On Confusion

Over time, I have become greatly perplexed by the phrase, "How are you doing?" and its sister phrase, "What's up?" I use both of thse phrases more or less regularly, but they are nonetheless enigmatic to me.
Consider the first: "How are you doing?" Doing what? Walking? I am walking by lifting up one foot and putting it in front of me, shifting my weight to that foot, then repeating the process with the other foot. Breathing? I inhale good air and exhale used air. Oh, you wanted to know what is going on in my life? Why didn't you ask that?
The second is similar: "What's up?" As a child, I was once fond of the obnoxious joke responses such as "the sky" or "the ceiling." For a while, I thought these comebacks were incredibly clever. In fact, I know some people who still think so.
Now, these seem like somewhat odd ways to ask after a person's health and well being, but the part that really confuses me is when a person uses these phrases as a greeting. There are those who ask "What's up?" and not actually expect an answer. What they really mean is "hello." The problem is, there are still a great number of people who ask "What's up?" and want to know what's up, which really means "what is going on?" However, with all these layers of nuance, I am sometimes confused by what a person is actually asking. Whenever I pass someone and they say, "How's it going?" I am forced to guess whether they are actually asking or just happen to be greeting me. Then I must decide whether to answer a question, or just say, "Hello," and move on. The split second I have to decipher the other persons intention is usually a grueling one, and the worst part is, I always seem to choose wrong.

On Identity

I Remember the Day

I remember the day
I realized my father wasn't tall
He always used to pick me up
And I would soar
With the ground so far away
He seemed like a giant
But that day
The other men were looking down on him
And he craned his neck to them all
My father changed that day
At least in my eyes
Like the day I found out that his name was Greg
Or Gregory
Or Mr. Fox
Not Daddy like I always called him
Gregory Fox is my father
But it is Daddy who tucks me in at night

I remember the day
I realized my father was short
I finally stood
Level with his broad shoulders
Knowing I had years of growing left
It was one thing to pass mom
She was just a girl
But to learn that my father
Was small
He changed in my eyes again that day
The he himself had never changed
But you see
Daddy was a great big man
And my father is only five-foot-eight
So I'm a bigger man than he.

I remember the day
I realized my father wasn't strong
He could always pin me when we wrestled
And he always broke my toughest tackles
But it didn't take long
Before I outran him
Before I hit him like a brick
And I realized he was a man
Just a man
Not superman
Like I secretly hoped
And somehow he was different then
Somehow he changed
My father always carried a pen
Never a sword
Daddy was still a super hero
But my father is just a writer

I remember the day
I realized my father was weak
It was the day
I saw him cry
And seeing those tears in his eyes
Changed the way I knew him
I learned
That he was like me
That he felt pain and sorrow too
Daddy was never soft
Never let his emotions show
Least of all to me
I didn't even know he could feel
But my father
Was a broken hearted man
Who tried to carry the world
And I'll never forget the day
I realized who he was

On Observations

The ironies of getting robbed:

A kicked in door looks really cool, until you try to close it.

Police fingerprint kits are cool, but the police don't clean up after using them. So not only were we robbed, but then there was grimy black dust all over the house.

Everyone in the house was subletting from the University of Notre Dame. Nothing belonging to the house (and therefore insured) was stolen, only the belongings of poor college students.

I have a lock for my computer so I can chain it to my desk, but I never used it this summer because I trust my housemates.

At the beginning of August, Best Buy sent me a letter encouraging me to renew the warranty on my laptop in case of accident or theft. I ignored it, and my warranty ran out...four days before I was robbed.

We still lock the house, but we are not sure what we are protecting.

On Sorting through Thinking

I always find it interesting what I come up with when I try to write poetry with a limited vocabulary choice. Basically this only happens when I write poems using those refrigerator magnets with words on them. They are intended to leave messages or funny statements, but I generally just make poems. I guess it comes naturally for me, or it's just force of habit. However, I've noticed that I usually end up sounding deeper in these than in my normal poems. I don't think I necessarily am, it just makes me sound different.

This Mortal Fog
composed with kitchen magnets

Beneath celestial music
Above my how's
Why's
Who's
I see light
From night moons and broad smiles
The earth flowers
A would not
Is not

On Misfortune

As I type this, I am sitting at a computer in a classroom at Notre Dame, logged in under a friends account. Normally, I would be typing a blog post on my laptop, where I do most of my writing. I suppose, it's where I did most of my writing.

This summer, I have been living with six other guys in a house provided by the University of Notre Dame. We are all students working for the Notre Dame Shakespeare Festival. Last night, one of my housemates and I returned to the house after a movie to find the door ajar. We thought it just meant that someone was home and had absent-mindedly forgotten to lock the door. Then we realized that it wouldn't shut because it had been kicked in, breaking the door itself, the latch, and bending the dead bolt.

The house where I am staying was robbed last night. Five computers (including mine) and an x-box were stolen, along with some other small electronics. A police report has been filed, but we're not really expecting much to come of it. Situations like this are difficult.

It has been an interesting experience. I have never been robbed before. It is quite different than I ever would have imagined. And I certainly never would have expected to take it the way I have. Once I got over the shock of the matter, I sat down to just think it over. What had I lost? Well, I lost a computer. Yes, it is a lot of money, but in the end, it is essentially just a time consuming collection of plastic and silicon. I was a bit more upset about losing all of my writings that were saved on the computer, but most of them, aside from a play and a short story that are both in progress, are backed up with hard copies. It is a bit upsetting that I lost almost all contact with the outside world. I don't have a phone, and now I cannot even communicate with people online. That is a bummer, but it will be amended in time. However, as I reflected, I came to discover that I had lost something else, and this was the most surprising.

I had lost my fear.

I don't know when it happened or how. Perhaps it had been long gone, and I simply hadn't noticed. Nevertheless, as my housemates began making preparations to find places to stay for the night, I realized that I had no qualms about sleeping in a freshly robbed house with the door kicked in. Now maybe that is just foolishness, but I simply wasn't afraid. It was actually a relief. I hate it whenever fear enters my life, and to not feel it at such a stressful time was remarkably freeing. What was there to fear anyway? I had already lost the most lucrative of my possessions, what else could be taken? My life? Why should I fear death?

Now, I did not stay in the house. A friend gave me a couch to sleep on. It has been remarkable how much compassion my housemates and I have received as a result of the incident. It has been encouraging, but, as I have said, I don't feel like I have lost that much. Maybe I am just too laid back for my own good. My only real misfortune is a bit of inconvenience in communicating with people, but other than that, I am doing quite well. Still, if any of you reading this are looking for something to pray for, feel free to pray for my housemates and I. This has been a lot harder on all of them, and it is certainly going to be unpleasant to replace these stolen items, even for someone as laid back as I am. Nevertheless, I know that God has been present, and his hand has been here protecting us. I have spent all summer reading through the prophets and learning about how God is a redeemer bringing good out of evil. I don't want to let a silly thing like a laptop make me forget what he can do.

On the Symbol of Canada

I admit to having certain quirks, as I am sure all people have, which may be considered slightly odd. However, these quirks are a large part of what makes me who I am, so over time I have chosen to embrace them. The problem is that I sometimes forget that these quirks can be observed by others, and these others do not always have a familiar enough acquaintence to overlook my oddities. In short, over the course of my life, I have gotten more than my share of strange looks. Recently, one of these looks of bewilderment was so pronounced as to inspire poetry:

The Maple Leaf

You think me a silly fellow,
Don't you?
As you pass me by.
Maybe I am...
No doubt I look it,
Clutching this maple leaf as I am
I hold it like
A very young girl enraptured by a dandelion,
Loving its soft yellow,
Caring not that it's a weed.
You may think a leaf a trifle--
An unimportant little thing--
But tell me,
Have you ever held one tenderly?
As you would a woman's hand?
Compassionately stroked the smooth green skin?
Letting it fold around your fingers--
Like a lady's delicacy?
There is more gentility in one maple leaf
Than can be found in a thousand men.
But fair as it is,
A leaf is fragile,
And taking it between your fingers--
You would see it
For what it is:
Just a membrane stretched between veins,
Little more than dust--
As easily torn as tossed aside,
And in the this
The leaf would prove a treasure,
For that is most valuable
Which is most difficult to keep.
So laugh,
If you like,
Scoff--
At the man,
The grown boy,
Holding a leaf as he walks.
But I hold the stories of life and love in my hand--
I hold the story of death.

On the Matrix

"You're going to realize just as I did, there's a difference between knowing the path and walking the path."

Yes. This is a quote from the Matrix. And even though that is the movie that tricked us all into thinking that Keanu Reeves might be able to act, the film still has some redeeming qualities. Among those are its intelligence. The depth of that movie is such that there are many lessons that Christians can learn from it. One of those lessons is the one mentioned above: "there's a difference between knowing the path and walking the path."
I don't know about you, but I sometimes get overly preoccupied with "doing the right thing," or "choosing the right path." Okay, I frequently get preoccupied with such concerns, especially as a Christian. There is a very strong movement among Christians to make sure that you are following God's will. I think this is incredibly important, but this is a very vague concept, and it is usually not very well explained. There is only further confusion added by going to school on a Christian campus where it seems like everyone is searching for God's will in different ways and with different definitions. I have understood for a while that there is something lacking in my conception of God's will, but it did not hit me until recently when I was watching the Matrix with a couple of my coworkers.

There's a difference between knowing the path and walking the path.

I don't have to know exactly what God's will is for my life. Perhaps he has a specific will for me, but he hasn't revealed much of it if he does. However, I know that God would have me obey his commands and live a life of love. He has told me that directly in his word. That is a path I can walk. I don't need to know all of the twists and turns or even where it will take me. All God asks is that I walk in that path and trust him with the rest.

On the Sky

The clouds drifted overhead like forgotten dreams, coming from and going to who knows where, and for a while my soul drifted with them--to another night when I watched the silent memories pass, so long and not so very long ago, and now I find that my heart lives in both moments, but it is too weak to experience them together.