I don't understand New Year's eve. It's just another day isn't it? So why save self-betterment until them? Seems to me you could make a resolution on November 14th, or March 23rd just as good as December 31st. And why stay up till 12:00? The sun is going to rise the next day just like it does every other day, except your going to be tired.
This is the 100th post of the ambiguously titled blog that I write. I can't decide what to call it. I never liked Maria's Music, and "i thank You God", while being a great poem is not a good name for a blog. Pretty uneventful post for #100. So here is a poem by E.E. Cummings!
i am a little church(no great cathedral)
far from the splendor and squalor of hurrying cities
--i do not worry if briefer days grow briefest,
i am not sorry when sun and rain make april
my life is the life of the reaper and the sower;
my prayers are prayers of earth's own clumsily striving
(finding and losing and laughing and crying)children
whose any sadness or joy is my grief or my gladness
around me surges a miracle of unceasing
birth and glory and death and resurrection:
over my sleeping self float flaming symbols
of hope,and i wake to a perfect patience of mountains
i am a little church(far from the frantic
world with its rapture and anguish)at peace with nature
--i do not worry if longer nights grow longest;
i am not sorry when silence becomes singing
winter by spring,i lift my diminutive spire to
merciful Him Whose only now is forever:
standing erect in the deathless truth of His presence
(welcoming humbly His light and proudly His darkness)
Happy New Years
December 31, 2008 | |
Frederick Dewayne Hubbard, RIP
December 30, 2008 | |
Unfortunately he will be mentioned most when telling kids to warm up. That's the show business for you.
Information Received
December 27, 2008 | |
I always liked the D(o)T(he)M(ath) "Information Received" posts so maybe an aspiring young philosopher will enjoy knowing the information I received lately. I got a few good books for Christmas, which prompted me to spend a little too much money at Borders. Knowledge is expensive. I wish I never had to attend to all the pedantry of highschool education again. But I still have half a year of teachers showing up 20 minutes late for class and 15 minute bitch sessions and watered down math classes and YouTube videos and showing movies because you don't want to teach and all of it! I wouldn't be able to recognize that my time was being wasted if I didn't attend the school I do though. Oh well... nothing human is perfect.
Christmas week 2008:
The Blue Castle - Lucy Maud Montgomery (I read it purly because it was recomended to me (it isn't exactly my normal genre), but all in all it is a good read. I'll post a essay on it at The College Blog later this week)
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen (I listened to the beggining of the audio book, but I'm going to give the whole book a chance)
Sence and Sensibility - Jane Austen (It was really cheap. How can you turn down paper back books under $7. And I figured if I can't stand it I might be in a better disposition later on in life. I think I might have bought it for the same reason right people listen to Mozart)
Persuasion - Jane Austen (The first of the three I chose to read. So far it's captivating! I refuse to discredit it, even though it is Jane Austen)
Selected Poems - E.E. Cummings (Richard S. Kennedy) (To properly address my obsession. I didn't know he was a painter - that explains it all! His poetry is so artistic!)
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald (I threw away the copy I read in 8th grade (oh how stupid!) so in the course of re-reading all those old books I didn't pay attention to, I needed to actually obtain a copy.)
This Side of Paradise - F. Scott Fitzgerald (I have never went wrong with Fitzgerald (The Penguine "Jazz Age Stories" is excellent)
The Rest is Noise - Alex Ross (popular aclaim and a love of Alex's blog (when he used to write on it!) propelled this purchase)
The Imitation of Christ - Thomes a Kempis (I've been thinking about obedience and suffering with respect to Christ lately)
Story of a Soul - St. Therese of Lisieux (recomended to me by a good friend)
Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury (probobly an important read for the next 4/8 years)
The Problem of Pain - C.S. Lewis (you can't go wrong with C.S. Lewis)
The Great Divorce - C. S. Lewis
The Communist Manifesto - Karl Marx and Friedrich Engles (also appropriate given the next president)
This is Your Brain on Music - Daniel J. Levitin (recomended by a sales clerk)
The Dialogues - Catherine of Siena (recomended by my fortunate peers who were taught this book)
The Divine Comedy - Dante Alghieri (John Ciardi) (I have read (for the purpose of attending class, not understanding) the Inferno, but when I have a long time I'm going to go through the whole Comedy slowly so I can actually learn from it!)
The Collected Works - St. John of the Cross (I have read some of his poems in Spanish (the translation doesn't do it justice. You would be well served learning Spanish for the soul purpose of reading "El Noche Oscura" properly) and I've always been fond of collected work type volumes)
I don't have room for all of them on my book shelves; all of my wonderful books are stacked in a leaning pile. I am a very lucky young man. Now I just need to time and energy to go through it all.
The Word became Flesh!
December 25, 2008 | |
(I love the next one! Check out the CHAOS)
Nativity - Martin de Vos
Mystic Nativity - Alessandro Botticelli
December 8th only, all items 50% off! No interest until 2010!
December 23, 2008 | |
One thing I can't get over is how disgusting the Christmas season has become. The birth of Jesus isn't even necessary for the holiday anymore; you could name December 25th President's day and people would carry on in their mindless, addicted ways. I spent last Christmas in Mexico and the one thing that surprised me was how understated it all was. On Christmas eve everyone was saying "Feliz Navidad!", and then Christmas day came, and it could have been any other day, and by dinner time all the shops were opened. Christmas was treated like every other important day in the church: no shops advertize Immaculate Conception sales! I just want "the holiday season" (could you find a more clinical name!) to be done with so I can concentrate on Jesus. The Advent painting of the day helped.
"Adoration of the Child" -Antonio Allegri da Correggio
Our bud Leo
December 21, 2008 | |
i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes
(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)
how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?
(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)
December 20, 2008 | |
My self-importance has been boiling over lately, so I created a second blog, Apolgus De Colegio. Actually the real purpose of "The College Blog" is so that when (if) I am in college my family will be able to read about all my humorous, fun-loving exploits. In other words a line has been drawn between the heavy (stay tuned here) and the lightweight (the other blog). So I was faced with a dillema today when I was diciding where to post a new post: I submitted my denunciation of resumes in the "tell us why your great" essay slot. I decided on Apologus De Colegio. Somehow I think keeping the two seperate is going to be very difficult. Which is a flatering statement about myself I think: not much comes that you can't comment on intelligently.
And today's depiction of Mary and Jesus!
Le Sommeil de l'Enfant Jésus
December 19, 2008 | |
The 1949 Grammy Awards
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I wish I lived in 1949. When do us moderns have two songs as great as this competing for the Academy award?!?
"Baby It's Cold Outside" - Frank Loesser
Unfortunately that is all to real of a reality right now. And the runner up:
"My Foolish Heart" - Victor Young and Ned Washington
I hate versions of this song in 6/8. It's a 4/4 ballad!
Bill Evans got it right:
Virgin Mary - Raphael
December 18, 2008 | |
Christmas day is next Thursday, so to lead up to it I will post a painting with Mary and baby Jesus in it each day until Christmas morning when the big time, adore God by gazing into the eyes of a perfectly drawn Mary and marveling at the perfectly humble baby post will come. But in the mean time we will lead up to that. Unfortunately the orthodox blogger didn't let me have huge pictures, and I was fed up, so I went this new route. I once again reaffirmed how ignorant of HTML and the times I live in I actually am.
JESUS!
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I go to the best high school ever. Maybe the best educational institution ever. I'll hold judgment until I spend a few years in college. But nobody likes admitting their ignorant of the future, even though it's the most ridiculous thing to be confident of, so maybe I will claim it's the best educational institution ever. But that's why I wonder: how confident was God that Jesus would be taken care of on Earth. Of course God knew, but would Jesus be fully human if his life wasn't subjected to the mundainity of human existance? See, this all started when my amazing, stupendous, I want to grow up to be like him headmaster (I LOVE having a headmaster!) said that Jesus' coming (Christmas, however odd that is to our modern minds) was a great act of humility. And of course it doesn't take much in the way of a spiritual life to realize that Jesus came down and died for people that hated him. You'd be the nicest person in the world if you lived like that. It might only take a day to understand when people love you so much they do stuff you hate, but when people you hate do stuff you hate you have to try to be like Jesus, which takes a lifetime. And some people never do it. I digress. So Jesus' coming was an act of humility in a different way, because he made himself vulnerable. Jesus scraped his knee (and bled real, red, juicy, gushing blood, not ambrosia) and other boys picked on him! And he was TEMPTED. So you can either say that this is proof God is rediculous and organized religion is foolish, and that is (it pains me to say this) a fair read of this story. But as Aristotle (I think?) said "it behooves the learner to believe", and as Augustine says over and over (paraphrased) "you can't get to God if your proud", so for all the humble, believing souls out there: JESUS LOVED YOU SO MUCH THAT HE SCRAPED HIS KNEE FOR YOU.
GOD IS GOOD! GOD IS GREAT! GOD IS EXCELLENT!
It's not nearly as mundane as you might think! It's miraculous. It's complete mystery. It's incredible!
After I spend a few years in college I think I will also stop using excessive capital letters, but hopefully not, because sometimes God is so good to you the least you can do is give him capital letters. It's like giving God the double highfive instead of the one handed variety. It's not fair how good God is to us. God is always watching over you, and if you want to do something stupid, he's there to stop you! I wish I truly loved God and all his little schemes.
More of Edward Estlin
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It's neat even more so because it uses some choice language. Early on in my blogging history I made the claim that choice language has a purpose, when used with discretion, as a conscious choice, and I'm no flip flopper (for life is no parenthesis). And how else could you address a disgusting problem than with disgusting language? Proccede with caution:
the boys i mean are not refined
the boys i mean are not refined
they go with girls who buck and bite
they do not give a fuck for luck
they hump them thirteen times a night
one hangs a hat upon her tit
one carves a cross on her behind
they do not give a shit for wit
the boys i mean are not refined
they come with girls who bite and buck
who cannot read and cannot write
who laugh like they would fall apart
and masturbate with dynamite
the boys i mean are not refined
they cannot chat of that and this
they do not give a fart for art
they kill like you would take a piss
they speak whatever's on their mind
they do whatever's in their pants
the boys i mean are not refined
they shake the mountains when they dance
Some people just don't capitalize
December 17, 2008 | |
E.E. Cummings didn't. I wish I knew definitively if Cummings wrote cynically. I'd guess not, but he should have. Auden got it better I think. The first:
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world
my blood approves,
and kisses are a far better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry
--the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids' flutter which says
we are for eachother: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life's not a paragraph
And death i think is no parenthesis
you shall above all things be glad and young
For if you're young,whatever life you wear
it will become you;and if you are glad
whatever's living will yourself become.
Girlboys may nothing more than boygirls need:
i can entirely her only love
whose any mystery makes every man's
flesh put space on;and his mind take off time
that you should ever think,may god forbid
and (in his mercy) your true lover spare:
for that way knowledge lies,the foetal grave
called progress,and negation's dead undoom.
I'd rather learn from one bird how to sing
than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance
And the second:
(From Prospero to Ariel)
Will a Miranda who is
No longer a silly lovesick little goose,
When Ferdinand and his brave world are her profession,
Go into raptures over existing at all?
Probably I over-estimate their difficulties;
Just the same, I am very glad I shall never
Be twenty and have to go through that business again,
The hours of fuss and fury, the conceit, the expense.
Links Galore!
December 14, 2008 | |
I know I'm two days late for a link post, but all those traditionalist "Friday Link Post" bloggers can eat it!
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The intelligent and thoughtful Good Thunder graciously corrected my errant post about The Feast of The Immaculate Conception.
But the scientists out there didn't lose the battle yet! According to our friend Franz Karl Naegele you calculate the estimated date of birth by taking the last menstrual period , add a year, subtract three months and add seven days to that date. So it'd all look something like:
March 25
- 3 months = December 25
+7 days = January 1
But then again Jesus could be born 7 days early...
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I saw two comercials on Nickelodian that I couldn't help but laugh at:
There was a time when little girls took care of real babies. How laughabal is it that the little girls of our generation take care of virtual kids!
Don't skip out... watch it all, it only gets better in the last 3/4ths. Nick actually made a game where kids go around shooting toxic chemicals. The youngins can even reduce their CO2 emmissions, as if they had any in the first place. Dennis Prager argues that "the war against tobacco is a symptom and cause of a shallower society. It has done far more harm to America than tobacco." We'll have a generation that thinks driving a car is worse than lieing pretty soon.
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I have never thought of what biblical figure I'd want to be, but Good Thunder chose John the Baptist. I might want to be Solomon. Reading Augustine's Confessions I stumbled on this proverb today: Rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee (Proverbs 9:8). You'd have to be pretty wise to deal with 1000 wives/concubines, especially in a time when half of the men out there can't stick with one.
I love how ragged he looks! Give up all your worldly convinces, bath in rivers, eat bugs for dinner and do the work of God! Amen!
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President Bush got a shoe thrown at him! Pretty good reaction time huh?
I guess it's not too odd of a choice.
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Do The Math brought some interesting stuff to light!I'm fond of "don't listen to me, I'm supposed to be accompanying you". Monk had to be the most humble piano player ever to grace the keys. Or foolish.
And "they tried to get me to hate white people, but someone would always come along and spoil it." Most people can hate someone they know. Sometimes a good guilt trip does my soul good: I remember that Jesus died for people who hated him.
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I want to remind the world that Obama isn't President yet, and in fact he won't be the President-Elect until tommorrow (December 15th).
And I continualy laugh at the close-to-home Coleman v. Franken escapade. This year my excellent, amazing, incredible highschool bought a shinny Scantron machine, and there have been no mishaps filling out the forms yet. And if there were, we'd get the question wrong. Now why can't America be as smart as highschool students?
And why would you alight Mrs. Palin's church? I'm glad they held service elsewhere today! Stick it to 'em.
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The favorite, Miss. Russia, won it all. I'm glad we can judge young woman's beauty in a time when we refuse to judge people based on how they dress, speak or act. But even this messed up reality is proof of the existance of God. Don't think I can do it? Watch! (After this brief picture)
(Miss Russia herself)
Despite national differences, tastes in beauty differ little.
And why is this? Not because of nurture. It's because of nature!
Certain parts of the female anatomy have instinctual draws, sure, but what primitive man would comment on the beauty of Miss. Bosnia-Herzegovina's (my personal favorite, only because of her country of origin) face. Nope... it's bigger than instinct.
And what is part of man's nature, yet more distinctivly human than instinct?!? THE MORAL LAW! God is GOOD, God is GREAT, God is EXCELLENT!
Miss America's greatest achievement "is being accepted as a member of the Entertainment Revue"
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John Cage's Indeterminacy.
" However, to come back to my story. A girl in the college there came back backstage afterward
and told me that something marvelous had happened. I said, “What?” She said, “One of the music majors is thinking for the first time in her life.” Then at dinner (it had been an afternoon concert), the Head of the Music Department told me that as he was leaving the concert hall, three of his students called, saying, “Come over here.” He went over. “What is it?” he said. One of the girls said, “Listen.” "
Advent!
December 10, 2008 | |
I love celebrating seasons of the church. Not because they mark historical dates but because they remind us of themes we can forget in our faith life. Think of how ridiculous celebrating dates as historical markers is? The Feast of The Immaculate Conception didn't even exist until 1476. The room for historical error, especially considering the historical accuracy of the times was plainly high. And even beyond that, the rediculously short pregnancy, or rather long pregnancy, considering that Christmas is less than a month away, would be odd indeed. Even more, why would it be at all important to your faith life to believe that Mary concieved on the 8th of December? Some people look at this and use it as evidence for why all of us religions types are crazy but they forget it's all about reminding us of themes.
On December 8th we celebrated the feast of the Immaculate Conception. A teacher of mine had us sing Happy Birthday. Being a man much consumed in the significance of actions he didn't tell us why we were singing, but my guess is we were reiterating the point that life begins at conception and that celebrating Jesus' coming. Most folks would sing Happy Birthday to Jesus of December 25th, but not at my school! But when I got beyond the pithy humor I was glad to be reminded of the theme of the day: The Virgin Mary. It struck me that she was perfect, without any sin. I can't go a day without sinning, and when ever I think I do I know my conscience has grown lax. And think of how lucky a guy Joseph was to marry a perfect women! There was a new post up at Modestly Yours that day and it became plain to me that The Virgin Mother cares about those women and how they act and dress. That she would even care about us is miraculous: God at least made us... you could (hubristicly and probobly hereticly) say he has a vested intrest in our success but what does Mary care about us? And if Mary cares about us so much and has so little reason to how can man care so little about his fellow man when he has all the reason in the world?
Free Jazz
December 07, 2008 | |
I wrote this as part of a larger speech I am going to deliver on Jazz. I thought it came out pretty well:
The term free-jazz is frightening to most because we have been taught to believe that banging on cans with spoons can be legitimized under the term “free-jazz” but like all music free-jazz can be looked at objectively. You need to distinguish between good music and bad music, and then good music you like and bad music you like. The free-jazz of Ornette Coleman may repulse your ears but to say that it is bad music I would argue is ignorant. To say that banging on cans is good music is ridiculous. Free-jazz is only slightly different than what we have been calling jazz all along. Free jazz eliminates all structure to the music. But jazz has little structure in reality. The most structured jazz song will have a written melody and written chord changes that are strictly adhered to. Jazz musicians had been improvising melodic lines in their solos since it’s inception and Miles Davis almost eliminated chord changes for jazz with his modal expeditions in Kind of Blue. It was not a great leap to decide to compose the melody of the tune on the spot and establish the tonality as the solo saw fit. Really the free-jazz musician is doing what any classical composer does, but while it took Beethoven 6 years to write his 9th symphony free jazz musicians compose instantly. It may seem like I’m downplaying free-jazz but in reality this was a huge step in jazz. You could play whatever you wanted to, whatever you heard going on in your head instantly. The freedom from convention that John Coltrane sought came to complete fruition. Yet this didn’t come without flaws as every great innovation does. The folks who were still listening to jazz lost the ability to say what was good and what wasn’t. Bad music was hailed as revolutionary because it was new. Even more distressing, iconic figures enjoyed instant popularity of every work they put their name on, no matter what it’s quality. Once again jazz became comic this time through Ornette Coleman. No doubt his music was revolutionary. His “The Shape Of Jazz To Come” is a landmark album in jazz. But unfortunately after that everything he layed his name to was hailed as genius. The Bad Plus, a popular jazz group today posted a piece about an Ornette Coleman chord change that encompassed all 12 musical notes, but in reality there was no A; only 11 notes were there. This lead to the response, “maybe this is a sly commentary on Ornette's essence - like, he doesn't need all 12 tones to actually have 12 tones?”. When Ornette decided to pick up a trumpet and violin and do what any parent of a 5 year old would call make noise but what jazz critics called genius one has to wonder. In another humorous yet ridiculous plot Ornette threatened the admittedly promiscuous women who hung out in jazz clubs at the time saying he would castrate himself if they did not leave him alone. He never did, but to seriously make such a claim necessitates mental instability.
Bratz Dolls
December 06, 2008 | |
You go Barbie!
Dakota Combo
December 04, 2008 | |
They say in church communities that without youths the community will die, and that with them it flourishes. The music scene is the same way, especially because of the connection between youth and advances and music. I have no doubt that the Minneapolis music scene (which is surprisingly strong for such an otherwise dull state) will thrive for years to come. I sometimes wonder how I ended up playing with such great players. So come to the Dakota and support live music (I feel like I've made it now that I've had an opportunity to throw out the cliche musicians phrase!).
Strange Fits of Passion Have I Known
December 03, 2008 | |
I'm writing a Symphony for Chorus in short to try and get money for college. I should have started 5 months ago but yesterday I embarked, and since I long ago said I'd never write lyrics again I needed to find some poetry. I decided on William Wordsworth's 5 "Lucy Poems". One nice thing about putting the poetry to music is that you memorize the poetry by accident. Check this out:
Strange fits of passion have I known:
And I will dare to tell,
But in the Lover's ear alone,
What once to me befell.
My initial thought was that Billy Wordsworth was wispering sweet nothings in his lover's ear about the shiver's she sends up his spine. But I'd contend that it is really much deeper than that. "Strange fits of passion" can be read as the moments when love of God overwhelms the soul and all you can do is shout "God is awesome". And "the Lover" can also be thought of as God, who unceasingly loves perfectly. So you have 4 things he can be saying then (pardon the ineloquent language):
1) I tell her how great she is
2) I tell God she is great
3) I tell her how great God is
4) I tell God how great God is
I think the 4 lines encompass all 4 interpretations. Wordsworth and Lucy (if she ever existed) aren't just a lustful grouping. To Wordsworth (and probobly only in Wordsworth's at this point slightly irrational mind), Lucy parallels the divine. The passionate response to God that comes in private prayer is paralleled with the response that company with Lucy brings. And Wordsworth is seemingly humbled (and embarrassed) by both. He only says how perfect the Lucy/God parallel is in life to one of them, and in the poem only under the ambiguous term "Lover".
I'm semi-neglecting the other 6/7ths of the poem right now. But can words even describe how incredibly better a Lucy that parallels the divine is than a Lucy that parallels a English Romantic wench?
Trees and Loves
December 02, 2008 | |
I've been negligent in my commitment to mention a few things I will miss about my high school on a more regular basis. I just wrote a college essay about how awesome my high school was, so I'm well prepared to submit two today:
I will miss attending a school that puts up, count 'em, 4 (big, full, tall) Christmas trees with lights and all. And there is none of this "Happy Holidays" or "Season's Greetings" or "Festive (insert religious/belief/thought neutral statement here)" but it's "MERRY CHRISTMAS!".
I will also miss attending the high school that has the best religion classes ever. Actually that a high school even has religion as a (real) class is pretty cool in my book. Today's religion class at Providence Academy was especially cool. First we discussed the liberal arts, and in an almost telepathic fashion my teacher gave me the perfect apology for my favorite liberal arts college, Thomas Aquinas College. I was using, "learning about the created world brings us closer to God, and so any study of that, whether in math, literature, music or any other pursuit, is worthwhile and noble" but I like his "the liberal arts allow you to and actually think" better. Much more direct.
And then we got into talking about real friendship. The class's vihament opinion that evil people can have friends, and that beliefs have nothing to do with friendship held up the whole thing. I contend that Stalin had no friends ( he killed whatever you could call a friend) and the devout Nazi and Jew were never friends.
But it caused this great need in me to spend too much time rereading C.S. Lewis' The 4 Loves and Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics (Bks. 8 and 9). I have been slowly finding time for Lewis over the past 3 weeks, and I was actually just nearing the chapter on Friendship. And I had read The Ethics during a particularly gruesome part of philosophy class, so it was done pretty shabbily. I took my time and found a lot that I missed! Oh if only I could do homework to actually learn.
And in addition to finding stuff I missed, I actually knew what it was all talking about! It was such an awesome feeling. I could puke it out on a test last year, but now I actually know what it's all saying. I could have wrote out "Eros thinks that a woman being herself is infinitely more important than that she is a woman" a year ago, but re-reading it today I know that it's true.
And that is why half of me wishes I could go to Providence Academy for another 4 years. And the other half of me wishes I could skip the next 10 years of life.