Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: architecture, california, cross-country trip, driving, summer break, summer plans, travel
The semester is basically over now, which gives me a nearly four-month break from schoolwork. You might be asking yourselves what I plan on doing during those four months, and I am nothing if not an answerer of your questions. So:
The day after final grades are due (since I’ll be grading papers right up till the deadline) I’m leaving here to go live with my sister for a month in California. I’ve never been there before, I plan on doing some thesis research and relaxing, and I figured now is as good a time as any since nobody is hiring for anything this summer anyway. I’m driving across the country, making stops in Nashville, Little Rock, Dallas, Oklahoma City, Albuquerque, Flagstaff, and Las Vegas before ending up in Santa Monica, and I’m going to see all the sights along the way (Sedona, Hoover Dam, Grand Canyon, Renzo Piano’s museum in Dallas, etc.) while staying in hostels and on people’s couches. So that’ll take about a week.
Once out there I plan on being creative and quiet. I’m hoping to do some screen printing, make some beer, visit architecture and the beach, and put together a book about my trip. The idea for the book is to use my Holga camera to document my trip and combine that with writing and sketches to make a kind of travel diary which I’ll then self-publish and sell/give away copies. I have a feeling doing this kind of project will be important to my creative growth. I also plan on working on my “beach bod” a lot.
My sister and I will then drive back at the end of June, taking a different route than by which I go out there. We’ll go north through Salt Lake City, Denver, etc. and then through Cincinnati to see what’s changed since we lived there.
Then a three-week break before I travel to Vermont to be a part of a two-week community design/build program in which I’ll be working on some kind of community shelter. The class is put on by the Yestermorrow school, if you want to look them up.
And then back to school for my final year. Should be a fun summer, and hopefully one that’s exciting and full of personal growth and a deeper understanding of myself, others, and my place in this world. If you’ll be in the L.A. area in June, look me up; I’ll buy you a drink and you can tell me stories.
Filed under: Uncategorized
Damien Hirst Would Think of A Good Title For This
Every plant you see is being born again
for the first time in a year.
Experiences are painted in pastels
as a sort of mirror of a colored dying autumn.
And that’s fine but there is more to it.
The blooms will be born
and exist
and age
and die
and I will do the same.
I have been born
and I do exist
and I am aging
and I will die.
I will grow old and become an employee.
I will get married.
I will have children.
And I will lie in my bed as years go by
and my body and the body lying next to me
will stiffen
will betray
will lose its litheness like the trees lose their blooms.
The wind will blow arthritis into my bones
and I will see pretty young things on the street
and feel regret.
The skin will sag like bark
the hair will fall out like leaves
and the mind will excuse itself like scent
until I am very much like my grandmother
who is a child now
and is mostly concerned with Jesus
and finding me a nice girl.
And I will lie in my bed and decompose
like the trees begin to do as soon as they are born.
In a few months the plants
will have been born
and will have lived
and will have aged
and will have died.
And in a few decades or a few hundred years I
will have been born
and will have lived
and will have aged
and will have died.
The wind blows leaves and years off just the same way.
Filed under: Uncategorized
On the way home today the local sports radio station cut out around the state line so I couldn’t listen to Minor League baseball anymore. The NPR station wasn’t doing anything I was interested in, so instead I went to the local talk radio station, the one I talked about a couple posts ago. The host was talking about the recent North Carolina House ruling that allows parents to have more options regarding sex education for their kids in public schools. Basically, the new law lets parents pick standard sex ed, abstinence-only sex ed, or no sex ed at all.
All the callers and the host pretty much threw out the “no sex-ed at all” option, and I think rightly so. Pulling your kid out of those classes would single out the kid for a lot of ridicule, and that’s never a good thing when middle-school students can be so cruel. Most of the callers, which would be expected in the Bible Belt, said they’d go for the abstinence-only option. That’s fine with me, parents should have that options if they want it, even though I don’t think abstinence-only education works.
But this one caller, man… she homeschools her daughter and told one of the craziest stories I’ve heard in a while. When the daughter was 8 or 9, the mom gave her this option: they’d either give her “the talk” then or she could wait until the night before her wedding and they’d give her the talk then. The daughter said she didn’t need to know about sex then so she’d wait until she got married. So now the daughter is 23 years old and apparently, if the mother is to be believed, doesn’t know how sex works. The mom said the daughter doesn’t know the whole process of how it all works.
The mom couched all of this in religious language I’ve heard all my life, a lot of husband-and-wife/loving relationship stuff, the normal Christian buzzwords when it comes to talking about sex. And you know, whatever, if abstinence is the way you’re going to teach your kids that’s fine with me. But it seems like the height of parental irresponsibility to keep your daughter so sheltered. I think part of a parent’s job is to prepare your kids for a life out in the world, to give them wisdom and knowledge and common sense and all that. And it seems like that mom is totally failing in that part of her job.
I’m going to come at this from my Christian point of view for a minute: I think having a kid is literally the most spiritual thing a person can do. Two people create a new life, allowed to play God for a moment, and given the responsibility of watching over and protecting the child the way we hope some higher power watches over us. It is the closest we can get to our God on earth. But it seems like we are not to just shelter our children. God did not shelter Adam and Eve, it did not shelter its son Jesus, and it did not shelter us now. We as a human race are constantly given love, acceptance, forgiveness, and guidance, but we are always free to make our own decisions. Some higher power has allowed us that freedom. It seems obvious that we as parents should do the same for our kids.
You’re right, I don’t know what kind of parent I’m going to be. Maybe I’ll see my child’s beautiful face for the first time and immediately promise myself to keep the outside world away from it. But I hope not.
Filed under: Uncategorized
My dad and I made homebrew beer from a kit I bought and it actually turned out pretty well. The people at school who I’ve given some to have liked it; I’m excited about making more and trying out some different varieties. This batch I’ve made is your basic pale ale with a little honey mixed in, and it’s a good spring beer I think.
Besides that I finished my shadowbox project and was happy with it to a large degree. It wasn’t exactly how I wanted it to be but I think it turned out pretty well given the materials I was working with. I think the aesthetics of it got across the ideas I was trying to present, and that’s really what mattered for this project.
Grading papers for my TA position is taking up so much time (there’s almost 60 students!) but it’s something I really enjoy. I get kind of excited when I talk to students in the class, or if I find out they enjoy writing and can do it fairly well. It’s a bit of a thrill to be able to grade papers and give them feedback, I just wish it didn’t take so much time when I’m already busy with my own schoolwork. But I’m getting paid so I can’t complain. Straight cash, homey, and all the other urban phrases associated with money (it’s actually not even straight cash because it’s a direct deposit paycheck, but “direct deposit, homey” doesn’t sound as good.)
Filed under: Uncategorized
33When they came to the place called The Skull, there they crucified Him and the criminals, one on the right and the other on the left.
34But Jesus was saying, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” And they cast lots, dividing up His garments among themselves.
35And the people stood by, looking on. And even the rulers were sneering at Him, saying, “He saved others; let Him save Himself if this is the Christ of God, His Chosen One.”
36The soldiers also mocked Him, coming up to Him, offering Him sour wine,
37and saying, “If You are the King of the Jews, save Yourself!”
38Now there was also an inscription above Him, “THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS.”
39One of the criminals who were hanged there was hurling abuse at Him, saying, “Are You not the Christ? Save Yourself and us!”
40But the other answered, and rebuking him said, “Do you not even fear God, since you are under the same sentence of condemnation?
41“And we indeed are suffering justly, for we are receiving what we deserve for our deeds; but this man has done nothing wrong.”
42And he was saying, “Jesus, remember me when You come in Your kingdom!”
43And He said to him, “Truly I say to you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.”
44It was now about the sixth hour, and darkness fell over the whole land until the ninth hour,
45because the sun was obscured; and the veil of the temple was torn in two.
46And Jesus, crying out with a loud voice, said, “Father, INTO YOUR HANDS I COMMIT MY SPIRIT.” Having said this, He breathed His last.
