Mary Versus the Trumpeting Legions of Apathy

Fact: If I've worked hard on Saturday, I enjoy Sunday immensely. Fact: If I haven't worked hard on Saturday, Sunday makes me a little anxious. I should have worked on revising my article more, yesterday. Then I'd feel better about coming back to school from Spring Break, not with everything done that I need to/want do, but just with at least one project completed. Especially because next week is a half week and I go to a conference. So much time slipping through the cracks. I need to meet with my adviser and revise my prospectus outline (perhaps drastically) and finish revising my article and transcribing my research and all the stuff that I kind of thought I'd be able to do with an entire week cleared of work and classes. Really, though, I think a lot of my anxiety right now comes from not doing much Saturday work from Monday to Saturday. Even if I were to go full force, I wouldn't finish everything I'd like to. Things just take more time than you anticipate; ...

Yesterday I went to the Coptic Christian Church more or less blind because the internet had failed to prepare me adaquately. There was a humorous exchange of clergymen talking about what to wear, but nothing for women, so here's a guide for you, should you choose to visit: 1- bring a headscarf. Like Eastern Orthodoxy, you'll need to over your hair during the service. A small scarf will do. 2- wear comfy shoes and clear your schedule. The entire service is around 3 hours long. Most of that will be standing (although you can sit during the sermon). 3-don't take communion. Only baptized members are welcome to communion, which you'll notice that they do shoeless, like Moses did before divinity. 4-dress nice-ish. There's a wide range of clothes--some folks (guys and girls) are in jeans, while some are dressed in suits. Pants are okay for women to wear, but it's probably better to stray on the side of formal and modest. No one wore shorts or very short skirts. 5-be co...

Well, February was a wash. It wasn't all wrenching heart-ache, although there was some of that and it wasn't all nerve-straining stress, although there was a little of that, too. I've always tried to make the best of the month, but it never quite turns out. It's nice when you get Presidents' Day off (UT doesn't) and I do like my mom and her birthday quite a deal, but still have a difficult time with the month. I'm bored of it being cold, and if there's snow (there isn't any here), it's all slush. If there isn't snow, the days change so rapidly. But March! March is always green calendars and kites in my mind, which is probably the result of years of construction-paper die-cuts from childhood. It's little tiny white flowers, and whole sprays of yellow ones. It's "nature's first green" gold and waking up to birdsong and a cool breeze through a warm day. I like March. I like things beginning, like spring, or the school year,...

So it's 2012, which, if you believe some Mayan conspiracy folks and a terrible disaster movie, portends the end of the world. Naturally, the end of the world has been on my mind lately. I read World War Z, which is a great zombie book, in one day on my brother's insistence. The other book I read over winter break was A Distant Mirror , which eerily mirrored not just World War I, but also World War Z. Both of these books remind me of Holocaust books, especially Schindler's List, which are gripping and painful because (a) people are incredible skum-balls and (b) people are incredibly noble. And most disasters--from ice storms to ends of the world like the the plague-- equally impact the good and the bad. In other words, we're all in this together. The rain and nuclear fallout descend equally on the righteous and the wicked. It's a fact that I noticed when I was reading 3rd Nephi concurrent with World War Z. Those people that Christ heals when he comes in glory? Many...

For my New Year's resolutions this year I made a series of propaganda posters to motivate me...

Santa Claus and Christianity have rather a rocky relationship, don't they? Is he a saint? A decadant example of rampant commercialism? Does he encourage or erode faith in things neither seen nor heard? Are his gifts alms or mammon? It's no wonder that some Christians are rather skittish about the Old Man. Still, I consider myself a great Santa apologist. Here's why: Santa Claus Knows That We're All God's Children. It's funny to think that being poor could have been such a stigma that the singer had to emphasize that Santa will love you even if you aren't rich. We've sort of come to take it for granted that gift reception shouldn't depend on wealth. There are enormous resources to mobilize all and any into providing "a Christmas" for the disadvantaged, and it's no accident that often these organizations are called Sub for Santa, or Santa's Helpers or an equivalent of that. Christian obligation to the poor fits in nicely to the Santa...

I was thinking about it this week and I realized that I'm happy with who I am, but not content. It's a really good place to be in, actually. I adore setting goals. I make New Year's Resolutions. And new semester's. And right now I have three pages of sticker-chart hanging on my bathroom wall. (Yes, one of the rows is for "write in journal/blog.") It's nice to keep in mind the things that I want to do, the person that I want to become. And I understand that, while my intentions may be good and my effort admirable, I probably won't make all of those goals. I might not get to the Serengeti before I turn 30 to cross it off my list. It's getting to the time of the year when I can look at the goals I made for 2011 and realize that I probably won't lose 10 pounds before Jan 1, nor will I pass my prospectus exam, unless the university system radically changes during finals week. And similarly this week there are several rows on the sticker chart that a...