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Originally uploaded by Justin Masterson.

I had a wonderful Christmas...I hope you did too.

Before I dive into the post, I'd like to note a couple of things about the picture which accompanies this post:
1. I just discovered the joy of "Flickr" photo sharing, as evidenced by the fact that there IS a picture accompanying this post. It's a fun tool, check it out.
2. If I would have known I was going to discover Flickr, and post a random happy-moment-with-wife picture from Christmas morning to my blog, I would have come up with something better than a skin-tight red pajama shirt to share with the world.
3. In case you're wondering, that angel over my shoulder is the "top of the Christmas tree" variety of shoulder-angel, and not the "whisper better ideas and gentle admonishments into my ear" variety of shoulder-angel. She stopped coming when I hit puberty.

Now, back to the post.


Christmas wrapped up all of 56 minutes ago. Stacy and I did lots of Christmasy things. We wrapped presents together, we drank coffee together (mulled cider was in short supply), we decorated our tree together, we listened to Christmas music together, we ate with and hung out with my family together, we opened gifts together, and we watched A Christmas Story four times together as it repeated on TBS.

It was a wonderful Christmas. Perhaps the best we've had.

In a couple of days we leave for her hometown to hang out with her parents and family. Their celebration of Christmas, much like Hannukah, lasts for eight days. Her mom is one of 10 kids, and each day the entire extended family moves from house to house looking at who got what and talking about who they got it from and then asking that who how much she paid and how much she could have paid if she would have driven across the state line to buy it and used a coupon. Stacy's family is fun, and, like mine and yours and everyone else's, full of characters and oddballs and drunken uncles and crying babies and fun cousins with life-partners. I like going out there, and it'll be a relaxing three days.

I hope your Christmas was brilliant, warm and deep, and that the Indescribable Love I felt was with you too. God is good, and this was a magnificent time of year to re-learn that.

Peace,
Justin

"You know that old saying about how you always hurt the ones you love? Well it goes both ways."
-Jack, Fight Club (1999)


A friend recently moved into our house for a few days.

She moved into our house, because she moved out of hers.

She moved out of hers, because her husband abused her. A lot.

She moved into our house. For the second time in a week.

The hardest part wasn't that she left him. The hardest part was that she had to do it twice. For me, that hardest part was that she walked back into her house...kids in tow...into the home of an abuser...and lay down next to him again.


I've much to share with you, but tonight I want to share this. I'm amazed and I'm confused and I'm really, really sorry for her, and for her kids. And, in some weird way, for her husband. This is not my world...I'm lucky that way. I live in a home with a woman who I not only love, but most of the time really like. My wife lives with a husband who she loves and most of the time likes, and who they both, deep down, believes won't ever intentionally harm her. I live with a woman I yearn to see after a long day, and she lives with a man she can go to bed at night knowing wants the best for her. I believe that Stacy and I could bring kids into the world and, somehow, raise them to be people who respect and love the opposite sex. Not because we're better, I don't think. We grew up that way...our kids will believe it because our parents, at some level or another, believed it. We were lucky.

My guess is that my friend's husband grew up in a home where he saw his mother treated with contempt, shame, and disgust. My guess is that his father was dominating, and his mother either stooping or overcompensating by raging against the kids. That's just my guess. I'm fairly sure that my friend grew up in a place where she questioned her own worth, and where her parents, by example, taught her that she was only as good as her foul shots and her pretty smile, and she had to know that someday she would slowly lose both.

I think she went back into that house not because she truly believed he would change, but because she believed she didn't deserve for him to. She's smart, educated, strong and beautiful...and yet she learned along the way that she wasn't worth true love; just marriage, and children, and a house, and the abuse.

We helped her get away. For now. I don't know if she'll stay away. I wonder if some twisted sense of destiny will bring her back to him. God, I hope not. No woman deserves that treatment. None.

I'm angry with my wife at this moment. I'm not going to tell you why, because it's her business and it's my business. But it doesn't matter. I'll be over it tomorrow or the next day or maybe next week. That doesn't matter either. What matters is that, by God's grace and decent parenting, I'm choosing to love right now. I'm loving by breathing slowly, remembering who she is and who I am, and typing furiously at my blog until I can fall asleep. And tomorrow, when I wake up and head off to work, I will choose to kiss her goodbye. It is my choice to love her, and it's a choice both of us make each day, whether we feel it with everything we have or whether we conjure it in spite of some squabble, petty or otherwise.

I'm not a great husband. But I'm a good one. And when our friend calls us tomorrow to ask us if she should return to her husband again, I'm going to close my eyes and, for as long as it takes, be grateful for what I have.

Please pray that she stays away, and that he seeks help. Her story is one of millions, and she and her kids deserve better.

Peace,
Justin

My friends just had a baby.

She is beautiful. I held her. She smelled new.



I liked it.

Peace,
Justin

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Originally uploaded by Justin Masterson.

I am in-between moments of heart-wrenching, sacred pride.

I will tell you about that in a moment. But first, I want to say thanks.



I've received several extraordinary comments, a few emails, and even a couple of phone calls about my last few posts...a sort of still-going chronicle of my fall from the faith or my hopeful toeing right into it, depending on how you look at it.

Thank you. Josh, Jacob, Patrick, Black17, Keith, Ryan, Denis, Anonymous and everyone else...thank you. I've heard everything from, "you're finally evolving [away from fundamental Christianity]" to "I'd like to meet with you, and I promise I won't try to convert you back [to fundamental Christianity]" to "wanna go for a beer and talk? [presumably about fundamental Christianity?]" I feel really loved, and I really appreciate it. Even if you did try to convert me...toward or away from your system of belief...I'd still feel loved, because you care enough to try.

That's all...thanks. I'll keep writing as I keep asking questions and getting answers and finding time between whatever it is I do all the time.




...Now, back to the topic at hand.

I am in-between moments of heart-wrenching, sacred pride.

A couple of weeks ago, my oldest brother married his wonderful and beautiful fiance. It was a gorgeous wedding, held in my parents' home, with a total of ten of us in attendance. I had the great honor of presiding over the ceremony...an honor whose profundity I could not understand until the moment came to actually do the presiding. As I stood between Brian and Maria, standing next to my twin brother and just a few feet from my parents...as I opened my mouth to speak those first words of the ceremony ("dearly beloved..."), it hit me: I have been asked to officiate the uniting of my own brother to his wife. My own brother. My own brother, Brian. My own brother, who I love more deeply than I know how to articulate.

I had the chance a couple of weeks ago to tell you about my twin brother, Matt. Now I'd like to tell you about Brian.

While Matt was my doppelganger present as we grew up, Brian was, in a way, a walking, talking, chest-hair-growing future. He is four-and-a-half years my senior, and acted simultaneously as my bully, my mentor, my spiritual advisor, my mom-ruiner, my hero, and my coal-mine canary all throughout my youth. I followed Brian the way perfume follows your churchy Great Aunt on a Sunday afternoon...just a few steps behind and lingering in the aftermath. Brian taught me how to take a charley-horse, and how to write a rhyming poem. He ruined my mom by breaking all the good rules before I could, so she would tighten them up by the time I got there...then he taught me how to defy her. (Matt needed no teaching in this regard; seemed to come as naturally as a morning pee). He went ahead of me, getting hurt by girls and making best guy friends and discovering clumsy football and taking final exams and picking up an accoustic guitar to see what happens when a guy who can't fix a car or throw a baseball or build a table decides you can be just as much a man with Rosewood and nickel-wounds. He cried over things I couldn't understand yet. He broke curfew doing things I only imagined as I lay in my bed listening to mom worry loudly over the phone to a friend. He was the first to do most everything. He was my brave future, and I loved him for it.

And somewhere in there, we became friends.

I remember when I was 12 or so, when he said, "man...you guys [meaning Matt and I] are cool...it's like you guys actually have personalities now. Like, you're actual people." He was right...when I began to become Justin and not Vince and Pam's son or Brian's brother or "one of the twins," he and I were ready to begin becoming friends. We grew together for the first time...instead of me just following him. We started to open up to each other, to experience life together as peers of a sort, despite our age difference. He soon became the closest friend I've ever known.

Brian and I share most everything. We talk about religion and faith and politics and beer and wives and swearing and philosophy and cars and sex and the Simpsons. I call Brian sometimes with a rhetorical question or one-line joke or a quote from a movie we saw ten years ago...I think I call to reconnect, and I think I call just to hear him. I ask him before I do anything that truly matters to me. I call him when I can't understand my wife, and he tells me when it's probably my fault. I love my time with him, and as he moved out of our house (his temporary digs until he got married), I felt like I was losing another brother, even though he'd be living just up I-71 a bit. I miss him when he leaves, and I love it when I see my message indicator flash on after I've deliberately ignored his call so that he'll leave some ridiculously stupid message. We seem to vibrate at the same frequency, Brian and I, and I think I'm so much better for it. I think I always have been.

Standing that evening, between Brian and Maria...I stood in the past, present and future at once. He was my older brother; a doctor, a rocker, and a traveler. He was still doing the things I've yet to try. But he was also my peer...my friend in a sense so deep I can't possibly express it here. But, in a weird way, I was the older brother for a moment...and perhaps for the first time. I've been married almost four-and-a-half years...I was able to share a few words about some of the pitfallsl, the joys, and the romance of commitment. I got to warn them and encourage them. I got to hug them. And when I got done, and they made their amazing promises to each other...I got to pronounce them husband and wife. It was one of the happiest moments of my life, and one I shall never neglect nor allow to fade.



So now, here I am. My twin brother, Matt, has just passed the Ohio Bar and will be sworn in on Monday. My older brother Brian just got married to a woman I am proud to know, and prouder to call my Sister. I am so damned proud I have no idea how to express it. I wear my joy like a sweater these days.

I'm so proud of you, brothers.

Peace,
Justin

Sometimes revelation is a mountain-top. Sometimes it's church confessional. Sometimes it's a hospital bed. And, every once in a while, it's a long red light on your drive to work.

I didn't expect much from my drive to work yesterday. I was a bit sore from the workout, a bit full from a rare breakfast of eggs and toast, and more than a little anxious about all I had to get done before my noon meeting. I had my iPod plugged in to the car stereo (I have forgone driving with earbuds in; turns out it's fantastically illegal), and it was shuffling through it's 10-GB songload, flitting fickley between genres like a DJ with the very worst kind of ADHD. On I-71 at Smith-Edwards it was Billy Joel, at Kenwood it was Evanesence, and by the time I got to Pfieffer, Elvis Costello was half-finished whiney-warbling his way through one of my favorite love ballads of his, "She."

As I pulled up to the intersection of Kenwood and Pfieffer and waited at a red light whose greatest pleasure is letting everyone go straight and nobody turn left, a new song came on. And this is where the revelation begins.

The song came from a band that doesn't exist anymore, and the only album they ever made and that the vast majority of you have never heard. They were called "Dividing the Plunder," and consisted of a husband and wife just about my age. They live in Greater Cincy, and I came in contact with them when they came by VCC for a performance one weekend. I loved the song they sang, bought the album, and digitized it into my iTunes, where it now sits, nestled in the cultural warm front between Diana Krall and Dr. Dre.

It's a good album. Decent music, OK production, but great writing. That's what caught me. The writing.

The song that came on was called "Maybe It's Faith," and it goes like this:

(the full version...like, the kind with music in it...is on iTunes, I just checked).


---

“Maybe It’s Faith”
Dividing the Plunder - The Ordinary

I wish I had more to say.
It’s such a quiet room.
But today I can’t give voice to anything but doubt.
It starts doubt deep inside me
In my blood and in each cell.
And it makes it’s way to the blank look in my eyes
And the questions on my lips.

I wish I had less to say
It’s such a crowded room.
But the sun came up this morning
And it all began again.
The compulsion's is inside me
And it beats against my doors
It seeps into my sterile polished closet
Brings the skeletons outside.

There was a time I would have covered my face
I would have turned away
I would have broken my bones trying get out the door.
Here it is, come and take a good look.
Get out of the way.
Maybe it’s faith when I just don’t know for sure.

I wish I had a thousand books
To fill in what I’m missing
And a thousand days to read them
And a time back guarantee.
It starts down deep inside me
Every breath and every fiber.
And it makes it’s way up to the empty stare
And the tears on my face.

But I wish I’d never read a word
The answers were too easy
And I’m grown enough to know there’s more mystery than proof.
But it stirs down deep inside me.
And it stirs the dust of faith
Cries out to me about my hollow nature
And the desperate human need.

There was a time I would have covered my face
I would have turned away
I would have broken my bones trying get out the door.
Here it is, come and take a good look.
Get out of the way.
Maybe it’s faith when I just don’t know for sure.

And it’s a little more earthy than I’d like to believe
Like the holes in God’s hands
Like the dirt on God’s feet.
But I’m not alone in that it’s comfort more
Than I ever felt pretending I know anything for sure.

There was a time I would have covered my face
I would have turned away
I would have broken my bones trying get out the door.
Here it is, come and take a good look.
Get out of the way.
Maybe it’s faith when I just don’t know for sure.

---

This is where revelation came. It washed over me like a backrub. Maybe where I'm at is faith.

Yes, I've got more questions than answers. I always have, and I suspect I mostly will. I'm in a place right now where it seems I'm not sure about much. I'm searching for theology, a system to follow, a religion to belong to that I can reconcile well enough to play along. But I don't know that I'm searching for faith itself.

There was a time when the question itself scared the hell out of me. A search for spirituality is, inherently, a search for your own identity. And whenever you question your identity, you're questioning the very essence of who you are, as well as your relationships, your friendships, and everything you know about your social circles. To question fundamental Christianity is to question most of my young adult life, and that's scary. As the song says, "there was a time I would have covered my face, I would have turned away, I would have broken my bones trying to get out the door."

But I think that time is not now. I'm losing that fear. My previous post (Oct 04) was kind of a big deal for me...it's not that I have begun to have these questions, it's that I'm becoming unafraid of what it means that I've had them all along. I think theology can be a wonderful, powerful structure for understanding the entirely ununderstandable...but the quest is a little more earthy than I'd like to believe. It's blood, and it's dirt, and it's God...it's sacred, yes; but it's also human. I can't worship the quest, but I am beginning to recognize it's inherent value. I refuse to believe that God's primary concern is whether or not I had the single salvation experience at some point before I get hit by a bus...our lives are lived in a constant tension between sacred and secular, and our purpose seems to be more about navigating that tension rather than relieving it. The quest is not God, but the quest for God may be salvation itself.

I may find absolute truth, and a theology, existing or created, to match. And I may not. But I don't think I'm lacking faith. Maybe it's faith that I'm continuing to seek God, perhaps now more than ever, despite the personal and social ramifications that result from questioning the faith of my youth. Maybe it's faith that I believe that it's safe to question Christianity, because I believe that Christ himself is greater than both the religion and it's questioning, and that earnest pursuit of Him will inevitably land me in His presence.

I am in a hard period, but it is a good period. I don't know much, and I'm asking a lot. And I think I've long feared that I'm losing my faith because I can't claim the same outward surity I had in high school or college. But maybe it's faith that I just don't know for sure.

I've got a lot more to write to you about. It's about Manhattan, neon at 40 floors, and my brother the Esquire. But it's time to get to work now.

Peace,
Justin

My friend Ryan wrote a great response to my last post...

If you're interested, check it out at:
http://c-change.blogspot.com

More to come...whoever has been reading in New Zealand, post something! I'd love to hear from ya!

Peace,
Justin

Some of my best conversations come over my first cup of coffee in the early morning, and some come over my last beer in the very, very early morning.

This post is about the former.

Lately, I've been working out each weekday morning with a good friend. In my attempt to lose the 35 pounds necessary to remove my least favorite set of chins, I've taken on a fairly rigorous diet and excercise plan. The plan goes like this:
1. Get up at 6:20, pick up friend down the street and get to gym by 6:30.
2. Work out until 7:30.
3. Sit on friend's porch and drink coffee until 8:15, and talk about the stuff of life.

Every morning we tackle the same three topics, and one wildcard. We talk about sex, we talk about faith & religion, and we talk about the squirrels that are eating a hole in his roof. The wildcard topic depends on what movie was on in the cardiocinema, how work is going, and how strong the coffee is. Either way, it's always a pleasant way to start my morning, and I love the conversation.

This morning was harder than previous...

This morning we talked about heaven and hell and what makes a Christian and what makes you saved. My friend is a very smart 20-something with a lifetime of history in the church, several years of missionary experience, and deep knowledge of the Bible. I am a very smart 20-something with a lifetime of history in and out of churches, several years of church employment, and a deep-seated need to keep asking the question.

He talked about his very cool experiences traveling the country and watching pagan people in pagan rituals at pagan festivals worshiping humanism and reveling in relativism. He said he hates relativism. He's got answers that involve Jesus, and the Bible, and what you have to figure out before you die.

I respect that...but I don't have those answers. I've got lots and lots of questions...but not a lot of answers. I know it's supposed to be noble to have questions...it's the intellectual pursuit, right? But that's not entirely true...I do have answers, I just have them for a while. I've known for a long time that a belief that the Bible is infallible feels wrong to me. I've known for a long time that the idea that you must "give your life" to Christ before you die in order to be with God in the afterlife feels wrong to me. I've known that the pursuit of God may be the end in and of itself, and that feels right to me.

It's a weak man that pretends shys away from what he knows is true...and these are what's true, at least as far as I can tell right now. And he shared what he believes is true, and that makes him strong too.

He is what most would call a Christian. And, for the first time since high school, I'm fairly convinced that by many standards, I am not. Some of my questions...and some of my truths...don't match those of the Christians I went to Young Life with and volunteered at church with and sit next to at work. In fact, it's quite probable that I've become the dangerous brand of pseudo-Christian that my youth-group leaders warned us about...the kind that question the basic truths of Christianity, and bit-and-piece out the Bible at there own discretion to match their worldviews. For the first time since becoming a young man, I am the moral relativist compared to those who used to be my peers. I still have so many questions left to answer, and I'm not ready to settle into some of the truths of fundamental Christianity.

I am the outsider in some ways...stuck in bizarre purgatory between religions...and I think I'm learning how to value that.

More to come, I'm sure.

Peace,
Justin

Watching the Simpsons of the last four or five years is a little like having your 95-year-old grandma to Sunday dinner...

You love your grandmother. You have many, many happy memories with her. She has been so good to you for so many years. She was a crucial part of you growing up, and you often spent all week looking forward to a happy Sunday spent with her. Her contribution to your life is immeasurable, and you will always be grateful...

...but now, things are starting to go. You love her, and you want the best for her, and it pains you to see her slowly failing. She doesn't remember who she was, her thoughts are often rambling and incoherent, she keeps telling the same stories over and over again. And, periodically, she pees her pants.

You don't laugh, because it's not funny. It's sad. Every week you hope she'll be more like she use to be than like she is. And you work hard to remember the younger, present, coherent, dignified woman she used to be You still keep inviting her to Sunday dinners because of all she has done for you. But it's not fun anymore...it's more for her than for you.

So, with that in mind, I offer this open letter to the producers of The Simpsons:

Dear James L. Brooks, Sam Simon, and Matt Groening,

I love your show. I have loved your show from its first season. I owned and proudly wore my "Who The Hell Are You?" tee to my eighth grade Catholic school math class, knowing full well I would be asked to remove it in lieu of a school-issued lost-and-found tee, complete with a note sent home to my mother. I gladly accepted this persecution...damn near proudly...because it was for The Simpsons, the first prime-time show in my lifetime with the guts to tell it like is, the willingness to offend me, and the humor to make me laugh about it. Your show changed television forever, and forever upped the bar for comedy TV, cartoons, and adult prime-time entertainment. You created a cultural mega-icon that changed the way we think about marriage, gender roles, politics, religion, and what's really funny, and I am forever grateful.

In that gratitude, I'd like to entreat you to please stop making your show. Please let the film project quietly disappear, let the existing merchandise work it's way through the gift-shops and fast-food happy meals, and let this season's episodes stay vaulted until they can be gifted to your great-grandchildren as a personal reminder of your powerful legacy. Please stop production on everything Simpsons, save for the DVD sets of your existing shows.

I want to remember you as you were, and not as you are now. I want to remember a show that is fresh, clever, biting, subversive, fearless, counter-cultural, and, most of all, funny. Before the weekly random guest-stars, before the nonsensical rambling plot-lines, before Homer went pseduo-effeminate and clinically retarded, before your writers started taking the easy jokes and kitschy pop-culture slams, and before you accurately recognized that true Simpsons fans will watch anything, and were willing to rest into complacency with your ideation and writing.

I want to celebrate everything you were. I continue to tune in every week out of respect...which is my choice, and for which I can't hold you accountable...but I have to admit, I keep hoping every week that you've been canceled. I want to relish my Simpsons DVD's (I will continue to buy them the day they come out...all the way through Season 11) and watch and re-watch your brilliant show in its prime.

Please, save your dignity, and make sure your legacy gets the celebrated and virtually untarnished reputation it deserves. After holding out hope for the last four or five years that you would go out strong, the unfortunate truth is that I'm now begging you to just go out.

Please let me enjoy The Simpsons for its brilliant inception and eleven brilliant seasons. Please stop making The Simpsons, and let's celebrate your hard work together with a glass of champagne as we watch and laugh at those magnificent years.

Thanks.

Respectfully,
Justin Masterson

I have reason to believe that nearly a dozen uteruses are conspiring against me.

In the last six months, approximately all of our friends either got pregnant or had babies. It's not a perfect statistic, but it's pretty damn close.

When the first couple were born, I thought, "Wow, how cool...what are the odds of two of my friends having babies at the same time? I should introduce them...perhaps the little bundles of cry could play together some day." When the next couple were born, I thought, "Wow, how fortunate...that God, in all of His generous bounty, had decided to bless our community of friends with such a cornucopia of little souls for us to tend to." When the next couple were born, I thought, "Wow, how creepy...the condoms around here sure are unreliable." Finally, when the most recent six were born and four more friends got pregnant...the truth became all too clear...

...there is a global conspiracy to try to get me to have a baby.

Somewhere underneath the streets of Cincinnati there is a an underground HQ, complete with large-screen plasma displays constantly updating with new pregnancy info, vertical pieces of glass that you can write on with markers from both sides in order to chart my progress, and a big black onyx table where all of the women in my life meet to plot every nuanced move necessary to change my heart from irresponsible young ragamuffin to responsible, reliable Pop.

...and at the head of that table sits my dear wife...hands tented together, head tilted slightly downward, an evil grin on her face and holding another picture of another cousin who just gave birth to another wrinkly squish-dough screamster.

...


Here's the weird part: it's kind of working. No, I'm not the hardened, wild-oats sowing bachelor who is turning into a big soft teddy bear. I was never that wild, and I'm not that teddybeary now. But my heart is changing. I think I like babies...at least a bit. More likely a lot.

My favorite part is when I get to be one-on-one with them. Nobody taking a picture of me holding the baby, nobody asking me how I'd like to be a daddy, nobody gesturing with their elbow at me holding the baby and then knowingly winking at Stacy. Just me and the baby...little, breathing, warm, helpless, surreal and perfect. That's my favorite part.

I want a son. I want a daughter. I want a newborn baby that kind of looks like me and kind of looks like Stacy and mostly looks like an old man. I want to hold my baby and know that I don't have to give her back. I want to wonder what my tiny son will be like when he's done fighting to stay asleep at night and has begun pulling the covers over his own head to dampen the wail of the alarm clock so he can stay in bed for a few more minutes. I want to fear the rise and fall of her chest, impossibly small and complex in my hand, as her eyes dart wildly beneath closed lids in her newborn dreams. I want a son to teach, a daughter to be perplexed by, and Saturday mornings of fallen Cheerios and headless Barbies.

I want it to be safe, I want it to be scary, I want it to go right and I want to build a rebel. I don't know what I want, but I want the experience as much as I fear it.

We're thinking about it. I'm thinking about it. A lot.

Peace,
Justin

My friends are in a hurricane right now, and I'm very afraid for their safety.

Please stop what you're doing and do this:

Those who pray, pray.
Those who meditate, meditate.
Those who intend, intend.
Those who envision, envision.

Evan and Ellen.
Cabo San Lucas.
Hurrican John.

Make it stop, keep them safe.

Thanks.

My twin brother left town this morning.

Technically, it was this morning, but it felt like a very late night just after midnight as my brother, Matt, and his wife, Jo, loaded the final hangers and pillows and boxes of books into their taxicab-yellow Penske moving truck, and pulled the clanging metal door shut. We had all had a party together for the hours before their midnight departure, ostensibly celebrating this new chapter in their lives, I suppose...but my older brother Brian said it well when he described "a pall over the whole thing." It was a celebration of new things, I guess...but for me, it felt a bit like a funeral.

I've never lived apart from Matt, really. We grew up in the same house, as you might imagine, and shared a bedroom for the bulk of our youth. We went to college together and lived next door from each other. We got ourselves married, and moved down the street from each other. Hell, we even shared the same room in-utero, and that was close quarters. We played together, we sledded together, we swam together, we joined rival ten-speed biking gangs in our neighborhood together, we fought each other, and we bled sometimes. I hated him when I was still in the stage where I could hate someone for stealing my dessert or not handing over the TV remote, and I loved him when I was still in the stage where you believed you didn't have a choice. He was my rival, my playmate, my bully, my confidant, my equal, my conscience, and the only one of us brave enough to tell Mom off.

Matt and I have always highlighted the enormity of the differences between us. He is a sports fanatic, an athlete, a social butterfly, and a raucous and loud voice that carries in any crowd and that sneers in the face of disagreement. I am an artist-type, a sedentary, an extrovert who fears the disappointment of others, and a peacemaker. But jesus, we're so alike sometimes. We did life together in a way that, unless you're a twin yourself, I don't think you can understand. In some ways, we polarized in order to live our lives as two halves of the same exprience, I think...we polarized to differentiate ourselves, and we polarized so that we could experience the completeness of life more fully together.

As kids, we were often asked if he could feel the same things I feel, and if we had any kind of special "twin power" that would allow us to sense what was going on to the other twin at any given time. I always laughed and said no. Today, I wonder more.

If this reads like a eulogy, it's because it is. Matt is far from dead...he is beginning the next step of a journey that will undoubtedly prove magnificent, frightening, resonant and powerful. He and Jo are finally going to be in a town big enough to accomodate their talents and their training. He will practice law, and he will excel. She will write and publish, and she will excel. They deserve this success...and I would never wish for them to stay here. But the fact remains, he's further away than he's ever been, and for the first time in my life, I can't just go see him. This is new, and this is hard.

Matt and I, for all these years being so close to each other in young adulthood, never spent a lot of time together. Truth is...I never felt like we had to. My love for my twin brother is as saturating, profound, and as unconditional as I will ever know. He was a constant for me...I quietly trusted because I knew he was there. He was always there.

Matt, if you're reading this...I miss you already. I cried last night, I cried this morning, and I'm crying now. I am so happy for you and Jo, and I have no doubts that this is the best move for you...but I don't want you to be gone. You are the only twin brother I will ever have, and I can't help but feel like a part of me is in DC now.

I love you deeply, and I look forward to seeing you soon.

-Justin

I always become a nihlist when I'm on vacation...

Not a dedicated, Uli Kunkel, floating in a pool surrounded by Jack Daniels bottles, "I beleeve in nuh-zing!" nihlist, mind you...just a "nothing means anything" nihlist. Which, as I think about this again, may not qualify as nihlism...or any ism for that matter...it may better qualify as good ol' fashioned depression.

I had a great weekend this weekend. I drove up with Stacy to Put-In-Bay, a tiny little island on the Ohio side of Lake Erie whose homes and city streets resemble Pleasantville and whose night-times resemble Mardi Gras. It's essentially a party paradise for four months out of the year, with all varieties of wealthy white boat-owners and their college-aged offspring gathering together to drink beer, flash people for beads, and spend a lot of time saying "WOOOO!" Fifty-something men with white hair tucked under straight-billed baseball caps roam the streets by day, buying cigars and t-shirts with funny sayings on them, and young people wake up at nooon and slowly take over the town by nightfall, when all is transformed into a pulsing, sexy, simmering party for those who can afford to get themselves blurry.

In short, it's a lot of fun.

However, I don't tend to enjoy it as much as I would expect. In the middle of everything I get introspective, distant, and navel-gazing. I wish I could say it was some kind of pious soul-thing...watching that sort of gluttony and debauchery from a distance with a holy discontent for the short-lived things of this world...but I'm usually four or five beers south of that ivory tower by then. No, I think it's more the realization that several hundred miles, several hundred dollars, several dozen cigarettes, and seven days of severance from my soberest sentience later, I'm left with a feeling of..."is this all there is?"

Right now I'm sitting in a bed in the Seelbach Hotel in downtown Louisville. I'm in a very large room with very dark oak, surrounded by four posters of bed and lying on a duvet with a thread count that exceeds the average Nicaraguan's yearly salary. The lighting is perfect, the dinner was magnificent, and the Kentucky bourbon that followed deserves a post of it's very own. I was lucky to be treated to these great amenities on this particular trip, and I'm glad to consume them and to smile while doing it. Yet, for all of the soft touches and scented soaps and leather seats and tasty glasses of wine...I still feel a bit hollow, and more than a bit useless.

I think that's the problem. I work at work, and I feel useful. I work at home sometimes, and when I do, I feel useful. I occasionally get to counsel my friends, console my parents, and fix things that break around the house...and I feel useful. But when I'm on vacation...all I do is consume. I just keep taking things in. The only thing I'm doing as I move from hotel to restaurant to rental car to playhouse to hotel is contribute to the GNP and global warming. I'd like to relax, to be sure, but I feel like there has to be more than just tickling my own underbelly, and that thought keeps me discontented. That discontent, if left to simmer long enough, eventually turns into a bland form of disgust, which eventually commits itself to pseudo-nihlism. That nihlishm takes the shape of, "If I am having all of the finest things in the world and all of them offer only momentary feelings of joy or growth...than nothing can mean anything."

Seems dramatic, doesn't it? I realize. But I can't get that feeling to go away. It comes as one of the many flavors of my neurosis, I guess...one little Buttered Popcorn in the multi-colored bag of Jelly Bellys we call the human condition. (Lord, that metaphor is a stretch, isn't it?) But it is what it is, and it's my blog, so there you have it.

I sleep now, and I dream of Stacy. I love to travel, and I look forward to going home.

Peace,
Justin

Hola amigos...it's been a long time since I rapped at ya.

(Onion fans, grin break now).

I had a wonderful after-dinner conversation with a very good friend last night about the relative goodness or badness of humanity. I don't know why dinner tends to induce good conversation, but I suspect it has something to do with the blood leaving your brain to support your bloated stomach, freeing up the brain from the burden of all those nutrients, and readying it for brash opining over tiramisu.

The conversation began with a discussion about drinking, as I recall. Which was odd, because neither of us were. In fact, now that I think about, that very fact probably made the discussion so topical. My friend is not a drinker...she will have an occasional drink here and there...but she's not a drinker like I'm a drinker and my father's a drinker and the men of Omega-Delta-Chi are drinkers. She samples, she sips, she moves on. She drinks to taste. I drink to drink for the most part, and I drink to get dull and happy.

My friend is very, very smart; so I tend to listen to her pretty carefully. She said that she doesn't drink much because she wants to live a healthy, natural life, and that getting buzzed or drunk doesn't seem natural to her. I told her that when I drink, I usually drink in order to feel more natural. I am an anxious person by the combined efforts of nature and nurture (with a healthy tip of the scales toward the latter), and I spend a great deal of my time worrying and fretting about one thing or another. I have a hard time letting go of what concerns me, and tension leaks out of me the same way gold bricks leak out of Fort Knox. So, when I drink, I drink to help me let go, settle down, and smile more. I don't know if it's a good policy or a bad policy, but I drink with relative modesty, so I'm not too worried about it.

What really interested me about the conversation is that she kept saying, for me. "Drinking is unnatural for me." "Being drunk is unhealthy for me." "It's a bad idea to get drunk to make yourself feel better...for me, anyways." She's like that...it's one of my favorite things about her...she refuses to exercise judgement against others as being good or bad in any real sense, which works out great when you're a solid mixture of both and you hang out with someone as excellent as her.

The trouble is, something being bad solely for me is a pretty foreign concept to me. I tend to believe that most things that are bad are bad, and most things that are good are good. I think it's the Catholic in me, or at least the Christian. Christianity doesn't have a lot of tolerance for moral relativism. If the Bible is to be believed, then Jesus didn't have a lot of conditional morality to share with the world. Nor did the God of the Old Testament. There are a lot of hard lines in the Bible, and less grey area than I think I'd like. At least, that's the case as I see it at first glance...

..but if you look a little deeper...

In Exodus 20, God says "Thou shalt not kill." (Thank heavens God speaks fluent King's English, or I'd have a hell of a time understanding him). But, then he orders the Jews to slaughter the Philistines. He says, "Thou shalt not bear false witness" [or, "lie" in modern translations], but then in I Kings 22 it says "The Lord hath put a lying spirit in the mouth of all these thy prophets, and the Lord hath spoken evil concerning thee." God says, "Thou shalt not steal," but also orders His people to "...spoil [steal from] the Egyptians" in Exodus 13.

So, if you think the King James translation is somewhat accurate, it seems you have a couple of options:
1. The Bible isn't accurately reflecting God's words to man.
2. The Bible is accurately reflecting God's words to man, and God is unintentionally contradicting Himself.
3. The Bible is accurately reflecting God's words to man, and God is intentionally contradicting Himself.

Or...of course...

4. Justin, it's wrong to question God and the Bible. Just have faith, or go to Hell.

If you believe #1, which I'm still trying to make up my mind about, then this conversation can probably wrap up here, because what's the point of worrying about something somebody made up a long time ago?

If you believe #2, then you don't believe in the same God I do, because my God tends to remember stuff.

If you believe #4, then enjoy this video, I'll pay you back for the time with a prompt money order to your place of residence.

But if you believe #3, which I ostensibly do, then you have to ask why God would do such a thing? Is it possible that morality can't simply be spelled out with hard rules? Is it possible that it's OK to kill some people some times, and not OK to other people other times? If that's the case...are there any hard rules? Is it ever OK to have sex with children? To eat your parents? To abort a baby? To lie?

And...if it can't be said that there are absolute lines of good and bad...how can it be said that a person is either? For the pedophile who was molested as a child, and who knew nothing in his life other than pain and suffering, and for whom the desire to understand his pain drove him to molest another...can we call him "bad?" If so, can we call him "worse" than he who steals two dollars from the register on his way out of work at Starbucks...providing the man at Starbucks knows it's wrong and has the ability to control his impulses?

If those who are driven by madness, revenge, or a crippled past (or a tasty cocktail of the three) to perform horrendous acts against humanity were truly oppressed by their disturbances, can we call them "bad?" Can we rightfully punish them? Shouldn't the child who has everything be punished more severely for a small transgression than the child with nothing who commits a large one?

Can a person ever be called "good?" Can a person ever be called "bad?" If not...can we call God either of these?

It was a good conversation, and it was a troubling conversation. I've thought about it all day...which is probably best. I don't want my fear of what would happen if there were no moral plumb lines to drive me to presume that there is one.

Peace,
Justin

The following is the most romantic post about stomach flu you'll read all day...

I got sick this week. Quite sick. The kind of sick you don't talk about at dinner parties. And for the last 36 hours or so I've been lying on my couch waiting for the sick to pass. And, lying in the overstuffed and oversized chair five feet from me has been my also very sick wife. (It seems she got me sick with the flu she had last week...and, not to be outdone, I returned the favor this week. I didn't think it was possible either, but then again, here we are). We have spent the last day-and-a-half trying to sleep, trading turns in the bathroom, and trying to guess how long ago four hours ago was so that we can take the next batch of Tylenol.

OK...I'll give you...not a formula for high romance.

However, for some reason, it was romantic. We were sharing the experience together. We took care of each other, watched each other get worse, and we've begun to watch each other get better. We called out quietly for one another in the hot and wakeful midnight hours, and we did so hoping that, for some reason, the other person would be awake enough to respond, just so we know that they're there. We hoped for each other, and even prayed for each other a little bit. We loved each other in our sickness...the kind of love that is bigger than grossiness and pukiness and trashcans by the bedside.

I loved my wife today...and she loved me. It's a strange thing to say, but I actually enjoyed being sick with Stacy. Being sick is life, and I love having life with her.

Peace,
Justin

I've been trying to post for two weeks about something I'm not sure how to talk about...

I have written a number of posts, edited them, and deleted them...all because I'm not sure how to say what I want to say on this very difficult and inflammatory issue, about which I am extremely emotionally connected.

All to no avail. So...on the excellent advice of my friend Steve...I've promised myself I'm just gonna write it and let it be what it is. Here is what I've been trying to say:

...


...I think being an illegal should be illegal.

...

...

...there, I've said it.

Whew...that feels better.

I'll expound a little.

I tend to think of myself as a liberal, progressive, dare I say Democratic kind of guy. I tend to think that I'm a compassionate kind of guy...at least in certain squishy areas of humankind. I also tend to think that I tend to speak without thinking, so I took some extra time to think about this one before I started speaking. And I still think being an illegal should be illegal.

If you've turned on the TV...or the radio...or the newspaper...(let that one go)...you've surely seen the great debate on immigration in America. Or, more specifically, the debate on Hispanic immigration into America. Nobody seems too concerned about the extraordinary number of people from India, or Korea, or China, or Eastern Africa who are streaming into the United States. And there's a perfectly good reason for that...

...they came here legally.

What's pissing everybody off is that people from Cuba are floating in on rafts, people from the D.R. are stowing away in the bottoms of freighters, and people from Mexico are t across the border in the middle of the night to get into this country. And get in they are...to the tune of an estimated 700% growth in illegal Hispanics living in the U.S. over the last ten years.

...wait, I'm not done. That part isn't pissing everybody off. In fact, as you may have noticed, illegal Hispanic workers have been living in the U.S. for quite some time, and doing a fine job at it. I don't know who was legal and who was illegal, but I know that Hispanic workers with very little English at their disposal have cooked my meals, mowed the lawn where I work, constructed my gym, cleaned my hotel rooms, delivered my Chinese food (which was a strange surprise), and so much more. And you didn't hear me complaining. They work cheap, they work hard, and they seemed happy enough.

That's where we get to the part where everybody is pissed off.

The seemed happy enough...for a while. And then, protests started. Protests about equal pay for equal work, protests about getting social services and schooling for the children of illegal immigrants, protests about minimum wage increases...and...here's my very favorite...protests about the U.S. Government's attempt to enforce and toughen immigration laws.

You know what, let's change the POV here to make things easier...

---

The following is an open lettter to pissed off illegal Hispanic immigrants:

---

Dear pissed off illegal Hispanic immigrants,

Thank you for doing all that hard work for me. You do really good work...truthfully, you do better work than I would have done, and you worked twice as hard without complaining. Thank you for doing that...I'm really glad that you chose to do that work, and I'm thankful that I could benefit from your tremendous work ethic.

However, I'm a bit concerned. You see...you're not supposed to be here. I know it sounds insensitive and elitist...but I'm actually just telling you what the law says. The law says that you're not supposed to be here. It says that you're welcome in this country...as tired and/or poor as you may be...and that you may come and work our fertile lands to make your living. All you have to do is what everyone else on the planet who wants to come and work in America has to...you have to apply, and you have to be accepted. I'm sorry that we let you make your living here without kicking you out sooner, because I can see why you'd get the impression you had the right to be here after a few years of nobody saying anything. That was our bad. But now you need to go home.

You see, I have a good friend named Maria. Maria is a brilliant woman, and a gifted lawyer. She wants to move to America from Peru so she can be a lawyer in the US and make a life for herself here. She went to school here on an educational visa, she fell in love with an American man, and now she wants to work here. She applied for a work visa and was denied, unfortunately, so she went back to Peru where she now waits for a chance to return to America, see her love again, and try to get a visa again. She's playing by the rules, and it hurts her. My prayer is that she gets her visa, moves here, and gets married to that man. My hope is that she may even some day wish to be a citizen of the US, though I will always respect her even if she doesn't.

So, here's the thing...I don't think you should be here. You weren't invited, you weren't cleared, and you sure as heck weren't approved for a work visa. In fact, we did everything we could to keep you out...we spent millions and millions of dollars building fences and hiring guys to drive up and down the border, just so you wouldn't come. But you made it through our fences, and you made it past our guards, and somehow you made your way into your current job. I admire your courage and your resolve...but you still shouldn't be here. This isn't "Red Rover"...just because you made it across the border and through the locked arms of the patrol doesn't mean you get to stay on this side. You don't get to stay, you don't get to work, and you sure as shit don't get to live off our social services.

You are here against the laws of this country. You broke the law, and like any other resident of the US who breaks the law, you are subject to consequences. You can march in the streets, sing our anthem in your language, and fly your flag above ours...you may be as polite or rude as you like (that's the beauty of our first amendment), but you're still here illegally. And until we make running over the border in the middle of the night a legal shortcut to the immigration process, you will remain illegal.

It sucks that you come from a shitty country. It sucks that I was fortunate enough to be born into a free country with great opportunity, and that you weren't. I hope that your country changes, and I hope that my country changes its laws so that good people can find good homes here easily. But that hasn't happened yet, and you're not supposed to be here.

Go home, find the application office for an American work visa, and get in line. While you're there, look for Maria...I'm praying she's up near the front.

Good luck,
Justin


---



Peace,
Justin

I've been neither funny nor clever in recent days, and as much as I'd like to post my shopping list and a copy of my insurance policy, I thought I'd post something of real content.

This is a blog entry from someone who I don't know who that someone is. Another someone sent it to me, and I thought it was both brilliant and sort of stupid at times. I thought the collective you might like it.


------

When you build up a structure and slap the word church on a sign out front, it becomes very easy for people to forget that church is not a place to go once a week, but rather something that we are.  Uh oh, here I go...
Forgive me, but I dont need a weekly program of rehearsed hooky tunes followed by a barrage of announcements and a puffy theological dissertation.  I dont need cell groups, home groups, singles groups, young married groups or mens groups.  Frankly, I'm pretty grouped out.  What I need is fellowship.  Not "Fellowship Bible" or "Fellowship Community" or "Fellowship Covenant" or "Fellowship Baptist."  I need community.  Not "Christ Community" or "Faith Community" or "Real Life Community."  And dont get me started on grace.  God knows we need that, but not in the form of another catchy church name.  I don't need to read another trite quip on a marquis telling me that a church is "prayer conditioned" or that "regular bible check ups prevent truth decay."    And I don't need to be professionally greeted at the door of the sanctuary.  I need to be known, not counted and alphabetized.  After all, Mr. Greeter, is it really nice to see me, or are you just happy to see another seat filled?  No, I don't want a bulletin.  Associate Pastor Whats-His-Name is going to read it all to me during the prayer-slash-announcement time anyway.  Besides, it's a good way for him to squeeze in some face time between "worship" and the offering.  Oh excuse me, I mean "tithe"  (the word church leadership uses to ensure Gods promises will be fulfilled to His people).  The "freedom isn't free" sales pitch:  Freedom comes at a cost!  And that cost is 10 percent of everything you have.  But if you're a guest, please don't feel obligated to give (only members should feel obligated).  Excuse me, do you not see that we are clinging so desperately to these laws that Jesus [admittedly] lived to fulfill, but also bled and died to free us from?  James says if you take on one law you must carry the weight of the entire law on your shoulders.  Brothers and sisters, that is not a burden we were meant to carry in light of the finishing work of Christ!  Tithe is merely a control device for leaders who can't trust the work of the Holy Spirit in the Body if Christ (or who don't understand that we have been freed from those regulations and rules).  It's the same thing they did back in the early church with circumcision.  Am I saying we shouldn't give?  By no means!  The apostle Paul has plenty to say about that.  He said that we should excel in the grace of giving just as we excel in the other good gifts (he also had a teensy weensy tiny bit to say about the end of the law too, which includes the mandate of tithing).  I didn't want to get started on tithe.  Guess its too late for that.  This is not merely a piece on tithing.  Rather, it is a satirical challenge issued to the prodigal church of America.
You see, we don't need churches with schedules to keep, fundraisers to promote, and people to reintroduce to life under law.  No thanks.  I'm over that.  What I need is a safe place for people who know each other intimately and, at a moments notice, can lay hands on one other and exercise their gifts with confidence and without fear.  Gifts like prophecy and healing.  It isn't wrong for me to desire a place where I can come to be prayed over without the formality of a scheduled altar call at the end of a service.  Besides, what kind of service is it to erect a building and obligate everyone to come and help pay the utility bills, outrageous mortgages, expansion funds, and salaries (for a staff who claims to equip, but mostly enables laziness amongst the members by doing all the work for them) when there are congregants who can't find healing from a common cold, let alone afford to pay their own rent?  And when we do attempt to reach out to those people, we stamp our church brand all over the project and piously advertise our "mission."
Is that authenticity?  Yes, it is very authentic.  But I can take you out in my back yard and show you something very authentic that my dog left behind - and no amount of clever marketing will make it stink any less.  We don't need authenticity.  We need truth.  And truth is not a marketing strategy.  It is not programmed.  Truth is only a formula when it is math.  The gospel is not math.  It is not an equation.  It is mystery - mystery revealed in the person of Christ our Deliverer, who never prepared a four point sermon, rented out a billboard, or handed out a tract.  He taught, he corrected, he rebuked, he interacted, he had compassion, he healed, he prayed, he studied, he believed in others, he cared for the poor, he had close friends who knew him well, and he looked people in the eyes simply because he took the time to.  But most of all, he loved.  And that's the truth.

-----

What do you think?

Peace,
Justin

I just had a terrifying dream.

I tend to dream vividly, and, fortunately, I tend to demonstrate no hint of a gift for prophecy in my dreaming. Which is comforting when you have the dream I just woke up from.

Bear with me...it may be hard to follow...

I dreamt that I was on a gameshow. I don't remember much about the gameshow, other than at the very end, it was possible to run up a giant ramp and grab a big TV and slide down with it. (Your prize was that you got to keep the TV). My brothers and I were competing as a team on this show, and I was the last to go. I ran as fast as I could, I grabbed the TV, and I got it back before the buzzer. (This is not the bad part of the dream). I handed it to my older brother and we all celebrated.

Then, something happened. I don't remember precisely what, but something. Somebody criticized me for not doing it fast enough, I think. I was hurt, and yelled back. Fine, no big deal. But the conversation escalated into a full-blown argument, which escalated into a full-blown fight. Once again, I don't remember why, and I don't think it matters much why. All I know, is I felt a rage boiling up in me, and I'm pretty sure that's why I had the dream in the first place...to address that feeling. Our verbal fight soon became a physical confrontation, and my twin brother, at this point, was smart enough to walk away. That left me and my older brother. I felt like he painted me into a corner...he had called me irresponsible and foolish, and had threatened to prove it to everyone I knew. The only thing I had left was my weight to push around, so I did. I attacked him, and I did so viciously. It was a good fight, and it should have been a fair fight...it was on paper, anyway. I did not significantly out-strength or out-skill him...it's just that I was so angry, I went nuts on him...and really hurt him. And I was glad.

...I wish the story ended there. I love my brother very much, and that was bad enough. But it didn't end there....

...On the way out the door, as my brother lay beaten on the floor behind me, I ran into a friend of mine. My friend is a she and she is a good friend and a good person. She asked what was going on, and I tried to explain why what had happened was totally reasonable and how I was pushed to it. She became frightened and angry and...worst of all...disappointed in me. She began to yell at me and even worse, I could see in her eyes that she didn't trust me. (BTW, I'm fairly sure she represented Stacy...because while I like this friend and all, I don't have the sort of heart investment in her that would make this dream as scary as it was. My guess is that my subconscious couldn't handle the thought of this being Stacy, so it made the nightmare more bearable by making it someone else). She saw me as a different person, and despite all of the relationship equity that we had built up over the years, it was all forgotten because of one bad choice. She threatened to tell everyone what a monster I was. I felt painted into a corner. I was angry, hurt, and felt trapped. (Are you seeing a pattern yet?) She tried to leave...so I hit her.

...I couldn't believe it. This strange gameshow dream had turned into a horrible nightmare...and it wasn't a nightmare where I'm chased by a knife-weilding psycho or confronted by an armed mugger on a dark street. In this dream, the psycho was me, the mugger was me...and that was even more terrifying.

I hit her twice. She fell to the ground, bruised and a little bloody, and yelled for help. Nobody came. As soon as I had done it, I knew it was wrong, and I immediately begun to apologize. I tried to help her up, but it was too late...she wouldn't let me come near her (and with good reason). She called the police from her cell phone. My she called my twin brother, and my parents, and even a couple of friends of mine who are much, much bigger than I am...just to protect her from me. They showed up, they comforted her, and they told me how despicable and disgusting I am. They stared at me with disappointed and hateful eyes. A couple of the men threatened to kill me if they ever heard that I did this again. In short, they did what I would do if I heard this about someone I knew.

The last thing I remember is my twin brother looking at me with a hurt, anger and disappointment and saying, "you're disgusting." That's when I woke up, and that's when I started to write this blog entry.



...please bear in mind, I have NEVER hit my wife. Nor any other woman. I haven't even been in a fight with another man for years. I am, for the most part, a gentle person who keeps his fists reserved to the punching bag, not for hurting others. I have never hit a woman, and that's part of why this bothered me so much. Why would I have a dream like this? Am I secretly a wife-beating husband? Am I harboring some deep resentment I don't know about? Am I truly dangerous?

This was a horrible dream. I woke up sweating and scared. I want to dismiss it and forget it, but my mind doesn't work that way. The best way to deal with it, for me, was to write it down. So I have.

I scared myself this morning.

Peace,
Justin

I'll give you... a space western is stupid.

...That's why it surprised me so much when I fell spurs-over-lasers in love with one.

Truthfully, I only kind of like cowboy flicks (save for Young Guns II and Tombstone...pseudo-cowboy, but fine filmmaking), and I really can't tolerate science-fiction. Star Wars makes me angry, Star Trek bores me and Star Crunch tastes like chocolate-covered boogers. (OK, I like Star Crunch, and it tastes nothing like boogers, but points are best made in threes).

So, when my friend Allan told me to pop in a DVD of a failed TV series from 2002 called "Firefly," I kept waiting for the punchline. However, it was better than editing the video I was supposed to be editing at the time, so I tuned in.

Holy....




...




....shit.



I have never loved a television series more. I have never had more heart investment, more head investment, and more wallet investment in a television series. I've bought the series DVD set twice, I bought the movie version twice (which we'll get to in a minute), I bought the comic book, and...good lord...I even bought the action figures. I love each of the ten principal characters with an interest that borders on perversion, when you consider that all of them are fictional, and when you consider that one of them is a spaceship. I've found myself using words like "Warp drive," "Grav-boot," and "Pert Near" in casual conversation. I've even cussed in Chinese once, which may seem odd, but it makes sense when you see the show. I listen to the podcasts about the show, I keep up with websites about the show, and I'm even a member of a couple of them.

I...am...a...geek.

I didn't mean to be. I've actually been in a six-month-long get-cooler regimen, including new clothes, frequent haircuts, and a scented spray I'm told is made of toilet water. This regimen isn't actually making me any cooler, but at least it's expensive. But this whole "Firefly" thing is really screwing things up.

It's the writing more than anything. The writing is so....so....so well-done. The writer, Joss Whedon, writes like I would if I were twice as smart and thrice as clever. It's deep...it's meaningful. Like, actually meaningful...it's about God, it's about family, it's about love, it's about trust, fear, gender roles, free speech, prostitution, God, the government, and sometimes it's about guns. The acting is almost entirely brilliant, with some exceptions, and even those exceptions are poorly-acted resucitated by well-written.

The show was cancelled because nobody watched it. Nobody watched it because it was on against something that was apparently much more interesting, and because Fox made them play the episodes out of order, so they made no sense. It also failed because "Space Western" is a pretty stupid idea.

But it worked. It totally worked. It is powerful, and it is profound.

The show failed, but the fans spread the word. They did such a good job, that the DVD sales of the failed show (it lasted less than a season) blew away expectations. They had to do a second and a third run...they flew off the shelves, and as word spread, they did more flying. They sold so many that Universal Studios picked up the failed (now extremely profitable) TV show and did the unprecendented and unthinkable...they made a big-budget movie out of it. The movie is called "Serenity," and it's a phenomenon.

Please please go rent the movie. If you can't rent it, borrow it from me. If you don't know me, buy it on Amazon. Better yet, buy the series. Watch at least three episodes. If you don't like it after that, I'll buy it from you.

I hate science fiction. I love Firefly. Go see Serenity, go and buy Firefly.

Now, I have some geekdom to get to.

Peace,
Justin

Transvestites make the best freaking moccachinos.



...at least, that's been my experience.

Yesterday, Stacy and I followed the advice of a good friend to check out the isolated little burg of Yellow Springs, Ohio. It's about an hour northeast of Cincy, and is the home to Antioch College, WYSO, and Dave Chappelle. It is also a little island of liberal thought in an otherwise uber-conservative state. The "downtown" area consists of about three blocks of shops, most of which sell batiked scarves and Indian jewelry and incense holders and....err-hmm...tobacco water-pipes. It's a little hippie paradise with a terrific record store, a tasty place to get a veggie burrito, and a lot of women with nose piercings. It was, in short, a very cool place to be.

It is also home to a very tall man who dresses in women's clothing as he serves coffee drinks at the Mermaid Cafe and Bookstore. He stands probably 6'2", wears a long brown wig, has yellowed teeth and a baritone voice, was donning a string of pearls and bracelet to match, and sported a flower-print dress that June Cleaver would have envied. He was very kind, well-spoken, and friendly...and he made a hell of a moccachino. (I'm referring to this person as "he," by the way, because I'm not certain if he would consider himself a "transvestite" [man dressing as a woman] or a "transgendered person" [woman stuck in a man's body]...and I never got to asking his name, because the only reason I wanted to know was out of morbid curiosity...and that seemed exploitative to me). He served several other customers while I was there, and nobody really had anything to say about it...or even seemed surprised or taken aback by this very tall man in women's clothing.

...and, for some reason...this made me feel quite proud of this little town.

I have heard Yellow Springs and its university anchor, Antioch, referred to as "progressive" on several occasions. This is usually spoken to mean "open-minded," "non-traditional," "having a diversity of thought" and...most accurately, I think, "liberal." That is to say, reflecting the values of social and political liberalism...

read as: ...save the environment, local business is better than big-business, the government can't be trusted, political activism is the highest form of patriotism, feed the poor, use less, live communally when you can, women should have the right to choose, being gay is just fine thank you, have a veggie burrito...etc., etc.

These things are called "progressive," implying that subscribing to these ideologies is more than just a choice that a person makes, for better or for worse...but that it is actual progress. That this an ascent of sorts...someone who lands on these believes has progressed from a less-evolved state of being to a more-evolved state.

...Here's where I'm headed with this.

I was proud of this "progressive" little town, with it's "progressive" little cafe run by a crossdresser, because I think deep down, I do believe that this is progress. I think I agree with those who call it "progressive" to have a town where a man can dress as a woman and still keep a job and still sell coffee and not be mocked or laughed or shunned day after day. Now, I'm certain that the guy at Mermaid's has had his share of ridicule...but I saw nothing but smiles and friendly faces buying books and coffee from him for the 90 minutes I was there. It was as if this was ...gasp... OK. And, that was heartening to me...it was encouraging.

I don't know whether or not crossdressing is morally wrong. I don't even know if that's a fair question. I think a better question is, "is it healthy for that person?" For instance...if his gender-identity issues had driven him to the point of suicide...and he instead opted to simply embrace his feminine side and dress as a woman in order to carry on with his life...it's hard for me to call that wrong....I'd call choosing a string of pearls and a pair of panty hose over a bullet pretty damned healthy. However, if he dresses like that in order to avoid dealing with some very deep hurt that needs addressing...if he's using it as a crutch to stave off the sense that he has to deal with the tough stuff of his past...then I would suggest it is unhealthy. Either way, I don't know that it's a matter of right and wrong...more a matter of what is going to bring this person closer to God and to his own personal mission.

If that's the case...and I'm perfectly aware that you may not be convinced it is...then why should he be ridiculed? Why should be shamed, ousted, or even encouraged to change his ways? To love people where they are, while still encouraging them towards the things that will bring them closer to God, seemed to be Jesus's way. I want to live that way. I want to live as a person who does not judge or condemn others, but helps them to discern what is most healthy and likely to reconnect them with God. Sometimes, this may mean a "tough love" approach of telling people that the choices they are making are not healthy, but I suspect that most advice needs to be worked out on an individual basis...not as a blanket rule of "activity x is morally wrong" or "activity x is morally acceptable."

It's possible that the guy working behind the counter at the Mermaid Cafe in Yellow Springs is living the healthiest possible life he can right now...and that that healthy life involves doing something I don't understand and can't possibly empathize with...dressing as a woman. I hope that I would always walk into a situation like that wanting to understand him first, and then, if allowed, to help him find whatever is most likely to bring him closer to God...without self-righteous judgement, without condemnation, without ridicule. To me...that sounds a great deal like progress.

Peace,
Justin





P.S. - Let's face it, I am quite judgemental...my previous posts should make that abundantly clear. I'm just judgemental about other issues. As much as I'd like to be the loving, Jesusesque guy described above...well, I'm not. But I'm working on it.

I don't claim to know much about politics.

Whatever it is that I might know about one political happening or another I learn in one of two ways:
1. By catching it on Morning Edition on NPR. Morning Edition is my way of both getting a healthy dose of intellectual-sounding words in my head before I get to work, and getting just enough liberal crap in my head to offset all of the conservative crap I hear on my radio alarm clock, which is tuned to AM talk radio. My hope is that I’m fairly moderate, or at least appropriately confused, before I get to work.
2. By reading the free New York Times or USA Today that gets left on the doorstep of my hotel rooms. I don’t know how they decide which one to leave me on any given day, but I’m starting to collect some quantitative data on that, and so far I have linked it to whether or not I rehang my bathroom towels.

And, true to my form, despite having a breadth of political knowledge that resembles a Necco wafer, I tend to spout off about it a lot. So, in that vein, here are my honest positions on issues that make people angry:

The Death Penalty: If I could write a slogan more clever than this one, which I saw once on a bumper sticker outside of a Catholic school, I would: “It seems wrong to me to kill people who kill people to show people that killing people is wrong.” The death penalty is not a deterrent, it’s not a cost-saver, and the only person it seems to stop is the guy strapped into the chair. The defenseless guy strapped into the chair. The fact that we’re killing people based on our legal system, which is biased, influenced, affected, racist and flawed (as any legal system is) really really freaks me out. Since the birth of DNA evidence analysis, more than 60 inmates have been released from death row. Just… …think… …about… …that…

Abortion: For all of you who are waiting for this Christian to say something right-wingy and intolerant about how cruel and awful abortion is…
…you’re right on time. Abortion is cruel and awful. I’m a little mixed on situations where the mother’s life is in danger, because then it’s kill one person or kill another…but babies, unborn or otherwise, are people, and they deserve the same chance to screw up or champion their lives as the rest of us do.

Homosexuality: I don’t know if being gay is wrong. I think most gay folks are born gay, and I’m guessing a few other folks subconsciously become gay because of one reason or another, and very very few choose to be gay on purpose. The Bible says it’s wrong. My heart says it isn’t. So…what do you do with that? I’ll tell you what you do, if you’re me: you realize that if being gay is wrong then gay people are doing wrong stuff just like I’m doing wrong stuff every day, and that I’m no different…no better or worse or more loved by God or less loved by God…then they are. Bottom line. If you choose to be gay, then you’re a braver man than I’ll ever be…I can’t imagine all that you’d have to put up with. Point is, I’m not better than you are, and I’m no worse. You’re a child of God, not a gay child of God or a straight child of God. Go be gay, don’t be gay, but God loves you and I just the same.

Euthanasia: I respect people’s right to die, and particularly respect their right to kill themselves, so long as they don’t kill or wound anybody else in the process. I think your right to die and your right to your thoughts are just about the only two inalienable rights on the planet, and unless we can prove that you are mentally unfit to make any decisions about your own life or death (such as a jilted lover who, in a fit of depression, goes running to her GP looking for a lethal dose of sodium pentathol). If you’re a cancer patient who is struggling with the pain everyday…or even just a cancer patient who doesn’t want to fight it anymore and is ready to go home…and has carefully thought this out…by all means, Doc, make it happen. Seems contradictory to be so against the death penalty and abortion and so in favor of euthanasia, doesn’t it? The key difference is who is making the choice. I respect your choice to die, though I hope you’ve got a damn good reason.

The President: George W. Bush is a monkey. He is a magical monkey who learned how to talk. I think we should congratulate him. I don’t think he’s immoral…I just think he’s retarded. And not in a cute way, either.

The Bible: I like the Bible. I downright love parts of it. The Bible seems to be the richest fount of knowledge, spiritual insight and historical teaching I’ve read thus far. It tells the story of a man who I believe was/is God, and it does it through the eyes of those that knew him…or, if you believe the Jesus Seminar, those that knew the guys that knew the guys that knew him. I think it is God’s inspired word. With that said, I’m also not entirely sure it’s God’s infallible or uncorrupted inspired word. Every translation is an act of interpretation, and after 3,000+ years, the thing’s been screwed with pretty heavily. I’m not sure that every word in the original text is the inspired word of God, either…but I know that I’m not a competent judge of what is and isn’t God’s inspired word, and that I know that I’ve had parts of the Bible validated by my own first-hand experiences with God…so I know at least some of it is, and I’ve yet to find nonsense in there. The bottom line on the Bible is that it seems to know a hell of a lot more than I do, and if I use my own sense of right and wrong as my sole moral plumb-line, I’m going to end up a morbidly obese sex-crazed drug addict who dies in prison on a car-thieving rap after trying to steal the original KITT. So, I have to look somewhere else….I look to the Bible…but that’s not the end of it. I ask my friends. I ask people smarter than me. I check with my gut. It’s not a great system, but I’ve yet to go to jail, and as far as I know KITT is still in Orlando.

OK, so that was just six issues. But it’s enough controversy for one post. I hope you agree with me, because that means the world looks one more person just like me, which means I stand a better chance of getting a better mortgage loan. But, if you disagree, I hope you post and tell me why. And do it loudly, so I’ll be sure to hear.

Peace,
Justin

If, right at this moment, you only have five minutes to read a blog.

Read Ryan Cook's.

Ryan wrote a response to our discussion on how I'm a jerk. He's my friend, and he's the kind of thinker and writer I want to grow up to be.

Peace,
Justin

This is a post about epicureanism, about Jesus, and about my dead fish.

I'll start with the latter.

This week, my fish died. He was a Beta, and his name was Sparky. As there was no funeral, please allow me to make my eulogy here.

When we were first married, Stacy and I attended an auction to raise money for my grade school. It was a good auction...we bought two things we couldn't afford for more than they were worth, which means the fundraiser went well. At the end of the night, the final thing to be auctioned off were the centerpieces on each table, which consisted of a rotund vase, filled with polished colored stones, with a green leafy plant poking out of the top and a Beta fish swimming around the plant's watery tendrils. I haven't owned a fish since I was five or so, and I was broke from buying whatever the heck it was we bought...so I was ready to pass. Happy and half-drunk auction attenders quickly snapped the fishy centerpieces up and, one by one, carried the large vases out with the lone fish inside of each sloshing around as its proud new owner toted it out.

As Stacy and I were leaving, a middle-aged woman with too much perfume and a very friendly smile came up to us with her own fish-in-a-jar, and begged us to take it, as her husband didn't seem to want a new pet as much as she did. Sparky had been a pet for all of five minutes, and already he was an orphan being moved into a foster home. Poor guy.

We took him. And for the last four years, he's been with us. He swam his lazy circles while we laughed, while we talked about getting pregnant, while we fought, while we tinked wine glasses to toast our first home purchase, while we celebrated my new job, while we cried over Stacy's first job (long story), and he swam while we did the thing married people do. We fed him as frequently as we remembered to, which probably averaged out to about once every week or so. Stacy changed the bowl water every month...give or take...mostly take. The plant that Sparky shared his bowl with has long since died, but Sparky pressed on. In fact, he pressed on, even when we went on vacation and forgot to feed him for a couple of weeks. He pressed on when we tried to change his water and dropped him on the floor. He pressed on when we moved the bowl to a place where we couldn't see it over the Christmas holiday, and thereby forgot to change the water for a couple of months. He even pressed on when he slipped by the sieve we use when we change his water and dropped right down into the garbage disposal...I had to fish him out with my hand, and he pressed on.

Sparky was a survivor.

And for some reason, that meant a lot to me. I'm not kidding...I really liked Sparky. I liked him more than the cats...which bothers me, because Sparky was free and required no effort at all, and the cats are expensive and loud and, let's face it, they're cats, which sucks. He pressed on, day after day, year after year, and never asked for much. I miss Sparky.








---

This ends the eulogy. And begins the other bit.

---

I had a very strange night a couple of nights ago. I was in Philadelphia working, and met up with a friend in Philly for a beer. Whilst sipping a stout dram of my favorite Scotch draught, two girls approached us and told a very long and complicated lie which I won't bother repeating but which was basically a long, stupid and highly involved pick-up line involving fake names and a greek man who doesn't really exist. As you might imagine, I opted out of the whole, "being picked up" thing. If you are wondering why right now, you haven't read enough of my blog or I haven't blogged enough of my love. I did, however, offer to play "wingman" for my very single friend, who is a bit of a ladies' man. To keep things short and tasteful, I spent the bulk of the evening talking to one girl about my marriage and her recent breakup, and he spent the bulk of the evening getting quite laid. He had a great time, she had a great time, and the girl I spoke with eventually left to meet up with some guys she met in the bar who had cocaine. And thus, the evening ended.

And I woke up the next morning and called my buddy and we had breakfast...and here's the thing...

...he was really happy.

He didn't sit down and say, "My god, man...I knew her for two hours before we had sex...what am I doing with my life?" He didn't say, "Man, I am so unfulfilled...I'm totally just living for myself...where's the bigger picture?" He sure as hell didn't say, "Justin, could you tell me about something better than this...like Jesus?"

In fact, he was really happy. He got to have sex with a pretty girl, and she was really excited about it, and they didn't have to exchange "I love you's" or digits or even learn each other's last names. And that's it. Lots of endorphins and fun and giggling and things that feel good when they touch you. And that was it.

Now don't get me wrong...I love sex. He loves sex. I do it with one person every time, he does it with different people. And that's totally cool with him.

That's what struck me...there was no gaping hole. There was no sense that, at the end of the day, he sits at the end of his bed and feels desperately alone and empty. There was no sense that he's missing a big chunk of his heart that only God could fill. He's a smart, successful, very cool guy, and he seems really generally pretty happy. And I think that's what confuses me so much.

When I was with Young Life ministry, we were told that every person needs Jesus. When I was with the Vineyard, we were told that every person has a God-shaped hole in their hearts/souls that calls out to be filled with what were offering. And those things may be true...but I don't know that I see it. And I don't know that those with the hole feel it as clearly as I assumed.

Truth is, epicureanism seems pretty great. It seems fun, and exciting, and somewhat fulfilling. Living each day as a hedonist seems like a pretty great way to live...and assuming you're not hurting other people, it's pretty hard to argue with. This presents a problem with evangelism as I know it.

How do you talk to someone about filling a hole in their hearts when they don't feel a hole? How do you tell somebody about Jesus's healing power when they don't feel sick? How do you share the story of Jesus fixed a broken you when he doesn't sense a broken him? And what happens when you don't sense a broken him?

I don't have answers. I want to know what you think. Christians speak up. Hedonists speak up. Christian hedonists, speak up. I need to think about this with other people.

Peace,
Justin

On a plane back from Baltimore…

I tell that you that only because I’m still in that stage where I feel cool saying on I’m on a plane back from anywhere. Even someplace silly, like Baltimore.

Here’s what I learned about Baltimore while I was there: 1) Crab Cakes are tasty when they’re made from crabs who were swimming just the day before, 2) even cities you don’t think about much can have big traffic problems, and 3) Cal Ripken Jr. was apparently quite popular for doing whatever it is that he did.

It’s a very pretty city…the harbor is beautiful, and there are lots of fun places to go. I was pretty busy, but I may return sometime to try out some of the neat-o stuff I drove by on my way to less neat-o stuff.

This ends the section about Baltimore.

This begins a section about how I’m not that great.

A guy who logged in anonymously but left me the name “Tito” had something to say in a comment to my post about Verizon Wireless and Capitalism (see previous post). If I’m reading his comment right, he basically said, “hey, you’re a funny guy. Not much of a Christian, but a funny guy.” Am I reading that right, Tito?

Man, I completely agree. Seriously, please don’t read this as sarcastic or cutting or facetious…I mean it. I’m really not a great Christian. And, I think it was really cool that you had the guts to point that out. I think the way you said it was, “you’re not much like what Jesus called us to” or something like that (can’t look it up, on a plane)…and I think you’re exactly right. I’m really not.

It’s not something I’m proud of. As much as I like giving the middle-finger to things and saying “I’m not following your rules, man!” [or insert some other suburban-white-kid-raging-against-the-world comment here], living as God wants me to live isn’t one of those things. In fact, that’s probably the only set of guiding rules and regulations that really matter in the loooooooooooong run [read:eternity], and I’m screwing many of them up.

Let me give you a laundry-list. It’s by no means complete, but at least it’s somewhat deplorable:
1. I’m very self-centered. I think of myself nearly all of the time, and I rarely do anything that makes me even remotely uncomfortable, regardless of how it might help other people
2. I swear like a sailor. And not just righteous swearing, like when I’m bowling or when I really mean something…I swear around kids sometimes on accident, and I swear at my wife when I’m angry. I picked it up as a little shingle of rebellion, and I haven’t learned how to put it down when it’s not going to be helpful. Swearing is great in some circumstances…lord knows I’m a proponent at times…but you’ve got to be able to hold your tongue when your tongue bears holding.
3. I’m a pervert. My mind is constantly darting in directions I don’t want it to, and while I don’t let my wang follow it in those directions, I can’t even claim that as righteousness because thinking and doing are so freaking married that it’s like I’m three-quarters-doing whatever it is I’m patting myself on the back for not doing. Nuff said on that topic, and no, I don’t want to talk about it.
4. I’m extremely critical and judgmental. I pick these niggly little human flaws and bitch about them to total strangers. Why? Probably just to make myself feel better about my own failings. Which, by the way, makes me a
5. Total hypocrite. As cute as it is to sit here and play humble by listing stuff I do wrong, the reality is that I really live this stuff. I criticize others, and I continue to live a life which begs criticism.

You know what? I was going to keep listing but my plane is landing and I’m starting to get depressed. I just picked the first five things I can think of…there are, no doubt, hundreds more. So, you’ll have to figure them out as you go, just like I am.

Sometimes, I’m a great guy. Sometimes I do great things for people and, every great once in a while, I do it for the right reasons. And sometimes…most of the time…I’m a pretty mediocre guy. I do and think things that are neither good nor bad but just are…I choose to live in lukewarm grays and browns for long periods of time without being outstanding in either direction. And sometimes I am a terrible guy, for a thousand reasons and in a thousand flavors.

I’m not great. I’m OK…I’d like to think I may get to be a better guy…but right now I’m just OK. Tito, man, the truth is you’re right…bottom line.

Peace,
Justin

I’m on the way home from our nation’s capital.

Actually, to be more specific, I’m on the way home from a little cookie-cutter suburb about half-an-hour north of our nation’s capital, named Rockville, Maryland.

It's possible that Rockville, Maryland might be the capital of something, but the odds are pretty good that it’s the “200+ Thread-Count Duvet Capital” or “The Residents Who Undergo Regular Prostate Exams Capital” or something equally mundane. For the most part, it was just hotels and chain restaurants…though I’ll concede that I really only saw as much as was within walking distance…which includes my hotel, and the chain-restaurant complex next to my hotel. So, for all I know, it may very well have been a small town inhabited by mermaid queens and fairie pixies of yore…but most of what I saw was little Mexican men working behind the swinging white doors at the chain restaurants, and little Haitian women who leave new soaps by your tub every morning.

I promise, this is not a blog entry about race, class, immigration, or the plight of poor Spanish-speakers in America.

It is, however, a post about the mystery of capitalism.

See, here’s the thing…when I was growing up, my dad and mom would come each evening into my bedroom and take turns lying down for 5-10 minutes with me to help me go to sleep. We’d talk about the day, we’d talk about what to expect tomorrow, and we’d talk about whatever it is they felt like talking to me about in order to get me to calm down enough to sleep. My mom, for the most part, nurtured. It’s what she’s best at, and I can tell you she’s brilliant at it. She would say comforting things and kind things and sleepy-bye kinds of things. It’s a wonderful topic for another post.

My dad, however, preferred to teach. I loved it. He would talk about how combustion engines work, or what Mastadons looked like, or how our bodies turn oxygen into carbon dioxide or how a bill becomes a law. Mind you…I was, like seven. But he told it so well, and with such interest and drama, that I was enthralled, and I was actually learning it.…it’s one of the reasons I think I know so many helpful little bits of reality today. One of my favorite talks…and one which I remember fondly…was the one about capitalism. He would tell me, night after night, about supply and demand. About widgets, and how the trick for the manufacturer was to create interest in widgets through advertising and PR, thereby increasing the demand, and then to meet that demand by orchestrating a supply. And the sweet spot, he explained, was to come as close to meeting demand as possible with the supply…that’s where the real profit was. He always said, “A thing is worth whatever someone is willing to pay for it...no less, and no more.” It was a beautiful and simple explanation for a terrifically complex subject, and it’s the reason why I can always pay less for a hotel, an eBay purchase, and concert tickets.

And I’ve always believed it. I believe Adam Smith when he says that supply and demand will control the market. I believe my college economics prof when he says that competition will hone the skills and agility of business the way natural selection hones the skills and agility of the woodland critters. I’ve believed that good businesses (or bad businesses with good marketing) will succeed, and bad business will either sharpen its operation, or it will fail.

Yes, yes…I believed all of it…my dad, my economics prof, Adam, Karl…

…and then, I went to a Verion Wireless store.



Good freaking god.



Let me back up. My phone died two days ago. Dunno why, just ceased to function. Fortunately, my hotel was directly across a very busy street from a Verizon Wireless retail store, which has a counter marked “customer service,” and a counter marked “technical support.” (The poetic irony of these two appellations will strike you in a minute). I was so excited; I thought I may be able to turn my phone in on my lunch break, and perhaps pick it up later that day or early the next.

Yes, that’s what I thought indeed. And it's only now that I realize, that’s a little like thinking, “perhaps my sweater will turn to solid marmalade that I could eat on my flight home.”

Instead, what happened was I entered a customer-support-hell, full of very very angry customers, and some tremendously stupid employees.

I don’t mean stupid like, “My god, that pizza man is so stupid, he forgot to give me back my change.” Rather, I mean stupid like, “Hey, is that tubby guy with the absent grin pooping his pants right now?”

The Verizon Wireless store in Rockville Maryland, should anyone ever ask you, is operated by a gang of imbecilic 17-year-olds whose IQ’s are only subbed by their basmented sense of motivation and pride in their work. I won’t get into the furry details, lest you get so empathetically angry that you punch your screen…but I will summarize:

Phone dies =
6 trips to Verizon Wireless store in Rockville Maryland.
4.5 total hours spent waiting in the lobby for the lethargic teens of tech support to diagnose the problem
2 new batteries, one of which didn’t fit in my phone, but was jammed in forcefully by Malak in tech support, in the hopes that maybe if the wrong battery is pushed into the wrong phone hard enough, God will sympathize and provide power to the phone.
1 complete loss of all my address book and contacts. The only reason this "1" wasn’t a higher number is because, let’s face it, you can only completely lose something once.
2 battery covers, neither of which fit, and one of which, I’m pretty sure, was just the top to a peanut butter jar.
2 brand new V710 Motorola phones to replace the one that Malak-the-tech-support-guy broke with the battery. (The second new one was to replace the first new one, which Greg in tech support broke when he dropped it trying to get the wrong battery cover on it).

And…in case you’re interested…I eventually did what the guys in Tech Support at Verizon Wireless could not…I figured out what was wrong with my original phone.



...The battery charger wasn’t working.

Seriously…it just needed a new battery charger.

Not a new battery, mind you. A charger. The little thing you plug into the wall.

That’s it.

And now I’m out a phone.

I was not alone…in the 4.5 hours that I stood in line at Verizon Wireless over the course of six trips, I watched at least 50 people get very very very angry with the people who work there. The employees were slow, they were stupid, they were poorly trained, they were poorly equipped, and they lacked basic customer support skills.

And, if capitalism works like it is supposed to, this store would be shut down. Its managers would be fired and its employees would be thrown to the wolves with nothing but their glitter encrusted cell phones, Usher or Beyonce ring-tone blaring, to protect them. If capitalism works, I would have a working phone and I would have spent another hundred bucks on cheap plastic electronic goodies while I was there, just because I was so enthralled with this amazing store and it’s brilliant associates.

Instead, I’m just pissed. And Verizon Wireless is still getting my $120 a month, because they offer better shitty service than the other shitty phone companies.

Hey, I wonder if the Verizon Wireless store in Rockville, Maryland is hiring? I’m pretty sure I know a guy…he sat two rows behind me at an Over the Rhine concert recently…

Peace,
Justin