Tea & Ink

Since January, I've been part of a writing group that meets every other Sunday. We usually have a short "lesson" on a different aspect of writing and a short time to write and share in small groups. It's through my church, so the topics tend to be spiritual. I feel pretty good about what I wrote yesterday (which says something about some of my works from previous weeks), so I thought I'd share it here.

A little background on the writing: the topic was humor, as in using humor to write about serious topics; we were given a piece of paper with a topic and verse as our starting point.

Topic: Oneness
Verse: Philippians 2:2 Then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose.

Wine or grape juice
Sprinkle or full-immersion
Armenian or Calvinist

I can label myself and you. We can put each other into boxes. And even though we claim the same Savior, we do not act as One. But it's okay, because I'm One with the others in my box, aren't I? Oh, wait, I just found out that one person who I thought was in my box has read all of Tim LaHaye's books...and liked them.

What is Oneness, then? If it is not having the same preferences, theological leanings, and beliefs about how to school our children, what is Oneness? How could I possibly consider myself One with a person who believes it is okay to ordain a homosexual woman? Since I don't know them or their faith personally, can I write them off as a non-believer? What if I know the person? And like them? What if I know the person, like them, and believe they are a Christian, and yet they still have these beliefs? Can we still be One?

Or maybe it's not a question of "Can we be One?" at all. Maybe it's that God has already made us One. And as much as we may want to deny it, we are One with Pat Robertson and Jesse Jackson and Donald Miller. Even if we think his books are overhyped and only vaguely spiritual. Because actually, if I was only One with the people I agree with on absolutely everything, I would only be One with myself.

I'll give you zucchini if you can help me

I want to start a garden. Here are my two biggest problems in doing this.

1. I live in a townhouse and don't technically "own" any land. I have a westward facing covered front porch and an eastward facing uncovered patio.

2. I don't know how to grow plants and the thought of starting a bunch of plants at once is a little overwhelming.

My solution for (1) is to grow a container garden. This brings on a couple of new problems. Namely, I don't have any containers and I don't know how big the containers should be in order to produce enough produce (ha) to make this venture financially responsible. I'm a little worried that I'm going to spend more getting started than I'll save in not buying produce at the store or farmer's market.

My solution for (2) is to read. Unfortunately, I get distracted when I start to read things. I checked out some books from the library, but I'll probably forget most of the stuff I've learned from them. I did learn (and remember) that the best place to position the containers is in a southern facing position. The south side of my house is attached to another house.

I do know that I want to grow tomatoes upside-down, using one of these: https://www.topsytree.com/flare/next?tag=ossmmn

If anyone has any knowledge of growing anything, but especially lettuce, tomatoes, and peppers, let me know!

It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.
-C.S. Lewis, Weight of Glory

So, I haven't actually read Weight of Glory (although it is on our "library"). I came across this quote, or at least this reference, about two years ago while reading Revelations of a Single Woman by Connally Gilliam. As I am wandering about in this struggle to "do" something with my life, I wonder, what is the holiday at the sea that I am missing out on? How often do I neglect pursuing relationship with God in order to spend time on trivial matters, like television, internet surfing, etc (mud pies)?

I'm even refiguring what my desires are at this point in my life. What has God gifted me in so that I may be a blessing to others? What is the strong (or perhaps weak) desire of my soul?

I believe that my desire to know God is far too weak, so to begin/continue this journey I first must recognize that. And hopefully the more I recognize that, the more I'll spend time trying to change that.

Maybe I'm the trainwreck

According to Luke, I enjoy a good trainwreck. I guess, in some ways, this is true. Sometimes, I just can't help myself.

This is most true when I read articles on cnn.com and (formerly quite frequently and now only sporadically) on stltoday.com. I will read the article (or just parts of it, to get the main idea) and then scroll down to the "Comments" area. Never have I posted my own comment, but I always form what I would respond to the often ignorant people who post. I get so upset by what they have to say, as many come across as uneducated or just plain idiotic. My ire towards these anonymous commentors settles into my stomach and I slowly (internally) grow more enraged as the day progresses. Finally, I spill my ire to Luke and he says, "Why do you even read those. People are dumb." So the next day, I just don't tell him about my ire.

High Horse

Yes, I read all four of the Twilight books. Yes, I was a little obsessed with them at the time. HOWEVER, my obsession came more from my fascination with how Stephanie Meyer would end the seemingly ill-fated loved story between a human and a vampire. I was expecting tragedy.

Instead, I found a brain-numbing romance with convoluted plot twists that ends with 756 pages of grotesqueness. First of all, Meyer never gives solid reasons for why Bella and Edward are in lurv. Second, the relationship between the two is co-dependent. Thirdly, Bella is blind to the what she would be giving up if she were to become a vampire, even though it's pointed out to her OVER and OVER. And finally, without giving too much away for those of you who actually want to read/see the books/movies, no one has to give up anything in the end. There are no deep, long-lasting themes in these books. They are trite and seem to be written to show teen girls exactly what they want: when you fall in love with a perfect-looking guy, everything will turn out perfectly and you'll get everything you want even though he has deep personal flaws.

The other large complaint I have is about how these books has been marketed to Christians because the main characters do not engage in pre-marital sex. Let me just say, it's not for lack of trying on Bella's part, and it's not because of a deep religious conviction for Edward; he just doesn't want to kill his human girlfriend. Also, in all of the discussion of sex, no one actually ever says the word "sex" throughout the entire series! So, not only are young girls being fed this line of relationship crap, but they're being taught to talk about sex without actually talking about it is okay.

So, to answer your questions, no, I will not be paying money to go watch New Moon.

Dinner transcript

Jill: Mrs. Haugland was my fourth grade teacher and Mr. Haugland was my PE teacher. He gave me my first ever C.

Luke: Did you deserve it?

Jill: No, he just didn't like me.

Luke: I'm sure. Did you pay attention in PE?

Jill: Yeah, but we didn't do fun things. He made us play volleyball. And I'm afraid of volleyballs.

Luke: Haha.

Jill: They really shouldn't grade people on how good they are at specific sports. I sucked at volleyball, but I was really good at square dancing and tinikling and parachutes.

Luke: Parachutes?

Jill: Yes! They were awesome!

Luke: We didn't play with parachutes after we were five. There's really only one game you can play.

Jill: Whatever. Parachutes are awesome. Besides, you shouldn't grade a fourth grader on how good they are at volleyball.

Luke: Did you pay attention?

Jill: I figured out how to do the funky feet.

Luke: What are the funky feet?

Jill gets up and shows him really cool footwork.

Luke: You weren't paying attention. I give you a B.

(Later.)

Luke: Okay, show me the funky feet again. I wasn't really paying attention.

Jill: You get a B.

Oy with the poodles already!

I received Gilmore Girls, Season 7, for Christmas this year, but I put off watching it until this past month because my watching it back in 2006-07 was so painful. Originally, my plan was to start watching with Season 1 and work my way to 7, but I decided that I needed to give Season 7 a chance to catch up with my multiple viewings of Seasons 1-6 (mostly 1-3, though). As I started to watch Season 7, I remembered how poorly it was written compared to the beginning of the series and how I constantly compared it to the caliber the show was in its early days. I spent a lot of time comparing the Rory we see in Seasons 5-7 with Seasons 1 & 2 Rory. When the show was on, I just couldn't reconcile the high maintenance Rory of the later seasons with the over-sized sweater wearing Rory in the beginning.

When Season 7 first came out on DVD, I told my friend Andrea that I didn't even want to own it because of the bad memories of being disappointed week after week. She told me that it was much better the second time through, because you're not expecting as much. There are a lot of things that I still don't like about Season 7. I still wonder what Amy Sherman-Palladino would have done with the Season 6 cliffhanger. Mostly, though, Andrea was right. It is better the second time. I think one of the reasons is because it's been so long since I've watched a lot of Gilmore Girls, so seeing any of my good friends in Stars Hollow was very nostalgic.

On Friday, I got to the series finale. I've been wishing for a movie to sum things all up for a couple of years. I don't need that anymore. I think that the last episode (even if it was written as the last episode) ended the show respectfully. I gave up missing the Rory of the earlier seasons because I didn't want her to grow up and change. When the show started she was a sophomore in high school and ended with her graduating from college. Of course she changed! She had to!

I also found myself crying at several points in the episode. There are so many moments that define what this show is about. The moment with Lane and Rory on the swing is so sweet. And Lorelai telling her parents that they would definitely stay for after dinner drinks shows how much the characters have changed even in the last couple of seasons. I love the final scene of the show. It is so fitting that it ends exactly where it started, with Lorelai and Rory in Luke's Diner.

No words that I write could adequately express my delight in this show. The characters make mistakes, repeatedly. However, I still love them because they are true to themselves. And My Luke is just going to have to deal with the constant Gilmore references and random episode watching (we went to a debutant ball, off course we had to watch Rory's coming out party!) with the same gruff manor the Lorelai's Luke would watch the show.