photo update

I've abandoned let myself off the hook for the Photo-A-Day project but I'll keep throwing things up there as they come. Here are a few new ones.

Stuff

Randomness abounds since I last posted. Here's a catchall to bring you up to date.

I finished finals on Dec. 8. It coincided nicely with the demise of my computer on Dec 7. Really. It's not like I wanted to turn those papers in on time or anything. Actually, I did manage to retrieve the papers and turn everything in with four hours to spare, saw clients all afternoon, worked the next morning at the holiday party for our kids (where I work) and then, as everyone drove out of the parking lot after cleaning up, I had the moment of letdown where you realize everything you've been pushing for has passed and now you don't know what to do with yourself. I went back to bed for three more hours that afternoon. When Monday arrived, it was time to deal with the computer and the Insurance Saga of trying to get a referral to a physical therapist to deal with a back injury from September (that story is long and involved and I will save it for another post).

Anyhow, it's 10 days past finals and I finally feel as if I've let go a little bit and am starting to feel relaxed. I'm heading home on Thursday for a week and Goat is flying up on Sunday, wish him luck for spending a week with my family in the great, drippy Northwest.

In other assorted, random news, I went to Goat's company holiday party at a bowling alley in Hollywood last night -- I've never been to a bowling alley with a dress code and a full bar (I bowled while drinking a Cosmopolitan and eating coconut shrimp). Also, in completely unrelated random news, in a short poll of the other interns at my site, between the 15 of us we speak at least 11 languages fluently: English, Spanish, Armenian, Russian, Romanian, Mandarin, Korean, Taiwanese, French, Italian, and some Indian language related to Hindi that I hadn't heard of. Other staff also speak Farsi and Hebrew. Only in LA.

Religion Soup

I am having issues with religion these days. Not really faith so much... somehow I'm OK with doubt as a part of faith, and the idea that God's not freaking out about it nearly as much as I am (or at least as much as I was most of last year). But religion is turning into another issue entirely. I have to admit I'm usually at a loss for words in describing how all of it fits together; Goat called the other night, and I was in the middle of thinking about all of it and I was crying, and he asked what was wrong, and after I attempted to assure him it was nothing he had done, or not done, I simply replied that it was part of my religion soup.

The truth is, I do not know much about how to be a Christian here, in my life anymore. I am no longer in a community that shares a common language, and can talk until the cows come home about theological issues, and agree at the end of the day that we (think we) understand God and how he works in the world. The real truth is, so much of my life as a Christian has been about knowing how to talk about it. Yeah, I really do think that I have been part of communities that tried to live out what we intellectualized, but when that part was hard, we settled with being able to articulate and conceptualize it, and feel better, feel like we had a handle on things. But now, I can't divert to talking about it when it gets confusing and difficult. I get... stuck. So I pout. Real mature, I know. But I'm stuck. If I knew how to do it any differently I would.

But I don't want to go back to being able to articulate everything. I'm OK without all the answers. I'm stuck, but I'd like to think I'm stuck because I'm bushwhacking forward. When I got off the phone with Goat, he was concerned whether I was OK. "OK, yeah. Of course." I said. "I'm emotional, but emotional doesn't mean 'not OK'."

Anyhow, I know I'm sort of becoming the one-woman Anne Lamott fan club (maybe I should bill her for the publicity), but I found her archive on Salon.com and I pick through it when I feel stuck, mostly because I find her approach to Christianity refreshing. I liked her a lot before I came to Fuller, and bought Traveling Mercies for everyone I know, but she's like water in a dry land in the midst of systematic theology hell. Here's the one I read today, which is helping calm me down enough to write my last systematics paper. Systematics is just way too... removed. She reminds me that Jesus is about something a lot more applicable than being able to articulate a coherent view on the providence of God in the face of the problem of evil and suffering.

Stop reading me. I'm babbling. Go read Anne. Go.

Advent-urous

I went to my friend Freya's church for the second time this weekend... I think I am finally at a point where I'm doing pretty well, and am able to go and hang out, and observe, and not freak out about needing to feel like I fit in somewhere right away. That makes me a lot less judgmental than I was most of last year, where I spent most of my time not talking to people because I thought that either they wouldn't like me or I wouldn't like them (which, when you don't really give people a chance, tends to make for a self-fulfilling prophecy).

Anyhow, Freya's church is really interesting... there are only about 15-20 people there any given Sunday, and they all have dinner together beforehand. Then they go over to this other room, and everybody picks out some sort of rhythm instrument, and they have this big, giant, drum-circle type worship. There are a lot of artists there, and last night one guy did this photo/painting during the service, which I happen to find so beautiful that I almost cry just looking at the thumbnail. Then they have art stuff set up in the corner, paints and chalk and oils and such, and you can wander over and do artwork during the service if you want.

This was the first Sunday of Advent, and I'm glad I went to church. It's one of the few seasons (the other being Easter) where we have any sense of tradition or ritual in the Protestant church, any sense of marking the time and seeing ourselves, collectively, as part of a larger picture. I don't really know why I love advent, in fact, most of my memories about it involve fighting over who got to light the candles. But I like being reminded to slow down and wait. Advent is about waiting. I used to like to think alot about hope and waiting. Now I'm a little busier living, instead of always thinking. According to Christian tradition, advent is about recalling the anticipation of the birth of Christ, and anticipating a day when he returns. Somebody last night said he tried to think about what Mary would feel like, waiting for the baby to be born. I said I thought she would want foot rubs every night, and somebody to bring her food to her on the couch in the living room.

Those two anticipations seem very different though. One is about reliving anticipation that achieved relief. The second anticipation is about waiting on something that seems so crazy you can hardly believe anybody really thinks it might happen. Waiting on something you want that may be a long-shot in the universe. This year, for me, both faith-wise and otherwise, advent is not so much about reliving anticipation for things that are already here. It's about waiting for things, things you wonder if your heart might break in two without, and not really being sure if they will ever come.

Sorta smart, sorta not

I was tutoring tonight, and usually I work on math with my student. But tonight he didn't have math, he just had history. Not exactly my best subject, but I figured, hey, he's 11, I'm sure I can handle it. Well, his assignment was just to highlight a bunch of stuff in his textbook. So, I sat there and watched him do it - really earning my keep here. He was reading about the Mycenaeans (n.b. I just had to look them up on Wikipedia to find out who they were). Anyhow, at one point, he looks up from his reading and asks whether the whole Trojan Horse thing was real, or just a story.

I didn't know what to say. History, in all it's glorious factitudity (n.b. also not sure if that's a word), escapes me.

Of course, I covered it up by telling him to read the text and see if he could find the answer. I may not know the answer but I know how to fake it, and that's gotta be more than half the battle.

Love, Nerd-Style

OK, so I know I am a former math nerd and may be the only person (other than Andrew, who sent me the link) who finds these hysterically funny.

Damn, I miss integration of functions.