Friday, February 7, 2014
A New Home
As promised, my dear 3.14 readers, I have a new URL today! You can now find me at bethzwrites.blogspot.com.
If I did everything correctly, all links from the old should redirect to the new -- please let me know if you notice anything that doesn't seem like it is flowing correctly. For now, the only difference you should notice is a lack of picture beneath the title. However, a new name and layout are on the way. Stay tuned!
If I did everything correctly, all links from the old should redirect to the new -- please let me know if you notice anything that doesn't seem like it is flowing correctly. For now, the only difference you should notice is a lack of picture beneath the title. However, a new name and layout are on the way. Stay tuned!
Tuesday, February 4, 2014
Upcoming Changes
Dear and loyal 3.14 Readers,
It's been a good run, hasn't it?
We've been on some lovely adventures -- graduation from undergrad and leaving my College; teaching in an inner city and living with some beautiful ladies; interning with the campus ministry, or "The Year of Adventures with Percy"; the acquisition of a Master's Degree; and now marriage and Being a Grown-Up.
Peter Pan was right -- to live is an awfully big adventure. I still love that allusion, but the time has come to say good-bye to Peter Pan. Over the next few days, be prepared for a new URL (I'm learning how to set up re-directs to make that seamless). Then, over the next few weeks, be prepared for some new formatting and a new name.
On one level, I am going to miss the old title, allusion, and style, but the time has come. The changes will help me be a bit more focused and intentional with this blog, which is never a bad thing. In fact, it might be a part of that "Being a Grown-Up" thing.
Sincerely,
Your Loyal Blogger
It's been a good run, hasn't it?
We've been on some lovely adventures -- graduation from undergrad and leaving my College; teaching in an inner city and living with some beautiful ladies; interning with the campus ministry, or "The Year of Adventures with Percy"; the acquisition of a Master's Degree; and now marriage and Being a Grown-Up.
Peter Pan was right -- to live is an awfully big adventure. I still love that allusion, but the time has come to say good-bye to Peter Pan. Over the next few days, be prepared for a new URL (I'm learning how to set up re-directs to make that seamless). Then, over the next few weeks, be prepared for some new formatting and a new name.
On one level, I am going to miss the old title, allusion, and style, but the time has come. The changes will help me be a bit more focused and intentional with this blog, which is never a bad thing. In fact, it might be a part of that "Being a Grown-Up" thing.
Sincerely,
Your Loyal Blogger
Wednesday, January 29, 2014
What Women Want
While we are on the topic of abortion, let's side step to another "women's rights" issue and talk about birth control. Most of the time you hear a dichotomy in conversations about birth control:
I am always overjoyed to see discussions of this nature in the secular spheres. One of the greatest harms the sexual revolution has done is kept women distanced from our bodies. Medicine is learning so much about our bodies -- which are pretty amazing and complex -- but we are taught to reject these inner workings without even knowing what they are.
Regardless of your opinions on birth control, I think it should be fairly obvious that we have a right to know how our bodies work. We can only make informed decisions on how to live our lives if we actually get information about ourselves.
*Contraceptive hormones/devices vs. nothing
*Normal people vs. crazy Catholics
Every now and then there is an admission that such a things as "NFP" exists, although it is generally equated to "nothing," and every now and then there is an admission that some other crazy Christians join the Catholics.
And then I found these articles. These two infinitely secular sources do not make an apologia for natural methods. They simply point out that hormone-free methods of avoiding pregnancy might be something that women want. The first article is less about what is being branded as "Fertility Awareness-Based Methods" (FABM) and more about the rejection of hormonal birth control:
[These women] buy organic kale and all-natural cleaning products, and so can’t quite get down with taking synthetic hormones every day... They’re sick of supposedly egalitarian relationships in which they bear the sole responsibility for staying baby-free.The author's main point is actually the rise of the "pullout method," if such technique can be deemed a method of birth control, as a direct response to a rejection of the Pill. The second article, a response to the first, is much more concerned with FAMB as a solution to this rejection:
Synthetic hormones come with side effects, condoms don’t feel great, intrauterine devices are kind of scary....surveys conducted by physicians at the University of Utah show that when natural fertility-awareness methods are described to women, 25 percent say they would strongly consider using one as their means of birth control. But thanks to its glaring image problem and a set of just-as-formidable infrastructural hindrances, ignorance of fertility awareness-based methods is widespread.This author goes on to explain that FABM is something that women want and do not have access to. She blames two factors: 1) a branding image, where FABM is too closely associated with both the rhythm method (which it is not) and the Catholic Church (which has embraced a religious version); and 2) the fact that it does not bring money to the pockets of pharmaceutical companies.
I am always overjoyed to see discussions of this nature in the secular spheres. One of the greatest harms the sexual revolution has done is kept women distanced from our bodies. Medicine is learning so much about our bodies -- which are pretty amazing and complex -- but we are taught to reject these inner workings without even knowing what they are.
Regardless of your opinions on birth control, I think it should be fairly obvious that we have a right to know how our bodies work. We can only make informed decisions on how to live our lives if we actually get information about ourselves.
Thursday, January 23, 2014
Reminders
Yesterday marked the 41st annual March for Life. As usual, the good Lord gave us a chance at redemptive suffering, this year sending ridiculously cold weather. For a few weeks, I had been promising friends, former classmates, and former colleagues that I would find them in DC. And I awoke Wednesday morning with day two of a cold -- the stage where standing up made me dizzy. I took a sick day against the frigid outdoors and curled up with a cup of herbal tea.
The Captain and I had planned on going to the March together but without a group -- a couple of free radicals, wandering in and out of the pro-life masses. I had just resigned myself to not going and missing all those cool people when the Captain told me that he was planning on heading into work if I was staying in.
With friends as my motivation and the Captain as my excuse, I bundled into a many-layered ball of purple fluff, with a scarf up to the apples of my cheeks and hat and hood pulled over my eyebrows. As it turned out, almost everyone at the March was bundled up in a similar fashion, or with sunglasses or ski goggles fighting the bright sun. This, combined with my reluctance to remove my gloves to use my phone, made it difficult to find people. I tried standing on a bench to peruse the sea of signs... which only made my head spin more.
To make a long story short, we found no one and had as near to a solitary March as two people can in the midst of several hundred thousand fellow protesters. In the end, I found myself rather disappointed and caught myself wondering, Why did we bother to come?
Thankfully, I recognized and rebuked this attitude. God was using our solitude as a reminder: the March for Life isn't about friends, or reunions, or who you know. It isn't about finding former roommates or showing off DC.
It is about the fact that people are dying and our society has given it a legal and cultural stamp of approval.
And until that changes, I need to be my tiny part in letting this nation and this world know that abortion is evil.
And until that changes, I need to be my tiny part of a generation that will not be silent until life triumphs.
And until that changes, I need to offer my tiny bit of redemptive suffering, so that love can win.
The Captain and I had planned on going to the March together but without a group -- a couple of free radicals, wandering in and out of the pro-life masses. I had just resigned myself to not going and missing all those cool people when the Captain told me that he was planning on heading into work if I was staying in.
With friends as my motivation and the Captain as my excuse, I bundled into a many-layered ball of purple fluff, with a scarf up to the apples of my cheeks and hat and hood pulled over my eyebrows. As it turned out, almost everyone at the March was bundled up in a similar fashion, or with sunglasses or ski goggles fighting the bright sun. This, combined with my reluctance to remove my gloves to use my phone, made it difficult to find people. I tried standing on a bench to peruse the sea of signs... which only made my head spin more.
To make a long story short, we found no one and had as near to a solitary March as two people can in the midst of several hundred thousand fellow protesters. In the end, I found myself rather disappointed and caught myself wondering, Why did we bother to come?
Thankfully, I recognized and rebuked this attitude. God was using our solitude as a reminder: the March for Life isn't about friends, or reunions, or who you know. It isn't about finding former roommates or showing off DC.
It is about the fact that people are dying and our society has given it a legal and cultural stamp of approval.
And until that changes, I need to be my tiny part in letting this nation and this world know that abortion is evil.
And until that changes, I need to be my tiny part of a generation that will not be silent until life triumphs.
And until that changes, I need to offer my tiny bit of redemptive suffering, so that love can win.
Monday, January 13, 2014
The Space I Occupy
When feminism was a fun idea and before I pursued it in a haphazard academic fashion, I learned a fact that surprised me. Men and women are taught to take up space differently. Men are taught to sit, stand, move while taking up lots of space. Women, on the other hand, are taught to be self-contained -- folded hands, legs, tucking in ourselves and our stuff. If these two Google searches don't sufficiently demonstrate the difference, watch this video without sound, just paying attention to body language and posture. Or, take a train ride during rush hour. Sit down next to a window and pay attention to how the people next to you sit.
This particular lesson stuck out to me because I remembered learning how to sit as a child. I would sit in the most comfortable position -- which often involved on foot on the opposite leg's knee (this is a great way as a small child to hold a large book) or my legs spread in some other way. I had to learn (rather reluctantly) to sit with my legs together, making myself compact. Now, I am very talented at this. It amazes me at times the difference in the amount of space the Captain and I take up in a church pew -- despite the fact that we are relatively the same size.
All these musings are meant to lead up to this Upworthy video that wandered across my Facebook recently. A young woman recited a bit of slam poetry that addresses how men and women take up space. She spends much of her time discussing food, but I think it goes deeper than how much pizza we can eat:
Thursday, January 9, 2014
Allusion Five: The First Amendment
I offer you the fifth and final installment in my Portugal series:
I suppose it is natural to understand the new by comparison with the familiar. (Hence Portugal story-telling through allusions.) I recognized there how much I was viewing things as an American. Our first morning, we grabbed an “ethnocentric breakfast” from Starbucks -- apparently coffee in paper cups is an American thing and not done in Portugal. And while I came away thinking that coffee in real mugs is a very civilized thing, that was our first day and we slept in and needed coffee and to make our tour on time. At that point, the idea that I couldn’t walk into a coffee shop and get a cup to carry out was a little bizarre.
Coffee was not the most distinctive way that I was American, though some of the other differences helped me understand “American” a little better. We learned from Day 1 that Portugal is very in touch with its history… and its history is older than anything we know. In 1755, an earthquake shook Lisbon and destroyed an ancient city -- at a time when our oldest cities were still rather nascent.
I’m used to playing tourist at monuments, museums, and parks, not churches, palaces, and castles. But when your history stretches back a thousand years, those are the places to see. The first stone cathedral we visited was in the Lisbon cathedral, which impressed me with its cavernous interior. The Captain, having seen (and sung in) European stone churches before, was less easily awed. And two days later I discovered why.
The monastery of St. Jerome in Lisbon was built by Henry the Navigator as a thank you for the safe return of an expedition. We came straight from the tiny village houses of Fatima into the stone and gold and marble richness of the Prince’s thank you. My mind flew in several vaguely formed directions at once:
*The disparity! The contrast of royalty to peasant, rich to poor. I understood the Protestant Reformation and other rebellions against the Church so much better. This point was brought home even more when we visited the Church of São Francisco in Porto, which was covered in 900 pounds of gold leaf.
*Wow -- I wish I could thank God like that. It’s hard to imagine having the kind of gratitude, let alone the resources, to give a mountain-sized church to God. I could use a lesson in gratitude. My thank-you gift to Him tends to be something more akin to a Glory-Be, or a decade of the Rosary, or Mass if I’m really ambitious.
*The First Amendment. Not only was the church built by a prince, but by-gone royalty lined the transepts, born in marble tombs on the backs of marble elephants. As I got a clearer picture of the intertwined nature of Church and State, I began to see a tad better what our forefathers did not want -- in terms of both religion and royalty.
The same musings on the foundation of our country struck me when we visited the National Coach Museum. The Captain had much more enthusiasm about it than I did -- I thought I was going to the medieval equivalent of a car show. I misunderstood the purpose of the coaches. Functionally, of course, they took royalty from point A to point B. But the purpose… to show off. So the coaches were covered with elaborate woodwork, gold leaf, and detailed paintings and upholstered in velvet. The purpose was beauty, but obviously more than beauty -- to impress upon the viewer the wealth and status of the owner.
The former stock-exchange, the Stock Exchange Palace, incidentally, was a way for the country to say the same thing. The whole building was impressive, but one room in particular, the Arabic Room, was created to make sure foreign visitors had a visceral experience of the wealth of the nation. The brightly-colored room glistens with Moorish-inspired detailed patterns of red and blue, outlined with gold leaf.
The whole impression of these structures was to overwhelm in a way that none of our stark, Romanesque national monuments possibly could -- we were built on escaping royalty. A bunch of idealistic, democratic rebels.
I hate to give America the final word in a series about Portugal. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, here is a photographic offering to end our adventures:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
~1st Amendment to the United States Constituion
I suppose it is natural to understand the new by comparison with the familiar. (Hence Portugal story-telling through allusions.) I recognized there how much I was viewing things as an American. Our first morning, we grabbed an “ethnocentric breakfast” from Starbucks -- apparently coffee in paper cups is an American thing and not done in Portugal. And while I came away thinking that coffee in real mugs is a very civilized thing, that was our first day and we slept in and needed coffee and to make our tour on time. At that point, the idea that I couldn’t walk into a coffee shop and get a cup to carry out was a little bizarre.
Coffee was not the most distinctive way that I was American, though some of the other differences helped me understand “American” a little better. We learned from Day 1 that Portugal is very in touch with its history… and its history is older than anything we know. In 1755, an earthquake shook Lisbon and destroyed an ancient city -- at a time when our oldest cities were still rather nascent.
I’m used to playing tourist at monuments, museums, and parks, not churches, palaces, and castles. But when your history stretches back a thousand years, those are the places to see. The first stone cathedral we visited was in the Lisbon cathedral, which impressed me with its cavernous interior. The Captain, having seen (and sung in) European stone churches before, was less easily awed. And two days later I discovered why.
The monastery of St. Jerome in Lisbon was built by Henry the Navigator as a thank you for the safe return of an expedition. We came straight from the tiny village houses of Fatima into the stone and gold and marble richness of the Prince’s thank you. My mind flew in several vaguely formed directions at once:
*The disparity! The contrast of royalty to peasant, rich to poor. I understood the Protestant Reformation and other rebellions against the Church so much better. This point was brought home even more when we visited the Church of São Francisco in Porto, which was covered in 900 pounds of gold leaf.
*Wow -- I wish I could thank God like that. It’s hard to imagine having the kind of gratitude, let alone the resources, to give a mountain-sized church to God. I could use a lesson in gratitude. My thank-you gift to Him tends to be something more akin to a Glory-Be, or a decade of the Rosary, or Mass if I’m really ambitious.
*The First Amendment. Not only was the church built by a prince, but by-gone royalty lined the transepts, born in marble tombs on the backs of marble elephants. As I got a clearer picture of the intertwined nature of Church and State, I began to see a tad better what our forefathers did not want -- in terms of both religion and royalty.
The same musings on the foundation of our country struck me when we visited the National Coach Museum. The Captain had much more enthusiasm about it than I did -- I thought I was going to the medieval equivalent of a car show. I misunderstood the purpose of the coaches. Functionally, of course, they took royalty from point A to point B. But the purpose… to show off. So the coaches were covered with elaborate woodwork, gold leaf, and detailed paintings and upholstered in velvet. The purpose was beauty, but obviously more than beauty -- to impress upon the viewer the wealth and status of the owner.
The former stock-exchange, the Stock Exchange Palace, incidentally, was a way for the country to say the same thing. The whole building was impressive, but one room in particular, the Arabic Room, was created to make sure foreign visitors had a visceral experience of the wealth of the nation. The brightly-colored room glistens with Moorish-inspired detailed patterns of red and blue, outlined with gold leaf.
The whole impression of these structures was to overwhelm in a way that none of our stark, Romanesque national monuments possibly could -- we were built on escaping royalty. A bunch of idealistic, democratic rebels.
I hate to give America the final word in a series about Portugal. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, here is a photographic offering to end our adventures:
 |
| Portugal, the Atlantic Ocean, and a castle, as seen from a palace |
Wednesday, January 8, 2014
Allusion Four: Harry Potter
I refuse to help the craze by linking to anything... if, somehow, you don't know Harry Potter (not sure which among my 3.14 loyal readers would not, but it's possible), a quick Google search will fill you in.
When we left Lisbon, midway through the trip, we took a bus north to a land called Porto. When we checked into our hotel in Porto, the receptionist pulled out a map to show us must-sees. Among them was a cafe which, she told us, was where J.K. Rowling penned Harry Potter’s first chapter. She was married to a Portuguese man at the time, and Porto claims the inspiration for the novels.
I am willing to give it to them -- though, having never visited London, the verdict might be premature. The magical Harry-Potter places include:
The Porto train station. The station itself is a huge white stone building on the outside. The inside is covered with murals in blue tile -- called azulejos -- depicting historical and religious scenes. The walls are covered with kings and queens and knights and peasants and farmers and saints and statues and little girls processing. Through the vast arches waiting the trains, which just burst through the mountainside -- the tracks lead in and out of a stone tunnel. We took a cruise up the Douro River to visit wine country (and visited some of Europe’s oldest and highest lock systems) and returned on a train to this station. As we chugged along the dark countryside, I agreed with the assessment that this was the Hogwarts Express.
The Majestic Cafe. When people state that Rowling started writing Harry Potter on a napkin in a European cafe, I picture a small outdoor patio that blends the historic and hipster into one perfect cappuccino. Instead, the Captain and I found a noble tea-room serving high tea in china pots with scones silver baskets and cloth napkins. The walls were tall mirrors lined with golden woodwork and topped with cherubs. The table-conversations rose slightly above a murmur and were accompanied by live music from a grand piano in the back. I honored the occasion with tea and scones -- accompanied by cream for the scones, something that fascinated the Captain.
The bookstore, Livraria Lello e Irmão. When we were told to find the bookstore that inspired Harry Potter and saw its icon on our tourist map, I expected a grand library dominating a street corner. Instead, we walked by the innocuous storefront at least twice before we realized it was the building we sought. The inside, however, did not disappoint. Books, of course, lined every inch of the store -- and a metal track allowed a cart like a mining train to transport books around the floor. And in the center -- a sweeping, doubled staircase, painted brilliant red next to rich wood, leading up to the second floor. The walls hosted paintings and detailed woodwork. And, of course, the books! The Captain found it slightly less fascinating than I did -- he is still learning how to drag me out of bookstores.
When we left Lisbon, midway through the trip, we took a bus north to a land called Porto. When we checked into our hotel in Porto, the receptionist pulled out a map to show us must-sees. Among them was a cafe which, she told us, was where J.K. Rowling penned Harry Potter’s first chapter. She was married to a Portuguese man at the time, and Porto claims the inspiration for the novels.
I am willing to give it to them -- though, having never visited London, the verdict might be premature. The magical Harry-Potter places include:
The Porto train station. The station itself is a huge white stone building on the outside. The inside is covered with murals in blue tile -- called azulejos -- depicting historical and religious scenes. The walls are covered with kings and queens and knights and peasants and farmers and saints and statues and little girls processing. Through the vast arches waiting the trains, which just burst through the mountainside -- the tracks lead in and out of a stone tunnel. We took a cruise up the Douro River to visit wine country (and visited some of Europe’s oldest and highest lock systems) and returned on a train to this station. As we chugged along the dark countryside, I agreed with the assessment that this was the Hogwarts Express.
The Majestic Cafe. When people state that Rowling started writing Harry Potter on a napkin in a European cafe, I picture a small outdoor patio that blends the historic and hipster into one perfect cappuccino. Instead, the Captain and I found a noble tea-room serving high tea in china pots with scones silver baskets and cloth napkins. The walls were tall mirrors lined with golden woodwork and topped with cherubs. The table-conversations rose slightly above a murmur and were accompanied by live music from a grand piano in the back. I honored the occasion with tea and scones -- accompanied by cream for the scones, something that fascinated the Captain.
The bookstore, Livraria Lello e Irmão. When we were told to find the bookstore that inspired Harry Potter and saw its icon on our tourist map, I expected a grand library dominating a street corner. Instead, we walked by the innocuous storefront at least twice before we realized it was the building we sought. The inside, however, did not disappoint. Books, of course, lined every inch of the store -- and a metal track allowed a cart like a mining train to transport books around the floor. And in the center -- a sweeping, doubled staircase, painted brilliant red next to rich wood, leading up to the second floor. The walls hosted paintings and detailed woodwork. And, of course, the books! The Captain found it slightly less fascinating than I did -- he is still learning how to drag me out of bookstores.
Friday, January 3, 2014
Allusion Three: The Day the Sun Danced
And now, the moment you've all been waiting for: Fatima!
I’m not sure this counts as an allusion, and, if it does, it is certainly not clever. The Day the Sun Danced is a children’s animated movie about the miracle of Fatima and the apparitions of Our Lady to the three shepherd children. If you don’t know about it, I would suggested more research than this video, but I would also recommend getting in touch with your inner child by starting here.
The Captain and I grabbed a bus from Lisbon to Fatima our second morning in Portugal. We started the morning with breakfast at a local coffee shop, a routine that quickly became one of my favorite things about Portugal. The dreary, drippy day (that got worse, rather than better as we approached Fatima) made me grateful for the water resistant jacket that the Captain had purchased to keep his bride warm. We trudged through the drizzle from the bus stop to the shrine, eager to find the information center, which I hoped was heated.
We found neither information nor heat, but instead a vast, cold basilica with an auditorium feel and an overwhelmingly gold mosaic. We did not linger long. Our next step took us to an underground series of chapels, all of which were closed, except for an Adoration chapel in the same empty, gold style as the basilica. Jesus was there, which made it awesome, but I was struggling with disappointed hopes for Fatima when we left the chapel.
We at last found a map in an otherwise barren building, which pointed us toward “Informacioãos.” That tiny building provided information only in the form of an English version of the map we already held. So we used it to explore.
Probably the greatest surprise I had in all of Portugal were those first couple hours in Fatima. The whole shrine felt… smoothed over. The cold basilica sat at one side of a huge esplanade, a vast stretch of concrete, asphalt, and limestone that stretched to a mountain of stairs, leading up to a covered outdoor altar and an older basilica. We gave ourselves a chilly tour of that basilica, a stone church built in the 1950s, and the resting place of the children who saw Mary.
Next, we set our sights on two meals -- lunch and then Mass. In between the two, we stopped at the Chapel of Apparitions, a three-sided glass and wood structure built to protect the small white house erected not long after the apparitions. We were surrounded by a few other pilgrims -- hearty, desperate, or determined, to be here in the grey. Praying there, so near to Our Lady, her presence so real, my heart broke. I know people come from all over for all reasons, but the ones that were most palpable were those from burdened hearts, overflowing to their mother -- people bringing their deep sorrows from this valley of tears. I was rather depressed as we returned to the old basilica for Mass.
Every Mass we attended in Portugal was, unsurprisingly, in Portuguese. My lack of understanding led to contemplative Masses. I brought before Our Lady all the aching I had felt in the Chapel of Apparitions. She took the aches… and gave me back her love. Her love that had led her aching heart, on behalf of her Son’s aching heart, to these particular people in this particular land, with one particular message -- that stretched across the world to spread her love and her Son’s love to people beyond that land. To touch even my heart in this valley of tears.
After Mass, I was much better disposed to the Shrine. The Captain saw people coming out of a building -- and since we were having trouble determining what was locked and what was open, we swam upstream into the building. There, I negotiated with a nun who spoke four or five languages in the only one we had in common (Spanish) to obtain tickets for a tour of the “exhibition.” I had no idea what to expect -- it turns out there were rooms filled with votive offerings left and sent to Our Lady of Fatima, from popes and pilgrims. I wished I had something to leave her.
By now, it was getting dark and we still needed to find our hotel. So we bought a couple candles and lit them in intercession for all the intentions that had been sent with us to Fatima.
Day Two of Fatima brought us to the countryside, about a mile from the shrine. We took a cab, whose driver was named John Paul -- “John Paul III,” he joked. This day, the sun favored us. The chill of the air and the damp of the dew, under the cloudless sky, made the morning feel new and refreshing. Limestone paths lead us into groves of olive trees, speckled with holmoaks and rock. We found a statue of Our Lady, marking where she appeared once to the children of Fatima, as well as statues of the Angel of Peace and the children, where he taught them a prayer of reparation and gave them communion. Out here, the world was at peace and so quiet that I felt as if I would hear Mary’s voice if I stayed and listen long enough. We had the paths to ourselves, with only orange breasted birds for company.
The paths eventually lead us into the village of Aljustrel, where the children had lived. We found another site of an angelic apparition, where the Angel of Portugal warned the children that they were going to suffer greatly, and the houses where they grew up -- tiny, simple buildings that made them somehow more real as children than anything I had seen or read thus far.
By the time, other pilgrims had started to appear. As the world finished waking up, we reluctantly left the corner of the world where, once, the sun danced.
I’m not sure this counts as an allusion, and, if it does, it is certainly not clever. The Day the Sun Danced is a children’s animated movie about the miracle of Fatima and the apparitions of Our Lady to the three shepherd children. If you don’t know about it, I would suggested more research than this video, but I would also recommend getting in touch with your inner child by starting here.
The Captain and I grabbed a bus from Lisbon to Fatima our second morning in Portugal. We started the morning with breakfast at a local coffee shop, a routine that quickly became one of my favorite things about Portugal. The dreary, drippy day (that got worse, rather than better as we approached Fatima) made me grateful for the water resistant jacket that the Captain had purchased to keep his bride warm. We trudged through the drizzle from the bus stop to the shrine, eager to find the information center, which I hoped was heated.
We found neither information nor heat, but instead a vast, cold basilica with an auditorium feel and an overwhelmingly gold mosaic. We did not linger long. Our next step took us to an underground series of chapels, all of which were closed, except for an Adoration chapel in the same empty, gold style as the basilica. Jesus was there, which made it awesome, but I was struggling with disappointed hopes for Fatima when we left the chapel.
We at last found a map in an otherwise barren building, which pointed us toward “Informacioãos.” That tiny building provided information only in the form of an English version of the map we already held. So we used it to explore.
Probably the greatest surprise I had in all of Portugal were those first couple hours in Fatima. The whole shrine felt… smoothed over. The cold basilica sat at one side of a huge esplanade, a vast stretch of concrete, asphalt, and limestone that stretched to a mountain of stairs, leading up to a covered outdoor altar and an older basilica. We gave ourselves a chilly tour of that basilica, a stone church built in the 1950s, and the resting place of the children who saw Mary.
Next, we set our sights on two meals -- lunch and then Mass. In between the two, we stopped at the Chapel of Apparitions, a three-sided glass and wood structure built to protect the small white house erected not long after the apparitions. We were surrounded by a few other pilgrims -- hearty, desperate, or determined, to be here in the grey. Praying there, so near to Our Lady, her presence so real, my heart broke. I know people come from all over for all reasons, but the ones that were most palpable were those from burdened hearts, overflowing to their mother -- people bringing their deep sorrows from this valley of tears. I was rather depressed as we returned to the old basilica for Mass.
Every Mass we attended in Portugal was, unsurprisingly, in Portuguese. My lack of understanding led to contemplative Masses. I brought before Our Lady all the aching I had felt in the Chapel of Apparitions. She took the aches… and gave me back her love. Her love that had led her aching heart, on behalf of her Son’s aching heart, to these particular people in this particular land, with one particular message -- that stretched across the world to spread her love and her Son’s love to people beyond that land. To touch even my heart in this valley of tears.
After Mass, I was much better disposed to the Shrine. The Captain saw people coming out of a building -- and since we were having trouble determining what was locked and what was open, we swam upstream into the building. There, I negotiated with a nun who spoke four or five languages in the only one we had in common (Spanish) to obtain tickets for a tour of the “exhibition.” I had no idea what to expect -- it turns out there were rooms filled with votive offerings left and sent to Our Lady of Fatima, from popes and pilgrims. I wished I had something to leave her.
By now, it was getting dark and we still needed to find our hotel. So we bought a couple candles and lit them in intercession for all the intentions that had been sent with us to Fatima.
Day Two of Fatima brought us to the countryside, about a mile from the shrine. We took a cab, whose driver was named John Paul -- “John Paul III,” he joked. This day, the sun favored us. The chill of the air and the damp of the dew, under the cloudless sky, made the morning feel new and refreshing. Limestone paths lead us into groves of olive trees, speckled with holmoaks and rock. We found a statue of Our Lady, marking where she appeared once to the children of Fatima, as well as statues of the Angel of Peace and the children, where he taught them a prayer of reparation and gave them communion. Out here, the world was at peace and so quiet that I felt as if I would hear Mary’s voice if I stayed and listen long enough. We had the paths to ourselves, with only orange breasted birds for company.
The paths eventually lead us into the village of Aljustrel, where the children had lived. We found another site of an angelic apparition, where the Angel of Portugal warned the children that they were going to suffer greatly, and the houses where they grew up -- tiny, simple buildings that made them somehow more real as children than anything I had seen or read thus far.
By the time, other pilgrims had started to appear. As the world finished waking up, we reluctantly left the corner of the world where, once, the sun danced.
Friday, December 27, 2013
Allusion Two: XKCD
Take a moment and revel in the fact that this allusion is host to another allusion. It’s like a mirror reflecting a mirror.
Okay, now picture this: you are standing on a stone wall, blocked from the edge of the mountain by massive ramparts that seem both as sturdy as the earth and shockingly sparse as a barrier between you and the open air that whips around your face and hair. You can see for miles in every direction. Look one way and forested land brings you to the beginning of the ocean, which eventually, in something resembling a horizon, falls off into the sky. Look the other way and you see hills and forests and towns sprawling out as far as your eye can manage. Look down and you see a lush flowering of trees dotted with chateaux, monasteries, and palaces. (Just don’t look behind you, or the German tourist doing the can-can over the edge might change the source of your breathlessness from exhilaration to fear.)
The castle was built into the mountain nearly a thousand years ago by the Moors. Unlike the kings who used this place as an artistic royal hang-out in the 1800s, the builders of the castle didn’t want the beauty of the view. They could see potential enemies approaching from any and all directions. As romantic as an “ancient castle on top of a windswept mountain” sounds, the structure was built to be the opposite of romantic: a purely utilitarian defensive endeavor. Both the Captain and I have visions of people plummeting to their deaths -- including the German can-can girl. We are shocked and delighted by the lack of ropes, rails, and warnings.
When we visited one of the palaces of the village -- not one of those dotting the forest below us, but one facing us on an opposing hilltop -- we found a similar child-like delight. As fascinating as it was to wander through the ornate rooms of the palace and imagine myself living in the lady-in-waiting’s chamber (less rich, but more charming than the queen’s), I loved best the climbing into (decorative) turrets and creeping along the walkways that hug the outside of the palace, dropping off into the brush clinging to the mountainside.
We are also delighted, in an unromantic way, by the wind turbines that speckle the tops of many of the hills we can see. We took a train ride out to the castle village of Sintra, as well as a few bus trips across Portugal, and we found the wind turbines everywhere. Not enough that they feel ubiquitous or overwhelming, but enough that they are part of the landscape -- surprisingly modern in a country that is still very much in touch with the beauty of its history.
On each bus trip we took -- a shorter one to and from Fatima and a longer one to and from Porto -- I watch the wind turbines, expecting them to come alive. I wanted to bring both -- the wind turbines and the bus -- back to the US. The public transportation, inter and intra-city, tended to be both affordable and convenient. We took trains, buses, boats, and cabs for all ten days and never once wished for a rental car. In fact, the driving patterns were difficult to follow. And the parking patterns even more so. More than once, we were almost hit by a parking car whose driver decided to jump his car onto the sidewalk and back up until it seemed like a good patch of sidewalk on which to leave his car.
Monday, December 23, 2013
Allusion One: The Arm of the Starfish
Madeline L’Engle is one of my favorite authors. Besides the fact that I enjoy her writing and stories, she has a talent for setting her worlds just next to ours -- everything is exactly the same and exactly right, except that she adds in a tad of history or geography that is not quite real. Her characters all inhabit this world with six degrees of separation, giving it a realistic texture. This particular novel is set in Portugal and has a chase scene that winds through the streets, museums, and monasteries of Lisbon. So, of course, when I found myself running through the streets, museums, and monasteries of Lisbon, I thought of Adam and Joshua.
Two things from the book stuck out in my memory. First, that Portuguese is a difficult language to learn, even if you know Spanish. It was a true God-send the amount of English that had permeated the culture in Portugal. Most young people we encountered spoke English at least passibly, some very well. We learned please and thank you and a very few other words before reaching Portugal, but they have a whole bunch of sounds that don’t resemble English or Spanish. So I ended up being able to read it enough to get by, to understand it enough to feel like I almost should be able to know something, and to speak it enough to look like a fool.
One of my favorite linguistic encounters came with a nun in Fatima. We wanted to go on a tour of the gift exhibition (they display votive gifts that people have left for Our Lady of Fatima). We asked the nun at the desk, “Fala ingles?” She did not, but offered us French, Italian, and Spanish as alternatives to Portuguese. So I got the information for the tour in Spanish, which was clearly not a native tongue for either of us.
My next favorite linguistic encounter was with a taxi driver who spoke no English. He was clearly a boisterous and friendly man, however. The Captain pointed to a map to show where we wanted to go -- “Oh, monasterio -- Geronimos!” He then began a conversation about how cold it was outside. It contained more laughter than substantial communication. When we approached our destination, he pointed out to us where we wanted to eat pastries and coffee as well as how to get to another historical site nearby -- all with hand gestures, sound effects, and our half-dozen words of Portuguese.
The second aspect of Portugal that stuck out to me from L’Engle’s book was the warm, light, airy feel of the country. This feeling was partly true. The warm is a thing. We only had temperatures in the mid-50s, but a few people we met assured us that this was cold -- January weather. Which means that plants stay alive because there is little, if any, frost. Flowers were still bravely in bloom, oranges were ripening on trees, and markets had planters of herbs springing into the walkways. The wind whipped away whatever heat might make it out of our (wind-proof) jackets, but the sun reassured us that it was not as cold as we thought.
As for the lightness and the airiness… we were in cities and they felt like cities -- just with narrower roads (and sidewalks) than we were used to. And many of the roads and sidewalks were limestone cobbles -- prettier than pavement at home, but worse on ankles that bricks. I saw many many women braving them in high heels, which seemed to be a very particular talent. In both Lisbon and Porto (the two cities we got to know), we embarked on lengthy walking tours across this sidewalk and saw houses in an array of light colors. Many sported the colored tile that is a hallmark of Portuguese architecture. Almost all were roofed in red clay tiles. So while the city seemed city-ish when walking through it, when looked at from above or afar, almost every Portuguese town or city we passed looked light and airy.
I want to reread The Arm of the Starfish and see which monastery hosts the end of the chase scene. We visited one monastery in Lisbon and looked at one from afar. The monastery was a huge, ancient stone building that held ornate religious art and the earthly remains of long-gone monarchs. The tabernacle was large enough that Jesus’ earthly form could have been inside it, holding His cross -- and it still would have looked too big to do the job. But I’ll get into more details about monarchs and monasteries in another allusion. (Teaser: the First Amendment.)
Two things from the book stuck out in my memory. First, that Portuguese is a difficult language to learn, even if you know Spanish. It was a true God-send the amount of English that had permeated the culture in Portugal. Most young people we encountered spoke English at least passibly, some very well. We learned please and thank you and a very few other words before reaching Portugal, but they have a whole bunch of sounds that don’t resemble English or Spanish. So I ended up being able to read it enough to get by, to understand it enough to feel like I almost should be able to know something, and to speak it enough to look like a fool.
One of my favorite linguistic encounters came with a nun in Fatima. We wanted to go on a tour of the gift exhibition (they display votive gifts that people have left for Our Lady of Fatima). We asked the nun at the desk, “Fala ingles?” She did not, but offered us French, Italian, and Spanish as alternatives to Portuguese. So I got the information for the tour in Spanish, which was clearly not a native tongue for either of us.
My next favorite linguistic encounter was with a taxi driver who spoke no English. He was clearly a boisterous and friendly man, however. The Captain pointed to a map to show where we wanted to go -- “Oh, monasterio -- Geronimos!” He then began a conversation about how cold it was outside. It contained more laughter than substantial communication. When we approached our destination, he pointed out to us where we wanted to eat pastries and coffee as well as how to get to another historical site nearby -- all with hand gestures, sound effects, and our half-dozen words of Portuguese.
The second aspect of Portugal that stuck out to me from L’Engle’s book was the warm, light, airy feel of the country. This feeling was partly true. The warm is a thing. We only had temperatures in the mid-50s, but a few people we met assured us that this was cold -- January weather. Which means that plants stay alive because there is little, if any, frost. Flowers were still bravely in bloom, oranges were ripening on trees, and markets had planters of herbs springing into the walkways. The wind whipped away whatever heat might make it out of our (wind-proof) jackets, but the sun reassured us that it was not as cold as we thought.
As for the lightness and the airiness… we were in cities and they felt like cities -- just with narrower roads (and sidewalks) than we were used to. And many of the roads and sidewalks were limestone cobbles -- prettier than pavement at home, but worse on ankles that bricks. I saw many many women braving them in high heels, which seemed to be a very particular talent. In both Lisbon and Porto (the two cities we got to know), we embarked on lengthy walking tours across this sidewalk and saw houses in an array of light colors. Many sported the colored tile that is a hallmark of Portuguese architecture. Almost all were roofed in red clay tiles. So while the city seemed city-ish when walking through it, when looked at from above or afar, almost every Portuguese town or city we passed looked light and airy.
I want to reread The Arm of the Starfish and see which monastery hosts the end of the chase scene. We visited one monastery in Lisbon and looked at one from afar. The monastery was a huge, ancient stone building that held ornate religious art and the earthly remains of long-gone monarchs. The tabernacle was large enough that Jesus’ earthly form could have been inside it, holding His cross -- and it still would have looked too big to do the job. But I’ll get into more details about monarchs and monasteries in another allusion. (Teaser: the First Amendment.)
Portugal in Allusions
It has recently come to my attention that I have been silent longer than I guaranteed in my last post. To honor my promise to be back for Advent, I am making it for the... last day of Advent (more or less). I have been writing a series of posts so that I can stick them up one at a time and start stockpiling some more posts and ideas for posts. And here is your beginning:
As you know, I recently got married. And, though work took me out of town right away, the Captain* and I did get to embark on an adventure of a honeymoon, just a little delayed. We flew across the ocean to a little country called Portugal to visit a part of Europe that he had not yet seen. I had not yet seen any of Europe -- it was my first time using my brand-new passport.
I could spend the next few weeks going on and on about Portugal, but one of my goals is not to bored my 3.14 loyal readers. So instead, I will have a few posts chronicling our adventures in a series of allusions -- because we understand everything new in terms of what we know. If you ask me in real life, I will tell you stories and show you pictures… once they make it off my camera and the Captain’s phone.
*Yes, he has been pseudonymless up until this point. He is remarkably difficult to name. I hope this makes you think of the Sound of Music. When I told our DJs that we wanted to be introduced as Captain and Mrs. von Trapp, one of them took notes. The other one got it and laughed. Like Captain von Trapp, he can sing and dance. Unlike Captain von Trapp, he has no children. Like Mrs. von Trapp, I have an affinity for nuns. Unlike Mrs. von Trapp, I cannot sing or dance.
As you know, I recently got married. And, though work took me out of town right away, the Captain* and I did get to embark on an adventure of a honeymoon, just a little delayed. We flew across the ocean to a little country called Portugal to visit a part of Europe that he had not yet seen. I had not yet seen any of Europe -- it was my first time using my brand-new passport.
I could spend the next few weeks going on and on about Portugal, but one of my goals is not to bored my 3.14 loyal readers. So instead, I will have a few posts chronicling our adventures in a series of allusions -- because we understand everything new in terms of what we know. If you ask me in real life, I will tell you stories and show you pictures… once they make it off my camera and the Captain’s phone.
*Yes, he has been pseudonymless up until this point. He is remarkably difficult to name. I hope this makes you think of the Sound of Music. When I told our DJs that we wanted to be introduced as Captain and Mrs. von Trapp, one of them took notes. The other one got it and laughed. Like Captain von Trapp, he can sing and dance. Unlike Captain von Trapp, he has no children. Like Mrs. von Trapp, I have an affinity for nuns. Unlike Mrs. von Trapp, I cannot sing or dance.
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Honey-Mooning
Here's the problem with sporadic blogs -- people don't read them.
Since that happens organically, it's likely that my 3.5 loyal followers have already given up on me. If, however, there is still one hanger-on, I want that hanger-on to know that the last three weeks and the next three weeks are my official honey-mooning (yes, I just got married!) and getting life settled anew period. I will be back in time to catch most of the Advent season.
Since that happens organically, it's likely that my 3.5 loyal followers have already given up on me. If, however, there is still one hanger-on, I want that hanger-on to know that the last three weeks and the next three weeks are my official honey-mooning (yes, I just got married!) and getting life settled anew period. I will be back in time to catch most of the Advent season.
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
Dating Advice for Men and Women
I'm going to take a slight risk with this post. Recently, this blog about dating advice for men has been floating around Facebook. And, men, read it. Women, go ahead and read it too. It is good dating advice for men. But I want to offer a counterpoint to women, because, quite frankly, we don't always do things better than men do. So, with further ado,
Five Notes on Dating for the Ladies
1) Be clear.
If men need to be intentional, so do women. We often can get away with playing games, with blowing hot and cold, with sending mixed signals and misleading hints. If we don't want guys equivocating, playing that pseudo-dating game, or defaulting into relationships, rather than straight-up asking us out, we've got to start straight-up answering. Be honest with the men in your life, especially when they are being honest and vulnerable with you.
Part of the ability to be clear and honest comes from a deep self-knowledge. How can you let someone else know what you want from a relationship, what you need in life, where you see yourself going through the year, unless you know can answer these questions? How can you tell if someone shares your values and priorities, unless you can identify them for yourself? The men I have seen be most hurt by women are wounded by women who don't know their own desires well enough. For example, more than one man in my life has been told by a woman, "I don't want to date; I want to court/be courted" -- yet she could not tell him what she mean by "courtship."
We don't need to have it all figured out -- we none of us have it all figured out -- but we need enough to recognize ourselves in an internal mirror and communicate some of that image, so to speak.
2) Be rational.
That being said... be honest, but don't overdo the analysis. I have two subpoints under this point 2).
a) Don't overtalk/overdiscuss it. Yes, it is good to know where your relationship stands. Sometimes this will require a DTR, depending on how the relationship started/progressed. But you don't need a DTR every day or every week, or even every month. Let things grow and progress; let the relationship take its course. You may need to reevaluate after a few months if it is not clear to you how things are progressing. That's okay -- and it's okay to bring it up if you have a strong reason to think something has changed. It just should not be an every single day discussion.
b) Don't overanalyze. Some of the best advice on communication between the genders is simple arithmetic. Men, when a lady speaks, take what you think she means, and multiply it by 3. Ladies, when a man speaks, take what you think he means and divide it by 3. Most things he says/does are not veiled hints, secret messages, or hidden meanings. When he says he doesn't want to hang out tonight because his football team is playing and he wants to watch it with the boys, that does not mean he doesn't like you. It doesn't mean he doesn't want to date you. It doesn't even mean he's tired of you. It simply means that he wants some beer and wings and to watch the Patriots play. If your mind is going crazy over-analyzing things, you are going to have a hard time holding yourself to (2)(a).
3) Let him lead.
If you have read anything on this blog (including that little bio of me on the side), you will have figured out that I am a self-professed feminist and a strong Polish woman. That should tell you two things about number (3). First, that I have a hard time writing it for fear of how some people may interpret it. Second, that I don't mean look down and be a doormat. I don't mean he has to make all the decisions or run your life. In fact, stay away from those models! Instead, find where and how he is a leader and affirm him in those areas. Figure out intentionally how to incorporate these things into your relationship.
As a corollary: let him do those little chivalrous things that melt female hearts, but don't demand them! This is a tricky balance to reach. I had a couple of male friends who taught me something about the balance when I was too far on the other side. They did things like run in front of me to open doors and flat-out refuse to go through lines before me. Eventually, I learned to accept these gestures with grace, rather than rolled eyes. I also got to witness how this small, token affirmation of their masculinity helped them develop it in other ways.
On the other hand, many men are not taught to do these things, or are taught by the women in their lives NOT to do these things. So judge a man by a greater picture of his heart than whether he takes the outside of the sidewalk.
4) Guard his eyes.
Okay, so guys were told to help guard our hearts. Ladies, we have got to guard their eyes. I tend to hate soapboxes on modesty and I am not going to tell you what to wear or how many inches below your neck your neckline should sit. As I walk through the mall with my fiance, I find myself jokingly covering his eyes at times -- but only half-jokingly. Because the fact is, I don't want him to see those parts of other ladies! And as a general rule of thumb, the parts of other ladies that I don't want him to see are the parts of me he should not be seeing till we are married. If I want him to entertain only pure thoughts about me, I need to be presenting myself in such a way that I encourage only pure thoughts. It's not about blaming women for men's thoughts -- it's about love. If I love him, I want to make it as easy as possible for him to keep his mind full of pure thoughts.
5) Girls struggle with lust too.
This is a direct answer to number 5 for men, on physical touch.
One day, I stumbled across a couple articles (I'm not sure that these were the ones, but they are good ones I found in retrospect) that focused on the fact that women struggle with physical desire. I was shocked at how freeing I found this point. When we believe that we should not be having a particular struggle, there are two consequences: 1) we tend to deny that we are having that struggle, which leads us unable to combat it; and 2) we tend to think we are particularly alone and particularly awful for having that struggle. We are too often led to believe that lust is a struggle unique to men, that only men desire more physically than is allowable before marriage. This is just not true. We were born with the same original sin and the same concupiscent desires as men. So ladies, read point number 5 for the men, and apply it to your own lives. And maybe click the links in the first sentence.
Five Notes on Dating for the Ladies
1) Be clear.
If men need to be intentional, so do women. We often can get away with playing games, with blowing hot and cold, with sending mixed signals and misleading hints. If we don't want guys equivocating, playing that pseudo-dating game, or defaulting into relationships, rather than straight-up asking us out, we've got to start straight-up answering. Be honest with the men in your life, especially when they are being honest and vulnerable with you.
Part of the ability to be clear and honest comes from a deep self-knowledge. How can you let someone else know what you want from a relationship, what you need in life, where you see yourself going through the year, unless you know can answer these questions? How can you tell if someone shares your values and priorities, unless you can identify them for yourself? The men I have seen be most hurt by women are wounded by women who don't know their own desires well enough. For example, more than one man in my life has been told by a woman, "I don't want to date; I want to court/be courted" -- yet she could not tell him what she mean by "courtship."
We don't need to have it all figured out -- we none of us have it all figured out -- but we need enough to recognize ourselves in an internal mirror and communicate some of that image, so to speak.
2) Be rational.
That being said... be honest, but don't overdo the analysis. I have two subpoints under this point 2).
a) Don't overtalk/overdiscuss it. Yes, it is good to know where your relationship stands. Sometimes this will require a DTR, depending on how the relationship started/progressed. But you don't need a DTR every day or every week, or even every month. Let things grow and progress; let the relationship take its course. You may need to reevaluate after a few months if it is not clear to you how things are progressing. That's okay -- and it's okay to bring it up if you have a strong reason to think something has changed. It just should not be an every single day discussion.
b) Don't overanalyze. Some of the best advice on communication between the genders is simple arithmetic. Men, when a lady speaks, take what you think she means, and multiply it by 3. Ladies, when a man speaks, take what you think he means and divide it by 3. Most things he says/does are not veiled hints, secret messages, or hidden meanings. When he says he doesn't want to hang out tonight because his football team is playing and he wants to watch it with the boys, that does not mean he doesn't like you. It doesn't mean he doesn't want to date you. It doesn't even mean he's tired of you. It simply means that he wants some beer and wings and to watch the Patriots play. If your mind is going crazy over-analyzing things, you are going to have a hard time holding yourself to (2)(a).
3) Let him lead.
If you have read anything on this blog (including that little bio of me on the side), you will have figured out that I am a self-professed feminist and a strong Polish woman. That should tell you two things about number (3). First, that I have a hard time writing it for fear of how some people may interpret it. Second, that I don't mean look down and be a doormat. I don't mean he has to make all the decisions or run your life. In fact, stay away from those models! Instead, find where and how he is a leader and affirm him in those areas. Figure out intentionally how to incorporate these things into your relationship.
As a corollary: let him do those little chivalrous things that melt female hearts, but don't demand them! This is a tricky balance to reach. I had a couple of male friends who taught me something about the balance when I was too far on the other side. They did things like run in front of me to open doors and flat-out refuse to go through lines before me. Eventually, I learned to accept these gestures with grace, rather than rolled eyes. I also got to witness how this small, token affirmation of their masculinity helped them develop it in other ways.
On the other hand, many men are not taught to do these things, or are taught by the women in their lives NOT to do these things. So judge a man by a greater picture of his heart than whether he takes the outside of the sidewalk.
4) Guard his eyes.
Okay, so guys were told to help guard our hearts. Ladies, we have got to guard their eyes. I tend to hate soapboxes on modesty and I am not going to tell you what to wear or how many inches below your neck your neckline should sit. As I walk through the mall with my fiance, I find myself jokingly covering his eyes at times -- but only half-jokingly. Because the fact is, I don't want him to see those parts of other ladies! And as a general rule of thumb, the parts of other ladies that I don't want him to see are the parts of me he should not be seeing till we are married. If I want him to entertain only pure thoughts about me, I need to be presenting myself in such a way that I encourage only pure thoughts. It's not about blaming women for men's thoughts -- it's about love. If I love him, I want to make it as easy as possible for him to keep his mind full of pure thoughts.
5) Girls struggle with lust too.
This is a direct answer to number 5 for men, on physical touch.
One day, I stumbled across a couple articles (I'm not sure that these were the ones, but they are good ones I found in retrospect) that focused on the fact that women struggle with physical desire. I was shocked at how freeing I found this point. When we believe that we should not be having a particular struggle, there are two consequences: 1) we tend to deny that we are having that struggle, which leads us unable to combat it; and 2) we tend to think we are particularly alone and particularly awful for having that struggle. We are too often led to believe that lust is a struggle unique to men, that only men desire more physically than is allowable before marriage. This is just not true. We were born with the same original sin and the same concupiscent desires as men. So ladies, read point number 5 for the men, and apply it to your own lives. And maybe click the links in the first sentence.
Tuesday, October 8, 2013
Fun Fact of the Day
Fun fact of the day: you can set Word's grammar check options to identify not only passive voice, but also cliches and gender-specific words.
I have not yet used this function, so I cannot tell you how it works. However, I am fascinated by its existence.
Thursday, October 3, 2013
Friday, September 27, 2013
Divorce and the Pill
Here's an interesting take on the Pill from a surprising source. Scientific American seems to be claiming that the Pill leads to higher divorce rates. Here's the two ways that happens, according to this article:
1) The Pill leads women to be attracted to men with major histocompatibility complex (MHC) genes that are more similar, rather than less similar to their own. Couples with similar MHC genes report less sexual satisfaction. Less sexual satisfaction could contribute to divorce.
2) The Pill leads women to be attracted to men with major histocompatibility complex (MHC) genes that are more similar, rather than less similar to their own. When a couple decides to have a baby, the woman goes off the Pill and finds herself less attracted to her husband, while simultaneously more attracted to other men. This change in attraction could lead to divorce.
Let me put in a few disclaimers and explanatory notes here:
The thing that interests me most about this article is that it comes from a source without a Christian bias. The point isn't to convince women not to use hormonal contraceptives, but to draw attention to an interesting scientific fact. And whatever we disagree on, I think most people of good will agree that women should have all the facts before making decisions about the drugs we use.
1) The Pill leads women to be attracted to men with major histocompatibility complex (MHC) genes that are more similar, rather than less similar to their own. Couples with similar MHC genes report less sexual satisfaction. Less sexual satisfaction could contribute to divorce.
2) The Pill leads women to be attracted to men with major histocompatibility complex (MHC) genes that are more similar, rather than less similar to their own. When a couple decides to have a baby, the woman goes off the Pill and finds herself less attracted to her husband, while simultaneously more attracted to other men. This change in attraction could lead to divorce.
Let me put in a few disclaimers and explanatory notes here:
*Just because widespread use of the Pill might lead to a higher divorce rate, it does not necessarily follow that an individual woman should not use the Pill for contraceptive purposes.
*I think that (i.e. women should not use the Pill for contraceptive purposes) for other reasons.
*If there is a correlation between use of the Pill and divorce, it should be enough for most women to think twice about the decision to use hormonal contraception. I don't want to be less attracted to my husband at the exact moment we want to have children.
*The changes in attraction from the use of hormonal contraception might be a social scientific explanation of divorce rates, but they are not an excuse for any individual divorce. It might be harder to make a marriage work in these circumstances, but (barring abusive situations) divorce should simply not be an option.
The thing that interests me most about this article is that it comes from a source without a Christian bias. The point isn't to convince women not to use hormonal contraceptives, but to draw attention to an interesting scientific fact. And whatever we disagree on, I think most people of good will agree that women should have all the facts before making decisions about the drugs we use.
Saturday, September 7, 2013
Breaking News: Syria
Breaking News: Majority of Americans Approve of Sending Congress to Syria. Thanks to The Onion for covering this story.
It amused me so much I had to share, though there is nothing amusing about the situation in Syria. I've been following it via NPR. At the time of the chemical weapons attack, they talked with a doctor at a hospital in Syria, who described the thousands of patients coming in. I was so horrified I nearly changed stations, but I don't want to be that person who turns a blind eye to the sufferings of others.
Over the next two days, I heard Kerry's and Obama's comments from NPR and tried to form an opinion on what we as the US should do. I reached the impasse that I always do when pondering foreign policy. On the one hand, I hate war and know the US does not have a good history of intervening in other nations' civil wars. On the other hand, listen to descriptions of the people hit by the sarin gas. By our common humanity, each person holds a certain responsibility for every other person on the planet. And if we don't do anything, who will?
NPR reassured me that these feelings are normal and gendered. More men than women support US military action in Syria -- not because women are more likely to oppose it, but because they are more likely to be undecided.
It amused me so much I had to share, though there is nothing amusing about the situation in Syria. I've been following it via NPR. At the time of the chemical weapons attack, they talked with a doctor at a hospital in Syria, who described the thousands of patients coming in. I was so horrified I nearly changed stations, but I don't want to be that person who turns a blind eye to the sufferings of others.
Over the next two days, I heard Kerry's and Obama's comments from NPR and tried to form an opinion on what we as the US should do. I reached the impasse that I always do when pondering foreign policy. On the one hand, I hate war and know the US does not have a good history of intervening in other nations' civil wars. On the other hand, listen to descriptions of the people hit by the sarin gas. By our common humanity, each person holds a certain responsibility for every other person on the planet. And if we don't do anything, who will?
NPR reassured me that these feelings are normal and gendered. More men than women support US military action in Syria -- not because women are more likely to oppose it, but because they are more likely to be undecided.
Thursday, August 29, 2013
We Need Feminism Because....
Lately, I've been antsy to start running again -- I stopped in June due to health issues and now that they are resolved, I am preparing to get back to it. So it's not surprising that as I wander through the neighborhood that will be mine in November, I sometimes think about where I will run.
I haven't just been thinking about it -- I've also talked to my fiance, who lives there now, about running routes in his neighborhood. The conversation went something like this:
"The running path down by the river -- is it safe?"
"I think your greatest danger is being hit by a bike." [Brief excursus about runners being hit by cyclists.] "I like running towards town better."
"Yeah, but I don't like running along main roads."
"There's a bridge over the highway so you won't get hit. There are some roads back here too that might be good. There's a big hill and lots of stairs that lead you to a park."
"That doesn't look like it'd be long enough. I'll probably go by the path."
"I don't like it in the winter. It's not very well lit."
[Moment of revelation for both of us: we are talking about different dangers.]
"Of course, I don't have the same concerns as a lady runner..."
I need feminism because my concerns when choosing a running path should not be dictated by my gender. That conversation brought to mind this collection of students explaining why they need feminism.
I haven't just been thinking about it -- I've also talked to my fiance, who lives there now, about running routes in his neighborhood. The conversation went something like this:
"The running path down by the river -- is it safe?"
"I think your greatest danger is being hit by a bike." [Brief excursus about runners being hit by cyclists.] "I like running towards town better."
"Yeah, but I don't like running along main roads."
"There's a bridge over the highway so you won't get hit. There are some roads back here too that might be good. There's a big hill and lots of stairs that lead you to a park."
"That doesn't look like it'd be long enough. I'll probably go by the path."
"I don't like it in the winter. It's not very well lit."
[Moment of revelation for both of us: we are talking about different dangers.]
"Of course, I don't have the same concerns as a lady runner..."
I need feminism because my concerns when choosing a running path should not be dictated by my gender. That conversation brought to mind this collection of students explaining why they need feminism.
Monday, August 12, 2013
Color Me Beautiful
I missed last week by a day -- oops. Here's one of my favorite links in my "Blog Me" folder by way of apology. It's part of Dove's Real Beauty Campaign. Imagine describing yourself to a sketch artist. How accurate do you think the picture would be? How much would it vary from a picture he would draw based on someone else's description? That's what Dove did.
I love the idea, and I know the message hits a lot of young women in a place they need some comfort. However, the rational, skeptical side of me wants to try it with men. Do men see themselves differently than other people do? We focus a lot of attention on women and body image. I would love to see some evidence that (if) the gender-bias reflects a reality.
I love the idea, and I know the message hits a lot of young women in a place they need some comfort. However, the rational, skeptical side of me wants to try it with men. Do men see themselves differently than other people do? We focus a lot of attention on women and body image. I would love to see some evidence that (if) the gender-bias reflects a reality.
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