Broken-down Poetry

Information

Now the serpent was more crafty than any other beast of the field that the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God actually say, ‘You shall not eat of any tree in the garden’?” And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden, but God said,‘You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the midst of the garden, neither shall you touch it, lest you die.’” But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” –Genesis 3:1-5

Fresh from the soil
We were beautiful and true
In control of our emotions
‘Til we ate the poison fruit

And now it’s hard to be
Hard to be
Hard to be a decent human being …

Childbirth is painful
We toil to grow our food
Ignorance made us hungry
Information made us no good
Every burden misunderstood –David Bazan

—–

Nate and I sat for two hours in the sculpture park yesterday, at night, watching the microscopic ferries and boats on the other side of the bay, keeping an eye on the moon. It was big, crescent. We landed there? And Mars? You are so small.

We talked about a lot of things, but a topic we keep falling back to was creation–done by the hand of God, a bang, or a hand-produced bang. Or whatever.

I can begin this conversation, but I can never end it. I get scared, part-way through; I freeze.

Because I know what I believe. I believe in the Great Metaphor of Genesis. I believe that there’s no heresy in saying that God and evolution are both true–that the earth is old and it took mutation and adaptation to get us from sludge to homo sapien. OK.

But I still freeze up. Why? I think it’s because there’s still that part of me that believes that science can nullify God’s truth, that somehow science can disprove God.

I never really believed this; I’ve always been fascinated by evolution, astronomy. But when I get in the position to defend Christianity, I find myself wanting to side with the fundies. I want to say, Well, hey, man. Maybe the earth is young. Maybe dinosaurs didn’t exist. Maybe the devil put those fossils there to trick us. 

This is silly, because I don’t really believe it.

So I thought to trace these thoughts a bit–this fear, really–and it came back to my fear of the Genesis story of Adam and Eve.

The only tree Adam and Eve couldn’t eat from was the tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Huh. So the fall of man is due to–knowledge?

And at first this thought was debilitating. Because I love knowledge. I thrive on knowledge. But what if knowledge is what’s keeping me from God, instead of knowledge drawing me closer to Him? Maybe knowledge–of science in particular–will lead me to denying God’s existence.

This is silly, too.

I don’t find Bazan’s lines (from the above song), “Ignorance made us hungry, information made us no good” to be true interpretations of Scripture. The problem isn’t just information or knowledge or wisdom; that’s not what that tree represented. It’s misguided knowledge. It’s useless information.

I learned this from theorist Neil Postman who calls the environment we’re in one of “information gluttony.” We have access to so much information (Google, iPhones, TV) that, frankly, we don’t know what to do with it all. It all has become useless. The question is not “what do we do with this information, now that we have it?” but rather, “how do we get more?”

It’s like in Vonnegut’s Galapagos, when the know-it-all robot Mandarax is finally tossed, like Adam’s discarded fruit, into the ocean. It was useless. Knowing Shakespearean quotes, out of context, is useless. It did not help the islanders survive. It did not make their lives any easier, any fuller.

So this comes back to my fear that information is somehow going to keep me from God. It’s not. Misguided information, sure. How you wield information–or anything–can take something neutral and make it destructive.

But the thing about God is, He is Mystery. And though I find comfort in that–too much comfort, maybe–I need to remember that he is also Knowable. Science is a way to unravel the mysteries of this earth and, subsequently, God, not a way to disprove Him. (Because, how?)

All truth is God’s truth.  Or as George MacDonald said, truth is truth, “whether out of the mouth of Jesus or Balaam” (or his ass).

I’m not sure when this happened, but somewhere down the line Christians got afraid of knowledge. We used to be scholars; now we lie to our kids, telling them that all of this is just a trick, A TRICK!, from the devil. Because God isn’t big enough to create through evolution. As if God needs us to prove Him.

He doesn’t.

August 26, 2012  Leave a comment

Creeds

At church Sunday, the pastor, Phil, spoke on Psalm 23, according to the lectionary. Phil said a lot about Psalm 23 and its parallel to Mark 6 (Jesus feeding the 5,000) — all interesting stuff — but I really appreciated Phil’s honesty about the passage.

Sometimes Psalm 23 (“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want….”) pisses you off. Sometimes it’s trite. Sometimes it needs to be awesome.

Phil talked about considering Psalm 23 as a creed; you don’t recite creeds because you necessarily like them or believe them — but because you want to.

I wrote a creed once, the winter of sophomore year, because I was full of doubt and wanted something solid I could believe in — something orthodox, but also true to me. So I spent most of Christmas break revising the creed until it was something worth reciting.

I think I have most of it memorized, still.

We believe in God, Maker of all we can and cannot see.
We believe in the Trinity: the holy relationship of Father, of Son and Spirit.
We believe that one Third of the Trinity, Jesus Christ, became human to liberate us.

We believe He was born of a virgin’s seed, lived on earth as a human, was tempted – like us, suffered – like us, but remained without fault.

He was tried and put to death as a threat to the Empire. And on the third day he resurrected, reacquainted with his followers, and ascended into heaven.

We believe in sola gratia – that only through God’s radical forgiveness we can be Liberated.
We believe in sola fide – that only through taking Jesus seriously can we receive His Grace.
We believe in sola Scriptura – that only through God’s Speaking can we know this Truth.

We believe in the universal Church, acting as Christ to the world: professing peace, love, grace and justice. We believe in the Kingdom already established on earth, and not yet complete.

Amen.

I sat through the rest of Phil’s sermon, wondering if there are other passages I can live by, I can recite, like my creed or Psalm 23. What do I want to believe; what do I want to bring me comfort?

I thought then about Dr. Brown’s comment during Lent about memorizing a poem for each of the 40 days. Maybe a poem can be a creed.

I’ve been doing a lot of writing lately, but not enough reading. I need to read; it’s so important to my development as a writer and my maturing as a person. So. I’m going to read, and I’m going to find creeds in my literature, in Scripture.

And maybe I’ll memorize the creeds too. Maybe one a week, maybe one a month — I don’t know. I do know memorizing is good for you. And I’m convinced that reciting creeds you don’t believe but want to believe is good too.

The Lord is my shepherd;
I shall not want.
He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside the still waters.
He restores my soul;
He leads me in the paths of righteousness
For His name’s sake.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil;
For You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.

You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil;
My cup runs over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
All the days of my life;
And I will dwell in the house of the Lord
Forever.

July 24, 2012  Leave a comment

A typical day

A former classmate of mine emailed me yesterday about starting a blog. Two weeks ago, Mrs. Lindsey Thomas did the same. And others have, so on. Conversations like that make me excited to write something, though I’m not sure what to write about.

—

I’m pretty settled in Seattle as this point. The only thing Nate and I really NEED (OK, want) is a couch. We have our eyes on one at Target — it folds out into a bed, in a very classy fashion.

We’ve kind of been at our typical daily routine at this point. Maybe you don’t know what that is. Maybe you’d like to know. …

5 a.m. Nate wakes up for work. He got a job at Queen Anne Painting, doing what he’s always done. Fortunately, he seems to really enjoy it — as much as he can enjoy painting for hours on end.

6 a.m. Nate catches his bus for work. He has to take it to wherever the painting site is, which is already a  bit of a pain for him.

9:45 a.m. I wake up! I start my day!

10:30 a.m. I do one of two things: I either sit at my computer to transcribe video for a few hours or I work on stuff for The League for the Blind and Disabled at Starbucks.

12:30-1 p.m. I eat lunch! I’m always tempted to eat delicious tacos from Malena’s or sketchy teriyaki from Yasuko’s … but more often than not I eat a salad at home or a sandwich.

1:30 p.m. I take my mid-day Mary break. (I watch an episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show on my computer.) This gives me enough energy to keep working.

2 p.m. Work some more.

4:30 p.m. I go down to the grocery store for dinner goods. We eat at home six days a week, and usually it’s pretty delicious stuff. Pesto pork chops. Chicken with lemon and thyme. Vegetable pasta. Etc.

6 p.m. Eat dinner with Nathan dearest. He tells me about the crazy people on the bus and what the homeowner’s father told him today. (Usually it’s all pretty amusing.)

7 p.m. Clean up. Or make Nate clean up.

7:30 p.m. I’ll either work on more transcribing or I’ll read/write/etc. I only have a few more stories left in that John Irving anthology I bought. Sometimes Nate and I walk down to Ken’s grocery in Queen Anne to buy giant pickles and watch the sunset. Seriously.

9:30 p.m. Nate and I eat our bedtime cookies and watch two episodes of Mary Tyler Moore.

10:30 p.m. Bedtime for Nate!

11:30 p.m. Bedtime for me!

July 21, 2012  Leave a comment

Hi from Seattle

I think it’s time to write about where I am and how I’m doing.

I’m in Seattle, and I’m doing quite well.

OK, more than that: It’s my third day here in Seattle, Washington, and everything is just pure excitement. Here are a few things I’ve learned/experienced in the past few days:

1. Recycling is not just hipster cool – it’s the law!

You have to recycle here. Every restaurant/coffee house and our apartment has bins for trash, compost, and recyclables. So basically we have three trash bins in our kitchen; what a pain! But it’s kind of cool. Unlike some places in Indiana where the recyclables end up in the trash anyway (cough-IWU-cough), this city takes its recycling seriously!

Also, there are no plastic bags here. Starting July 1, the city outlawed plastic bags in stores. If you want to pay 5 or 10 cents for a paper bag, you may. You also get a discount for bringing your own bags! Cha-ching!

2. Everything is pricier here.

I kind of expected this, but it’s been a little frustrating now that I’m really living it. Meijer spoiled me. I got used to buying cheap produce, cheap dairy, and cheap everything. It sucks when you’re basically starting from scratch too. Nate and I bought the most important ingredients — olive oil and peppercorns — and hope those will keep us happy enough. Who needs fancy spices anyway? Not us!

We are acting a bit like poor people these days, which is perfectly fine. I told Mom and Russ a while back that I’ve had it pretty easy my whole life — it’s time for some challenges. I’m trying to embrace that, but seriously, I’m craving some $7 cheese.

Speaking of food. There’s a grocery store 0.2 miles from our apartment called QFC, and Kroger owns it. I gasp with glee when I saw Kroger brand foods. Like a bit of home with us. Except even Kroger brand food costs more out here.

3. You can walk basically anywhere.

Technically I could have (or should have) taken the bus to the Magnolia farmers’ market today — but I didn’t. My shins hurt like hell, but it really was a lovely walk.

Malena's Tacos in Queen Anne (we split fish and carne asada tacos -- amazing).

Like I mentioned before, the grocery store is super close to our apartment. (It’s in Interbay, across from the Starbucks I’m in right now.) There are plenty of things here and across the interbay into Magnolia (like Thai food!). In our neighborhood, Queen Anne, you have to walk a ways to get to anything — but it’s worth it. We found a lovely bakery called Macrina and a fantastic hole-in-the-wall taco place across the street from it. From there, it’s only a bit farther to other restaurants and boutiques.

4. Crows suck; flowers are beautiful.

OK, crows like to hang around the West Queen Anne area, apparently. Maybe it’s all the plants — I don’t know. But anyway, there are plenty of beautiful plants wherever you walk in Queen Anne. There’s so much LIFE here, as I’ve pointed out to Nate several times. I’m sure it has something to do with the mild temperatures (70s this week!) and the rain (which we have yet to experience).

5. It’s not that hard living with a dude — so far, anyway.

Nate made me dinner last night! That's linguine with jumbo shrimp, orange bell pepper, and snow peas in a sundried tomato alfredo.

I think I got lucky. Nate can be a bit of a bachelor when it comes to cleanliness, but he’s been pretty great to live with. He at least tries to respect my let’s-try-to-keep-things-clean rules, and he’s awfully helpful. He does the dishes, makes me dinner (!!!), surprises me with things (breakfast yesterday morning), and is otherwise a delight to be with.

It’s helped, I think, that we’ve had plenty of alone time. He has spent a few hours a day out on his own — today, looking for jobs and other days just exploring. Right now he’s guitar-ing while I’m here working and blogging.

In the next few days I hope to write about the neighborhoods of Seattle, which are really interesting to me. Each has its own personality; I love it!

July 7, 2012  Leave a comment

Liminal

I’m already learning the language of The Seattle School. One word that keeps coming up is liminal—

liminal (adj.) 1884, from L. limen “threshold, cross-piece, sill”

I’m at this threshold between college and post-grad, between Indiana and Seattle, between single and engaged.

Like my last liminal period, between high school and college, I spent this time thinking about me, rather, who I am, who I want to be at graduation. I labeled this time in my life an identity crisis; I think I’m at another one.

Who am I, fundamentally? And who do I want Seattle Lauren to be?

When I make decisions like this, it’s not that I’m trying to redefine who I am. I’m trying to live out who I really am, to be proud of that, to be more me than I’ve ever been. And the verse I quote so often in these thresholds: “I want to be all the Jesus Christ saved me for and wants me to be.”

—

1. I am a writer. I can’t deny this. I write every day. Whether I’m writing a blog post here or for Neither Liberal Nor Arts, or whether I’m working on my memoir, writing for work, or wrestling with the words of a poem — I’m writing. Every day. I am a woman of words. I am a student of words.

2. I am a reader. This summer hasn’t expressed that much. I’ve bought more books than I’ve read. But fundamentally, I am a reader. On my drive home from work the other day, I considered how books really do change me, change my epistemology. Books change me a bit, but the conversations I have about those books change me exponentially more.

3. I am a philosopher/theologian. OK, at least kind of. I have always been a thinker. I have always wrestled with who I think God is, what life is, what reality is. Maybe I’m not the next Kierkegaard or Kant, but thinking and considering God and the world is truly a part of me.

 4. I am a believer. I can’t not believe in God. I have gone through series of doubts. I’ve done things I thought I’d never do. But I keep finding myself with God, thanking him for life, for good coffee and conversation, for my circumstances. I’m not ready to convince YOU to be a Christian (this is quite Kierkegaardian/existentialist of me), but I know why I believe. It has a lot to do with the ordinary, the everyday.

Lauren

June 12, 2012  Leave a comment

Angst

Self-reflection used to be easy for me.

I used to sit with my 72-page spiral bound and a Bible  in my bathroom, water running, to talk to myself and God. That’s how I figured things out. It was easy.

I don’t journal anymore.

I have outlets for self-expression, sure. There’s this blog and my poetry and my memoir and that tearful drive to and from Marion. But I’m scared to ask myself real questions. Like, what are you doing with your life, Lauren? Like, why aren’t you focusing on anyone but yourself?

Today I’m so aware of my selfishness, my lack of concern for others — but I’m too afraid to figure out why. Have I become too focused on my boyfriend that I’ve forgotten others? (That’s the one that really scares me. How do I balance relationships?) Have I become too focused on myself — my present, my future?

I’ve been trying to read Kierkegaard lately, because I really love his philosophies, as explained to me by my philosophy professor. But I’ve never actually read anything he’s written. I mean, not beyond a few pages in one of his books. I know his Wikipedia page pretty well. I know I need to get on that.

But one thing Kierkegaard is known for is his theories on angst.* Kierkegaard calls angst “unfocused fear,” or “deep-seated spiritual condition of insecurity and fear in the free human being” (yes, that’s Wikipedia). It’s related to man’s fear of failing God.

So I’ve been angsty lately, I guess you could say. I told Nate I’m bordering depression, but I don’t think that’s true. I’m just angsty. I’m afraid. I’m afraid of not having everything figured out before moving to Seattle. I’m afraid Nate won’t come with me, or that he won’t want to, or that he’ll come and we’ll break up.

I’m afraid of finding a job in Seattle. I’m afraid of adulthood. I’m afraid of leaving my friends, my family. I’m afraid of graduate school. I’m scared of the big books I’m going to read. I’m afraid of God screwing up my life (for His glory, blah blah). I’m afraid of not liking who I’ve become. I’m afraid of living with a boy. I’m afraid of living alone. I’m afraid of making new friends.

So yeah, Soren, I’m terrified. This free will God gave me is freaking awful sometimes.

It’s turning me into a teenager again. I never leave my room. I do safe things. Like read. And watch House.**

Steven, Rachel, and I were just talking this evening about conclusions – how we cheat them. In newswriting, you can just tack on dates and times or an inspiring/informative quote. In essay writing, you summarize.

As for blogs, well, I’m going to leave this one open.

That seems nice and existential of me. You know, angst that comes from freedom, etc.

*Actually, I read a whole essay on Updike’s Rabbit Angstrom and his Kierkegaardian angst — but still, a secondary source.

**I want to write a paper titled, “Dr. Gregory House, ethics, and the Kierkegaardian Response.” It’ll be about angst and ethics on the TV show House. I smell master’s thesis!

May 12, 2012  Leave a comment

The 5 Best Classes at IWU

I decided to make this list sometime last year, after taking two really great classes in the same semester. This post is meant to both encourage professors for creating great classes and to help underclassmen make smart scheduling decisions!

Criteria: All these classes have to have changed my epistemology (my view of Truth) in one way or another, in order to qualify. I’ve taken many other really great classes at IWU — these are just my favorites!

These are in order, because it’s more fun that way.

—–

Honorable mention: Creative Nonfiction, Mary Brown. You are never the subject. Technically Annie Dillard taught me this, but it was in this class that I learned it. Even when you’re writing about yourself, you cannot be the subject. If you are, you’re writing a journal entry — and no one will care to read it.

Honorable mention: World Civilization, Mark Smith. This class changed my view of sin. Smith often inserted theology into his lectures. One thing he taught was how in order to have a big view of Grace — and Grace IS big! — you must have a big view of sin. I loved that. If you belittle sin, you belittle Grace.

5. Prose Style, Paul Allison. Prose changed my view of the reader-writer relationship. We spent a third of the semester studying Classic Style, a type of writing where the author assumes everything he’s saying is Truth. He approaches his work in such a way. This called into question how I view Truth in how I write. What is my position as a writer? Do I believe what I’m saying is Truth? Am I writing solely reflexively — everything comes back to me? This not only changed how I write, but how I read.

4. Contemporary Literature, Mary Brown. This class taught me how good writing can teach you to empathize. Reading about someone living a completely different life than you live, can teach you how to relate. I will never live like Rabbit Angstrom, John Updike’s sex-hungry character — but I will always know people like him. I will always need to find common ground with people with different morals than me.

3.  Communication Theory, Greg Fiebig. Really, these last three tie for first place. I love these theories. I am a theoretical thinker, so this may show my bias. There is a theory for everything worthwhile. Whenever Nate and I are in a fight, I whip out the ol’ Comm Theory book and reread Relational Dialectics or the Face Negotiation theories. I will keep this book forever.

2. Media and Society, Mark Perry. Media and Society taught me the word epistemology (lol) and how the media shapes it. Since taking this class sophomore year, I’ve had so many conversations about this — especially the book we read in it, Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death. The primary medium of a society (ours being TV and the Internet) shapes how we view truth. We need to see to believe. We believe everything must be entertaining — including religion and school.

1. The History of the Christian and Muslim Encounter, Lisa Toland. This class changed my view of the Middle East. I took this class after I went to Iraq, and it may have even done more for my perception of the country. I learned from Toland and the texts we read the context of Sept. 11, the Iraq War, and there are sour relationships between us and the rest of the world. I learned how Christians and Muslims did get along well in the Byzantine Empire (you know, before the Crusades). AND I learned about the Muslim faith — I know why I don’t believe in Islam, but I still admire and respect the Muslim faith.

May 1, 2012  Leave a comment