email is so last year

It is a much better idea to use The Bureau of Communications.

There are templates for all sorts of occasions, from accusation to romantic revelation to thank you notes. You just fill in your preferred answers and email them to your pals and enemies. I particularly enjoyed this somewhat specific gem, pictured below. (I feel I should not like the Internet as much as I do.)


P.S. I found this on How About Orange.

raisins may be inferior, but a cookie remains a cookie

Students hit me up for fundraising all the time.

Last week I got a box of pre-portioned cookie dough. I decided to buy Oatmeal Raisin because it's:
1)healthier than chocolate chip
2)less likely to be eaten raw, big wads at a time



I'm not sure about #1, but I think you should know that #2 is flat out untrue.

re: Tianenmen Square

Yesterday, a student told me he wanted to become a dictator over stupid people, like the Chinese.

Me: Chinese people aren't stupid.
Boy: Yes they are. Why else would they stand in front of tanks?


What I wanted to say and didn't: I have no words in the face of this kind of ignorance.

What I wish I'd thought to say: May you possess that level of moral courage at any moment in your life.

Last night I went to a yoga class for the first time in a long while, and we worked on relaxing the tension in our necks, backs, and shoulders.

I've felt like crying all day.

I'm not sure these things are connected, but nor am I sure they're not.

Two films

This weekend, I went to see two films, both of which I recommend. I loved, loved Persepolis, and The Savages was indeed a "serious comedy."

Persepolis:

The Savages:

7515 Apartment 3-D

Dear Apartment 3-D,

People have always laughed a little when I tell them where I live, like you're an IMAX theater, but I'm fiercely serious about you. 3-D, you're no joke to me, like you are my ugly child and I refuse to acknowledge the fact that your ears stick out.

In the interest of full disclosure, I should say that I leapt into you impulsively like some do with matrimony. In a giddy rush, I signed that lease, picturing so many things -- you and me and my sister, you and me and my boyfriend. I didn't picture just you and me, frankly. I didn't anticipate so much quality time, but I think this was my fault entirely. I guess part of my hurry to enter into a contract with you was to get away from somewhere else, and nobody could reasonably hold you culpable. I sure don't.

I've taken you for granted, 3-D, you and your appliances. I've known that I could count on the ease of your lightning-quick dishwasher, so I've let my messes pile high. I've strewn my grading and my dirty clothes all around. I'm sorry. Sort of. Maybe that's just part and parcel of what it means to live with me, mister.

But I've also loved you wantonly. In an April flurry, I blasted your walls with my orange and yellow enthusiasm, and I festooned you with tree roots and a prayer garden. I hung a bird feeder and ribbons with wishes. And I've always been wholly enamored by your fireplace. I've roasted my toes and my back dozens of times, and I would happily reside in your warm glow all day long if teeth didn't need brushed and students didn't need taught. I've spent hours outside on your soft lawn, my blanket and I basking in pretty words and in quiet. We've had some good times. It was never meant to be a forever thing with us, and I think we both knew that, but we've gotten used to each other and I'll be a little sad to see you go.

Our days are numbered, 3-D. Perhaps in light of this new knowledge, I see you more fondly. In my literature classes, I teach students about round and flat characters, the former with complexities and nuances, and the latter without. Well, to me, 3-D, you've always been a delightfully round character. Three-dimensional all the way.

Let's make the most of our last days, and let's part on good terms. Okay?

Sincerely,

Erinn

holding jesus hostage

I saw this video on Dooce, and it's just so outlandish that I almost can't believe it was on an actual news program. I'm proud to hail from West Michigan. (Thanks for noticing that, Julie!)

anything + "loins" = hilarity

For part of their Romeo & Juliet exam, students were supposed to memorize a few short quotations from the play. On the exam, they had to fill in blanks. Here are some of their answers.

Actual text:

• A plague on both your houses!
  - Mercutio

Student answers:

• A shame on both your parts!
• A head on both your sides!

Actual text:

• From forth the fatal loins of these two foes,
  A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life.
  - Chorus

Student answers:

• From forth the tomb loins of these two people
• From forth the long loins of these two families
• From forth the cut loins of these two lovers
• From forth the prodigious loins of these two lovers
• From forth the vexed loins of these two families
• From forth the deep loins of these two lovers
• And my favorite, which gives me a hilarious visual:
  From forth the fighting loins of these two lambs
  
  

Are you telling me you built a time machine... out of a DeLorean?

Walking through the halls today, I heard a sophomore girl say to her friend, "No! You're an Alf ninja!"

Not. Even. Kidding.

confession

Today is Fat Tuesday, the day before the beginning of the Lenten Fast. For centuries, households have taken the day prior to the fast as a time of excess, a moment in which to use up extra fat and sugar. Growing up in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, I joyfully experienced the German tradition of eating fastnachts, potato-based doughnuts that put all other variants to shame. They remain to me the most delectable of sweets, and no pastry or cinnamon roll can ever aspire to reach the golden glow that my childhood memories lend to the fastnacht. I haven’t eaten one in well over a decade.

Last night, I decided to try my hand at a homemade version.

I gorged myself on seven doughnuts. Seven. At probably 500 calories a pop, I consumed double my daily caloric intake in a few hour span. By the end, the smell of hot grease turned my stomach. I carefully bagged the remaining items, satisfied that I’d finished making them, excited to give them to friends, but disappointed that they weren’t nearly as delicious as the ones I’d eaten as a girl. They were good, mark you, but fell short of divinity.

Of course they did.

I sat alone in my apartment with dozens of doughnuts. As my body protested, I stuffed more and more of them down my gullet, perfectly sentient that this act would throw my physical equilibrium to the wind for yet another week. My head knew better, but there was a tyrannous thing that snarled and clawed and reason gave in, as it always does. It was gluttony, and the worst form of it – solitary gluttony.

I think Fat Tuesday is supposed to be a group time of rejoicing and fellowship, a moment to revel before buckling down into the serious contemplation that Lent inspires.

But for me, it was an excuse for me to listen to ugly self-destructive things, and not to my body.


In many circles, Lent is unpopular, the bad cop to Easter’s good one. We don’t much like depriving ourselves, and we wonder at why we should when we’ve been blessed with bounty. We don’t like letting things stand between ourselves and the objects of our desire.

It seems, though, that Lent can be something other than legalistic joy-killing; it could be freedom. The long wait that Lent marks casts a brighter light on the joy of Easter, on the moment when sin and death lost the war for humanity.

After gorging last night, I woke this morning feeling rather like a synthetic version of myself, more chemical than alert, more plastic than human. This morning, looking in the mirror, I noticed that my skin seemed dull and my hair dry and awkward. I was ashamed at what I’d done, and my body looked back at me confused and sad.

I know that for me, it is time for Lent. It is time – not for restriction, but for reality. It is time to be limited. It is time to recognize that joy is a property of the Spirit and not of the bakery. It is time for me to recognize that my body is not my own and that my sustenance matters enough to God that I ought not scramble after it nor fear its absence. All of my attempts to care for myself end up resembling neglect or worship, or some unholy amalgamation of both. Self-limitation is beautiful and strong and, at least for me, infinitely more difficult than self-indulgence.

South Whoville

An attractive man in a business suit walked into Subway after me today. He ordered a roast beast sandwich.

I did not think he was very cute after that.

faith and finance, ad naseum

Hello, My name is Erinn. 

I'm 27 years old and I still don't understand money. 

I'm currently taking a class called Financial Peace University, designed to help people prioritize their spending, get rid of debt, and live more generously. It's a fascinating class, and I'm making some positive changes in my habits, like eating out less frequently and cutting up my credit card. 

Christian doctrine seems to be a bit schizophrenic on how stable and/or significant a Christian's finances ought to be. 

This well-covered ground of faith-centered finance talk has been up in my face a lot of late. The sermons I've heard over the last few weeks have been about wise decision-making, some specifically with respect to finances. 

One of the (many) books I'm reading, Living More With Less, talks a great deal about how Christians ought to live in a way that is essentially near the poverty line because such a lifestyle shows greater respect for the way much of the world lives. One contributor quotes Gandhi's saying, "He who has more than he needs is a thief."

How is this idea to be reconciled with the idea that God wants us to be financially secure so that we might bless others?

It seems as if these two lifestyles fit snugly within the framework of (Western) Christianity. It does not, however, seem as if these two lifestyles are wholly reconcilable. 

And, mark me, I cannot truthfully claim to be consistent with either direction. I don't have financial peace, and I don't cultivate simplicity. I talk about such stuff all the time, but if I'm honest, I'm a closet materialist. Too often I spend my money selfishly, an act that is unconscionable no matter which direction you take. 

I've known godly people in both camps and in neither. What are your thoughts on this?

Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. - Carl Sanburg

Teachers should never, ever say that they choose their profession because of snow days and summer. Never. And I do not wish to sound as if I'm in league with this reprehensible lot.

However, there is so much to be said for snow days.

Snow days are my second favorite kind of day, second only to Christmas Eve in splendor. Summer and spring break and all of these vacationy days fill quickly with family plans and neglected doctor visits. The days pile upon themselves; one day rolls into the next, and soon the vacation itself becomes unpleasantly routine. 

Snow days are perfect because they cannot become routine, and they cannot be planned. I am always prepared to work on such days, awake and usually showered long before I hear the phone ring with news. And then, like glorious petals, the moments unfurl before me. I am, for once, conscious of time, precious time. At all moments of my day, I thrill at the knowledge that I am living the seconds of a gift. The cornmeal wheat pancakes I made for breakfast? A gift. The painting I will finish after lunch? A gift. The fire I sit beside? A gift. Time seems powerful, deep, brimming with meaning and possibility in a way it could not have been if I'd known what it would hold. I run my fingers along its contours, I dip my toes into its oceans. 

Time is a gift, they tell us, a finite set of moments that cannot be stored, only spent.