29 November 2008
Now Playing: The Decemberists, "16 Military Wives" from "The Picaresque" on Philip's laptop.
For once the house has been completely full. Our days usually include Philip doing loads of thermodynamics, physics, and statics homework at the living room table, Stephen building sewers for his Roman helots on the computer upstairs, and Keith mucking about with Philip's computer.
Of course the first third of the week, after Keith arrived, was spent "fixing" Philip's computer: Philip and Keith spent most of Wednesday and Thursday attacking the problem, getting frustrated, doing something else, then going back to the computer again. I think that after a lot of jockeying with memory sticks and online downloads they finally managed to uninstall or reinstall or install Linux, and after that, having nothing better to do, they proceeded to install a myriad of add-ons and slick cosmetic changes that make Philip's Dell look like a Mac when booted up. Which is the point, as Keith informed me.
Our house has been sadly cat-less since Mandy left us. Sandy is being given an unprecedented amount of attention. On Wednesday, she chased one of the neighbor's cats all the way down the street into the creek, and returned about an hour later absolutely filthy and very proud of herself. She has since then been given two baths, one of them with my mother's own hair shampoo.
On Wednesday, Laura, Stephen, Keith, my mother, and I spent most of the afternoon raking leaves in the front yard. The south side of the yard was a mat of silver maple leaves, silver and gold, that crunched underfoot like tissue paper. The north side of the yard, where the grass was longer, was harder to rake, but we did our best. It was nearly dark before we finished. Keith and Stephen stacked twenty-two bags under the basketball goal on the driveway.
Thanksgiving was the usual family affair, though Mr. Workman, from church, also joined us. After everyone left in the afternoon, we all went for a walk around San Born Lake--even my parents went with us. Philip led Keith, Laura, and Stephen on a wild goose chase down the side of the dam into the swamp under the old cottonwood trees, but my parents and I walked around the lake on the normal trail. We saw a magnificent red-tailed hawk, a great blue heron trying to fish while a flock of mallard ducks paddled nearby, and a kingfisher. Someone had butchered a deer on the peninsula, the hideousness of a sawn-off leg and its empty rotting rib cage reminding me of the horror of the dead frogs in Perelandra. We stood on the peninsula and waited for the ardent explorers to return--we could hear their voices coming clear across the still water.
Yesterday, my mother and all of us except Philip went out to Grammy's house. We dug up her dead basil plants for her, aromatic brittle stalks crammed into a bin bag. I refilled her bird feeder. Last night all of us except my father went to the Cs' house for a post-Thanksgiving party to which everyone was supposed to bring Thanksgiving leftovers--I'd say that people brought a lot more. Mrs. S brought venison stew, and Bridget had made a peanut butter meringue pie. After people finished eating, we played games. Philip started a poker game with the guys in the living room, playing with chips from another game. The younger girls played a sort of Scrabble while Mrs. C, Mrs. S, and my mother laughed hysterically over Mad Gab. Then Mrs. C decided that she wanted to play Pit, and quite soon an incredibly noisy game of Pit was happening back in the sunroom. It got even noisier when Philip and Laura joined in. The parakeets in their cage on the bookshelf twittered nervously while everyone yelled "One, one one!" or "Three, three, three!" at the tops of their lungs.
I went grocery shopping with my mother and Laura today. The disgusting commercialism of Wal-Mart at Christmastime is enough to make me want to pick up and move to some deserted island in the Pacific, or the coast of Donegal, but I don't think that would be very wise.
Somehow or other I managed to finish almost everything on my list for the week, including a couple of parcels posted, a haircut, birthday presents purchased, cards made, e-mails written, and the like. Also read A Wind in the Door, A Wrinkle in Time, and the first two Harry Potter books. "Helped" my parents choose new glasses frames, too, though I'm not sure I was quite necessary for that job.
Stephen and I baked loads of cookies yesterday, and I baked scones today for Anna and me. Philip and I have been teasing each other non-stop. I suppose it helps him let out steam while he's revising. I'm fairly sure it scandalizes our parents. At some point I guess we'll have to grow up and stop mucking about, but I don't know when the cut-off age is for nonsense.
Oh, yay, "Sons and Daughters". It's about the only happy song The Decemberists have ever written. Rhyming "cinnamon" and "aluminum"...!
For once the house has been completely full. Our days usually include Philip doing loads of thermodynamics, physics, and statics homework at the living room table, Stephen building sewers for his Roman helots on the computer upstairs, and Keith mucking about with Philip's computer.
Of course the first third of the week, after Keith arrived, was spent "fixing" Philip's computer: Philip and Keith spent most of Wednesday and Thursday attacking the problem, getting frustrated, doing something else, then going back to the computer again. I think that after a lot of jockeying with memory sticks and online downloads they finally managed to uninstall or reinstall or install Linux, and after that, having nothing better to do, they proceeded to install a myriad of add-ons and slick cosmetic changes that make Philip's Dell look like a Mac when booted up. Which is the point, as Keith informed me.
Our house has been sadly cat-less since Mandy left us. Sandy is being given an unprecedented amount of attention. On Wednesday, she chased one of the neighbor's cats all the way down the street into the creek, and returned about an hour later absolutely filthy and very proud of herself. She has since then been given two baths, one of them with my mother's own hair shampoo.
On Wednesday, Laura, Stephen, Keith, my mother, and I spent most of the afternoon raking leaves in the front yard. The south side of the yard was a mat of silver maple leaves, silver and gold, that crunched underfoot like tissue paper. The north side of the yard, where the grass was longer, was harder to rake, but we did our best. It was nearly dark before we finished. Keith and Stephen stacked twenty-two bags under the basketball goal on the driveway.
Thanksgiving was the usual family affair, though Mr. Workman, from church, also joined us. After everyone left in the afternoon, we all went for a walk around San Born Lake--even my parents went with us. Philip led Keith, Laura, and Stephen on a wild goose chase down the side of the dam into the swamp under the old cottonwood trees, but my parents and I walked around the lake on the normal trail. We saw a magnificent red-tailed hawk, a great blue heron trying to fish while a flock of mallard ducks paddled nearby, and a kingfisher. Someone had butchered a deer on the peninsula, the hideousness of a sawn-off leg and its empty rotting rib cage reminding me of the horror of the dead frogs in Perelandra. We stood on the peninsula and waited for the ardent explorers to return--we could hear their voices coming clear across the still water.
Yesterday, my mother and all of us except Philip went out to Grammy's house. We dug up her dead basil plants for her, aromatic brittle stalks crammed into a bin bag. I refilled her bird feeder. Last night all of us except my father went to the Cs' house for a post-Thanksgiving party to which everyone was supposed to bring Thanksgiving leftovers--I'd say that people brought a lot more. Mrs. S brought venison stew, and Bridget had made a peanut butter meringue pie. After people finished eating, we played games. Philip started a poker game with the guys in the living room, playing with chips from another game. The younger girls played a sort of Scrabble while Mrs. C, Mrs. S, and my mother laughed hysterically over Mad Gab. Then Mrs. C decided that she wanted to play Pit, and quite soon an incredibly noisy game of Pit was happening back in the sunroom. It got even noisier when Philip and Laura joined in. The parakeets in their cage on the bookshelf twittered nervously while everyone yelled "One, one one!" or "Three, three, three!" at the tops of their lungs.
I went grocery shopping with my mother and Laura today. The disgusting commercialism of Wal-Mart at Christmastime is enough to make me want to pick up and move to some deserted island in the Pacific, or the coast of Donegal, but I don't think that would be very wise.
Somehow or other I managed to finish almost everything on my list for the week, including a couple of parcels posted, a haircut, birthday presents purchased, cards made, e-mails written, and the like. Also read A Wind in the Door, A Wrinkle in Time, and the first two Harry Potter books. "Helped" my parents choose new glasses frames, too, though I'm not sure I was quite necessary for that job.
Stephen and I baked loads of cookies yesterday, and I baked scones today for Anna and me. Philip and I have been teasing each other non-stop. I suppose it helps him let out steam while he's revising. I'm fairly sure it scandalizes our parents. At some point I guess we'll have to grow up and stop mucking about, but I don't know when the cut-off age is for nonsense.
Oh, yay, "Sons and Daughters". It's about the only happy song The Decemberists have ever written. Rhyming "cinnamon" and "aluminum"...!
26 November 2008
Now Playing: Some random rap song Keith found on YouTube.
I've been trying to teach Laura how to make paper cranes this afternoon. My mother is baking the turkey for tomorrow, and two fat loaves of challah bread that Laura made earlier are sitting on the dining room table.
Psalm 36, trying to explore the love of God. One way to battle unbelief is to think about His love in concrete ways.
5 Your steadfast love, O Lord, extends to the heavens, your faithfulness to the clouds.
6 Your righteousness is like the mountains of God; your judgments are like the great deep; man and beast you save, O Lord.
7 How precious is your steadfast love, O God! The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings.
8 They feast on the abundance of your house, and you give them drink from the river of your delights.
9 For with you is the fountain of life; in your light do we see light.
God's love is infinite and overarching. It is a love that is transcendent, superior to any love on earth, while still touching the earth. His love is steadfast, like the mountains, and also like the mountains, in some ways terrifying. C.S. Lewis beautifully describes angels in Perelandra as exemplifying the pure intense charis of God, an intensity resulting from its purity, its sovereignty, its immensity. In some ways this is the redemption of the Romantic idea of the sublime that Burke and Kant talk about: God's love is frightening in its immensity and hugeness, in the fact that it makes us as human beings realize our smallness, our helpless, our inability to love in a way at all comparable.
This love is not without purpose, though. God's love would be terrifying because of its transcendence and sovereignty since we cannot and will not choose to reflect it, but it is channeled into redemption, David says. Not only redemption of human beings, but redemption of creation, "man and beast". His love has chosen to manifest itself sovereignly by flowing through creation instead of judging fallen creation for its inability to reflect that love. C.S. Lewis again writes about the "joy" that happens when the infinite, simply for love, rejects all other possibilities for the one on which His choice has settled. Here that choice is salvation, into which God has amazingly directed all the power of His will.
This makes God's love precious, valuable, weighty. This also makes His love safe, a place of refuge. In this love human beings can find rest and protection, complete security. There is no anger remaining for sins in the past. In the face of His love I can acknowledge my vulnerability and need and find rest.
Not only is His love protecting, but it is satisfying. David speaks of God's love as food and drink, satisfying and refreshing. In Christ nothing else will satisfy or should satisfy. Christ Himself is our abundance, the meal that we eat and drink. This means peace for the future and peace for the present, energy to love those around me.
God's love gives truth, gives direction, gives light. By God's love I can measure all other loves, see all other lights in light of His light. Light also gives freedom from fear: in the light I can confront the things that terrify me and see them for what they are. Since His love is my refuge, I have a safe place from which to confront sin and straight sight with which to confront that sin, to see it for what it is. Then His love gives the energy, the satisfaction, the food and drink, with which to combat that sin.
So I pray this for those I know:
10 Oh, continue your steadfast love to those who know you, and your righteousness to the upright of heart!
I've been trying to teach Laura how to make paper cranes this afternoon. My mother is baking the turkey for tomorrow, and two fat loaves of challah bread that Laura made earlier are sitting on the dining room table.
Psalm 36, trying to explore the love of God. One way to battle unbelief is to think about His love in concrete ways.
5 Your steadfast love, O Lord, extends to the heavens, your faithfulness to the clouds.
6 Your righteousness is like the mountains of God; your judgments are like the great deep; man and beast you save, O Lord.
7 How precious is your steadfast love, O God! The children of mankind take refuge in the shadow of your wings.
8 They feast on the abundance of your house, and you give them drink from the river of your delights.
9 For with you is the fountain of life; in your light do we see light.
God's love is infinite and overarching. It is a love that is transcendent, superior to any love on earth, while still touching the earth. His love is steadfast, like the mountains, and also like the mountains, in some ways terrifying. C.S. Lewis beautifully describes angels in Perelandra as exemplifying the pure intense charis of God, an intensity resulting from its purity, its sovereignty, its immensity. In some ways this is the redemption of the Romantic idea of the sublime that Burke and Kant talk about: God's love is frightening in its immensity and hugeness, in the fact that it makes us as human beings realize our smallness, our helpless, our inability to love in a way at all comparable.
This love is not without purpose, though. God's love would be terrifying because of its transcendence and sovereignty since we cannot and will not choose to reflect it, but it is channeled into redemption, David says. Not only redemption of human beings, but redemption of creation, "man and beast". His love has chosen to manifest itself sovereignly by flowing through creation instead of judging fallen creation for its inability to reflect that love. C.S. Lewis again writes about the "joy" that happens when the infinite, simply for love, rejects all other possibilities for the one on which His choice has settled. Here that choice is salvation, into which God has amazingly directed all the power of His will.
This makes God's love precious, valuable, weighty. This also makes His love safe, a place of refuge. In this love human beings can find rest and protection, complete security. There is no anger remaining for sins in the past. In the face of His love I can acknowledge my vulnerability and need and find rest.
Not only is His love protecting, but it is satisfying. David speaks of God's love as food and drink, satisfying and refreshing. In Christ nothing else will satisfy or should satisfy. Christ Himself is our abundance, the meal that we eat and drink. This means peace for the future and peace for the present, energy to love those around me.
God's love gives truth, gives direction, gives light. By God's love I can measure all other loves, see all other lights in light of His light. Light also gives freedom from fear: in the light I can confront the things that terrify me and see them for what they are. Since His love is my refuge, I have a safe place from which to confront sin and straight sight with which to confront that sin, to see it for what it is. Then His love gives the energy, the satisfaction, the food and drink, with which to combat that sin.
So I pray this for those I know:
10 Oh, continue your steadfast love to those who know you, and your righteousness to the upright of heart!
24 November 2008
Now Playing: Mozart, "Requiem", "Kyrie Eleison".
What have I been doing these past weeks?
Monday, 10 November: Decided that next year I would sleep in a broom closet under someone's stairs, Harry-Potter style.
Tuesday, 11 November: Listened to some ridiculous Australian rap with Nicole and was laughed at by someone for using the word "wellies".
Wednesday, 12 November: Ran into my main lecturer in the gym, which was awkward, and sat through an exceedingly dull Mortar Board meeting.
Thursday, 13 November: Drank a latte made for me by Philip, which kept me awake while I worked on my senior project.
Friday, 14 November: Went to an international fair with Rachel at which Europe was sadly underrepresented, and then watched Harry Potter with a constantly-changing assortment of people in Nicole's apartment even though Nicole herself wasn't there most of the time.
Over that weekend, I talked to Catherine on the phone, volunteered at an international festival for kids where I got to help out in the booth for Scotland, and was visited by Sarah, Laura, and Anna, who crashed our apartment and helped Rachel and me eat up whole bags of sweets while watching Superman Returns.
Monday, 17 November: Was invited by a professor to give a lecture on Old English poetry next year if I'm still in Tulsa, which would be so much fun!
Tuesday, 18 November: Attempted with varying degrees of success to be in five places at once, including tea with Crystal, a fancy shmancy cocktail reception in the library, a birthday party for Nicole, an editors' meeting for Stylus, and RUF.
Wednesday, 19 November: Went to tea at Joanna's apartment and worked on senior project all evening after that.
Thursday, 20 November: Made snowflakes with Crystal, Alyson, and Rachel after Bible study tonight! We covered our apartment floor with tiny snippets of paper and hung the beautiful results all over the ceiling.
Friday, 21 November: Went to a performance of Mozart's "Requiem" with my mother, Laura, Tara, Nicole, Rachel, and Amy in Trinity Episcopal Church downtown, and was overwhelmed by its absolute beauty.
Saturday, 22 November: Spent all morning working on a community garden with other RUFfians, and then spent all afternoon cleaning our apartment and packing so that Philip and I could be back in Stillwater in time for tea.
And that's about the sum of my life for the past two weeks.
Today we had to put one of our cats down.... Not exactly the best way to start Thanksgiving break. She was my favorite of our pets, too, so I have to admit that I'll miss her (N.B., "her", not "it", which might admittedly be rather ridiculous to the sensible world).
Think of it as one more tiny piece of delight taken away, and one small token of the hideousness of the Fall, our sin wrecking even the helpless creation.
More serious stuff some other time. I'm away to sleep.
What have I been doing these past weeks?
Monday, 10 November: Decided that next year I would sleep in a broom closet under someone's stairs, Harry-Potter style.
Tuesday, 11 November: Listened to some ridiculous Australian rap with Nicole and was laughed at by someone for using the word "wellies".
Wednesday, 12 November: Ran into my main lecturer in the gym, which was awkward, and sat through an exceedingly dull Mortar Board meeting.
Thursday, 13 November: Drank a latte made for me by Philip, which kept me awake while I worked on my senior project.
Friday, 14 November: Went to an international fair with Rachel at which Europe was sadly underrepresented, and then watched Harry Potter with a constantly-changing assortment of people in Nicole's apartment even though Nicole herself wasn't there most of the time.
Over that weekend, I talked to Catherine on the phone, volunteered at an international festival for kids where I got to help out in the booth for Scotland, and was visited by Sarah, Laura, and Anna, who crashed our apartment and helped Rachel and me eat up whole bags of sweets while watching Superman Returns.
Monday, 17 November: Was invited by a professor to give a lecture on Old English poetry next year if I'm still in Tulsa, which would be so much fun!
Tuesday, 18 November: Attempted with varying degrees of success to be in five places at once, including tea with Crystal, a fancy shmancy cocktail reception in the library, a birthday party for Nicole, an editors' meeting for Stylus, and RUF.
Wednesday, 19 November: Went to tea at Joanna's apartment and worked on senior project all evening after that.
Thursday, 20 November: Made snowflakes with Crystal, Alyson, and Rachel after Bible study tonight! We covered our apartment floor with tiny snippets of paper and hung the beautiful results all over the ceiling.
Friday, 21 November: Went to a performance of Mozart's "Requiem" with my mother, Laura, Tara, Nicole, Rachel, and Amy in Trinity Episcopal Church downtown, and was overwhelmed by its absolute beauty.
Saturday, 22 November: Spent all morning working on a community garden with other RUFfians, and then spent all afternoon cleaning our apartment and packing so that Philip and I could be back in Stillwater in time for tea.
And that's about the sum of my life for the past two weeks.
Today we had to put one of our cats down.... Not exactly the best way to start Thanksgiving break. She was my favorite of our pets, too, so I have to admit that I'll miss her (N.B., "her", not "it", which might admittedly be rather ridiculous to the sensible world).
Think of it as one more tiny piece of delight taken away, and one small token of the hideousness of the Fall, our sin wrecking even the helpless creation.
More serious stuff some other time. I'm away to sleep.
09 November 2008
Now Playing: Handel, "Messiah", "I Know That My Redeemer Liveth".
A sense of undeserving makes receiving the gladness of others a powerful means of grace.
Yesterday I was eating breakfast, and Rachel was heading out the door to the gym, when my mobile rang: it was Emmaline, to my delight. I was treated to an excellent half-hour of drinking good tea and talking to her while she was on the train out of Belfast, at least until her service gave out. We chatted away until her service cut out (the first time), and when she rang me back, I was justly slagged off for having assumed that after only ten minutes she was already to Culleybackey when five minutes before she'd been buying her ticket from someone near City Central.
For her birthday treat Saturday afternoon, I took Crystal to the Gilcrease Museum to see the Ansel Adams exhibit. We spent about three hours there, until the museum closed, meandering through endless rooms of black-and-white photographs. Like the afternoon outside, intense, sharply defined beauty, overwhelming in its powerful detail.
Afterward, Crystal, Rachel, and I ate tea in The Hut. Rachel left to study in the library then, but Crystal and I went back to our apartment. We were talking about Seneca when my mobile rang: Emmaline again. Listening to my accent change when I greeted Emmaline, Crystal glanced at me and laughed, and Emmaline on the other end slagged me off. I was regaled with accounts of pranks happening inRenwick and plans for another Thanksgiving dinner over the course of our conversation.
Crystal left, and I said good-night to Emmaline at half seven, when Stephen and I had agreed to meet to go to the Signature Symphony concert for which Alisha had reserved tickets. They playedVivaldi's "Four Seasons" tonight, alternating with Piazzolla's "Four Seasons", an Argentinean version. Equally beautiful pieces, Vivaldi's irrepressible exuberance and lyricism on one hand and Piazzolla's exotic tango rhythms and eerie quotations from Vivaldi on the other. The violin technique was amazing.
Today I went back to Stillwater for church: was amused by Renee babbling during Sabbath school, was attacked by Christa after Sabbath school (she wanted to know where Rachel Sr. was), was nearly strangled by Laura, and was given a much-needed talking-to from wise Katie during lunch. In second service we prayed U.K. style, in small circles of five or six all in the one room, which I like far more than our normal practice of praying as one huge congregational group. Laughed with Stephanie at her crazy children, who were running around everywhere without shoes after second service, and spent the afternoon with my parents before driving back to uni.
As my parents pointed out, we are monuments to God's excellence: He shows His power by subduing His enemies and His grace by making them His children.
Even when the mental knowledge of this is questioned and the heart's emotions evaporate, that truth is still true because He is still the same, and His possession of us never ends because He never ends.
A sense of undeserving makes receiving the gladness of others a powerful means of grace.
Yesterday I was eating breakfast, and Rachel was heading out the door to the gym, when my mobile rang: it was Emmaline, to my delight. I was treated to an excellent half-hour of drinking good tea and talking to her while she was on the train out of Belfast, at least until her service gave out. We chatted away until her service cut out (the first time), and when she rang me back, I was justly slagged off for having assumed that after only ten minutes she was already to Culleybackey when five minutes before she'd been buying her ticket from someone near City Central.
For her birthday treat Saturday afternoon, I took Crystal to the Gilcrease Museum to see the Ansel Adams exhibit. We spent about three hours there, until the museum closed, meandering through endless rooms of black-and-white photographs. Like the afternoon outside, intense, sharply defined beauty, overwhelming in its powerful detail.
Afterward, Crystal, Rachel, and I ate tea in The Hut. Rachel left to study in the library then, but Crystal and I went back to our apartment. We were talking about Seneca when my mobile rang: Emmaline again. Listening to my accent change when I greeted Emmaline, Crystal glanced at me and laughed, and Emmaline on the other end slagged me off. I was regaled with accounts of pranks happening inRenwick and plans for another Thanksgiving dinner over the course of our conversation.
Crystal left, and I said good-night to Emmaline at half seven, when Stephen and I had agreed to meet to go to the Signature Symphony concert for which Alisha had reserved tickets. They playedVivaldi's "Four Seasons" tonight, alternating with Piazzolla's "Four Seasons", an Argentinean version. Equally beautiful pieces, Vivaldi's irrepressible exuberance and lyricism on one hand and Piazzolla's exotic tango rhythms and eerie quotations from Vivaldi on the other. The violin technique was amazing.
Today I went back to Stillwater for church: was amused by Renee babbling during Sabbath school, was attacked by Christa after Sabbath school (she wanted to know where Rachel Sr. was), was nearly strangled by Laura, and was given a much-needed talking-to from wise Katie during lunch. In second service we prayed U.K. style, in small circles of five or six all in the one room, which I like far more than our normal practice of praying as one huge congregational group. Laughed with Stephanie at her crazy children, who were running around everywhere without shoes after second service, and spent the afternoon with my parents before driving back to uni.
As my parents pointed out, we are monuments to God's excellence: He shows His power by subduing His enemies and His grace by making them His children.
Even when the mental knowledge of this is questioned and the heart's emotions evaporate, that truth is still true because He is still the same, and His possession of us never ends because He never ends.
05 November 2008
Now Playing: Felix Mendelssohn, "Symphony No. 4 in A Major," "Con Moto Moderato".
I've been collecting words this week. I was reading Walter Benjamin for Honors and senior project, as well as talking to Rachel and Alyson, the combination of which resulted in these fine specimens.
Sesquipedalian: Describing words a foot-and-a-half long, from Horace. As Rachel pointed out, this word is self-defeating. You can't accuse someone of being sesquipedalian without being it yourself.
Chthonic: Underground. It makes me think of submarine things that have become subterranean, round ammonite fossils and tiny limestone shells.
Phantasmagoria: An exhibition of optical illusions chiefly produced by a magic lantern. Not even the Oxford English Dictionary knows where it comes from, so the word itself is phantasmagoric, a combination of unusual or strange elements. The first part is Greek, but the second part might be Greek or French or the invention of someone wanting a word that sounded fantastic.
I was reading Perelandra today while I was practicing my flute (yes, the two go together, which is why I'm an English major and not a music major). As the Green Woman says at the beginning, stepping out of time and looking at oneself from the Alongside is rather a strange habit that we earth-dwellers have. I seem to have had trouble doing it these last few months, at least with the quiet calm contemplative attitude, too busy either worrying or working to step out for a moment and consider.
We had an absolutely glorious thunderstorm in Tulsa Wednesday night. When I emerged from working in the library at five o'clock in the evening, a huge cloud was rearing along the western horizon between the sky and the setting sun, its edge gilded white and gold from the sun behind it. The wind was swirling round the corner of the library. For some reason, because of the way the library is built, it always seems to be blowing up at you from the doorway, which is on a level below the ground.
Then when Nicole and I left The Hut a couple of hours later, the pavement was damp and the air moist. We were standing outside her apartment talking when a blue flash of lightning lit the sky, and we hightailed it to our separate apartments. Rachel and I spent the rest of the evening studying in our apartment and watching the storm as it came in two separate "events". The second one was more violent and prolonged than the first. Cascades of rain blew over the roofs of the apartments; the streetlamps outside rocked with the force of the wind; lightning staggered the darkness.
The next day, it was crisp and clear and very windy from the northwest, and ever since then it's been blowing colder and colder, stripping the leaves from the trees against a vivid blue sky. Intense sunshine dazzles through what leaves are left.
Today I had an extra flute lesson, the first of a set of extra lessons that will be happening on Friday mornings. Bach and Vivaldi are both at the stage where they require mostly large-scale practice, so today the professor and I started on Blavet. Fussy French music, like Versailles, all ornament with very little underneath. Whenever I play the crisp shining little trills and appoggiaturas, I see those gardens and gilded facades.
I've been collecting words this week. I was reading Walter Benjamin for Honors and senior project, as well as talking to Rachel and Alyson, the combination of which resulted in these fine specimens.
Sesquipedalian: Describing words a foot-and-a-half long, from Horace. As Rachel pointed out, this word is self-defeating. You can't accuse someone of being sesquipedalian without being it yourself.
Chthonic: Underground. It makes me think of submarine things that have become subterranean, round ammonite fossils and tiny limestone shells.
Phantasmagoria: An exhibition of optical illusions chiefly produced by a magic lantern. Not even the Oxford English Dictionary knows where it comes from, so the word itself is phantasmagoric, a combination of unusual or strange elements. The first part is Greek, but the second part might be Greek or French or the invention of someone wanting a word that sounded fantastic.
I was reading Perelandra today while I was practicing my flute (yes, the two go together, which is why I'm an English major and not a music major). As the Green Woman says at the beginning, stepping out of time and looking at oneself from the Alongside is rather a strange habit that we earth-dwellers have. I seem to have had trouble doing it these last few months, at least with the quiet calm contemplative attitude, too busy either worrying or working to step out for a moment and consider.
We had an absolutely glorious thunderstorm in Tulsa Wednesday night. When I emerged from working in the library at five o'clock in the evening, a huge cloud was rearing along the western horizon between the sky and the setting sun, its edge gilded white and gold from the sun behind it. The wind was swirling round the corner of the library. For some reason, because of the way the library is built, it always seems to be blowing up at you from the doorway, which is on a level below the ground.
Then when Nicole and I left The Hut a couple of hours later, the pavement was damp and the air moist. We were standing outside her apartment talking when a blue flash of lightning lit the sky, and we hightailed it to our separate apartments. Rachel and I spent the rest of the evening studying in our apartment and watching the storm as it came in two separate "events". The second one was more violent and prolonged than the first. Cascades of rain blew over the roofs of the apartments; the streetlamps outside rocked with the force of the wind; lightning staggered the darkness.
The next day, it was crisp and clear and very windy from the northwest, and ever since then it's been blowing colder and colder, stripping the leaves from the trees against a vivid blue sky. Intense sunshine dazzles through what leaves are left.
Today I had an extra flute lesson, the first of a set of extra lessons that will be happening on Friday mornings. Bach and Vivaldi are both at the stage where they require mostly large-scale practice, so today the professor and I started on Blavet. Fussy French music, like Versailles, all ornament with very little underneath. Whenever I play the crisp shining little trills and appoggiaturas, I see those gardens and gilded facades.
04 November 2008
Now Playing: Fox News on Nicole's TV.
You can't escape it even here.
Somehow, this is indicative, though: Fox is finally getting around to announcing the results of the first states with polls to close, and Rachel and Nicole have both dozed off on the battered green leather sofas.
So much talk. Pastor preached an excellent sermon on Sabbath day about how our hope is not in political candidates. Neither one of these boys seems to do what is exactly right, and in my young idealistic mind that's cause enough for voter disillusionment.
It's been interesting to hear professors talk about this election. They're all voting for Obama, of course. We talked in Honors today about the use of the media to frame this election. Media announcers make fanfare and spectacle out of something that happens quietly in tiny booths, individual by individual: fair enough assessment. It's interesting to think about how voting is a public spectacle just like sporting events or parades.
Meanwhile, though, the demands of the body have to be met. Rachel and I are away for our tea.
You can't escape it even here.
Somehow, this is indicative, though: Fox is finally getting around to announcing the results of the first states with polls to close, and Rachel and Nicole have both dozed off on the battered green leather sofas.
So much talk. Pastor preached an excellent sermon on Sabbath day about how our hope is not in political candidates. Neither one of these boys seems to do what is exactly right, and in my young idealistic mind that's cause enough for voter disillusionment.
It's been interesting to hear professors talk about this election. They're all voting for Obama, of course. We talked in Honors today about the use of the media to frame this election. Media announcers make fanfare and spectacle out of something that happens quietly in tiny booths, individual by individual: fair enough assessment. It's interesting to think about how voting is a public spectacle just like sporting events or parades.
Meanwhile, though, the demands of the body have to be met. Rachel and I are away for our tea.
03 November 2008
Now Playing: Harry Gregson-Williams, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian soundtrack, "Raid on the Castle".
Epic music for a day like this.
My alarm went off at seven this morning. Usually that would mean that I turn it off and curl up for another half-hour, or at least that's been the pattern for the past few weeks, rather shameful laziness, but now that I don't have a certain person's mobile phone ringing every five minutes to wake me up in the morning, what am I supposed to do?
Today was registration day for seniors. I had less than the usual fun with TU's wonderful online registration system. Despite the fact that the system told me, after I'd asked to enroll in certain courses, that I didn't have the authority to access the next page, when I went back and tried to register again, it mysteriously decided that I had enrolled in those courses after all. This time there were only two courses, Advanced Poetry and Beginning French I, which it wouldn't let me register, resulting in only one of the usual stiffly polite e-mails to the advisor of Arts and Sciences, asking her nicely please to register me in those two sections.
So I am now enrolled in flute lessons, of course, Advanced Poetry, which happens most of Wednesday afternoons, Beginning French I, at the lovely time of nine o'clock MWF mornings, Honors, and a random history class, "Imperial Rome and Its Legacy", taught by TU's new history professor. Wonder of wonders, the department actually decided to hire a medievalist for a change! He's teaching two courses this semester, and I've registered in this upper division course.
After that fun was over, I dressed and ate my breakfast while looking through all the pictures I (and Emmaline and Rachel) had taken last year in order to pull some of them for the presentation I was supposed to do for the study abroad office today. My advisor, Dr. S, is teaching a "freshman experience" course, which supposedly introduces first year students to the wonderful life of the university. Professors always seem to be at a loss to make these courses interesting, and Dr. S's solution this week was to ask me and one of the peer advisors at the study abroad office, Alex, to come in and give a presentation about study abroad.
Alex studied abroad in China, so his stories are somewhat more exotic than mine, involving mountain-surfing and herds of yak. He and I spent a couple of hours in the study abroad office this morning putting our slideshow together and talking about what we wanted to say--or rather, just talking, since Alex, being an exceedingly friendly chap, loves talking to people. We laughed at each other's pictures. There was one of him on a narrow little street in China, standing against a wall, with everyone on the street staring at him: he's a lanky, fair-skinned, bearded, bright ginger chap in a street full of short, dark Chinese.
The study abroad office was quiet this morning. Ms. B, the secretary, discovered in the course of the morning that I haven't been getting paid for most of the work I've been doing, so after Alex and I finished, she sent me scurrying back to my apartment to pick up my planner, where I've written down all my hours, and to get that sorted out. I had just enough time to practice my flute for half-an-hour before Dr. S's class was supposed to start at noon.
Dr. S's class was upstairs in the English building, in the one classroom in the English building, where all English classes are held (at least it seems that way sometimes). One of the dullest rooms I've ever been in, except that it has windows on two sides running all the way round. Today the windows gave a view of an exceptionally lovely autumn noon, sunshine and golden leaves spiraling against the glass.
Alex gave his presentation about the basics of applying for study abroad first, and then we did our dual slideshow. We basically just told random stories the whole time--Paris, London, Shanghai, Pakistan, cows, yaks, abbeys in cow pastures, road trips across Mongolia, and various other odds and ends came into the presentation at different times. (See my pictures from the slideshow here.)
Class ended at ten to one. After class, I went down the hall with Dr. S to her office, and we spent half-an-hour talking about senior project. We had a good discussion, though: I'd turned in a paper last week for senior project, and she'd given me the dreaded A- on it (I abominate A-'s, in the immortal words of Josh K.) because the ideas weren't clear enough. When she asked me what I meant to say, and I told her, of course it sounded fine (then!), and we spent awhile honing it, coming up with an outline, etc. I left with her cheerful "Take care," ringing in my ears.
I went over to ACAC and bought a salad for lunch. Philip was working at Carrello's with Amy. Said hello to them, then went to PHIL 2113 at two o'clock. Today the professor finally decided to hand out a pop quiz on the fearsome Kant. I had done the readings, really and truly, but it had been two weeks ago, when the readings were due. So today I made a less-than-desirable score on the quiz.
After PHIL 2113, I had an hour-long flute lesson. I played through the entire Bach sonata for Professor R today, like running a marathon. The result was that I need to spend more time with my best friend, the metronome, making sure that the appoggiaturas are exactly on the beat. I played the Vivaldi for him, too. He'd brought a photocopy of a cleaner edition than the Rampal edition, which is the one I own. Rampal had removed at least ten bars of Vivaldi's original music from the flute part, so now I have a little bit of new music to weave into the piece, but I'm glad because it makes the concerto much more seamless, less chopped into sections.
When my lesson was over, I walked back to ACAC to buy milk. Tiny round leaves were swirling off the oak trees in the plaza between the library and the chapel, and the sun was setting fast behind the downtown skyline. Leaves falling today, far faster than last week. The trees are resplendent, golds and reds, and all their glory whirling away on the south wind.
In ACAC, Jenny M. was just getting off work at Carrello's, and Amy was working there. I perched on the edge of a table with Jenny and chatted with she and Amy about life. Jenny and I walked over to Mayo together. It was good to be able to spend time with her, even if it was just a walk across campus.
Just after she left, Rachel came back from the gym. I went to the caf to pick up some tea, a sandwich in a box. I ate it sitting at the table in our dining room with Rachel. We talked about maths classes, topology, her NSF fellowship essays, Dr. G's freshman Honors class, memories of that.... I read more of Out of the Silent Planet, and when she left for a meeting, I finally settled down at my desk to work on senior project.
At half eight I walked to the gym to run. In the gym, one of the basketball courts was occupied by a basketball game, another was occupied by volleyball, and the middle court was occupied by two people playing badminton. Quick graceful movements, shuttlecock flying, remembering walking nights up the road with Emmaline, Charlotte, Sarah W., and Andy L.
I ran and listened to my father's third lesson on James about treating everyone equally, as we have been treated by Christ, with grace. While I was running on the treadmill on the first floor, Philip was lifting weights in front of the mirrors nearby, pulling hideous grimaces every time his muscles tightened.
I rowed for ten minutes, then went downstairs to the atrium to meet the girls for prayer. None of them were there yet, but Philip was, lounging in an armchair, watching a football game on the enormous TV. We chatted until Alyson arrived, and then Rachel after her. Philip said good-night. The three of us sat at a table and talked about school. We shared prayer requests, for ourselves and for others, for the Knorrs, for the elections tomorrow.
Rachel and I walked back to our apartment after prayer. The evening was chilly with a strong southeast wind. A rich smoke-smell hung on the air.
Rachel is making tea for herself. I'm listening to the end of the Prince Caspian soundtrack, that Switchfoot song, "This Is Home". I need to take a shower.
Epic music for a day like this.
My alarm went off at seven this morning. Usually that would mean that I turn it off and curl up for another half-hour, or at least that's been the pattern for the past few weeks, rather shameful laziness, but now that I don't have a certain person's mobile phone ringing every five minutes to wake me up in the morning, what am I supposed to do?
Today was registration day for seniors. I had less than the usual fun with TU's wonderful online registration system. Despite the fact that the system told me, after I'd asked to enroll in certain courses, that I didn't have the authority to access the next page, when I went back and tried to register again, it mysteriously decided that I had enrolled in those courses after all. This time there were only two courses, Advanced Poetry and Beginning French I, which it wouldn't let me register, resulting in only one of the usual stiffly polite e-mails to the advisor of Arts and Sciences, asking her nicely please to register me in those two sections.
So I am now enrolled in flute lessons, of course, Advanced Poetry, which happens most of Wednesday afternoons, Beginning French I, at the lovely time of nine o'clock MWF mornings, Honors, and a random history class, "Imperial Rome and Its Legacy", taught by TU's new history professor. Wonder of wonders, the department actually decided to hire a medievalist for a change! He's teaching two courses this semester, and I've registered in this upper division course.
After that fun was over, I dressed and ate my breakfast while looking through all the pictures I (and Emmaline and Rachel) had taken last year in order to pull some of them for the presentation I was supposed to do for the study abroad office today. My advisor, Dr. S, is teaching a "freshman experience" course, which supposedly introduces first year students to the wonderful life of the university. Professors always seem to be at a loss to make these courses interesting, and Dr. S's solution this week was to ask me and one of the peer advisors at the study abroad office, Alex, to come in and give a presentation about study abroad.
Alex studied abroad in China, so his stories are somewhat more exotic than mine, involving mountain-surfing and herds of yak. He and I spent a couple of hours in the study abroad office this morning putting our slideshow together and talking about what we wanted to say--or rather, just talking, since Alex, being an exceedingly friendly chap, loves talking to people. We laughed at each other's pictures. There was one of him on a narrow little street in China, standing against a wall, with everyone on the street staring at him: he's a lanky, fair-skinned, bearded, bright ginger chap in a street full of short, dark Chinese.
The study abroad office was quiet this morning. Ms. B, the secretary, discovered in the course of the morning that I haven't been getting paid for most of the work I've been doing, so after Alex and I finished, she sent me scurrying back to my apartment to pick up my planner, where I've written down all my hours, and to get that sorted out. I had just enough time to practice my flute for half-an-hour before Dr. S's class was supposed to start at noon.
Dr. S's class was upstairs in the English building, in the one classroom in the English building, where all English classes are held (at least it seems that way sometimes). One of the dullest rooms I've ever been in, except that it has windows on two sides running all the way round. Today the windows gave a view of an exceptionally lovely autumn noon, sunshine and golden leaves spiraling against the glass.
Alex gave his presentation about the basics of applying for study abroad first, and then we did our dual slideshow. We basically just told random stories the whole time--Paris, London, Shanghai, Pakistan, cows, yaks, abbeys in cow pastures, road trips across Mongolia, and various other odds and ends came into the presentation at different times. (See my pictures from the slideshow here.)
Class ended at ten to one. After class, I went down the hall with Dr. S to her office, and we spent half-an-hour talking about senior project. We had a good discussion, though: I'd turned in a paper last week for senior project, and she'd given me the dreaded A- on it (I abominate A-'s, in the immortal words of Josh K.) because the ideas weren't clear enough. When she asked me what I meant to say, and I told her, of course it sounded fine (then!), and we spent awhile honing it, coming up with an outline, etc. I left with her cheerful "Take care," ringing in my ears.
I went over to ACAC and bought a salad for lunch. Philip was working at Carrello's with Amy. Said hello to them, then went to PHIL 2113 at two o'clock. Today the professor finally decided to hand out a pop quiz on the fearsome Kant. I had done the readings, really and truly, but it had been two weeks ago, when the readings were due. So today I made a less-than-desirable score on the quiz.
After PHIL 2113, I had an hour-long flute lesson. I played through the entire Bach sonata for Professor R today, like running a marathon. The result was that I need to spend more time with my best friend, the metronome, making sure that the appoggiaturas are exactly on the beat. I played the Vivaldi for him, too. He'd brought a photocopy of a cleaner edition than the Rampal edition, which is the one I own. Rampal had removed at least ten bars of Vivaldi's original music from the flute part, so now I have a little bit of new music to weave into the piece, but I'm glad because it makes the concerto much more seamless, less chopped into sections.
When my lesson was over, I walked back to ACAC to buy milk. Tiny round leaves were swirling off the oak trees in the plaza between the library and the chapel, and the sun was setting fast behind the downtown skyline. Leaves falling today, far faster than last week. The trees are resplendent, golds and reds, and all their glory whirling away on the south wind.
In ACAC, Jenny M. was just getting off work at Carrello's, and Amy was working there. I perched on the edge of a table with Jenny and chatted with she and Amy about life. Jenny and I walked over to Mayo together. It was good to be able to spend time with her, even if it was just a walk across campus.
Just after she left, Rachel came back from the gym. I went to the caf to pick up some tea, a sandwich in a box. I ate it sitting at the table in our dining room with Rachel. We talked about maths classes, topology, her NSF fellowship essays, Dr. G's freshman Honors class, memories of that.... I read more of Out of the Silent Planet, and when she left for a meeting, I finally settled down at my desk to work on senior project.
At half eight I walked to the gym to run. In the gym, one of the basketball courts was occupied by a basketball game, another was occupied by volleyball, and the middle court was occupied by two people playing badminton. Quick graceful movements, shuttlecock flying, remembering walking nights up the road with Emmaline, Charlotte, Sarah W., and Andy L.
I ran and listened to my father's third lesson on James about treating everyone equally, as we have been treated by Christ, with grace. While I was running on the treadmill on the first floor, Philip was lifting weights in front of the mirrors nearby, pulling hideous grimaces every time his muscles tightened.
I rowed for ten minutes, then went downstairs to the atrium to meet the girls for prayer. None of them were there yet, but Philip was, lounging in an armchair, watching a football game on the enormous TV. We chatted until Alyson arrived, and then Rachel after her. Philip said good-night. The three of us sat at a table and talked about school. We shared prayer requests, for ourselves and for others, for the Knorrs, for the elections tomorrow.
Rachel and I walked back to our apartment after prayer. The evening was chilly with a strong southeast wind. A rich smoke-smell hung on the air.
Rachel is making tea for herself. I'm listening to the end of the Prince Caspian soundtrack, that Switchfoot song, "This Is Home". I need to take a shower.
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