Francabandera Blog

The Joy of Procreation

2008-06-04T19:55:00.000-07:00

Praise God that I'm pregnant again. We're really excited. It will be another February baby (or late January).

That being said (yay!), I probably won't be blogging very often as I am very tired. This pregnancy exhaustion is hitting me early and hard, so maybe as the weeks go on I will be able to rebound, but we'll see.

Just thought I should let y'all know.

UnMothers Unite!

2008-05-10T23:18:00.000-07:00

Mother's Day: A day of flowers, of jewlery, of blatant consumerism. Sunday morning, many churches will have a pastor's wife or other female preach on the "highest value of womanhood". While we're all at church, waxing lyrical on the value of mothers, there are millions of women skipping church because for them, it's the worst day of the year.

I would know, for seven years I hated Mother's Day with every fiber of my being. You see, the doctor had told us that I probably wouldn't be able to have kids, and for seven years that proved true. Sure, I sucked it up and went to church, but I never actually listened to the sermon on mothers (something that I would never be). Instead I wrote bitter tirades against God, the church, life, any spirit from the dark beyond that was screwing up my life. And then I finally had a kid, for which I'm forever grateful; but not everyone does.

Along with the childless, there are those that are childfree by choice. Either because they weren't ready and are no longer able, or they choose to devote their life to their calling. Whatever the reason, it is a valid choice. They too feel denigrated and less-valued on Mother's Day; especially in the church. How horrible it is, that in the one place where everyone should be welcome, we alienate and disdain.

On top of that, there are those who recently lost a mother, or whose mothers were horrible mothers (read: abuse, molestation, even infanticide). Too often the church pretends that everything is all shiny, and that all mothers deserve to be lauded, or that simply by giving birth they gain a sort of sainthood. I've known some terrible mothers and I would certainly never praise their "motherhood", such as it is. I would like to see the church recognize Mother's Day, and then go on with business as usual. Perhaps some churches wouldn't see a drop in female attendance on that day.

In the US, Mother's Day was originally a day for women to protest war. The spirit was activism and empowerment for women, not a mindless indulgent consumer holiday. Consider Julia Ward Howe's Mother's Day Proclamation of 1870:

Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means Whereby the great human family can live in peace...
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God -
In the name of womanhood and humanity,
I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality,
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.

So, in the original spirit of Mother's Day, I hereby claim this day for all women, mothers or not. I claim it for the childed, the childless, and the childfree. I claim it for their God-given gifts, their creativity, and their many and endless births (of children and projects and creative manifestations). I claim this day for what we are capable of when we band together and by ourselves. On this Mother's Day, celebrate all the women in your life simply for who they are: Mothers, wives, sisters, daughters, friends, and children of the Most High King. Motherhood notwithstanding, of course.

The Requisite Politics Post

2008-05-10T07:53:00.000-07:00

I have come to believe that I am the only democrat in my entire church. That might be in error but, so far, I haven’t come across another. It’s come more and more to light recently because people are talking about the election. Well, I say “talking”, but it’s mainly ranting against the evil little “socialist” democrats and how only Republicans are Christian.

Baloney. That’s what I think of that. God will use anyone, regardless of their political affiliation; and there are certainly non-Christians in the Republican Party. I think of the scripture in Romans 9, when Paul is talking about the authority God grants to earthy governments. I see the scripture as saying that the government as a system is allowed by God (as are the people that run it) to work His will; thus it is also allowable for Christians to participate in the system. The Bible does not, however, dictate which affiliation a Christian is to have.

I believe that Christians should follow Jesus’ example; care about the orphans, widows, the poor, the sick and infirm, the elderly, etc, etc. So as Christians, we should be concerned about social welfare, justice, equality, and peace. We should care about social security for our elderly, and health care for the poor, and fiscal accountability for our cities.

It often irritates me that Christians seem to focus only on a few areas to the exclusion of all others. And we all know what they are: Homosexuality, abortion, and more recently, bioethics like stem cell research. Yes, those are important issues, but they are not the only ones! Yes, I am pro-life, in that I believe life begins at conception, but I also don’t believe it ends at birth. I should be just as concerned about the adoption process, or the foster care system, or education reform. Yes, I believe that homosexuality is a sin, but it is not the sin above all sins, and honestly, I’m not really sure that the government should regulate its citizen’s private sex lives beyond the norm. I certainly don’t want them butting into mine, so why should I ask them to get involved other consensual, adult relationships? My purpose here wasn’t to rant specifically about homosexuality or abortion (although you’re welcome to start a conversation in the comments).

My purpose is to widen the lens a little to show that democrats and Christ are not mutually exclusive. Nor are Republicans only a “Christian Party”. I certainly don’t claim to know everything, and my political affiliations may change, but I firmly believe in the causes Jesus cared for. I believe in whole societies and whole people. I believe in a society that holds children in high regard. I believe in a system where regular people can make a difference. None of those are on either party’s manifesto; they are, however, on Christ’s.

So, for this election, as the partisan squalls rise to new levels, let’s not lean to the left or to the right, but stay centered; well, Christ-centered, anyway.

Stories and Stakeholders

2008-05-07T21:55:00.000-07:00

I have a large extended family. My grandpa had three sisters and a brother; each, in turn, had kids, grandkids, and even great-grandkids. A lot of people. I’m currently scanning back issues of our family newsletter to distribute via email. That right, we have a family newsletter. Actually, we have two; a newsletter and a family chronicle. Genealogical trees, fiction, horrible (in retrospect) teenage poetry, jokes, stories, and even puzzles were included.

My family is a family of storytellers. And I love it. There is something humbling about knowing that the people I only know as “Grandpa” or “Great-Aunt” were once my age; with the same passions, the same troubles, the same heartaches, the same hopes and fears. That my great-uncle once cut down his grandpa’s (my great-great grandpa’s) mailbox in a fit of childish anger. That my grandpa got his younger brother a job at a creamery. That my mom went camping with her parents, just as I went camping with mine. It’s reassuring to know that people and interactions really don’t change. It reminds us that we all have a story in common; and while I may barely know my second and third cousins, we all come from the same stock and that connects us.

I’m writing a paper for school right now about the responsibility of digital preservation, and I spend a lot of time talking about the different types of stakeholders there are. Before we can come up with a solution to a problem, we need to identify the stakeholders. We need to know who’s involved with the issue; we need to know who is connected.

Is digital preservation really all that different than my family? Is my family all that different than the church? Are stakeholders the same as common stories? I loved having my family because I knew that I was never alone, and that all these people would love and accept me no matter what I did, simply because I was theirs and a part of their story.

Sound familiar? We are God’s, and He is ours, and we are each other's. We all have a common story; we all have a stake in each other. Before we can even begin to solve any of our problems and show the message of Christ, we need to understand this basic issue. Before we can save other people, we need to understand our stake in other people. It’s a heady thought, to take what I get from my family and end up with the most basic fact of life: That we are all a branch of the same family and take part in a transcendent story; of love and sin and redemption.

Once we understand that, then, just as I love my cousin who’s made some pretty bad decisions, or my third cousins even though I’ve never met them, it should be just as easy loving a Muslim, or a lesbian, or a drug addict, or whomever, simply because we all are human. We all have a Common Story.

Mea Culpa

2008-05-03T17:49:00.000-07:00

I know, it's been a month since I've posted. I've really been concentrating on my ministry blog, and working on networking and figuring out my internet ministry. I've got a lot of my brain cogs going at the moment.

We've moved back up to Auburn. We're staying at my in-laws house for a couple months while they're in Africa to save some money. Then we'll rent a house. I'll let you all know the address once we move in August.

Judah is getting bigger by the minute. He's such a personality, it's crazy that just a few months ago he was just a thing to schlep around. Now he's signing like crazy and talking and pointing and running and jumping (if you can believe it!). He has very definite opinions on things like how oatmeal is bad, and the park is better than the house, and dogs are the best things in the whole wide world. I didn't know 15 month olds were so opinionated.

I'll be adding some pictures to the photo gallery sometime this week. I think. I hope. Keep an open mind, just in case. :-)

Anyway, I'm on dial up right now (ye olde spawn of satan), so I should start uploading this because I have to go to bed in a few hours. Catch you later, though hopefully, it won't be a month later this time!

Breaking Out and Other Randomness

2008-04-02T20:53:00.000-07:00

I started a second blog on my youth group's website, where I post about faith and culture and youth. Some of them are cross-posts from here, the newer ones are not. But I was very excited to be noticed by the guys at Rethinking Youth Ministry as a new blog they stumbled upon and thought their readers might want to check out. Very cool. They said I had some insightful thoughts on the creative use of prayer, adolescence, and culture. I love the internet.

Judah has begun signing in sign language. It's very exciting. I'm sure every parent goes through it, but it's the first thrill of knowing that he understnads what I am saying and can respond. That interaction sends chills down my spine. He can sign "more", and "stop", and "all done". And he says "doggie". We watched the World Ugliest Dog Competition recently, and he said it every single frickin time a dog came on. Eventually, we had to change it because it got tiresome. But it was still exciting. Yay, we now have proof that he is a real person.

A funny story: Brandin and I ate artichokes with dinner tonight, and I was going to cut around his artichoke heart so he could eat it. I asked him, "So, can I cut your heart out now?" You know it's a strong marriage that can survive that.

Brandin quit Harley and his last day is tomorrow. He is going to work for an independent auto shop in Meadow Vista. I'm so excited to be moving up the hill and closer to family and church. Free babysitting, coolness.

Not much of a blog post, but I've been busy with my other blog (Is that cyberspace adultery?). Feel free to check it out if you want to think deep thoughts and such. Otherwise, I'll leave you with this video.

Framing - The Religious Way?

2008-03-27T21:27:00.000-07:00

It's not a new surprise in politics (or cognitive science) that the way that something is phrased affects the way it is understood. Put more simply, the language affects the meaning. I'm sure couples all over are nodding empahtically. I mean, who hasn't said, "That's not what I meant" after a terrible misunderstanding? Politicians have known this for ages. Phrase an idea, or a bill, in an emotive, easy to remember way, and you will incite debate, riot, and ultimately control the nature of politics. George Lakoff, linguist turned political advisor, wrote a book called Don't Think of an Elephant about political framing.

I'm going to turn this idea diagonally (and diametrically, I suppose) into a discussion about framing in prayer. I know, it sounds weird, but trust me. The way you pray makes a big difference, not to God, mind you, but to yourself. Let me make this abundantly clear: I believe that God knows our hearts and it doesn't matter what words we use when we pray. If we use words at all. I know for a fact (for the Bible tells me so) that anguished groaning will suffice in a pinch. However, how we pray (and what we focus on) says a lot about what matters to us. What are the usual suspects in prayer? First and foremost, necessities: Things like personal pain, family, finances, jobs, earthly things. Secondly, one's spiritual wellbeing: mercy, forgiveness, emotions, pride, etc. And finally, if we get around to it, worship. Not that there is anything wrong wtih praying for our own wellbeing and earthly things. God says ask and it shall be given. But the Bible also says that worship of God should come first, above all else.

So, let's do a little prayer experiment this week. Let's stop focusing on the negative things in our life that we'd like God to change, and start our prayers with worship. Then maybe move on to thanksgiving for all the things in our lives that we do have. And maybe end the prayer with praise that God is who He is, that He made us in His image, and that He is willing to forgive us. Let's see how our perception of life changes once we focus on what truly matters.

Confession 2.0 and Digital Forgiveness

2008-03-20T21:44:00.000-07:00

I saw an article today on cnn.com about the rise of online confession sites where people can anonymously post their sins. Many of these sites are run by large churches, but often have no clergy or counselor staff, or even have any way to reply to the confessions. It makes me rather sad, actually.

I understand that in the Catholic church, attendance for confession is down to an all-time low, around 25%. I think, however, this seems like simply patching the leak, rather then addressing the problem. What's wrong with the online confessionals? Many things. Firstly, it encourages a sense of voyeurism and exhibitionism. Who needs to read the deeply personal confessions of others? The majority of them are sexual in nature, but they run the gamut of human depravity. Extra-marital affairs, drugs, self-harm, theft, and even murder. On ivescrewedup.com, one widely quoted confession talks about killing 4 people, one of them a 17 year old boy who died for his country (most people believe it was a soldier confessing).

I think I'm with the Catholic church on this one. These confessional sites are too voyeuristic and impersonal to be true to the sense of penitence that the office was designed for. The point of confession is that we make our sins known to God. For Catholics, this entails Confession. For other Christians, this involves prayer, and maybe accountability partners. Internet confession seems like a way to avoid prayer and simply be a one-stop shop to unload guilt and avoid taking responsibility. There is no shepherding, no counseling, no pastoring at these sites. And that is exactly what the confessors need.

he problem with online confessionals is the lack of human contact. In a Catholic church, the priest asks the confessor questions, offers suggestions for reparations and absolution. The internet can do none of those things. The root of the problem is the personal disconnect that the internet brings. While it is a useful tool and, honestly, I couldn't survive without it, there is not a relational aspect of the internet. Even so-called chat rooms, and forums lack true personal relations. There is something to be said for the cartharsis of face to face conversation. Or face to the disembodied voice in the confessional, at least. As I am not Catholic, I have never been to a formal confessional, so there may be much that I don't know about the practice and Doctrine of Reconciliation. What I do know is that human beings need human interaction. In Christianity, this becomes especially pertinent as we try to show Christ to the world.

Spitzer and the New Reality

2008-03-16T12:02:00.000-07:00

I'm going to talk today about the trust between generations, and what youths need. Teens are looking for authenticity. They want adults (and a religion) that are real, honest, and down to earth. Tough order to fill? Yeahsureyoubetchya. Granted, television tried to become more authentic with reality shows, prime time game shows, and talk shows. Those worked pretty well, until they too became scripted and hackneyed. And the teens often don't feel they can turn to Christianity, for they've all seen the televangelists and the warped christian viewpoints that the media airs. Example: Yesterday CBS aired a segment on global warming and the evangelical response. On the one hand, they showed a young, twenty something who wrote a referendum about being environmentally conscious that he got signed by all the bigwigs in the Southern Baptist Conference. On the other hand, they showed a middle aged pastor (denomination unknown) saying that by responding to global warming, we're pandering to abortion and gay-right, because everybody knows that they want us to think it's just a population issue. Not exactly a rousing promo for Christianity. Or intellectuals, for that matter.

Where else can teens look for authenticity? Leaders? Politics? The Spitzer debacle proves undeniably that even so-called "moral crusaders" can be inauthentic and hypocritical. What else is left? Our teens are media saturated skeptics, used to looking for the hidden message and the underlying motivation. They see someone and automatically think: I hear what you're saying, but what do you really want from me?

So what can we, as adults and Christians, do to rectify what the world, the media, and what we have done to break the trust of our youth? There is no simple solution. The obvious place to start is to become real to your teens. Be honest. If you screw up, apologize and let them know. Be there for them, not because you want something, but because you want to. As Christians, it is important that we have moral and religious guidelines, but don't forget to have grace and mercy. It is easy to get caught up in the political stances of Christianity, but if we do that, we cannot forget to have more grace than we have judgement: Else we fall into the Spitzer trap and lose the respect of our teens. I'll come back to this idea of grace in a later post.

For now, remember that our teens aren't looking to us for perfection. They're looking for authenticity, stability, and certitude. They need to know that whatever might happen in their life, we will not forsake them. And if they know that we will not forsake them, how much more so then will they know that God will not forsake them. And that is the crux of the issue.

Censorship and Free Press

2008-03-06T21:21:00.000-08:00

It's funny how almost all of our discussions in my Intro to Library Science class end up about censorship and the ethical responsibility that librarians have toward free access to information (in the American Library Association's Code of Ethics). It was brought to my attention again when I read about the muckraking website, WikiLeaks where people can post documents that reveal government / institutional corruption. Muckraking is certainly not a new vocation, in fact, muckraker were primarily the ones to get out the word about the deplorable conditions of slums, meatpacking plants, and factories in the early 1900s (i.e. Upton Sinclair's The Jungle). Anyway, a Bank in the Caymans sued the website, the domain was frozen, a horrible backlash occurred, and just this week, the bank withdrew their lawsuit. Score one for the Bill of Rights. However, censorship is still a hot button issue. Books are constantly being challenged and banned every year. The Illinois Library Association publishes a list of Banned Books, 2006-2007. They have lists for each year. Honestly, some of the challenges surprised me, and some I expected. For instance, the Harry Potter bannings didn't surprise me. The challenge to the new translation fo the Epic of Gilgamesh did, however. One of the oldest stories known (rivalling the Bible) was challenged for "sexual situation". Huh, go figure. To me, it shows that every book has something that is offensive to someone, and it makes it difficult for librarians, whose main goal is to provide free information. There is one distinction, though. I need to separate the Public Library and the School Library. The School Library is supposed to act in loco parentis (in place of the parents), so they do have a very real obligation to at least listen to the parents' objections to certain books. Public Librarians, however, are not acting in loco parentis, and therefore have less of an obligation to pander to any special interest groups, but owe their allegiance to globalization and the entire community in general. It is a difficult balancing act. So how does a Librarian balance this, with the censoring demands of a multi-cultural public on the one hand, and our obligation to provide free access to information? The situation becomes especially difficult when these censhorship attempts are entangled with the libary's funding. How much is information worth? It is certianly food for thought, and a heavy one at that. =>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=>=> And now for something completely different: Here is a clip of Judah laughing hilariously when Brandin was spinning a ball on the ground. It's the simple things in life. It was certainly a nice break when I was debating the merits (or de-merits) of censorship online with my class. If only we continued to laugh like this as adults, the world might be a very different place.

Mind the Gap!

2008-02-24T21:12:00.000-08:00

So our Pastor at church has been preaching about responsibility a lot lately, and it has got me thinking about my responsibilities and taking them more seriously. Youth group especially. I am putting together a newsletter for the parents in our church about youth culture and how to find a mutual platform for conversation. From what I've seen, youth today are looking for authenticity and meaning. They want to belong, to make a difference, to be someone. They want relationships, they want to be heard and seen.

Take these desires and add to the mix the new online applications like MySpace, Facebook, and heck, even Blogger, you have a great tool as well as a great danger. These social networking sites are a great way to connect to your friends, make new friends, post pictures, and make your voice heard. It is a place to carve out a little space just for you on the internet. Teens are on MySpace like never before, and often unsupervised simply because their parents are unaware of the possible dangers. What kinds of dangers? It's just a nice place to talk to their friends, right? Think about this: What if the teen posts their phone number, posts a picture that has their home address in the background, their birthdate, full name. Any of this information is ripe for the picking by unscrupulous hands. I'm not saying that these sites are bad, but just like anything, they can be misused and should be monitored by parents.

So parents, what can you do? Google your kids. I'm serious. Put their name (first and last) in quotation marks and search for them on Google. It is amazing what can come up. For instance, I Google myself now and then, just to see what comes up. It's surprising. Typical things, like my website and my blog. In 2001 I signed an online endometriosis "quilt", that still shows up. I found that someone I don't know quoted my blog in their blog (certainly an odd feeling, and they took it totally out of context), and a message board from my 2004 astronomy class where I posted a couple times talking about theories of the age of the universe. Crazy stuff that I didn't even remember writing, let alone that it was still findable online.

So yes, parents; Google your kids, look at their MySpace page frequently, look at their friends MySpace pages, but above all, teach them safe online practices. Tell them to not give out revealing info, only post things that they would want their parents and (more often these days) their potential employer to see. More and more employers are Googling their applicants. You can tell a lot about a person by the online social networks they belong to. If your child belongs to the group "Another day in the drunk tank", then, yeah, you might want to have a conversation about alcohol.

Above all, parents need to educate themselves about the things their children spend the most time on. Is your child always on MySpace? Check it out. Facebook? Get comfortable with it. Flickr? Figure it out. Otherwise, your children will be on this wide, vast internet, talking to who knows what kind of people, posting tons of pictures, and putting themselves (and you) in all kinds of danger. Get with it, parents; it's only going to get worse if you don't start now.

Happy First Birthday, Judah!!

2008-02-13T18:09:00.000-08:00

Well, Judah is finally a year old today. It's truly amazing how fast it went by. I don't even remember him being such a little tiny thing. It seems like I've always known him.

For his first birthday, Judah passed two milestones. The first, and more major one, is that he finally was able to walk across the room. Haltingly and hesitantly, yes, but walking nonetheless.

The second milestone is that I had to clear off his bookshelf of all but board books or vinyl books. It's like the verse in the Bible, Ezekiel 3:3 "Then he said to me, 'Son of man, eat this scroll I am giving you and fill your stomach with it.' So I ate it, and it tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth." I don't know what paper tastes like, but if the poor state of those books are any answer, they must be sweet. Judah ate the spines, ate corners off the covers, tore out pages. Finally, I gave up for a while and stored all his paper books until he gets out of this habit.

Next Generation

2008-02-08T19:32:00.000-08:00

No, this isn't a Star Trek post, sorry. I suppose it's inevitable that when you have a kid you think about what they'll grow up into, and what kind of generation they'll be a part of. At least, I think about it a lot, but it especially came into clarity when I read Polaroids from the Dead by Douglas Coupland. Now, it certainly isn't his best, but it is a nice, somewhat sad look at culture in general. It summed up the generations quite nicely, and it got me thinking about what my generation is like, and what Judah's will be like in the future.

My generation is post-industrial, post-modern, post-nuclear, and some even say post-human. What, then, is left to name a generation when all of the monikers have been used? Today we are a transient generation: The ill-formed offspring of ex-hippie parents, still pining for freedom but tethered to the tide of digitalization. Born in a place, no more than a name, and always moving on. Not the upwardly mobile days of old, but a non-linear, meaningless sporadic movement of the virtually disconnected. We are, as Coupland says, de-narrated.

What is left for a homogenized time, when neuroses are normal and we look with suspicion upon anyone who claims to be anything remotely normal. If someone has lived in the same town all their life, never been divorced, abused, or unhappy, we wonder and mutter at them as we pass by; what are you hiding? where are your skeletons? You don't belong.

What then is left for the next generation? A generation that is more digital than human? Will we have a cadre of children who cannot relate in person, because they are used to vitual space? Children who can code computer programs but not read a book? It certainly seems like a terminal prognosis, though I'm sure our parents thought the same thing and look how well our generation turned out. In a manner of speaking, of course.

Posh Mom, Alternadad, and the Reign of the Cool Parent

2008-01-15T20:33:00.000-08:00

I was looking for an online parenting chat forum, and I had trouble finding one where I could fit in. There are so many different parenting trends, it's kind of hard to fid something I like. A review of the major sites:

Posh Mom is the mind set of being supermom in jimmy choos. These are the women who hand out cute business cards for play dates. Hey, if they have the money to spend on manicures and lattes, more power to them. Certainly not the group for me, though.

Next on the list (and this one looks promising), Grupsters. Well, there are a lot of names for this mind-set. The main philosophy is that life as we know it, does not end with the advent of "the tinyness", and that by unilaterally swearing off the doodlebops and the wiggles, we can retain the essence of who we are. This is more of a spectrum mindset. There are people like Alternadad, who is editor of the website "Offsprung: For parents who don't suck" (now there's a motto to live by!) who believe that they should not pander to the "kid" lifestyle and continue to live their life as they want. It's a bit extreme for me, although I do love the chat forums on Offsprung. Very funny. The article in the New Yorker by Adam Sternbergh explains this phenomenon.
Interesting ideas, and I'll be thinking about this for a while and maybe I'll get back to it in a later post.

Then there's Urban Baby which seems like a cross between the two. I don't know which community will fit my ideas and lifestyle yet. I'll lurk for a while on the latter two and see if there is anything interesting. If anyone belongs to any online groups, I'd love to hear about them.

A Letter from Kenya

2008-01-05T08:54:00.000-08:00

As I have African missionaries for in-laws, I have been following the violence in Kenya following their Presidential elections closely. My inlaws are in the US for another month, and for that I am thankful, but they do need to return to that confusion soon. My father-in-law emailed one of thir employees in Nairobi, Charles, (a native Kenyan) to ask how things were. The email affected me, so I thought I should post it here. I decided to leave the names in, since they are common names, and anyone who doesn't know them personally, wouldn't be able to find them. With no more ado:

Thank you so much for praying with us, there is trouble all over the country apart from Central part of Kenya. Hell broke loose after the presidential announcement on Sunday 30th December 2007. My family and i spent that night in the cold. There was immense looting and burning especially where we stay. I thank God for shielding us. We have heard the international community raising their voices on the same. On the ground, it's so bad compared to what is heard announced over the media. Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa is in the country to talk to the winner and loser. Our prayers are that they feel for Kenyans and understand one another. At the moment it is turning tribal where the presidents tribe ( Kikuyu) is targeted all over the country. It is the largest tribe and are widely spread. Transport is limited, most gas stations have run out petrol with little stock of diesel. Today it was God's favor that i filled the car and 40 liters in jerrycan. The 9 seater is in workshop. We do not know how tomorrow is going to be because the opposition party have called for an open air meeting in Nairobi but the government is opposed to it. About 300 people have lost their lives. Yesterday, rowdy youths in the Rift Valley surrounded a P C A church where people had run for shelter, torched it killing about 35 people mostly women and children. The opposition feels the election was rigged. We pray but leave the rest to God. Isaac and Josephine are still upcountry for lack of transport. Evans has not turned up and his phone is not reached. The rest are okay and well. I will update as we go along. At the moment their is tension in the city. God bless you and keep on praying with us.

Though the letter may just seem a recapping of the news headlines that we've seen this past week, the underlying tension nearly took my breath away. I am fortunate that in America we have not yet felt the panic and confusion of a political/economic/demographical melee in my lifetime. I am glad that Charles was able to find some fuel for his car, and I pray that they will find Evans safe, wherever he is. Please keep the Kenyans (both Luo's and Kikuyu's) in your thoughts and prayers and hopefully, this will come to an end soon.

On RockBand and Being Human

2007-12-26T19:22:00.000-08:00

So this is a bit of a double post. Firstly, I have long ridiculed the people who get all excited about RockBand, Guitar Hero, and SingStar. The video games always seemed silly. People just sitting there in front of their t.v, pretending to play guitar/drums/sing, even though they can't play that instrument. And then I actually played it. And guess what. It was so much fun. So Brandin, my brother and I pooled all our Target gift cards together from Christmas and bought it for our Playstation 3. Yes, we may look really stupid, sitting there, playing a plastic guitar. But really, who cares what people think when you're having so much fun?

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I got the book Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris for Christmas. I put it on my Amazon wishlist mainly because I thought it sounded like an "Office Space" type novel, and since I love the movie, I figured that I would love any book of the vein. Well, I am a little over halfway through the book and already know that I got much more than I expected. It's not just simply vapid, office meaninglessness, but there is something deeper. The characters in the novel are office caricatures; that weird guy in accounting who tells long stories with no point, or the receptionist who sends out mass emails of chain letters or stupid pictures, gossips, the watercooler: These caricatures are not new. Yet Ferris brings new life to them and we, as readers, become invested in the life of this office.

The novel is written in the all-inclusive first person plural, "we", which sucks the reader in and I found myself identifying with the office workers as their boss had breast cancer, as lay-offs came, when their coworker overdosed on antidepressants, when their ex-coworker became mentally unhinged, etc. It's really not a complex book on the surface, but meaning simmers just under the surface. How well do you really know your coworkers? Heck, it doesn't even have to be coworkers, it could be friends, even family. So often we are content to give and receive cursory answers that we may never really know what the other person is going through.

After reading this book, I am left with a feeling of vague discontent. The disconcerting realization that the people that I spend the most time with (coworkers, friends), I truly know the least. That by "just getting through the day", I am somehow missing the fundamental reason of being human: To care for people, invest in them, and receive care in return. I think it's a lesson well learned, and one I'm sure that I will continually need to relearn.

The Horror! The Horror!

2007-12-16T18:28:00.000-08:00

An innocent family strolled through the gates: Mom, dad, a baby in a stroller. The autumn breeze wafted through the parking lot, blowing papers, empty coke cans, the dross of an unhappy childhood. The family closed in on the windswept courtyard, unaware of the eyes following them, or the danger that threatened their every step. They continued on into the bowels of the beast, into the very depths of the dragon's lair: This insidious thing called highschool. . .

So I needed to get a highschool transcript for my grad program. Brandin, Judah, and I stropped by to request one. I honestly haven't been back there since I graduated 6 years ago, and would you believe it, the maelstrom of emotions were still there. All the inadequacy, the nervousness, the feeling of being judged, the paranoia, they were just as strong in me now, as they were when I was sixteen. So strong, in fact, that I actually surprised Brandin into laughter (and I must add, a bit of justified ridicule) when I stopped before a corridor between classrooms and hissed, "We can't go that way, people will see us!" Am I an adult now, or am I an adult?

Hmm, isn't it interesting how influential highschool is to a teen, that 6 years later the feelings are still so influential and negative. It certainly gave me a new perspective on my teens in our youth group, that we cannot treat the highschool experience as trivial or insignificant. Those emotions that war so furious within these teens will not just "go away", but linger, perhaps buried and unnoticed, yet still strong enough to stop me, a relatively stable, happy adult, in my tracks. I walked through the hallway to the registrar's office and saw clumps of teens looking at us, then looking away and I felt a primal fear that seemed to permeate throughout my entire body: They're looking at me. They're judging me. They're laughing at me. I don't belong here.

I hope to re-read this, or at least remember these thoughts when I deal with our teens in youth group, or when Judah goes to school, so I can remember to listen and understand. Teenagers do not need another judge or executioner; they seem to do that all quite well in their own mind. Perhaps the next time your teen comes to you talking about perceived threats or judgments (however real or delusional it may seem to you), you listen instead of writing their fear off as unfounded. It certainly still feels real enough to me.

Dignity and Justice for All of Us

2007-12-09T19:06:00.000-08:00

As a kind of segway from my post a week ago, this week I am joining with millions around the globe (or at least, those who know about it) in promoting Human Rights Day on December 10th. The United Nations uses Dec. 10 of each year to remind people of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

This seemed like a good day to pay tribute to Aung San Suu Kyi, the pro-democracy leader and Nobel laureate of Burma. She has been on and off house arrest for the last eighteen years. Her 1997 book, Voice of Hope is being re-released and updated in paperback, and it coincides with the restart of dialogue and negotiations between her, Burman government officials, and the UN. It was her wish that we would use our liberty to promote theirs.

So, on this Human Rights Day, I am using my liberty of free speech and dissemination to remind us of how lucky we are to be able to debate and (if the Right has their way) possibly repeal an extension of a child's civil rights in education bill (see my previous post). It really puts things into perspective when you think of how much we take for granted that we don't even realize that we take for granted: Voting, a system that works (usually), free speech, personal liberties, the list goes on and on.

So, the next time you engage your neighbor in a political debate, or participate in politics, remember Aung San: The woman who gave up her freedom to fight for a seeming lost cause, so that her people might enjoy the same liberties that we enjoy.

Let's get ready to RUMBLE!!!!

2007-12-02T14:53:00.000-08:00

Are you ready for the fight of the year? Or, at least the newest political/religious/demographical mud-slinging melee? Senate Bill 777 is a wolf in sheep's clothing, to hear it from the right, and for the left it's all about equality and love and harmony in schools. Is it, as the Christian Right would have us believe, a Satanic attack on "Traditional Morals" and "Family Values", or as the Liberals claim, just another logical Civil Rights bill? Or maybe somewhere in the grey ether between all the polarity?

I encourage you to read the bill before making any reactionary decisions in either direction. I've read debates on this bill as well, and I understand both points of view. Discrimination in classrooms is something that should not be allowed. Previously, the typical "protected" classes of people afforded equal rights and opportunities were "regardless of sex, ethnic group identification, race, national origin, religion, mental or physical disability, or regardless of any actual or perceived characteristic that is contained in the definition of hate crimes set forth in Section 422.55 of the Penal Code." This bill changes one meager word that has resounding consequences. The bill eliminates the word "sex", which was usually defined as being born either male or female, and replaces it with "gender", which the bill defines as "sex, and includes a person's gender identity and gender related appearance and behavior whether or not stereotypically associated with the person's assigned sex at birth." This is the main difficulty I see with the bill.

Now, let me be clear: I agree that all people, regardless of sexual identity, should be afforded equal rights and opportunities. I am in no way for discrimination of any kind anywhere. Let's all put aside our political and doctrinal beliefs, just for the moment, have a seat at the round table and actually look at the bill. I have to point out the obvious logistical problems that may arise after the bill is passed. By defining gender as identity and behavior, what happens when a transgendered boy feels discriminated against in the boys locker room (highly possible) and appeals to the school board citing this bill? It seems ludicrous that he could be allowed to use the girls locker room, because then all the boys (who truly feel like boys) will do the same thing just to get access to that nirvana of male adolescence. So then what? Do the schools add locker rooms for the gender-unsure? Should schools really have four locker rooms, boys, girls, boys-who-feel-like-girls, and girls-who feel-like-boys, wasting taxpayer money that should be spent on things like computer labs, textbooks, and libraries? Where this issue might have only been an issue before the bill, it now has a basis in law and feasibly could lead to possible litigation for the school districts.

I think that there is no right or wrong with this bill. There are good points and bad points. Maybe the question boils down to this: Is any possible fallout (i.e. litigation, argument, taxes) worth it to keep our children from discrimination? It seems that this bill puts the school in a tougher position than it was in before. While before, schools could resolve their issues on a case by case basis, this sets a precedent with a recourse in law. Maybe I'm being alarmist and the situation that I'm imagining is ludicrous and no sensible person would ever do it. But if people were sensible, would we really need any "discrimination" laws in the first place?

Thanksgiving Thanks

2007-11-22T19:19:00.000-08:00

So, to the usual Thanksgiving reflections: Family, baby, health, a home, etc. All the little warm fuzzies that make up the season. And our new flat screen t.v, of course.

So I'm all signed up for classes next semester. Yay! It's been a couple years since I have been in school, so I'm understandably a little nervous about the whole shebang. Especially since grad school is quite a bit more difficult than undergraduate work, so I'll have to step up. But I've got a new laptop, so when I need to escape the babyish chaos, I can run over to Starbucks, or the library, or even Borders and work on school work.

I guess we'll see. The art museum library wants to have us volunteers (there are 5 of us now) staff the library on Saturdays, so it can be open to the public then. That is planned for February, possibly, so that might be cool. Something other than monotonous cataloguing. I think I'll have to learn a bit more about art tho, if I'm going to be answering any reference or research questions. Eek.

So it's been a good thanksgiving. I'm thankful for the chance to stay home and go to school and further my career. I'm thinking of concentrating on being a Youth Services Librarian. They seem to be in desperate need of those right now. Plus, what could be more rewarding than giving the next generation a love of books? Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Hugs not Drugs

2007-11-11T21:17:00.000-08:00

An eighth grade girl in Illinois was suspended after hugging two of her friends after school the other day. She said that she was just hugging them good bye since school was out, though they were still on school grounds. The school quoted their handbook on Msnbc, saying that their policy states that "Displays of affection should not occur on the school campus at any time. It is in poor taste, reflects poor judgment, and brings discredit to the school and to the persons involved." The girl, on her appearance on the Today show, said that they had just come from a "Hugs not Drugs" school presentation. Hmmm, something's fishy here.

What kind of double standard are we sending our kids today? I understand the school's position, partly, because of all the current emphasis on sexual harassment, not only in the workplace for adults, but in schools as well. I understand their intentions, but someone, in some distant school board meeting had a rock-solid reason for implementing this policy. So much so, in fact, the the school directors passed, stamped, and sealed it as law. And policy, once in place, is very difficult to repeal. One school said that they put their policy in place because the students were coming into classes late because they were hugging their friends in the hallway.

So the school is between a rock and a hard place; they were, as they said, "just following policy". But what kind of a world is it where hugging a friend goodbye is considered "poor taste and poor judgment"? Where is the allowance for intentions or circumstance? Is there no defense for the student? Why should the student even have to defend her actions? I hugged my friends practically every day when I was in middle school. I can certainly tell you, I'd rather have kids being late for class from hugging rather than from drugs, or alcohol, violence, or indifference, or any of the myriad issues that assault our youth. Don't the desperately bleak problems facing our schools today deserve more attention (both from the school board and the media) than a girl hugging her friend?

Come on people, let's focus on the real problems here, not a spontaneous moment of friendly affection. I, for one, would have our youth be a generation who want to hug their friends rather than kill them. Isn't that the entire point of social education?

Hug Your Kids

2007-11-04T12:23:00.000-08:00

So maybe this post and the last one will make me seem like a morbid person. I'm not, really, I swear. It's just that so much has happened lately that the precariousness of life is forefront in my mind. This, too, shall pass, I'm sure, but while it's here you'll just have to put up with my maudlin babbling.

First there were the Southern California fires. Then last week there was a double homicide in Sacramento where a mother found the bodies of her son and her ex-husband. That mother was one of our temps, so that one hit really close to home since I knew her. And just yesterday there was a 108 car pile up near Fresno on the freeway. It just continually hammers home the point that life is not permanent, and for some, it is even less so. You may die, I may die. Today, tomorrow, or 80 years from now. Who knows.

I'll keep this one short, since it is so depressing a subject. Hug your kids, your spouse, your parents. I've never enjoyed Judah so much as I have lately. Even things that would normally frustrate me: getting up 4 times in a single night with him. This week, I cherish it because it means that we're both here and together. What more could a mother ask for?

Death by Cataloguing

2007-10-28T15:01:00.000-07:00

The Daily News: This just in, a volunteer at the Crocker Art Museum Library was crushed to death by the AACR2 (Anglo-American Rules for Cataloguing 2002 edition).

Well, not quite, but that's what I felt like. I am now volunteering at the Hansen Library at the Crocker Art Museum in downtown Sacramento on Saturdays. I met with the Librarian yesterday to see what he wanted me to do, and he ended up giving me a 2 hour crash course on cataloguing. I had no idea it was so complex. MARC (MAchine Readable Catalogue Record) format is a long list of numbered fields that you fill in with everything under the sun so the computer can read the record and show the user what we normally see, a normal bibliographic reference. The librarian loaned me his edition of the AACR2. It is a binder full of about 300-400 pages of cataloguing rules. How to describe something, what a delimiter is, what goes in which subfield, how to catalogue things that are unclassifiable (i.e. ephemera, maps, individual letters, etc). It is certainly more than I ever expected, but I'm reading that and doing a lot of research this week so I will have some idea of what I'm doing next saturday. I hope. Needless to say, he needs cataloguers. There were about 20 boxes of books to catalogue, and he just brought in the first box of 3000 books that some artist in Berkeley donated.

Splash! Here's to getting my feet wet by just plunging right in. Any experience will look good on my resume when I want to get a library job, and any experience will give me a leg up on my classes for my Masters in Library and Information Science that I'm starting in January.

Hopefully the schedule will work out, because he has two other cataloguer volunteers and with me as a third, he said they might be able to have the library open to the public on Saturdays, instead of only 4 hours on Thursdays. But there are thousands of books left to catalogue, and miles to go before I sleep.

The Muddle of the Middle

2007-10-06T20:16:00.000-07:00

I read "The Five People You Meet in Heaven" by Mitch Albom a few months ago, and one thing that he said has really affected me and I can't get it out of my mind. He said that when death takes someone, whether through illness or accident, there is more to it than just the taking of that person; that in the "taking", death misses someone else. There is more to any death event, there is a middle ground, where the person may not even be aware that they were missed, but there is some thing that ties them intrinsically to the one taken (though they may not find out until they get to heaven too).
Now, I may not agree with his version of heaven, but this idea of primal give and take has stuck with me. Now, whenever I see or hear of a fatal accident on the freeway, I think of all those people who may not even be aware that they were missed. Had they not forgotten their jacket and went back home to get it, had the kids not slept in late, had hit that green light, they might have been the one dead. They are in the middle now. They were missed. They should be thankful.
But, our human mind really isn't equipped to continually deal with the realities of death, so we forget about that "close call" on the freeway last week, and just go about our lives. I just can't get that idea out of my head everytime I hear about a death. Rather morbid, but I think it really shows the interconnectivity of all life. How what I do affects what everyone else around me does, though I may not be aware of the how or why. If I have a bad morning on the commute to work, and cut someone off, will that person have a bad day, and then go home and fight with their family?
Certainly food for thought.

The Absence of Time

2007-09-29T17:19:00.001-07:00

Well, I'm pretty happy that the website is up, but it's going to take time to get it where I want it. I have lots of ideas, but I'm still learning html, so we'll see how long it looks like a sixth-grade school project.

So I was thinking the other day how weird it is that I really can't remember Judah being a little infant. I am so used to him being 7 months that I forget what it was like when he couldn't even lift his head. It just seems like he has always been this age. The author, Jorge Luis Borges, described this feeling as the "absence of time": that yesterday is only present memory, and tomorrow is only future hope. There is no "time" per se, but all we have is this present moment. It feels like that sometimes with Judah. I know he was little, but I can't equate that unresponsive sack of sugar with this crawling, babbling, smiling baby. The mental disconnect comes because we get caught in the busy-ness of life and Judah grows so incrementally that we don't really notice until we stop and look back and compare. And then I think, "when did he grow so much? I never noticed him growing." I wonder if other people ever feel that, or if they're too busy to actually stop and think about stupid things like this . . .