Unoccupied

About a month ago, I joked about our camping trip as an "Occupy Marin" trip. Since then, the Occupy protest in San Francisco has ended, with the police effectively clearing out the plaza near the ferry building.

Remaining is only this strange lingering sadness when I walk by the former occupy site on my way to work. It was nice to know there were people out there who still cared enough to take a stand by lying down.

Jesus from a Postmodern Perspective: A Man I Could Actually Follow

This is the title of final paper for one of my classes....Intrigued?

This is part-two of my education and faith overlap. I have been in a class this semester studying critical and postmodern pedagogies. It has all the big names in educational theory (Marx, Apple, Giroux, Friere, Foucault  Solaranzo, Bhabba, Said, etc). These are the men and women (mostly white men though, sigh) that get my heart racing. These are the theorist who say what is in my heart for the world of education.

As I have been studying these theories, I realize that what they are saying isn't anything new. Jesus said it all way before any of them or their great, great, great grandparents were born. But I have said all this before here.

Jesus is super appealing and awesome when we actually look at what he preached. So, I started wondering why the church doesn't seem to preach the Jesus that I know and why we don't seem to be compelled to live the way he lived. My answer and a way to articulate it came from this class.

To be continued...

Aging

How do you age gracefully?

My 27th Birthday is quickly approaching and while I don't feel old, a recent magazine article about aging made me wonder how I am going to age gracefully in this day and age. This article was similar to  the what to wear in your 20s, 30s, 40s and beyond articles, but it was for cosmetic surgery and botox. There were recommendations for every decade and I was left wondering if I should be getting botox...And I'm not even 30 yet!

I couldn't finish the article. I was considering a cosmetic change that was more than just lotions and creams. I was considering "procedures" that I used to think only movie stars and the elite underwent in the attempts of clinging to the fountain of youth. Will botox and face lifts be the norm one day?

For a girl who has a hard time contemplating dying her hair when the grey takes over, going under the knife seems impossible. So that is why I pose to you, how do you age gracefully when media is telling you look old when you are 26?

Occupy Marin

In Solidarity with Occupy SF, Occupy Oakland, and Occupy Cal, Robyn and I decided to occupy Hawk Camp in the Marin Headlands. Some highlights from our trip...

We departed the SF Ferry Building headed for Sausalito...

Then we stopped at Lighthouse Cafe for a delicious breakfast. Robyn got a huge

blueberry pancake!

Our backpacks rested like upside turtles in front of the many steps we had to climb... but at the

top the view of the Bay was fantastic!

Finally we arrived at Hawk Camp overlooking the Marin Headlands and SF to the south. Robyn kept warm with her stylish wardrobe of socks while Danny set up the stove for some delicious Mac N Cheese N Sausage under the full moon.

In the morning we packed up, headed down the mountain and caught the 76 bus back across the Golden Gate Bridge, all in time for church at 11am! It was a great escape from the city for the weekend.

Dead Week

SF state doesn't really have a dead week and as a grad student I don't really have finals. I just am writing papers as finals. So, the week before finals isn't really a "dead week" by Cal Poly definitions. However, this week, four weeks from the end of the semester, is a dead week for me. A presentation today, a ten page lit review is due tomorrow, and a six page proposal is due on Thursday. Oh, and I should be doing the reading to go along with all of these classes... approximately 10-12 articles/chapters ranging from 10-20 pages each.

So, why am I writing a blog? Because it is my dead week and procrastination is as much a part of the tradition as little sleep.

Easter on Halloween

Last night we watch Practical Magic to participate in Halloween. In short, Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman bring back a man from the dead and are haunted by his spirit. I won't give away the ending just in case you desperately want to see this C+ movie, but as we were going to bed, it struck me that ghost stories are about letting the dead stay dead. Danny responded that there seems to be something innate in us that knows that it is unnatural to bringing the dead back to life. If we do disturb the dead, scary things happen.

Then, Danny said that there is one story where someone coming back to life isn't scary.

This one story would be the story of Jesus' resurrection. My first response was to agree. Of course Jesus' raising from the dead is a good thing and a happy thing. All the pastel colors, smiling faces, and soft and cuddly bunnies of Easter usually invoke joy in my spirit. Fear for my life and shaking at seeing a dead man alive are not my responses at Easter.

But maybe they should be. With all the images and feelings of Halloween night in my head, the resurrection did not seem that warm and fuzzy. It was actually kind of terrifying. No wonder the first thing Jesus said was do not be afraid. I mean, he was a DEAD MAN literally walking! Now, we can intellectualize that he was neither ghost nor zombie, but a human again. BUT he was no longer human in the same sense as we are human today. He did look different. I am truly surprised that S**t is not recorded as Mary's first word when she saw Jesus. She was coming to anoint a dead body and instead encounters one that is very much alive. Sounds like a Halloween movie to me.

Shouldn't our reaction be similar to a scary movie when we encounter the only person in history who has died and come back to life? Shouldn't we be fearful of what this person could do to us if they can't die? Shouldn't we be shaking and terrified?

Well, no. Why? Because Jesus, in his utmost compassion, says don't be afraid. It is a good thing he is alive. It means that we won't die if we believe in his sacrifice. It means that we don't have to pay for all the wrong things we have done. He welcomes us under his sacrifice and we no longer have to be afraid...of anything.

But, the fear and awe that Mary and the Disciples felt when they first saw Jesus is lost on us during the Easter season. For me, I enjoy the celebration part of Jesus' resurrection. I like the candy, dancing, and happiness. The truth is that Jesus does have a ton of power. It isn't that he never died, but he died and came back to life. A man that can do that is more than a man and that kind of power is scary. I need to be a bit more reverent when I remember this incredible (and a bit creepy) miracle.

Maybe we should reflect more on the resurrection during Halloween in order to restore our awe of the only man who has come back from the dead. Maybe we should be reminded of the scary part of the resurrection. Maybe we should carefully consider someone doing what we know is not "natural".

Can I pour it in the InterVarsity mug?

Danny asked me this the day after we moved into our new apartment. If the beverage had been coffee I would have said sure, even though the InterVarsity mug is not one of my favorites. We had just moved-in and were pulling our dishes out of boxes as we needed them. Drinking coffee out of my favorite mug was the least of my concerns. If the beverage had been milk, water, or juice, I would have agreed to consume my it from the blue, thick walled, mug. Shoot, even if I was handed a cocktail in that mug, I would have gladly accepted it at that point.

So why, when Danny asked this did I shake my head, pry my body, and slowly stumble (for I could barely walk from soreness) toward one specific box?

Because it was wine and it needed a wine glass.