| You Are a Purple Crayon |
 Your world is colored in dreamy, divine, and classy colors. You hold yourself to a sky high standard, and you are always graceful. People envy, idolize, and copy you without realizing it. You are an icon for those who know you. And while it is hard to be a perfectionist, rest assured it's paying off! Your color wheel opposite is yellow. While yellow people may be wise, they lack the manners and class needed to impress you. |
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Yes, I'm preaching again
Or trying to. I'm supposed to preach at my brother's wedding on Sunday, and I'm having a hard time coming up with things to say about wedded bliss... or marriage in general, really. So here:
Monday, August 20, 2007
Um. Hi.
Ok, I have no real excuse for not blogging. I've had time for other things, like West Wing and Buffy. And dinners! Yay cooking. And setting up a Facebook account, as promised. But I'm out of the habit, and haven't had much to say. So, um, hi. I'm doing really exciting things like getting a room ready to paint and cooking and looking for things in boxes. Oh, and I have two wedding sermons to write soon. So I'm not really sure how much I'll be around at all. I'm not really in the mood, and I'm not really doing much to speak of. Maybe I'll be around more again when classes start and I have more need to procrastinate.
Monday, August 13, 2007
Spiderman!
 | You scored as The Amazing Spider-Man, After being bitten by a radioactive spider, Peter Parker was transformed from a nerdy high school student into New York's greatest hero. Peter enjoys the thrill of being a super hero, but he struggles with the burdens of leading a double life. He hopes someday to win the heart of his true love Mary Jane, the woman he's loved since before he even liked girls. Right now, he just wants to make it through college and pay his bills.
Which Action Hero Would You Be? v. 2.0 created with QuizFarm.com |
Guess what I have?
A kitchen!
In celebration of which, I'm having dinner guests as often as possible. Tonight's menu: spaghetti with asparagus, tomato, and lemon. Next time we'll add a little more seasoning, but there will be a next time. 'Twas good.
We now return to our regularly scheduled cleaning.
In celebration of which, I'm having dinner guests as often as possible. Tonight's menu: spaghetti with asparagus, tomato, and lemon. Next time we'll add a little more seasoning, but there will be a next time. 'Twas good.
We now return to our regularly scheduled cleaning.
Sunday, August 05, 2007
Made my parents cry...
Didn't mean to, of course. But here's the sermon I preached this morning that did it. Turns out, it's hard to keep preaching a difficult sermon when you can see your parents crying at it, but somehow I managed to preach this sermon three times this morning. Now, I'm going to bed.
****************************
I remember the first time I heard the Indigo Girls’ music. It was a Tuesday night when I was 11 years old, and I was sitting around a campfire at Girl Scout Camp listening to one of our counselors sing songs with her guitar. And she started this one:
I’m trying to tell you something about my life
Maybe give me insight between black and white
And the best thing you’ve ever done for me
Is to help me take my life less seriously
It’s only life, after all
And I was hooked. Partly because I thought that counselor was about the coolest person ever, partly because I liked the song itself. We sang that song every night that week during our unit campfire, and when it came time to go home, I determined to find the song and buy the cassette. I had no idea then that the song, “Closer to Fine,” was the definitive Indigo Girls song, nor did I know what a major role the Indigo Girls’ music would play in my life over the next fifteen years.
And I also didn’t know, that week at camp, that as I was sitting around a campfire learning that song, that same night my grandfather was dying of a heart attack. I didn’t know that he had died until my parents came and picked me up from camp on Friday.
I didn’t have much experience with death at age 11. No one in my family had died within my memory, and I’d never been to a funeral. It was hard for me to wrap my head around my grandfather’s death, hard for me to know how to let go. But I remember standing upstairs with my family and Nick White,* before the funeral began, and I remember Nick saying to us that this service was not to say goodbye, but to say thank you – but then acknowledging, “Some thank-yous are harder to say than others.” I knew what he said was true, but it didn’t help me feel any less sad about it. I missed my grandfather fiercely for a long time.
Of course, I’ve never had an easy time letting go. So it’s a little strange in a way to think that “Closer to Fine” became my greatest musical refuge through middle school, and remains deeply significant to me. Maybe I’m just thick-headed, but you wouldn’t know to look at me that I’ve been listening intently to the message of “it’s only life, after all” for fifteen years. But while I’ll be the first to admit that I still tend to hold onto life with a vice grip, I think it’s made some inroads. And I think there’s something to this message.
Now, maybe this seems like the wrong week to suggest that we need to hold life lightly. 5 people have been confirmed dead so far, with more missing, after Wednesday’s bridge collapse in Minnesota. And while it doesn’t take the rug out from under us the same way that the tragedies of Katrina or September 11 did, it’s still shaken us. Its very ordinariness calls to our attention how fragile and temporary are the things we take for granted – from bridges to homes to our very lives. And while five is not a particularly high body count, each of those five people still had friends and family and acquaintances who must now mourn that death.
So yeah, maybe it’s not the best week for this conversation. But when is it ever the best week? We ought to talk about these things on bright sunny days, when there’s not a cloud of trouble in sight and we can talk dispassionately, prepare ourselves, think objectively about life. But those days are so few that it seems a shame to darken them with such topics.
And even if best weeks came around, or came around more often, I think today’s Gospel warns us that we can’t afford to wait for those best weeks. If we wait until we’ve planned and scraped and taken care of everything else on our to-do lists, we will find that we have run out of time. Today, now, we must begin to loosen our grasp on life.
Now, don’t misunderstand me here. Several years after the Indigo Girls released “Closer to Fine,” Indigo Girl Amy Ray said in an interview that when she first heard the song, the line "it's only life, after all" struck her as being incredibly blasé about something that she felt was so sacred. It took her awhile to see the truth of that line in the context of the rest of the song, but in stepping back and listening to the whole, eventually she learned to sing that line along with her bandmate. I think that’s what we need to do with this idea. It’s not that life is not sacred. I think if we read the rest of the Gospels, the rest of the Bible, that’s clear. Life is incredibly sacred. But precisely because it is so sacred, we need to treat it with respect by holding it lightly. There’s a Madeleine L’Engle character who says “The only way to deal with something deadly serious is to try to treat it a little lightly.”
I hold my friends’ lives pretty tightly. But if I have to be willing to die myself in order to be fully Christ’s, then I also have to be willing to trust that even the death of those I love most will not separate me from the love of God – or, perhaps harder, that it will not ultimately separate me from the love of those people. I have to learn to trust that I can indeed hold life lightly – others’ as well as my own – because this life is not our last chance. Our earthly life is not all there is to life.
We know that our earthly relationships can draw us either closer to or farther from God. Yet it never occurred to me until this year that even our healthy, loving, relationships might be among the possessions that can possess us – that when Jesus says “one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions” that might include people. Of course, we can never truly possess another human being, but we talk all the time as though we can – “Be mine” “He’s taken” “She belongs to him.” Indeed, the world around us often encourages us to tighten our grip on the people we care about, as though we could control either them or the relationship that way. I’m thinking, for instance, of the Eagles song that says
Lying here in the darkness
I hear the sirens wail
Somebody’s going to emergency,
Somebody’s going to jail
You find somebody to love in this world
You better hang on tooth and nail
But hanging on tooth and nail won’t keep the person you love from going to emergency, or for that matter from going to jail. And it has some serious repercussions for the relationship. If you’re hanging on tooth and nail, it doesn’t leave much room for things like gentleness or perspective. It makes it difficult to step back and ask what’s best for either person; to savor the time spent together; in short, to spend that time loving each other. In other words, holding life too tightly not only gets between us and God, it gets between us and those we love.
And really, that seems like just a stupid waste of life. If anything, I’ve probably tried to hold onto my friends’ lives even tighter as an adult than I did at age 11. But earlier this year, in a moment of weakness, I agreed to let a seminary friend watch the video from when St. Paul’s Youth did Godspell the first time around. Some of you know that Emily, a friend of mine who played the Jesus character, has since died. I still miss her terribly. After we watched the last scene, where Jesus returns to his friends after they’ve carried his body offstage, I told my friend, “I just want her to walk back in for real.” And he looked at me and said “It may take an unfair amount of time. But she’s going to.” And for just a moment, by trusting the friend who was in front of me, I was able to loosen my grasp and trust God to hold onto life for me – not only mine but Emily’s and my grandfather’s as well.
*Previous rector.
****************************
I remember the first time I heard the Indigo Girls’ music. It was a Tuesday night when I was 11 years old, and I was sitting around a campfire at Girl Scout Camp listening to one of our counselors sing songs with her guitar. And she started this one:
I’m trying to tell you something about my life
Maybe give me insight between black and white
And the best thing you’ve ever done for me
Is to help me take my life less seriously
It’s only life, after all
And I was hooked. Partly because I thought that counselor was about the coolest person ever, partly because I liked the song itself. We sang that song every night that week during our unit campfire, and when it came time to go home, I determined to find the song and buy the cassette. I had no idea then that the song, “Closer to Fine,” was the definitive Indigo Girls song, nor did I know what a major role the Indigo Girls’ music would play in my life over the next fifteen years.
And I also didn’t know, that week at camp, that as I was sitting around a campfire learning that song, that same night my grandfather was dying of a heart attack. I didn’t know that he had died until my parents came and picked me up from camp on Friday.
I didn’t have much experience with death at age 11. No one in my family had died within my memory, and I’d never been to a funeral. It was hard for me to wrap my head around my grandfather’s death, hard for me to know how to let go. But I remember standing upstairs with my family and Nick White,* before the funeral began, and I remember Nick saying to us that this service was not to say goodbye, but to say thank you – but then acknowledging, “Some thank-yous are harder to say than others.” I knew what he said was true, but it didn’t help me feel any less sad about it. I missed my grandfather fiercely for a long time.
Of course, I’ve never had an easy time letting go. So it’s a little strange in a way to think that “Closer to Fine” became my greatest musical refuge through middle school, and remains deeply significant to me. Maybe I’m just thick-headed, but you wouldn’t know to look at me that I’ve been listening intently to the message of “it’s only life, after all” for fifteen years. But while I’ll be the first to admit that I still tend to hold onto life with a vice grip, I think it’s made some inroads. And I think there’s something to this message.
Now, maybe this seems like the wrong week to suggest that we need to hold life lightly. 5 people have been confirmed dead so far, with more missing, after Wednesday’s bridge collapse in Minnesota. And while it doesn’t take the rug out from under us the same way that the tragedies of Katrina or September 11 did, it’s still shaken us. Its very ordinariness calls to our attention how fragile and temporary are the things we take for granted – from bridges to homes to our very lives. And while five is not a particularly high body count, each of those five people still had friends and family and acquaintances who must now mourn that death.
So yeah, maybe it’s not the best week for this conversation. But when is it ever the best week? We ought to talk about these things on bright sunny days, when there’s not a cloud of trouble in sight and we can talk dispassionately, prepare ourselves, think objectively about life. But those days are so few that it seems a shame to darken them with such topics.
And even if best weeks came around, or came around more often, I think today’s Gospel warns us that we can’t afford to wait for those best weeks. If we wait until we’ve planned and scraped and taken care of everything else on our to-do lists, we will find that we have run out of time. Today, now, we must begin to loosen our grasp on life.
Now, don’t misunderstand me here. Several years after the Indigo Girls released “Closer to Fine,” Indigo Girl Amy Ray said in an interview that when she first heard the song, the line "it's only life, after all" struck her as being incredibly blasé about something that she felt was so sacred. It took her awhile to see the truth of that line in the context of the rest of the song, but in stepping back and listening to the whole, eventually she learned to sing that line along with her bandmate. I think that’s what we need to do with this idea. It’s not that life is not sacred. I think if we read the rest of the Gospels, the rest of the Bible, that’s clear. Life is incredibly sacred. But precisely because it is so sacred, we need to treat it with respect by holding it lightly. There’s a Madeleine L’Engle character who says “The only way to deal with something deadly serious is to try to treat it a little lightly.”
I hold my friends’ lives pretty tightly. But if I have to be willing to die myself in order to be fully Christ’s, then I also have to be willing to trust that even the death of those I love most will not separate me from the love of God – or, perhaps harder, that it will not ultimately separate me from the love of those people. I have to learn to trust that I can indeed hold life lightly – others’ as well as my own – because this life is not our last chance. Our earthly life is not all there is to life.
We know that our earthly relationships can draw us either closer to or farther from God. Yet it never occurred to me until this year that even our healthy, loving, relationships might be among the possessions that can possess us – that when Jesus says “one’s life does not consist in the abundance of possessions” that might include people. Of course, we can never truly possess another human being, but we talk all the time as though we can – “Be mine” “He’s taken” “She belongs to him.” Indeed, the world around us often encourages us to tighten our grip on the people we care about, as though we could control either them or the relationship that way. I’m thinking, for instance, of the Eagles song that says
Lying here in the darkness
I hear the sirens wail
Somebody’s going to emergency,
Somebody’s going to jail
You find somebody to love in this world
You better hang on tooth and nail
But hanging on tooth and nail won’t keep the person you love from going to emergency, or for that matter from going to jail. And it has some serious repercussions for the relationship. If you’re hanging on tooth and nail, it doesn’t leave much room for things like gentleness or perspective. It makes it difficult to step back and ask what’s best for either person; to savor the time spent together; in short, to spend that time loving each other. In other words, holding life too tightly not only gets between us and God, it gets between us and those we love.
And really, that seems like just a stupid waste of life. If anything, I’ve probably tried to hold onto my friends’ lives even tighter as an adult than I did at age 11. But earlier this year, in a moment of weakness, I agreed to let a seminary friend watch the video from when St. Paul’s Youth did Godspell the first time around. Some of you know that Emily, a friend of mine who played the Jesus character, has since died. I still miss her terribly. After we watched the last scene, where Jesus returns to his friends after they’ve carried his body offstage, I told my friend, “I just want her to walk back in for real.” And he looked at me and said “It may take an unfair amount of time. But she’s going to.” And for just a moment, by trusting the friend who was in front of me, I was able to loosen my grasp and trust God to hold onto life for me – not only mine but Emily’s and my grandfather’s as well.
*Previous rector.
Friday, August 03, 2007
Friday Five: Pilgrimage
1. Have you ever been on a pilgrimage? (however you choose to define the term) Share a bit about it. If not, what's your reaction to the idea of pilgrimage?
Yes. In 2002, I spent Lent traveling around England, Wales, and the Scottish Highlands. I'd had a hard time finding anywhere to worship in Germany and being on pilgrimage in English-speaking countries with Anglican churches everywhere was really refreshing.
2. Share a place you've always wanted to visit on pilgrimage.
There are a few - Ireland, Russia - but always the Holy Land, ever since I can remember.
3. What would you make sure to pack in your suitcase or backpack to make the pilgrimage more meaningful? Or does "stuff" just distract from the experience?
I barely remember what clothes or books I took on pilgrimage - but my Bible, prayer book, journal, and camera were indispensible. I don't think my Bible and journal have ever gotten so much use as they did those five weeks.
4. If you could make a pilgrimage with someone (living, dead or fictional) as your guide, who would it be? (I'm about thisclose to saying "Besides Jesus." Yes, we all know he was indispensable to those chaps heading to Emmaus, but it's too easy an answer)
Like Jane, I can think of a few excellent companions, but for a guide? That's tough - partly because I so enjoyed being on pilgrimage without one.
5. Eventually the pilgrim must return home, but can you suggest any strategies for keeping that deep "mountaintop" perspective in the midst of everyday life?
Nope.
Yes. In 2002, I spent Lent traveling around England, Wales, and the Scottish Highlands. I'd had a hard time finding anywhere to worship in Germany and being on pilgrimage in English-speaking countries with Anglican churches everywhere was really refreshing.
2. Share a place you've always wanted to visit on pilgrimage.
There are a few - Ireland, Russia - but always the Holy Land, ever since I can remember.
3. What would you make sure to pack in your suitcase or backpack to make the pilgrimage more meaningful? Or does "stuff" just distract from the experience?
I barely remember what clothes or books I took on pilgrimage - but my Bible, prayer book, journal, and camera were indispensible. I don't think my Bible and journal have ever gotten so much use as they did those five weeks.
4. If you could make a pilgrimage with someone (living, dead or fictional) as your guide, who would it be? (I'm about thisclose to saying "Besides Jesus." Yes, we all know he was indispensable to those chaps heading to Emmaus, but it's too easy an answer)
Like Jane, I can think of a few excellent companions, but for a guide? That's tough - partly because I so enjoyed being on pilgrimage without one.
5. Eventually the pilgrim must return home, but can you suggest any strategies for keeping that deep "mountaintop" perspective in the midst of everyday life?
Nope.
Must be preaching time again...
... 'cause Spud's back online! That's right, folks, camp is almost over and I'm preaching at my home parish on Sunday, so I thought it was about time to get back to procrastinating. I mean, blogging. Blogger tells me I haven't posted since May 28, so here's a brief recap of the summer before I revive my RevGalBlogPals status with a Friday Five.
~Graduated from seminary. Have apparently mastered divinity.
~Got ordained to the diaconate.
~Trained staff
~Directed two core camps and two day camps (Sorry, don't have pictures of that yet. I forgot to bring my camera cable with me this summer.)
~Worked as nature specialist for a day camp that I didn't have to direct
We clean up the camp Monday and Tuesday, with an end-of-camp staff dinner Monday night. Before that I have to finish my sermon for Sunday and write staff evaluations. Oh, and my cousin's wedding shower is tomorrow. And my future sister-in-law's is next week. And I'm moving soon. But before I do that I need to organize and turn in some reflections and recommendations for next year's camps. So, I'm not quite out yet - but there's light at the end of the tunnel. If I can just manage to survive the next four days, I should be able to handle the next couple of weeks after that.
~Graduated from seminary. Have apparently mastered divinity.
~Got ordained to the diaconate.
~Trained staff
~Directed two core camps and two day camps (Sorry, don't have pictures of that yet. I forgot to bring my camera cable with me this summer.)
~Worked as nature specialist for a day camp that I didn't have to direct
We clean up the camp Monday and Tuesday, with an end-of-camp staff dinner Monday night. Before that I have to finish my sermon for Sunday and write staff evaluations. Oh, and my cousin's wedding shower is tomorrow. And my future sister-in-law's is next week. And I'm moving soon. But before I do that I need to organize and turn in some reflections and recommendations for next year's camps. So, I'm not quite out yet - but there's light at the end of the tunnel. If I can just manage to survive the next four days, I should be able to handle the next couple of weeks after that.
Monday, May 28, 2007
Swamped
Working on the last paper/journal of my M.Div. career right now, and hoping to finish it tonight, but camp is oozing in through every window, door, and crack in the foundation right now, and threatening to take over my life sooner than I can afford to let it. Likely to be fairly incommunicado for a while.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Quiz
I'm so supposed to be writing a play church paper right now. I'm so watching Gilmore Girls and reading blogs and taking quizzes instead.... Must... be... productive....
| Your Dominant Intelligence is Linguistic Intelligence |
 You are excellent with words and language. You explain yourself well. An elegant speaker, you can converse well with anyone on the fly. You are also good at remembering information and convicing someone of your point of view. A master of creative phrasing and unique words, you enjoy expanding your vocabulary. You would make a fantastic poet, journalist, writer, teacher, lawyer, politician, or translator. |
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
today sucks
Ok, I had a decent morning. But job has sucked big time and needs fixing, classes sucked, I have a meeting tomorrow I really don't want to go to, and someone acquired my debit card number and used it for two good-sized wire transfers tonight. (My bank called pretty immediately to verify them, so they've been reversed and all is clear, but it still meant an hour on the phone, getting a new card, etc.) Today sucks.
As requested
The play church service went very well, in the end. I got a chance to practice in front of a friend that morning, which helped a lot. It turns out I'm actually more comfortable doing it when there are people around, which was a surprise. It's also sort of amazing how real the whole thing felt - the sermon was a real sermon, the prayers for healing were real prayers, but even the invalid eucharist felt pretty real. It's also pretty cool - I'm glad that's not the last time I get to do it.
Saturday, May 19, 2007
Thursday, May 17, 2007
Y'all lied
Ok, dear readers. When I took Use of the Voice two years ago, and got freaked out by having to chant Gospels and especially Eucharistic Prayers, you told me not to worry, that by the time I got to play church and graduation, I'd be ready.
Not so much.
I'm cool with the deacon thing. But today I have to preach and preside at a service of public healing with Eucharist, and I'm way freaked out. Way, way, freaked out. We start at 1 pm CDT - if you think of it, say a little prayer that I survive, and preferably don't screw up too badly. (Oh, but I won't be able to post and let you know that I've survived until probably Saturday or Sunday, because as soon as classes are done today the seniors head off for our closing retreat.)
Not so much.
I'm cool with the deacon thing. But today I have to preach and preside at a service of public healing with Eucharist, and I'm way freaked out. Way, way, freaked out. We start at 1 pm CDT - if you think of it, say a little prayer that I survive, and preferably don't screw up too badly. (Oh, but I won't be able to post and let you know that I've survived until probably Saturday or Sunday, because as soon as classes are done today the seniors head off for our closing retreat.)
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
Gilmore Girls
The blogosphere is beginning to bubble with news and speculation about Gilmore Girls ending. I'd like publicly to note that I'm watching through the whole series on DVD, and have not followed season 7 at all, and thus do not wish to hear anything from anyone about what has happened this season or how the show ends. You managed it with West Wing; you can do it with Gilmore Girls! Thanks!
Monday, May 14, 2007
Song of the Week
Great Big Sea for the past week. Sadly, I think it'll continue to be just as apropos for another week or two, but I'll post it this week anyway.
"Consequence Free"
Wouldn't it be great, if no one ever got offended
Wouldn't it be great to say what's really on your mind
I have always said 'all the rules are made for bending'
And if I let my hair down, would that be such a crime?
[Chorus]
I wanna be consequence free
I wanna be where nothing needs to matter
I wanna be consequence free
just sing Na Na Na Na Na Ne Na Na Na
I could really use, to lose my Catholic conscience
Cuz I'm getting sick of feeling guilty all the time
I won't abuse it, Yeah I've got the best intentions
For a little bit of anarchy but not the hurting kind
[Chorus]
I couldn't sleep at all last night
cause I had so much on my mind
I'd like to leave it all behind,
but you know it's not that easy
[Chorus]
Wouldn't it be great, if the band just never ended
We could stay out late and we would never hear last call
We wouldn't need to worry about approval or permission,
we could - slip off the edge and never worry about the fall
"Consequence Free"
Wouldn't it be great, if no one ever got offended
Wouldn't it be great to say what's really on your mind
I have always said 'all the rules are made for bending'
And if I let my hair down, would that be such a crime?
[Chorus]
I wanna be consequence free
I wanna be where nothing needs to matter
I wanna be consequence free
just sing Na Na Na Na Na Ne Na Na Na
I could really use, to lose my Catholic conscience
Cuz I'm getting sick of feeling guilty all the time
I won't abuse it, Yeah I've got the best intentions
For a little bit of anarchy but not the hurting kind
[Chorus]
I couldn't sleep at all last night
cause I had so much on my mind
I'd like to leave it all behind,
but you know it's not that easy
[Chorus]
Wouldn't it be great, if the band just never ended
We could stay out late and we would never hear last call
We wouldn't need to worry about approval or permission,
we could - slip off the edge and never worry about the fall
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Random thoughts and questions
~It's hard to practice the absolution with a straight face when you're absolving four Care Bears (one of which is winking at you) and a Care Bears Cousin. Also it feels kind of weird randomly absolving your stuffed animals every time you walk by them.
~Did Campbell's Tomato Garden soup always have so much zucchini? I'm pretty sure I ate Tomato garden a lot my year in St. Louis and my first year at SWTS, and I don't remember a particularly large amount of zucchini, but I poured a can into a bowl today and it looked like a lot, so I checked and found that zucchini is indeed the third ingredient, after water and tomato puree. This is very sad for me.
~828 words is way too much for the intro and conclusion to a 5-7 minute sermon. It's actually not a bad problem to have, though, since I have until Thursday to work it out.
~It's kind of strange that I have a stuffed raccoon (a purple one with a heart-shaped lightbulb on his belly, but a raccoon nonetheless) given how little I like raccoons and how much I really don't think they're cute. I'd sort of managed to forget that my Care Bear Cousin is a raccoon until I went to "anoint" him for "healing" this afternoon, and up close it's very clear that he's a raccoon. (That's not as weird as it sounds - I have to do a practice healing service in our play church class this week, so I'm practicing praying over stuffed animals. Hmm. Yeah. I guess it's still almost as weird as it sounds.)
~Did Campbell's Tomato Garden soup always have so much zucchini? I'm pretty sure I ate Tomato garden a lot my year in St. Louis and my first year at SWTS, and I don't remember a particularly large amount of zucchini, but I poured a can into a bowl today and it looked like a lot, so I checked and found that zucchini is indeed the third ingredient, after water and tomato puree. This is very sad for me.
~828 words is way too much for the intro and conclusion to a 5-7 minute sermon. It's actually not a bad problem to have, though, since I have until Thursday to work it out.
~It's kind of strange that I have a stuffed raccoon (a purple one with a heart-shaped lightbulb on his belly, but a raccoon nonetheless) given how little I like raccoons and how much I really don't think they're cute. I'd sort of managed to forget that my Care Bear Cousin is a raccoon until I went to "anoint" him for "healing" this afternoon, and up close it's very clear that he's a raccoon. (That's not as weird as it sounds - I have to do a practice healing service in our play church class this week, so I'm practicing praying over stuffed animals. Hmm. Yeah. I guess it's still almost as weird as it sounds.)
Parents are funny, #498
In honor of Mother's Day, here's another way that my parents are funny, funny people:
My parents are pretty insistent on us addressing the ordination invitations traditionally - so, Mr. and Mrs. Man, or Mr. Man and The Rev. Woman, etc. I've pushed back on a few names where I know it's important to people, but mostly that's how the invitations are going out. (Which also means some people who would probably prefer another form will get the more traditional address... sorry.)
I just looked at the list they sent me, though, and I noticed two things: first, they seem to have made an exception for cousins. My two women cousins who are coupled but haven't taken new last names are listed as Ms. Allison and Mr. Bob, and Ms. Amanda and Mr. Jeff. Which is hilarious to me, given their traditionalism on the rest of the list.
Second, one of the clergy I put on the list is listed simply as The Rev. Woman, despite my having mentioned that the invitation should go to The Rev. Woman and Ms. Partner. Which is, of course, a lot less hilarious to me. I think it's an oversight, not an intentional thing, but it's still worthy of an eye-roll in the parental direction.
Ah, parents. Happy Mother's Day, everyone.
My parents are pretty insistent on us addressing the ordination invitations traditionally - so, Mr. and Mrs. Man, or Mr. Man and The Rev. Woman, etc. I've pushed back on a few names where I know it's important to people, but mostly that's how the invitations are going out. (Which also means some people who would probably prefer another form will get the more traditional address... sorry.)
I just looked at the list they sent me, though, and I noticed two things: first, they seem to have made an exception for cousins. My two women cousins who are coupled but haven't taken new last names are listed as Ms. Allison and Mr. Bob, and Ms. Amanda and Mr. Jeff. Which is hilarious to me, given their traditionalism on the rest of the list.
Second, one of the clergy I put on the list is listed simply as The Rev. Woman, despite my having mentioned that the invitation should go to The Rev. Woman and Ms. Partner. Which is, of course, a lot less hilarious to me. I think it's an oversight, not an intentional thing, but it's still worthy of an eye-roll in the parental direction.
Ah, parents. Happy Mother's Day, everyone.
Saturday, May 12, 2007
Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters
If you are, know, or think you might ever meet a girl or young woman, and you haven't already been persuaded to pick up Courtney Martin's new book Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters, go read Hugo's review of it now. I'll try to post my own thoughts about it when a)I finish the book and b)I'm a little more coherent than I'm feeling right now.
Tuesday, May 08, 2007
Hebrew gone
Also English syntax. Sorry. I imagine in half an hour or so I'll have returned to normal English. But the Hebrew exam is done, which means that the Hebrew course also is done. It means also that I have the rest of the term to ponder music, meaning, and liturgy. Hurray for that!
Monday, May 07, 2007
Song of the Week
Ani Difranco this week, after a friend pointed me back to the phoenix the other day.
32 Flavors
squint your eyes and look closer
I'm not between you and your ambition
I am a poster girl with no poster
I am thirty-two flavors and then some
and I'm beyond your peripheral vision
so you might want to turn your head
cause someday you're going to get hungry
and eat most of the words you just said
both my parents taught me about good will
and I have done well by their names
just the kindness I've lavished on strangers
is more than I can explain
still there's many who've turned out their porch lights
just so I would think they were not home
and hid in the dark of their windows
til I'd passed and left them alone
and god help you if you are an ugly girl
course too pretty is also your doom
cause everyone harbors a secret hatred
for the prettiest girl in the room
and god help you if you are a pheonix
and you dare to rise up from the ash
a thousand eyes will smolder with jealousy
while you are just flying past
I never try to give my life meaning
by demeaning you
and I would like to state for the record
I did everything that I could do
I'm not saying that I'm a saint
I just don't want to live that way
no, I will never be a saint
but I will always say
squint your eyes and look closer
I'm not between you and your ambition
I am a poster girl with no poster
I am thirty-two flavors and then some
And I'm beyond your peripheral vision
So you might want to turn your head
Cause someday you might find you're starving
and eating all of the words you said
32 Flavors
squint your eyes and look closer
I'm not between you and your ambition
I am a poster girl with no poster
I am thirty-two flavors and then some
and I'm beyond your peripheral vision
so you might want to turn your head
cause someday you're going to get hungry
and eat most of the words you just said
both my parents taught me about good will
and I have done well by their names
just the kindness I've lavished on strangers
is more than I can explain
still there's many who've turned out their porch lights
just so I would think they were not home
and hid in the dark of their windows
til I'd passed and left them alone
and god help you if you are an ugly girl
course too pretty is also your doom
cause everyone harbors a secret hatred
for the prettiest girl in the room
and god help you if you are a pheonix
and you dare to rise up from the ash
a thousand eyes will smolder with jealousy
while you are just flying past
I never try to give my life meaning
by demeaning you
and I would like to state for the record
I did everything that I could do
I'm not saying that I'm a saint
I just don't want to live that way
no, I will never be a saint
but I will always say
squint your eyes and look closer
I'm not between you and your ambition
I am a poster girl with no poster
I am thirty-two flavors and then some
And I'm beyond your peripheral vision
So you might want to turn your head
Cause someday you might find you're starving
and eating all of the words you said
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