Now Playing: Psalm 130.

Anyone ever tried ginger milk tea? Thanks to our pastor's wife I was privileged to enjoy the experience this afternoon while on the phone with Nicole. Some of the strangest good stuff I've ever tried. Asian food, real Asian food, surprises my American tastebuds whenever they encounter it, and ginger milk tea was no exception. It's a powder, non-dairy creamer, sugar (spelled "suger" in the English translation on the back of the packet), and ginger, stirred into hot water. And the result is--spicy, to say the least.

Yesterday I finished the last book in Lawhead's Song of Albion trilogy, The Endless Knot. The book picks up flawlessly where the second book left off, with celebration and rejoicing. However, the latter half of the book grows rapidly darker until it reaches its bizarre conclusion. I must say that after reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, I should be more comfortable with narration unfolding from a "dead" character's point of view, but every time it weirds me out (pardon the colloquialism).

If you're going to read the book, beware--plot points may be given away. In one sense, the end of the book beautifully mirrors and consummates its beginning, as the main character recognizes that his death mirrors that of Christ, recreating the world, elevating it to a higher, purer existence.

However, my main reaction to the main character's death and subsequent "resurrection" was one of bewilderment. How can a mere human being replicate the sacrifice of Christ? How can a human's death bring about the recreation of two worlds in a way that mirrors Revelation 21-22? Lawhead seems to want his readers to draw these conclusions, but I almost feel that such conclusions are presumptuous. Certainly let us have Christ figures in literature, but put them in their proper place, please, ultimately as sinful humans.

I know that as a Christian I probably ought to appreciate Lawhead's conclusion more than I do, and I know that many of you will probably disagree with me. Though Lawhead tells a good story, I can't help wishing he had ended it differently. For me these books are fun but not great literature--to which they have no pretensions anyway.

Wanted to reply to the comment on the last post: The intense, complete devotion to a spouse portrayed in A Severe Mercy definitely could be overwhelming. I suppose it wasn't to me since I was too busy thinking about the other themes in the book. (And thus, perhaps, looking at one tree instead of the forest.)

Towards the end of the book, Vanauken does acknowledge that such total devotion was spiritually perilous to himself and his wife. Looking back on his life with her, he realizes that at some point, in some way God would have had to come first, and he calls himself "pagan" for focusing so completely on his wife.

And on a more cheerful note, I found that phone this morning!

Now Playing: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

Today I had the misfortune to lose my phone, so if any of you try to ring or text me, that's why I'm not responding. I'm pretty sure our neighbor's dog ate it because I lost it while taking her for a walk. I was so pleased with myself for thinking to take it along in case someone from Michigan rang, and I held it in my hand in the pocket most of the way--until I wasn't holding it anymore, I suppose. My theory is that the dog jumped up and ate it, but who knows now. Frustrating.

On Sunday evening I finished reading A Severe Mercy by Sheldon Vanauken. Really one of the best books I've read in awhile. When I told the W girls I was reading it, they gave me wide-eyed looks as though I had told them I was planning to battle a dragon, but honestly I'm not sure why.

The book is well written, with beautiful descriptions and records of conversations between highly literate and intelligent people. It includes letters by C.S. Lewis, which, of course, automatically makes it wonderful. (ahem) The story follows a young couple through their conversion to Christianity and subsequent tragedy and its aftermath.

Perhaps the book is so precious to me because I read it at a point of deep discouragement and frustration with my sinfulness and circumstances. One of its themes is the "ongoing act of creation" in which God is engaging, which a Calvinist would call God's sovereignty. Yet I find thinking of it with Vanauken's term more helpful. "Creation" carries with it all the connotations of purposefulness, beauty, and authority without the theological maelstrom that sometimes accompanies "predestination". God is creating the world now as an author in the midst of writing a story creates the story, though God's creation is perfect on first draft. Every event, even the smallest, carries significance because it is part of this artistic act of God's creation as it unfolds through time.

In addition to this beautiful way of thinking of God's sovereignty, the book also deals with the interwoven themes of Heaven, joy, love, and eternity. In any situation this would be encouraging, but reading about the way in which someone else applied these truths to their own life rekindled my own hope in these truths. Heaven is a certainty not a distant vague daydream but an actual destination to which each day brings me slightly closer.

And that certainty is one filled with the glorious light of Christ's presence. Though Vanauken never describes being enthralled with Christ's love himself, he portrays his wife's complete surrender to Christ. He and I stand in much the same position--a place of longing for Christ's presence without fully realizing complete surrender or a satisfying sense of Christ's love.

Although I can understand why the book would be overwhelming--it portrays tragic emotional/spiritual crises--it gives a clear-eyed, honest approach to the relationship between sorrow and the majestic Savior.

Now Playing: One of Stephen's piano pieces.

Last night I finished Moo by Jane Smiley. This book was a graduation gift, so I was compelled to read it at some point. For those of you with strong sensibilities, beware--the language and subject matter extend past the Chaucerian in bawdiness.

Moo is a satire of academic life, set in a midwestern town at a large state university. Thanks to that setting, one point of humor arose from the outset since aspects of the novel's setting mirror the setting in which I have grown up. (To make a not-so-subtle parallel, one of the buildings on the novel's campus is named Stillwater Hall). Unfortunately, satire has never been a favorite genre of mine, so my reading of this book was biased from the outset.

More humorous at times were the parodies of the academic writing style and of interdepartmental arguments. I don't often laugh out loud over books, and this book is definitely not one to provoke that kind of mirth, but occasionally the parallels were just too strong, and I had to smile.

Smiley's sense of the poignant is also strong in the book, though, and such moments were what made the book valuable. Her telling observations about her characters reflected to me the emptiness of a lifestyle without Christ, even as she parodied the complacent self-righteous Christianity that some academics seem to assume to be the definition of faith. She strips the masks from her characters' motives, revealing pure animal desires as well as the emptiness the characters find as they follow those desires. Lives full of sad humor seem to be the fate of midwestern humanity, at least according to Smiley, though she ends on a triumphant note--a marriage, of course.

All-in-all, this is not a book I would necessarily recommend to anyone. Having said that, its humor and poignancy made for several thought-provoking moments. And now I'm (supposedly) ready for academia! Hooray.

Now Playing: Beethoven, Symphony No. 7, "Poco Sostenuto--Vivace."

Not that anyone misses this particularly, but thought I'd post a wee something up here. There might possibly be some photos around [ somewhere ], too.

Since I theoretically have so much time to read these days, I may post a few short reviews of books. The first happens to be a pair of books, The Paradise Wars and The Silver Hand, Books I and II of the Song of Albion trilogy by Stephen Lawhead.

Both books are set in a quasi-Celtic Britain, the premise of the plot being that a pair of Oxford students are whisked away to Albion thanks to a sort of space-time discontinuum. What follows is set almost exclusively in the Celticized world of Albion, in which characters from Celtic legend predominate.

The plot moves swiftly and intensely through a story that grows increasingly dark from the first book to the second. Since Lawhead is a Christian author, the imagery in the story is unmistakable as a salvific figure arises from the most unlikely corner. The moments of triumph shine vividly against the extremely dark acts of evil with which the hero and his tiny contingent of followers must contend.

Overall, the plot is a simple, classic struggle between very good and very evil. Very good appears to be weak and outnumbered; very evil is--well, very evil. From a human perspective, though, such a plot often mirrors our experience on this earth, so books that follow that experience can be a refreshing reminder of the inevitable triumph our world will have in Christ.

The third book in the trilogy, The Endless Knot, is sitting next to my laptop, waiting its turn.

Now Playing: Sufjan Stevens, "Seven Swans", "The Dress Looks Nice On You."

This morning my mother took our cat, Annie, to be declawed. Here is the offending creature herself. She may look innocent, but she has become more and more nasty, scratching ankles/arms of people she decides she doesn't like. This evening I came home from work and discovered her sprawled in a corner of the study behind the sofa, still heavily anesthetized, with blue booties on her paws. She looks pathetic.

Since it's been just barely above freezing, the streets have become a mess of slush. I drove to the gym this morning, the car waffling slightly, and then to work later. Work was slow today.

As soon as I got home, I had to turn around and leave again to meet my Korean student, H, at the FRC. She had invited me to meet her family today, so when I arrived at the FRC, I found she and her husband waiting for me with their minivan. They live in one of the new blocks of married student housing buildings--brand new apartments. Culture shock number one, of course, was that I forgot to take my shoes off at the door and had to be prompted by my hosts.

H introduced me to her husband and her three children. She had prepared a delicious meal for us: sweet potato noodles with vegetables and a big dish of white noodles with shrimp, broccoli, and peppers round the edge. It really was delicious. We sat round the table and carried on a sort of conversation. When I asked them what their favorite Korean food was, they told me that it was kimchi. "Would you like to try some now?" the daughter asked. H immediately went to the fridge and brought out a bowl of the stuff--pickled fermented cabbage soaked in chili. It looked something like this:

  

(Thanks to the wonderful Wikipedia). Slimy at first and then just spicy. They laughed at my attempt to use chopsticks and were thoughtful enough to provide a wee fork, though obviously it would've been much, much easier to use chopsticks to eat the sticky noodles. Actually, despite the awkward silences, it was a pleasant time. They were friendly, we laughed at our attempts to communicate, and in the end I learned about them and their culture. After an hour, H and her husband drove me back to my car, and I went home.

At home I sat in the study and read a letter from Laura--almost as hilarious as listening to her talk. Completely hyper. My father was working on papers, so I sat and talked to him.

We all ate tea together, an unusual occurrence that happens about twice a week. After tea, we watched a Foyle's War episode, III.1. Laura rang in the middle of it, so we chatted with her for a bit. Family worship after. I just barely remembered to rescue my wash from the dryer. 

White rabbit, by the way!