december is here, and so am i

So, a few updates that are short. Very short, I guess, but stuff y'all would probably care to know.

1. I failed at NaNoWriMo this year. Sadpanda times, indeed. I'll have to try again next year.
2. I finished my senior paper. It's notbadokish. If you like reading 40 pages of boring, it's online over at Books & Papers. It's the first entry under papers, titled "Finding God's Agenda for Homosexual Students."
3. I defend said senior paper on Thursday afternoon. I have no idea what that means, but I'm pretty sure it'll be a gimme putt.
4. I will be done with college a week from Monday. That's just crazy stupid.
5. I will be moving out to El Segundo, California, during the first week of 2008. If any of y'all know anybody out there who wants to throw money my way in exchange for some work, let me know. ;)
6. I love Miles Davis, green tea, and Febreze NOTICEables air fresheners.
7. I plan on writing much more once school is fading into the background...it's scary how soon that is.

Anywho, in the meantime,

Peace, love, and joy to you all.

Where I'm At ~or~ Far From Home

So it's been a while since a general life update on here, or any kind of consistent posting. I wish that wasn't the case, but things got pretty busy really fast this summer, and this blog kinda slipped in the old priority list.

But now--now, I'm stranded here in Tulsa, alone on a Saturday night with a mountain of reading and writing to do and a complete lack of any desire to do it. It was out of moments like this that this blog was birthed.

I guess I should start at the beginning. Of June. This summer in El Segundo was amazing. Absolutely incredible. It was probably the best summer of my life. The city is gorgeous and friendly and everything I hoped it would be, with a bustling Main Street within walking distance of just about everything, tons of local-owned sandwich shops where they enter your order almost as soon as they see your face, and a Farmer's Market that shuts everything down on Thursday afternoons. The weather is pretty much always room temperature, with a high of 75ish and a low of 65ish; the windows in my bungalow were open every day and every night. Oh, and the Pacific Ocean is just around the corner; I snuck down just to look at the water to fill up a couple of lunch hours on slower days.

While I was down there, I never really thought that I went to the beach all that much, but, sitting down and thinking about it now, I probably hit it up four or more times a week. Something about the sand and the water and the wind and the nature of it all just never got normal to me. It was always breathtaking when I reached the top of the hill on Grand and could finally glimpse the waters beneath.

The church was awesome, too. Instead of assigning me the random intern jobs that no one else wanted, they actually took the time to find out what my passions and strengths in ministry were and then worked with me to design places for me to use those in conjunction with their ministry. It was really cool and gave me a lot of opportunities to test myself in real youth ministry situations. I was amazed with how quickly the staff welcomed me into their lives and their work and supported me and valued my opinion on all sorts of things that I didn't really feel qualified to give an opinion on. It was scary, but in a good way.

The people were also great. My biggest fear going into the summer was that it usually takes longer for people to begin liking me than I was going to spend out in El Segundo, but as the summer unfolded I really quickly fell into some really great new friendships and reopened a couple of old ones. When I first arrived I thought that I'd have loads of time alone in my bungalow to read and study, but between work and hanging out with all the great people I met, I ended up spending very little time back there at all.

There was also a girl. She's pretty amazing. If you want any more of a story than that, shoot me an e-mail, or call or IM me or just stop me walking through the GC and I'll be glad to tell you all about it.


But that's the summer...I think. I mean, there are a ton more stories than that, and maybe over the course of time you'll hear them all. But for now, I think that'll do.

Now I'm back in Tulsa. I've got a ton of work ahead of me this semester. But then there's a bright glowing future somewhere after that and I can't wait to get to it.

Peace, love, and joy to you all.

So there's this girl.

Stories from this Summer (some with photographic evidence even)

Dear Everybody,

The other day I started writing haiku. It's been pleasurable.

Some of them are about things that have happened this summer. I like these specific haiku, maybe even more than some of the other ones.

But I like the other ones too.

So, I've decided to post several of them over here so you all can enjoy them and hear what kind of stuff has been going on down here. Kind of.

And since they're only like seventeen to seventeen-and-a-half syllables each, they will not bore you to death either.

Haiku 1 (Wed 8/1/07)

$85
More than a week's worth of work
Parking tickets suck

Being parked in the El Segundo Beach lot after dusk: $50
Being parked on Virginia St between 8 & 10 am Wednesdays: $35
Being a part of funding the largest metropolitan network of roads in the world: Priceless.

OK, so I don't know if it is the largest metropolitan network of roads, but LA's pretty freakin' huge.

Haiku 3 (Fri 8/3/07) my foot is on fire quickly now right foot go down crap am i a dumb

So, beach night was Thursday...and I thought I could do the whole walking across coals thing again. But I hit a wet spot, so this is what my foot looks like now:


The bottom side is definitely worse, but my camera only occasionally works, so this is the shot I got; as you can see, my foot sank into the coals and it burned all the way around. A little light second-degree and quite a bit of strong first-degree means I'm having a blast everywhere I go.

Haiku 6 (Fri 8/3/07)

working in baja
we ate the orphans' last rice
then we came back home

That story is straight up true, y'all. I'll have to tell it sometime in person...the blog thing is cool and all, but it's just going to miss the mark on this one.

Haiku 8 (Sat 8/5/07) my beard looks awesome without it i look fifteen; die, facial hair code!

That first line's true...the senior pastor at my church said so this morning. So I mean, you can disagree, you're just disagreeing with God. ;) Here's a pic of me laying the law down on some troubled youth at beach night. (or something along those lines...)


Peace, love,
and joy to
you all.

An Update ~or~ A News Report, a Girl, and a Poem

I'm tired. I've been working hard and staying very busy all summer. It's been pretty awesome.

But really, I'm still the same me. I don't really watch TV, cause I don't have the time. And I haven't touched a guitar since May, cause I didn't bring one out here. Other than that, I'm still basically the same me.

Oh, except for I kinda fell in love with this girl. At first, I didn't know what to think of her, but the more time I spend listening to her, the more I like what I hear. The problem is that her hair is shorter than mine, and mine's pretty freaking short. Oh, and she's like twice my age.

I am, of course, talking about none other than Sinead O'Connor, who's newish album "Theology" has been playing over and over in my head for the past couple of days now. I recommend it with the caveat that it's not a systematic theology textbook, so if you are going to take issue with her riffs on the Old Testament, then just let it be. But, until somebody else writes awesome music about Job, Jesus, and Psalm 91, I'll be listening to this.

Lastly is a poem. That I didn't write. But I like it. The only way I came across it was through one of the blogs I read to try to stretch the boundaries of how I define ministry. The blog is jonnybaker but the poem is by kester. Enjoy!

If we could all
just stop throwing stones,
and stoop, knees bent
and write in the dust,

we'd see that the dust
was once stone -
grand, and hard, and proud, and tough -
now ground and dissolved
in grace and tears.

So... how much better
to be a grain of dirt
on that kind prophet’s hands
than a stone
in the cold, accusing Temple
of the pure.

an avant-ish page from my notebook

Today was cloudy.
It was sunny once. Lunch. Fun.
But then it was cloudy. I don't
remember when or how. But it was
cloudy.
It was cloudy when I went to
dinner. I brought a hoodie to be safe
in my backpack when I grabbed
my iPod.
There's a feather next to me blowing
all about in the wind. It hasn't left
yet but it's so small and the breeze
is strong
I listened to Jay Bakker during
my walk and my meal. The hash
browns were very good.
The message was about God having
forgotten our sin. It's on iTunes.
I started walking toward the water.
Jay made some jokes about Brad Pitt,
Ty Pennington and Brennan Manning. I
laughed out loud.
He ran out of words at Grand & Main.
I tried to listen the songs I
put on my iPod today. They didn't
work until I hit Evolution.
The Cinematic Orchestra makes my
life seem like art.
It sounded like it was skipping or something.
THE STARS
LIGHT UP MY LIFE
And I thought of Jay Bakker and Phil2 and
DC Talk and shining like stars.
EVERLASTING
THE SUN (SON?)
LIGHT UP (OF?) MY LIFE
I was struck.
WHAT I MEAN
THE SON
IN DAWN (?)
YOUR LOVE
YOUR LIFE
SO BRIGHT
EVERLASTING
I hit the crest of the hill. I saw
the water. The clouds broke.
EVOLUTION
A change.

The Pleasure Cruise of the Disciples

So, youth ministry has always been a big thing for me, right? A bunch of times you'll see it show up in my posts or whatever.

It's always weird to me, though, because it's such a huge part of my life but most all of my friends and even family members have never really seen me doing youth ministry stuff.

A few weeks ago, I got the opportunity to speak to Uturn (which is the youth ministry here at El Segundo Foursquare Church). I talked about trusting God and facing your fears, which have kinda been the things that I'd been working through with this whole internship experience.


Anyway, the message got recorded, so I thought it might be fun to post a little bit from right at the end, kinda as proof to you guys who haven't really ever seen or heard me do youth ministry that I actually do it. Oh, and to give everyone the opportunity to make fun of the fact that I don't seem to fully understand the concept of a microphone, or that it's pretty obvious that my speaking style is more influenced by dane cook and nick swardson than billy graham or some other preachery guy.

Anywho, here's a little ten minute chunk I like to call the tennis story.

Staff Meeting

From the "They don't quite know what tao do with me here" Department

The other day at church somebody asked me what my favorite flower was. I responded, "Wheat."

From the "All my posts somehow are about girls" Department

I regret that I'm not blogging more about my experience here in El Seg. It's kinda like there's this girl I really like and I think she might read my blog so I don't talk about it much. Only the girl's name this time is Everythingabout Thissummer.

From the "All my posts are ridiculously self-serving" Department

My favorite sentence that I've written on transparency|inaction:

"An old deaf man came up to me and we had a whole conversation about the hail and driving in it and tornadoes."

from Coming Home (Part 3/3)

From the "Business as usual" Department

I suppose that I'm a little bit sadder of late (not entirely sure why)...but I'm planning on getting down to the beach in the next day or two, so I'm hoping that's all that I need.

From the "Completely random" Department

Earlier today I realized that I've become one of those sadpanda people who holds conversations with their pets while progressing through a series of crossword puzzles. Oh well. I suppose there are still opportunities in monkery.


Peace, love, and joy to you all.

5 Things

5 Things that are different about my experience in Tulsa and El Segundo

1. Tulsa: Nasty river bed. El Segundo: Beach.
2. Tulsa: Moderate level of traffic. El Segundo: [almost] No traffic. Los Angeles: tons of traffic.
3. Tulsa: Everyone acts like a Christian. (Nine times out of ten they are a Christian) El Segundo: Everyone acts like your friend. (Nine times out of ten they are your friend.)
4. Tulsa: Gas costs $2.80 a gallon. El Segundo: Gas costs $3.39 a gallon.
5. Tulsa (particularly ORU): People wear quite a bit of clothing. El Segundo: Everybody wears less.
   

5 Things that are the same about Tulsa and El Segundo

1. People are really nice.
2. There are oil refineries nearby.
3. I live in a safe, affluent neighborhood only a few miles from a city or neighborhood nationally known for poverty and crime. (North Tulsa and Compton)
4. Me.
5. I live really, really close to really loud things. (The other guys at ORU, LAX here in El Segundo)

5 Things that I've done in the past 48 hours that will make ridiculous stories

1. Thursday 9:00pm-11:00pm: Finished Uturn, set the stage for Sunday, and then headed to In-N-Out with the sibs and some of the cool kids here in El Seg.
2. Friday 7:00am: Left the house with the sibs for a full day at Disneyland (pictures here, if you haven't already seen them).
3. Friday 10:30pm: Returned from Disneyland. Pretty much straight to bed.
4. Saturday 2:20-7:00am: Woke up, showered, and went to church, where I ran camera 2 on an insane program for the youth group here. I'll have to tell you about it someday.
5. Saturday 9:00pm: Remember that I need to do laundry in order to have something to wear to church tomorrow. Decide to write something to force my body to stay awake.
   

5 Things I'm worried about getting done this week

1. Script for a theatre/video thing for summer camp.
2. Outline for teaching coming up in a week and a half.
3. Catching up on Summer Greek.
4. Keeping my ministry journal up to date.
5. Whatever that other thing was that I was thinking about but forgot.
   

5 Things I've spent too much time doing in the past week

1. Staring at ceilings looking for inspiration instead of just writing a script.
2. Driving to LAX (even though it's only five minutes; four trips there in a week [eight if you count the In-N-Out runs, which I do] is still quite a bit)
3. Trying to figure out who I know in Southfield, Michigan.
4. Reading sports news.
5. Thinking...

5 Things to Close

1. Peace,
2. love,
3. and joy
4. to
5. you all
   

A Realer Post About California

It's awesome.

El Segundo, for those of you wondering, really is a small town stuck on the side of LA. I'm right south of LAX (and am nearly constantly reminded of the fact when I'm at the house where I'm staying), north of a huge Chevron oil refinery, west of highway 1 and east of the ocean. It's pretty rockin.

I can't go anywhere with staff members without running into several sets of people that we (meaning they) know. Last night, just to pick up some Chicken Dijon we ran into no less than 3 different groups of people, all out on unrelated errands who wanted to talk to us.

I, having lived here only five days, have already run into somebody that I know out on the streets. Walking home from work today, I ran into one of the members of El Segundo Foursquare Church who happened to be picking his child up from daycare as I was walking by. I refused his offer for a ride home not because I had anything against him, but because it was such a gorgeous day in El Segundo today.

I've been to the beach a little. I'm planning on going back on Friday sometime.

This experience is really stretching and exciting and scary and hard and amazing. I love the people here; I don't know that I've ever felt accepted into a group so quickly. And, instead of really putting me to work on their pet projects, they've really given me the opportunity to tell them what I enjoy doing and try to figure out ways to build ways for me to do that as part of the greater mission of ES4sq.

Which is really cool. And at least a little frightening. I just really want to do well.

I think that's all I've got tonight. I hope y'all are having wonderful summers, and I hope to hear from all of you soon.

Peace, love, and joy to you all.