The Tesseract (and other more normal forms of movement)

90's Mixed Tape: Volume I - 1990-1994

2008-12-15T00:48:00.011-05:00

Tight rolled jeans... check.

Flannel shirt tied around waist... check.

Braided leather belt that is way too long so that I can fold it over and let it dangle in front of my legs ... check.

Swatch ... check.

The year is the early 90s. I've just plopped down my the Charlotte Hornets purple and turquoise bean bag. I'm eating dunkaroos and drinking Sunny Delight like it is actually real juice. The lights are low so that I can play Sonic and Knuckles without any distracting glow. I have my boom-box, with high-speed dubbing and bass boost, at my side. While the game is loading ... (Ssssseeeeggggggaaaaaa) ... I pop in my mixed tape (that was made from the ten CDs that I got for a penny each because I signed up for the Columbia House Music Club) and mash play.

Here are the tunes I was spinning - AKA - my top ten mixed tape hits of the first five years of the 90s.

10. Lighting Crashes - Live. What a weird song (maybe the only song ever that says placenta). But man it was good.
9. What Would You Say - Dave Matthews Band. I know. It's not cool to like Dave. But it was the 90s. We did things a lot less cool.
8. Mr. Jones - Counting Crows. "She's lookin' at you, oh, no no, she lookin' at me." Classic.
7. Dreams - The Cranberries. This song really does make me feel like I'm in a dream.
6. Hey Jealousy - Gin Blossoms. Simply great rock music. I love it.
5. Under The Bridge - Red Hot Chili Peppers. Maybe the Peppers best song ever.
4. Say It Ain't So - Weezer. What an epic song for a band that influenced a generation!
3. Let Her Cry - Hootie and the Blowfish. Everything about this song is perfect.
2. Wonderwall - Oasis. Maybe one of the most memorable song of the 90s.
1. Two Princes - Spin Doctors. These guys are the epitome of the 90s.

Honorable Mention:

Name - Goo Goo Dolls. What is this song about?
Smells Like Teen Spirit - Nirvana. Every kid with a guitar or a set of drums learned to play this one.
Alive - Pearl Jam. Who thought flannel and combat boots went together so well?
Run-Around - Blue Traveler. The best harmonica player in the world.
No Rain - Blind Melon. Reminds me of daisies and girls in bumble-bee outfits.
Today - Smashing Pumpkins. I guess singers weren't require to be able to sing in the 90s.
To Be With You - Mr. Big. A great song to sing with you friends and change keys twice.
All I Want - Toad the Wet Sprocket. This one makes it just because the band name is so cool.

Scooter Sticks, Optional

2008-07-04T23:25:00.008-04:00

What better day is there than today to celebrate all things American? Of course Flag Day is great. But, I mean, this is the day we created a document, waited months for everyone to get to Philadelphia to sign it, sealed in an envelope, put it on a ship, stored in the captain's cambers under the poop deck - where many crewmen more than likely contracted scurvy- and waited many more months for the correspondence to reach the mother land. It doesn't get any better than that (unless you're England ... or those guys who got scurvy). In light of such a great day, it seems fitting to do that which seems fitting for such a great day - to celebrate all things American. So here is my top ten greatest Patriotic moments. Eat your heart out George!

10. Born on the Fourth of July. A great Tom Cruise movie. (Way better than MI2).

9. Freedom Fries. I remember somebody telling me once that the government or somebody was trying to change the name of French fries to Freedom fries. Now that's American.

8. Jimmy Hendrix plays the National Anthem. A great moment for American music and for headbands.

7. Will Ferrell lets his 'patriotism' show. Classic SNL. Classic American.

6. The Patriot. Mel Gibson. American Revolution. Heath Ledger. Slow motion running with an American flag. Nuf said.

5. Hacksaw Jim Duggan sports the American flag. What is more American than a professional wrestler wearing an American flag (and a speedo)?

4. Joe Dirt's soliloquy about fireworks. Nothing says patriotic like fireworks. And nobody knows fireworks like Joe Dirt.

3. Fourth of July Hot Dog Eating Contest. The perfect combination of all things American - competition, determination, and processed meat.

2. Rocky beats Ivan Drago. American boxer beats Soviet boxer - in Russia! Patriotic to the core.

1. Bill Pullman's speech from Independence Day. This is arguably the greatest patriotic movie of all time. What is more patriotic than a movie, released during Fourth of July weekend, about America whipping some alien tail on July the Fourth and making July Fourth Independence Day for the whole world? Welcome to Earf!

There you have it. My top ten patriotic moments of all time. Let freedom fries ring.

You Should Bee Dancing

2008-06-29T23:36:00.016-04:00

It is scarcely known that bees communicate by dancing. I'm not kidding. This is only one of the incredibly amazing facets of a bee's existence. I could go on and on about the extreme efficiency of how the bee works and fulfills his or her task. Consider the beehive, for instance. The beehive is constructed of numerous rows and columns of adjoining hexagons. The hexagon provides maximum efficiency. Why? Well, the more sides a shape has, the more area it covers. A circle, of course, provides the largest area of any shape. But, when circles are placed next to other circles, space is lost in between. So to achieve efficiency, bees need a shape that can be placed side-by-side without any loss of space. Three shapes fit this requirement. The triangle, the square, and the hexagon. The hexagon has the most sides of these options and thus is the most efficient shape possible for bees to construct their hives.

But, enough about the hives. I'm talking about dancing here. Bee dancing. Scout bees are among the faithful ranks of the worker bees that are responsible for finding a food source, returning to the hive, and giving detailed directions for other worker bees to go and harvest said food source. Once a scout bee finds food, it returns to the hive prepared to give these detailed directions to the worker bees. The scout gathers a group of worker bees around it, puts on its favorite boogie music, and then proceeds to communicate - dance style. When the scout bee does the sea walk upwards, then the worker bees know to fly toward the sun. But, when the scout bee does the Roger Rabbit backwards, then the worker bees know to fly away from the sun. And any angle in between, as you can imagine. But, that's not all. The duration and intensity of the scout bee's Harlem shake tells the worker bees how far from the hive to fly. So the scout bee not only tells the workers which direction to fly, but also how far to go. Now I know what you're thinking - this boogaloo is too crazy to believe. But, I assure you it's true. I watched a documentary about bees once.

Not these Bees.

Keane, C. S. Lewis, and Suffering

2007-11-16T16:16:00.000-05:00

I posted this blog on MySpace not a few fort-nights ago. I thought I would fit well here. Enjoy.

Under the Iron Sea may be one of my favorite albums that I have heard in quite some time. Following their debut album Hopes and Fears, Tom Chaplin, Tim Rice-Oxley, Richard Hughes of Keane have once again created a work that is not only musically astute and engaging but also insightfully poetic and honest. It seems that much of what was hoped for has proved to be that which they had feared. The entirety of the album seems to revolve around the theme of maturation and the coincidental awakening to reality that there ensues.

"Is It Any Wonder?", the first release from the album, depicts a man who looks at the world around him and asks the question “Is it any wonder I’m tired?.” The first verse of the songs reads as follows: “I always thought that I knew/ I’d always have the right to/ Be living in the kingdom of the good and true and so on/ But now I think I was wrong/ And you were laughing along/ And now I look a fool for thinking you were on my side.” The questions are then asked: ‘Is it any wonder I’m tired?/ Is it any wonder that I feel uptight?/ Is it any wonder I don’t know what right?” Why is he tired? Why is he uptight? Well, those things that he had thought to be true about the world around him, namely that he was living in the kingdom of the good and true, have been found wanting. With one simple glance at the world there is no difficulty in seeing the hurt and suffering so prevalent in our daily lives and around us, leaving no reason why anyone wouldn’t ask the question, “Is it any wonder?”

Now whether this song and the others on the album are simply about the heartaches of the relationships between a man and a woman or something more profound is unclear. But what is clear is that something does not seem right about how reality has been described and what seems evident. That which was said to be good and true appears to be merely lyrics of children’s rhymes, some fantastic fairytale that only leaves us shaking our fists at the sky when reality finally comes to fruition.

C. S. Lewis understood this dilemma to be universal. He observed that the reality of pain and suffering seems to fly in the face of the claims of goodness and truth made by major world religions, especially those claims of the Christian faith.

“To ask whether the universe as we see it looks more like the work of a wise and good Creator or the work of chance, indifference, or malevolence, is to omit from the outset all the relevant factors in the religious problem. Christianity is not the conclusion of philosophical debate on the origins of the universe: it is a catastrophic historical event following on the long spiritual preparation of humanity which I have described. It is not a system into which we have to fit the awkward fact of pain: it is itself one of the awkward facts which have to be fitted into any system we make. In a sense, it creates, rather than solves, the problem of pain, for pain would be no problem unless, side by side with our daily experiences of this painful world, we had received what we think a good assurance that ultimate reality is righteous and loving. (The Problem of Pain, p.14)”

Why is suffering a problem? Well, because Christianity claims that there is One who is good and righteous and loving controlling all things, including suffering. How can God be good if He permits, allows, or even decrees that suffering and evil exist? How can God be right to allow evil and suffering to go unchecked? How can God be loving if He will not remove pain and suffering from those whom He supposedly loves?

We’ve now come to the point in which I would love to say that the Bible explains this quite well. I could claim, as some do, that God limits His knowledge of the future so as to ensure our libertarian free-will and thus can not foresee what events may cause suffering but can only provide comfort and healing to our wounds. A pastor expressing this theology once told a suffering woman of his congregation, “Don’t worry. God didn’t see this coming just as much as you.” Not only is this logically inconsistent, but this belief is unbiblical.

Or I could claim that God doesn’t want us to suffer and any suffering you may endure is consequent to your sin. This too, though seemingly true, is unbiblical. Read Job and see this poor attempt by his friends to solve Job’s questioning. This was their understanding of suffering. ‘Job you are in this position because you have sinned against God.’ But what does God have to say about the position in which Job resided (bereft of children, deprived of possessions, covered in boils). To summarize, God basically said to Job, “I AM I AM. I AM God, Job, and you are not.” And what was Job’s response? He covered his mouth, repented of accusing God with wrongdoing, and despised himself. The truth is that the Bible gives no simple understanding of suffering and why it plays a part in the will of God. Yet, the Bible is clear that God is absolutely sovereign over absolutely everything, including pain and suffering. And nowhere is God charged with wrongdoing for their existence. There comes a time when we must agree with the actions of Job – take the fist shaking at the sky and move it to our tongues, repent and trust a good God that is worthy of all trust.

But is this the end of the discussion? Why does this solution not satisfy? Why does something seem unresolved? The song Crystal Ball refrains with the lyrics: ‘Oh crystal ball save us all/ Tell me life is beautiful/ Mirror, mirror on the wall.’ The individual in this song, feeling trapped under the iron sea of despair and defeat, cries to something or someone greater than him. Someone, who like a crystal ball, sees all things. Or someone, who like the mirror on the wall, knows all things. Surely this One can tells us why suffering exists. The One to whom he cries, though he may not know it, is God. However, as we have already seen God does not answer this question as we might like. And we must be content to end our quest here.

Yet, He promises that all things, including suffering and pain, work for good, that is the good of those who are called by Him (Romans 8:28). It is here that we understand, if even in a veiled sense, the purpose of suffering. And we will never understand how this works for good unless we know the One whose suffering was greatest. The apostle Paul’s claim that his present suffering (and it was suffering) was nothing would be absolutely insane, unless he knew the One whose suffering has brought insurmountable glory. Peter’s exhortation that we should suffer for doing good is absurd foolishness, unless our suffering brings us closer to the One whose suffering for the cause of good is unmatched. The claims of James that our tribulations are filling that which we lack are zany babblings, unless he knows the One who alone can fulfill that which we lack.

If we are to understand suffering we must know the One who suffered. Nowhere else in Scripture is there a greater picture of suffering than that of the cross of Jesus Christ. And when we consider the cross, make no mistake, it was absolutely the will of God that His Son suffer and die. Why? Surely our little words like love, mercy, holiness, and glory catch some glimpse of the answer to this question. But words will never be able to fully explain why the Son of God should suffer for the good of people who hate him. We can never express completely why Christ, the only godly One, would die for sinners and endure the hostility of the cross, with all of it shame and degradation. Nonetheless, the truth is that for those with faith in the Son his suffering has brought them their greatest good.

Only in view of the cross of Christ can suffering be understood to be good. How precisely is it good? We may never know. But this is certain: it was good for Jesus to suffer. It was good for us that Jesus suffered. And it is good for us to suffer with him. Only someone who embraces these words:

Surely he has borne our griefs
and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken,
smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was wounded for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his stripes we are healed (Isaiah 53:4-5)

can accept these things as true and understand them to be beautiful.

The Son of God suffered unto the death, not that men might not suffer, but that their suffering might be like His.
– George MacDonald, Unspoken Sermons, First Series

Why should Bill have all the fun?

2007-10-31T23:30:00.000-04:00

I really enjoy writing poetry. Most of the poems I write are sonnets. I like the structure and find that these short poems can express a simple, yet profound truth. A sonnet is a fourteen-line poem, written in iambic pentameter. An iamb is a pair of unstressed and stressed syllables. Pentameter yields a meter that includes five iambs. Almost everything Shakespeare wrote was in iambic pentameter, even his plays. The poem is constructed with three quatrains (stanzas with four lines) and concludes with a single couplet (a stanza with two lines). The rhyme scheme is: ABAB, CDCD, EFEF, GG. I love the mathematical structure that lies beneath the imagery. My sonnets are usually simple. But they provide an outlet for creativity, nonetheless.

Here are a few that I've written for some of the important people in my life. Hopefully, if you like what you read, you’ll write a sonnet or two also.

This one was written for two of my dearest friends on the anniversary of their wedding.

The darkness of this world may seem to veil
The smallest hope of joy within this life
Yet hope may through the darkness still prevail
When love adjoins a man unto his wife
Far pleasant than the taste of finest wine
More fragrant than the flowers of the field
And sweeter than the fruits upon the vine
Is love that only this union can yield
For Christ has made marriage to be a sign
A picture that His love and grace confide
And love compassionate and so benign
Becomes the drink and feast of His own bride
Now listen to the wisdom from above
So eat, my friends, and drink, be drunk with love!

I wrote this poem for my pastor and his wife upon the birth of their second son.

It is not hid that gifts are from above
And that they come from the Father of lights
And every blessing is an act of love
That falls with mercy from heaven’s own heights
And of the gifts that our great God may give
Not one may bring such joy as you have here
When God speaks into darkness and says, “Live.”
And brings into this world a child so dear
What grace that we have seen within this act
That God entrusts into your house a soul
That you might seek to fill that which he lacks
And with the Savior’s love then make him whole
Show your son how much that he is prized
Give him nothing in this world but Christ

Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed the poems.

It made the Pan refuse to grow.

2007-10-17T00:09:00.000-04:00

Even if you've never heard the term 'hook', you know one when you hear it. The hook is the part of the song, usually at the beginning or the end of the chorus, that catches the attention of the listeners and draws them into the ethos of the song. Most are rather cheap and leave you with an unyielding urge to hum the hook even against the will. Most songwriters pen them while visions of dollar signs dance in their heads. Most choke the rest the song, so that when the song is over the listener is unable to remember the content of the song (assuming that it has content).

But good songwriting has hooks that do much more. To explain, here are two examples of great hooks. Sufjan Stevens has a song called "John Wayne Gacy, Jr." If you don't know John Wayne Gacy, you will after listening to this song. Gacy was a serial killer in Illinois. Gacy rapped and murdered thirty-three young men and boys and hid most of the dead bodies in the crawl space under his house. Sufjan does an incredible job of painting a picture of this despicable man through word and music. What this man did was awful. But you may be wondering, "Why on Earth, would someone write a song about such a terrible man?" Sufjan tells you in his hook. The final stanza of the song reads: "And in my best behavior/I am really just like him/Look beneath the floorboards/For the secrets I have hid." When Sufjan sympathizes with this man, the song's truth pulls you as an undertow, carrying you from the shore that is the disgust of someone's speck to the deep and drowning sea that is your plank. Sufjan captures the reality of sin. And he puts a face on it - not a madman dressed up like a clown, but his, and yours, and mine. That's good songwriting. That's a good hook.

Andy Gullahorn, using another emotion, does nothing less spectacular. In an unpublished song -we'll call it "I Was More of Man Back Then,” Andy chronicles the plight of man who becomes less and less manly as he ages. This comical tales leads us from a youth filled with hunting (described as shooting a dear in the heart and rubbing its blood on his face) to watching Dora, the explorer; Dr. Pepper every meal to salad for diner, again; and from Jean-Claude Van Dame to Gilmore Girls. The hook ends each stanza claiming, "Baby, I was more of man back then." The last stanza describes Andy at diner with his wife, "protruding gut" tucked in, and watching the young men walk by. He remembers being like them - lonely, but independent, as he called it. The last two lines of the song read: "And if lonesome is what manly is, then, baby, I was more of a man back then." There it is. In an instant, he takes you to from the humor of a man aging to the glory of a man's love for and dependence upon his wife. His abruptness is startling and catches you off guard. And it is here, being off guard, that he can communicate his emotions towards his wife. Any other way and the song would be cliché and sappy. That's good songwriting. That's a good hook.

One more blog won't hurt. Right?

2007-10-10T22:29:00.000-04:00

Here it is. I have joined the faithful ranks of those men and women hoping that someone, somewhere, somehow might stumble upon these instant publications, called blogs. I have joined those who feel some satisfaction in posting their thoughts, however trivial they may seem. And my thoughts, in the grand theater, most likely are trivial. But, I know goodness when it moves me. I know truth when it changes me. And I know beauty when it captivates me. My goal here it to find these things in all areas of life and to write about them, even if no one reads. But, I hope someone does read. I hope others will seek to find these things in their lives. They're there. They just need to be found.