Plus ça change

Snowing heavily now. One to three inches by morning.

Jared is back here to have a warm place to sleep.

Losing a Roomie

The first little period of having an 18-year-old roommate is nearly over. He's got next week off for Spring Break, and needs to get the house back in order for his parents' return from Brazil. Then, apparently, things will get very busy and he'll be finishing the school year, going to church camp, visiting Brazil, and generally being elsewhere for the entire summer. It sounds like I won't see much of him until September.

He got disgusted with me last night because I was feeling sentimental.

Well I did know this day was coming, and he is, after all, returning in the Fall, but I'll miss him very much. Yes, he's inconvenient. No, he's not a constant companion—often he retreats to his room to spend the evening on the phone and on instant messaging. Often, when I begin to share some priceless bit of wisdom, he reminds me that I've already said it twice in the last month. But I'll still miss him very much.

I love Italian

Did up some pasta last night with very authentic tagliatelle. Here are the cooking instructions (and I'm being very careful to preserve the authentic spelling):

Councils for one good baking:
To carry to boiling salt water (1 litre of water in 100 gr of pasta), therefore to pour and cook second the established times. Like this Laporta's pasta exspresses the maximum of the taste, of the goodness leaving unchanged all its characteristics.

(The French isn't a great deal better.)

time for my favorite poem

some poems are seasonal)
i know this one is and i'm glad that the site has typed it in courier typeface, the way the author originally envisioned it

i love the way mud-luscious and puddle-wonderful work and the way eddieandbill are joined at the hip (and so are bettyandisbel

but most of all i love the way the old lame balloonman turns out to be Pan, whistling to all the little forest animals and inviting them to the first wild romp of the season.

It's Spring!

Most of the snow is gone!

The first crocuses (croci?) are up.

I heard a dove today.

I think I'll survive.

Concrete Thinkers

I'm feeling like Professor Kirk from The Chronicles of Narnia—"What are they teaching in the schools these days?"

I suppose it's all electronic. If my students want a flight of imagination (someone else's imagination), they go to a movie or fire up a computer game. If they actually read print (an increasingly odd and specialist activity), it always has a recipe-book concreteness. Each word only has one unambiguous simple meaning. No shades. No poetry. No assignment from a teacher can ever be humorous, sad, sarcastic, or ironic.

It all reminds me of the time when I was a tour guide for a busload of Japanese students. I tried to warm them up with a joke. They took notes.

One of my colleagues was trying to teach Shakespeare's Hamlet. The textbook said it would be helpful if the reader imagined himself/herself to be in Denmark or England. The students came to the conclusion that all plays take place in Denmark or England.

I once tried to do something with non-literal language. I began with the old song, "You Are the Wind Beneath My Wings," then moved to the 23rd Psalm, and asked if we could take these literally. Did Bette Midler think she had aluminum wings projecting from her body? Did the Psalmist think he had white wool and ate grass? The students' conclusion: poetry in general is totally stupid nonsense.

I'm not sure how to get out of this depressing loop. I think I'll try folk songs. I wonder if I can find a great joke that everyone gets. (Not likely)

I do suspect that this hyper-literalist language that avoids all thinking and interpretation does play into the hands of the right-wing nut-case demagogues. Example: Someone in the Federal government suggested that it would be a good idea to perhaps restrict fishing in certain areas to avoid depleting streams and lakes. (That's a very nuanced and "maybe" kind of statement.) Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh picked it up. They can't do "maybe" and "nuance," so it came out as a solid order (it wasn't) from the president himself (it wasn't) saying that all fishing would forever be forbidden in the USA. And because my students (and others like them) can't discern between the literal prescription of an operating manual and the ambiguity of someone who is pondering an idea—and assume that anyone who speaks on the radio is always absolutely correct—America assumes that Obama has come up with another way to strip us of our rights.

unChristian: Political

OK, I'll admit that this is only one portion of the book's chapter on Christian politics, but ...

When this market research company wanted to find out about support for a "Christianized" country, these were the five items that defined support:

• Strongly oppose removal of "In God We Trust"
• Strongly oppose removal of "one nation under God" (from the Pledge of Allegiance, I presume)
• Strongly oppose removal of Ten Commandments from government buildings
• Strongly favor federal marriage amendment
• Strongly favor adding the teaching of creationism in public schools.

That's what "Christianizes" America? Public memorials to civil religion? We've got the first three right now, and we're such examples of Christian character as a nation?

What about these Christian initiatives on the federal government level?

• Commitment that all future military action will fit the definition of a "just war."
• Commitment to helping the poorest among us find jobs and health care
• Eliminating pay-outs to rescue obscenely rich companies that have screwed up their business.
• Really getting serious about eliminating government corruption and graft
• Caring for the environment (Even if we do believe George W's silly anti-science stance, it's part of Christian stewardship to take care of the stuff God gives us.)
• Guaranteeing justice even for our enemies—those browner, more hispanic or more gay than ourselves (Wait! are those really our enemies?)

That list might have a chance of being called "Christian character." After all, the drug dealer or hit man who pays with money marked "In God We Trust" hasn't gotten the message anyhow.

unChristian: Irrelevant and Isolated

It's no secret that Christians like to pull away from the world and build walls. The medieval monasteries did that. Ironically, foreign missionaries do that. Amish do that.

A recent Yahoo News article on textbooks used by homeschoolers seemed astonished that the textbooks presented a one-sided creationist view of science. The news writers were surprised by this statement printed in the introduction to one book:

"Those who do not believe that the Bible is the inspired, inerrant Word of God will find many points in this book puzzling," says the introduction to "Biology: Third Edition" from Bob Jones University Press. "This book was not written for them."

The textbook delivers a religious ultimatum to young readers and parents, warning in its "History of Life" chapter that a "Christian worldview ... is the only correct view of reality; anyone who rejects it will not only fail to reach heaven but also fail to see the world as it truly is."

The preference for chiropractors and homeopathy to medical doctors is rooted in the idea that science always sabotages Christian faith. So is the disdain for such mundane matters as academic accreditation, critical thinking, and even statistical analysis. "Don't confuse me with godless facts. I know what I believe." The Bible must not be polluted with comparative linguistics. If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, then it's good enough for me.

But that wasn't what I wanted to write about here.

The book unChristian makes the odd point that younger people, both inside and outside the church, are very interested in spiritual issues, but don't think that the church is a very good place to find answers to spiritual questions. That's just fascinating. It's like saying that McDonald's isn't a very good place to find hamburgers. What can you find at church?

• A weekly public speaking and music event, usually in an idiom that today's people find odd and old-fashioned. (Face it: today's teenagers aren't that thrilled by 1970s folk-songs.)
• Advice on how to be a better person.
• Intense pressure to conform (at least superficially and temporarily) to the outward markings of religious people.
• Intense condemnation of some things that inwardly you really don't object to (having sex with a girlfriend you really love, protecting the rights and safety of your gay friend)
• Lots of politics, and the thinly-veiled implication that America has a Christian political party and a Satanic one. Coupled with this is the dedication to make America's civil institutions into a mechanism for imposing superficial Christian practices on unbelievers.

What can't you find?

• An understanding that we're all "in process" and some of us haven't caught up with the others.
• A way to deal with the tough day-to-day questions: "Will I ever figure out my life?" "Why is God always so silent?" "What if I'm just tired of keeping all the rules?" "Why are you guys always so happy and I'm not?"
• Friendship that will stand by me even when I screw up.
• Intellectually satisfying explanations of some of the tough issues.
• An attitude of confidence and compassion rather than fear and loathing when facing the outside world.

E-mail?

I just figured out something about a generational difference.

My students will often e-mail me and get really frustrated when I don't receive it and respond to it within an hour. I'm doing conferences and this morning a student was really upset that I didn't do anything about her e-mail yesterday that said she was sick and couldn't make her appointment yesterday. This kind of thing keeps happening.

So here's the generational thing. I will check my business e-mail maybe once a day. I've got five different active e-mail accounts, and only one of them is constantly on my Apple desktop. And that's the way I like it. University accounts spit out something like 200 messages a week, 199 of which are pointless.

Watching my students (and watching Jared very closely), it's obvious, though, that today's teenagers consider five minutes away from e-mail, Twitter, Facebook, and text messaging to be a REAL problem. Any message is worth an instant reply. Any. Certainly the reply is usually two or three letters, but it's there.

I've got other things to do with my time. If I'm in the middle of a conversation with a student, I'm not going to e-mail someone. And that causes my kids to get upset.

Third Day

My supervisor at Akron decreed that we must meet with every student at midterm to give out grades (because the University software, after three years of trying, still can't figure out how to deliver midterm grades). I must say I wasn't looking forward to it. Seventy-five ten-minute conferences. And I made things more difficult by telling myself that I'd grade all the papers from last Thursday before meeting the students.

Today is the third day of conferences, and I don't quite know what to expect. The clueless woman who never gets assignments right and says it's my fault will be there. So will a couple of people who simply write D papers.

Yesterday I met

• One student who obviously has such anxiety that he simply cannot submit anything. He trembled throughout the whole interview.
• A student who is apparently learning-disabled and never diagnosed. When you read her stuff, you can't really figure out what she's trying to say.
  
• A student who works as a paramedic and has been out of class because she was accidentally jabbed with a needle infected with HIV. She's having a bad reaction to her medications.
• A student who apparently spent the first few weeks of the semester drunk, but is now getting his act together.

For the record, I also met with at least half a dozen very bright, gifted students who write beautifully and are a pleasure to read. It all went so well that I'm thinking of returning every paper this way.

More on loneliness

This is yet more of the scattered rough draft that I began below.

The Loneliness book makes two telling points in the first chapter. (1) We are often lonely because we have structured it that way and (2) loneliness is more of a taboo subject than most others.

I'll deal with #1 later, though it's interesting to note that English departments are terrible at interpersonal relationships. I spend my day teaching young adults, yet I feel alone because never have any interaction with peers and the teaching isn't that personal. I have a tiny cubicle office and we never have department meetings or group lunches or anything like that. I tried a Departmental blog but nobody would join. At GFC, things are getting better, though we still stress events that don't involve any significant interaction.

#2, the one about loneliness being a taboo subject, is worth more time. The two psychiatrist authors say that people are much more comfortable saying they are depressed than saying they are lonely. I know that at GFC, some topics are "safe" and some are definitely off-menu.

First example: A few years back we had men's prayer breakfasts, about once every six months. It was the usual thing: powdered donuts followed by singing and then sort of a round-the-circle prayer request. The leader asked a question about "what you are afraid of." (Probably keyed into a Bible verse he'd read to us.) I broke the rules. I suspect we were expected to say something about fearing a liberal in the White House, fearing that the Ten Commandments plaque would get removed from the courthouse, or fearing that public schools would continue teaching evolution. My rule-breaking comment was that I feared entering old age alone and with no really good pension plan. Ten or fifteen seconds of absolute silence followed. They looked uncomfortably at one another (presumably because they all have great pension plans and will never be alone when they are old). Then someone broke the silence with a comment about a "safe" fear—probably something political.

It's funny how distant we make things.

Safe prayer topics:

• Health problems of some distant relative
• Perceived attacks by the government on one of our sacred cows
• My spouse needs to repent

Unsafe prayer topics:

• I made an idiot of myself at work and now I must apologize
• I'm really lonely
• I feel so disconnected from family members
• I fill my life with so much stuff that I have no time for anything or anyone important
• I wish I didn't feel so insignificant
• I need to repent but I don't want to
• I don't think I like my spouse any more

See a trend?

Second example: I guess I never learn. This one happened at a small-group meeting. Once again someone asked what we'd like people to pray about in our lives. Once again I said the wrong thing. I said that I spend a lot of my time feeling really alone. One member (bless his little heart) took the opportunity to use me as a preaching example and exhorted the group—long and loud—to reach out to this poor guy (me) and not to let this sad case (me) languish in loneliness. It was embarrassing. He went on for hours, it seemed. Probably five minutes. Then that was it. Neither he nor anyone else from the group ever said much of anything to me again about it. No coffee invitations. Nothing.

I think the problem is that those depersonalized prayer requests don't make the listener feel guilty. If my Uncle Herb in New Jersey is suffering from gout, nobody in the group is culpable. Nobody identifies much either. But if I say I'd love a coffee friend, everyone in the group feels like a failure. Every group member is a potential answer to prayer, and obviously they all screwed up. And it's a level of vulnerability that's scary. There's an enormous difference between "yes I have a sick uncle too" and "yes I feel really lonely and unable to connect too."

Really alone

Think of this as a scattered rough draft of another Arkenstone article. Jerry (and others) are really welcome to comment.

Yesterday I ran into a reference to The lonely American: drifting apart in the twenty-first century by Jacqueline Olds and Richard S. Schwartz. (Here's a response in The New York Times.) No, I haven't had time to read them, though I did read some excerpts. The point seems to be that the USA is increasingly lonely, pathologically so. I'd guess (before doing the reading) that men are in worse shape than women. There's got to be a reason that teenagers are on the Internet 24/7, that porn is usually a substitute for healthy relationships, and that we're always setting records in drug/alcohol abuse.

Churches (especially our church—because we stress community so much) should be an effective bulwark against this sort of problem, but it's at least as bad in here as it is out there. Examples:

Focusing on our families. I don't know the source of this one, but (until quite recently) we used to teach people to ditch friendships when they got married. I lost one friend this way. He got married, and I never talked with him again. Another young man got the message from a church leader at his wedding reception, and he told the elder to buzz off. Is this some sort of perversion from Bill Gothard? From Focus on the Family? Where?

• Sidenote that might not make it into a finished column: We hate established experts who have done genuine research at universities because we assume universities are always anti-Christian, but anyone who writes a book, gets it self-published and stocked at Christian bookstores becomes a respected voice. Thus the plethora of nut-case psychological theories in churches.

Terrorists. We love to be afraid, listen to the most unfounded rumor disguised as fact (ask me some time about my brother's experience sharing an office with Fox News in Washington), and have a general distrust of masculinity. Thus, any attempt by men to form friendships is suspect. Tight female friendships are respected and can endure for years, but when men get together, there must be something weird going on.

Structure. The traditionalist role for men is "bring home the paycheck, play with the kids, help dry the dishes, and go to sleep." The approved Christian structure doesn't have room for "a night out with the boys." (They will probably play poker, smoke cigars, drink beer, and go to a strip-tease show.) Women have ample structured time to be with other women. Think about Women's Ministry, Dance Group, Sewing Circle, and so forth. Men?  A weekend once every two or three years. And if we wanted to get radical (obscene? perverted? subversive at least!) and suggest that social structures for finding friendship across gender or age barriers might work, it's definitely forbidden by our taboos.

Loop back. Women have multiple places to find friendship. So do children and teenagers. Men, however, are out in the cold. Well perhaps not all men. Single men definitely, because the only real validity for a man is found in his place as husband/father. Married guys can at least talk with their wives and children. (And we know that married people are never lonely, right?)