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March 30, 2006
Dim
As I've said before, I tend to believe that you can come to terms with anything if you can come to terms with it on an aesthetically formal level.
It might work for the "big decisions about the future," too.
Posted by elissa at 10:39 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 28, 2006
If Whittier Had a MySpace Page
Name: ~**sTarLeT kItTy**~
Interests: *i love pink* shopping, shopping, shopping!!! flirting, movies, chocolate... ummmm, talking on the phone, photography... omg i loooooooove orlando bloom!!!!
Expertise: looking seductive, haha jk
About Me: well, ummmm, i am an almost two year old cat and i specialize in being waaaaay too cute for my own good! LoL. if you want to know more about me just ask!!!!!
(This new series of occasional "If Whittier Had a MySpace" posts was inspired by a recent article, first published in the New York Times, conducting a psychoanalysis of online self-portraiture.)
Posted by elissa at 02:52 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Roommates... in the Lord
Being known is a life-giving thing.
Our culture has great expectations for college friendships. These friendships, you are told, are the ones that will last forever. These are the friends you tell stories about for the rest of your life. And yet, forming these fabled relationships can be a bit tricky. In one sense, you become extraordinarily close, extraordinarily quickly because you seemingly cannot escape each other. You eat the same meals, share a bathroom, and see each other in pajamas. You begin to know every detail of each other’s daily life. But that’s where the struggle lies as well – you only know the details of daily life. College students are very much out of context. They are thrust into an entirely different location and mode of life, surrounded by strangers who know nothing of their past.
For some, this is exciting – a chance to recreate themselves however they want! For me, it was inordinately frustrating. I wanted people to know why I was who I was; I wanted them to know my family and my life long friends; I wanted them to know all the little victories in my life; I even wanted them to know my failures. Something, anything, that would hint at the grace that formed my person. Somehow, I forgot that I was still living -- still achieving, still falling, still being broken and rebuilt.
Into this new muck of life entered the girls who would become my roommates, walking with me, crying with me, confronting me, and affirming me. And then, suddenly, there were more of us, more than could live in just one or two rooms. Beth called us "Roommates in the Lord."
As I sat in Rachel and April's living room this past weekend, watching Betsy open pink bridal shower gift after pink bridal shower gift, I was surrounded again by some of the girls who know me best. Ironically, "being known" so well actually changed me. In many ways, my exuberant, tearful, honest, messy, confusing, giddy relationships with the Roommates in the Lord prepared me for marriage. I don't think that I actually knew *how* to love with such willing and self-aware commitment until I was loved by these girls. To different degrees and in different capacities, we pushed and waded and skipped through broken hearts, broken bodies, uncertain futures, dark pasts, academic trauma, new love, confused love, inside jokes, ridiculous stories, and personal victories. Now, three of us are married and two more are engaged. We have new, "grown up" lives in education, politics, counseling, recruitment, drama, and ministry. And, soon, we'll be proud aunts of the first Roomates in the Lord baby.
I suppose it would all be a sappy, Hallmark-worthy thing...if only it weren't so full of continuing aches, struggles, and questions. But, this is real. The hurt only reaffirms our reality as needy women at the foot of the Cross, the only place where we can ever be fully known.
Posted by elissa at 07:10 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
March 23, 2006
Analogies from the Plum
Many folks are already familiar with the Worst Analogies Ever Written in a High School Essay contest that was hosted by the Washington Post Style Invitational a few years ago. I love that list of analogies. I read it whenever I'm feeling a bit blue.
On particularly desolate days, I need something a bit stronger. Or, rather, someone. There are times when only a Wodehousian analogy from the Plum himself will suffice. Observe, in no particular order:
- She now looked like a tomato struggling for self expression.
- The Right Hon. was a tubby little chap who looked as if he had been poured into his clothes and had forgotton to say 'When'! -- Very Good, Jeeves
- I turned to Aunt Agatha, whose demeanor was rather like that of one who, picking daisies on the railway, has just caught the down express in the small of the back.
- Her laugh was like the Scotch express entering a tunnel.
- She gave a sort of despairing gesture, like a vicar’s daughter who has discovered Erastianism in the village. -- Laughing Gas
- Freddie experianced the sort of abysmal soul sadness which afflicts one of Tolstoy's peasents when, after putting in a heavy days work strangling his father, beating his wife, and dropping the baby into the city resorvoir, he turns to the cupboard, only to find the vodka bottle empty.
- In repose, it has a sort of meditative expression, as if she were a pure white soul thinking beautiful thoughts, and, when animated, so dashed animated that it boosts the morale to just look at her. Her eyes are a kind of browny-hazel and her hair rather along the same lines. The general effect is of an angel who eats a lot of yeast. -- The Mating Season
Lovely. Is PG Wodehouse in the canon?
(Even more fun can be found in this alt.wodehouse list appendix.)
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March 22, 2006
Culture in My Lunchbox
After heating up my lunch of leftover apple-stuffed meatloaf and mashed potatoes, I realized that I had neglected to pack a fork. Good thing I always carry a pair of disposable wooden chopsticks in my purse.
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March 21, 2006
Edible Spheres: Elissa's Food Venn Diagram
Elissa's Food Venn Diagram is one -- better -- way for people to understand how to eat healthy happily. Two overlapping circles and three different colors represent the three food groups. Here's what the colors stand for:
* blue - sweet foods
* brown - salty or savory foods
* green - heavenly manna
Mmmm... let's be frank. The USDA Food Pyramid does a fine job of helping you create meals that are healthfully balanced. But in the world where my stomach rules, food does not naturally fall into Grains, Fruits, Vegetables, Dairy, Meats & Protein, and Fats & Oils. No, all food worth discussing fits into one of three categories.
There are sweet foods. There are salty or savory foods. And there, in that place of rejoicing tongues and truly satisfied stomachs, there is the contemporary equivalent of manna. We'll call those "w00t" foods.
For the most part, these distinctions are fairly self-explanatory. Chocolate cake is clearly a sweet food. French fries are salty. Caramel Crunch Chex Mix is most definitely a w00t food.
The goal, then, is to feed myself with as much food as fits into the w00t category as possible. I plan meals around this diagram. I marinate meat in soy sauce, garlic, ginger, and sugar -- salty, savory, and sweet all in one glorious sauce. I add a little bit of sugar and sweet basil to my spaghetti sauce. I serve stir-fried sugar snap peas with spicy grilled chicken. Sometimes, only a small change is needed to propel a food into the golden mean. Cinnamon sugar on whole wheat toast, for example, is far better than on white bread. Or brown sugar ham -- rather than plain ham -- adds an extra dimension to egg, cheese, and toast breakfasts. It's like the yin yang of cooking, folks.
Sure, I may not be eating healthier because of my handy venn diagram, but my stomach sure is happy. And that's good for everyone.
Posted by elissa at 12:37 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
March 20, 2006
Low Visibility: Rainy Day Playlist
|
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. |
Ready for the Rain Blue Rain After the Rain Rain All Day Rain A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall Sit Down, Stand Up Rain Chief Sitting in the Rain Bluer Feel the Rain Strange Rain Mudfootball Foggy Day The Gloaming. Feels Like Rain |
Dime Store Prophets Dawn Kinnard John Coltrane Fleming & John Patty Griffin Bob Dylan Radiohead Dryve Yo Yo Ma, Edgar Meyer, Mark O'Conner Over the Rhine My Friend Stephanie Common Children Jack Johnson Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong Radiohead Dime Store Prophets |
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Gray Day
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March 17, 2006
A Strange Tale of Octopi, Mice, and Missing Skeletons
(Disclaimer: according to the dictionary, "octopuses" is the preferred plural for the topic we are about to discuss. I'm sad and rebellious, and I shall persist in using "octopi" as it sounds far cooler for our purposes here.)
A few nights ago, over dinner with some friends, we discussed the wonders of octopi. Perhaps "discussed" is too generous a term. It really was more like a factoid round, with each of us offering what trivia knowledge we possessed on the creature, thus creating a veritable wiki of a conversation. Octopi have "arms," not "tentacles." Octopi can change color. They are edible, even when fresh. They can even kill a shark. But for Tricia, our resident octopus devotee, the octopus's most fantastic quality is its ability to squeeze through spaces no bigger than its eye. That's what you get when you have practically no internal skeleton.
All of this reminded me of another strange but far less enlightening conversation I had a few years ago while I was working as a graphic design intern for the Department of Defense. Our office, although sealed off hermetically from the sun, was apparently still pentrable by rodents. One of my bosses was a "chief" in the Navy, and her office, in particular, was being hit hard by the invasion. "I don't think it's mice," one of other ladies in the office remarked one morning. I thought I saw one run by the other night and it was too big to be a mouse."
"Oh no," Chief replied firmly. "It's mice. I had my office door locked last night and there was still stuff that had been chewed through this morning."
Seeing that no one had quite made the same logical leap, Chief continued, "Mice don't have bones. That's the difference between mice and rats. Rats have bones, mice don't. That's why they can squeeze under doors and through cracks."
Mmm.
That's one of those firmly-held factoids you should just keep to yourself.
Posted by elissa at 01:46 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 15, 2006
Can You Handle This, Cupcake?
Sometimes I'm totally impressed by just how cool Noel and I are. You see, at the end of February we threw a cupcake party for Paige's birthday.
Oh. Perhaps the concepts of "cool" and "cupcake party" are creating some cognitive dissonance. This would not be the case if you had read a recent article in The Pulse about the growing popularity of, well, cupcakes. Even the Real Simple issue that I received a week after Paige's party jumped on the bandwagon, highlighting cupcake decorating techniques.
What made us even more hip, however, was the democratization of the decorated cupcake. Almost everyone who came concocted edible wonders from the provided frosting and candy.
Creations ranged from the simple echoes of nature...
...to slightly more elaborate representations...
...to attempts at portraiture...
...and trompe l'oeil...
It was fun. But don't believe the people that say that eating cupcakes is a delicate, dainty affair.
It's not.
Posted by elissa at 02:55 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
Writing Center Adverts, IV
SIP-writers, before senioritis reduces you to a lump of academic dormancy, ensure your imminent departure! Come to the Writing Center for help with development, organization, clarity, syntax, and format. Tutors are specially trained to help you locate that pesky "thesis" everyone keeps talking about.
But don't wait too long. Slots are filling up quickly! Come by today to put your name on our master SIP calendar.
The Writing Center.
Sanderson 119.
"Real world" through here.
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March 14, 2006
I Feel Like I Need to Bake Something
Even for someone like me -- someone whose love for math extends only to the important ability to triple recipes -- this is mesmerizing.
Posted by elissa at 12:14 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
March 13, 2006
Making the Private Public (Discourse)
My supervising professor and I had a bit of a verbal a few weeks ago. He said that written accounts of personal experiences -- particularly in the vein of "my life was like such and such and now it's so much better" -- were useless as pieces of public discourse. Such writing, he argued, is only good for the writer's personal expression. It does not give the audience anything to do...other than perhaps become jealous or jaded.
He's right, of course, in his observation that many a "testimony time" devolves into a perverted challenge to one-up other folks with the extent and severity of one's own trials and sins. And I suppose he's also correct in saying that a lot of undergraduate "personal experience" writing falls far short of even a broad definition of "public discourse." But I wanted to argue for a place, albeit a limited one, for the personal essay to live in the public realm. "Maybe when I'm older," I told him, "I'll agree completely with you. But right now I'm young, and I need it."
In their "Modern Love" column, the New York Times ran an essay entitled Two Decembers: Loss and Redemption" (you have to pay for the article now, but you can read a copy of it here). When the author, Anne Marie Feld, was sixteen, her mother committed suicide. In precise, evocative sentences, Feld's essay recounts her mother's last day, the painful uncovering of her mother's hidden mental problems, and Feld's attempt to distance herself from the ordeal. It's written faithfully... not dramatically, not emotionally, not self-pityingly. Redemption comes when Feld gives birth to her own daughter almost twenty years to the day after her mother's suicide. She ends, "But when they finally returned her raw, chickenlike body to me after bathing her, my first thought was that she looked like my mother."
After reading that essay for the first time, I felt more human. You see, I'm only twenty-four. My hurt, my losses, my triumphs, and my relationships have all been real...but they've also been thoe of a young woman who grew up on a small island and who went to college on a small mountain. I'll be the first to admit that my slice of life-participation has been a narrow one.
Essays like Feld's -- authentic, thoughtful, and well-written reflections on private experiences -- let me ache or rejoice in a new way. They let me be baffled about tensions I did not know existed. They let me struggle with temptations I have never faced. They let me mourn for people I did not know. They let me marvel at places I have not traveled.
Novels can often incite the same catharsis, of course. But, to me, there's something transparent and intimate about the short, focused, personal essay. So much life is compressed into a few short pages and explodes when read by a curious mind. In this thing, at least, I do not think I would mind being old before my time.
Posted by elissa at 03:56 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
March 10, 2006
Reading a Theology of Art
I spent most of today sitting out on my trampoline, chomping away at my new pile of books-to-read-for-personal-and-professional-development. Noel and I are planning on going to the Wheaton Theology Conference (The Beauty of God: Theology and the Arts)* in a few weeks, and, in preparation, I asked one of Covenant's Bible professors to suggest some pre-conference reading material.
He responded with a roughly three page bibliography.**
My trimmed -- and hopefully manageable -- list now contains:
Theology and Culture
Begbie, Jeremy. Beholding the Glory : Incarnation through the Arts. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2000.
Dyrness, William A. Visual Faith : Art, Theology, and Worship in Dialogue, Engaging Culture. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2001.
Holness, Lyn. Theology in Dialogue: The Impact of the Arts, Humanities, and Science on Contemporary Religious Thought. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdman's Publishing, 2002.
The Trinity
Augustine. The Trinity. Translated by Edmund Hill, The Works of Saint Augustine: A Translation for the 21st Century. Brooklyn, N.Y.: New City Press, 1991.
Vanhoozer, Kevin J. The Trinity in a Pluralistic Age. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdman's Publishing, 1997.
Christology
Greene, Colin J. D. Christology in Cultural Perspective: Marking out the Horizons. Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Pub., 2004.
Hughes, Philip Edgcumbe. The True Image: The Origin and Destiny of Man in Christ. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1989.
The idea, should you be wondering, is to think about framing a broader and more theologically rich view of the visual arts. Ever since I took Historiography and read "Traditional Christianity and the Possibility of Historical Knowledge" by Mark Noll, I've been fascinated by the idea that the key doctrine for understanding and participating in culture may be the Incarnation -- not just "God as Creator" or the cultural mandate, as Reformed folk often suggest.
So far today I've finished off the Begbie book and have waded a couple of chapters into Dyrness. Oh, graduate school. Could you really offer such cerebral pleasures on a daily basis?***
--- Footnotes ---
* If you would like to help us fund this endeavor, feel free to buy this fabulous pressure cooker that we have up for sale! Just in time for all those summer weddings you have to lug a gift to!
** Christology and Trinitarian theology are, after all, two of his primary areas of interest.
*** Well, not the theology side. But I could be paid to read all day, and that would be awesome.
Posted by elissa at 03:37 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
March 09, 2006
The World Comes to Wendy's
When we saw the confused-looking mass of people standing in and out of line at Wendy's, we almost turned around and walked back out. But, our wallets were thin and the lure of the 99 cent menu was strong. We took our place in the back of line. I started counting. There were 14 of them: most were edging out of middle-age, but a couple landed somewhere in the thirty-something range. It was an unexpected group to see at a fast food joint on a Sunday night, particularly with just one man-with-a-credit-card preparing to foot the bill. A reunion of former Wendy employees, perhaps?
And then, we realized. About half of them were not speaking English. Neither of us could quite place the language, but it was unmistakably eastern European. Suddenly, the strange contrast of fashion that had hitherto befuddled me made sense. Half of the company exhibited a typical southern aesthetic: oxfords and khakis for the men, brightly colored twin sets and coordinated earrings for the women. But "Eastern European" explained that lady-in-salmon's lavish embroidery. That woman's fur lined boots, that lady's orange-and-black tweed skirt, and that man's silky burgundy tie and mustard houndstooth jacket found a happy, harmonious place in the grand geographical scheme of international fashion.
Wait... Eastern European?! What brought this eclectic group together? What were they doing here? And, most importantly, what would they think of Wendy's? We began listening in earnest.
Ordering was a painful process. The man-with-the-credit-card tried to be helpful and corral folks towards the register, but those who had already ordered found themselves captivated by the strange and wonderful items requested by those who followed...and tacked on additional requests to the last person in line. Another salad, please? Make that two. What is this "Caesar"? What was that brown thing in the cup? The lady in salmon trotted back up to the register with one final request: "Can they have more potatoes?" she asked. "They like those a lot. Maybe three?"
By the time it was our turn to order, the Wendy's employees were understandably exhausted and their supplies were running low. Among our planned dinner of 99 cent items we asked for a potato. "We're all out," the girl sighed.
We were bemused. The world had come to Wendy's, spent $63.66, and eaten all the baked potatoes. Is this the globalization everyone's been talking about?
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March 08, 2006
And By That You Mean...
"I hate Wal-Mart," one of my neighbors told me as we walked out into expansive parking lot at the Cummings Highway Wal-Mart. "It just feels like the federal government."
Posted by elissa at 04:26 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 07, 2006
Life Slices
We stood, camera in hand, before a battered, abandoned house on the 54th block of Virginia. Three middle-aged men walked by. "What're y'all doin'?" one yelled at us.
"Taking pictures for an art project."
"Art project?!" he exclaimed, incredulously. "In 1967..." He paused for effect. "I drew a Stick. Man. And that was the last art project I did."
A few minutes later we training our lens on the dilapidated "Motown" house on the corner of Virginia and 55th. After observing curiously for a few moments, a little fellow -- wearing a fur-lined parka three sizes too big for his eleven year old frame -- approached us. "Dere's possums in dat house," he offered helpfully.
"Really?" Noel asked.
"Yeah, I've seen 'em."
"Do you like possums?" I asked.
The boy shrugged nochalantly. "Yeah."
"Why? They're ugly."
"Naaaah." He jogged off to meet a friend, shaking his head at our obviously skewed aesthetic.
Posted by elissa at 11:17 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
March 06, 2006
That's Class
Noel and I went to the Foundry on Friday night for some drinks and jazz. To me, the Foundry is a triumph of bar layout design. The space is flowing but still broken into four sections: the bar scene, the pool and shuffleboard tables, the big tv area, and the jazz band audience. Generally, it's a harmonious blending of worlds, enabling bar-goers with a range of priorities to all do exactly as they please in a single location. This freedom, however, is unfortunately not recognized by every patron.
Noel ordered a bourbon, I took a vodka and tonic, and we settled down at one of the small, candle-lit tables in the "listening" quadrant. The Kevin Roberts Jazz Quartet launched into their set. I could practically feel myself oozing intelligence and sophistication.
Then, they entered. Two girls in their early twenties tottered in on exceptionally lofty heels, each clutching a blue plastic cup -- the 16 oz. party model -- in a hand. It soon became clear that whatever substance filled those cups had already done a thorough job of releasing the ladies from any obligation to normal social courtesies. After trading in their blue cups for red wine, the girls began to listen talk. Very loudly. The blonde fished her cell phone out of her sequined purse and yelled, "Wow, I've missed six calls!" "Really?!" her brunette companion responded with equal volume.
The trumpeter continued on, cruelly ignoring the blonde's attempts to return a call. "I can't hear you, it's so loud in here!" the blonde complained into her phone. "Oh, oh, okay. We'll be there soon!"
"How 'bout right now," Noel muttered bitterly.
Unfortunately, there were some personal matters to handle first. It seemed that Blonde was skeptical of Brunette's relationship with "Steve." Apparently she was quite confident in sharing these reservations, seeing as she announced her concerns at a comfortable volume for all adjacent tables to hear. "I mean, I like Steve a lot," she confided loudly, "I think he's a respectable guy, you know? But it's hard, you know, it's hard to like, you know, like tell and stuff." Having dispensed such meaningful sentiments in such an intimate fashion, Blonde drained her wine glass expertly and Brunette followed suit. A few, merciful minutes later they tottered back out, squealing delightedly as they met some other friends.
Perhaps it was just the vodka and tonic taking effect, but I could have sworn that, as the girls exited, all four musicians hit a particularly triumphant chord.
Continue reading "That's Class"
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March 03, 2006
A New Household Addition
So, we bought a plant...
and named it Tina.
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Echo, Wow, and Flutter
Echo, Wow and Flutter, 2000, Leaves, pills, photo-collage, acrylic. resin on wood panel, 84 x 120
Since being married, I have become more acutely aware of the odd collection of "ways that I am." There seems to be a push for people, particulalry in the Reformed community, to designate a specific "calling" as their primary focus. (I might blame this on a typically western need to create hierarchy.) For married women, it tends to go something along the lines of "being a wife/mother is your primary calling...and don't worry about where everything else goes because you probably won't have time anyway." I'm not sure what the representational graphic would look like, but I'm guessing that folks would either go with a stepladder or solar system arrangement.
Although Fred Tomaselli's collage "Echo, Wow, and Flutter" doesn't function particularly well as a theologically-correct diagram of relational, vocational, and spiritual calling, it does resonate with me as a quirky representation of my past week. This week, all the colorful, cherished, and sometimes separate strands of what I do and what I love overlapped into a dynamic explosion of, well, living.
I taught writing and tutored students. I studied German, read Gadamer, and discussed Heidegger and philosophical hermeneutics. I received good news from a graduate school. I designed invitations for a friend's wedding. I designed logos for a national homeschooling leadership organization. I planned paintings. I threw a party. I cooked meals. I baked bread. I visited with good friends. I wrote and sent out our church's weekly newsletter. I watched baseball while eating Cracker Jacks. I watched soccer while drinking beer. I swept our floors. I folded laundry. I bought a plant.
It was a fairly typical week, but it felt extraordinarily full and rich. Perhaps it was the particularly meaningful juxtaposition of being accepted by a graduate school... and then going home and cooking dinner. Domestic, scholarly, educational, artistic, and relational pursuits packed in tightly this week. And instead of crashing or elbowing for space, instead of me being forced to turn internal switches on and off, all the ways of being added depth and significance to each other.
It's not neat, it's not straightforward, and it's definitely not easy to unpack. But it is real -- incarnational, even -- and I want to live like that.
Posted by elissa at 02:01 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
March 01, 2006
The Ontology of Being Mixed
"So, um, what are you?" asked the pharmacist, handing back my driver's license.
"Excuse me?"
"You know, what are you? Your name is so, um..."
I decided to rescue her before she dug herself deeper. "Oh, that. Well, I'm half-Japanese, which explains my middle name, but I married someone with a German last name."
"Oh. That's pretty confusing, huh?"
Posted by elissa at 04:41 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Covenant's First Professor Portrait Gallery
As promised long ago:
The accompanying press release:
“Gang of Four”
A Portrait Exhibition
In the tradition of pop artists and propaganda posters,
these portraits capture the far-reaching, revolutionary essence
of our four longest-standing English professors.
See Foreman, Barker, Hesselink, and Wildeman,
each represented as the cultural icons you always knew they could be.
Come. Be dazzled.
(While you’re there, meet with a Writing Center tutor for all your
brainstorming, drafting, revising, organizing, and editing needs.)
The Writing Center.
Sanderson 119, by the vending machines.
Almost more culture than you can handle.
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