Meet the VeeBJamN Network

Well congratulations to me.  I graduated!!!  ( . . . like three months ago.)

As everyone knows, graduation marks a turning point in life.  For many, it means leaving behind what you've been doing and going on to either more school or some job out in the real world.  For myself, it means blindly leaping from the safety and comfort of being a student and charging forward into the great unknown.

Whenever someone finds out that I've graduated, I am obligated to go through the same conversation with them that I've had with everyone I've come into contact with lately.  It almost always sounds almost exactly like this:

"I just graduated from college in May."
"Really?  So what are you going to do now?"
"I'm not really sure.  I'm sort of figuring it out as I go along."
"Well what's your degree in?"
"Mathematics."
"Well do you want to teach?"

And so it goes every time.  Here's how the conversation would go if I didn't run my language through a Social-Acceptability Filter:

"Crap.  I'm so sick of having this conversation.  Is there a way I can cleverly avoid telling them that I've graduated?"
"Really?  So what are you going to do now?"
"None of your damn business."
"Well what's your degree in?"
"Math.  Don't you dare say anything about teaching."
"Well do you want to teach?"
"You know, I've never thought of that incredibly obvious answer.  Thank you for solving all my problems in the brief three seconds that you've known I have them.  You are truly a genius."

Truth is, I don't have any clue what I want to do with my life, and I don't know whether my degree will have anything to do with what I end up doing.  I think I would honestly prefer people to give me career advice without knowing what my degree is.  I think that would be much more effective for both of us and make me much less likely to want to punch them in the face.

Honestly, the only thing that I know for sure I want to be a part of my life is writing.  I love writing.  I've read into becoming a professional author (so don't you dare start suggesting I do that for a career) and the catch is that until you have a finished work and get connected with a publisher, you must have another form of income.  Then even once you have a work out there, the odds are not in your favor of that being your sole source of income.  Thus, you must have some other job.

Whatever.  I can live with that.

The other thing that I've found while researching the author life is that every single piece of advice says that if that's what you want to do, then you need to write for at least an hour every day.  It's not really important what you write, just THAT you write.  Now, in case you haven't noticed, I've been really bad about keeping up with this blog.  The problem, I've decided, is that I've never been on a regular schedule with it, and that I'm easily distracted.  I get bored writing it or run out of ideas and start working on something else instead.  Thus, I have developed a solution:

The VeeBJamN Network!

Four different and distinct blogs that will all be updated once a week on a different day.  The idea here is that each blog will have a slightly (or possibly drastically) different feel to it and I will update one of them each night of the week.  The other days, I will use the time I would normally spend writing blogs to research and write in the novels that I have rattling around in the back of my brain.  Hopefully, with some accountabilibuddies out there (I'm currently accepting applications for the position.), I'll be able to write every day and crank out a novel in the not-too-distant future.

What are these blogs and when can I expect updates for them, you ask?  Well I'm glad you asked:

• Beneath the Curls:  This blog will continue to be what it's been.  It will be a place for me to share with you whatever I've been thinking about.  Hopefully if this is cut back to once a week, they can actually be mostly quality posts rather than awkward posts about having nothing to say.  You can expect these updates on Sunday evenings.
  GoldenAfro.blogspot.com
• Get Me in Jail:  The Irregular Misadventures of Franc Bar.  Some of you have been following Franc's story for a little while now.  If you haven't been keeping up with it, now is the time!  As the stories of Franc, Kenneth, and Admiral continue to develop and begin to come together, things could get CRAZY!  I'm super excited about this one which will be updated on Monday nights.
  GetMeInJail.blogspot.com
• Rollicking Regards:  An all-new blog!  Red is one of the founding members of the zoologically puppetastic a capella group Bought & Paid 4 (currently available for bookings) and is ready to answer some fanmail.  If you need advice, would like Red's perspective, or would just like to tell him a cool story, send your letters to veebjamn@yahoo.com (because he hasn't figured out how to set up his own email address yet), and he will eagerly write back to you on Tuesday evenings.
  RollickingRegards.blogspot.com
• Let's Talk Talkies:  I love TV shows and movies and probably spend far too much time thinking about them.  I figured it was about time other people started hearing some of those thoughts and analyses.  My goal here is to offer my thoughts on at least one movie or TV show every week.  Who knows?  There may even be the occasional guest reviewer.  New reviews will be posted on Thursday nights.
  LetsTalkTalkies.blogspot.com

 These updates should start coming in the next week.  If you aren't interested in trying to keep up with where all of these are, there will be links updated on my website along with a brief summary of the post:

veebjamn.webs.com

 To my loyal followers up until now, I thank you for your support.  For those that are new to my writings, I thank you for giving me a chance.  For those that are sick of me saying thank you to vague groups of people, I thank you for keeping those opinions to yourself.

Welcome to the VeeBJamN Network!!!

Ready or Not

It never ceases to amaze me how wildly different some beliefs are across denominations.  On the surface, many of us do many of the same things, but some subtle differences, if looked at a bit more deeply, can reveal HUGE differences in the underlying beliefs.

My sister-in-law is a born and raised Baptist.  In the Baptist church, you are baptized when you accept Jesus into your life (or something like that).  I don't understand the theological details there because I'm a born and raised Lutheran and darn proud of it.  In the Lutheran church, more often than not, baptism is done as an infant.  That's not a rule, it's just how it typically takes place.  Whether she remembers them or not, we have had a few discussions about these differences.

I always understood baptism for Baptists to be very similar to confirmation for Lutherans.  In a lot of ways, this isn't a bad parallel.  Both, in their respective denominations, seem to signify a point where you are taking responsibility for your own faith.  However, there is still a large difference there that cuts right to the root of the differences in our views on baptism.  This difference was pointed out to me by a simple question from my sister-in-law:

"Why don't y'all do confirmation whenever the person is ready?"

 I'm sure I gave some snarky answer at the time (because when don't I?), but I've spent time thinking about it since then.  The idea was brought before me once again on Sunday when our WONDERFUL pastor gave her sermon about baptism.  She got the following story from somewhere, but I can't remember where.  Sorry if you're reading this and I stole it from you.  My bad.  It's just such a GREAT illustration.

In cattle country, occasionally, there are cattle that are wild and unmarked.  These cattle are referred to as mavericks.  (No.  I'm not talking about Sarah Palin.  But for those still playing the drinking game, I think this counts.)  Whichever rancher catches a maverick and puts their brand on it first is considered to be its owner.

There was a little girl who grew up on a ranch.  She had spent enough of her life out with her father dealing with their herd that she knew the lingo as well as she knew how to spell her name.  She was in school one day and for whatever reason, the discussion turned to religion.  The little girl proudly declared that she had been baptized and was a child of God (and darn proud of it!).  One little boy in her class didn't understand this.  He asked her what it meant to be baptized, and she explained it as clear as day.  "Well, you see, I was just a little maverick runnin' around the plains.  Then God snatched me up and put his brand on me, so everyone would know I'm his forever!"

In this simple statement from the mouth of a little girl comes what I consider to be the fundamental difference between a Lutheran understanding of God and a Baptist understanding of God.  Is God waiting for us, or is God hunting us down?

If you've ever seen a cow being branded, then you know that that cow has no interest in having a mark burned into its flesh.  They kick and whine and it usually takes several people to keep them down just long enough to get that mark on them.  That cow has no choice in the matter.  If you've ever watched an infant baptism, it's not so different.  I don't think I've ever seen an infant baptism where the child didn't start crying and screaming at some point.  The child has no choice in the matter.  If you've ever heard someone going through confirmation classes, it's not so different.  They whine and complain, and if it weren't for their parents, they probably would never go.

I don't want people to get the wrong idea. I'm not saying that there are not at least pieces of this in Baptist theology (for all I honestly know, this idea could be exactly the same in both). I'm also not saying that all Baptists believe this. My point is coming from a completely stereotypical version. But from what I've seen with things like altar calls, "be saved", and choosing when to enter God's family, the burden is on you. This image is God the Inviter. He sent out his invitations, and now it's up to you to come to him. This is a beautiful image of God.  If this is the version of God that you believe in, great!  The idea of being an invited guest to a King's banquet . . . how could anyone think that is bad?

It's just not the version of God that I see.

To me, a fundamental aspect of Lutheran theology is God the Hunter.  The God of Lutheran theology isn't sitting back waiting for you to come to him.  He's in your face, pinning you down, and branding you as his.  He isn't sitting in Heaven hoping that you will make the right choices and someday get to be with him.  He's with you right now whether you want him to be or not.  This is God the Hound, chasing Adam and Eve through Eden.  This is God the Seeker, trapping Jonah in a whale so he can't get away.  This is God the Cowboy, tackling you to the ground kicking and screaming, so that he can leave his mark on you, and everyone will know you're his forever.

The question here was not about which is the true identity of God.  God is all these things and more.  The question at hand was (if you'll recall), "Why don't y'all do confirmation whenever the person is ready?"  The answer to that question, with everything you've just read in mind, is relatively simple:

"God isn't waiting for you to be ready.  He's coming for you when HE is ready."

 I can't help but wonder what the world would be like if God had waited for anyone in the Bible (including Jesus) to realize they were ready before he thrust their task in front of them.

Rehumanizing the Christ Part IV A

Christmas is by far my favorite holiday.  My family has a full day's worth of traditions on Christmas Eve, and as far as I'm concerned, that is sacred.  Any other holiday during the year, you can change stuff around without upsetting me too much, but you do not mess with Christmas Eve.  Just go ahead and assume that I'm occupied all day Christmas Eve from now until . . . forever.  That's how serious I am.

With all that excitement that builds up for me, however, I find it necessary to restrict myself with regards to when I can get excited.  I really try hard to not think about Christmas before Thanksgiving so that my Christmas excitement doesn't overpower anything before then.

HOWEVER

I've been thinking about Christmas a lot lately.  I've been writing a Christmas puppet show for my church, so I've been listening to Christmas music and reading Christmas jokes and just generally spending a lot of time thinking about Christmas.  Thankfully, I'm almost done.  But since I'm on that train of thought, I started thinking about Joseph today, so I figured I may as well force you all to think about it too.

Thus, I humbly present for your consideration:

REHUMANIZING JOSEPH

 I'll warn you, this isn't going to be a happy friendly one.

From what I've seen, Joseph has been very romanticized in our culture.  Usually, he is viewed as a very caring, loving adoptive father.  He's viewed as a very willing parent to the newborn messiah and very open to raising this child that isn't genetically his.

But what if he wasn't?

The Bible doesn't talk much about Joseph.  He's seen as being betrothed to Mary, planning to divorce her quietly, being visited in a dream by an angel, and told to go ahead and marry her.  He has a couple more dreams telling them when they need to travel, but after that he's pretty much only mentioned with Mary or not at all.

And with ambiguity, I take the liberty of filling in the details as I choose.

Usually, the details are filled in very optimistically, but what if they weren't?  What if we take a more pessimistic approach?  What if Joseph was more of an absentee parent?  This is how I will be looking at the narrative.  Sorry.

Joseph is betrothed to a beautiful girl.  He's excited about it.  Until he finds out she's pregnant.

Obviously, the girl slept with someone else.  And really, he couldn't blame her.  He was nearly twice her age.  But he still cared about her.  More importantly, he still cared about his own reputation.  If he were to divorce her without anyone finding out, he could keep from anyone making the connection that she cheated on him.  Just maybe, they would think that she had simply had sex with someone prior to marriage.  Not the best scenario for her, but it was the best he could do.

Then, one night, he's visited in a dream by an angel.  This incredibly intimidating figure tells him that he should still marry her.  What could he do?  He couldn't say no to someone who could transcend all the laws of the universe and enter directly into his mind!

So he married her.

When the child was born, he tried hard to care for the child.  He wanted to be a good father, but he felt trapped.  He knew the boy wasn't his.  By rights, he owed this boy nothing, but he was trapped.  He couldn't divorce her now that there was a kid.  What would people think?  More importantly, what would the angel do?

As the boy grew up, Joseph became more and more aware of the fact that this boy wasn't his.  He didn't look like him.  He didn't act like him.  Joseph had both feet firmly planted on the ground while this boy was flying high with his head in the clouds.  This was not his son, and he knew it.  But no one else did.  So this kid was going to get his inheritance.

After all, the world thought the boy was his.

He had several more sons, and desperately wanted to reveal the truth so that HIS son could get what was rightfully his.  But his reputation.  And the angel.

He couldn't do it.

That didn't mean he had to treat this boy like a son.

I'm going to leave the rest of this to your imagination, because in my mind, it gets very dark from there.  In the modern retelling, following this line of thought, Joseph becomes an alcoholic and eventually dies trying to tell the truth as he does.  It's super depressing.

For the record, I HATE this image of Joseph.  I think it's awful.  Unfortunately, it's something that some people have to go through.  Who's to say Jesus didn't have to go through it too?  If you notice, the title of this post has an "A" in it.  "B" will be coming very soon:  REDEEMING JOSEPH.  I much prefer the image of Joseph that I will talk about in that one.

But think about it.

What if Jesus didn't have a happy childhood?

It's sad.  It should be just as sad that it happens to anyone.






I promise the next one will be happy!  It'll melt your heart and make it smile!

My Obligatory Election Post

I'm trying to write a Christmas puppet show for my church and I hit a writer's block on the last scene, so I figure I may as well get my obligatory election post out of the way.

Let me just take care of this now since I'm talking politics:  ACHOO!

To be honest, I don't know who's winning right now.  I do know that the last time I checked the CNN website, Romney had the popular vote, but Obama was winning the election.  Thank you electoral college.  You are what's wrong with America.  Whoever ends up winning, I don't really care.

As far as I can tell, our government is set up to slow down change as much as possible.  Whoever wins, by the time they've managed to put any legislation through, it'll have been talked to death and resuscitated so many times that most of us will just be happy the debates over it are done.  Moreover, the president is mostly for giving speeches.  Both these guys have shown that they can do that, so, you know, there it is.

This pretty much seems to sum up this election:

Epic Rap Battles of History: Obama vs Romney

I'm pretty sure Lincoln won that one.  No surprise.  He already beat Chuck Norris in a rap battle.  The fact that this race has come down to choosing between "the shiniest of two turds" is the result of our two party system.  I think parties can even make it worse for their own candidate.  Republicans make me not want to vote for Romney and Democrats make me not want to vote for Obama.  Without political parties, we would at least get to choose between the shiniest of three or four turds.

Here's my view of politics in three simple words:  less is more.

I don't like the government to be intervening in every aspect of my life.  I'm far more a capitalist than a socialist.  You want your government to pay for all your needs?  Make enough money to buy your own country.  I also don't think it's the government's job to enforce much of a moral code.  Keep people from killing each other, sure.  But on gray areas where we can't agree, I say leave it to people to decide.

Wonder Woman gave me the best perspective on this I've heard yet.  We were talking about abortion and she said that she doesn't agree with abortion, but it isn't the government's place to enforce that moral code.  I completely agree with this!  I think it's wrong to cheat on you spouse, but that doesn't mean the government should fine you for adultery.  I think it's wrong to stand outside the SUB and tell people their going to Hell.  That doesn't mean it's the government's responsibility to shut them up.  When the government starts enforcing a particular extreme of a moral gray area, we are one step closer to the government that instigated WWII.

I'm done ranting on the government, so I'll sum it up.  I don't think the government should be paying for health care.  For anyone.  I think health care should be viewed as a service provided by individuals or companies.  I don't think America should be intervening in other country's governments.  How arrogant of us is it that we think we've perfected human government?  I think tax money should go to protecting citizens.  By that I mean minimalistic.  Have an army as an intimidation factor to other countries.  Have law enforcement to protect citizens from each other.  Don't pay politicians.  EVER.

Just imagine for a moment, if you will, a country run only by those who care enough to perform those duties on a volunteer basis.  More importantly, imagine a country where the people who make the laws must follow the laws.

Regardless of your views or mine on politics, what today really comes down to is voting.

I've heard over and over again people telling others that they need to vote if they are able.  "It doesn't matter who you vote for, as long as you vote."  I'm sorry to offend you, but I don't think everyone who CAN vote SHOULD vote.

Allow me to explain.

I believe that if you are educated on the issues and the candidates, you have a moral obligation to vote.  ESPECIALLY if you feel strongly one way or the other.  However, on the other hand, I think that if you don't actually know what each candidate stands for or you don't know what's going on the country and you are voting just for the sake of voting, I believe you have a moral obligation NOT to vote.

Democracy is a form of government walking an extremely fine line.  The word was intended to mean "rule by the people".  However, even back in ancient Athenian times, people were referring to democracy as "rule by the mob".  When we form together and join the group behind a candidate just for the sake of exercising our right to vote, we fall solidly into being ruled by mobs.  If you don't know what a candidate stands for, how can you say you support them?

I will be honest.  I didn't vote.

I consider myself fairly educated on issues, but I honestly don't care about the role of the president enough to get educated on their platforms.  As such, if I were to vote for either Obama or Romney for president, I would consider myself to be slapping the American political system in the face, and if you don't vote for one of those two, thanks to political parties, your vote is a complete waste.  I hope to someday care enough to get educated, but right now, I don't.  Either candidate will do things that will make me hate them, because I have problems with authority.  Hazards of being a middle child.  (Check the statistics!  Their fun!)

If you are passionate toward either candidate, you are betraying yourself, the system, and America by not voting.  If you are uneducated or honestly don't care, you are betraying yourself, the system, and America by voting.

Vote.  Don't vote.

Vote for Obama.  Vote for Romney.

In the end, the world is gone in 45 days anyway.

ACHOO!





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UPDATE (like, 3 seconds later):

I'm not a big fan of drama queens freaking out thinking that things are going to suddenly drastically change, but they are NOTHING compared to what I just read.

Dear Facebook user, comments such as "take a step back and fuck your own face" directed at people simply for preferring one candidate over the other are NEVER acceptable.  That right there is the reason people hate politics, avoid them, and don't vote.  I sincerely hope the person who posted that is reading this.  You are being childish.  You are being rude on the deepest possible level I can imagine.  There is absolutely no reason to say things like that in a civilized setting.

Have a molecule of class, would you?

"Services" ACHOO!

I would like to think that up until now in writing this blog, I've done a very good job of not giving out much personal information.  My name is posted somewhere on the site (I'll never tell you where!), but other than that, I've done my best to avoid anything that would help you find me.  However, today I am so pissed off at the university that I attend, that I am going to break my personal code.

So rapists and murderers that have been desperately scouring the pages of this blog looking for a way to find me, come at me, bro!  I could go Hulk on just about anyone right now.

I attend Texas Tech University.  There are many things I like about this school.  The campus is gorgeous.  I love that it is isolated from the surrounding city of Lubbock, because I don't like the way cities feel.  Tech doesn't have that feeling.  Most of the professors aren't too bad, particularly in the math and classics departments that I most often deal with.  I do my absolute best to take pride in my school and give my full support to being a Red Raider.

But today, if you asked me, I would tell you that if you are even slightly considering going ANYWHERE else, run.  Save yourself before it's too late.

In sitcoms, there is often a joke for a particular character that continues running through the entire season.  Whatever it may be, just when you think you won't hear anything about it again, WHAM!  There it is!  I love this!  It's like a little nod to those people that are watching the show frequently enough to realize that its happening.

My running joke isn't funny anymore.

Before the semester started, as I was preparing to move in, I got the odd urge to check my parking permit.  Nothing blatantly told me to check this.  It was just a feeling.  I honestly remember buying a parking permit back when I registered to live in the dorms again.  Apparently, I was wrong or something in their system screwed up.  Either way, I didn't have a permit.  Even worse, there were no more permits for my dorm's parking lot.  The closest permit I could still get was a block away.  I realize that parking a block away doesn't seem like that much, but let me ask you this:  If you had a garage or driveway right in front of your house and you had to park in some lot down the street, wouldn't you be ticked?
Anyway, at that point I was ticked.  I could pretty much convince myself that I had messed up and this was still my fault.  After a few days I could laugh about the extra exercise I got walking to my car.  I really didn't think it was THAT bad, just a minor annoyance.  According to their rules, I could even park in my dorm's parking lot on the weekends.  (Because that makes sense. (ACHOO!) )

And so, the very first weekend out of the bottle, I went somewhere Friday night, and came back to leave my car in the parking lot of my dorm.

I came back to it Saturday afternoon to find not one, but two tickets:  one for Friday and one for Saturday.

Luckily, the appeal process was pretty easy.  I went online and appealed both.  The results came back within two weeks, and they said that I was indeed in the right and waved both tickets.  I was satisfied and resolved let bygones be bygones.  I made my peace with TTU Parking "Services" (The word services here having the broadest possible meaning attributed to the word.), and went on.  I parked down the block during the week and in my dorm's lot on the weekend.  Everything was fine.

Until I got an email one Friday morning telling me that I had been issued another parking ticket.

By the time I got to my car to verify that I was still parked in the lot in which I was supposed to be parked (the same spot I had been parked in all week) there was another ticket.  They had ticketed me for Thursday and Friday.  (Apparently Monday through Wednesday you can park wherever you want.  Right?  (ACHOO!) )  Worst of all, they had ticketed me for parking in the lot for which I had a permit.  The permit that I had been stuck with because I could not get the permit for my dorm's parking lot.  A permit I could not get because they were out by the time I realized I didn't have one.

I appealed these tickets as well and put them out of my mind.

Until, at least three weeks later, I got a notice from Student Business Services telling me that I had a balance due despite the fact that I had already paid off my tuition bill.

I checked my bill and, wouldn't you know it, there was a lovely little note from parking in which my $25 unjustified parking ticket (which I had appealed and not yet heard back on) had been turned over to Student Business Services and had a few late fees attached resulting in the grand prize of over $200!  (It's like I won the Price is Right!)  I immediately called Parking "Services" and asked them what was going on.  They told me that I had not paid the ticket and it was passed due so they turned it over.  I told them that I had appealed that ticket and had yet to hear back about it.  They said they had no record of ever receiving this appeal.  They got the one for the other ticket (which I STILL haven't heard back on (two weeks, my butt!) ), but nothing for this one.  They did, however, agree to wave the fees because everyone gets a free courtesy ticket or something like that.

I was satisfied and once again put it out of my mind.

Until last night.

Last night, my mom called me telling me that they had received an email saying I had a hold on my account from Student Business Services because of overdue bills.  I checked and confirmed this.  Then I checked my email and saw that at 5:30, they had sent me an email telling me about this hold.

Registration is tomorrow.

I checked my bill to find that that stupid parking ticket was still there, so I called Parking "Services".  They told me that they had waved the fee for that ticket, but for some reason it hadn't gone through to Student Business Services.  (FYI, my first call to them about this ticket in which the fee was waved was TWO WEEKS ago.)  They assured me that they would resend it and it would be taken care of in the next few days.  The next few dayS.  Plural.  I, in my naivete, let it go.

Today, I checked my account once more to find the same hold, so I called Student Business Services who told me that they had received nothing from Parking "Services".  So, I called parking.  Again.  They told me that they would email their boss and let them know, but that she had been on vacation and was behind.  They once again assured me that it would be taken care of in a few dayS.  I asked if there was anything I could do to speed up the process.  They said no.  They recommended I go ahead and pay and wait for the transaction to go through and I would be reimbursed.

I am now pissed.

It's not that I CAN'T pay it.  It's that I SHOULDN'T have to.  Why should I pay because someone else screwed up?  I resolved to go to the various Services in person and try to work this out.  However, as I tried to talk to my roommate about all of this, I quickly realized that I could not form any of my arguments into a cohesive thought, because I'm so pissed off.  I haven't been able to verbalize a thought about this cohesively since.

I paid.

I'm pissed about it, but what choice did I have?  If I didn't, let me lay out for you the sequence of events from the beginning of this fiasco as they could have played out, assuming that my tongue's betrayal continued and I couldn't get them to work it out today:

1. I do not get the parking permit for my dorm as I thought I did.
2. I am forced to park in another lot because they are "out" in my dorm's lot.
3. I receive a ticket for parking in the lot I am supposed to park in.
4. I appeal the ticket.
5. The appeal goes unregistered by Parking "Services".
6. The ticket gets turned over to Business Services.
7. Parking "Services" agrees to wave the fees.
8. They forget to tell the people in charge of the money.
9. I get a hold on my account.
10. I refuse to pay the fee, but cannot argue my case, because I don't know how to deal with anger.
11. I cannot register for the classes I need, because they fill up before I'm allowed to register.
12. I have to push back my graduation.

Right now, the main reason I don't want #12 to happen is because I don't want to deal with TTU Parking "Services" anymore.  I wouldn't mind being here another semester, but I want to graduation mostly because I'm sick of dealing with them.

Am I a drama queen?  Yes.
Am I blowing this all out of proportion?  Probably.
Do I care right now?  No!

I may have gone too far saying not to come to Tech at all.  There really are many wonderful things about this school.  I do, however, recommend that whoever you are, wherever your classes are, and wherever you live, skip out on dealing with Parking "Services" and just park at Wal-Mart.

The Kitchen Table Test

To say that I like "How I Met Your Mother" could qualify as a nominee for the Understatement of the Year award.  It would be almost like saying Ted likes Star Wars.  I'm a little bit completely obsessed.  If you aren't, you either haven't seen it because you live in a third world country (in which case please leave a comment telling me how you found and are reading my blog) or you have been mistakenly watching the wrong show.  These are the only possibilities.  (There's also the very remote chance that you've seen it and don't like it, but, to be frank, I'm writing this blog for people who aren't cold humorless monsters.)

I've been rewatching the series from the beginning over the last several weeks and today I watched an episode in which Ted finds out that Lily has been sabotaging his relationships for years.  As part of her confession, Lily tells him that the girls she did this with failed what she called the Front Porch Test.

Basically, Lily and Marshall (who, for those of you in third world countries, are married) have been best friends with Ted since college.  Lily makes the rather reasonable assumption that they will be very good friends for their entire lives.  Thus, she considers their futures through this Front Porch Test.  She pictures the four of them (Marshall, Lily, Ted, and whoever the girl happens to be that week) on the front porch of one of their houses in the distant future.  If she doesn't like the way the scenario plays out, that girl has failed the Front Porch Test.

This got me thinking.  (Because, let's face it, what doesn't?)  I have a similar test.  However, it's not really with my friends.  Older Ted as the narrator of the story refers to all the other characters in the core cast as "uncles" and "aunts".  They are family.  Like them, I have a test with my family.  It's not a Front Porch Test.  We don't really spend much time on the porch.

For my family, it's the Kitchen Table Test.

My family ROCKS!  Seriously, they rock.  Actually, "rock" is being modest.  My family is the MOST AWESOMEST!!!  So, as Lily put it, "whoever you marry, whoever joins Team Awesome . . . the bar's set pretty high."

I didn't realize just how high that bar was set until someone passed the Kitchen Table Test.

My family spends a lot of time together.  (And really, who could blame us?  I mean, we're awesome!)  We not only love each other, but (most days) we genuinely LIKE each other.  I thought this was how all families were for the longest time.  I've since realized just how blessed I am.  Anyway, the ultimate culmination of our time spent together is dinner.  Dinner has long been a sacred tradition in my family.  It (almost) always takes place around the kitchen table and is one of the most fun things anyone can do, as far as I'm concerned.  My mom is a MAGNANIMOUS cook!  Between that and the fact that everyone in my family is classically trained in the great art of conversation (Yes, there are still people good at that.) family dinners are almost as awesome as we are.

However, I could easily see how family dinners with us could be intimidating for some people.  It's hard to be surrounded by that much awesomeness.  But for me, anyone who's going to join our family has to be able to not only survive, but thrive in that setting.

This is the Kitchen Table Test.

I have a really good imagination and generally I'm at least decent at reading people.  Thanks to these skills, I can usually run the Kitchen Table Test in my mind if I've spent enough time around the person.  However, it's even better if we can run the test live.  Needless to say, not many people have passed the test.  Even less have passed the test in person.

One has.

My sister-in-law, Wonder Woman, is pretty great.  I have a theory that if I spend enough time with almost anyone, I will grow to hate them.  Wonder Woman and I are both majoring in math at the same school.  Thank to this little "coincidence" we have class together every day of the week.  Consistently after class, we find time to talk to each other.  Basically, I'm spending time with this girl every day of the week, and I still don't hate her.  That's pretty impressive into and of itself.

She's actually the reason I realized the importance of the Kitchen Table Test.  I remember the first time my brother, Superman, brought her home for dinner with all of us.  We immediately jumped in and were our usual awesome selves.  I don't know how she felt about that dinner, but all of us could tell there was something special there.  It takes a special kind of person to hold up under those conditions.  She passed with flying colors.

Throughout our time with her, she's managed to weasel her way into all of our hearts.  And, like everyone who will pass the Kitchen Table Test, we not only love her, we LIKE her.  My sister, Goober, has even gone so far as to deem her a saint (with reciprocity, of course).

Superman, Wonder Woman, Goober, and I hang out pretty regularly.  We like spending time around each other.  In fact, they're all definitely among my favorite people to be around, not just as a group, but as individuals.  I, and I suspect I'm not the only one, have come to realize that whoever Goober and I end up with will have to pass all of these tests.  We will all have to like them.  We will all have to be not only willing, but excited about hanging out with them.

And most importantly, they will have to pass the Kitchen Table Test.

What's you test?

The Third Wheel Effect

Everyone has been the odd man out at some point in their life.

Personally, my odd-wheel record is seven.  Third wheel's bad.  Fifth wheel's rough.  Seventh wheel?  Uggh!  I don't know how high the official world record is, though.  I have a theory that after a certain point, the individual relationships start breaking down and it's impossible to have an odd wheel.  I've yet to find anyone willing to test this theory for me.

I've been asking myself lately just why it is that being a third wheel is so depressing.  I don't mind being alone.  I actually prefer a lot of the time.  But when I'm the third wheel, I feel more alone than when I'm by myself.  Why?

Most people, when you ask them this question, will give you a rather simple answer.  They will say that seeing other people together is a constant reminder of what you don't have.  I think they're close, but not quite there.  If that were the case, watching most of my favorite shows such as How I Met Your Mother and The Big Bang Theory would make me feel alone too, but they don't.  What is it about being around actual people?  Why is it so much worse than seeing them on TV?

For example, sitting at home, watching a movie involving a party, knowing full well that you are alone and other people are out together, is not depressing.  Yet being at a party, and not interacting with anyone else, but sitting alone, is depressing.

People will again offer a simple explanation to this as well:  When it's on TV, you don't have the option of being a part of it.  It's the proximity that hurts so much.

As per usual, I don't think it's that simple.  I do, however, think that the Third Wheel Effect can be explained in three simple words:  Imagination vs. Reality.  (Honestly, I think this is the summation of many issues in most people's lives.)

As a math major, I write a lot of proofs.  Anytime you write a proof, you start by defining what you're working with.  (In fact, a lot of the time, simply pushing definitions into one another will give you the proof.)  This is essentially what I'm going to do here.

I have a large imagination.  It terrifies me.  The best way I have of explaining it is by comparing it to fire.  If it is controlled, it can be an incredible and useful tool in limitless endeavors.  However, when it gets out of control, it destroys everything in its path, and is incredibly difficult to stop.  Just ask any firefighter.

Everyone has some imagination, and just about everyone has lost control of it at some point.  It's what makes you see things out of the corner of your eye when you're alone in your room.  It's what makes you feel like someone's watching you when there's no one around.  It's what fills the darkness with terrifying images of monsters and murderers when a child is trying to sleep.

Imagination is a fire fueled by emptiness.  This is why we fear the dark and the silence.

I firmly believe this.  When an artist looks at an empty canvass, imagination seeks to fill it with paint.  When a sculptor sees a block of clay, empty of all uniqueness, imagination is what seeks to fill it with characteristics.  When a writer gets hold of a character with a blank and empty future, imagination seeks to fill it with adventure.  When a musician hears the empty, echoing silence of a room, imagination seeks to fill it with music.  When a child sees all the empty space in the closet, imagination seeks to fill it with monsters.

So, then, how do we control imagination?  Creativity.

Some of the least imaginative people in the world come up with the most creative solutions to problems.  Similarly, some of the most imaginative people in the world live boring, mundane lives because they cannot come up with a way to use it.  Creativity and imagination are not the same thing.  Creativity is the ability to control and wield what imagination you have.  And, like any skill, it takes training.

Creativity is a much more conscious effort than the innate power of imagination.  This is why things get scarier at night.  You start easing your brain into doing less work, and one of the things that typically shuts down first is creativity.  Without creativity, imagination runs free and unbridled, filling the dark and the silence with whatever it can.

But what does any of this have to do with being a third wheel?  This is where we must jump over to the other, much uglier word:  Reality.

The philosopher Descartes once tried to determine what things were undoubtedly true.  In order to do this, he doubted everything.  I mean EVERYTHING.  Then, he threw out whatever he couldn't prove.  It got to the point that he threw out the entire universe, essentially offering the idea that we could be living in the Matrix.  That is, as he explained it, some demon could be manipulating his brain and making him experience things that weren't actually there.  All of this, he said, made him sad.  He then decided that since he was sad, he must exist.  This has since led to interesting philosophical discussions and paradoxes.

We can't prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that anything is real.  To be honest, as best I can tell, we typically determine whether something we're sensing is real by whether or not someone else senses it.

Think about the movie A Beautiful Mind (HUGE spoiler alert).  In his reality, he was working for the government.  He had this college roommate with a daughter who he watched grow up.  In everyone else's reality, he was nuts, because he saw people that no one else did.  Who's to say that these people didn't exist?  Everyone.  What makes someone crazy is if everyone else's view of reality contradicts their own.

Reality is determined by the majority.

Imagination is constantly seeking to fill the emptiness around you.  Without anyone else there to deny what you are sensing, whether that be the feeling that someone's watching you or the bump you heard in the basement, who's to say what's real?

As a third wheel or the wallflower sitting at the edges of a party, you are alone.  There is no one connected to you, thus you are just as alone as when there's no one around you.  Where those connections should go, there is an emptiness.  Imagination floods in and tries to consume the emptiness, to fill it.

When you are completely alone, there's no one else there to say that imagination isn't filling that emptiness.  There's no one there to confirm that you are alone, thus who's to say you are actually alone?  Without anyone else there, you're free to float on a cloud of imagination and forget the real world.  On the other hand, when you are alone around other people, there is someone there to ground you in reality.  They can confirm that you are alone, and you accept this reality.

It's not being alone that makes you lonely.  It's accepting that you are alone.

I'm not saying that people consciously come to these conclusions.  I don't think that people decide to feel lonlier because of conscious confirmation that they are alone.  These things occur subconsciously with you ever realizing them.  That's what makes it so scary.

Is there anything you can do about this?  I don't know.  All my experiments in this endeavor have failed.  The only solution I've found is zoning out.  That lets you escape away from even your senses.  With this wide open emptiness in your mind, imagination is free to flood in and fill it with a new reality.  A new world.  A Whole New World.  A better world.

Maybe crazy people have it right.  Maybe we should all just throw out this world and let our imaginations build a new one.  Maybe reality really is just for people who don't have enough imagination to come up with anything better.

Summer Vacation

As the semester comes to a close, I want to leave you with some inspiring thoughts:

There's a hundred and four days of summer vacation 'til school comes along just to end it.
So the annual problem for our generation is finding a good way to spend it.

Like maybe . . .

Building a robot, becoming a mummy, or racing up a climbing tower!
Discovering love you thought didn't exist or meeting folks with superpowers!

Going canoeing, hiking up a bluff, or taking a picture with Dave!
Riding on a horse, chilling in a pool, or getting a tan that's insane!

As you can see, there's a whole lot of stuff to do before school starts this fall.
So stick with us 'cause here at Cross Trails we're gonna do it all!
So stick with us 'cause here at Cross Trails we're gonna do it all!

In case you're curious, all of the above can and has happened to either me or my friends while working for Cross Trails Ministry.  If you like kids, love God, and any of the above appeals to you, you should spend your summer working with us at the absolute best job in the world!

Cross Trails is currently searching very hard for guys ages 18 and up and anyone 21 and up.  If you're interested, visit their website:

Cross Trails Ministry

 Or if you prefer to deal with a person rather than a machine, I am more than happy to answer any questions that you have.  I don't have all the answers, but I do know how to find most of them.  Feel free to send me an email:

veebjamn@yahoo.com

Trust me when I tell you that it is by far the best job in the whole world!!!

The Hipster Bandwagon

Goodness . . . you know it's been a long time since I've posted when Blogspot isn't even in my history.  I gave up trying to figure out why I'm not posting regularly, but whatever the reason, I'm fired up, so hold onto your horses.

In my speech class last year, they said that you should end persuasive papers and speeches with a call to action.  I'm gonna completely disregard that and start with a "call to action" instead:

GET OVER YOURSELF!!!

I mean, goodness, humanity.  What's your deal?  I just read the top six posts on my Facebook feed and they were all subtle (possibly subconscious) ways of gaining superiority over everyone else.  And if you're paying attention, I'm doing the EXACT same thing!  By realizing that people are acting superior to others, I'm setting myself up as superior to them.  Thereby, I've placed myself as high on the superiority chain as I can get.  BEAT THAT!!!

Really, though, there's a particular way of demanding superiority that ticks me off.  Interestingly, it's also one of the most common forms.  I know I wrote about it before, but I cannot stand the hipster movement!

As a recap for those that don't know, when I refer to a hipster, I'm referring specifically to that moment when people think they are better because they like something no one else does.  This usually mutates a step further into the idea that things are naturally not as good if everyone else likes it.  Thus, anything "mainstream" is COMPLETELY out of the question.

For those of you that know me, I'm being more than a little hypocritical here.  But, really, I was a hipster before being a hipster was cool.  Now hipsters are just WAY too mainstream!

Seriously, though, hipsters tend to reveal themselves most often in the entertainment industry.  For these people, different is as good a compliment as you can give a piece of creativity.  Formulaic movies suck.  Music that plays on the radio is appalling.  And NOBODY has good taste in books.  If it's written, played, performed, or created in such a way that the majority of the population can understand and appreciate it, it really isn't worth their time.

Go ask an English prof about almost any popular book.  Then ask them what their absolute favorite book of all times is and try to read it.  You'll be getting pretty close to an understanding of what I'm talking about then.  English profs are generally the biggest literary hipsters I've ever talked to.  The "Academy" is a group of the hipsters of movies.

What scares me more than anything about the hipster movement is that so many people don't realize they're a part of it.

For example, I present the idea of a bandwagon.  Literally, a bandwagon is a wagon which carries the band in a parade.  Back in the 1800s, an extremely popular clown by the name of Dan Rice offered a presidential candidate the opportunity to campaign on his bandwagon.  After that, many local politicians would want to ride on the bandwagon with said presidential candidate in the hopes that his popularity would rub off.  People started using the term "jumping on the bandwagon" derogatorily, and it stuck.

Most people don't think about football fans as being hipsters.  After all [flipping scarf over left shoulder and adjusting glasses that I don't need] football is SO mainstream!  And yet, have you ever talked to a true diehard fan of a team that sucks?  Those people are extremely proud that they haven't left a sinking ship.  Worse than fans of awful teams, though, are fans of suddenly good teams.  This "sudden" change can actually be rather slow.  It could happen over several years.  The point is that people who were fans back when the team sucked criticize those that became fans since the team's rise to glory.  They say they're just jumping on the bandwagon.

I raise to you this question:  WHO CARES?!?

Seriously, if jumping on the bandwagon gives someone the sense of satisfaction they need to get through the day, is it any of your business?  If I've been particularly impressed by a team's season and want to see them succeed, should it really bother you if I root for them?

Just because you discovered something before I did, does that really make you any more appreciative of it than me?

But, as I said before, the hipster movement is just a symptom of the larger human need of finding ways to feel superior to others.  Some people find it in intellect.  Some people find it in physicality.  Some people find it in their religion.  Some people find it in their creativity.  Some people find it in liking things no one else could possibly like.  Some people find it in making observations about people and then generalizing them until all of humanity is culpable.

Some people find it in using words like culpable.

I challenge you this week to get over yourself.  Find some way to make yourself inferior to others.  Save other people the trouble of finding superiority and give it to them.  You'll find a unique way to do this, but I can't think of a better way than to publicly listing reasons why people can feel superior to me:

• I'm EXTREMELY shy.
• I'm two-faced.
• I've spent over 19 of the last 20 years of my life single.
• I'm argumentative.
• I convince people that things are true when I have no idea what I'm talking about.
• I'm scared of failure, storms, and Bigfoot.
• High School Musical 3 makes me want to cry.

Now, since I am human, I would like to undo everything I just did by publicly listing reasons why people should feel inferior to me:

• Most people will never really realize I'm shy.
• I'm two-faced.
• I've spent over 19 of the last 20 years of my life single.
• I am NOT argumentative!  (And I resent your tone!)
• I convince people that things are true when I have no idea what I'm talking about.
• I'm willing to admit I'm afraid of failure, storms, and Bigfoot, and that HSM3 made me want to cry.
• I thought of making this list before you did!

B.C. Friday

For a long time, I've written under the name B.C. Friday.

My mom (I think it was my mom) asked me about my pseudonym once.  She asked me why I used it.  I'm pretty sure my answer at the time was weak and probably full of "I don't know"s.  I've given it thought since then and come up with a few basic reasons.

I noticed early on that the most impressive and influential writers tended to use a form of their name involving initials and a legitimate name.  C.S. Lewis, J.K. Rowling, J.R.R. Tolkien.  I had others at one point, but these were the big ones for me at the time.  I'm more than a little superstitious, so I figured it couldn't hurt to emulate them.  However, this isn't really a reason for why to use a pseudonym as much as a reason for why I chose the one I did.

The next reason was probably more likely the original reason why I started using it:  I'm a sucker for dramatics.

I always loved theater.  I loved becoming someone else.  To me, by using a different name when I wrote meant temporarily becoming a different person.  Since it's not so much a name as a code, it adds a distinct air of mystery to this new character I would get to portray.  It's not for nothing that I was called "Drama Queen" by a group of girls for a week this summer.

However, it would be really easy to argue that using a pseudonym doesn't properly give me credit for my work.  This makes sense, but interestingly leads me into the main reason why I continue to use this pseudonym.

I was having a conversation with someone earlier about story telling.  We started by talking about the differences and similarities between writing a story and telling a story.  We agreed that story telling required an ability to react to your audience and adapt your story accordingly and that writing required an ability to stay focused on the story long enough to get it on paper.

Personally, I've never been good at story telling.  I can't sit down and weave a story in an instant and quickly craft it into a performance worth listening to.  I certainly can't adapt and change my stories once they're on a course.

I think the reason I can't tell stories is because I can't come up with stories.

Don't get me wrong.  I can write stories all day long if I really want to.  However, my firm belief is that I have never once come up with a good story.  That's not my gift.  I can't sit here and give you a sequence of events off the top of my head and them both make sense and be interesting.  Furthermore, if I could, I know I wouldn't be able to convert them into words that would be worth reading.

My gift is characters.  I can meet a character and in an instant give you their entire backstory.  If you asked me about almost any event in the life of any one of my characters, I could probably tell you about it.  I like to believe that my characters are separate and individual entities with lives of their own, but I would like to point out that at the beginning of this paragraph, I used the word "meet", not "make".

The truth of the matter is, I don't really think you can "make" a good character.  A truly great and believable character, is either raised, met, or a combination of the two.  I can't honestly tell you which most authors use.

Raising a character means taking a character from a particular point and weaving the world around them so that they grow into the character you want them to be.  As I mentioned earlier, I'm not very good at creating stories, so this doesn't really work for me.  Meeting a character involves encountering a character at a particular point in their life and then learning their backstory.

I usually meet my characters.  I will be going along in a story and suddenly run into a point where a character must be, and, conveniently, a character will be there.  I can almost guarantee you when a story needs a character, there will be one there.  The hard part is getting to know them.  I can't tell you how I do that, but I do.  Typically, when I write a story, I have a starting point.  Usually it's a particular moment in a particular character's life.  As this protagonist encounters other characters, I meet and get to know them.  I typically just let these characters lose and follow them around.

I've now finally circled around to my point.

One of the main reasons I continue to use a pseudonym when I write is the fact that I don't feel like I have much more right to the story than you.  The only reason I would even begin to convince myself I do is because I met the characters before you.  I believe that before me, the credit for my stories should go to God and the characters.  They're the ones who made the stories.  They're the ones who presented themselves to me when I needed them.  I just wrote the thing down.

Thus, B.C. Friday, for me, represents so much more than just me.  It's my subtle way of taking the credit out of my hands.  B.C. Friday is the culmination of every character that got even the briefest of cameos in one of my stories, God's generous blessing to me of a glimpse into these characters' lives, and finally, little me, translating it all into a form you people can actually read.

I'll admit, while this last reason sounds really good, I honestly started using a pseudonym because I'm a superstitious drama queen.  However, that doesn't change the fact that this post ex facto reasoning is the reason I continue to use a pseudonym.  I tried to quit using it, and it just felt wrong.

I felt like a traitor.

So, out of gratitude to God for giving me the opportunity to glance into someone else's life if only for a moment, and in honor of every person who ended up in a life interesting enough for me to enjoy, I will continue to write under the name B.C. Friday.

It's the least I can do.