18 de Agosto 2008
be respectful
i recently registered for the third consecutive year at one institution. i haven't transferred in transcripts or planned an escape. i haven't applied to another school, i haven't even snubbed the second annual flag football game--even though by this point, had i stuck to the original plan to get an MACS, i shoulda been long gone. this is a real breakthrough for me, given that the last time i went to the same school for three years in a row was 3,4,5 grade.
to commemorate my achievement(s?) i've transcribed the following for your perusal. let's just say it came just in time to remind me why i keep doing what i do and how i couldn't really stop now, even if i tried.
Sent: Sunday, August 17, 2008 8:47 PM
Subject: about the paper
hi J, hope the vakay went well.
i am a little nervous about the paper. i'm close to finished but would like to ask you a few questions just to make sure i actually did the assignment and not some other sort of random research paper. i'm hoping i can describe to you a sort of outline of what i did and you can point to holes i should fill in or tell me it is probably an just a fine paper and i should get over my grade... or both.
i have monday and tuesday (afternoons) open.
thanks,
A
Date: Sun, 17 Aug 2008 22:32:00 -0700
Subject: RE: about the paper
Can you send me the outline via e-mail? Or, if you want to meet face to face, will it be okay to leave it until Tuesday right after lunch? Let me know. J
Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 12:25 PM
Subject: RE: about the paper
this is an overview of each section of the essay:
Why Romans is special (to the Canon)
Paul's motivation
Jews vs. ethne
Paul's departure from the Hellenistic letter structure
Difficulty with 1:16-25
16-25 as foundational
Paul's thesis: new relationship to the law through Christ
Judaism's anti-idolatry stance
Paul's rhetorical strategy in 16-25
Paul's (post)modern readership's bias
the verses, in turn
16More on Paul's motivation, why he is unashamed
17God is God
ek pisteos eis pistin
this may set the tone for the rest of the book of Romans
Paul addresses Judaism again
18wrath and righteousness
19,20 without excuse
21,22, 23 Paul addresses pagan hearts
24, 25 Paul addresses homosexuality
ethics and strategy throughout 16-25
Why Romans is special (to us)
relevance of Romans
in a previous email i asked you to find the holes but now i'm reflecting and i'm concerned because i sat down to write the paper and felt really inadequate.
maybe it wouldn't be possible to do the assignment wrong because exegesis is kind of a random research paper project. Maybe it would be harder for me to do not do the assignment than i thought--you gave rather broad perameters.
but i hope you can help with the more personal side of the problem:
it all started because i didn't know how much to rely on the original language, given my lack of skill there. i ended up reliant on commentaries and making several important leaps on intuition. (which, i know can lead to trouble) for example: i defended the idea that the gospel was "news" because it seemed important as i was writing, then reread Johnson only to find that he thought the same thing and i had simply missed it before. and while it seems that Johnson and i are probably ok to assume that the gospel is news, what if i made a serious error on another point? what if in the context of all these commentaries, my voice is just the voice of another whiny, ignorant seminarian repeating all the same mistakes?
in a way i'm reinventing the wheel when i don't rely on commentaries and not trusting the commentaries when i do rely on them. Moreover, the more i read, the more difficult it is to imagine that i have anything to contribute to the conversation.
Also, i'm concerned that each paragraph might be hiding something that, further down the road, would lead to a terrifying heresy. i mean, i didn't write anything really insane but i have a tendency to try to say too much, without proper defense or clarity--and that is something that could affect my grade and/or career, if i can't get it under control.
its like a catch 22: either i'm not contributing because i'm inadequate or i'm not contributing because i'm unintelligible. if the assignment was to exegete my experiences, i could do that. Maybe that is what i have learned in two year of mhgs. but when it comes to Romans i don't know where i fit in the conversation. i feel like exegesis is an invitation to a really important dinner party, but on the way through the door, they tell you not to say anything stupid, which just makes me more nervous.
i know you're a docter; are there any pills i can pop for this? good grief.
so that is the rant.
i could come tuesday after lunch to chat, unless you think i'm just overreacting.
A.
[THIS IS WHERE IT GETS GOOD:]
Abigail,
I doubt if you can do the assignment entirely wrong. Your analogy about being invited to an important dinner party is a good one. However, when you get to the door, they only ask you to be respectful of others' opinions when you come into the room. And at the end of the party they are asking you to summarize where you think you fit into the conversation. So you will inevitably use the opinions of others (only the modern period thinks originality is a bonus), and anyway I do not expect unique contributions to the discussion about Romans 1 from MDiv students. Just be coherent and document well.
Your nervousness about using Greek is understandable, but the point of the program here at MHGS is to be able to use the commentaries/resources intelligently, not to work in the original text with publishable results.
I agree this is not a typical MHGS assignment, but it is because there is a longer, broader conversation about Romans than about Freud. And it is possible to produce heresy, but it is not the unforgivable sin.
Can you give me a one or two sentence summary of what Paul says in Romans 1:16-25 that is important for anyone these days? The outline looks fine ... but I don't know what your thesis is.
As far as meeting tomorrow, I can come in. It is really your call whether the conversation is necessary. There are no pills. Sorry. But don't put such high expectations on yourself that you end up a basket case. It really isn't worth it.
Let me know what you want me to do.
J.
end of transmission
and by way of footnote i would like to add that one time i made an appointment with this prof and the good dr responded with an email, all it said was "it is written."
just thought you should know.
[i wish there were a more concise answer to the question, "how is school?" but there isn't. so here is how it really is: high drama, high expectations, and lots of email to put the problem into perspective. it is not a rhythm we can maintain for long but it has been ok for the past three year and it will have to do for the next three, whee.]
and now i'm off to walk the dog before it rains again.
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16 de Agosto 2008
i dare you
search youtube for
tight bro's [sic] from way back when
and put your nose in the corner.
please note the use of the maracas at the end of the song.
thank you.
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26 de Julio 2008
via negativa
in order to distract myself from the apophatic and the problem of gelassenheit i googled myself (my name). Derrida says there is much in naming, or giving a name (to him they are two different things).
it turns out i am lost.
there are people out there looking for me. or the old, hyphenated version of me, which i'd rather not discuss anyway... and that is actually pretty fitting.
i think, given the option, i'll stay lost for a while.
why not?
maybe they know more about me by knowing less.
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12 de Julio 2008
cheesy tomato
i woke up this morning feeling all crumply and weird.
and when i opened the fridge to think about milk what i really wanted was a beer. it was 8:30am.
so i didn't have beer.
i think mostly i wanted comfort food.
cheese, probably. or just to lick the salt off the salt shaker.
so here is a recipe my dad used to make me when i was little (he is probably making it right now but he only cooks on the barbecue so you could try that, i however, only cook in the toaster oven so that is what i'm recommending):
first you go to the farmers market and buy a tomato that looks like it is about to go bad; they usually have a bin in the truck or wherever with these half price tomatoes that are just splitting at the seams and they tell you you should choose for yourself because they don't want to be held responsible if you get a moldy one.
but though they are right on the edge they are just right.
it is sort of like a cure for the common crumply feeling.
let me know if you like it but don't say anything if you don't because that would be sort of a nasty surprise.
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27 de Marzo 2008
two things i always avoid
newspapers
cnn
so i didn't hear the speech; i read about it in the Stranger's Last Days column, which, you might be thinking qualifies as a newspaper but, trust me, it doesn't. Nobody knows news better than a photojournalist's wife and i'm here to tell you that the Last Days is NOT news--its much better!
so here is the Obama quote:
"The real problem is not that someone who doesn't look like you might take your job--its that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit. I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together--unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction--towards a better future for our children and our grandchildren."
and here is what Last Days said about that:
"In a testament to Obama's conviction and/or acting chops [and/or speech writers--hooray writers!], none of this made Last Days want to throw up. Obama '08!"
then something about a man building a robot and programming it to kill him and they're calling it suicide..
then there is a bit about a pigeon running around 3rd and Union with a thyringe thtuck through ith head like an arrow (keep that in mind for Halloween costume next year).
"This week continues with one of the more pathos-rich scenarios to unfold on a Seattle street since LD watched that saltine dissolve in a shallow puddle...[i remember that!] ...Once LD posted Melyssa's report on the Slog, not one but 2 Slog commenters revealed they too had seen the syringe pigeon. 'I saw that pigeon in about the same place a week or two ago, 'wrote Andrew. 'For what it's worth, it appears to be a chronic condition for this pigeon rather than a fatal one.' 'I, too, saw that same bird, or another one with the same affliction, a week or so ago at the ... bus stop,'wrote DJ Girth [haha]. '2 junkies were laughing at it. It sort of felt like they had something to do with it.' These reminiscences brought a bracing rant from Greendyke: 'Jesus fuck--this pigeon has been walking around like this for 3 weeks and at least 3 sloggers have seen it and NO ONE in Seattle has helped it? I am ashamed to be a human being.' Finally, key perspective was provided by Comte: 'You ever try to catch a pigeon? I personally wouldn't feel all that comfortable trying to wrap my hands around a squirming bird with th business end of somebody's works sticking out of it. And while it may seem callous and inhumane, I would point out that the poor bird is apparently surviving, so that says something for the resiliency of Columba livia.'"
then, on my birthday: "Nothing happened today, unless you count the AP revelation that the 2-year-old [sic] boy in La Joya Texas, who was found dead with a fatally fractured skull was most likely accidentally crushed by a morbidly obese relative. Good one, God."
and then i got this email from our minister of outreach (who is one of the few people who understands my ministry most of the time):
Monday, March 24, 2008 - 10:05 AM PDT
State shuts down another North Seattle motel
Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle)
For the second time in less than a week, the Washington Department of Health has shut down a motel in the 12000 block of North Aurora Avenue in North Seattle.
This time, the state shut down the Seattle Motor Inn at 12245 N. Aurora Ave., with an inspector saying "members of the public who may choose to stay there are at risk of serious injury and/or illness because of the motel's unsanitary and unsafe condition."
Last week, the state shut down the Orion Motel
State officials said they're responding to complaints from the city of Seattle when inspecting and revoking the licenses of the North Seattle motels.
The Seattle Motor Inn, according to the state's inspection, revealed in one unit that "a five-gallon bucket filled with dark brown, fetid water from a leaking fixture was being stored under the vanity next to the bathroom."
In another unit, "sharp metal wire stuck out from the edge of the mattress ... and the walls were grimy and in poor condition with thick runny gobs of dried-on liquids found throughout."
In a third unit, "mold was found growing on the wall behind the toilet."
The pool at the motel "is one-third full of fetid, contaminated water" and the pool area "is littered with debris and discarded items." And the inspector noted that "nearly all of the smoke detectors tested at the property were not operable."
The owner of the Seattle Motor Inn, listed by the state as Dean and Jill Inman of Bothell, have 20 days to request a hearing and contest the charges. The motel's license was revoked on March 22.
sure, i like when government officials are as poetic as to use the phrase "runny gobs" in a report but i was there every Monday afternoon for a good many months and the fetid, gobby nast was real moreover, the children who played and lived and tried to do homework in those rooms were real. and they loved their moms and dads and that was real too. and i consider myself lucky not to have contracted a serious disease despite my very real dis-ease.
No wonder i felt so wild and weirded out last week.
i can't believe people worry about PMS when all this kind of roller coastering hopeful and otherwise shitty shit is really going on all around us; maybe we should all be moody and bitchy EVERYDAY.
did i mention i love you more than i love tomwaits, which is a lot?
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24 de Marzo 2008
tomwaits
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19 de Marzo 2008
research = bitch slap
"...in order to treat children ethically we need to be able to hear what it is they value and to be able to see how they make sense of the social world.[...] Children have standpoints which are not the same as adult standpoints; moreover they know a great deal about parenting and its consequences"(Smart, Neale, Wade, 2001).
they know.
you know.
i know.
we know.
more than anyone expected we would.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 10:54 AM | TrackBack
7 de Marzo 2008
one million tiny risks
this is what it feels like to make sure your heart broke before,
by breaking my heart over and over.
when grandma celia died i really wanted to see the body.
this is sort of like that.
i will always want more.
always.
from you.
from me.
it feels like i'm losing it.
but not really.
there is something about reading
what i wrote
when it is
written all over your face.
i never knew my own strength
i never knew how much power i had
or didn't have.
a kind of power without any power
like magic, all tricks and turning
but it really mattered,
didn't it?
yeah.
every shining time.
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28 de Febrero 2008
damnlot
i may have scandazilized my spiritual director.
but, as my good friends used to say, "I'm payin' for it!"
she may call and cancel the rest of the meetings we have scheduled.
but what can you do?
not a wholedamnlot.
but i'm taking suggestions anyway.
sometimes my thoughts are so loud i put on the headphones and then forget to push play, and i don't even realize i've forgotten.
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14 de Febrero 2008
lenten fast
wow lent came early this year.
happy valentine's day.
and my birthday will be on good friday this year. maybe we won't have cake.
my 3,4,5 class and i are working our way through the voyage of the dawn treader.
they keep asking really good questions like
"what EXACTLY is going on?!"
they crack me up.
and i got a little lost when prince caspian was retelling the entire journey (that pissed me off, i really didn't get that part) and i told them and they said they were lost too and "could we draw a map?" and "what if i draw a picture of the ship that is actually helpful, could i do that?"
i said, in all honesty, "that would be amazing."
and, not to brag, or anything, but they also built models of church buildings and told us all about them and all the problems their parishioners were having, or not having, because the roof caved in or the walls were too high or there wasn't a wall where one might have been. i sat there with my mouth hanging open the whole time because they understand more about church buildings than most people do and especially because they kept bringing their explanations back to what would be best for the people inside or outside the church buildings because that is what really matters--the people.
in other news
my new year's resolution may have been about not trying to carry in too much stuff from the car so i won't drop things in the snow or mud. that is the way this year is turning out anyway.
so i gave up straining my eyes for lent. which is as much to say that i finally went to the eye doctor
he said this will only sting a little. and then when i complained he said he couldn't very well tell me that it was going to hurt like hell.
he said i am farsighted which means i've been fooling myself by compensating, and that if i would just relax i'd realize that i can't really read the words without a little help.
ouch.
happy valentine's day again.
lurv.
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14 de Enero 2008
apollo, geez.
like some mythic creature, angry, disheartened and volatile
like a stirred pot that bubbles, boils, toils-
trouble
that is how i am these days.
conversation on race and i speak about my hard won white skin, hardened, burning itching, aching, tingling like a sun burn, all the time.
skin is meant to protect us but it is so fragile, even the dull knives are dangerous (even if it is overcast you still get burned). i've hated my skin just like you have hated yours, but let's not compare heartache for once. damnit.
skin can't really protect us. nothing can.
i can't possibly take care of you, why would you think anyone can take care of anyone? are you that hopeful still? why don't you just be hopeful and i'll be, well, not as hopeful as you and that will just have to do for now.
usually honesty is a really lonely, dark place.
and though you come to me afterward and let me hug you and you thank me for being inarticulate with you
i just don't know what to do next.
all the things i thought would kill me are not killing me. the disagreements and yelling matches and embarrassing thoughts and holes in the floor that i thought i'd fall through, that i feared you would look through, are just sort of happening and i can't stop them and i'm still here.
the self i have is a brightly colored self with a large dangerous beak for cracking tough nuts and
it is rapidly wildly going up in flames. which is not bad but quite a spectacle in my humble opinion.
and the wings we always wanted, what of those? well, ouch.
somewhere there is a god who sees all this happening and laughs gently, i have just enough faith to believe: God laughs.
perhaps God is loyal, i don't know.
but lets not kid ourselves, i've become pretty damn ballsy lately and if i can make it through another turn of the planet, that will be good.
i always thought superman was kind of stupid, i mean just going out in the sun, is that all it takes? just go out in the light and everything will be fine? seems like its too easy and yet it wasn't always easy enough. that is stupid.
it isn't easy. it is never easy. you know what happens to people who go too close to the sun.
what a bitch.
seminary can be a real bitch some, er, most of the time.
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20 de Diciembre 2007
I Hate Christmas.
and that is OK.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 11:52 AM | TrackBack
10 de Diciembre 2007
i'm right
where i'm supposed to be.
and that doesn't happen very often.
and i know this because i am somehow finally able to write essays again. and it really (and i'm being honest now so proceed cautiously)
it really doesn't matter to me if the professors like the essays because i am getting to the bottom of things and feeling satisfied by the way the paragraphs end. the titles make me hopeful and the last paragraphs make me stop and then i want to read the whole thing over again even though i just spent two weeks writing it.
i am finally getting the writing done.
and the good grades might be nice but i think it was better than an A today when we got into the church van to leave the motel ministry and PHoff raised both fists triumphantly in the air and proclaimed, "I love my job!" and i felt partially responsible because i was the one who told him it was his turn to read a story and when he asked if he was in charge of singing i said, "yes, yes you are."
and i'll be damned if we didn't sing every single Christmas song he could think of, plus away in a manger because he looked at me like i ought to have more singing to do.
so, remember bitchbitchbitch and i was sure i would never finish? well i did it. you can read it in the extended entry.
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7 de Diciembre 2007
add
vent:
it has been a terrible week. the kind of week that comes so close to Christmas.
things are so much worse in December: it is colder and people are trying so hard to buy the right thing, send the right card, not eat too many cookies, not burn down the house, feed and clothe the homeless.
so you lost your advent calendar? perfect. here is what you do: just go into the kitchen and each night before bed open up a different cabinet door, or open up a different box (cereal crackers cookies). your life is an advent calendar; open another door today and peek inside at who is hiding behind it. wake up and open your eyes. who is there today? day seven is about to end, what did you find behind another door day?
advent is my favorite part of this whole Christmessy time.
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25 de Noviembre 2007
bitchbitchbitch
i have very little sympathy for myself, so i am abusing the internet.
here is today's impossible assignment:
Final Essay: Living Faithfully in a Postmodern Cultural Context
After reading Bauman’s Liquid Modernity, students select one the book’s five main themes (Emancipation, Individuality, Time/Space, Work, or Community) and write an 800-1,200 word essay. The essay will help readers appreciate the implication of the postmodern turn and gain a fresh vision for faithful Christian living in this cultural context. The essay should be aimed at the readership of Christianity Today/Relevant Magazine. Students will each have approximately 10 minutes to present their essay.
Due: December 4, 2007
it begins to seem like a problem poetry cannot solve.
i could just drop out, and do something important like pregnancy.
and then i hear a friend's voice:
"quit being such a baby; you're in graduate school"(insert footnote)
(chalk one up for all my favorite mistakes and the lessons we learned along the way.)
will i one day tell myself:
"quit being such a baby; the baby needs you"?
that is what i am afraid of
and they wonder why i don't have kids of my own...
this goddamn paperwritingbullshit, its making me crazy.
oh, and just for the record: remember second grade when i punched Matt in the face? well, i think he might be a doctor one day and that makes him a either smarter or stupider than i am... but what i'm trying to tell you is that i sort of feel the same way now that i did then: just really stupid
and i'm not really sure that this is all happening because i'm not really capable of something like that or like this, am i?
awhell.
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13 de Noviembre 2007
orphanwidowstranger skanksgibbing
I'm at my favorite place in greenwood, Chocolati. it is the chocolate place, not a coffee place. Molly, the chocohottie (that is what it says on her business card under manager) just told one of her customers that she is next to use the bathroom because she is "here working and he is here just sitting around being Jewish."
somebody shouted out, "he has to work pretty hard to be Jewish, you know."
Friends from Cali visited on Sunday, it was so good to see them and get all the gossip from their glock-shooting combat boot wearing department of corrections YAHOO! using nine computer household dashboard satellite navigation system perspective.
Yes, i have friends like that. they help me stay connected to my CCPOA roots. Not to say, everyone should have to feel the way it felt when Neal brought a gun into my apartment and I actually thought about my mortality for a split second when Martin pointed it at the kitchen cabinets where we keep the breakfast cereal (how often have I wanted to do that!?), even though I usually try to get very drunk in order to avoid thinking about a quick death by bullet to the brain.
So last night we pulled into our parking lot and the headlights pointed right at a huge pile of garbage. I think the garbage man avoided our building last week. And Martin says to me: "I hope we don't move back to Morgan Hill."
Talk about ambivalence! We miss our friends so much, but we just couldn't ever move back there. This is the strangest feeling.
I decided last night, with the help of Trader Joe's, that I can in fact make a skanksgibbing dinner even though I hate the holidays--that Target commercial with the Advent calendar doors opening on toy trains and table settings makes me really really upset.
We will invite our friends in the tradition of the MoHill Orphan Thanksgiving. But in the true Divinitybiblethumper spirit we will call it the Orphan widow stranger Skanksgibbing and play the Dune board game over and over until I win for once.
Just know that if you're reading this and you want some not-family company on 11/22 come to our new house and be ready for The Spice and maybe a gom jabbar in the jugular, if you're unlucky. Fear is the little mind killer.
I set my mind in motion.
In closing I will just say Molly is telling somebody about her birth control and everything, I love it here.
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26 de Octubre 2007
Good News!
every week we visit the kids whose parents are forced to use a local motel (named after a steak house: the black angus) for transitional housing.
And because we don't want to call it something boring like "motel ministry" we call it "Good News!" (exclamation mark mandatory).
And every week i love it (exclamation mark optional).
There is this one kid who can't be more than 6 years old and I swear he is God's little brother. But none of us can say his name right because we can't get past his speach impediment, so we don't really know what is going on...
We carved pumpkins last week and they had what some people would call "a wonderful time".
Pastor Hoffman said, "how did you show them Jesus?" or some other question that sounded like that but also more like something he would actually say.
And I told him that we just did what we thought would be fun. We just showed up and tried (granted, it wasn't very hard trying) to have a good time.
And I know Jesus was there, damn it. But I didn't say it just like that. And PHoff was pleased. I could tell by the look on his face. It was sort of this smiley, wiley, quiet wondering exactly how we all got on staff.
Martin started calling him that, PHoff, and I thought for sure he would put a gentle stop to that but instead he let me borrow a book called Don't Make Me Stop Now (underlining of title will have to remain implied). And before he let me run off with it he borrowed my orange highlighter (seminarian style) and wrote "PHoff" really big on the title page.
after he just read me this: "He looked at her hair streaming out of the window and congratulated himself on learning to love not who she was when he first met her but the woman she had become to him as he navigated all sorts of treacherous currrents in his own psyche, and he had told anyone who would listen to him that this was what real love was, a frequent and vigilant guaging of your own reality, constant calibrations to include your lover in th eworld that would surely overwhelm you if you let it remain yours alone."
In other news,
we bought a house and it is a fine little house. The original owners, who only recently moved out, hung little rocks from the limbs of a small tree in the backyard. They are like Christmas tree decorations, only different. Most of all, it has a white picket fence, just a little bit of one, along the neighbors' driveway. I think I will just leave it alone until one day it falls over onto our neighbors' car and that will be that, I suppose.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 8:34 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
31 de Mayo 2007
revenge
so the bees are dying. but one huge one just came in the apartment (did you know I don't believe in shutting the screen door? well, I don't.)
and even though martin doesn't believe in karma, he keeps talking about it... like when something really fair happens it is as though he has just sighted a rare species of rat.
all i'm saying is that i have been stung so many times by bees that i think next time i may have a highly allergic reaction or just swat it away like a mosquito. no one can say.
so it is slightly nice to hear that they are not doing well... but of course here i am mired in ambivalence.
violent ambivalence:
i want the bees should all go to hell, damn them.
but also, that their furry little asses would hold still and just be OK for once.
i don't know. i don't know. is there karma for bees?
they probably have their own saint, it is probably francis, so you know it is a good one.
what do you have to do to get a saint, is there a weight requirement?
what is worse, I have finally figured out that there is one person on the earth that i hate more than all the others.
there, i said it.
pastor hoffman asked me how my swear jar is coming along.
he is a man full of great questions. i really admire him.
sometimes i think i should have a mean thoughts jar... and i ought to put in a coin every time i have a really mean thought and then i could anonymously send the money to the person i hate and i could tell myself, "If they only knew what all that money really means..!" because it would be nice to quantify my hatred and then package up the data and enclose a note that says: this is exactly what i owe you, this is exactly how much you are worth, this is exactly how heavy you ought to be, this is exactly, but exactly how very much i hate you, no more, no less. maybe we would all be very much relieved to have it finally documented and out there in an understandable tangible communicable form.
and do you think it would be enough to pay off the house? nah, because i don't even have that much to begin with so it really puts all that hate into perspective... i mean, i don't think i have enough to really buy the farm or anything like that, but man oh, man i sure do have enough to make it worth while.
as for you and your house: i love you,
whoever you are who reads this and sometimes pretends not to because i know i can tell you whatever i want and you won't write back about bad grammar.
if i get a small box of pennies in the mail because you think i am abusing the internet and my privileges as an english speaker and you hate me for it, i'll just suppose it isn't that bad, because it could have been enough to buy a house but in the end it was just a box of pennies.
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9 de Abril 2007
i just might be the reason my professors are bartenders:
"this is what it is really like" (or "this is why we make good drunks"):
i am, at this very moment, sitting in class listening, watching the group presentations from our mission projects.
i feel impatient because we are all very busy listening to each other. and congratulating each other and its all painful.
how can all these people working for good grades and heartfelt thanks be so uncomfortable for me?
what if i don't "like" the presentation? then i am the outcast.
what if i don't offer gratitude and clap loudly? then i am missing all the wonderful work done all around me.
how can my opinion be wrong? why is this happening?
i feel mean and rude and closed off
am i just immature? because i don't want to do this anymore?
it is sort like a room full of bad poems... and they are not bad to the people who wrote them but they just don't say anything to me.
and that is OK, you know, in the anne lamott sense of OKness. but it doesn't FEEL OK.
i feel like i'm taking crazy pills.
so i went to feed the meter and get a drink of water. i will survive.
went to see anne lamott and she looks as beautiful as ever.
someone stood up at the microphone amidst the huge crown of anne-fans and said i have a problem with death and crucifixion at easter, can you talk a little about that?
and she did.
she said that we need to understand our spiritual identities.
all i know is:
i don't think i should go to the tulip festival because i would just want to lie on the tulips and that would crush them.
especially a yellow tulip with one red petal.
so much depends on one red petal.
it is all quite frustrating.
and now a (wholenother) confession:
i was supposed to anoint people at the easter vigil by wiping oil liberally across and down their faces.
i didn't, i stood there with my whole head dripping oil, it was getting in my eyes and i couldn't see very well. i crossed their foreheads liberally rather than slathering them up and down with the sign of Christ.
i was supposed to tell them
"in remembrance of your babtism ... you bear the sign and seal for the kingdom of God."
but instead i said "you are signed and sealed..." so
that night i was lying in bed wondering why it had sounded a little off and i realized
the answer to that question just happened to be
stevie wonder.
and how he has permeated the vernacular
i made it sound like they were entering the kingdom of motown as if they will meet st. peter and tell him "here i am baby, signed sealed delivered."
Father forgive me, i don't know what the hell i'm doing.
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25 de Marzo 2007
one friend undead, one too close to it.
so if you are keeping up with the blog you might already know:
i find myself attaching to people now.
i used to be able to avoid this but now i can't help it.
attachment is like a new wilderness to me and instead of disposing with people, i find myself hugging them, like a bafoon, wrapping my arms around over their shoulders or placing my hands on their shoulder blades (where the wings would go) and pulling them close to me.
today is my niece's fifth birthday. i bought her a pink wimple with silk flowers around the edge and asked her to tell me how many she thinks i love her. she said 14. i told her she was wrong and held her close and rocked her on the kitchen floor until she laughed and said "100!"
i don't know what that means but i'll bet she does.
then her little sister came in with the fuzzy pajamas on and we shouted good night to each other until their mother kicked me out of the house (as politely as she could manage) i don't blame her.
it is just that when we truly connect it is sort of wild and unstoppable.
i don't think i like this new abigail who was definitely not functioning properly when i heard on thursday that the parish administrator (one of my new favorite people) had been sent to the hospital to get staples in his head. when i saw him today i think we were both surprised that i was touching him, actually HUGging him (i'm not the type to hug, you see). i stopped hugging him and then martin hugged him and i thought O. God, who are we hugging all over this poor man?
why am i so attached to my friend darren? of course he is an amazing person: fun, helpful, graceful, wise, loving, gentle... all the good things. but that is not enough reason, or so i tell myself.
there is something in me that cares more now. my mother in law said that she saw me nurturing this weekend, she never knew how nurturing i could be. this is probably because i have never been as nurturing as i could be.
i think i need one of those name tags with the blue edges that says "Hello, I'm"
and i will write: "not prone to caring or connecting or attachment but you never really know." in the white space, as if it is my identity and you never knew before... because we haven't yet met.
and i will wear it when i look in the mirror, to remind myself that i am capable of new things like hugging and attachment and (gasp) nurturing.
it is a good thing i gave up swearing for lent... otherwise i wouldn't have said any of this... the entire entry would have been two words
one of them holy and the other not.
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21 de Marzo 2007
rcl
stands for revised common lectionary.
which will probably be the end of abigail as you know her.
i have also taken on certain ministerial responsibilities (checking up on my kids) that require(s) attending two holy communion services every sunday (I will have the liturgy memorized shortly; i am getting my fill of the body of christ-lemmetellya).
but strange things happen to me in church now. i am actually listening!
so i thought i would confess.
i have an idea that death is about movement away from me. my abuelito keeps telling me he is going to die. i told him to stop worrying about my faith and just get home to jesus...
but sometimes i tell myself someone is dead because i don't know what to do with their absence. i guess i'm just not afraid enough of death to avoid really pretending hard. the mourning is easier if i assume it will be final.
of course i have only done this with two people so far (i'm still young, you see).
and they both came back... and it has taken me two and half years to know what to do
enter rcl
i was wondering why i would want them to come back, why i would let them come back, why i wouldn't try harder to keep them, er... gone.
i am an idiot. that is why, that is the whole reason.
a complete *&$%ing numbskull.
most of you have heard the story about jesus being a sucker so i won't explain all that here. but i think i am closest to my call when i am at my most dumbest.
anyway, if you have been following the rcl, you know that last week was all about the prodigal son. and i realized
my friend who was lost has been found.
and i wished he was dead and i wanted it to be final but i kept my ear to the ground and my eye to the horizon and a figure finally moved a little closer than usual, the waves of heat obscured the vertical line on the horizon and i saw, as he moved closer, that he was on his knees the way ancient pilgrims approached a sacred place.
and i like a fool was hopinghopinghoping. like a drunkard, i was stumbling and slurring and misunderstood over and over again.
today is my birthday, of course, so i have annuals on my mind... three years from now we will be back to the week after the return of prodigal son and i will be back to singing happy birthday to myself (really quietly the way my abuelito likes to do--i was singing "they say its your birthday! nananananana!" alone, while i put away laundry last night and martin caught me... it was sort of funny, but altogether ridiculous and perhaps to be avoided in the future, when i am older and wiser.)
as i chalk up the lectionary passages the epiphanies come with punctuated equilibrium... like the good times, the births and deaths, the birthdays and holy days and bad days.
and i thought you should know, just so you know
i'm just saying is all.
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27 de Febrero 2007
i gave up swearing for lent so it is difficult to describe to you how excited i am...
so i will just tell you and you will have to work it out and get worked up on your own.
it will be my birthday soon.
we are going to see the bodies exhibit (real human bodies!).
http://www.bodiestheexhibition.com/
the best part of this event is that my husband (a man who is heroic in all ways, if you ask me) told his parents that going to said exhibit, with them, would be my birthday wish.
if you had asked me what i wanted for my birthday i might have thought it was too crazy to say "bodieeeez!" out loud... i would have said 'oh, lets just go out to dinner' and then i would have suggested a restaurant where i could try to get a lettuce wedge (lettuce being my current favorite food). but cadavers and in-laws seem like the perfect way to spend a day, especially my birthday, don't you think?
i am serious.
think about the poetic quality of the whole thing...
it is going to be a(*&^%ing)mazing
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13 de Febrero 2007
tent city is leaving early
the nomadic homeless shelter is leaving a week earlier than expected. they have been on the front lawn of our church for almost 2 months and i think i'm really going to miss them. they are so sad and perfect and i think i learned more from them than i did from dan allender last semester... if you can believe that.
i'm going through a van morrison stage. it is like a bob dylan stage or a neil young phase, or a led zeppelin stage, only different.
somehow i am getting junkemail that is really really poetic. the subject lines seem to be the first lines of poems but i am too afraid that if i open it up it will just be an advertisement for a penis enlarger... so i just stick with the first line.
and that is a good metaphor.
a dear friend of mine is opting out of the class called prayer, discernment and listening (or something like that) to take a class on transferring photos to glass, which makes them a little easier to get at... talk about discern...
ha! another truly poetic moment.
it is pretty much raining poems here, like the way rumi claims that blessings fall all around us.
and when something is really true, i begin to wonder if the planes won't be able to land because the cloud cover is so thick with serendipity.
can you tell i am writing this from the cupcake place, where everything is usually at least sort of OK... at least you can get a damn good decaf americano and a sticker that suggests we rock out with our cupcake out or maybe: legalize frostitution.
(i love a good switcheroo of p with f, you know i do)
but for an update on my life as a lutheran:
they feed me almost every day, sometimes twice. i haven't been grocery shopping in quite a while. i suggest you all become lutherans and you can stop eating just beans for dinner...
a man from the ministry of funny walks just bought more cupcakes than he can carry and nearly stumbled over the man with the handcart carrying buckets of yellow sloshy egg stuff.
oh cupcake, cupcake, if you were a homeless man you would camp out on the front lawn and right now i would be like nina simone when she sings about loss and suffering because someone left you out in the rain.
oh, and happy valentine's day.
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1 de Enero 2007
a little unfinished business
thought you might want to see what we do at the so-called postmodern mars hill graduate school.
i'm posting it because i know it is awkward but it is good for me to give in to my faults. unfinished is better than not started when it comes to a book review.
i know for a fact that at least one of you, dear readers, has a well edited blog... and so you will have to bear the burden of upholding the language this time. my apologies and utmost respect go out to you.
Continue reading "a little unfinished business"
Posted by crymytinyflood at 11:01 PM | TrackBack
grade shmade
this is what is bad:
a paper good enough to turn in for a grade (all i really want is to pass)
is far from good enough to submit for publication (all i really want is to avoid embarassing myself).
and since i have to do the former but don't have to do the latter, i am not really ever going to publish anything i would stand behind 100%. but that was never the point, was it? you don't wait until you believe yourself to start writing. you don't wait until you believe yourself to finish a piece. some things are just true whether we believe in them or not. typos are true, grammatical errors are true, spliced commas (God bless them) are true. you really get a pretty accurate picture of how afraid someone is, how shy and ignorant and in need of grace someone is when they don't value their voice enough to at least word toward flow in an essay.
damnit.
you know exactly what i am talking about, don't just think to yourself that you should tell me i am being too hard on myself.
there will always be a part of me that thinks i can do better, or i should have done better.
all writing is an attempt to link the chain fence, tie the words together. but each sentence, each word can quickly turn into a failure. a 250 word essay assignment becomes a real test of courage.
what is the cure for perfectionism? one beer or two?
but the truth is that for all my courage, i didn't really pass my practicum class.
i graduated cum laude from undergrad and then with a 4.0 from my credential program despite moving around from school to school.
but i have not been promoted to my second practicum because i don't understand the weight of my words.
i get a pass, rather than a fail, for the class. but i'm not to take my second practicum until i figure out a way to understand that what i say matters.
i have to stop thinking that i am always talking shit if i want to finish this degree.
to perfect or not to perfect, that is the question.
why does each word function more like one of those pointy steak knives? in a perfect world they would strike like daggars and drama would reign... it would all be like for whom the bell tolls, we could use the formal and use the literal translations for the swears.
at least the drama feigns serious, which is better than the constant accidental comic relief i've been providing all semester.
...except for that one time dr. friesen cried (the jury is still out on whether or not it was my fault.)
there is a very thin line between taking myself too seriously (which assumes that i ought to be taken seriously) and not taking myself seriously enough (which assumes that no one else takes me seriously)
one minute i say something funny and the room explodes with the laughter of 75 overwrought seminarians, the next minute the professor is asking for a moment because my comment conjured up images of irrational violence against the Text.
how was i to know my comment would be taken so seriously? i was just confessing my confusion, i didn't expect anyone to enter in with me, and be so upset by what confuses me.
i guess i want to be taken seriously... i guess i want to be serious.
serious is a funky concept.
is it a face? a tone? a posture?
something that comes with age or experience? something behind the words that i can't control anyway? should i try to harness the ethereal serious, so it doesn't get out of control, just out of courtesy to others?
does lack of self-awareness make me (gasp) socially malfunctional?
[is malfunctional a word?]
when i think of the times i was supposed to be serious, they are times i just took a real gamble and said what i thought needed to be said--as if serious and important were the same thing. but i probably should have kept my mouth shut because usually what i thought really needed to be said came out sounding really funny. it can be quite comical when i get serious, i don't do it very well.
damn it.
its like the geico commercial: the lady describes a serious problem with serious face and tone... but then burt bacharach starts singing... and the song sounds kind of funny and serious but the words are so unexpected and yet so true... and that is why it is just so funny. so so so funny... i suggest you look it up on you tube...
http://youtube.com/watch?v=ERRzKNtRAfg
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29 de Diciembre 2006
feeling a little
ok
president ford (yeah, well, he avoided it at least twice... had a good run and all that)
james brown (jump back)
saddam hussein (but damn)
it has been a long week.
i have a window that looks out on the city of baghdad tonight, or (because my husband likes to channel surf during commercials) across the street to eric cartman's house... or sometimes i watch cars crash into each other on the highway. all in the same hour i can watch prostitutes arrested, babies born, buildings explode, or bundt cake batter in a standing mixer in martha stewart's kitchen studio.
i know i'm not the only person allowing these images to tell me what to feel, or even how to feel it.
the question now is how to feel about this murder in particular.
i want to feel okay about punishment, sort of, i suppose...
but
i imagine a moment of silence... and then we all begin to hug each other. its over its over we're all supposed murmer, clutching, burying our faces in, the pin stripe shoulders which bear the burden of evening news. turn to the left and hug anderson cooper... and then just as quickly as anderson goes to commercial, i'm supposed to turn and gather the little starving sudanese boy into my arms. tell him its over its over, as if killing bad men, or at least this one, could solve all the world's problems.
makes you wish there was an all scrubs all the time channel. scrubs week on comedy central is really helping... maybe we should petition to get ... oh, nevermind...
how long did it take YOU to make the elliot-roseanne connetion?
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29 de Noviembre 2006
infant baptism
may have put me over the edge:
maybe i should get my mdiv.
my sister, the one who doesn't believe in the ordination of women told me i should just get it... so that is wierd.
i don't know though...
i have a year to decide.
should we take a vote?
Posted by crymytinyflood at 10:07 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
26 de Octubre 2006
it is pretty
damn cold here
(insert dipthongs at will)
Posted by crymytinyflood at 12:31 PM | TrackBack
29 de Septiembre 2006
well you had to go
hoping my fellow seminarians weren't assholes.
actually, i have been referring to them all as my bitches, even to their faces and i think they like it (i am from cali + they are from indiana = everycrazything i say = laughable), because they are not really assholes, they seem more capable of caring about what i say than flipping me off at any moment... but if i told them to flip me off... you can see where this is going.
oh and remember that night at labri that one guy woke up and played the piano at 2 in the morning?
i think i saw him at the seminary my sister wanted me to go to, so i guess that is where the assholes go to seminary in the great northwest.
moreover we have decided to make tee shirts that say things like
i was hermeneutered at mars hill
and
dr. dwight friesen: bringing the nude back to hermeneutics.
and all this just to try to keep the interest of our spouses... because when you get home at 6pm from your work as an eisegesis superpower the spouse is more likely to be interested in dinner than who you rescued today and that just feels downright awful. but if someone was naked... patrick (hatrick) and i just figured it might help.
but something completely expected did happen: there is a person who really doesn't want to be my friend anymore. she was part of the crew in morgan hill and now she says i owe her $81 because her dog bit me and well, according to her the friendship is off...
but i don't care if your dog bites me
can you believe the people i know? now you see why i am so jaded and i figure even having friends is ironic, much less "The Incarnational Relationship"
i am not mad at her, just really very confused (redundancy intended). if you want to read all about it you can go on her myspace and check it out: her name is brenna, she shouldn't be too hard to find (she wants to be found i imagine) but if you find it (hinthint juliana) feel free to post a link in the comments. i am the abagail of which she speaks--the names have been spelled incorrectly to protect the innocent, (or else maybe she just doesn't care about spelling... which may lead you to wonder exactly how we became friends) and some of the facts have been changed, i can only imagine why.
but for the record this is the second time i have been, as beyonce says, dissed on the internet, and the last time this happened it was cleared up with a couple phone calls and the offending party is now happily--as much as God intended anyone to be happy in marriage (did you read that book by gary thomas?)-- married and we are friends again. so if you really want to hate me go ahead but i don't hate you, because, well if you know the song, i'm a survivor: "my mama taught me better than that."
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24 de Junio 2006
if i am going to make a complete idiot
of myself, then this is a good place to start.
for the "mixed nuts fans": "No, Felix, a plan goes like this: first we do this, and then we do this, then we do this."
for the rest of you: you are just going to have to see the movie to really understand how important it is that you don't criticize the plan or ask too many questions because that whole criticism thing won't get you too far with me.
(I have, in the space of the last 30 days, yelled at the children's and families ministries committee at our church, told my boss that "there is a lot of work to be done and i am not doing any of it" and taken on the ticket scalpers in front of the San Francisco Giants ball park. So please note: i am not to be trifled with right now.)
i fly out on August (what a good name for a month, eh?) first and find a place to live.
then i come back and then we drive up and then we come back. then we pack the truck and drive up again, and stay there for at least three years. Please come and visit, it will be very nice to have you!
somehow in that time i will, hopefully, be magically transformed, in my sleep, perhaps, into someone who is brave enough to either make babies, teach school again or send work in for publication.
Martin, because he is so brilliant, can work for the newspaper or go to seminary that is yet to be decided. he does not feel obligated to explain it all and when i get to be as smart as he is, maybe i won't explain myself either - explaining gets me in a lot of trouble.
this is mostly all the information i have
please remember: i am a teacher; i am not in the business of answering questions, not really anyway, rather i am highly trained in doing just the opposite.
(what is that, confounded?)
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4 de Marzo 2006
not good
here is a list:
Saturday morning
last week
here is something i have been thinking about
the town where i work is very strange to me.
the word got out that there is this great new teacher at Little Sonshine Preschool, (the school that comes most highly recommended by St. Catherine's which is, in turn, the school i have chosen as a sworn enemy because of its robbing parents and traumatizing my students and then sending them back to me)
one mother came in to my boss and very gravely stated, "Bradley must have Mrs. Jimenez next year."
but then the story takes a turn:
Later that day...
I was informed that a certain little bird, we will call her P.K.C., (aren't those amazing initials? her name is even more poetic but we must protect it... you can't just have it because you like it) has informed her mother that she is "gonna get my nose pierced too." She meant "too" as in conjuction with her recent ear piercing, not as an act of solidarity with her highly recommended teacher.
Something funny:
if you start to call Ella The Ella Bird, and Kayla The Kayla Bird, and Payton the Payton bird... soon the other students, like Hayden Spiderman, will call them that and they are no longer students, but now these wondrous creatures flying past and landing to eat out of your hand... So Hayden Spiderman has decided that is what they are... and you know you have to give him credence because he can draw the most amazing trains and he knows how to have a good time, too.
Something Good:
Miss Jessica, yes she is a bird but more like a miss at three years old, was screaming (again). But there is a trick that works on her so watch carefully. you sit down and say to her "tell me who loves you." and it stops, the screaming just stops. and there you have your miracle for the day.
I think we will start to answer the phone by saying, "yes, I'm very busy and important, what do you want?" even if that movie is going out of style... and Hugh Grant is a womanizer, we like the idea.
At worship practice we were singing something and the words came out "that jew" instead of "that you" and I made the annie hall joke ("I don't know, jew eat, not did you, but jew, jew eat?") and Daniel Dupre, our minister most sinister, looked me square in the face and said, "you are mean." At last! we have touched down to reality. On the weeks that I sing for them the congregation comes to tell me nice things, and I think, for a moment, they have forgotten how mean I am. That is all I can figure out about that. It stuns me to hear them say, "you have such a sweet spirit" and "that was so beautiful" or one dad said to me "that was awful, just awful, I nearly cried, don't do that again." Have you heard the song Babe in the Straw? That is the one that made him nearly cry. But it was Christmastime and I hate Christmastime... not Christ mass, per se, but Christmastime makes me feel very very mean. The real lyrics are "Prince of the Universe," but I nearly sang Prince of the early birds, just because I was feeling like I knew better--Jesus is just as much Prince of the early birds, isn't He? And anyway the children's minister and church secretary had goaded me on.
and the truth is that i am not trying to be nice or sweet. and when i was supposed to give my testimony to the elders so i could join the church i sat there and told them that i didn't want to be a member at all, i wanted to get a little closer to figuring out why this whole membership thing doesn't really work and i certainly wouldn't want to try to fix things or get all involved in a congregation with problems but it is more like signing on to a family and making a commitment because it is good for my spiritual development to commit to something, God damn it.
So you see i am not pretending to be some nice person. or any of that hooey.
i just don't know. do people like someone so brutally straightforward?
oh, stay tuned for news of the continuation of the graduate school education... the letter arrived, pretty soon i'll get the courage to open it up.
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21 de Febrero 2006
flagrant use of blog for preservation of language
there is no such thing as normalcy, not on any philisophical or practical scale, nor is there a place for this kind of mess in the English language. It is, to use another word widely (wildly?) misused supposed to be right but it is not correct. The truth is you can't run around changing the way words are used when it isn't for any good reason.
Sure, if it was funny sounding or clever or there was some double meaning... but not, especially not, if you are otherwise attempting to impress.
I don't claim to know it all. In fact I should confess that I am still not sure when to use laying and lying, or lay and lie... and it is disconcerting
but nobody paid me and my editor large sums of money to get it right-at least not yet. And when they do, you just better tell them not to pay me by the hour.
merciful heavens.
I am hacking my way through A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius and I wanted to stab myself in the leg with a salad fork when I found the aforementioned mistake. The book depends, absolutely, on his... well, to loosely quote Captain Amazing: "knowing that you know I knew you knew."
but it all falls apart: the theme that he is smart enough to write a brilliant book despite dropping out of college, the clever relationship he spent so much time building in the first funny few pages... it is what the book is about. (Sorry if you thought the book was a story of two brothers... I am just not buying that.)
It all comes crashing down with a simple editing foible.
So excuuuse me if I have lost respect so early in the book, but if you are out there Dave Eggers, and you care about the language, you will send me a little comment promising
"it won't happen again." Copy and paste it if you'd like, maybe you are one of those writers who secretly wants to take it all back but you pretend not to care. In any case, don't even apologize, just promise.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 8:23 AM | TrackBack
8 de Febrero 2006
for mary
did they mean to break the applicants in half, or to see if we could take the torque?
of course I might get in. of course it is the school I want to go to. but the interview didn't make me cry and now I want to know if it was supposed to. or maybe they are just playing the odds that if I don't cry at the interview, they can just wait until I get the rejection letter. either way it seems pretty cruel.
after it was all over, and I couldn't do anything more to win over admissions, there was mary.
after I drove my old friend to her house in the U district. there she was, this tiny warrior sitting in the car, face bent toward her hands and I know she was smiling when she told me "oh abigail you have so much to learnasdoI."
I went to the interview thinking it was for graduate school, but maybe it was for Mary...
just to hear her wisened little voice lilt across the words to answer the question.
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10 de Enero 2006
poet
mary oliver read her poem: "wild geese" on city arts and lectures
and i like the part about "soft animal body".
that was good and i thought
poetry poetry poetry poetry poetry poetry poetry
what a crazy tree
and then i walked to my front door. the dog downstairs is named karma, and she barks, but only if you deserve it.
i think maybe i will tell the admissions people that i am really going back to grad school because the cat who lives here likes to eat my essays fresh from the bubble jet printer and i think it is God's way of explaining things.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 8:39 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
23 de Diciembre 2005
Christmisshoo
on the topic of whether to laugh or cry over blood and skin, wine and bread turning into gin and birthday cake: this is what we call a not problem. At preschool we laugh raucously until our giant heads cause us to fall off our chairs, hit a body part on the table and then we "cry real hard." It is all very well choreographed.
there are a few answers that usually work;
try these on:
(first one)
"Hey teacher, what are panthers made of?"
"Tell me what you think."
"MMMlegs and claws and whiskers and stuff, huh teacher?"
(second one)
"Teacher, Uyen is crying."
"I know, did you ask her why?"
They always know why the one is crying. And I mean always. I never know what the hell is going on but everytime I ask them about each other the answers pop up, and they are undeniably correct answers. It took me a few months to test this theory but now that I am faced with two weeks away from them I am really at a loss.
Hanging out at the local ChuckECheese's, hoping a few might pop in on dates with dads may have worked but Mr. Cheese won't have any beers for me so I think I might be better off at Mr. Jimenez' house.
otherwise Christmas and the missyou issue usually go hand in hand and I am getting used to this. And anyway, even preschoolers know laughing and crying can take turns.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 10:11 AM | TrackBack
11 de Noviembre 2005
quetzal
definition of resplendent
Resplendent Quetzal
Pharomachrus mocinno costaricensis
Photography © Mason Fischer, All Rights Reserved
Courtesy International Expeditions, Inc.
"Quetzal is derived from the Aztec words for birds feathers, precious and beautiful. The size of a small, pigeon-like bird, the male owns an amazing meter-long tail along with a short head crest, and red breast. Although the female is duller in color and with no tail plumes, both sexes head, back and wings are emerald green. This allows the bird to blend with the foliage of the cloud forest where it lives.
... Its diet consists mainly of wild figs, avocados, insects, small frogs and lizards. Drinking water is obtained from the base of bromeliads. When the bird detects an intruder, it will sit motionless for long periods of time. When further threatened, it will let out an alarm cry, that is a harsh weec-weec sound accompanied by quickly flicking its tail feathers like a fan every second."
During courtship, the males will perform spiraling skyward flights, then dive back to the canopy. Between March and June, paired quetzals use rotten tree stumps for nests, in the lower part of the forest canopy but never on or near the ground; favoring those stumps with holes made by other birds or animals. They usually produce two eggs that are light blue in color. The work of nest building, incubation and care of the young are shared by the pair. The area around the nest tree is protected by the male sounding a two-toned whistle which he repeats every 8 to 10 minutes in the morning and again at dusk."
http://www.costaricaexpeditions.com/gallery/wildlifegalle/quetzal.html?1
Salinger was right, you can't just turn your back on poetry, as if it isn't everywhere.
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2 de Octubre 2005
we arrived at Brenda's book party just as Lynn (Hejinian? it was hard to tell, she had a pair of big brown glasses on) was asking some very difficult questions and I thought of some of you defending theses.
and yet the answers came easily to B.
She said it took six months just to order them and still she thinks of them as marbled, that you can read them in any order. She said each line stands alone (which you will appreciate more when you see how much black and white is on each page.)
When she was done answering all the questions Bob told everyone that we ought to rearrange ourselves so that more people could hear better which was my cue to stand up and step over some very annoying people who thought they had to laugh out loud at every one of B's poetry jokes. And then I realized only natural thing for me to do was sit down under the table with the veggie platters. This is what it is to be a very small poet: you sit under the table among the clearance books and laugh silently, to yourself.
She said the seamstress is knitting together the clouds, a seamstress: a maker against war. A maker against the war, as if, well, a certain other maker is otherwise occupied. (no real pun intended.)
I should tell you that B memorized the 23rd psalm as a child but rewrote it more recently-it is on page 14 and right before she read it she said "The Bible needs a little rewriting as an epic." I congratulated myself for not taking offense when she insists each time I talk to her that I need my MFA, if only so I can rewrite my poems. she wears a cross and a Figa on one chain around her neck, she said the Figa "is kind of a fuck you to the devil."
But the favorite poem today, before I go stand in a long line for Communion Sundaes intinction, is the poem called "White Fir Description" because I usually hate white fir trees but I have heard God's forgiveness is for everyone.
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19 de Septiembre 2005
for the trees.
I lived in the forest a long time now I miss it... the trees: the forest for the trees.
The Oaks that twist, pinching bits of skin on the yellowing hillsides, do not offer to hold in the clouds like Redwood trees can.
And it feels as if you have to try harder to stay on the ground, there is so much sky trying to get at you.
The nice thing is that the moon isn't quite so often ducking behind the branches, only once or twice behind the hill as it rises and Martin says: ah ha, we are gaining on it... It is as if he is slowly remembering a good dream.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 9:38 PM | TrackBack
12 de Septiembre 2005
If you can't
say anything nice, then you are probably Basque like me. I boycotted the Passion of the Christ because I don't need that.
The Savior, in my imagination, sweats like bleeding and when I am at my angriest shaking and wild from eye to eye I can figure most of this out, on my own.
In all honesty, I should confess: I am not yet sick of The Last Temptation of Christ because I like to hear Harvey Keitel frustrated with Willen Dafoe: "I'm not like them." I have already been reprimanded for really liking this movie, so if you were headed down that path consider it well worn, and keep in mind I come from good sheep-herding/ Pyreneese stock.
Don't mind me, you know I nearly ruined my copy of Sayers' Creed or Chaos? from overuse; I'm not afraid of drama. But if we were supposed to be working it out with fear and trembling this whole time, why were we surprised by the impact of the violence? I am particularly proud of a certain Children's Minister who is notorious for crying at church staff meetings. She admitted to me today that she fell asleep while the subtitles flashed across the passion, and it isn't due to lack of interest or lack of emotional involvement. In fact she blames a glass of wine.
And speaking of chaos...I don't have children of my own and I'm not sure I ever will. I do have 40 four year olds who bring me their broken expectations and their untied shoelaces and their faces angry and knotted by injustice. It is my reminder of even the tiniest scrapes on the back of the man who made it clear that these expectations and this faith are our way to an understanding of our place in His kingdom.
So I pull out a pink kleenex and smear around some salty tears while we wait for the clumpy eyelashes to dry and sing "deep and wide, there's a fountain flowing deep and wide." And I'll be damned if we don't all throw ourselves into it with wide arms and wide eyes everytime.
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10 de Septiembre 2005
untie
There is this new show: Weeds.
An ironically accurate Showtime comedy about the suburbs of California. I know we can't all live here, that is okay, I was born in Alaska... you never know where you will end up.
Every town I live in has one favorite road.
Vallejo: Arkansas St.
Occidental: Bohemian Hwy.
Lake Forest Park: Lake City Way
Edmonds: Hwy 99
Santa Cruz: Mission St.
Moraga: Let's be serious, there was only one road out of there.
San Francisco: Mission St.
San Martin: New Ave.
Gilroy: Watsonville Rd.
I drive Watsonville Rd. everyday to work. It ties you around a few hills and runs up in the valley curved like the hand of God. And everyday I am reminded
I have one thing to learn today: I can't run away; Untie myself and just hold still.
You know how children can be, they run to you and it is like a gosling flying into your face. I love to watch my students run away from me. The motion of it rocks me to sleep, the rhythm of it throbs against my chest. I wait for them to disappear around the corner of the building and I wonder what God is doing whenever I spin on one heel and sprint. He must be as sure as I am that in another moment I will stop.
No matter what road I am on, at the end of the night I will stop where the two hills cleave together to make the creek lie down and listen for His crickets also throbbing, slowly but loudly, to keep me sure of Him.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 7:51 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
6 de Septiembre 2005
pookas
My wedding ring is designed to minimize spin on the finger.
Last night Martin told me "I've got the girl who pulls her earlobe." I usually get around to that point, you know.
Joel asked me if I still get the spins when I drink. I asked him if he checks to see if his teeth go numb- that is my favorite way to tell. Earlier he bet me three dollars that Zephaniah is not a book in the Bible, but it wasn't fair because I didn't tell him that one of my favorite verses is in that particular book. Staying with Boo and Joel is good because they don't really wake up until I arrive and then we have champagne and beer and whiskey and pizza, in that order. And when it is time to get to work there is a great deal of cleaning and organizing and putting tiny little things where she thinks they should go and then maybe more beer and finally MeeKrab (should I worry about spelling it in English?) and then back to champagne. It is a sort of cycle I need every once in a while to keep myself sane so it is good that they are back where I need them. Joel is right, you have to find communion where you can.
Exactly how much can you prepare for? Rings spinning, heads spinning, signals for I want to go home, tapping your teeth when you are sober just so you know what it ought to feel like, marrying an MDiv doesn't mean you will win every bet about prophets.
I got a new student today. His mom told me that if I find any pookas she would be glad to fill in. It means if there are holes in the snack calendar I should call her. Her little boy, just turned four, told me to be careful, a centipede had crawled into the grass near my feet. I told him I'd keep my eyes open. He told me: don't even blink.
Does a cycle always have a pooka? Does it always spin?
Posted by crymytinyflood at 10:14 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
1 de Septiembre 2005
Brenda says
i'm having a book party on sept 27 at 5 30 in berkeley-- university press books on bancroft and telegraph-- please come! yay for poetry-- xobrenda
and also this whole long thing for all of you in California:
dear friends, this is from real brenda, not a form letter; but please forgive the group mail and the bcc addresses-- some people don't want their addresses out there.
i have been involved in an effort on behalf of codepink (and all of california) to try to lobby our state assemblypersons to author or co-author a resolution to bring home the national guard from iraq (i am attaching a copy of the proposed resolution and one of several letters i'm sending as follow up-- yours will be different).
a few weeks ago, some of us went to sacramento and spoke to our state assembly person, senators or staff. we took the information about the national guard to them, and we took copies of the resolution. we were encouraged to continue.
we have just learned that assemblyperson loni hancock has agreed to co-author a resolution if (and only if) we can find 15 other assemblypersons to help her. we/ code pinkists know of five assemblymembers who look like they are willing, but they could use some phone calls and letters to encourage them. and others need to be contacted from 'scratch.'
i am hoping that you will become ''instant activists'' even if you are busy or shy and make that phone call or two. or even more... send some letters, priority mail, soon!.
i hope some of you who live in the following areas, or who **know** people in the following areas, will please pick up the phone and make one phone call (or more) to your assemblyperson who might co-author this resolution. it's a bit scary, but if i can do it, you can do it! (pasted from code pink:)
keep reading, California birds.
Continue reading "Brenda says"
Posted by crymytinyflood at 7:29 PM | TrackBack