix the good ol' Canonet today (all it took was a Q-tip, some turpentine, and a little patience), so I'll be able to actually document some of these things.

The last week or two in York have been an interesting blend of stress and relaxation. Working on trip plans, catching up on schoolwork, and maintaining my steady stream of extra-curricular reading. I came up with a to-do list of things to accomplish and places to visit and trips to take before leaving York, but John thinks that's just over-planning. I guess we'll see how much of the list is even possible to complete in the five weeks we'll have in York after Easter break, what with classes picking up and final papers being due then. I'm sure a handful of blog-worthy things have happened in my life since the last post, but now all my mind is on is the upcoming adventures, the Tate Modern in London, Indian food, Versailles, the Lutheran cathedral in Reykjavik, Norwegian sweaters, etc. etc. I hope to make a few brief posts while traveling, but I guess we'll see how that works out.

Goodbye for now!

| above: a view from my window at dusk

A Lonely Roll

2008-03-07T09:02:00.001-05:00

I recently had developed the one roll of film I managed to take with my lovely Canonet before it rebroke itself. It was definitely an experiment in taking pictures, but seeing some of the results makes me only more depressed that the thing is no longer working. Here goes nothing:

Around Town

- Monk Bar, gateway to the city center

- blurred night scene

- Yorkies at work in their cubicles

- view from Gillygate road, I believe

- the York City Art Gallery (free admission!)

- crane skyline, just like in GR

- the River Ouse at dusk

Wall Walk

- houses and the Minster, complete with restoration scaffolding

- what used to be the residence of the Archbishop of York

- John reads on a corner tower

- York Saint John University

- overlooking Bootham Square and the city art gallery

- from the south walls of the city

Earthquake!

2008-03-06T08:37:00.001-05:00

For whatever reasons, my blogging activity has slackened as of late. For one, I guess I've been a bit more busy as of late, my to-do lists, projects, and ideas growing and overflowing to their typical status of open-ended incompletion, piled on my desk and around my room. Besides that, I also became a little burnt out with keeping such rigorous track of my life via the internet, and I guess you could say that it wasn't helping me avoid homesickness, either.

But, after a little over a week, I'm back in blogging business. In the meantime, we've experienced a minor earthquake in York, I got a snazzy new pair of shoes, my miniature garden has partially revived, and I've filled out digital stacks of applications and essays for the Calvin homebase. Now I'll be waiting anxiously to see if I get any scholarship money or summer job offers as a result. My procrastination crisis has only been worsening, but as Easter break is only a little over a week away, it's time for me to get to work on some of my projects and assignments! Easier said than done...

Yesterday, we took a trip to the Castle Museum here in York. The museum takes its title from its location on the site of the York Castle, and does not actually feature much history of castles. Instead, it tracks the history of life in modern York and England, from 1600s through the Victorian period and up to the 1950s. Much of the content of the museum consists of reconstructed rooms and workshops featuring original furniture, fabrics, tools, appliances, etc. There is even a reconstructed Victorian street made of (I believe) original storefronts and the like. What most interested me were the domestic elements of the displays, seeing how people went about their day-to-day life washing clothes, cooking, or getting around town. Likewise, it was fascinating to see the models of workshops and what they represent of a drastically different system of the division of labor. Instead of huge factories that use dozens of men to mass-produce furniture, clothing, or even sewing pins, this alternative places the highly-skilled worker in a cozy workshop, surrounded by the familiar tools needed to make by hand tires, candles, or shoes. As William Morris would emphasize, "he [the worker] had full control over his own material, tools, and time; in other words he was an artist." I suppose comments such as these reveal my own growing idealization of these past times, but I can't help speculating at what it would be like if there were more of a balance between the assembly line and these older ways of doing things by hand, with dedicated time, careful skill, and an elevated aesthetic.

Also, last Friday a group of us attended the York Youth Theatre production of Nick Lane's version of 1984. It was no Waiting for Godot, but it made for an enjoyable evening activity. I guess I love Orwell's novel to excuse whatever problems arise from a local youth production.

| photo: proof of my attendance last Friday night

Fountains Abbey, the Temples of Piety and Fame, the Castle Museum

2008-03-01T17:14:00.007-05:00

Fountains Abbey and Enlightenment Temples

We had reasonably nice weather for our second visit (I believe second... I may have things confused) to abbey ruins. Unlike the abbey at Whitby, these ruins were substantial, and you could actually get a feel for how things must have functioned. The stories behind all these monasteries, although similar with each other, tend to seem so surprising and dramatic compared to the sorts of religious movements I see nowadays. To imagine a group of 12 guys setting off from civilization into a wilderness area, trying to set up house there and live simple and devote lives, working and establishing a surrounding community (often of poverty-stricken farmers and peasants)--such meaningful and drastic changes seem incredible, almost unbelievable, when viewed from with my own culture, in which not eating at McDonald's seems like a drastic life choice. Our tour guide, a religion or history professor from York St. John, made a wonderful storyteller, and his excitement and knowledge base made our time there much more enjoyable. After getting a feel for the place, we walked back through the surrounding sheep pastures and ate some snacks at the remarkably over-priced cafe/restaurant for tourists like us. We had a little time left before departure, and so a few of us made it over to see the Victorian gardens (not exactly blooming this time of year) and "temples" (i.e.--completely pointless but grand-looking monuments to abstract concepts, such as "The Temple of Piety" and "The Temple of Fame," located on dramatic points of the landscape like bluffs or hillsides). These definitely were a marked contrast, almost an ironic contradiction, to the sort of lifestyle and ideas represented by the ruins of Fountains Abbey. So I made sure to get a picture of myself with both.

| left: trapped Sampson-style in the Temple of Fame
| right: stumbling upon a monastery in the woods?

The Castle Museum

In brief summary, we also visited The Castle Museum. Located on the site of the old York Castle (and incorporating some very old castle leftovers, especially dungeon rooms), it houses a collection of artifacts that document the progression of English life and culture over the past few hundred years. Especially interesting to me where the reconstructed rooms from different styles and periods, featuring authentic furniture and decorations. For some reason, getting the inside scoop on how people have lived their daily lives over the years is fascinating to me. Seeing a Victorian bedroom setup or learning all about the domestic practices of the early 20th century intrigue me much more than some of the strictly historical accounts (especially the ones in which history = (equals) nothing more than military and political events). In the museum, we got to take a stroll down Kirkgate, a Victorian street reconstructed out of mostly original storefronts and materials and what-not. The various workshops of the candle maker and the cobbler and printer were all inspiring, especially to imagine them in action, although I feel that these displays hearkened back to Feudal times as much as 19th century. I never thought I'd feel nostalgic for such things, but... if I can get my hands on John's photos of the candle shop, maybe you'll feel the same.

A Good Life?

2008-02-26T20:16:00.002-05:00

Last Friday, John and I suffered our first major defeat in becoming cross- and high-cultured. I had been looking forward to seeing Beckett's "Waiting For Godot" since as soon as I saw it advertised at the York Theatre Royal. We were bragging about it all day to our fellows in dorm, class, and program, and set out a reasonable half hour early for the box office. However, when we walked through the doors, we were met by a large yellow SOLD OUT sign across the day's listings, and a rather stern older woman informed us that there was absolutely no way we would be able to see any of the remaining showings. But, I think I'll manage to pull myself together, and our budding plans to see the play version of "1984" are helping. This time, we'll know to pre-order our tickets.

Other than that, in my day-to-day activities, I'm trying to cultivate a good life for myself. This has mostly involved the more intellectual aspects of my life. For one, reading has never been such an important and rewarding part of my everyday life. Nearly everything I've spent time with so far, whether assigned readings for classes or impulsive library check-outs or impromptu internet discoveries, has all been working to give me a bigger picture of culture, literature, history, religion... the list could continue. And what has been even more exciting than this for me is the way my understanding of contemporary life is being affected. It's strange that learning about Vikings or the Arts and Crafts Movement could seem relevant to whether or not I want to go to grad school, but that's not far from the truth. I'm trying to make the most of this sort-of monastic sabbatical, as it's likely a one-of-a-kind opportunity. My hope is that all these abstract, theoretical mind games will be able to translate into real action and change in my post-England life. For now, though, it seems like all I can do is keep my nose in the books and my head in the clouds.

In other news, lots of cards have been happening as of late. Nearly every night there have been massive games of speed/spit, spoons, poker, rummy, and who knows what else. Tonight, there was a line of three games of spit happening on my bedroom floor while I sat and read. I take pride in thinking that I was somewhat involved in the beginning of this card craze, when John, Trine, Anne-Marte, and myself played a fierce game of Canasta last week. Of course, Trine and I cleaned up, as you can see in the below scores:

John, Anne-Marte: 3055
Trine, Ryan: 4220

John and Anne-Marte were forced to forfeit to avoid further embarrassment, which John tried to excuse by calling Canasta "just a game for old people. Besides, it's getting late..." I guess some people just aren't cut out for Canasta.

| photo: Canasta in action!

A Full Day in Manchester

2008-02-20T20:07:00.009-05:00

This past Saturday was our program excursion to Manchester. We left at about 8:00AM for a one-and-a-half-hour train ride. I tend to love train rides, but I was a bit sleep-deprived and napped for most of the way. Napping may not have been the best idea, as I felt disoriented and upside-down, like on a space station in another dimension, when I woke up. Coffee cured that quick enough, though, and we were off to the Manchester Art Gallery. Of course, only a few minutes into our walk, some of our group ran in front of a street tram and, narrowly avoiding death (maybe not quite that), managed to cause a huge traffic jam as the tram was stuck in the middle of an intersection while its brakes cooled. Another tram or two had to stop behind it, and there were cars backed up for a few blocks in every which way. God bless American tourists...

Our main task at the city gallery was to view their prime collection of Pre-Raphaelite work. We've been studying the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (PRB) for our class with Jamie, "Victorian Britain and Postmodern Culture," and they've made frequent appearances in my 19th Century Literature class, as well. My enjoyment of the PRB's work was dramatically increased in person, as their signature vibrant colors and almost neurotic attention to detail were more distinct than in mere facsimile. It was good to see the more well-known/essential works, such as Ford Madox Brown's "Work" or William Holman Hunt's "The Hireling Shepherd," but I think I most enjoyed the haunting "Ophelia," by Arthur Hughes. Their Modern(ist) collection wasn't anything too incredible, but I did enjoy seeing some pieces by Wyndham Lewis (whose literary work I've encountered), as well as LS Lowry, Francis Bacon, Modigliani, and some others I can't remember.

After that, we were off to the nearby Manchester City Hall, one of the most elaborate (and expensive) Gothic-revival structures around. The interior is incredibly elaborate on the first few floors, but as you climb higher through the building, the details get less intricate--clever, eh? The building's Great Hall features a dozen or so murals of varying quality by Pre-Raphaelite painter Ford Madox Brown. These reminded me of the Diego Rivera murals in the Detroit Institute of Art (back when art mattered enough to be displayied in public?), although dramatically different in theme and content. The ceiling of the Great Hall is decorated by coats of arms from each of the cities and/or countries with which Manchester has/had connections, and some of these proved mildly entertaining (Canada=beaver?). Something that seemed especially quirky from our contemporary tourist context was the "Manchester bees" mosaic-ed into the tile floors outside the Great Hall. Not only did it seem odd to permanently embed a swarm of bees in the midst of the dramatic gothic architecture, but the things (which are supposed to represent the buzzing, busy spirit of the city) looked a bit like something from a newspaper comic strip.

We wrapped up at City Hall just in time for lunch, so John and I headed to one of the cheap buffets outside of town. The food wasn't that great, but we still managed to eat almost our body weight in greasy Asian-esque treats. We then headed into the small but densely-concentrated Chinatown to do some shopping at the Wing Fat Supermarket. We got some much-need goodies there, including:
- tea (Chinese longjing?) in a nice tin
- Sri Racha hot sauce (quite hard to find amongst the bland, creamy, meaty foods they stock in British supermarkets)
- incense
- kim chee
- cool little printed paper things
All in all, a very productive shopping venture.

We rushed off from Wing Fat to meet our group before leaving for the Museum of Science and Industry. Manchester has its claim to fame as the first industrialized city in the world, and we got to see the artifacts (some working) of their textile-industry heritage as well as the steam-engine power systems that fueled the industry. The steam engines were inspiring in their intricacy and brute mechanics (quite a contrast to our current digitized, microscopic machines), but I especially enjoyed learning about the processes and systems involved in producing cloth. Now I want to build a loom! Even learning about the fabric itself put me more in touch with something so commonplace as to usually avoid attention or scrutiny. I was surprised to learn how many common types of synthetic fabric (I believe polyster, acrylic, and nylon among others) are actually petroleum-based, aka oil. That's something I don't often hear discussed.

The Museum of Science and Industry marked the end of our official group program, so we were free to do our own thing. I had hoped to stay in the city later into the night, to see the sights and enjoy the new scenery, but for some reason the whole group was exhausted and wanted to get home by the time we were done with museums at 5:00PM. I had read online, though, that there was a great view from Cloud 23, the 23rd-story bar at the Manchester Hilton. This strange, modern, somewhat precarious-looking hotel structure was right near the Museum of Science and Industry, so I convinced Brian and John to take a detour there with me. We had to wait in line in the lobby until a couple slick-looking doormen let us up the elevator. The place was quite posh, with quiet electronic music playing and rich European socialites milling about with double-digit mixed drinks. We flipped through the menu (the first page featured a bottle of champagne for 2000 pounds), managing to select something that wouldn't break the bank. All the seats were taken up by the aforementioned city slickers, so we milled about trying to look natural with our backpacks and scruffy clothes while taking in the views of the city, which were fantastic! The sun was nearing the horizon, so the whole city was swamped in a blueish-orange haze. We could see the clock tower of the city hall, the authentic Chinese arch (commissioned by Chairman Mao back in the day), and the various waterways cutting through the city. Part of the bar extends out from the rest of the building, seemingly hovering over thin air, and part of the floor took advantage of this fact with glass plates that make it seem like you're standing on thin air above the miniature pedestrians and cars below. We were glad to have overcome our exhaustion and complete this expedition, but as nice as it was to seem posh for a short spell, I'm glad not to be one of the suave, refined people we saw there. It all seems quite dull and empty from an outside perspective, even after just a half hour.

Cloud 23 consumed the last of our reserve energy, so we walked back to Picadilly Station just in time for the next train to York. I again fell asleep, dreaming of steam engines on golden landscapes somehow mixed up in our class with Jamie. And again, my nap left me disoriented and dreamy for the walk back from station to campus. Oddly enough, we all agreed that coming back from Manchester felt like a return home. We knew the streets, the skyline, the campus, and our own individuals rooms and beds. I guess that's a good sign as we approach the halfway mark between our arrival in York and the coming insanity of Easter break. For a while, at least, I have a home across the Atlantic Ocean.

| photo: Ryan on Cloud 23, although the spectacular view of the city wasn't quite captured on film

Birthday Party!

2008-02-19T11:15:00.003-05:00

Last night, we went to Lisa's birthday party with Trine, Mari, Suzanne, and Anne-Marte. It was a bit of a cold walk out to the off-campus YSJ apartments where Lisa lives, but like the last time we were there, they had prepared enough food to feed a castle. Cakes and cupcakes and cookies! And coffee, too!

I got the chance to try out my new suspenders, which were well received, and I also learned that they are called "bukseseler" in Norwegian. Trine taught me some other words and phrases by writing things down on napkins. For example, for our trip to Norway, I learned the phrase "vakre kvinne hva heter du," which I thought meant "what is your name, beautiful woman?," but apparently this translation they gave me doesn't have quite the poetic or romantic connotations I had hoped. Better luck next time? My fate improved then as we preceded to discuss the phonetic spellings of such strange English words as "kernel" and "colonel." I guess I've always been better at spelling than romance.

Thanks to Trine and her handy digital camera for the pictures below!

| left: Lisa blows out her birthday candles
| right: me with my bukseseler, eh?

Minster and a Movie

2008-02-14T19:41:00.005-05:00

Wednesday night, I went together with our group went to Evensong at the Minster. After the service was a book reception hosted in the main room/sanctuary/hall(?). This book was the result of last year's Ebor Lectures, hosted annually (I believe) at the Minster. Free juice and wine! After some brief (or not so brief) words by various people involved with the book or the lectures or what-have-you, we sat down for the introductory session of this year's Ebor Lectures, featuring a lecture by sociologist Grace Davie, entitled "Patterns of Religion in Modern Europe: A Global Perspective."

Much of the talk, both during the book reception and in Davie's lecture, was related to the recent controversy here about some remarks made by the Archbishop of Canterbury regarding the relationship between British government and religious traditions, specifically one example he cited of Islamic sharia law. Of course, the press here had just as much of a heyday with the Archbishop's remarks as the US would have with any controversial remark made by, say, a Presidential candidate. Beyond just this recent British hubbub, though, are the growing tensions in Europe over immigration from Southwest Asia. Compared to all the commotion in the US over illegal immigration from Mexico, things here in uber-enlightened Europe can get just as nasty--an interesting contrast of perspectives, especially in the context of Davie's lecture.

To begin with, she offered two general observations: 1) Europe is relatively "secular," but the rest of the world is decidedly not, and 2) the rest of the world is arriving in Europe. She then considered the status of religion in contemporary Europe along five subjects: 1) the almost overwhelming presence of religion, specifically, Christianity, in Europe's cultural heritage, 2) the "vicarious" practice of religion by minority groups on behalf of whole communities, countries or cultures, 3) the shift from obligation to consumption (personal choice) as the motivating factors for holding religious commitments, 4) the presence of new arrivals (and their religious and cultural heritage) in Europe as a primarily economic phenomenon, although with great implications for religion, and finally 5) the question of what's going to religion in Europe.

One thing that interested me was her observation that religion has shifted from a compulsory status to one in which there is a growing space for personal, meaningful choices and commitments regarding religion. Although I would definitely object to her language of "consumerism" and even "free choice" to describe one's faith, I think the growing possibility of meaningful decisions is valuable. Other than this, I especially noticed her predictions for the future, which included, 1) the presence of Islam in Europe not being something that can be ignored, and furthermore not just another option on the spiritual market, but a catalyst for a sea change in the whole religious landscape, the relationship between church and state, and the definitions of liberal democracy, 2) the "increased salience of religion in public life," and 3) the fact that in the future, Europe will for once be drastically influenced by the rest of the world, and not vice versa.

Then on Friday, we had another movie night at the Smiths', this time to see Miss Potter, the new(er) movie based on the life and career of children's author/illustrator Beatrix Potter. On one hand, it was really just one of those typical historical biographies for families, a handful of which are released every year--sentimental, cheesy symphonic score, etc. But more than that, I actually really enjoyed it! It was honest, although with a dramatic and happy-ending twist, to the tragedy and solitude that were a backdrop to such characters and stories as Peter Rabbit or the Tale of Jemima Puddle-duck. The movie should also be applauded for dealing (somewhat seriously) with the variety of social issues surrounding her life and career as well as her conservation efforts in later life. These sorts of things were what made her ultimate personal and commercial success (and this movie's resolution) more than just another typical happy ending.

| left: John and I in front of the North doors of the Minster (compliments of Brad)
| right: Brad's first attempt with the camera didn't work out so well, but the result was still pretty nice looking, I think

Procrastination in the Radiant Garden

2008-02-13T10:22:00.003-05:00

Most of today, as well as a portion of yesterday evening, have been marked by a bout of procrastination in the midst of completing our first real "assignment" here in York. The task is simple, a "reflection" on what we've learned about the history of this place, Romans and Vikings and all. And in fact, I've been quite interested in this material (our readings in books such as A Traveller's History of England by Christopher Daniell or group excursions to the Yorkshire Museum or Clifford's Tower). More than just purely academic interest, even, our brief survey of England's long and varied history has opened up new perspectives on our present-day culture, its bipolar strengths and weaknesses, and where we might all be headed. But, the burn-out I experienced at the end of last semester was not dealt with during the off-season of Christmas break, interim, and getting here to York, so now I'm stuck with trying to re-motivate myself for academics. Oh boy... I think I'd rather just keep reading poetry.

On a lighter note, on my way to lunch today, I stopped to check my post at the Student Union, and in the "W" box was a nice little Valentine addressed to me from "the ladies of GFC," via representative Kay Berry. I guess you could say this wasn't exactly the sort of mail I was expecting (I thought perhaps a late textbook had arrived by now), but it was wonderful surprise. I was with my dorm-neighbor, Emma, at the time, and she was so overwhelmed by the "cuteness" of the situation that she spread the event to I think the entire female population of apartment block E. Now all the girls are complaining about not getting Valentine's from the adults in their life.

After lunch, John barged into my room to drag me off to Morrison's "to buy a blanket." However, once we got there, he became discouraged at the high price tag of fleece throws (and they only other bedding options they seem to have here are fitted sheet, duvet, and pillow case), and I decided to fulfill my goal of buying a planter for my window. Miraculously, we wandered into the produce section of the store and there discovered an abundance of potted herbs. I chose coriander (cilantro) and flat-leafed parsley, while John opted for the more aromatic choices of mint and basil. To complete our project, we also picked up a couple narrow plastic bins and some potting soil, then headed home to take care of the transplanting. Below is a clip from after our little adventure, although it's a little too bright to see anything.

| video: The Radiant Garden (complete with audio tour)

Choral Evensong

2008-02-10T14:08:00.001-05:00

Brian, John, and I just returned from the evening service at the Minster. As the contraband program with which I absconded after the service describes, "Evensong is the form of Evening Prayer that is distinctive to the Church of England and other Churches of the Anglican Communion. It includes elements from the medieval Latin evening services of Vespers and Compline, and has been largely unchanged since the first English-language Book of Common Prayer in 1549." For the two Sundays that I've been here, I'd heard the church bells ringing as a summons to this service, and so today we finally made it a priority to get ourselves there.

For me, it was a fabulous experience. The immense presence that the Minster has exerted on me while walking the streets in the city center or looking out my bedroom window is only all the more concentrated inside its immense walls and expanses of stained glass. The space beneath its high arched ceilings seems almost otherworldly, all that history and tradition floating upwards amongst the chatter of tourists passing through. The majority of tonight's hour-long service consisted of the choir singing (as my program again explains, "The cathedrals and other great churches of the Anglican Communion maintain a strong choral tradition..."), and although the abundance of Latin was somewhat inhibiting, I was able to sit tight and be truly edified by the music. Now, I'm no expert in choral music, but the music to me was incredibly powerful. Listening to the final echo of voices reverberate in the distant corners of the ceiling or watching the carved stone wrap around the sky-colored stained-glass windows allowed me to back out of my imminent, mobile, autonomous culture and receive something special. The history of the words being recited and the engraving on the wood beside my seat all became important to what was happening at that moment, what has happened in the past, and what could happen in the future. The happenings of the year 1549 became important in my mind, the young choir girl not quite keeping up with the music mattered immensely--even the flickering candles between the aisles seemed to signal something important. To have such potentially or typically trivial circumstances and objects be crucially involved in a church experience is exactly what I needed, at least for this evening.

Please forgive my baroque and over-dramatic language above, but the music tonight was quite nice indeed. And the echoes!

More Eavesdropping

2008-02-09T20:26:00.002-05:00

A few days after arriving in York, I went with John and Brad to the local public library. I checked out a selection of collections of poetry, only to discover, right in the middle of Billy Collins, yet another piece of correspondence not addressed to me. This is not quite the find as the last "found correspondence" I posted (this one is not nearly as old, extensive, or quirky), but I was perversely excited nonetheless. On one hand, there is not nearly as much to decode in this postcard as in the letter from Jay, but otherwise it's all the more mysterious and intriguing because of its brevity. So much context is taken for granted by both author and recipient, it feels like overhearing a conversation between strangers. At any rate, it's as British as the day is long, and I think I want to meet some of these characters: "Stuart Humby?" "Rosemary Stubbs?" You can't make this stuff up...

Below are images of the postcard and a transcription of its message:

Dear Val,

I hope all is well with you and
yours. You may know that Stuart Humby
has finished his stint as an overseer, and I
have been appointed your overseer in his place
(still shared with Rosemary Stubbs). As always,
do give me a ring if you need help. I hope to
pop in and see you & Makel--and Elizabeth--before long.
I'll email you to fix a time.

Best wishes,
Sylvia

Approx. Week 2

2008-02-08T19:44:00.000-05:00

After another "routine" week of life here, I feel myself settling in to just that: a routine. Or, at least I feel mostly familiar with my immediate surroundings, with my schedules and daily requirements, and so on. But, along with this settled feeling, I am also beginning to notice the typical cloud of requirements, obligations, and due dates that tend to only compile as any semester (even during a vacation to Europe) progresses. Over the past few days, I've already felt conflicts between what I would like to be doing (both leisurely-laziness and personal goals and projects) and what I really "need" to be doing academically for this next week, this next semester, even for this upcoming summer and afterwards.

In spite of this growing shadow, I'm still trying to keep my time here as a sort of retreat or hermitage. Granted, I've been living the 21st century version of a hermitage, complete with blog, Skype, and iPod, but at least I've had some time for reflection and personal cultivation--the essential things, right?

We've spent a few nights this past week at Jamie and his family's house. They've been very gracious in opening up their house to a dozen marooned college students. Last Sunday, we were there to observe the American Football match known as the Super Bowl. Granted, I read an essay on early modernist poetry during much of the game and left after seeing Tom Petty's half-time performance, but it was still interesting to get a more British perspective (it on a local British channel, hosted by 1 British and 2 American commentators) on American sports, or culture in general. Then, on Friday, we were there again to watch the movie "Atonement," based on the popular English author Ian Mcewan's book of the same name. It was an interesting film, to say the least. It had the feel of a film adapted from a book, but was at the same time very visually arresting, reminding me even of the Pre-Raphaelite painting we've been looking at in class. I'm not usually one to keep up with popular culture, but between football and seeing a handful of the award-nominated films this year, I feel like I'm becoming a proper American over here in York.

| photo: Brad reacts to a crucial moment in Super Bowl XLII

Washing By Hand

2008-02-04T15:43:00.001-05:00

Laundry

On my knees,
I can wring out the dirt
into a small white basin.

These garments of mine
have soaked a long time,
soaped now fruited,

rinsed, hung out
on a thin, white cord
between the walls

that hem me in, before
and behind, stretching out
from one end of all space

and time to the other.

I took a bit of Sunday afternoon to do my laundry. The machines here are ludicrously expensive, and besides the laundry room seems open infrequently, at best, so I decided to invest in a plastic bin in order to wash my clothes. For drying, I strung up a bit of rope or I utilize the extensive radiators and heated piping that runs along the border of my room. It was such a good experience, I think I might try to do away with the use of laundry machines even when I get home. I can simply purchase a washboard from Lehman's or make a more serious investment, such as the Wonder Wash. Great!

| video: a demonstration of my groundbreaking, state-of-the-art laundry techniques

Blooming Hyacinth

2008-02-02T12:54:00.000-05:00

My room these past few days has been filled with the sweet, fruity scent of my blooming hyacinth. Even Emma next door can smell it, and the hall is taking on a new, fresh aura. At night, I like to light my two candles, set the flowers on the floor beside me, and read some of the books of poetry I got from the public library here--it's a great way to pass an evening alone.

Or, for evenings not spent alone, there is a fair amount to do in town (for instance, 365 establishments of drinking--one for every day of the year?). This past Friday, John and I went to the apartment of some international students, where some girls from Norway filled us up with pizza after pizza. Apparently, the Norwegian method of eating pizza involves copious amounts of ketchup squirted onto the finished product. I tried this tactic once, and I'll admit, it wasn't as strange as I expected, but I still decided that it wasn't quite for me. There were some students from France and Spain there, as well, and it was nice to be able to meet such a variety of people. One of the Norwegian girls' banker-boyfriend was coming up from London, so we all walked down to the city center and spent some time at a posh nightclub full of young professionals sipping martinis with their legs crossed. We all felt a bit under-dressed, but the Norwegians turned out to be make quite good partners in conversation and crime (on the dance floor, I mean). Enough so that John is now set on adding Bergen, Norway to our already concentrated Easter Break itinerary... it would be nice to see those fjords...

Saturday our group from Calvin went on our rescheduled tour of Roman York. Our tour guide turned out to be an eccentric but brilliant middle-aged man, somewhat of a cross between Johnny Depp and a fan of death metal. His outfit was all black, except for purple shoestrings on his leather boots. He wore a long trench-coat over a snazzy vest, with chrome pendants and a pocket watch chain draping from one vest pocket to the other. Over the course of two freezing cold hours, he led us along the Roman portions of the city walls and into a couple fortresses and ruins, ending near some Roman coffins and a statue of Constantine. The entire time, walking or standing still, he spouted off information about dates and locations, archaeological finds, and bizarre trivia and anecdotes (for example, Romans mixed bull's blood into the concrete of their walls and Roman soldiers sometimes wore wind chimes dangling from their crotches to fend off evil). His progression seemed to be just as much haphazard recall and stream-of-consciousness babbling as well-rehearsed speech material. A few times he nearly struck passers-by with a sudden over-excited flailing gesture intended to emphasize a point he was making about the strangeness of Roman military uniform. Between these types of antics and his constant fidgeting with his water bottle, the tour was the combination of a highly-informative educational experience and a bizarre circus spectacle. John and I considered following this character home, or trying to get him to come hang out with us for the evening, but at the last minute we kind of chickened out. Maybe next time.

Wall Walk

2008-01-30T18:00:00.000-05:00

After our tour of the Roman elements of York was canceled this afternoon, John and I decided to take a walk along the walls anyways. Here are two Polaroid shots in the setting dark (click to enlarge).

| left: it's dark. why is there a Ferris wheel there?
| right: nearly-candid camera

Journaling on Journaling

2008-01-30T16:47:00.000-05:00

I had hoped to at least keep a more regular and in-depth journal during my time in England, and perhaps even do some online documentation, as well. The fact that journaling is one of the primary assignments in my class with Jamie is conducive to this goal of mine. However, strange internet connections and the lack of both digital film resources and any prowess with analogue film will unfortunately constrain at least the visual elements of my chronicles. Such considerations remind me of a project I have thought about in the past, which would be to see how completely I could document a day of my life with a mixture of hi-tech and re-appropriated methods and sources. For example, I could photograph or videotape portions of my day, but to go beyond that sort of "reality-TV" shtick, I could include signatures of people I interact with, recipes of the food I ate, or records of my dreams (with attempted interpretations, of course!). Well, as could be guessed, such a project has yet to come to fruition, and with my limited resources here in York, it's not likely to commence any time soon.

Bleh. I can see why such forms as travel memoirs take so much work. They require drawing on a unique blend of journalistic skills, habits, and perceptions as well as a basic ability to think and write well. My understanding of more traditional journaling is that it can help to sort through the everyday and commonplace experiences in order to get at the bigger, underlying issues of life--hence it's valuable as a tool for the work of memory and consiousness's work of processing and retaining the lives we live. But, it's difficult enough to do that sort of "ordinary" diary-work well. In a very new and undiscovered environment, the quantity and variety of mere details stack up and seem to get in the way of any sort of worthwhile reflection. Everything from the color of the walls to the history of the dirt is new, new, new, and by the time you list and remark on each of these quirks, it's too late to cover anything else. Really, this paragraph here is about as close as I've come thus far to actually thinking about what it means to be here. Thankfully, there should be plenty more time for such worthwhile reflection, maybe after more than three days are past and I've actually had time to have experiences and live here. And with that thought, I've suddenly become convinced that I should go walk around the city center--perhaps along the River Ouse?

About A Weekend

2008-01-28T17:47:00.001-05:00

It's been a little more than a weekend that I've been here. My high ambitions for exploration on Saturday didn't quite work out, as I slept until about two in the afternoon, clocking in at over 16 hours of sleep--a new, personal record. I spent the rest of the day by myself in the city center, getting lost, un-lost, and re-lost--it was wonderful. I wish I could've had someone along with me to walk along the city walls and look out over the greenest yards and gardens I've ever seen. That night, I went to use some of my weekend stipend on reasonably-priced but quite good Indian food and also went to the pub in the Student Union for a while with some people from my building.

Sunday was our trip with the other international students to the seaside towns of Whitby and Scarborough. To get there, we took a shuttle across the Yorkshire Moors, which were covered in heather and sheep. It's nice to see agriculture and livestock incorporated somewhat into the culture here, even in terms of physical space, compared to the monstrous but phantom-intangible industries of the States. Contrary to the cynical opinions of people in the dorms, Whitby (think Bram Stoker and Dracula) was gorgeous. The city spreads from where the Esk River feeds into the North Sea up the steep walls of the river valley. We started with a quick walk-through/around of the ancient Whitby Abbey, which overlooks the city from the East Cliff. After traveling down the 199 steps from the abbey, John and I scooted around town a bit before eating at a place called Gatsby's. Due to our location on the seaside, we felt it necessary to attempt an order of fish and chips, which were remarkably better than my past experiences with the two, but still not exactly what I want out of life. We went on on the beach during low tide and walked out on the pier (where I unfortunately ruined my first role of film) before heading reconvening with our group and heading down the coast to Scarborough. Scarborough was similarly scenic, but less charming and more trash (think casinos and inflatable carnival attractions), so we just ate some apple pie and walked around a bit, searching for bathrooms and something more interesting to look at than billboards.

| left: Gatsby's Cafe and Restaurant--the fish and chips were fresh but greasy, and the tea was even greater
| right: me reading a bit of Bram Stoker's "Dracula" (set partially in Whitby) on a path we found behind some houses on the hill

Somehow, the past two days alone have felt like a month's worth of details and miniature experiences, but it was nice today to get introduced to two our two classes with Prof. Smith. It will be nice to study here, I think. Being around so much culture somehow encourages me to get into the books, and although there's so much to do and see, the newness seems just solitary enough to have lots of personal/study time. For example, this afternoon, after returning from the market with school supplies, a potted hyacinth, and some candles, I've holed up here in my room reading and writing--two things that often got squeezed out of life back home but are the sorts of things I think I most need in order to live my life well.

Suddenly, It's Spring

2008-01-25T20:17:00.001-05:00

Great Peter, the bell in the towers of York Minster that rings out the hours, just finished signaling the seven o'clock hour, or 19:00. Looking out my window across the dormitory courtyard, I see the giant face of the Minster illuminated against the night sky. It is unusually (or so I hear) windy this evening, but other than that I would consider it most mild, warm even. This afternoon, at least, was wonderfully blue and sunny, especially compared to the recent grew snows of Grand Rapids. I can only imagine what wonderful effects this could have on the mid-winter blues which were just beginning to set in back home.

After a handful of delays with planes, shuttles, etc. (like accidentally having an extra 2000 pounds of fuel loaded into our plane to Chicago?), we made it to York Saint John just after noon. We half unpacked and set up shop in our rooms and got a bit to eat from the cafeteria before a rather chaotic campus tour and class registration process--at least, it seemed chaotic after not sleeping much for a few days. By the end of it all, I felt more disoriented than the other way around, but I suppose that's all right because I figured out which classes I am going to take and learned the whereabouts of the coffee shop as well as the on-campus pub.

Jamie gave us a whirlwind tour of downtown York before dinner, and so we got to see them tearing down the markets while the sun cast a golden haze on to York Minster's west towers. The downtown is unimaginably (at least for someone from the midwest of the United States) beautiful and full of life. The heart of the city is surrounded by walls built, I believe around the time of Constantine, and so entrance can only be gained through the city gates (called "bars"), for example Monk's Bar or Bootham Bar. Cars and motor traffic are kept to a minimum, except at night for deliveries or tearing down market stalls--otherwise, it is just pedestrians and bicycles to explore the shops, theaters, restaurants, galleries, pubs, cafes, historic sites, churches, and ancient alleyways. The only familiar sign or slogan I saw was Pizza Hut. What a relief.

Dinner in the dining hall was greasy but not half bad: vegetable samosas with mango chutney, bread pudding, and local milk (although, mango chutney and custard don't mix too well in a sleep-deprived belly). Afterwards, John, Bryan, and I walked to Sainsbury's (the equivalent of D&W or Family Fare)j and a few other stores to pick up some necessary supplies. Things at these chain stores, at least, seemed an odd mixture of incredibly affordable (40 pence for a big jug of soap) and more expensive (5 pound for batteries). At any rate, it seems more manageable, at least in my circumstances, to survive on a budget than I had imagined.

I do hate to generalize, even on the positive side, but the people I've encountered have been especially friendly. Students in the building I'm living in acknowledge me and the rest of the group, even going out of their way to to say hello. Even strangers on the sidewalk asked us if we needed help. Now, that could just be because we stick out like sore thumbs (which I definitely feel), but even then I think it speaks well of the people I've been around so far.

Tomorrow, I think we'll have to take care of some more practical things, but after that, the day will most likely consist of a trip back down to the river, getting a public library card, and a trip to the free city art museum. But, those sorts of grand activities require sleep, which I haven't had much of...

| photo: a view of my bed, window, and desk from the sink
| video: no sleep!

Dear Jay?

2008-01-14T17:09:00.004-05:00

More than a year ago, I purchased a copy of James Joyce's "Ulysses" from a local antique shop. The edition I found was published in 1946 by Random House's "The Modern Library" series, and while holding it in my hands that day, I decided that it was the version of "Ulysses" that I wanted to someday read. When the book showed up on the syllabus for my British Literature class this past fall, I was excited to put my esteemed copy to use. Apart from the actual pleasure or reading the assigned book was an old letter I discovered about midway through the text (somewhere near the "Calypso" episode), from Sue to someone named Jay, or perhaps the more mid-19th-century name Gay. After consulting a handful of friends, it was decided that the owner of the book must be in fact Sue, who authored the letter to J/Gay but neglected to send it, for whatever reasons, nesting it instead inside the unfinished edition of Joyce's novel.

As for dating the letter, I have tracked down the most accessible external reference, that being Sue's mention of the movie "Carousel" (although she misspells the word), which, according to the International Movie Database, was Rodgers and Hammerstein's romantic musical starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones, among others. Released on February 16, 1956, "Carousel" was nominated for awards by the Writer's Guild of America and the Director's Guild of America. At any rate, this puts the date of the letter's authorship at roughly late winter or early spring in 1956, when the desegregation of schools was still a hot issue and when Elvis Presley and Marylin Monroe had just begun making waves.

The only other external reference I could pin down was Sue's reference to "Ole Denison," which I take as a reference to Denison University in Granville, OH, just a short drive from where I grew up. Denison University still has a Tri Delta sorority (as Sue mentions in the letter), but I couldn't find any online records capable of leading me to the identity of Sue, J/Gay, and her friends. Ironically, the only Google search item that directly corresponded was an antique postcard of the Tri-Delta sorority house at Denison University, dated from a decade before the letter I have.

I've included the text of the letter below, having rendered it as closely as possible to the original, which includes the misspellings and the Emily-Dickinson-like use of hyphens as all-'round punctuation marks. There are in fact many quirks in the letter (a handful of which I've noted), and it is interesting to see the ways in which I am forced to approach the letter as an artifact from a time and a place--even a culture and a lifestyle--much different than my own.

---

(page 1)

Dear Jay,

I can't find any other paper so
you'll have to put up with this--

The place doesn't look any
different- except Skippy who has
been clipped- he looks like a
little lion- his tail is -> * I
think he's a little embarassed
about it all.

(My?) passed everything so he'll
graduate but Donny's not doing
so well--He's a nervous wreck--

I was wondering if you'd do
me a favor--get the $20 check
from Sandy Yates--go to bank
& cash it--forget it--then go to
Ileen Dunkin's & buy one of those
little seed dolls that are under
glass & and have them send it air
mail or something--It's for
Mom for Mothers' Day.

Also would you send me
the Student directory with the
tri delt grades. I put them in
there next to the girls names

(page 2)

I talked to Judy- She said Occi
wasn't home yet- She also
gave me some words of
advice--"If I play my cards
coolly I can have Occi for
the summer!" Isn't that
sweet of her--Well I'm not
going to play my cards
coolly and If Occi wants to
take me out--O.K.--if not
their are plenty of other
fish around here.

How's everyone-there- say
"Hi" for me.

I don't know when we're
moving to the beach- Any
chance that you can come
down before you start work-
It's kind of cold around here
but it would still be fun-
I wish you'd go back to Ole
Denison next year. Did you
ever find out who mystery-
man was- the one that
came to visit you- or was
it the same one who called.

(page 3)

Went to the movies last night
with (My?) and Duck boy- we
sat around eating crackers
and "trinken" beer. Tell
Dick Huffman- we saw "Carosel"
It was great- the boys laughed

Bud gets home today so
Judy is jumping around- Oh
Well-

Well had**- Write and have a
ball.

If you want you can also
have them send that beach
towel- out of the $20.

Thanks-
love-
See Ya Soon-
Sue

* helpful illustration of Skippy's hairdo:

** this could be the word "had," but the capitalization makes me wonder if it's something like "Hap"--perhaps a nickname?

Poetry Manifesto

2008-01-11T08:14:00.001-05:00

For my "Creative Writing: Poetry" class last semester, we were implored to write a "manifesto" of sorts, elucidating our take on some fundamental elements of the craft of poetry--meter, rhyme, diction, and so on--as well as a big-picture analysis of what poetry is or should be, what it should do, how it relates to other arts, how it relates to life. I felt a lot of tension in preparing for this assignment, as our class spent a large part of the semester pressing against conventional and personal boundaries of what poetry was allowed to be. We looked at poems by E.E. Cummings, prose poems, and digitally-animated poems on the internet. We looked at the word paintings of Joan Miro, and we even listened to sound collages by John Cage. In every instance, we were supposed to deal with the question, "Is this poetry?"

I enjoyed tracking this expansion of what is legit poetry, and I was grateful for the passion my professor (L.S. Klatt) had for refreshing the shape and content of poetry and for trying to re-engage it with its brother and sisters in other forms of art/science/life. However, when it came time to lay out my opinions on the subject, to mark out some boundaries and definitions, I felt immobilized. The best I could do, at the time, was to let loose with a somewhat obscure philippic as a form of catharsis. After turning in my purgation to Klatt, the real world of grades and potential failure set in, and I found myself nervous about how the thing would be received. Thankfully, although I "failed to engage the terms of the assignment" and "did something completely different, to the extent that it it couldn't be graded," my gracious and understanding professor understood that what I did was worthwhile and valuable for myself. Therefore, he simply pretended it wasn't on the syllabus and didn't factor his non-grade into my final shakedown. At any rate, here is my poetic abreaction:

*

Something Scrawled on Napkins in the Attic, Overheard in a Dream

"The emotion of art is impersonal."

- T.S. Eliot, “Tradition and the Individual Talent”

"lenses extend unwish through curving wherewhen until unwish returns on its unself."

- E.E. Cummings, “pity this busy monster,manunkind,”

§ 1: That if one wants once to be undone, then tons of dust and rubble must from everything of It become (and us’s It, as well)

Words

Words are crunchy. Words are oozing. Words are kaleidoscopes and chisels. Swiss Army words. Words deal quite a blow. They are, in fact, a gamble. Or, words are upside-down, sometimes. Have you ever had the inside outside? Words have. Or at least, they did once. It’s words when you remember everything, 1 2 3. First comes the picture, then comes the feelings, then comes the phrases in the baby carriage. Words up the ante. At Christmas, or on other special occasions, words make sense. Words are all in, all the time. Words taste good over a warm meal. Reports indicate that they may even contribute to factors which are responsible for low cholesterol and a healthy heart. What wonderful little engines! Words come out to play at night, when the neighbor kids are fast asleep. Sometimes they shoot hoops, and you hear the drumslap of the ball hitting asphalt while you sleep. Slam dunk! Two plus two equals words. Two times two equals words, too. Words break open the ground on their way towards sunlight. They just keep coming. Do you see where they end? Beans and leaves bud on their tips, and their wide stem reaches up, up, and we see giants climbing down, down, word by word by word.

When you go to visit your grandmother, that’s not words. It’s not words if and only if it’s indeed you. What’s you? Not words, that’s for sure. Kissing’s not words, neither. Nor washing dishes. Nope. You are making a quiche with the tomatoes from your garden when you realize there’s a camera outside your window and Martha Steward is beating the eggs. Not words. Nada. Words are not this stale-potato-chip culture. No-sir-ee. Words don’t make cents. Just sentences. Personally, I’ve never had a halo, only visions of paystubs and diplomas. But, words are not quite enrolled in college. And paystubs are just numbers, that’s all. Words have been received with little critical acclaim. They were not nominated for any awards, this year or last. Words are forgotten, or can be. Words have been banned as playground equipment--too many sharp edges. For now, words shiver through the night on a bench in Central Park, wrapped up in newspapers without headlines or captions, only images. The police find words and beat them out of the park, out of the city limits, banned for good, like graffiti in a dark alley or a tattoo on the small of Lady Liberty’s back. Goodbye, words. Goodbye for now. Please speak well of us to whatever lies beyond.

Presence

Oh, but what about the paper? Where is the inkwell? I would recommend a few things: 1) artifacts, 2) artefacts, 3) art, 4) facts, or forget 1-4 and just come inside to drink some cocoa with me by the fire. I have a friend, actually several, that do certain things better than I do. One draws pictures, often utilizing the circle. Another calculates the phases of a chemical shift (on four sheets of paper, stapled one to the other). Some strange denizens downtown attach objects onto walls. They call this “art.” My grandfather makes the walls to which these objects are attached. But as for me and my house, we are bound lock-stock-barrel to: Hallmark Publishing House in 3 easy steps; Walmart University; or, if you’re lucky, you go to bed in a slim volume beneath a dictionary on the 5th floor of an empty library. I invited my friends to come along for a poem, but they objected to my use of the term on the grounds that its utilization marked a cognitive instability on my part and that it would be in the best interests of all concerned if I were committed to a mental institution at once. Well, shucks. From now on, anything goes.

And everything goes with it.

§ 2: That a lantern lights a small, warm cabin and the cave Itself is dark, dark, dark

A Partial, Indirect, and Admittedly Biased Summary of the Issue

Ronald McHegel runs for President of something or other. You drop your great aunt’s glass vase. Ronald McHegel trips and falls. Our poems come to us on a box of Wheaties. Or on the milk carton: Missing Child. What nonsense. Even worse? Yes. In fact, there is a heavy, dusted book in storage in the basement at the museum in a ghost town on the edge of nowhere in a black hole--as of now, the final resting place for all our poems--from hereon referred to by the prosecution as “It”.

It is a pair of moldy socks disguised as a university setting. It is a hot dog in a tuxedo. It is an festering zit under your sister’s... It has issued an array of designations, jurisdictions, blueprints, modules, collections, modifications and edits, implications, resolutions, citations, documentations, complications, and so on and so forth. Lots of words from Greek or Latin, I think. Who knows how things got to be this way? This bad! Yes, you in the front. Speak up, please, this is no cubbyhole we’re suffocating in.

So you would say that the issue is not a new one? Oh, you would rather learn how to bind books yourself, and make one for your dead dog, than release a hit series of novels that reaches high tide on the New York Times Bestseller List? You’d rather eat a brick than here your publisher call you by name through a levitating Bluetooth device? You’d rather burn your manuscripts in the fireplace, taking turns with your best friend, than wire yourself into the intertwining infrastructure of post-industrial wordsmithing? You would rather receive feedback from your little brother than T.S. Eliot, or even a Writer’s Guild, certified non-profit as described in Section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986?

Calms, Balms, Alms...

Swish-swish my friend, and listen-listen.

R.S.V.P

We are leaving this damp, dripping hell-cavern and there’s nothing It can do about it but join the parade. Supplies have been gathered from the furthest recesses of the dark, the lonely, and the blind. We may have to do without technology for a while, but typewriters are not so hard to come by. Neither are our voices and handshakes, small but shiny, glowing even, like the esteemed and mysterious Lingulodinium polyedrum. We’ve hands and voices together, you and I. We’ve them! Our itinerary is carved in the soles of our shoes, a tattered atlas. When we hold them all together, we decipher the way. We find the way out of It. As I was saying, It is a dragon

turd. Will it join the parade? This party is not by invitation only.

So forget chatrooms, scholarly journals, and Barnes and Noble Booksellers. Forget It. Go read a diary or a letter, a masterpiece. Write a sonnet with your eyes closed. Goodbye cool world! There’s an old device called a ditto machine. It ran on a liquid called “spirit fluid.” Now there’s something you don’t see too often these days: spirit. If you see fit, please hide a poem for me under the “Welcome” mat, beside the Hide-A-Key. I won’t even spellcheck the thing. Just be sure to put some soul power inside. Be sure to go it alone, without no recipes. Meanwhile, we’ll be outside, warming our hands over your anthologies, such beautiful glowing embers. We’ll be waiting for It, waiting for you.

§ 3: Appendix

Poetic Units by Era

The Author’s Logical Technique for Analyzing A Text

If a thing says a thing, then that thing is true.
A thing isn’t true.
Therefore, the thing doesn’t say a thing.

A Brief but Exhaustive History of It

- March 15, 37000 BCE: It is a pond
- March 16, 37000 BCE: It crawls out of the pond, grows legs
- February 18, 1237 BCE: another pyramid is built out of It
- December 25, 500 BCE: the It dynasty rules in China
- August 17, 3 CE: Peace on Earth, and Goodwill toward It
- July 6, 700 CE: the Dark Ages begin It in Europe
- October 12, 1492 CE: Christopher Columbus sights It
- April 6, 1909 CE: It is found at the North Pole
- September 1, 1876 CE: the Dutch found It in Grand Rapids, Michigan, USA
- November 30, 2007 CE: this is It!

A Weekend on North Manitou Island

2007-09-12T00:44:00.000-04:00

Friday

7:45AM
- well, after getting back from the farm at 10:OOPM, Brooks and I decided to stop procrastinating and pack our figure out menus and equipment and pack up for our end-of-summer excursion to North Manitou Island. as could be expected, things didn't come together as quickly or effortlessly as we half-expected, and so as midnight and then 2:00AM passed, our only real option was to stay up, depart for the ferry in Leelanau sometime before 5:00AM. it was my first time north of Muskegon, and I was amazed at how different and beautiful some of the drive was. things were definitely different than Grand Rapids, and at times it even felt like we had left the Midwest altogether. Brooks slept for a little bit before the sun came up, and we got into Leelanua with enough time to wander around for a bit. it used to be an old fishing village, so there are still wonderful traces of that left amongst all the craft stores and other tourist junk. at any rate, we decided to eat at the only place close and open, some cafe' named after a bird, I think, and are getting ready to head over to the ferry for departure. oh, and here's a copy of the weekend's menu:

Day #1:
breakfast - greasy breakfast and coffee at a diner by the ferry landing in Leelenau
lunch - hummus and pita, snacks
dinner - curried couscous

Day #2:
breakfast - omelettes
lunch - sandwiches
dinner - spaghetti

Day #3:
breakfast - oatmeal and goji berries
lunch - quiches from a deli in Traverse City (this item filled in post-return)

1:28PM
- we just went through "orientation" with a ranger, looked around the village a little, and then hiked about 3.5 miles to the cemetery for hummus-lunch and a break. there are lots of little stone crosses guarding graves from 1938 and earlier. we sat in a nice green clearing with brush and shrubs, small dunes, and the lake in the background, but other people that took the ferry over with us started showing up, so we fled the scene for less populated spaces.

8:00PM
- we spend most of the afternoon hiking aimlessly around Dimmick's Point, skirting along the waterfront barefoot, riling up the hordes of seagulls. we crossed from the mainland to the side of the island open to Lake Michigan, which meant more active water and a lake-ier smell. however, we realized then that we were about to run out of water, so we were forced to cut back across the dunes to get to fresher water and less lake-slime-soup water. going back felt like a desert or apocalypstic wasteland, with rolling sands and shrubs and ancient telephone poles and fenceposts jutting out like dead trees or crucifixes. somewhat turned around with no sure trail to follow, hungry, and exhausted from our literally sleepless night before, we pitch tent in the first secluded clearing we find. I'm slightly disappointed by the lack of a stunning dune-top vista, but then again I don't need to always strive for such romantic settings, do I? we ate dinner and tried to play cards, but I annihilated Brooks (see score below). after Brook's forfeiture, we immediately passed out for what could have been hours or days, but was in fact only about a half hour. at any rate, waking up after that brief nap was surreal and mystical feeling--after exhaustion and waking up dazed in a clearing on an island, how did I get here? ah, this is wonderful.

and the squirrels! oh, buffalo squirrel!

Rummy 500

Brooks Ryan
50 215
+ 5 35
= 55 250
+ -5 80
= 50 330
+ 140 95
= 190 425
(BROOKS
FORFEITS)

Saturday

3:26PM
- lunch somewhere near Tamarack Lake/Pond. last night we ran around on the dunes and took beach pictures. bed at about 9:00, which may be the earliest I've had since I was a little kid. the coyotes seemed to be everwhere, or at least fast-moving along a wide circumference. from our tent, they sounded almost like neighborhood dogs, although wilder and a bit creepier. sqiurrels or bison (everything sounds bigger in the dark, from inside a tent) scampered around the tent almost all night. we slept through 5:00AM and 7:30AM alarms until about 10:30AM, which gave us a total of about 13 horus of sleep. by the time we got on the trail it was noon and just heating up. we hurried across the bottom of the island, discovering a huge patch of blackberries for a snack, got a nice dune-top view of the lake, and wound our way up the west side of the island, through wide, grassy clearings and past a few ruins of homesteads. we tried to cut through an unmaintained, but it ended in a clearing, so we decided to eat lunch and must now decide whether to backtrack a ways or blaze a trail through who-knows-what.

9:10PM
- in the dark, in the tent, nearing sleep, our trailblazing didn't go so well, so we were forced to backtrack to the main path and cover another 5 or so miles on the path that loops up toward Swenson's Place. we ran out of water mid-hike, but finally made it back across the island, pumped another load of water from the lake, and set up camp at a much nicer location than last night: on the edges of a clearing with a through-trees view of the lake, and just a mile down the beach from the village, the dock, and the gorgeous poplar trees that surround them.

Sunday

7:15AM
- we take breakfast on the beach, with the sun setting a fire into the water that stretches down to wear we sit with our oatmeal. the sun has turned from pink to fierce yellow as we waited for our water to boil. we are pretty much smack-dab in the middle of the island's slightly crescent shape. forward to our right is Dimmick's Point, where we slept two nights ago (it looks quite far away after yesterday's 14-mile hike), and beyond that I can make out the faint shape of the Empire Dunes on the mainland. to our left is the gorgeous ranger station, nestled right up against the shore and surrounded by the poplars. on both sides of us, the arms of the beach curve forward as if they were reaching back toward the rising sun.

9:30AM
- we made it back to the dock/village/ranger station by coming along some of the nicest stretch of trail we've hiked so far, with the lake coming through the thin trees on our right, quite varied foliage and plant life, and finally on our left, the remains of shackes, summer houses, and a school all sinking back beneath the tide of gravity, mosses, and roots.

back at the village, we've sat at picnic tables, waiting for the ferry to arrive. a pony-tailed ranger gave us some coffee and a bit of conversation. Brooks tried to teach me some German fragments, but as I don't do too well with speaking, I just tried to jot down a few key items:

10 Cool German Words, with selected helpful phrases (please forgive any inaccuracies, mispellings, or typographical deficiencies):
hugelish - hilly
essen - food
baum - tree
apfel - apple / abfel - trash
haus - house
bot - boat
katz - cat
strabe - street
tisch - table
schuh - shoe

Wie heisen sie schoener Frau? - What's your name, beautiful woman?
Wo ist du? - Where are you?
Sie ist meine Freundin. - She's my girlfriend.

after German class, we took care of some personal business in the outhouses (much better than digging another hole) and are trying to absorb the vibrant colors around us: the polarized light off the water, the flickering sun through leaves and branches. it's quite chilly with the wind off the water, which along with the first smoldering of orange and brown in the treetops, reminds us that it is indeed already the second morning of September. what a great way to begin not just a month but school year, with a whole new load of books and business lying just around the corner, just another morning or two from this one.

Summer 2007 - The Haunted Tour

2007-07-10T21:52:00.001-04:00

I see now (approx. 2.5 years later) that I never got around to finishing, or even beginning, my account of our Winston Jazz Routine Tour with State Bird and Discover America. All I had posted was this link to a live recording of one song of our set in Abilene, TX. It's a somewhat clamorous reworking of the quiet title track off of Sospiri. I guess it's... all right (was Nate sick that day or something?).

http://www.virb.com/silencesessions/music/albums/27582

a few poems

2007-05-16T04:15:00.000-04:00

untitled earth song

Oh circulating cell,
wrapped with flesh,

all rests upon a root,
life rushing beneath.

I press two feet to you,
soles in osmosis,

and my mouth shapes a seed.

Resting against the trunk,
a gradual spine--

the bend of shade reaches
down, your hands over my eyes.

I see our horizon, swaddled
in skin and bloodstreams,

turning into turning.

Three Haiku

I. Water
drench in amnion
an ocean inside a cup
and spilling over

II. Ice
fluid takes body
creeps down into a valley
a slow, rounded breath

III. Vapor
the lung's final clutch
now a thousand floating hands
touch your ears and knees

Wyoming

On every side,
we see the lip
of our brown dish of earth.

The sun stirs westward,
its wake pulling
at the prairie grasses
like they are fronds of kelp.

This wind would enjoy
the quick whistle
of dissolving us into itself,
but we brace ourselves against it.

We pee along the highway,
hidden behind a shrub,
careful not to face the wind.

We hold onto each other
by smiling.

Our van follows the thin road
towards an early dusk,
dragging tumbleweed beside us.

Away from the breeze,
we fall into each other--
in the rush forward,
leaning ahead--
insatiable in our want

to exceed the horizon,
to outrun the wind's coaxing
and pass beneath every color here.

Do we notice as we pass
from state to state?
Can the sea breeze blow so far?
Will we arrive in time for dinner?

We proceed inch by inch,
with the ground now breaking apart
and the sky spilling over its edge.

Simple Sonnets

I.
Thou
brings
things
now.

Why
comes
some
sigh?

Small
voices!
All
noises!

Silence:
Violence.

II.
Whisper
Each
Speech
Crisper

As
Hum
Hmm...
Passes.

Cower!
Here
Nears
Our

Coming
Drumming.

The Voice

2007-05-06T15:24:00.000-04:00

Finally, here's a copy of the paper I wrote for my linguistics class about "The Voice," the phonological expression of me and my friends' high-school sense of humor, interaction, personality, and reality even. I'm not sure what my prof thought about the whole thing, but I guess I feigned mastery, intelligence, and confidence enough to get an A-. Also, completing this project brought a lot of closure to that whole stage of my life, a good mix of rememberance and farewell-to. So in that personal aspect, it was definitely worth the undertaking.

some notes: 1) the title is supposed to be substantially over the top, 2) please ignore the academic B-S, 3) the interview excerpts are the best

“The Voice of Reason, the Voice of Irreverence, and Other Very Human Articulations: A Case Study in Adolescent Slang, Identity, and Personality”

Ryan Weberling
Professor W. Vande Kopple
English 334--Linguistics
April 27, 2007

Introduction

Beginning in the freshman year of my high-school career, those in my immediate peer group developed a mode of interaction centered on a system of slang we developed and utilized, dubbed “the Voice” by those involved with and affected by it. The Voice, as such, was more than just a lexicon of slang, but involved semantics, style and function, mannerisms and non-verbal commu-nication, and especially, as indicated by the name it was given, phonology or, more broadly, the intonation of the speaker’s voice. In this paper, I will provide a brief overview, history, and analysis of the system we used. The content will arise primarily from interviews carried out with those who were in-volved with the Voice, with occasional reference to relevant sources and ideas. However, the main effort of this project is to convey, through one limited case study, the extent to which people’s language, specifically the unique ways in which individuals and groups speak, affects identities, personalities, and relationships.

Overview and History

How was this mode of interaction developed, and how did it spread? “It all started when two of us were picking beans in my family’s garden,” recalls Nathan, one of the original speakers. “My dad was making us pick these beans, and we were really angry about that, and we just started making fun of stuff. I believe the first phrase was ‘beans, beans, beans... what are we gonna do with all them beans?’” The nature of these beginnings already reveal the commonplace capacity of language to demarcate boundaries, to establish space for restless juvenile identities, and to express otherwise restricted sentiments. As Teresa Labov notes, “Adolescents make particular use of the second characteristic in using slang to differentiate themselves from adults” (340).

This way of speaking soon caught on with others in the social group at church and school, at first remaining limited to those in the immediate sphere of contact. Soon, though, it began to permeate into other related groups and demographics. Two interviewees recalled the spread of the Voice:

Nathan: There were some people that picked up on it that might be more expected--younger brothers, girlfriends, and so on--but there were other cases, some people we had marginal contact with, like at coffee shops or church that we’d see once a week or once a month, but we came known by it, and these other people even started doing it.

Derek: People older than us, like college students, started doing it as well. But the weirdest was when our parents started trying to imitate us.”

Nathan: I think that’s when we started to realize that it had gone too far...and that was the beginning of the challenge to get rid of the Voice. We would make bets and pay each other a dollar or two if we slipped into using it again. It was hard not to.”

The Voice, or the social dynamics created by its use, had a dramatic influence on those who spoke it. John, who was part of the first generation of speakers, recalls his experiences:

There was a group of us who didn’t even look like we’d be friends, but we could relate with [the Voice]...[and] it contributed to tying us all together more than almost anything else. It defined our life for almost three years. And it still does, in a small way. When we get together, we still do it. When I meet new people, I tell them my sense of humor is based on this weird thing we used to do.

Although use of the Voice was at first spurred on and incited by members of the group at every possible occasion, it soon began to dominate the group’s interactions to an undesired extent. Again, John recalls this shift:

"It was a sense of humor we all agreed on, and it ended up controlling us...It’s not something we could just fluff off. It was some sort of psychological... addiction. We couldn’t kick it. We needed to have an alter-ego to be funny, to relate. When it got to the point where we couldn’t get ourselves or each other to stop doing it, that’s when realized: some people our age did drugs or had sex... well, we had the Voice.
It turned against us. There was no way to get angry with each other. You couldn’t get upset because as soon as you brought an issue up, others could invoke the Voice to completely shut you down. There was never any arguing or fighting and therefore no real resolutions, because the Voice made getting mad seem ridiculous...we couldn’t have any emotions, even if we got really excited, the Voice would just cancel it out...On a positive side, it kept us from getting too serious, but it wasn’t healthy to not be capable of dealing with each other. Everything just got made fun of.”

All of the original speakers have since graduated from high-school and moved on to college or various other post-high-school pursuits. Since then, though, the Voice has been transmitted at a substantial level through two high-school “generations” (that is, two sets of students four years apart, such that one set is graduating when the younger set is entering high school). There have also been observations, much to the disbelief of those initially involved, of isolated occurrences of use by those as much as ten years younger than the original speakers--the equivalent of nearly three such “generations.” This staying power continues to reflect on the inclination or even the necessity for young people explore the entirety of their surroundings, whether linguistically, relationally, or critically.

Analysis

On a more technical level, of what did this system of interaction consist? Nathan explains, “It’s hard to understand or explain to other people, but I think for us who experienced it, it was such a clear, noticeable thing.” What began as a loose imitation of Southern dialect shifted drastically into a wide range of variations. Interviewees mentioned such variations as “pompous,” ”playful or joyful,” “violent,” “sour and grumbling,” “depressed,” and most prominently, “sarcastic” and “awkward.” This wide range of descriptions makes sense in light of the fact that the majority of interviewees noted their use of the Voice as a means for displaying emotions and personalities.

The Voice itself was characterized by an intonation that was varied but always recognizable. Derek describes it as such: Everyone had their own take on it, but it was always a continual thing...There are other people I’ve met at college who have their own crazy voices or jokes, but there’s a difference between just ‘a voice’ and ‘THE Voice.’” Non-verbal communication had as much of a defining quality as intonation. Speaking in the Voice required a large, crucial vocabulary of gestures, facial expressions, and mannerisms.

“It was so many things combined together: facial expressions, voice intonation, body posture was crucial, hands in the pockets and lips protruding--and the most important part was the delivery, raising the head and then slamming it back down, like an elephant.” You had to frown until the two points of your lower lip are as far down as possible, hopefully getting down to the chin line, where you’re making this Godfather-like, old Marlin Brando look--an old, haggard, moaning and grumbling face.

As flourishing young speakers, we certainly took advantage of what W.F. Bolton describes as the “productive” and “arbitrary” nature of language (Bolton, 62-62). We possessed the social and creative energy that Felix Rodriguez asigns to our demographic: “Of all social groups,” he writes, “the young are the most prone to the use and renovation of slang and unconventional language. They exhibit great social dynamism and are receptive to changes in fashion: in clothes, look, style, and also in speech.”

Our lexicon, as it were, expanded and was formed by a process of bricolage drawing from various sources in pop culture, inside jokes, and everyday experiences. A large portion of the phrases we adapted could be included in the category of “non-propositional” language specifically in Van Lancker Sidtis’ categories of 1) conventional expresions, 2) expletives, 3) indirect requests, and especially, 4) pause fillers (Van Lancker Sidtis, 3). On the other hand, though, many of the terms, phrases, and ideas were assembled into an informal and fluid lexical collection with nearly infinite semantic applications. There was a way of, John explains, of “turning lines from movies into phrases. If you used the Voice for the delivery of a line, it could be applicable to anything, and it would become something totally different, with totally different meanings.” Nathan agrees, recalling, “On one hand, it was just a goofy thing...but we could use [the Voice] whenever, to express almost anything with these phrases.”

Several examples stand out. One instance of a “found phrase” that found wide use and application is “razzle dazzle,” which was taken from a popular basketball video game. The phrase, originally used to highlight slam dunks, was employed in its new context as a greeting, an exclamation, a curse, or quite regularly, to mock political figures. The term ‘Puffy Biffalo’, a coinage supposedly based on sound symbolism, “stood for anything that was laying on the ground, Cheetos snack food, and trees--or it could be used as an insult.” A more systematic feature of the Voice was a naming process of adding an “-o” suffix to proper names and titles. For example, speakers Derek, Nathan, and Stephen became known as “Debo,” “Nato,” and “Stevo.”

Many items were created out of the immediate social context. “Southern style,” once used as a reference to the quality of one family’s hospitality, became a descriptor for any action that needed to be done in a bombastic manner. An example of functional shift is the use of the word “pamcake”--first used to describe the singed but under-cooked, soggy-with-cottage-cheese breakfast creations of one of our mothers--as a verb meaning roughly, “to embarrass oneself” or, more generally, “to make a mess of a situation.”

It is also helpful to consider the Voice in terms of its style and function. The Voice fits well the “casual” and the “intimate” categories of Martin Joos’ styles of conversation (Daniels, 50). Casual language, in Joos’ terminology, often features ellipsis, or “the shorthand of shared meaning,” and slang--the expression of these meanings “in a way that defines the group and excludes others.” Likewise, the intimate style contains language that is “personal, fragmentary, and implicit,” “a kind of language which ‘fuses two separate personalities’” (Daniels, 50). In comparison to these considerations, many interviewees noted the capacity of the Voice to establish their identity within and without the group, and a few also described the Voice as a sort of character or “alter-ego” that emerged from the group and could be taken on.

Summary and Conclusion

Why is it that this bizarre mode of communication spread so far and endured so long? I believe such a phenomenon as the Voice could occur because there is a vital interaction between language and both individual and group identity. “[Our native language] is the code we use to communicate in the most powerful and intimate experiences of our lives. It is a central part of our personality, an expression of who we are and wish to be” (Daniels, 56). The same considerations that apply to native languages or dialects are relevant to the slang of social groups, especially of youth for whom language is an exciting avenue for the expression of their maturing ideals and self-concepts.

The interviews I conducted were very revealing as to the motivating factors and the forces that drove speakers of the Voice to such extremes. “We were in a humorless town, where the constant jokes and conversation were just degrading women and getting drunk,” says one interviewee. “I think the Voice developed as a way to disconnect with that, an escape.” This fits well with the assessment of Felix Rodriguez, who explains that young people “may use slang as a countercultural tool, as a weapon against established authority and conventions” (247). Many interviewees agreed with the idea of the Voice as part of the struggle against established norms and expectations:

"Part of it was the way we looked at our high-school culture, our city and surrounding context, and so much of what we saw seemed ridiculous. The Voice provided an escape. We saw so much we thought was pointless or absurd--high-school drama, sex and drugs, the drive for a good career. It helped us establish our place in the world. We couldn’t make fun of certain things, things about ourselves or just unmentionable or taboo things, and the Voice was this objective alter-ego we could use to do that.”

Thus, the Voice was crucial to establishing definitions, evaluations, and boundaries amongst individuals, the group, and the surrounding components of society.

The most profound effects of the Voice, however, were on the individuals in the group and the dynamics that existed between them. It was an important part of growing up and learning about ourselves and each other. “[The Voice] was a way of putting a face on our awkwardness as teenagers,” John confesses, “because if we could make fun of it, then maybe afterward we could ignore it.“ He then goes on to explain the way that the Voice affected the friend relationships of his adolescence:

"[The Voice] was one area we could always relate to each other on. It was definitely part of trying to fit in with each other, and the Voice helped me, at least, because as much as I wasn’t like you guys or didn’t fit in, I could catch on with the way you guys talked and actually be close to you guys, to my peers."

Such an intimate connection to and dependency on language is not uncommon. It is in fact, the nature of most peoples’ relationship to the way they speak. It was more dramatically noticeable in this case, though, because it occurred within the microcosms of family, church, and high-school-subculture.

The Voice instantiates the “three general effects of slang that distinguish it from other types of vocabulary: informality, group identification, and opposition to authority” (Rodriguez, 250). The Voice is unique and serves as a valuably revealing example for study because of the small scale on which it occurred. Its existence and function communicates the vital connection between the language of adolescents as a means of self-expression and the formation of their personalities and identities. It speaks also of the dependency of human beings on their own unique modes of communication and the profound desire to speak one’s own langauge and still be understood.

Works Cited

Bolton, W. F. "Language: An Introduction." Language: Readings in Language and Culture. Ed. Donna Erickson. 6th ed. Boston/New York: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1998.

Daniels, Harvey A. "Nine Ideas about Language." Language: Readings in Language and Culture. Ed. Donna Erickson. 6th ed. Boston/New York: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1998.

Ebel, Connie C. "Slang, Metaphor, and Folk Speech." American Speech (2003): 151-61.

Labov, Teresa. "Social and Language Boundaries among Adolescents." American Speech 67.4 (1992): 339-66.

Rodriguez, Felix. Rev. of “Slang Sociability: In-Group Language among College Students,” by Connie C. Eble. Journal of English Linguistics 26.3 (1998): 247-65.

Van Lancker Sidtis, Diana. "When novel sentences spoken or heard for the first time in the history of the universe are not enough: toward a dual-process model of language." International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders 39.1 (2004): 1-44.

Mid-Winter Mid-West Mini-Tour w/ The Winston Jazz Routine

2007-01-27T05:16:00.000-05:00

Akron, OH @ The Lime Spider
New Philadelphia, OH @ State Bird's nest, garage and recording studio
Columbus, OH @ Milo Electric
Kansas City, MO @ The Brick
Kansac City, MO @ The Record Bar
Fayettesville, AR @ Blu Martini Lounge
Memphis, TN @ Newby's
Kokomo, IN @ some people's basement

In all honesty, it was a relatively short and undramatic trip. Those are hardly negative characteristics, though, and I couldn't think of a better way to spend a week and a half away from school. what follows are some brief notes, summaries, excerpts, etc.:

1) playing music and travelling with 3 of my good friends--they were wonderful company in spite of illness, sleep deprivation, and hours together in a cramped and stinky van. it's nice to find other humans--or to realize there are connections between people--that distance, time, and changing lives cannot touch. it provides a sense of security. it makes life more meaningful. the universe seems to make just a little more sense when you can sit down and converse with an old friend as if you didn't live hundreds of miles apart and see each other infrequently at best.

2) heading south to escape (or so we thought) the harsh winter--what really occurred was maybe one or two days that were noticeably warmer than a Michigan winter. In fact, as I stood on a front portch in the frigid, gusty wind on New Year's Eve, I heard of unseasonably warm and pleasant weather descending upon my friends in Grand Rapids.

3) seeing places I've never seen--learning that towns in southern Indiana and Illinois have some of the most startling, interesting, and weird names I've ever seen (St. Elmo, Glen Carbon, Paris, Lebanon, Brazil, Teutonville, and my personal favorite, Spiceland); driving across the Mississippi River, sleepless at 7AM with the sun glaring in the rearview mirror; watching a scenic valley in Arkansas turn from soggy, foggy dusk to glowing, gorgeous utopia after a long and sleepless night of internal wretching; finding a disgusting urinal, the size of a bathtub-turned-sideways and filled with broken beer bottles and soggy cigarette butts, and soon discovering that the commercial establishments surrounding Newby's in Memphis, TN, have some of the most horrible bathrooms I've ever set foot in; witnessing several acts of near-domestic violence just by walking a few blocks in search of a decent toilet; and finally, revisiting the dismal land of Kokomo where I lived for three months at age five.

4) meeting new friends--I can officially announce that, after witnessing the relentless and remarkable, almost miraculous, generosity we encountered on this trip (notably Nathan Reusch, Aaron Clark and the people at Main Street Cafe in KC; the brilliant and astonishingly friendly Minus Story; Ann and the guy who got our van working in Indiana)--yes indeed, there is some hope left for humanity. We also had the opportunity to learn from and hopefully also to challenge a group of street preachers in Fayettesville who thought it was a good idea to hold up signs like "He Who Committeth Sin Is Of The Devil" or "Whoever Sleeps With A Divorced Woman Committeth Adultery" outside of the bars along Dickson Avenue.

5) seeing old friends--all sorts of friends and family in Ohio (good ol' John Frankenfield and Steev Richter and Jonathon Hape and Nick and Megan and Angie and Joanna and Natalie and the Adam Glass), the talented and hospitable New Philadelphians... Philadolphins, Nathan and Mike and all sorts of others in KC, etc. etc.

6) encountering new music and art--music via Minus Story, Olympic Size and Comrade; Danny Gibson's intelligent and unconventional posters and prints and who-knows-what-else; and bang-a-rang Thomas Park's photography

7) eating good food--the Broadway coffee shop for espresso and the Korma Sutra for Indian food in KC, Mrs. Phillips homemade carry-out for on the road, loads of spaghetti at Aaron's house and nearly every other stop, extra-fluffy pancakes by Aaron's mom and our kind host in the Middle of Nowhere, Arkansas, and last but not least, some of the best cookies I've ever had at Ann's in Indianapolis.

All the above, along with countless details and thoughts and exchanges, coalesced into a vivid and sustaining exploit. In hindsight, I see that it's mostly the small details that were most meaningful. An unexpected but exciting note in the middle of a song you were nearly bored with, someone's kind remark after playing, a light-hearted conversation over spaghetti or a serious talk on the verge of sleep, finding bright moss on a rock and a small waterfall in the woods--these are the things I'll remember for years to come. Sleeping uncomfortably in the back of a van or sitting around to read for hours because there's nothing else to do is hardly the stuff of movies or memoirs, but it's the stuff of real life being pursued down new and exciting roads. I'm glad to have taken the trip. I wouldn't trade that week and a half for anything.

compliments to the wonderful Thomas Park for making us look nearly attractive in these photographs:

fun in the photobooth:

polaroids I haphazardly captured:

the State Bird Basement | Coby after a rude awakening

visitors from afar (Columbus) | relaxing at the Main Street Cafe (KC)

a wonderul place to spend an afternoon | after playing at The Brick (KC)

where Minus Story is recording their new album (KC) | the nicest venue we played at (KC)

Derek on bass for "The Sower" | Caleb is a wonderful drummer

intro to The Sower

in conclusion, some digital fragments of a beautiful poster (the handiwork of genius Danny Gibson):

"Born to Farming: Connection and Reincarnation in the Poetry of Wendell Berry"

2006-11-20T15:28:00.000-05:00

This is another piece, a shorter "critical appraisal essay," that I wrote for my Craft of Writing class. I checked out half a dozen collections of poetry from the school library, but Wendell Berry's "Farming: A Hand Book" caught my attention. He writes pastoral/nature/farming poetry that actually results from his lifestyle as a farmer. Sometimes political, sometimes meditative, usually simple and earthy, always authentic. He's lived in Kentucky with his wife and family(?) for the past two decades, farming the earth organically (using horses not tractors, for example) and writing poetry, essays, fiction, etc. He inspires me to do likewise.

"Born to Farming: Connection and Reincarnation in the Poetry of Wendell Berry"

Farming: A Hand Book is Wendell Berry’s guide not to the literal techniques of farming, but to living as “the grower of trees, the gardener, the man born to farming” (3). First published in 1967, the work is divided into three unnamed sections of poetry and a short play entitled “The Bringer of Water.” The second section of poetry contains a series “Mad Farmer” poems, which allow Berry to express more fiery and provocative sentiments through an alter ego. Occasional internal rhyme is the closest he comes to any conventional poetic device, and his diction is straightforward and unostentatious. Overall, the poems are simple, peaceful, usually pastoral, and advocate a lifestyle of the same qualities. More than just an agricultural activity, farming is presented as a way of living, thinking, and being that is rewarding, beautiful, and sustainable. It is the ideal life.

As a farmer, Berry has a view of the world that is joyfully reincarnational, of life as “only the earth risen up a little way into the light, among the leaves” (20). To him, life is cyclical: “Going and coming back, it forms its curves, a nerved ghostly anatomy in the air” (7). Thus, he will “take [his] stand on the earth like a tree in a field, passing without haste or regret toward what will be, my life a patient willing descent into the grass” (31). Ultimately, Berry sees an organic sameness between human and plant life and a union of every life with the earth--all are dust, either constituting life or nourishing it. The farmer’s life is but one stage of this cycle.

This reincarnational understanding stems from the farmer’s central concern of connection: connection to his own birth, present existence, and imminent death; to his family and community; and most vitally with the earth, even a specific plot of land, as the context and source of his life. First, the meditative quality of Berry’s writing is an example of him connecting to himself as a farmer and is a model for others to do likewise. Part of the farmer’s meditation is appreciating the roots of his birth and the fruits of his present life. Another is coming to face his mortality. Death is presented as good and necessary, as “the seed of the beginning and the end” (31)--the last that the farmer sows. By understanding the cyclical nature of his life, he will be able to connect with it.

Secondly, human relationships are a foundation of the ideal life. Several poems explore the idea of human connection in spite of humanity’s tendency towards inhumanity. They show that the simple and peaceful farmer will inevitably face isolation from the brooding events of the outside world. And yet, if he will “purge [his] mind of the airy claims of church and state, and observe the ancient wisdom of tribesmen and peasant, who understood they labored on their earth only to lie down in it in peace, and were content” (20)--if he can do this, he will be capable of establishing more humane connections with the larger community. These social connections contribute to the evolving rotation of life, as individuals die but the community continues. Marriage especially is an elemental relationship, seen as a source of restful security and identity (“Air and Fire”) and fiery renewal (“Earth and Fire”). It is the source of the family and all of its inner life and connections. In marriage, the farmer and his wife die to themselves but provide life to each other and to future generations--it makes the farmer “time and again, a new man” (47).

Lastly, “A Standing Ground” explains how a farmer’s connection with a literal place on earth will keep him from becoming “uprooted” in a more figurative sense. Ironically, turning away from crowds to be “apart” holds the “promise of life and peace” and “the healing shadow of the woods.” The farmer by his work is capable of “Enriching The Earth,” as another poem title suggests, and through this he brings forth further life. Only as he serves and becomes unified with the earth on which he lives will he be able to live fully or combat evil.

Farming: A Hand Book is an instructive chronicle of Berry’s own life as a farmer. In it, he has laid down from mind to page his crop of words, which in turn offers seed to readers and inspires them to also grow into the rich life of the farmer. This life’s agricultural work, it’s holistic connectivity, and it’s simple, meditative, and peaceful nature would allow them to live more meaningful and moral lives. Quietly from outside the city, they could sow change in and offer nourishment to other humans and the earth, even into death. Should they choose the farmer’s life, they will surely keep Wendell Berry’s manual close at hand.

"Soaring Up Into Womanhood: Femininity from the Perspective of an Early Girl Scout Handbook"

2006-11-17T22:38:00.000-05:00

The Girl Scouts of America once played a significant role in the development of young women, and it persists today as a unique component of American childhood. Throughout the organization’s history, it has helped shape the identities of girls. The groups’ early handbooks, though, are filled with stereotypes that strike contemporary readers as bizarre, old-fashioned, even harmful. These source materials are valuable artifacts, providing a first-hand perspective on the beliefs of their authors and readers. They can be used to locate and analyse gender stereotypes that were part of the larger culture.

Throughout the group’s early publications, one discovers the characteristics desired of young girls and the roles they are expected to fill as they grow into adult women. The fourth edition of the Official Handbook, published in 1923, lists ten qualities desired of girl scouts in its section “The Laws of the Girl Scouts” (4-12). Girl scouts are to be trusted, loyal, useful and helpful to others, courteous, cheerful, thrifty, and clean. It is notable that these merely describe what a girl scout is to be, in contrast to the action-oriented identity of boys that had developed by the 1968 Boy Scout Handbook. Boys Scouts are members of a troop and a worldwide brotherhood, busy in the great outdoors, prepared for service, dressed in uniform, adorned with scout badges, and out on the scouting trail towards citizenship, career, and manhood (13-26, 379). This contrast between the boys’ external achievements and the girls’ internal qualities reinforces the stereotype of girls as primarily passive creatures. In fact, the only verb that appears on the girls’ list is in the seventh law: “a girl scout obeys orders” (9).

Each of the Girl Scout’s laws comes with further explanations that reveal the culture’s view of women. For example, the law of courtesy means that “it is not enough for women to be helpful in this world; they must do it pleasantly” (7). Or, for a girl scout to be truly obedient, “she must remember to obey first and complain afterward” (9). It is important for women to be thrifty because “no matter how much money a man may earn, it is usually the women of the family generally have the spending of most of it” (10). Therefore, a girl must learn to save and to spend “on some system,” lest she become “niggardly” or go in debt. The fate of her family, her community, and her country depend on this saving and spending--one of the few active roles expected of women in that day.

Lastly, a Girl Scout should remember “health is probably a woman’s greatest capital” (10). Thus the tenth law:

Just as she stands for a clean, healthy community and a clean, healthy home, so
every Girl Scout knows the deep and vital need for clean and healthy bodies in the
mothers of the next generation. This means NOT only keeping her skin fresh and sweet and her system free from every impurity, but it goes far deeper than this... (12)

A girl must tend to her mind and spirit as well as keeping her skin attractive, for she somehow has been objectified by her culture as a sign of her family and community’s well being.

Girl Scouts have clear roles planned out for their futures: either homemaking or healthcare. The introduction to these roles comes even earlier than the Girl Scouts, in the Brownie Scout program. According to the Brownie Scout Handbook of 1956, members “learn how to do things to help other people, especially those at home” (28). As part of their education, then, they have “a good time keeping house at troop meetings” (28) and learn to use kitchen utensils, take care of young children, and entertain guests--valuable training for what their culture will expect of them as adults.

After the Brownie Scouts, girls are invited to become full-fledged Girl Scout Guides, a title explained in the Foreword of the 1923 Handbook as “a good and helpful comrade to her brother or husband or son”. As background, the text offers an inspiring history of the girl scouts’ predecessors, including Sacajawea and Louisa May Alcott. Sacajawea, “The Bird Woman,” is praised for her “great virtues of daring and endurance...out-of-door wisdom and self-reliance” (23). And yet, the story continues, “a country full of ‘Bird Women’ could not be said to have advanced very far in civilization.” So the manual offers this warning: “let every Scout who finds housework dull, and feels that she is capable of bigger things, remember this: [Louisa may Alcott] had to drop the pen, often and often, for the needle, the dish-cloth, and the broom” (24). The story concludes: “to direct her household has always been a woman’s job, in every century, and girls were learning to do it before Columbus ever discovered Sacajawea’s country” (24).

A few pages later, it is admitted, “we no longer believe that housekeeping should take up all a woman’s time” (25). Instead, a girl will become the envy of older generations of women when “she has learned how to manage her cooking and cleaning and household routine so that she has plenty of time to spend on other things that interest her” (25). Thus the expected role of a woman remains clear.

The pinnacle of a scout’s development is The Scout Aide merit badge, which “will probably be regarded by the outside world as the most important decoration the Girl Scouts can win...any grown girl or woman should be proud to own it” (105). The primary subject in The Scout Aide program is the art of the Home Maker, or “Keeper of the House.” The pages in this section are dedicated mostly to the kitchen and its floor, the stove and icebox, dish washing, and the proper handling of waste. It also focuses on the good manners and social forms necessary for the woman’s job of entertaining, such as being sure to “stand where guests can see you at once when they enter” (129). A specific accomplishment is earning the merit badge for cooking, a sign that meals can be planned “in such a way that nothing is wasted and that the family is satisfied and well-nourished” (133). Finally, if a girl scout has ambitions outside the house, she can choose from several subject titles in the field of healthcare: child nurse, first aide, home nurse, or the more indefinite “health guardian.”

The central message girls learn in the Scout Aide program is that household economics is “the great general business and profession of women,” and “if it is raised to the level of the other great businesses and professions, and managed quickly, efficiently, and economically, will cease to be regarded as drudgery and take its real place among the arts and sciences” (105) While this sounds like a noble aim, the only hope it gives is that girls may someday raise their assigned lot in the home to something equaling the tasks and roles of men. It does nothing to broaden the options of maturing young women.

In the first half of the twentieth century, there were clear expectations of what a woman was supposed to be like and to do with her life. An essentially passive nature was assumed in females of the time period, and homemaking and healthcare were their prized occupations. Early Girl Scout handbooks are a direct entry point to the culture that held these expectations.

every gentle air, pt. 2

2006-11-08T15:23:00.000-05:00

The re-release of Every Gentle Air, Pt. 2 is now available for purchase from The Record Machine's online store: merchline.com/therecordmachine/. The original edition was a run of 100 hand-painted CD-Rs (yes, with acrylic paint) that came packaged in hand-made booklets with hand-sewn green seed pouches. How handy. Overall, the project included contributions from over a dozen musicians, sound people, artists, writers, helpers, and friends. This new edition has professionally-done packaging and CDs and one more song than the original. Copies are $10. You can sample a trio of the songs here: myspace.com/everygentleair. Perhaps you'd like to take a closer look?

A Significant Place

2006-10-31T16:30:00.000-05:00

Another short assignment, this time to describe a significant place, paying special detail to specifics and concrete realities than can help individualize the scene and make it vivid and believable to the reader. My description ends with an event, but hopefully that's acceptable because a place is usually not significant unless something happens there.

"The Donut Pond"

There was once a playground behind my church, and in it stood a large wooden structure, a tower. I often found myself climbing up its rickety steps late at night, my shoes dew-soaked and my hands gripping the rails loosely to avoid splinters. Its wood rubbed rough under my hands as they passed over its cracked and faded grey surface, except for where there were blotches of softer greenish moss and mildew. I would push my pen and journal into my pocket and use both hands to hoist myself up to the topmost beam of the tower. The beam supported a pole beneath it, the kind for kids to wrap their arms and legs around and slide down to the mulch-covered ground below.

My legs would dangle off the beam, with nothing between them and the ground fifteen feet below. To my right lay Grace Fellowship Church, my church, nestled low to the ground like a monastery. It had tan, stuccoed walls, reddish doors, and a prominent frame of dark lumber. Directly before me and to my left were our two small ponds, filled with the memories of several decades’ worth of baptisms and summer camp canoe races. I had participated in both. Behind the ponds was a soccer field that stretched out and ended in a gravel road. Running along the entire length of the road was an edge of woods that circled around the ponds on my left, the church on my right, and closed in on the hill behind me like a great curtain.

I would sit atop my tower at the numerous summer camps or winter retreats my church hosted or during spontaneous times of introspection that led me wandering through the grounds near my church. Journals were filled there, love letters composed, tears shed, curses and questions and praises called out over the waters of the pond. The scene was constant and reliable over the years--the hard line of treetops all around me, the welcoming red doors of the church building, the moon reflecting off the pond water.

I had changed over the years, though--often as a result of time spent on top of that tower. Two summers ago, just weeks before I moved away for college, I heard of plans to tear down the playground. I joked with friends that all twenty years of my faith would collapse along with it. Then, in the last few days before leaving for school, some friends and I had a campfire in the woods near our church. We went to gather wood from a stack of logs and scrap wood, and there I found pieces of the faded grey lumber. These were oddly drier than everything else in the pile, and so we hauled them over to the fire and burnt them up. Everything outside the ring of firelight faded to night, and my shoes became soaked with dew. I felt my insides turning to ashes at what I had done. But as I sat and warmed my hands over the smoldering playground equipment, another tower, made of smoke, billowed up past the treetops and disappeared into the sky.

Two Poems: A Focus on Audience

2006-10-31T16:09:00.000-05:00

The assignment was to write two poems based on the same event, one for a close, personal audience and the other for a more general audience. I'm not sure if I actually did that or if I just changed who the poem was addressed to.

Mother, do you remember
when you hugged your brother?
Grandma Wiseman was dead,
and rain fell between the gravestones.
Our umbrellas kept us dry,
but your tears wet each others’ backs.

Just a child then, I looked to the ground.

*

Grandma Wiseman was born
before airplanes or world wars,
when the world’s odometer had just
rolled into a fresh century.
She died after another millenium
had been marked out with three zeros,
with airplane crashes and Hiroshima
as well-known milestones.

Father pulled the Honda off the dirt road.
He appreciated the pastor’s soft words,
mother the selections of Scripture.
My brother and I stayed silent in the backseat.
We drove on to the memorial service,
the numbers on the dashboard
counting off the distance.

John Updike--"Hoeing"

2006-10-31T16:00:00.000-05:00

Since class assignments are already completed and typed onto my computer, they are easier to post than anything else I write (if there is anything else I write). Here's an analysis of the poem "Hoeing" by John Updike, with the text of the poem included. I can't figure out how Updike can write such a pure and almost conventionally beautiful poem as this but also produce novels like "Amazon" that are almost pornographic... or so I've heard. I haven't actually read that book.

John Updike, “Hoeing”

I sometimes fear the younger generation will be deprived
of the pleasures of hoeing;
there is no knowing
how many souls have been formed by this simple exercise.

The dry earth like a great scab breaks, revealing
moist-dark loam--
the pea-root’s home,
a fertile wound perpetually healing.

How neatly the green weeds go under;
The blade chops the earth new.
Ignorant the wise boy who
has never performed this simple, stupid, and useful wonder.

*

The actual content of the poem is the clearest and foremost way Updike reveals its theme. The first stanza introduces the two levels on which he will be working: the dirt of the earth and the human soul. The progression of these first four lines connects the physical act of tilling the ground to a deeper level of inner spiritual cultivation as a single experience. The second stanza then offers an image describing most obviously an agrarian task. However, this is also an account of the complex nature of soul-growth as a painful and destructive act, but also as a necessary undertaking that offers rich, life-giving rewards. Indeed, hoeing necessarily opens scabs and surface wounds, but this reveals the potential for growth and healing. Finally, the third stanza explains how the green weeds already flourishing, whether rooted in dirt or heart, must be sacrificed to bring forth the “moist-dark” treasures of wisdom, wonder, and ultimately, the new life of earth and soul.

Several elements of form also contribute to the poem’s meaning. Overall, the long, dragging lines set off by short, chopped-off lines suggest the hauling and hacking motions of the hoe. In the second stanza, the crack of the dry earth’s scab is emphasized by the placement of a comma directly after the word “breaks” in line 5, and the two hyphenated words introduce and signify the fusion of destructive and curative powers into a healer-wound. Lastly, the semi-colon at the end of line 9 emphasizes the chopping action of the hoe, serves as the pivotal point of turning-over from weeds to new earth, and sets off the most concrete, concise, and profound image of the hoe’s work: “the blade chops the earth new.” These structural components contribute subtly but powerfully to the theme revealed by the poem’s content.

"Rags and Tatters in the Terrible Swamp"

2006-10-17T16:22:00.000-04:00

Another essay, this one for my history class "Modern History of the World and the West." The prof includes a lot of original source material as well as more literary readings, which is refreshing compared to the usual rut of textbooks and workbooks. This particular essay was an analysis of the historical fiction novel "Silence" by Shusaku Endo. It tells the story of a Jesuit priest who sneaks into Japan as a missionary during the period when Japan was shutting itself off from the West, especially from Christianity. The book has caused quite a stir, especially among Japanese Christians or those who are interested in the way that Christianity spreads across cultural boundaries, at times fusing to or at other times displacing the native culture and its religion.

It's really a powerful novel, in spite of what seems to be some problems with the translation and editing, and even some more glaring problems with the writing itself. Endo is considered Japan's leading novelist, and "Silence" is greatly comparable to Graham Greene's "The Power and the Glory." In fact, "Silence" takes at least one key phrase directly from 'The Power and the Glory," and the critical acclaim on the back of "Silence" features a quote from Greene praising it as one of the finest books of the 20th century.

“Rags and Tatters in the Terrible Swamp”

In the novel “Silence,” author Shusaku Endo raises many theological issues. He addresses, perhaps most prominently, God’s silence in the presence of evil, but he also struggles with God’s sovereignty and love in relation to the apostle Judas’ betrayal of Jesus and the nature of true Christian faith in regards to martyrdom, apostasy, and the silence of the persecuted church. Most of these issues are resolved powerfully by the book’s end. However, Endo also raises another question: how can Christianity fit into Japanese society without one of the two being compromised? To answer this difficult question, Endo tells us the tragic but redemptive story of Sebastian Rodrigues. By focusing on Rodrigues’ transformation from a Portuguese priest into the truly Japanese man Okada San’emon, Endo asserts that Westernized, European Christianity--what translator William Johnston terms “Hellenistic Christianity” (xvii)-- must be rethought before it can enter Japanese society.

At the beginning of the novel, Father Rodrigues is the embodiment of this Hellenistic Christianity, bearing also the ethnocentric, colonizing spirit of Western Europe. He has a naivety of Japanese culture that leads him to remark to Garrpe that all Japanese people look the same. Rodrigues also maintains a sense of absolute assurance in the rightness of his own beliefs and those of his church. In his first encounter with Inoue and the daimyo, he tells them, “According to our way of thinking, truth is universal” (108), betraying his foundational conviction that not just Christianity, but the Portuguese way of doing Christianity, is the only and absolute truth.

Both Rodrigues and his faith have been transplanted into Japanese culture, and at first they seem to flourish. His work as priest to the impoverished peasants of Tomogi seems to go exceedingly well, just as the initial introduction of Christianity to Japan led to numbers of converts estimated in the hundreds of thousands. “Everything had worked out beyond our wildest expectations,” he writes (45), describing the seeming effortlessness, assuredness, and safety of their work. However, just as the authenticity of the multitudes of Japanese conversions later came into question, Rodriguez begins to see problems in the assimilation of Christianity into Japanese culture. There seems to be “some error in their outlook” and “their whole attitude makes [him] uneasy” (45). As the novel progresses, and especially after encountering Ferreira, Rodrigues will begin to see the deeper issue that is at hand.

The novel’s central conflict, that is the question of how Christianity can fit into Japanese culture without destroying the integrity of one or the other, is enunciated as both the apostatized Ferreira and the political leaders of Japan, representative of Hellenistic Christianity and imperial Japanese society, respectively, insist that Christianity cannot fit into Japan. Ferreira insists that Christianity can only become trapped in the culture of Japan like a butterfly in a spider web. The external skeleton of the religion may remain intact, but the form of the body is sucked clean of its true inner life. The Japanese, on the other hand, see Christianity as a tree that cannot take root in the swamp-like culture of Japan or a pushy woman whose affection Japan does not desire. The tree produces no fruit, and the woman is barren. Initially, Rodrigues is likewise trapped by these pictures of the conflict between Christianity and Japanese society. The two seem irreconcilable. And yet, through the course of Rodrigues’ stay in prison, as he witnesses executions and apostasies and experiences God’s silence, he discovers an unforeseen means of reconciliation between them that is more radical than he ever could have expected.

Through what Rodrigues experiences in prison, his understanding of religion and faith, of the Church and missionary work, are drastically altered. He sees ways in which his own Christianity, embedded in a net-like culture of its own, resembles the butterfly trapped in the web of Japanese culture, sucked clean of its inner life. His idea of Christianity as a prospering and triumphant ideology melts into a deep comprehension of the death that true Christianity requires, expressed perhaps as a literal martyrdom or in his case the total sacrifice of one’s culture, one’s independence and security in the world, and even one’s name. He realizes that the pity he had previously felt for the Japanese “was not action. It was not love” (135). In the end, Rodrigues is forced to undertake a new task “more important than the Church, more important than missionary work” (170): that is, to give up his priesthood, his self-assurance, and his righteousness in the eyes of the world in order to truly love others and Christ by, of all things, apostatizing.

Likewise, the face of his Savior Jesus begins to change. It is no longer the idealized, attractive, commanding, or healthy countenance he often imagined in the past. He begins to see the face of Christ in the one-eyed gaze or servile smile of his fellow man. Christ is downtrodden, unsightly, abused and suffering. Indeed, this is what He reveals to him as Rodrigues holds his foot above the fumie: “Trample! Trample! It was to be trampled on by men that I came into this world” (171). It is in this that Rodrigues understands the reconciliation of his faith to Japanese culture. He must abandon himself wholly to it, just as Christ abandoned himself, giving up his livelihood, his rights, and even his name, in order to truly “live the same life as the Japanese Christians” (188), to “become a Japanese” (189).

Rodrigues acknowledges that his beliefs have changed. He tells God, “My faith in you is different from what it was; but I love you still” (189). He also sees that he has parted ways with the Hellenistic Christianity with which he began: “I know that my Lord is different from the God that is preached in the churches” (175). And yet in this position, he administers the sacrament of confession to his weak brother Kichijiro, a fellow apostate and Judas-like betrayer of Christ, and finally hears the quiet voice of Christ spoken through his own life.

By the novel’s end, Father Rodrigues has begun to understand the truth that has since become powerfully evident to Christians: that is, that the evangelization and the Westernization of a society are not, or at least should not be, the same thing. Instead, the truth of his faith must mature beyond the doctrines and practices of his Hellenistic Christianity to become the living, incarnating Truth that is the person of Jesus. Rodrigues is the novel’s example of this as he gives up everything to show love to those “wasted like rags and tatters” (116) around him. Thus, “Silence” demonstrates that although the roots of the Westernized European church cannot take hold in Japan’s cultural swamp, the incarnating spirit of Jesus, betrayed, trampled upon, and soft-spoken to the end, enters Japan “like water flowing into dry earth” (32).

"Good Things From Grease"

2006-10-17T16:13:00.000-04:00

This is another essay I wrote for my English class. It was supposed to be a "persuasive essay," but seeing as I have enough trouble convincing myself of most things, it was a challenge to craft a piece that truly attempts to persuade anyone of anything. I guess that purely rhetorical arguments are not the most effective means of affecting today's individualized, think-for-yourself, "postmodern" readership, and that's why many writers opt for raw and hard data, historical documentation, and especially personal story-telling (memoir) as means of persuasion. Anything less didactic, deconstructible, etc. etc. than a pure essay.

I tried to take a casual and light tone, but ended up mostly repeating myself and not narrowing anything down to workable specifics. At least that's the gist of what my professor said, and I'm inclined to believe him. Sometimes amidst the joking around in class or reading the pencil scribbles on returned assignments, it's easy to forget that I'm learning from and receiving critique from an accomplished, award-winning author (he won NEWBERRY PRIZE for his children's novel "Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy"!). It's definitely a privilige, and it helps that he's such a funny, caring, and laid-back guy. Anyways:

"Good Things From Grease"

As automobile drivers, Americans are disconnected from their vehicles. They take for granted the transportation that they have such easy access to and are forgetful, even thoroughly unaware of the intricate machinery that carries them so dependably, safely, and quickly. Cars do not demand engagement or involvement from their users, other than the occasional oil change or engine repair. By default, the average car owner never considers the development and technological advances that have come together to produce the masterpiece that now resides in his or her garage. It can be even harder to find someone with gratitude for the opportunity and the money to possess such a convenient, efficient (at least in some regards), and luxurious invention. Odds are, the person hardly has any idea how the thing works, other than the standard procedures for on/off, accelerate/decelerate, and refuel.

When Americans turn sixteen years old, they earn not only the right to legally operate a vehicle, but often they will also inherit an automobile of their own. Unfortunately, they very rarely receive any appreciation for what they so easily acquire. They are only required to reach out and snatch the keys from a parent’s open hand to access levels of speed, convenience, and autonomy that are wholly unprecedented. They soon become a blur across the landscape, gliding here and there in climate-controlled isolation towards whatever destination they fancy.

But, with the jangling keys comes the beginning of a lifetime of careless, meaningless, and stressful dependence on personal vehicles. The young driver will soon become just another road-enraged driver, taking his or her place in the cursing commotion of traffic jams and adding their voices to the never-ending grumble against gas prices. Compared to the intimate relationship between ancient riders and their animal means of transportation or to the more modern, community- and group-oriented systems of train or bus travel, the spirit of the automobile has become unfeeling and coldly utilitarian in every aspect. There is no connection from the heart or mind to the engine, to the landscape being navigated, or to the other people traveling nearby.

---

But, for those environmentally or financially conscious, those who enjoy cars and contraptions, or those who undertake diverse projects and hobbies; for the slightly subversive, creative, or curious; for anyone who feels the prevailing disconnect of the automobile: there is the possibility of running a car on vegetable oil. After only a minor DIY or professional conversion procedure performed on any diesel-engine-bearing car, truck, van, or bus, it is possible to drive right on past the gas station and instead fill up with the free grease in a waste storage unit behind the local Chinese restaurant.

The potential to run a diesel engine on pure, unmodified vegetable oil is no new discovery. The engine’s inventor, Rudolf Diesel, once designed a prototype engine that ran on peanut oil, and he also speculated on the possible future significance of running vegetable oil as fuel. The mounting “energy crises” and the concerns about fossil fuels, along with recent innovations and improvement from largely grassroots efforts, have resulted in increased interest in both SVO (Straight Vegetable Oil) and WVO (Waste Vegetable Oil). Especially on the Internet, numerous websites have emerged offering resources, statistics, services, and a place to network with other people interested in vegetable fuel sources.

Many benefits of using vegetable oil are being touted by those involved in the growing community of its users and innovators. The fact that waste vegetable oil can be gathered for a slight charge or often for free from restaurants, chip or snack factories, and potato processing plants, is an immediate and very appealing benefit to users. Online companies offer pumps with built-in filters that be used to fill a vehicle up directly from a WVO storage unit. Also, it must be noted that deisel engines, whether running off diesel or vegetable fuel, are up to 40% more efficient than their average gasoline-burning counterparts.

Environmentally aware people may appreciate that the emissions from engines running on vegetable oil contain no sulfur dioxide, the prime chemical contributor to acid rain. Also, while the level of carbon dioxide produced by WVO-burning engines is comparable to that produced by diesel-burning engines, the gross figure for WVO-burning engines is actually less because the plants that end up as fuel in a gas tank spend their life in the field absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

On perhaps a more profound level, the entire process of converting a diesel engine to run off of SVO or WVO is a powerful way for people to cure the disconnect they find between themselves and their vehicles, their surroundings, and their partners on the road. Just doing the preliminary research and installation work forces owners to learn about the basic functioning and mechanics of their vehicle. They are forced to interact with the nuts and bolts of what they depend on so frequently. As they talk online or face to face with other people interested in cars, the environment, saving money, subcultures, or travel, people will naturally develop connections to humans other than the car salesmen, auto mechanics, or insurance agents that the present system offers. After the conversion, the process of setting up and maintaining a supply of vegetable fuel can connect people to their neighborhoods, cities, and entire country in new ways, as the act of keeping a car running moves beyond the commercial sphere and becomes a creative and relational task that takes planning and current knowledge of a person’s surroundings. The environmental advantages of vegetable fuel offer users a chance to learn about and engage with the surrounding natural world. Whether on cross-country road trips of short trips across town, travel has the potential to become a more thoughtful, meaningful, and intentional part of a person’s life.

Obviously, neither straight or waste vegetable oil is the miraculous alternative fuel source that will solve energy crises or save the environment. The world’s food supply cannot be diverted to take the place of gasoline, and all of America’s drivers cannot begin mining grease dumpsters for fuel. And yet, for those resourceful and motivated, intrigued by the opportunity to benefit from the waste of society and concerned about the environment, the possibility may strike them as something good and worthwhile. And it can even be hoped that making the switch to vegetable oil will in some way contribute to holistic and healthy lifestyles, reconnecting people to their vehicles, their surroundings, and each other.

"When The Night Comes Falling From The Sky"

2006-10-12T01:35:00.000-04:00

the following is a "personal essay" i wrote several weeks ago for my Craft of Writing class. there's a lack of subtance and the emotions are too overbearing. my professor said there's no coherent flow to the piece as a whole, and no, i don't know where the idea to use all the Bob Dylan stuff came from. in hindsight, i feel like i didn't manage to express what i was attempting to express. blah blah blah.

"When The Night Comes Falling From The Sky"

We walked uphill towards the far end of the clearing, and found ourselves atop the ridge of a naturally-formed hillside ampitheater. A huge outdoor stage lay below where we stood, facing us. The friends we were visiting explained that we were on the abandoned grounds of an outdoor music festival, untouched since the 1970s when The Beach Boys and Bob Dylan had filled the surrounding hills with the waves and winds of rock and roll. For decades, it had lain hidden away like the ruins of a forgotten temple.

We climbed onto the stage, which was littered with squares of stage platforms that rolled on rusted wheels. Straining together, we maneuvered one of these pieces out from under the awning of the stage and stretched out on it, on our backs, under the stars. The moon was just a sliver that night, we had left the glare of man-made lights in our dust miles down the road, and our backs pressed against ground that Brian Wilson had once tread. For all these reasons, the stars seemed brighter, closer, and more numerous than ever before. What had always seemed just a few sparkling stones strewn across the heavens was then a thick, glittering dust that coated over the glassy dome of the sky. For a while we forgot everything, forgot all of our subterranean homesick blues, and became lost in the mystery of the firmament spread out around us.

*

I’ve been reading a book, “The Gifts of the Jews,” by a guy named Thomas Cahill. It talks about how people in ancient times understood the universe. To them, Cahill explains, the sky was the realm of the gods, literally populated by the dieties of their religion. They transcribed supernatural dramas and truths from the stars and based their agricultures, governments, religions, and personal lives upon the movement of lights in the rotating sky-dome. Of course, now we know better than these ancients, and their worldview seems bizarrely naive. We know that the sun is not really a flaming chariot that drives over our heads and crashes into the sea at the end of each day. We know better than to offer sacrifices to heavenly bodies or to structure our society after the constellations.

And yet, we have not escaped the heavens and their influence. The sun truly is the source of our planet’s life, and the moon reaches down even through our atmosphere to churn up the tides of the ocean. On an even deeper level, the heavens have remained the quintessential picture of mystery and beauty, whether in art, religion, or secrets whispered between lovers. As Cahill notes, the sky “is still our principal metaphor for limitlessness and transcendence,” a metaphor used to convey the mysteries of our human experience.

I wonder, then, if the scientists who have unmade the supersitious beliefs of the ancients and purged the sky of deities are all that different than the priests of old. With diagrams and equations, astronomers and physicists try to describe mystery and immensity from a distance that is almost unimaginable. They peer out through telescopes to search the dark void for light and matter, or they sort through notebooks of calculations bent on a task similar to that of a monk or a poet. They seek to describe and communicate to us ideas and visions that are so incredible we could not imagine them on our own, and with their help we finally begin to visualize and comprehend a universe that exceeds our expectations and imaginations. They are seers, or see-ers, just as much as priests or poets.

And so Bob Dylan, a seer in his own rite, said it like this:

Seen a shooting star tonight
And I thought of you.
You were trying to break into another world,
A world I never knew.
I always kind of wondered
If you ever made it through.

*

The next summer, Katie and I were on our way home from visiting the same friends and again found ourselves near the festival grounds. We pulled off through a field and into the same clearing. We parked and walked over the ridge of the hill to find the stage still there, still sacred. We remembered the intensity of the stars the summer before and looked up to a similar spectacle, this time with the full face of the moon also shining down on us. To our right was one of several abandoned, shed-like buildings we had seen the year before, and in the moonlight we saw that it had once been some sort of concession stand or ticket booth, with an awning extending out from a large window that covered most of its front. Edges of plywood surrounded the windowframe, but the main panels had been knocked out. We tried to see into its interior, but the moonlight from above revealed nothing past the windowframe.

As we examined the building, the sense of beauty that had filled the night shifted to an atmosphere of childish mischief and fright. We were sure the building was haunted, that someone or something lived there in the shadows. We dared each other to creep up to the window, and both accepted the challenge, snickering but becoming genuinely nervous. We made it to the window but still couldn’t see anything inside. Pieces of broken glass lay about our feet and seemed to catch the reflection of the stars.

On another dare, we stepped together over the damaged windowsill into the dark, our legs stretching to find the floor. The soles of our shoes crushed onto shards of glass and sent our pulses surging, but we held our breaths and took several steps into the dark, onto creaky floorboards, and halted. Our eyes were beginning to adjust to the darkness, and we could just make out each other’s faces when several winged creatures, birds or bats, dropped down from the ceiling and flapped out of the window. We both screamed, leapt back over the windowsill, and ran to the car. Katie plunged the keys into the ignition, and whipped the car around through the grass and back down to the main road, both of us laughing at ourselves and overwhelmed with a strange sense of excitment. We had approached something unknown. It was just a shed, yes, but our imaginations had been overwhelmed by the mystery of it all, and so it felt as if we had, for a brief moment, broken into another world.