Sermon on thankfulness

Sorry I haven't been posting over the last couple days, given how it was Thanksgiving (and I spent that day with some family friends) and how I've been having loads of free time to do whatever I want (outside of hanging with people, since they're all elsewhere). But I'd like to use this 100th post to talk about the season of thanks, giving, and sharing (especially since both Turkey and Jesus day cover much of the same ideals).

Anyways, I was fortunate enough to be roused on Thursday with a combination of my alarm going off and the phone ringing, and giving directions to "Dash's" mother on finding Mellby Hall. Next, after completely ignoring the ice crystals on my window, I threw on my clothes, and opting for my fall jacket instead of my winter parka, and met the weather with shivering results. The morning service was alright. I hadn't been to a Thanksgiving Day church service since 2002, so I figured I was due. It was a nice brick building (including the interior of the sanctuary) with a decent-sounding organ, and it seemed pretty festivitous. There were several Ole students there that I didn't know. The rest were families and older-generation folk.

So then after the service I trucked over to "Dash's" house (via car; it was at least 20 blocks away), played around with the cats (Cotton and Teya; Lunchbox had been shipped off to faraway lands), helped set up some of the table and food stuff (sort of), and enjoyed a nutritious meal with a smorgasboard of Thanksgiving-related munchies. I even learned how to play the dulcimer (I think).

The last day or so I've been sleeping and eating on a really weird schedule. I napped from 6pm to 9pm, then stayed up till 5am, went back to sleep till 1:15pm, and managed to stay up all day up till right now. But within all this off-schedule living, not to mention the fact that in 18 hours I will be again at work, singing in Urness Recital Hall with the massed choir working on Christmas fest music that supposedly we will have memorized (even though there are a couple pieces that I never got copies of, so I won't have them learned, let alone memorized), I have been pondering and mentally putting together a list of what I was thankful for. It did take me a couple days, as I've been asleep about half the time. So here it is:

I get to eat leftover food from the Thanksgiving dinner I had on Thursday. I got to eat leftover food that a couple of my friends ate for their Thanksgiving dinner from Thursday. I got to see some snow on the ground Friday. I even got to walk around in it Friday evening. I've had the room to myself the past 3 days. I've been able to chill with a few friends during break, despite the fact that the vast majority of them have been gone. I called my mom on Thursday while at "Dash's" house, got some news about home, etc. I was able to enjoy a break from all the stressful homework and practicing that I've been having to do, and will have to do again soon. I got into an Interim class, finally. I'll be able to go home for the first time in several months in less than a month. I got to watch a Suns-Nets game on ESPN tonight, and even though I would've enjoyed more watching the Nets come from behind to win the game, I still enjoyed watching some basketball TV. I'm thankful that the Bulls beat the Spurs tonight. I'm thankful that the White Sox won the World Series last month. I'm thankful that the Cubs signed a couple relief pitchers within the last 10 days.

I started going back through the blog, and it was the first time I realized that the year 2005 is nearing its end. I'm still kind of in shock. As a kid I thought this year would never get here. I never really thought of life past 2004, when I graduated from high school. The concept of the word 2005 is still somewhat new to me, and in a little over a month the calendar will change *ahem* sox and wear the 2006 label at the top of each monthly calendar. It was also the first year I really got back into religion after taking a little over a year off. I'm thankful that I started going to the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA) organization back in January to help soothe my aching soul, which was still broken from the St Luke's Scandal which peaked just a couple years ago. I was rather disappointed when I returned home at the end of May and found myself internally denouncing Episcopalianism as "going thru the motions" after a service at Canterbury one of the first Sunday evenings of the summer. I was rather intrigued when I started going regularly to St Paul's Church by the Lake at mid-summer and accepting again this brand of Christianity as the true call to faith. But I was thusly disappointed after I returned to school in September that I didn't find FCA as soul-moving as I did when I first opened my heart to it 8 months prior. So at this point, I'm definitely back into religion (I've gone to Morning Prayer every Friday, and I've gone to Selah, FCA, and Bible Study on scattered occasions), but I'm still rather confused. I went to Milwaukee on the Fall Break mission trip, not sure if I was going to have a repeat spiritual moment that I did in Arkansas back in March. I did somewhat, but less than what I had hoped.

I also witnessed the Patriots, Spurs and White Sox claim the championship titles in the worlds of football, basketball and baseball. Even though I was happy for the Patriots and Spurs for winning their titles to demonstrate that it takes a team rather than individuals to win, watching the White Sox exorcize their demons really hit home for me. Even though it isn't the Cubs that won, I am grateful to have seen the city of Chicago (one that I have been familiar for over 20 years) finally have a baseball team to boast that it was the best. And although I was thoroughly disappointed that Illinois University lost the title game and the Bulls in the first round of the playoffs, I am thankful that they got as far as they did.

I think life has a lot to do with expectations. My life, at any rate. I still remember expecting to go to Houston for the baseball All-Star game festivities with a crew several of my best friends from home (church and high school), and walking away from the plan in February empty-handed, hand squashed. I remember not knowing whether I would ever see my church friends after my family broke off from the church after the scandal, thus depending the rest of my senior year and every day of summer 2004 hoping to hang out with them on a regular basis. Ditto keeping up with them freshman year. Last year (freshman year) was, in a way, kind of an extension of my life before St. Olaf. I was basically balancing my time between hanging/figuring out my school friends and IM'ing my home friends (among classes and choir), trying to keep in touch with several people all at once. For whatever reason, this year my expectations have been completely turned around. I've only talked with several of my home friends only a few times. I've spent much more time hanging with my school friends and unintentionally burning my home friends. If one were to ask me who my best friends were even a year and a half ago, I would rattle off a list that included mostly people from my church youth group and perhaps a couple others from high school. Ask me the same question now (November 2005) and the list is completely overhauled, replaced by fellow St Olaf students. Not because of choice, but happenstance.

I should end this rant (if it sounds like one). After all, it's still the season of Thanksgiving, and considering that I meandered to the topic of friends, I should note that I have at least 20 people that I am truly thankful that I get to know and hang out with them. I was going to create a list similar to the one that I listed above, but I stopped after reaching 36 people, just so I could see on paper who I could rely on any given day to hang out with. So there's a positive thought. After all, I still have two parents alive and kicking, one grandparent still kicking, a cat and a bird, a third "surrogate" parent as she likes to call herself, 3 places to call home (school, mom's place, dad's place), 2 cars, 3 computers, a bajillion pianos/keyboards (although the list shrinks to 3 if I take out all the pianos and keyboards at St Olaf), 5.25 semesters and 3 interims left of college, a church in which to attend chapel and/or Sunday services as I want, 3 beds (one at school, 2 at home), approximately 5 sets of bed sheets, a TV, video games, and a month's worth of clothing. Even though that list is far from perfect, I know of many people that would love to have all the things I have been blessed with. Probably the only thing that is missing (that I can think of at 2:30 in the morning) is a job. I've suffered my bouts with laziness and sluggishness, but I figure if I can at least find a job with decent pay that I can stand, then I can't do too badly.

I really should stop trying to live like a Cubs fan desperate for a championship. Clearly the players have more control over whether the team wins than the fans do. The Cubs lost Game 6 of the NLCS in 2003 because then-SS Alex Gonzalez booted the ball, not because some idiot fan tipped a foul ball five minutes earlier. But there are times when it's hard not to get caught up in everything. I know of people who are like that, especially at work, and could use some prayers. But at the same time, while prayers are floating around, we cannot forget to give thanks to God for the good things that have happened. It's not like life is totally horrible, although I can say from first-hand experience it has often felt that way. After all, God is always moving. It's hard to be motivated when one is standing still, so to speak. If one can learn how to move with the Spirit of God, then that would help immensely.

Moving with God, as opposed to against Him, creates a whole new sense of expectations and reality. I think what really helped in March when I went to Arkansas was that there was so much unknown. There were 12 of us making the trip, and at the beginning my friend Dylan was the only person I knew. But as the week progressed, I made 10 new friends, and I know for a fact that if I was expecting things to happen my way, I wouldn't have experienced the joys that God had in store for me. I think if I can reach that plateau again, and take it for what it's worth, well, now that would be something for which to be thankful.

Generation... Y?

My generation finally has a name! ...although I am rather disappointed in the name they chose. I never really understood the reasoning for the term "Generation X" for people born in the mid-to-late 60s and 70s, and I think that they chose Y for my generation simply because it came after X.

But it has to be official, because it said so in today's ["http://www.usatoday.com/money/workplace/2005-11-06-gen-y_x.htm"] USA Today paper. Never mind that it's not a great newspaper. ...

Questions on the choice of seclusion

Late last night, I was extremely bored and started running through sort of random web sites that either a.) I had never visited before, or b.) had not seen in quite a while. At some point I found myself going through various articles that more or less said the same things. The topic was the release of the new anthology containing all 3 thousand-odd strips of Calvin and Hobbes, and the first time its creator, Bill Watterson, “speaks up” about his retreat into seclusion since New Year’s Day 1996.

Of course, the fans’ questions still pour in: why did Watterson hang up his pen so soon? (he was only 38 when he called it quits) Why didn’t he license Calvin and Hobbes? Will he ever return to cartooning? Will we ever see another Calvin and Hobbes strip? Even 10 years later, these questions are still burning strong, perhaps even stronger than 9 years ago. We more or less know the facts behind the situation. Watterson was not going to sacrifice the sanctity of his art to the mindless advertisement regime that has helped bring down America and parts of the rest of the world (although you can’t say George W. Bush didn’t do his part). When I took a Sociology class first semester of last year, we learned about the “MacWorld” influence of mindless American advertising that our once-great country spewed across the globe, and how exploitation, merging, and mindless homogenation of commerce, culture and tradition has turned adiverse culture into a huge McDonald’s. Only a few foreign films, probably known as one of the best film genres, are heard of as much as crappy action movies like “The Matrix Revolution.” Quaint local shops and other attractions are being replaced by megastores like Walmart...

I could go on, but it goes to show only a sliver of what Watterson was going through. Were he to succumb to every little thing Universal Press Syndicate asked of him, Calvin and Hobbes strips would turn to the crapper and lose much of what made it so good. Watching the Simpsons for the past few years has turned me off. We rarely see a new episode in which some famous celebrity, corporation, or popular event was not part of the main theme. Occasionally we’d get a new twist in plot that for some reason wasn’t discovered before and yet if that plot were introduced even five years ago would not have made any sense. Reading other comic strips that used to be great nowadays have also turned me off, as the content often reflects the MacWorld ideology that was brought up earlier.

I’d say it was a good thing though, that Watterson retired when he did. Although I will never understand why he did what he did, I get that he was doing it for peace of mind, and for his integrity. After all, he did claim that he had nothing new to offer to the strip (probably why he introduced a couple new alien characters named Galaxoid and Nebular two months before the strip ended). But it is also possible to assume that perhaps Watterson is more of a painter, a throwback artist who fancies in art before the 20th century, and that he created the Calvin and Hobbes strip merely as a side project that simply captured the hearts of millions of people.

It’s interesting to see how some of the best people at their jobs somehow have their careers cut short. Barry Sanders, a running back for the Detroit Lions during the late 80s and most of the 90s, abruptly stopped his Hall of Fame career during his prime because he no longer had the desire to play the game. This was a guy who ran with the football as good as anyone, and yet when he reached the end zone he simply handed off the ball to the referee. Unlike Deion Sanders, he never did an end-zone dance. He merely shrugged off each personal accomplishment as a means to improve the situation for his team.

George Gerswhin, in my opinion, was one of the best, if not the best, composer of all time. He was ahead of his time (early 20th century), combining jazz, late developments of romanticism, and early developments of modern music. He wrote a lot of Broadway tunes, and perhaps not so many piano and orchestra pieces. But the way he incorporated rhythm, melody, and harmony was absolutely seamless. He managed to keep his music fresh and catchy, and yet logical at the same time. Alas, he died young, at the same age as Watterson at his retirement, but the way he wrote music captured the hearts of many people, in the same way that Watterson’s creation did.

A fourth guy I would have brought up had he not returned to his profession not once, but twice, would have fit very well into this category. Had it not been for his ultimate desire to keep playing basketball, Michael Jordan surely would have topped this list. And for that I am ultimately happy, as I am a die-hard Bulls fan, and was always a huge Michael Jordan fan. But given that after 3 straight championship titles, he temporarily retired from the NBA after his father’s murder and yearning to fulfill his dream of playing baseball. Like Watterson in cartooning, Barry Sanders in football (up for debate), Gershwin in music (also up for debate), Michael Jordan was the best basketball player ever. Had he not returned in 1995, I’m sure he would still enter the NBA Hall of Fame, but as another example of a great career cut short. Of course, depending on how many championship titles LeBron James racks up, MJ’s status will remain intact until James matches or surpasses the six MJ got.

I also ran into a website article (taken from a group blog) comparing Calvinball to a Cubs-Reds game back in September that went wrong in so many ways for both teams. Somehow the Cubs still managed to lose it, by a crappy score of 7-4 in extra innings. As I was reading through it, I started to yearn for the days of the 90s when Calvin was in the papers, the Bulls were champions, and I still had yet to experience life away from home.

On second thought, when I saw the price of another Calvin and Hobbes book (centered on the Sunday strips) that came out in 2001, it was worth around $10 last night. Perhaps in a few years, the big anthologies will be worth around $50 as opposed to the current $150 tag, assuming inflation doesn’t suddenly spike and keep the price sky high. After all I still have all the other Calvin and Hobbes books, except for the aforementioned book that came out 4 years ago and one of the earlier books that got lost during moving season many years ago. I have other more pressing things to think about than some dinky anthology.