Mysterium fidei

...mystery of faith...




I just got back from the Jesus for President tour stop in Raleigh, and am fascinated. What an evening of beautiful storytelling, heartwrenching music and discomforting challenges.

There were heavy southern (American) accents, old timey bluegrass, and Middle Eastern wails. Letters from soldiers, and scorn of America as the world's god. There was love overflowing, and messages that would make my patriotic father furious, most likely.

Surprisingly, Shane Claiborne and friends touched on many struggles I've been dealing with for several years related to politics, patriotism, the role of the Church, and what the gospel of Christ really means for the world, and the United States of America, today.

Lots to think about.

breaking the musicfast!

More than a year ago (several?) I basically stopped buying music. For real. For the same reason that I try not to buy chocolate, or buy ice cream, or start watching a new series I've never watched online (where all the episodes are available at once): once I start, I very nearly can't stop. Pandora.com is probably the only thing that allowed me to do this; otherwise I would have died inside from lack of new music. But I think it's time for the fast to end, and I can't wait to start splurging on...

• Beyoncé! Somehow I own nothing of her music...I think she is one of the most talented pop (in the broad sense) music-makers out there today. girl power music at its best - love it.
• Over the Rhine. newly introduced to them and she's basically who I want to be.
• Emilliana Torrini. beautiful voice, entrancing music.
• Eisley's newest album...i'm still steaming from having gotten the time wrong for a recent show, and walking in right after they finished.
• The Album Leaf. chill and pretty.
• Sufjan Stevens. been listening to him for years...to the same 4 songs. dumb. no more.
• Patty Griffin...everything I don't already have :)
• Bjork
  
• Chris Thile
  
• Nickel Creek - everything! i only had one album, and I've lost even that one. not owning NC is like an insult to music.
• Rocky Votolato
  
• Mason Jennings. his music makes me feel so happy, haha
• The Frames. going backward from having listened to The Swell Season first, the Frames are just as great.
• Coldplay's newest. I feel silly even admitting that one.
• Ray LaMontagne...everything i don't already have.
• Rich Price.
• Damien Rice! how do i only have 2 songs?? ridiculous.
• ...and more Ray Charles, Supremes, Marvin Gaye, Doris Day, Rosemary Clooney, Rachmaninoff, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Turina, Mozart, Beethoven, Elgar..

And that's pretty much scratching the surface. mmmmm i can almost taste the forthcoming musical goodness now :)

Love & Loss

A dear friend of mine is working through his fourth month since his wife of many years passed away from cancer. By no means is he dealing with any kind of hopeless despair (his blog can show you why) but experiencing his grief and loss is certainly the most prominent feature of his life at this time.

At one point he said something I've heard many times before: "better to have loved and lost than not loved at all."

That's something I've never really believed, at least not for my nature and personality. But, oddly enough, I've been having to concede that perhaps that is the only kind of loss of love I would accept if it meant having the kind of love that my friend and his wife so clearly shared when she was alive. I say odd, because I truly cannot imagine a more painful kind of loss - and that loss is only so great because the love was so great - and yet the greatness of the love makes the prospect of such pain worthwhile, or at least bearable.

But I have witnessed other kinds of love lost that I want nothing to do with; and there is where I don't believe it's "better to have loved and lost." There are some things, in my mind, that don't make the loss worthwhile.

Again, that's for myself, anyway. My concession there, though, has to be that maybe I can only say that because I've never been in love and so don't know what I'm missing. But still...from where I stand, it isn't always worth it.

Probably something people would say I need to figure out how to deal with, but oh well. :P

Here, have a time slot.

I have often had a hard time believing that it is both necessary and good that my life must be orchestrated around what can fit into specified blocks of time...30 minutes on this afternoon here, 2 hours on that evening there...

But, if I am to:

build relationships with the people around me like I want to,

be involved with social justice like I want to be,

earn a living wage like I have to,

and spend time just reading/writing/musicking/resting/vegging/exercising etc. like I need to,

(and do everything else that crops up in life that must be done)

...then I believe that partitioning my life into time slots is the only way to get to do it all.

I do believe that the American life is different from much of the world in its speed, and think that there are certainly some Americans who could do with a little less speed. If you're flying through a life based around your career (or anything else) at a breakneck speed and it is draining you, then you need to slow down.

But while I can still do all this and be energized rather than drained, then I will continue to do it. Especially because I think one day this will change (read: when I have a family) -- while I'm not accountable to anyone else (I mean, not to the level that you are when you have your own family), I want to be as completely involved in this stuff as I can be.

Yeah, spontaneity is kind of sacrificed when that is the kind of life you lead, in a way. Although...it makes me laugh that I intentionally try to schedule space into my week and month that has nothing actually scheduled in it, so that I can have time to either just relax/recoup or do something spontaneously fun...does scheduling opportunities for spontaneity mean it's no longer spontaneous??? ahhhhh :) haha.

And I have decided that sometime in the next year, I am going to try to realize a long-time goal of mine and seek a weekend (or more) of individual retreat at a monastic guest house. Preferably a really old one :)

It's all about the balance.

So, for this stage of my life, time slots it is, then.

Should I stay, or should I go?

...except, now that I think about it, that's not really an apt title for this post. Because my question isn't so much about "should I, or shouldn't I?"...

I've had a few recent conversations about how much I am loving getting ingrained into the fabric of my community (Raleigh...never thought I'd say that), but how I never like to make "life" plans more than 6 months out, because...I don't want it to be hard to pull up roots. Partly because there's a piece of me that longs to be a part of a world outside of the United States of America.

But the truth is, it would be hard for me to pull up roots; there's no getting around it. A friend I just had a beach weekend with was talking about how she's feeling pulled to something international, possibly, and all I can think is, "you just moved to North Carolina and are looking for your second job here - how can you even be thinking about leaving already?"

Oh, Melinda :)

A joke from this past weekend is about how "slow" I am - with getting ready, with getting places, with making decisions, with everything. 'Tis true, I own that one. Part of the problem is probably that I don't have a problem with that particular characteristic of mine, hehe. Anyway, maybe that just means that I do things in life slowly, and that this is okay - maybe I will slowly become a part of this community of Raleigh, NC, and one day will perhaps slowly grow into a totally new life somewhere else.

So really, it's not a matter of should I or shouldn't I (not yet, anyway) - just a matter of taking care to fulfill God's mission for me right here, right now. And hopefully He'll make it obvious when the "here" needs to change.

Arrrr!

My pirate name is:

Mad Jenny Flint

Every pirate is a little bit crazy. You, though, are more than just a little bit. Like the rock flint, you're hard and sharp. But, also like flint, you're easily chipped, and sparky. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

(I think this is what happens when you're trying to do work at 11:30 at night..)

Come celebrate the 4th of July with the homeless!

The following is taken from the LoveWinsAlways blog.

---------------------------------

A lot of people have wanted to know some practical ways they could help in our mission of loving the poor, homeless and destitute of Raleigh, North Carolina. Here is your chance.

At 4pm on the Fourth of July, 2008 we are going to have a cookout in Moore Square (click here for a map) in downtown, Raleigh. There will be hot dogs, baked beans, watermelon, soft drinks and much more (we hope, anyway). If somebody could bring some guitars and such, that would be pretty cool too.

Why are we doing this, you ask? Several reasons:

• Because while no doubt you have friends and loved ones to spend the Fourth with, many of the homeless and poor do not. Bring your friends and loved ones with you.

• Because on holidays the soup kitchens are closed, so any free meals usually consist of bag lunches with peanut butter and honey sandwiches. Surely we can do better than that?

• Because when the poor go hungry, it ticks Jesus off.

• Because you need more friends who have less than you do.

• Because you will get to eat with some really cool people.

• Because things like friendship, community, dignity and happiness are important in the Kingdom of God.

• Because while everyone else is celebrating their allegiance to the American Empire (the same Empire that often says your worth is related to your net worth), we can show our ultimate allegiance to the Kingdom of God, which says these people are priceless and worth fighting for.

NOTE: The purpose of this event is not to win souls, to pass out tracts or to break out with the street preaching. Instead, we want to have fun, to meet new people and to show the love of God in the way of Jesus.

If this sounds like something you would like to be a part of, we need lots of food and help to pull this off. Leave a comment below or send me an email and I will send you a list of things we need.

i don't understand bored.

Really, I don't. I don't at all know how to relate to people who don't know what to do with their time and thus sometimes must wallow in that annoyance called boredom...seriously, I would be happy to take some of their disposable time off their hands (and I'm not talking about for purposes of getting the house clean or finally doing all the laundry).

Because I have come to the unsatisfactory but realistic conclusion that I will never be able to do everything I want at a given point in my life, because there are simply way too many things I want to do.

Right now, I'm:

• learning about cultural competence as it relates to the response to human trafficking
• developing a network of local faith communities to respond to local human trafficking
• painting a little bit
• going to a weekly homegroup for my church
• starting a journey group-discipleship thing with a couple other girls
• trying to learn how to be a booking agent for a music artist
• planning wall murals for a children's clinic
• teaching women's self-defense (on hiatus for a few more months until the ol' knee heals up!)
• working out sort of regularly (is that an oxymoron?)
  

But I ALSO want to:

• start writing articles again
• paint a lot more
• start a mixed media project
• get involved in community theater
• start/front a jazz band
• somehow find myself singing for a not-jazz band (even after years, I've never really figured out what that means...some kind of cross between Over the Rhine and Regina Spektor and Natasha Bedingfield and Fiona Apple and Patty Griffin and Schuyler Fisk)
• hike/bike the state parks and greenways
• really learn how to salsa
• work out very regularly
  
• start ballet again
• learn how to use my loop station and compose avant cello songs
  
• learn how to play guitar, at least enough to legitimately do open mic nights
• do Jubilee-type work full time
• learn to become a decent photographer
  

The frustrating thing is none of these things are out of the realm of doability in and of themselves - they're not those lofty dream-goals I had/I still have like "live in Spain" or "open a chocolate shop." The only solution I can wrap my brain around is that maybe I'll eventually get things out of my system so I can start spending pieces of my life on the next thing.

I can't help but think, though, that there are very few things on either of those lists I'll actually want to quit. I mean, the three things I was doing and am not doing now (writing articles, taking ballet and teaching self-defense) I want to go back to! How am I ever going to get to all the new things I want to do?

Basically, the likely reality is that there will be things in life that I really want to do, but they'll just have to get the shaft, because there is only so much of me to go around, and I'll have to get over it.

This post probably sounds like I'm trying to impress people because I'm "so very interesting, look at all the things I want to do!" but seriously, I'm just trying to work through said "get over it" process. Blah.

ShellyRhettLink

I would just like to put in plugs for my friends Shelly of the Shelly Moore Band and Rhett and Link of...Rhett & Link. (Okay, so I've never actually met Link...but it's almost like you just can't say Rhett anymore without also saying Link. Sorry, Rhett. 'n'Link.)

Both exceptionally talented groups, one is currently promoting their beautifully crafted album of heartfelt worship(ful) songs, and the other is launching their coverage of their Alka-Seltzer Great American Road Trip today. Personally, I think one is among the cream of the crop of Christian artists out there, and the other is going to soon be giving those FreeCreditReport.com and Embarq guys all a run for their money. How Shelly is going to pull it off I just don't know, but....kidding. I'm pretty sure their pictures give an idea of who would be doing what..

But you know what they both are? AWESOME. Check them out.

Halos? Really?

Corporate people tend to see cause marketing (when corporations and businesses align themselves with a cause or charity - like the partnership between McDonalds' and St. Jude Children's Research Hospital) as a great beneficial relationship, one that raises money and positive notoriety for the cause and boosts goodwill (and thus possibly sales) toward the corporation.

I've heard non-corporate people make scathing remarks about cause marketing as an empty, shallow ploy that exploits charity for the corporation's own gain.

I don't think it's ever so black-and-white, 100% of the time. I don't doubt that there are some businesses that, were cause marketing a nonexistent concept, are truly driven by selfish (or at the least, ignorant) people who would see no reason to help others if it doesn't help them -- but there are others that would engage in charitable practices anyway, because it's the right and socially responsible thing to do.

And I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a corporate marketing director working on cause marketing who is sniggering greedily about what an unwitting tool their charity is.

I do admit that it feels a bit odd to have a ceremony to "hand out the halos;" that seems taking it a bit far...but if cause marketing benefits a cause that could use the help (as most all causes could), does it matter if the company's intentions are less than purely altruistic?

Even if I wasn't a hippie...

...there's still no way I would ever understand the mindset that drives women to do this: http://www.newsobserver.com/105/story/1093016.html

There is a 14-year-old girl who was forced to be a sex slave right here in Wake County, NC.

I encourage you to read this and other news about human trafficking going on in our country, and in our state. The abolitionist group I'm involved with has a wiki set up that includes state and national articles (see "Media Reports")...including a story from the N&O today about a sex trafficking case right here in Wake County.

ramble and muse..

I just had an interesting question/thought.

Since my "depressive period" three years ago, I have had to make a continual and active effort to never return there, to never indulge in those lines of thinking that I know can lead me there. In times of crisis it is necessarily a more concentrated effort, and that is where I find myself now, with my lovely big health insurance nightmare.

Anyway, my tendencies (or I think that's actually too strong of a word...but I can't think of a lesser one for now) being something I'm more conscious of these days, I've had the subject of depression on my mind more - well, because of that and also just because it's a subject that kind of fascinates me, as a matter of psychology and sociology.

ANYway, just now in the midst of one of said musings, it struck me how there would be so many more healthy and happy people (or at least, perhaps, healthier and happier) were it not for shame. When I look back on my own experiences, finally learning to be open with others about my hardship was hands down the first and biggest movement toward a recovery. The thing that prevented this step for nearly half a year was, quite irrefutably, shame. People thought I had things together. I didn't want anyone to know I was broken.

And then it struck me how so many women involved in some kind of abuse or trafficking or exploitation don't seek help because of shame, because the pain they live in somehow seems better than the pain of being exposed. Some cultures actually even hold to the belief that, for example, a woman who is raped has been shamed and she should rather die than be exposed and bring shame to her family. As if it was her choice to start with.

And so my question is, WHY? If our culture(s) didn't denigrate people who have fallen victim to depression, abuse, mental illness etc., I truly believe many individuals would feel so much freer to seek the help they need, be it medical, legal, or maybe just a conversation with a friend.

The real shame is how people respond to the broken. Brokenness in certain forms is disturbing to "non-broken" people who don't know how to deal with with it, and so they don't want to hear about it. And that's the sentiment that our society has built itself on (maybe it's better than 50 years ago, but there's still a long way to go), and those who are broken know this, they feel it, and so they keep quiet in their own little mental dungeons.

And the funny thing is, I don't actually believe that "non-broken" people exist. I'm not sure why over time, certain things got singled out to have shame attached to them, why there are some things that people just don't like to talk about. It took me over a year, I think, to be able to talk freely about depression, and now it's no big deal - to me. But I still get the feeling that for someone to speak freely about something like that, to someone who has never experienced anything similar, it is a bit shocking and uncomfortable. And I think that's a problem.

Slavery STILL Exists (i.e., if you want to stay in the dark, don't read this)

I have been digging through the world of human trafficking for the past half-year, and am continually becoming convinced that one of the greatest shames, one of the greatest tragedies, is that so many people in the United States and throughout the world have no idea that this is even going on.

Almost every one I know in this fight has a story similar to mine, and it's one with a common theme of shock. I mean, I'd always known about "sweatshops" and "sex slaves" and the like, but really, I had no idea...I didn't think about it much. I didn't know it was like this. I didn't know the trade of human beings is the third most active criminal enterprise worldwide, next only to drugs and firearms. I didn't know that numbers-wise, slavery captures many more lives today than did the transatlantic slave trade of a couple centuries ago.

* * *

Though not technically visually graphic, this video is disturbing, as it should be. But if you can't watch it, at least watch the second one, for Radiohead's "All I Need."

Communitas.

There's a big push in the Christian world (at least, among my generation) toward all things "community" and "relationships" and the like. I am intrigued by it all, from New Monasticism to Nieu Communities to less-hardcore versions like my church's "journey groups" (intentional, spiritually-focused relationships between three or four of the church body).

I can't say I embrace it all though, at least not practically. Part of me thrills at the thought of being refined by fire (as it surely would be for this girl, who loves her privacy dearly) through an intimate community of believers that reaches out to the surrounding community-at-large just as much as it grows closer and more connected to each other and God from within.

But...

The problem with the other (bigger) part of me is that, ironically, I have finally achieved what I have been aiming to achieve for the last 24 years. I am settled in a nice apartment in a lovely part of town with a great roommate and a wonderful church and great friends and a good job, and am heartily time-invested in several causes that are important to me...and the last thing I want to do is to shake all that up.

And I will admit something that I have never before dared to admit beyond the confines of my own mind: for several years, I've had a Jonah-esque fear that God may one day ask me let him shake my life up, and move me far, far away to who knows where, to do who knows what.

I've never admitted that aloud, because I have this dumb idea that I will jinx it into happening if I do (as if I could trick God into not asking, simply by never mentioning it...)

I think that's one reason I have been pretty adamant about not ever making big life plans for anything further than 6 months out - because if God did want me to do something totally uncomfortable, at least it might be less painful than if I had to be absolutely ripped away from the roots I had been so focused on growing..

That, and (and this might sound stupid, but it's honest) I have this idea that doing anything for God - like moving to a rural South American community, or joining a ministerial community in my own state, or what have you - means begging people for money, and the very thought of that makes my insides cringe. Fundraising makes me miserable - it rubs hard against the grain of my very personality, and I never want to have to do it.

Ah, me. Call me a coward, but I'm just not going to think about any of that much, for now.

proceso, no producto...

orrr, not.

I normally love that philosophy I first learned from from my favorite Spanish teacher, "process, not product." But as far as this new knee goes, I'm all about getting this process over and getting the final product.

However, good news is that apparently "I must be a fast healer" as my PT said today, as the process is going very well. Though, if there's one word that I would use to describe this whole process, it would be, irrefutably: weird.

Weird, because...

• One's first surgery experience is necessarily so, I think. I don't remember falling asleep, or waking up. And I never thought I could possibly be so glad for a bedpan as I was at about 2pm on April 24. Thank goodness I was on inhibition-reducing drugs, or else I would probably have refused it...and that just couldn't have ended well.

• When everything you do requires very slow, incremental movements (or in the first week, hardly any movement at all), you get into a time warp. I have been in a time warp for 12 days, almost two weeks since my surgery!! What?? How? (Everything takes so long to do, and with so much concentration and carefulness, that time actually goes by very quickly..and yet I never seem to be getting much done.)

• It's so strange that one week of sitting in a chair weakens you so much that you'll take months and months to recover your strength.

• I feel like an elderly person. In addition to my crutches I have a walker in the kitchen, a cane in the bathroom and a chair in the shower (the last three of which belong to my grandma...who apparently is getting around much better than I am these days). And now that I'm weaning off of one crutch, I am walking (shuffling) even more slowly now.

• Perhaps the strangest (and most wonderful) thing is that I have experienced next-to-no pain this whole time, and with minimal help from strong meds (which I quit after about six days anyway, because they were making me sick!) I think I can only attribute that to the prayers on my behalf, because that definitely makes no sense! So thank you if you prayed!...the doctors did a phenomenal job, or I have a super pain-resisting body, or something, but I am so grateful that on top of the many inconveniences, the only bodily discomfort I've really had to deal with was side affects from the drugs during the first week. Even PT isn't very bad...I didn't even remember to take Tylenol beforehand today and I was fine.

12 days down, about six months to go...but I seriously think I've about finished the hardest part, thank God!!!!!

(that picture was actually the day of the surgery...the Robogirl leg has been gone for about a week now, replaced with a very misshapen-but-getting-stronger-every-day appendage. I'll take that.)

well, shoot haha

So not only am I getting my knee cut up tomorrow, but to add insult to injury (hmm..no pun intended), I just found my first gray hair. I am SHOCKED I tell you, SHOCKED!

hehe :P It's all good though...that's actually funny to me. Especially considering that only a few days ago did I tell my hairstylist that if I got my dad's genes, I wouldn't see any gray until I was in my 40's.

Thanks Mom ;)

Where's the line?

My somewhat recent (if a year is recent) foray into the world of social justice has kind of messed up my life. And I'm not talking in that euphemistic way of describing "how glad I am to have found my calling and I'll never be the same yaddayadda..." I suppose that is true, but when I think of "messed up," I really am thinking in terms of inconvenience. Discomfort. Annoyance. Irritation.

It's really incovenient that: my conscience won't allow me to shop at Victoria's Secret anymore, because the word "sweatshop" has a much more robust meaning to me these days.

It's annoying that: I feel as if I'll be more apt to be perceived as prudish these days, because my work against modern slavery has opened my eyes to how our society distorts and abuses sexuality in a way that contributes to so much harm in so, so many ways.

It's irritating that: my work in women's safety and abolitionism has replaced my inoculation to violence with an aversion to it, to the extent that my television and cinema entertainment choices have become more limited.

It sucks that: my most recent attendance at a show of a certain favorite 80's party band was probably my last, because for the first time I found myself unable to brush off or excuse their explicit raunchiness-as-performance-shtick.

...and I could go on. But not indefinitely, because I haven't yet become willing to be a martyr for the idea of social justice itself...

I've been wrestling with a concept that is at the foundation of my abolition group Jubilee - "standing for justice, rejoicing in freedom" - freedom in both the physical sense and all the metaphysical senses. One Jubilee woman once shared about a friend who was completely obsessed with only eating slow (local) foods, buying only free-trade items, taking great care to never accidentally support anything that directly or indirectly harmed anyone or anything...and if you consider what it would take to live that way, that is not freedom...that is being chained down by an idea.

But of course it's not a bad idea, right? I mean, you're being a responsible, caring, "good person." But I just think that something is lost when you make your life almost impossible to live for the sake of never having anything to do with something even remotely tainted.

But do I think it's okay to let some things slide? Well, I can't say that I do. But I do let things slide; I choose to not research every little thing I buy/do/eat/etc. because I don't want to go crazy.

...But part of me really wishes I had the fortitude and discipline to be like that stringently conscious woman.

...But part of me doesn't want to hear about another favorite company that uses sweatshops or another entertaining t.v. show that has faulty sexual morals, because I don't want to feel compelled to sacrifice yet one more thing...nor do I think a life burdened by solid sacrifices is any way to live, particularly if I claim to have freedom in Christ.

...But then I'm struck with how unfair it is that I have the choice to either sacrifice enjoyment/convenience or to let things slide, whereas so many others in the world do not.

But, but, but.........clearly I have not resolved this issue in my mind. I wonder if I ever will?..

it's time

"it's times like these you learn to live again
it's times like these you give and give again
it's times like these you learn to love again"




[love it]

twitter THIS. what.

So I've seen twitterings all over the place lately, and I finally felt like I had to know what it is. I've intentionally avoided it up til now, because: as a "communications professional," I am forever being inundated with webinars, newsletters, emails, etc etc etcetcetectetdcet about Social Freakin' Media. I promise, it is the buzzword in the communications sector...and I am sick of it! Now, I like my Facebook to keep up with people, but beyond that I just don't like the idea of using the faceless (no pun intended) internet for what I consider to be essentially faux-relationship building. And at the risk of sounding hypocritical, this blog is mainly for catharsis and practice...I'm not exactly trying to find life-long friends here.

I tried to explain this to my father the other day (specifically, telling him I found LinkedIn to be useless to me), at which he point he proceeded to lecture me on how, if I want to advance myself professionally, I really need to learn how to use it (and he would be happy to teach me).

AHHH!

* * *

In other news - this season is the first time I've watched AI in about...mmm, probably four or five years, and I have to say, Jason Castro wins me over just about every time. No hay más remedio.

But until last night, I have never before actually been sad about an American Idol contestant getting the boot. I'm sorry, Michael Johns. And I can't believe I ever used to like Ryan "I'm going to make you think we'll give you a break like at last year's Idol Gives Back, and then crush this falsely-raised hope beneath my Gucci shoe" Seacrest...what a jerk. That's too sensationalist, even for Idol.