justifying

It feels strange and incredible to be in this moment, which is in a way the culmination of my college musical experience thus far.  But I have come to realize that the hard work is done.  How deserving this music is of the dozens, maybe even hundreds of hours I have given it.  I have never before dedicated the time and discipline of diving deeper and deeper into a single piece of music, until I know every note forward and backward and through, and my fingers and my very bones know what every line and melody feels like.  I'm trying very hard to forget the people who will be listening:  tonight is about me and this music.  My greatest goal for this concert is to let the joy of music and God and life flow through my fingers, celebrating the life I have given to this instrument.

admitting

Watching the movie Codes of Gender last night made me want to punch consumer culture in the face.  It was more than the usual rant about gender representations in advertising, but it gave me the usual feelings:  anger at the blatant objectification and devaluing of women, disappointment in the women everywhere who allow this to happen, and the blindness of all who look on these images and see what is "normal".  And more than anything, a growing awareness of my complete inability to change it.

Sometimes I am energized by baby steps toward change for the better (like Mike vandalizing the cafeteria advertisements of a Jersey Shore-themed dance party by ripping off all the pictures of bikini-clad girls), but I'm tired of little change.  I just want a world where people have the rights they deserve.  Is that so much to hope and dream and pray for?

Here's a crazy new idea:  this world might be too big for me.

conservativism

I have these two friends who I respect a lot who happen to be conservative.  And there's this super-conservative church in Washington that they really like, and my friend posted one of their sermons online.  So I listened to it (while I was writing a research paper for music history, incidentally).
I was expecting to start listening to it, become annoyed and/or infuriated, and stop.  But I was surprised to realize that it actually made a lot of sense.

Okay, so there were a few moments that made me cringe, like the part about the man being the head of the household and the woman being a passive helper.  ("It's a man knowing what he's doing and inviting a woman to participate.")  But the point is that despite the patriarchal emphasis, a lot of it sounded good to me.  Because the truth is that I still believe in marriage that lasts forever.  I believe that loving someone deeply is not about happiness, it's about holiness, and happiness will follow.

This idea of my views meeting with conservative views has been confronting me a lot lately.  I'm not becoming a Republican or anything -- I'm still a long way from that.  But I've been challenged to accept people with different (conservative) beliefs, and even more than that, I've been realizing that we may not be as different as I used to think.  I've also been realizing the importance of the middle ground.  I really believe you can find common ground with anybody if you try, and yet it's so hard for us to do that with people who we understand to be "different" from us.

On the Mars Hill website, it says this:
WELCOME
it's all about Jesus, it's only about Jesus, it's always about Jesus

I mean, I can't really argue with that, right?  In a sense, the rest is just details.
It's not that nothing else matters.  Lots of other things are really important; but I think that if together you have a foundation on something like this, the other things should never keep you from getting along.

So, hey.  Maybe we should start looking at the people who seem completely, radically different from us and find ways to relate to them and to love them.  I think that would make the world a better place.

spring break memories [2]

Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that a spring was breaking
out in my heart.
I said: Along which secret aqueduct,
oh water, are you coming to me,
water of a new life
that I have never drunk?

Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that I had a beehive
here inside my heart.
And the golden bees
were making white combs
and sweet honey
from my old failures.

Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that a fiery sun was giving
light inside my heart.
It was fiery because I felt
warmth as from a hearth,
and sun because it gave light
and brought tears to my eyes.

Last night as I slept,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that it was God I had
here inside my heart.


Antonio Machado,
Last Night As I Was Sleeping


isn't this what you always wanted your life to be?

spring break memories

This is one of the readings that we included in our Chambers concert.  It was instantly beautiful to me. Read it and let the words sink into your soul.


Days pass and the years vanish, 
and we walk sightless among the miracles. 
Lord, fill our eyes with seeing and our minds with knowing. 
Let there be moments when your Presence, 
like lightning, 
illuminates the darkness in which we walk. 
Help us to see, wherever we gaze, 
that the bush burns unconsumed. 
And we, clay touched by God, 
will reach out for holiness and exclaim in wonder, 
“How filled with awe is this place,
 and we did not know it.”


Mishkan Tefilah, 
Jewish Sabbath Prayer Book