nanovivid

Mind… full of thoughts. Must… get them out coherently. This… may or may not happen.

I haven’t journaled in a while because I didn’t have that much to write for public consumption, and there hasn’t been too much eventfulness happening. But today I had a conversation that sparked a lot of thought.

I was talking to Ryan and we were discussing things that were happening in his life spiritually. In responding to what was going on, I was struck very hard by how different my perspective on spirituality and relating to God has become. This makes it rather odd to have certain types of conversations with people, where the assumption is all the "normal" christian ideas about life. I wrote this a couple minutes after the conversation ended:

When did I stop caring about "living for Jesus" and "letting God work in my life?" It’s such a strange feeling to have conversations with people about their lives and not be coming at it from the same perspective. I guess I just don’t get it anymore.

Walking home from work I did some further thinking about why this difference bothers me. Multiple factors play into it, I think, but one major one is that I don’t like to disagree with people or be different. I want to be able to have my ideas fit in with those of others and be able to feel that we relate. For me, disagreeing on serious issues is a major decision to make, so it’s hard to have different ideas about how to go about "becoming like Jesus" and such. Even on the issue of war… I definitely come at it from a pacifist point of view, but it’s hard for me to talk about it with people who strongly disagree, because I don’t like arguing (which is usually what such conversations become). Meh.

Another factor is something I’ve written about before - I’ve always sort of been a "rock" for people in their hard times spiritually, and now… I can still be there and listen, and I could probably give them good "christian" advice, but it wouldn’t be genuine. I guess I need to accept that I can’t be everything to everyone. But I often wish I could be.

This entry might sound like a bit of a step back from my ultra-optimistic rant from a couple weeks ago. I guess maybe it is. Maybe it’s me realizing that I still have a lot of questions to work through and decisions to make.

Adding fuel to the fire, I watched Waking Life again tonight. I really like that movie, and I appreciate it more now than I did the first time I saw it. There are a lot of beautiful ideas discussed, and it leaves more questions than answers, and that’s fine with me. I don’t have anything specific from the movie to discuss, but it just helped keep my thoughtful mood going.

I’m so freaking introspective sometimes. :-)

Quick living situation update: We looked at an apartment on Tuesday and have decided to pursue that instead of the house because a) It’ll work better lease-wise with Steve getting married next May and b) the landlord of the house hasn’t gotten back to us in like three weeks (or is it longer?). The landlord of the apartment is much more friendly and I hope this one will work out. Applications go in tomorrow, we should know by early next week.

♫ Something Corporate - Fall

My barn having burned to the ground, I can now see the moon (Chinese Proverb). I saw that quote yesterday while I was working on a rather stubborn laptop problem (which I’m really hoping is finally resolved). The proverb seems to fit in well with my understanding of what has happened and is happening in my life. I’ve lost a lot of my previous ideas about God and faith, but with that has come the discovery of new and beautiful experiences that I never had before.

Tonight I came (once again) to the realization that spending time regretting things I do and feeling down about them doesn’t help anything. Forget it, adam. It’s ThePastTown. Learning from the past is one thing, dwelling on it and sulking about it is another. This is one of those facts I know I’m going to need to learn over and over. The moments when I do get it are nice, because I can smile and say to myself, self, it’s time to move on. It’s a good feeling.

On to less serious things… In my last update, I forgot to include one of the other "fun" things that happened Sunday night. I was hanging out with Tonya in her suite and Kristen came in. All was well for a while until Kristen decided to attack me and punch me in the face! Ok, so it was an accident… and she really didn’t "attack" me exactly. But I did get a nice love tap above my left eye. No black eye though. Thanks for showing me the love, Kristen!

Last night I saw the Simpsons Christmas episode from 2001. For some reason it hit me as very profound how in the end the family still accepts Lisa despite her different beliefs. The more I watch of that show, the more I’m impressed at the way they handle difficult issues with humor and style (when they choose to do so :-).

I feel the need to express my love of this icon for Phoenix I like it much better than any of the other Phoenix icons I’ve seen so far. (The real version doesn’t have the white dots around the edge like the picture at deviantART shows). I’ve used Resource Hacker to replace Phoenix’s default dinosaur icon and now my Phoenix windows look much yummier. Mmmmmm… icons…

My #1 online discovery for today was Mack Daddy Mario 3. I never knew Mario could get down like that. And while we’re on the subject of fun flash stuff, check out the Industorious Clock (and the rest of MONO*crafts). It’s a very cool piece of flash work.

♫ U2's The Joshua Tree album

And the snow came down… and it came down… and it came down some more. Then just when we thought it was done… you guessed it, more snow. It’s hard to say exactly how much we got because there is a lot of drifting, but it’s around a foot. Quite the winter wonderland.

Last night I wandered into Dave’s suite for their 300th Simpsons episode party. That was good times. Dave, Ross, and Welby decided to build a column out of all the cereal boxes they had been saving. Despite several peoples’ attempts to knock it down, it’s still standing. Oh, and the Simpsons were good too.

I’ve been listening to Mint’s Digital Mix pretty much all afternoon and evening. It’s some quality deep/progressive house that I’m totally digging. Great tracks, great samples… just good all around. My favorite track from the mix is Mint’s remix of Structure by Dream Traveler. As Courtney said, the vocals are eerie and sweet at the same time. If you have a fast connection and/or can deal with a 125 meg download, definitely download it (the Structure remix comes in around 45 minutes). Alternately, on the Listen page at Mint’s site there is a clip of Structure. Either way, it’s worth listening to.

I know what you’re thinking now… where are the deep introspective observations that adam’s been giving us so much of lately? Well, none for tonight. Don’t worry, there’ll be more later. ;-)

♫ Mint - Digital Mix

Last night it seemed like we weren’t going to get much snow, and then this morning I wake up and surprise! It’s still snowing! It’s the nice sticky kind of snow that gets on everything too, so the trees are all cool looking and stuff. I’ve been hearing rumors that we might get up at a foot around here by Monday… that would be sweet.

I thought my mouse was dying or else Windows was messed up because it kept randomly clicking and it wasn’t doing it in BeOS… turns out it had gotten kinda unplugged. Go figure.

I’ve updated the about section with some more info about me as well as a slice of a picture that my roommate Steve took the other day. He wanted to try out his new flash, and the picture actually turned out halfway decent. I don’t like that I’m wearing my glasses instead of contacts, but other than that I like it.

Today I’ve been listening to A Sorta Fairytale by Tori Amos a lot… such a great song. There’s a clip of the chorus that plays in the background of the flash version of her website, so give it a listen if you get a chance.

I guess that’s about all there is to say at the moment. Today has been a good and unusually non-lazy day for a Saturday — I did laundry, went to the weight room, and helped Michael (aka evil reverse switcher boy) get his iPod working in Windows. If you’re in the snow zones, enjoy it, otherwise, enjoy your non-snow weather.

♫ t.A.T.u. - All The Things She Said

After spending this Friday night in the "computer room" of the apartment avoiding one of my roommates and his quasi-valentine’s date, I’ve realized how much less of a life I’ve had since moving out of the dorm, and even moreso since starting full-time work. I’m sure that I could have more stuff to do on weekends if I worked on it, but sometimes it just doesn’t seem worth it. Oh well. At least I have people to talk to online.

This week has been sort of roller-coasterish emotionally (then again, what week isn’t?). There’s a lot of stuff I’d like to talk about here but I really can’t at this point. In the end, it’s come out good, and I’m feeling better about myself as a person than I did before. It’s pretty cool to actually start liking myself. Not that I totally didn’t before, but I’m getting better at accepting who I am and running with it. Yay. (Many thanks to Ney for staying up waaay too late Monday night talking when I needed it).

One thing that’s been on my mind a couple times (once during the rather chilly seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time outside run I took on Tuesday) is about my thought processes. It seems like I need approval from someone else to allow myself to accept a thought or idea. The impetus for these thoughts has again been Bart’s talk in chapel. I’ve realized that it took hearing somebody who is in a position of authority say "hey, I have lots of doubts about this faith thing too, and here are some things I’m still not sure about" for me to really be able to embrace the questioning of my theology and faith. Why is this? Why do I need someone else to tell me that it’s ok to think certain thoughts or have certain ideas? Maybe by realizing this I can start to work around it. I hope so.

I realized that I left out something I wanted to make a note of from Bart’s evening Q&A session. This isn’t an exact quote, but it’s the general idea. He said "If you’re going to call yourself a follower of Jesus, you have no choice but to love gay people. Not to tell them how wrong their lifestyle is, not to sit in judgement of them, but to love them. Not necessarily agree with their way of life. But love them." And I’m all holla! The more I think about it, I agree that if christians could get their heads around the whole compassion thing, there would be a lot less people hurt by the church. Sure, there’s a good chance that there are rights and wrongs, but it’s no good shoving them down peoples’ throats. The only people I recall Jesus coming down hard on for their sins were the religious leaders of the day, not the prostitutes, drunks, and tax collectors he hung out with. Hm.

To totally jump subjects here, I thought I was going to really really miss "college life" once I graduated, but so far it hasn’t been that bad. Of course, it helps that I’m still pretty much on-campus and have people to hang out with, but I guess I’ve already started forming sort of a post-college group of friendships online and with people who will be staying around after graduation (yet I still have no life on Friday night… go figure). Now if only I had a place to live after the lease runs out in April… (yeah, no house news yet. poopie.)

Bouncing back a few days, Tuesday night we had a Big "PHAT" Greek Wedding Party at Dawn and Mark’s with yummy homemade pizza (mmmmm… spinach…). Nathan and Jared were disappointed that they weren’t allowed to play "Attack!" (the game where they, well, attack me) but they were mostly pacified when I read them some stories. Then we watched the movie, which I already knew I loved. "Do not let your past dictate who you are, but allow it to be a part of who you will become…. Yeah, this Dear Abby, she really knows what she’s talking about."

So there’s your update on my life. Have a great weekend. And happy Singles Awareness Day! :-P

♫ Slyder - Score

Today was a fun drive to Dulles and back type day. Erica needed a ride from the airport so I picked her up and we went to Clarendon to eat at Big Bowl and check out the Apple store. The meal was delish, of course, but unfortunately the Apple store didn’t have the 17" PowerBook yet. Oh well, I’ll get to see it eventually.

On the drive back we had a really awesome conversation about where we are spiritually and emotionally and all kinds of good stuff. Definitely an uplifter.

Once we got back to campus, I headed over to the forum on homosexuality, which was very interesting. Unfortunately, I missed the first half hour, but I was there for the Q&A time. (It was taped so I’ll get to check out the opening later). I think it was a good chance for people to be exposed to a range of opinions and ideas, and I’m glad I went.

After the epiphany type thing I had last week about being able to start having some sort of faith again, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about what that means for my life. One thing that I know needs work is my relationships with my parents and my brother. I’ve never totally figured out what has happened to drive us apart, but I know there are things I especially need to talk to my parents about. I know I’ve caused them all pain by being distant, but it’s so hard to rebuild things. Just because it’s hard isn’t reason not to try though. But… it’s hard. Ergh.

Regardless of what I’ve decided spiritually, there are still a lot of things I’m dealing with and some habits that I’m constantly fighting to change, but don’t want to change. It’s frustrating, but I know there’s very few people who aren’t working at something similar, so I’m not alone. I wrote this a while back about the struggle with addiction to, well, anything…

what am i to do?
you seduce me with just one word
all it takes is a thought
a moment alone with myself
and i run back to you
i find security in your arms
and death too
your forbidden lips
lock with mine
suffocating me with ecstasy
how can i fight so beautiful
so treacherous an enemy
your charms are too much
you win me every time
and so the cycle goes…

So I guess that’s kind of a dark way to end this entry. Sorry about that… here, a thank-you always helps to cheer things up, right?

Thanks everybody for the support from my last two entries. It’s cool to know that people care about me enough to spend time reading my ramblings. (Seriously, it means a lot…) :-)

♫ Cedar - Mix for UrbanFeatures.net

Life is ironic. Yesterday I was talking to Jeremiah about this whole "faith crisis" thing and I said "… but it could all change tomorrow." And you know what… it almost has. It’s not that all of a sudden my former faith is restored… but I’m starting to believe again. See, Bart Campolo came and spoke today at chapel and what he had to say made a lot of sense to me — in fact, at many points he could have been speaking straight to me. One thing he talked about was what happens when it becomes impossible for you to keep believing the same way you always have and his experience with that. It is so encouraging for me to realize that it’s possible to go through huge changes in theology without losing faith.

Quick note: now that I finally sit down to write about this, it’s not quite as emotional as I expected it to be. I’ve never felt on the verge of tears as many times in one day before. Every time I started to think about what Bart said in chapel I would have to push it away because I needed to be functional at work. It’s a relief to let that shield down.

Part of my faith crisis has come from the realization that there was a huge disconnect between what I believed and how I lived. I believed in a God who loved everyone, who cared for the poor and needy. But I lived like God was a rulebook, like knowing God put me in an exclusive club that I wanted to keep others out of. Something had to break.

You don’t wake up one morning and say, "Hey, I think it would be fun to become unorthodox and believe differently from most people I know. Having a different understanding of God and salvation that will make a lot of people think I’m a heretic would be great!" Re-evaluating faith happens once it’s impossible to stay in the same place any longer. I doubt I’ll ever again reach a place where I say "this is what I believe and nothing is going to change it." But I can say now that I do believe in a loving God… one who loves everyone and I’m hoping there’s a chance that mercy can triumph over judgement. I believe that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. I’m just not so sure (and here comes the sticky part) about the eternal damnation thing any more. I want to believe in a God whose love is big enough to overcome any obstacle. Sure, if someone rejects that love, they’re not going to heaven, I’ll agree with that. But I don’t want a God who gives up on people and sends them to hell forever because they didn’t say the magic words before their time on earth was up.

Those are not easy things to say. They’re not thoughts I want to think. I really really want to think orthodox evangelical thoughts. But that’s not being honest. This is being honest. This is where I am. And it’s baby steps toward believing and beginning to live again as a follower of Jesus. I’m finding a God to love and who loves me (and everyone) — not for what I do but just because that’s the way it is.

If what I’m believing now makes me not a christian to some people, then so be it. I’m starting to falter after Jesus again, and I like to think that’s what matters, not that I get my theology just right. None of this is nailed down anyways. But at least I’m moving.

I think that just maybe this prodigal is starting to find a way back. More than ever, Massivivid’s Boomerang resonates with me…

you’re going down boy
i’m hot on your heels
i’ve been chasing you for what feels like years
and everybody knows that i’m prone to get my way
you better watch your thunder its the first thing i’m gonna steal
keep an eye on your wonder it’s the only thing that’s real

you’ll be back

you’re beautiful trying to get yourself born
you’re beautiful and it’s stitched into every pore
and it’s painful to watch you headlong into the black
but if i don’t let you go, you won’t be back.

you know it’s time boy
you’re losing the plot
i’ve been chasing you, is that all you’ve got
look over your shoulder and realize that my eyes are on you
you’re fantastically iconoclastic
and drastically reducing all you know to plastic
you’re spastic and elastic and now
i’m gonna smash you apart.

you’re beautiful trying to get yourself born
you’re beautiful and it’s stitched into every pore
and it’s painful to watch you headlong into the black
but if i don’t let you go, you won’t be back.

To close, a quote from LaDonna Witmer:

I don’t worship so much with uplifted palms and hymns as I do… with burning questions and anguished, soul-ravaged confessions. That, to me, is real. Yes, there are moments of joy and happy thoughts. But there is also an almost inappropriate honesty. And I like to believe that God finds both equally satisfying…

Last week I ran into a friend that I haven’t talked with much lately and she mentioned that in one of her classes (I think it was pastoral leadership) they had to share the story of a pastor who had influenced their faith journey. Apparently one person couldn’t think of a clergyperson but picked me. And then after they were done, other people chimed in agreeing about how I had played a large role in their spiritual development.

All I was able to do was smile and say thanks, because I had and still have a lot of conflicting feelings about hearing this. On the one hand it feels really good to know I have influenced peoples’ lives. I’m glad that I’ve been a positive influence on people. But then I think about where I am today and how much of a different person I am.

What I’ve realized is that over the past couple months is that I have sort of allowed my faith to fall apart. It’s very strange to realize that I don’t really know what I believe, and even stranger to almost be ok with that fact. Most of the time I can just go on with life as normal, but then there are times when I am no longer feeling in control that are really scary. It would almost be easier to just give up and go back to just accepting things at face value like I did for so long; to sing the happy songs and just be "ok." But that would not be real, and I’d rather bleed and know I’m alive then be "clean" and "good"… and dying inside. Still, sometimes I want to give up and just believe that Jesus is coming back tomorrow to make everything ok… but I’ve been promised that before and it definitely didn’t happen (yeah, I know that’s a whole different can of worms).

So things are still in a very fluid state. I haven’t abandoned my faith in Jesus, but I guess it is sort of on hiatus at the moment. I saw this quote on one of my friend’s profiles and it really hit home: "Change comes when the pain of staying the same is too great." So true.

Now on to the lighter side of life! Friday I went with Ryan and Rianna (pronounced Rie-aaan-ah, not Rie-ah-nah :-) to see The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe performed by The King’s Players at Liberty University. I have to say that play was one of the most unintentionally hilarious theatrical events I’ve ever witnessed. If I had it on video, the MSTing would practically write itself! So what made it so awesomely bad? Let me count the ways…

• Way ghetto set and costumes. We’re talking dumpster diving quality here.
• Acting worse than Manos: Hands of Fate (ok, so that’s a little extreme… but it was close).
• Opening music: badly done generic praise music (and it was solo trax!)
• Intermission and closing music: the score of the original Lord of the Rings movie (the old one, not the one that’s making bazillions now), which Ryan informed us is "one of the most brilliant pieces of music ever written" or something to that effect.

There were so many times during the play that I had to try really hard not to laugh out loud, because I felt bad for laughing at what was obviously not meant as a comedy. But it was so freaking funny! If they reworked it as a purposeful comedy, I think they would have a hit on their hands.

Then on Saturday, Ri and I saw Catch Me If You Can. We both thoroughly enjoyed it. I thought that Leo gave a decidedly non-sucky performance, and Tom Hanks wasn’t half bad either. :-) Definitely recommended as a fun movie (that also deals with some weighty issues such as finding self-identity and moving on from the past).

House update: Things are still up in the air. Steve and I talked to the landlord today and it went… ok. He’s gotten burned a lot in the past and how do you convince someone you’re not going to trash the place? We’re still hopeful that it’s going to work out.

Music: I got the new Sheltershed cd. It totally rocks. Of course, how could anything with spoken-word poetry by LaDonna Witmer not rock? Favorite songs: Rainbow, Dreams, DJ Culture, Coriander. Go get your copy today!

Here are some must-visit links:

• From the things-that-shouldn’t-work-but-do department: Johnny Cash - Hurt music video. Yes, Johnny Cash covers Nine Inch Nails. This is one of the most powerful, gut-wrenching videos I’ve seen in a while. Just a total "wow" experience.
• Interview with The Brothers Chaps… you know, the Homestar Runner guys. Good stuff.
• Linux Switch parody - I want a beowulf cluster of atomic supermen!

Update
Somehow I managed to totally forget about seeing Bowling for Columbine yesterday. I’m not sure how I did it, but thanks to Dave for reminding me. If you get the chance, I would highly recommending seeing this film. It’s a documentary, but not the boring PBS kind. :-) One of the main questions of the film is why the US has so many more gun-related murders per year than any other country in the world. The answers he comes up with have nothing to do with a need for gun control or any of the usual methods used to address the problem. Drawing from Barry Glassner’s book The Culture of Fear, Michael Moore highlights how much our media focuses on things that scare us and keep us in fear. If you want a movie that will make you think, check it out.

♫ Dijitol Kitchin