So, we went to Serendipity tonight because we knew Silly Jilly would be there. Silly Jilly makes balloon animals. Two weeks ago she made Caroline a giraffe (George). George looked very strange when parts of him began to pop.

So, we walk over (after pizza, not the healthiest evening…) and Caroline is VERY excited at this point. Silly Jilly offers to make another giraffe, a monkey, a lady bug (I saw one of these, it was pretty amazing – she is much better than Cowboy Gil), and since she didn’t offer to make any of the little Einstein’s (maybe you have seen their show at 7:00 AM CDT???) we decided on Mickey (he comes on at 7:30).

The entire time Silly Jilly was making Mickey Caroline was screaming, “WOW WOW WOW, LOOK AT THAT!!! LOOK AT THAT!!! WOW WOW, LOOK AT THAT MICKEY!!!” And hopping up and down. It was like an ad for balloon-animal-vendors… And we thought we should share.

Sorry for the low-resolution picture, I only had my phone

I want to go to bed.

I will soon.

Have some finals this week, but I’m blogging at 1:12 because I hate sin. Usually I am careful on my blog to not talk too Christian-ey… But, I hate sin. I want my friends and family to stop drowning in it.

Sorry that I always use that word, but that is what it looks like to me from here.

Caroline reminds me of so much of what is good in the world, and yet I know that (while I “have what it takes”) I cannot protect her from the world, her own flesh, and the one who prowls about seeking to devour her…

Lord, I believe… help my unbelief.

So, I posted that picture because it is awesome.

I thought about writing about stories and how I rented the third Season of Arrested Development (“STEVE HOLT!!!”). It was good and funny – I laughed out loud on my own – but I was sad to not have rented a story. I even bought popcorn. I cannot remember the last time I bought popcorn for a couch-movie.

Earlier in the week I rented and watched 1408. Rachel began watching, then we all decided she shouldn’t watch it. I don’t recommend it. It is neither scary enough nor good enough. The evil isn’t tangible enough and the character development is too tangible. However, I will give it to Stephen King he understands the point of suffering to some degree.

Cusack sees several ghosts in the movie, and was sort of disappointed in them (except for the startling aspect) until I realized I was supposed to be. No apparition or physical sensation or even the anticipation of such is as powerful as your own past and your own story. Now, this – in and of itself – does not equal what I would call a robust definition of suffering! Rather it is merely a description.

But, at the end it is clear that Cusack is better for having gone through it. His marriage is better, his work is leagues and light years better, his marriage is better… Some of it was new suffering, some was facing old suffering – most was dealing with himself…

So, why do we elevate our experience? Is this what we do now that Sartre and Kirkegaard have really influenced everybody (they were existentialists… don’t ask me much more than that)? We think we’re not supposed to suffer… I suppose much of the culture tells us we are not supposed to… When looking for reasons and especially what to do we simply go to ourselves (In Cusack’s case he was still writing, but writing cheap silly Haunted House tour Guide Books and surfing while his wife didn’t even know where he was. I have sympathy for where his character was, but that isn’t the right response.) So, what is the right response? I don’t know. I have a lot of trouble looking people who have suffered in the eye and telling them they have elevated their experience over what they know to be true about life, suffering, and community.

Isn’t community funny too? We love it, we hate it, we need it so desperately, it creates as much hardship as anything… We run from it, we cannot run from it?

So, Rachel and I saw Juno tonight. I enjoy movies. This was one of the few that I saw without refreshments – I am on a “I don’t know how to really diet, but I should breathe between bites…” diet, and it includes not ordering popcorn and a large cup of corn to drink (you know that that is all that soda is right?).

I liked that it resolved a bit more than other 2008ish movies, but wasn’t a feel good 80’s flick (although I really like those and am pretty amazing at pointless 80’s trivia). I liked the characterization and movement – didn’t see Jason Bateman ending the way he ended in the movie. It made me like people more, believe in life and the movement within it, made me want to buy the soundtrack for my wife, made me want to watch more Arrested Development…

Other things I could write about… The friend who made a decision to not keep their baby – hard to think about without Juno. The pen I just successfully filled with ink that belonged to my great-grandfather. A listener of my podcast wants me to podcast about guilt. And I’m tired of Seminary, mainly because I still see drowning people everywhere as I drive to a place where my role (Calling???) is to sit and be trained (deal with my authority issues???) while many of the drowning ones ask me to speak – at events, into their lives, over coffee…

Discuss… (You may also discuss my daughter on her second birthday eating a cupcake out of a cone – GREAT IDEA, my wife is a genius)…

So, I have an assignment to read about 20 different websites of missions organizations and world news sites. As I prepare to do this I was drinking a nice beverage, and then – because my back has been hurting – I sat in the massage chair Rachel got me for Christmas. Before I signed on my blog (and also before the mission sites) I looked at fountain pens on E-Bay and Paradisepen.com…

Seems a bit out of whack, and yet I believe the Gospel has as much to say towards religious people (if not more) as it does to irreligious people. Meaning: there is no rule about whether or not I can have a fountain pen (or three). But, there is this reality (regardless of my perception) that the point of money is more likely to put the world back together than it is to make me happy. I like big defintions… Remind me to tell you what I told the last teenager who asked me if God could make a rock so heavy he couldn’t lift it.

Almost two years ago we took Caroline home from the hospital (March 18th). Now, on the first page of the book I made her through my computer (thanks IPHOTO), if I say, “There’s Caroline just after she was born…” She will say, “She was very smushy” (Because that is the caption and because she is very verbal).

There are still people everywhere I know who seem to be drowning in life. My wife and I were watching In the Bedroom (because it is based upon a Short Story by my favorite author)… it is poignant about suffering and companionship.

I am leading a thingey about worldviews for seniors… They don’t know if it is relevant… They don’t know that the world will walk up to them every day and ask them in no uncertain terms where and how and why their worldview speaks to them… “What is your purpose… Why is the world such a mess… What happens when you die… Is there any hope… ” There’s one other one I can’t even remember… Probably something about identity.

Thoughts?

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So, I just finished “The Road”. My mom wants my brother (a Philosophy professor) to lead a discussion on it sometime in Denver (where she lives, he teaches in Chicago). So, I got it for my birthday. Everyone on this side of the family has read it.

I wish I had read it before I had a daughter, even though it is easier to understand now.

I am glad I have read McCarthy before (Blood Meridian), and was aware of how dark of a writer he is.

It is the saddest book of fiction I have ever read. Although I did not cry – it was too stark of a sadness to cry, too well done, too many ashes everywhere “If I’m not allowed to cry you’re not…” I am moved I suppose. But, I think I stereotype “being moved” as a good thing. I was moved at Dachau. Fiction cannot capture the reality of Dachau, but I suppose The Road might be one of the closest.

The two books that did make me cry – A Severe Mercy (twice) and the Killer Angels (when Chamberlain makes his men salute their confederates). See why I didn’t cry? I cry at weird stuff.

They make a lot of McCarthy’s books into movies, and this one was an Oprah pick (I will have to find out what she thought. Seriously) so it will certainly be a movie. I will not want to see it, but I will probably see it.

Why are we so obsessed with the end of the world? How many movies and stories exist about it? My brother eventually wants to write about how Apocalyptic works serve to display what we think is of ultimate value. This is apparently a brand of philosophy known as aesthetics. I thought I knew what aesthetics were… things have too many meanings.

I hope that there is more hope than darkness upon the Road. Caroline exists to show me that there is.

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Tony Campolo, who writes as prolifically as anyone (except maybe Phillip Roth and some Romance Novelists), and a couple of years ago he wrote a book after surveying a large number of people who were over 100 years old. He had three main points after surveying them: they wished they had risked more, spent more energy to leave a legacy, and reflected more.

I have been praying and thinking about growing stronger, mainly in the area of reflecting (the other two I don’t struggle with as much).

This year I have been struck over and over and over by the Fall. My street curves and the colors are wonderful (and I have a thing for curvy streets).

I have a good friend who was recently admitted to the hospital for grief and anxiety, I have friends who have been wounded deeply by their church and cannot see straight because of it, I’m beginning my first sermon series ever (in front of a church on a Sunday morning)… And, I am still struck by Autumn.

Thoughts? Are you better at reflecting when your life is chaos? Does the Fall touch something deep in your soul?

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I love the idea of books. Sometimes I also love books. I wrote my Senior Thesis on the Brothers Karamozov (even though I did not finish it for months). I think I received a “c” on the paper.

Now, I’m reading it with a group of guys and enjoying it even more.

As I have said before, it often seems as though everyone around me is drowning, and sometimes it seems like the water threatens me also. Alyosha, (the youngest of the brothers proper, second youngest really) is having a similar day – his brothers are scheming or scoundreling, his mentor lays dying in the same room, his father a reprobate, and a random crippled woman from his childhood has just professed her undying love for him.

These are Dostoyevshy’s words as Alyosha lays down in his cell at the monastery, “He slowly replaced the note in the envelope, crossed himself and lay down. The agitation in his heart passed at once. “God have mercy upon all of them, have all these unhappy and turbulent souls in Thy keeping, and set them in the right path. All ways are Thine. Save them according to Thy wisdom. Thou art love. Thou wilt send joy to all!” Alyosha murmured, crossing himself, and falling into peaceful sleep.”

I prayed this prayer last night, and will likely pray it again…

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Do I really need to comment on this pic?

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So, I commented on another blog and it was all deep and heady stuff. Not really, but I didn’t get to talk about my daughter. The other blog gets like 3 billion hits a day, and i suppose that means people would rather discuss religion, philosophy, people than my daughter. But, as for me and my blog… we would rather talk about Caroline and maybe tie it in to something else…

We went to the park yesterday after I spent most of the morning engrossed in my studies. Caroline likes the park, there are things to climb on, steps to go up, three slides to go down (one she can do with me just waiting at the bottom), a squirrel that sort of bounces (although he/she recently lost a handle), a very strange rock/paper/scissors game, and four swings (two for small kids, two for kids who know how to swing).

She is pretty good about telling you where she wants to go, asking for help and all that. So, we move to the black swing (for little people) and she swings on it for about 15 minutes. Keep in mind she is 17 months old – NOTHING holds her attention that long (except for a few choice books – Go, Dog Go and a book of 9 stories she refers to as “Timmy” because the first story is called “Busy Timmy” – more on Timmy Later). I am pushing her pretty high (mom wasn’t at the park), and she is alternating between regular swinging, leaning back and looking up, leaning forward and looking down. She’s not laughing a ton, but she is smiling and saying “Whee-Uh” a lot. I become concerned she may get sick so I take her off.

Instead of going to the slide (s) the wonky-Squirrel (usually her second choice after swinging), the climbing stuff (she can climb one of them), or the bouncey bridge we go to the Yellow Swing (still for smaller kids), and she says “S-ing s-ing!”, so we swing in the Yellow Slide for about 5-7 minutes. I take her out not wanting her to have left the park without sliding, etc. So, she takes my hand and leads me to the 3rd swing (for big kids), and we do that oen together for about ten minutes.

It was awesome, I have to hold her with one arm and remember when to bend my knees and when to straighten them but the sun is setting (beginning to anyway), she is talking to me, “Hi Daddy, hi daddy, hi daddy… Timmy, Oh Timmy, Timmy, Timmy, Oh Timmy Oh Timmy…” (Rachel and I think she is sad for Timmy because if you pay attention you notice Timmy knows no actual people and lives a very sad life).

At the same time we are within 30 minutes of bed-time so I again set her down on the ground thinking we can slide a few times and maybe go to the bridge (Dad is good at shaking the bridge). Nope, on to Swing Number Four… She actually tries to climb into it which was awesome because it is over her head, but no one told her so she is grabbing it and trying to swing her leg into it…

I think she likes to be held, but there must be something else going on (cartoons, a swing, a book). Caroline is one of two very fortunate people who I really like to touch and be touched by (my wife being the other) – this is unfortunate for our cat, Batman. Therefore, it was wonderful to just swing for awhile. This park is shaded so we didn’t sweat a ton, it is a relatively pretty park with a big field between us and the sun. There were other dogs so the nice melody of our dog, Ron, moaning to womp the other dogs simply added to the afternoon. Okay, the last part was sarcastic… Nevertheless, it was a wonderful trip to the park. We didn’t need to play hard, we just needed some quality time with Dada…