"Our state fair is a great state fair"

I saw a miniature mule dressed up like Raggedy Anne this weekend.

And I was visibly upset when she didn't take first place.

From my air-conditioned perch at my employer's booth in the Mathewson Arena, I saw many things I never dreamed possible: Shetland ponies staining to drag 400-pound loads, their muscles rippling, their knees buckling; teen farmers-to-be tossing a cow-pie discus and leaping six-foot-tall hay bales in a single bound; and, most fabulous/disturbing of all, a mini-mule fashion show featuring pint-sized beasts of burden in their Trick-or-Treat finest.

A few times I ventured out into the sweltering heat in search of "bargain" $3.50 corn dogs, and I made the rounds at the Varied Industries and Ag buildings to browse the vendors (though I did not purchase anything). I soon found myself back at my stool in the Mathewson center, saying hello to cranky, sweaty fairgoers and attempting to entice them to subscribe to the magazine.

The days were long, and although the building was air-conditioned, the crush of people kept the air sticky. When the time came to pack up, I was ready to leave, though I must say being at the fair amused me. Although I am from the Midwest and am descended from farmers, it's rare for me to see such a concentrated display of agricultural pride. The fair is full of "now that's not something you see everyday" moments. I enjoyed it. But I'm also glad I don't have to go back.

All things in moderation. I've had my fill of funnel cake for the year.

Sweet*Salty*Crunchy

I've discovered the ultimate snack mix.

In tupperware container (or empty almond tin), toss together the following ingredients:
•3/4 cup Wheaties
•Handful lightly salted, dry roasted almonds
•Handful dark chocolate chips

It's the perfect blend of sweetness, saltiness, and crunchiness in every bite. And it's not entirely devoid of health. My new favorite.

All-time low

My hometown U.S. representative, Brad Ellsworth, may stink at keeping campaign promises, but at least he's bringing sexyback to Washington, D.C.

Why am I not impressed?

In memorium

One year ago today...

Perhaps I'm just a sucker for anniversaries, to ascribing meaning to personally historic dates. The evening of Wednesday, April 26, 2006 was a pivotal point not only for me, but for an entire university community. It was a time of lost innocence, but more importantly it was a time of courage and grace amid grief. As the world around me unraveled, I discovered anew the ultimate insignificance of everything outside of relationships, outside of love.

The Virginia Tech shootings actually brought all of my feelings back with shocking intensity. No, the five slain Taylorites weren't senselessly gunned down by a bumbling madman (instead they were impaled by an overextending truck driver), but somehow I could relate to the Hokies. I know what it feels like to wander aimlessly around a college campus fresh on the heels of tragedy. I know what it's like to wait in agony for the names of the dead, all the while wondering if I really want to hear the list. And I know what it's like to graduate shortly thereafter, knowing that this event would define my college years.

I've heard several VaTech seniors ruminate on that last point in various news outlets. While I understand the regret such a circumstance triggers, I don't feel its a bad thing that the week of April 26 encapsulated my Taylor experience. I pray that the class of 2007 at Virginia Tech will experience the same freedom and perspective that only comes from surviving pain. The faces of the dead will never leave my subconscious, yet the memory of their lives will never cease to inspire me to make the most of my time here. Their lives and their passings beseech me to choose love, to laugh more, to be a better friend.

No one lives forever, but in the memories of our friends and families, we are immortal.

Laura, Betsy, Monica, Brad, Laurel... I remember.

"Because our hearts are so shy"

Relationships can do one of two things: Blind us to our inadequacies (via blame) or make us painfully aware of personal shortcomings. While these may seem like two mutually exclusive realities, the dichotomy is not so severe. Indeed, it's almost easy to grab hold of moral superiority all the while knowing in your heart you harbor much deeper deficiencies. Perhaps that's why we all fear being known, i.e. intimacy. It's just easier to sleep at night without the gnawing sensation that some flaw needs to be addressed. When no one knows you, there's no reason to fix yourself.

I read the Song of Solomon a short while ago. It shook me. In Searching for God Knows What, Donald Miller said salvation is actually about relationship. The Song paints a portrait of that Truth while pointing to the great human need/fear of intimacy. Which brings me to the Question that's been hounding my soul for the past nine months: Have I found the One my heart loves or will my own insecurities keep me from committing? Can time tell?

Sick cycle

According to some talking head on the news, the frequency of illness during the winter is no longer attributed to the cold weather outside; rather, people get sick because everyone is huddled inside where the air is dry from heaters. Once one person gets sick, everyone else gets sick. I have found this to be true in the last 48 hours.

Over the past week, several people in our newsroom were sick, so I was not surprised to find last night as I groggily assembled this morning's paper that I may have caught the bug. Sure enough, as the night stretched on the tightness in my throat became more of a throb. When at last the time came for my weekend to begin, I staggered out to my car feeling utterly defeated. The disease had caught me.

I awoke this morning to the distinct feeling one gets after swallowing a porcupine. And so I have spent the day chugging green tea and chicken noodle soup while laying on Cliff's couch trying desperately not to infect anything. Although my present state of discomfort reeks, I am quite thankful for several things:

--Cliff... and his couch
--My last two bags of Zen tea
--The chicken noodle soup recipe I invented two weeks ago

Life, love, labor... Missouri style

I've long neglected this little blog, but I have an excuse (and a pretty good one at that). I don't have internet access in my apartment. It's one of those things I haven't quite figured out how to fit in the budget. And with WiFi available in many public places (and in my boyfriend's apartment), my very own hookup to the information superhighway is just not a priority right now.

I am on the internet a lot at work, but that's work. One is not supposed to update one's blog at work. I think that's a Commandment. Anyway, I still read other people's blogs while I'm at work waiting for stories to come in and what not. I figure if everyone else gets cigarette breaks, I'm entitled to my blog breaks. I'm sure my lungs will thank me later.

Since last I opined, I moved to Missouri. It's been a pretty good move if you ask me. I'm still loving the newness relocation begets. I suppose in my heart I'm still a nomad.

I now live very near to Cliff and that is an incredibly wonderful thing. Absence may make the heart grow fonder, but it does absolutely nothing for the growth of a relationship. I commute an hour each way to work, which I actually enjoy and might even love if it weren't for high gas prices, scary semi-trucks and ice/snow storms. I don't have a TV, so I've been able to reconnect with one of my favorite forms of mass media, the radio. It's a pretty sweet medium for me because I can listen in my home and on the road.

Resolved

My cousin's cousin, a local fifth grader, had his New Year's resolution published in the Evansville Courier & Press. I found it humbling and inspiring and I intend to make it my own:

"In 2007, I will improve the way I treat others in my family and how I talk to them, because the way I did was not very good. I’m going to start to listen better and have a better attitude. I want to help around the house more and be more grateful."

Shadowland

"Broken wing,
Forgotten dream,
Shattered thing that a man's hands can't ever mend
Shadowland and desert sand
A [woman] searches for a love that will never die..."
--Josh Garrels

Heartache penetrates to the depths of my soul. Within me churns a raging sea of confusion and loss. This hopelessness is not necessarily a result of any direct violation against me. It is a weariness with the world that has taken root in my soul and festered to full-grown despondency. Everyday, in the oddest ways, it hits me between the eyes: this world is broken beyond repair.

This morning I read the confession of a U.S. soldier who brandished sexuality against a young Iraqi girl as a weapon of unparralleled destruction. Rape, torture, trafficking, molestation... I believe in many ways these are the most heinous crimes of our day`(if not all of history). They rob individuals of their personhood while all of society suffers as a result of their commission.

It is crimes like these and other "lesser" offenses (i.e. sex in the media) that make me wonder if love and sexuality can belong in the same sentence anymore. I hope to God they do, but my limited experience and previously mentioned world-weariness cause me to doubt. I believe the original design of sex was to express love, commitment, and unique intimacy within the marriage bed; however, that design has long been hijacked and maligned into a tool of power, control, and violence in which one party dominates another from the inside.

Nothing seems quite so sinister as that which was intended for one's good being used to reap destruction. Tis the nature of modern sexuality. Where is redemption? Now that's a concept worth pondering.

"Our brave new world..."

I taught my Grandpa how to Google this morning. The world will never be the same.

Yay for civic duty

I’ve been of voting age for four years now. It’s an age I longed to attain for, well, eighteen years. I can’t say I’m very politically savvy, but I’ve always wanted to contribute to the democratic process. I remember campaigning for President H.W. Bush in his race against Bill Clinton when I was in second grade on my school bus. We even held a mock election on my bus and Bush won by a landslide. However, the way of Bus 44 was not the way of America. I remember waking up the morning after the election to my mother scrubbing toilets. I asked her who won and was so saddened by her response I remember that solemn moment to this day. Democracy is fickle, but at least it’s fair.

Back to civic responsibility. Although I’ve been “of age” for the past several years, I’ve never actually voted. I was never a conscientious objector to the Ballot Battle. In fact, I completed the absentee ballot in 2004, but it never quite felt legit. I’d never physically huddled in a portable voting booth to make my selections for who should serve in office. Never… until now!

This moment of triumph took me back to the place I first began politicking, Highland Elementary School. After failing twice to locate the correct table at which to sign into my precinct, I made my way to the back of the gym where I had once won a cake that tasted like Styrofoam at the Spring Fling. I signed in and took my place in line behind a rather tall gentleman. He turned around and told me, “Thanks for being here!” I thought it an odd statement, but soon understood his meaning when he followed up with, “I hope more young people come out to vote.”

Young people. Yes, I look like I’m in high school but thank God I’m not. I made my selections via touch screen and was on my way, proud of my contribution to the democracy. My vote may not count for much, but voting like a grown up sure beats grade school bus antics.

Thriller!!!

So I was just listening to "The Tri-State's Only True Alternative 89.1 the BASH," a radio station that specializes in favorites from bands like Foo Fighters, Disturbed, and Korn, and they just played Michael Jackson's "Thriller"! Memories of Airband 2005 came flooding back as I remembered with pride the killer show Third Floor English brought to Rediger. Yeah, that was awesome.

Oh, and let's hear it for WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONS the St. Louis Cardinals!!! Sweet justice, that's all I have to say. Wish I were in Louie with Cliff right now.

The most ridiculous item of the week: No crying in baseball

Cliff once referred to me as a “five-year-old” Cardinals fan, which in many ways is quite accurate. I first began following baseball in Game 7 of the National League Championship Series 2004, Cardinals vs. Astros. Prior to that I’d sat out a couple of games at Wrigley Field and Camden Yards, more for the culture than enlightened participation. Even my modicum of softball experience failed to educate me beyond the basics of the game, since I was in third grade at the time and the only thing I remember about my short stint as a catcher for the “True Blues” was that my coach had a TV in the back of his van (which in 1993 was pretty freakin’ sweet).

So basically, I’ve been a true fan for three years. At this point I understand many of the finer aspects of the game. I know when it’s prudent to use the “suicide squeeze.” I recognize the threat of an opposing pitcher’s low ERA. I even know the difference between the National League and the American League. And yet, some things continue to baffle me. Case in point: Kenny Rogers and the brown smudge controversy of Sunday’s Game 2 of the World Series.

On that holiest of days, the Tiger pitcher sported a considerable brown stain at the base of his left thumb throughout the top of the first inning. MLB rules clearly state that any pitcher in possession of a foreign substance must be immediately ejected from the game and suspended for the next 10. While it is obvious that Rogers was in possession of such a substance for at least the first inning of the game, the rule is invalidated by Cardinal manager Tony La Russa’s failure to seek a more thorough investigation.

Here is what I don’t understand: why is that La Russa’s responsibility? If the umpires knew of the substance (which they reportedly did since they told Rogers to wash his hands), why aren’t they equally as obligated to take care of the situation? Why must it fall on the opposing team to raise a stink in order to make the game fair? In my mind, this is similar to requiring victims of abuse or rape to rat out their assailant before the justice system will do its job. I know that’s an extreme analogy and baseball is “just a game,” but it makes me sick to think that Major League Baseball condones such conduct.

From Loompaland to the World Series (I hope)

I just gotta get this out there... Scott Spiezio looks uncannily like an Oompa-Loompa. Get that boy some orange face paint and Wonka'd be all over that. Seriously.

"C's get degrees"

“Intelligent fools
PhD's in illusion
Masters of mass confusion
Bachelors in past illusion”
--Lauryn Hill, “Freedom Time”

This weekend while visiting Cliff in Columbia, I was afflicted by a cold. As I stood in line at the local Wal-Mart to purchase green tea and chicken soup, I overheard the following conversation between two coeds in front of me:

Girl 1: My parents are really pissed off at me because my phone bill was so bad.
Girl 2: What did they say?
1: They were all, “Why do you have to text so much?” And I’m like, “I thought we had unlimited,” and they were all, “Well, now we do.”
2: Huh.
1: Yeah. They were like, “Why don’t you just call the person?”
2: *Scoffing* It’s not like you can always talk to people.
1: I know. It’s like, what am I supposed to do while I’m in class?

There is something hopelessly wrong with “higher education” in America. I’d say the majority of American college students have little to no appreciation for learning. Universities originated in ancient monastic settlements like Ireland’s Clonmacnoise where scholars devoted their very lives to the preservation of knowledge. Those men paid dearly for the opportunity to learn, and in turn saved civilization from the Dark Ages. The students of today seem more interested in draining their parents’ bank accounts for an education they refuse to ingest, imbibing instead in all manner of frivolities.

With college tuition ever on the rise, it’s a wonder some people choose to invest in that which they don’t take seriously. It’s not like my own college years were characterized by excessive diligence, but while I was enrolled I understood that the reason I was there was primarily to learn. I wonder at the circus academia has become as I pine for a time when degrees actually meant something.

"Lifeboat Theory: How to Kill Your Neighbor"

“Because the world owes me nothing
We owe each other the world.”

Those words, originally penned by Ani DiFranco, propelled me via Josh Garrels’ soulful rendition as I traversed I-64/I-70 to Columbia, MO this weekend. I’d been feeling troubled by the realization that the “real world” more closely resembles middle school hierarchy than I'd previously thought.

Donald Miller speaks of "Lifeboat Theory" in Searching for God Knows What. It’s the idea that in life, as in middle school, we are constantly evaluating our worth as compared to those around us. In essence, if five of my coworkers and I are in a lifeboat with the capacity for only five people, am I valuable (i.e. attractive, hard-working, athletic, intelligent, etc.) enough to avoid being pitched overboard? Miller suggests that this is the way all post-Fall humans live their lives. We feel this pressure to prove our worth each and everyday because something is missing in our lives that insures that worth. Read the book; it’s basically amazing.

Anyway, as I pondered the reality of Lifeboat Theory in my own life, I realized how easy it is to denigrate others for the sake of proving my own validity. I think how foolish this is, because ultimately only people, only relationships, matter. Here I am, thinking I’m preserving my very existence when in reality I’m torching it.

Last night, Cliff and I viewed a wonderful chunk of cinema called Luther. In one of the most powerful scenes, Martin Luther extols his congregation to love one another in his absence as he faces excommunication from the church. Not long after he’s gone, the people turn on one another, fueling their wrath with twisted interpretations of Luther’s own writings. Watching it all unfold, I wanted to scream at those people for how wrong they were, but in the end I realize I do exactly the same thing.

I feel like I’m constantly playing defense, like I’m ever under siege from an enemy threat. In reality, that’s just the human condition. I will never feel entirely secure here on this earth, but maybe security is not the point. I’ve always known I wanted to live for adventure, but it’s easy to lose sight of ambition when reality knocks at the door.

Whatever the consequence, I want out of this lifeboat. I know the world is not going to endow me with worth. The only viable Source for what I seek is God Himself.

"Only beauty helps"

"Simone Weil was absolutely right-- beauty and affliction are the only two things that can pierce our hearts. Because this is so true, we must have a measure of beauty in our lives proportionate to our affliction. No, more. Much more." --John Eldredge, The Journey of Desire

Fall has arrived in Evansville and I am glad for it. The changing of the leaves combined with much earlier, much more exquisite sunsets reminds me that life in the midwest is not devoid of beauty. I anticipate many more breathtaking sights this weekend as my journey takes me through the rolling hills of east central Missouri. My eyes will feast and I will remember deep in my soul that God is good.

"I make a vow, right here and now"

Cages or wings
Which do you prefer?
Ask the birds.
Fear or love, baby,
Don’t say the answer
Actions speak louder than words.

--tick, tick, BOOM! by Jonathan Larson

One of the hardest lessons I’m learning right now is that everything in life must be pursued. Nothing comes easily, it’s all a fight. I guess I somehow assumed that upon graduating from college opportunities would throw themselves at me. I was hopelessly wrong.

Although I’ve never seen the show, I’ve come to realize from its soundtrack that my life has begun to resemble tick, tick, BOOM!, a musical written by the late, great Jonathan Larson about a man on the brink of age 30 who is experiencing what John Mayer so eloquently referred to as a “quarter-life crisis.” I first made this connection a little over a year ago. It’s odd how little has changed.

Still, I’m happy to report that in the past week I realized that one of the songs I relate to is “Why” in which Johnny explains how he came to understand his calling.

When I was nine,
Michael and I
Entered a talent show down at the Y

Nine A.M. went to rehearse by some stairs
Mike couldn't sing
But I said, "No one cares"

We sang "Yellow Bird" and "Let's Go Fly A Kite"
Over and over and over
Till we got it right

When we emerged from the YMCA
Three o'clock sun had made the grass hay

I thought,
Hey, what a way to spend a day
Hey, what a way to spend a day
I make a vow, right here and now
I'm gonna spend my time this way

Johnny goes on to tell of several such epiphanies throughout his 29 years. As I thought on this, I realized I had a similar moment of realization last May as I wrote my senior paper during my spring break. In the mornings, I’d work out or relax, then I’d head over to the library for a few hours of work. In seven days, I’d completed a 35-page rhetorical analysis of John Colapinto’s coverage of the David Reimer saga. I remember reading and typing and researching and typing, all the while thinking, “Hey, what a way to spend the day!”

So for the first time I’m admitting to myself that I want to spend my time that way. I want to write. I don’t exactly know what I want to write, but I want to research and I want to read and I want to write! I admire writers like John Colapinto who create narrative masterpiece while also presenting relevant scientific findings. I also respect writers like John Eldredge who incorporate narrative truth from film, poetry, literature, and art into introspective nonfiction.

Just like Jon (and John and John), I’m making a vow to chase this desire. I’m still clueless how, but at least I have somewhat of a goal for which to toil.

I’m gonna spend my time this way.

Even cats need omega-3s

Why do cats like fish so much? Do fish taste like mice?

It's not a child, it's a choice?

I recently caught an old episode of Gilmore Girls in which Rory is in her second year at Yale. Every bit the little “feminist,” she resides in her own room plastered with posters decrying the “War on Choice.” I thought this an interesting/contradictory motif for this series to propel, considering the focal point of said series is a relationship between a mother and daughter that is abnormally intimate due their proximity in ages. It makes me wonder how differently the series would have turned out if Loralei had opted for abortion when she was single, sixteen and inconveniently pregnant with Rory. Personally, I don’t believe in the legitimacy of choices that snuff out the existence of innocent human beings, whether those innocents are workers in the World Trade Center or “products of conception” with beating hearts inside their mother’s wombs. I guess it’s sweet that Rory is defending her mother’s right to choose whether she lived or died… or maybe it’s just sick.