Star Wars and Candy

Saturday was a lazy day and we ended up finishing the Star Wars trilogy. That felt good and wasteful at the same time. I needed a down day, so I'm ok with that.

Now that my kids had seen the redemption of Darth Vader, their next set of questions dealt with how he became what he was. If he could become good again, how did he become evil in the first place? Well, thanks to the George Lucas empire, we have three more movies to answer that question!

Oh boy. I don't think I can take that much Star Wars in so short a time. We'd better wait a little before watching the other movies. A guy can only take so much of the Force. Actually, I'm not sure I want my kids to see the third movie yet, so we may have to wait a long time. I think it's probably a bit dark for such young minds.

Saturday night, we had a 'Trunk or Treat' at my church. People decorated the trunks of their cars or vans, most brought some kind of a game, and handed out candy to kids as they went around the parking lot. It was so much fun! My oldest decided to bring a toy basketball hoop and ball so everyone could shoot baskets for candy. For some reason, that was a big hit and I had a great time supervising the game. We tied the hoop to the car and let the kids take shots.

And now my kids are loaded up on candy! Number three has very little self control and ended up with a stomach ache last night. Hopefully a few more of those will inspire him to develop some discipline. I have my doubts, but I'll hang onto hope for him. He's a brilliant child, but that intelligence doesn't seem to spill over into common sense sometimes. I guess he takes after his dad.

Star Wars

I have neglected my childrens' education. We watched Star Wars with them this week and it was the first time they had ever seen it. But it's never too late to set things right, so I am making amends for my neglect.

Apparently they've heard about Star Wars quite a bit from friends at school and they knew a lot of the characters' names. They wanted to see Yoda, but I thought we'd better start at the beginning (or in the middle depending on your perspective) and watch the original 1977 film first. Maybe we'll get to Yoda this weekend.

I'm not a big-time Star Wars fan - obviously, since my kids hadn't seen it before this week - but I think the storyline is really good and the movies are classics in their own way. Good vs. evil, the Force, cheesy acting in parts, a fighting corp of Jedi (religionists/philosophers/warriors), some of whom embrace evil, sometimes awkward dialogue, and ultimately redemption. I like the story for its cut and dry distinction between good and evil and I like it for the religious overtones.

Yoda makes the movies great all by himself. Frank Oz's voice coming from a little, green, mystical, mighty, warrior muppet who spouts wisdom and a philosophy of life and warfare that rivals some of the great philosophers of all time. What's not to love?

It has been fun to see my kids get excited about the movies. Running around the house last night with imaginary blasters and light sabers, they did their part to save the galaxy. It reminded me of their play acting after we watched the Tron movies. It's so cute to see them doing the same kinds of things I used to do with my brothers ... inspired by the same movies I watched as a kid.

Aristotle on Friendship

After I finished school a couple years ago, while looking for things to pursue with so much extra time on my hands, I began writing this blog. I also bought some courses on CD to listen to while driving. With extra time and some extra computing power in the brain, I enjoyed using those resources to learn about various topics. I've listened to lectures on philosophy, values (economic/philosophical), C.S. Lewis, Buddhism, etc.

I took a break from listening to them for a few months when life got busy with buying a house, moving, fixing up houses, selling a house, and everything that went with all that. I started listening to one of the philosophy courses again last week and it has been so delightful. I know that makes me weird, but I'm ok with that. I love philosophy. Which is cool because the Greek word philosophy means 'love of wisdom' (philo = love and sophia = wisdom). So I think that means I love the love of wisdom.

Aristotle

Here are some of my thoughts from what I heard during one of the lectures on Aristotle. Aristotle laid out three types of friendships: 1) friendship based on sensual (not necessarily sexual) pleasure; 2) friendship based on utility; and 3) friendship based on virtue. Aristotle is not opposed to friendships of the first two kinds, but he does recognize the transitory nature of such relationships. In the first, when the pleasure dies or becomes stale, the friendship is dissolved. In the second, when either party sees no further use for the other, the relationship is dissolved.

In the last, however, friendship can last as long as both parties strive after virtue. This is a choice and does not have to depend on circumstances outside the control of the participants. In this way, the final form of friendship can potentially last forever. Aristotle calls this kind of friendship 'teleia philia' or completed/perfected friendship. The expression is intended to convey a type of friendship that realizes the highest ideals of human associations, grounded in the end purpose of such relationships - virtue. In this kind of relationship, a person wants for his friend what is best for his friend, not necessarily what is best for himself. The needs of the two friends don't have to be mutually exclusive, but when they do oppose one another, such friends, motivated by pure love for one another, will tend to seek what is best for their friend. This reminded me of the high Christian ideal of charity or Christlike love. It also reminded me of Emmanuel Kant's assertion that the only thing that can be said to be truly good without qualification is a good will.

I thought about these kinds of friendship and came up with a few examples of each from my own life. There are times where I enter into brief relationships with others for the pleasure of having someone to talk to and share ideas. This is pretty rare for me, being a bit of an introvert, but it does happen. Part of my friendship with members of my family derives from physical closeness, cuddling, enjoying a good meal with them, a movie, etc. However, if those relationships were based solely on these physical pleasures, they would be extremely shallow and easily destroyed. Thankfully, there are other foundations for those relationships.

Although my children are occasionally helpful to me, I don't find myself motivated to be friends with them for what they can do for me. With my wife, however, I am very motivated by the mutual benefits we offer one another. We specialize in different areas of domestic life and help one another make a beautiful, comfortable home. Other relationships of mine based on utility are found in business. Though I enjoy talking with colleagues and customers, a significant portion of our relationships are utilitarian. We can help one another achieve things through cooperation and each of us benefits materially from the relationship.

I like to think that in many of my relationships, both business and personal, I am also motivated by a desire for the welfare of the other person. I hope this is true in my marriage if nowhere else. I won't claim special knowledge of this motivation simply because I'm not certain I have fully realized this ideal. But I am convinced it is real and attainable.

I also believe that a good, healthy relationship need not be motivated solely be the last of the three motivators Aristotle describes. A healthy marriage, for example, should be rich in all three bases of friendship. To be strong, the foundation of the relationship should be virtue. But marriage partners should help one another with their various responsibilities and activities (utility), and they should definitely seek to bring pleasure to each other ... probably in that order. Maybe that's what makes marriage so great. It can be the perfect combination of every aspect of friendship. And maybe that's why it can be so painful - when that ideal is not attained.

Emily and I have felt the disappointment of frustrated expectations in marriage, but we've decided to work on it and make our relationship the best we can. And with God's help, it seems to be working. I am happier in my marriage today than I have ever felt in my life and I see the joy it brings when we approach it with the right expectations and attitude. I can't claim we've realized the ideal, but it feels like we're approaching the ideal of teleia philia, a perfected friendship.

Report Cards

My kids got report cards recently. Here are some of the highlights:
 

Child #1, teacher comments: "To say that [your child] and I share a love of reading is an understatement. His craving for the written word is immense. I appreciate that he gives his personal best, is a good role model and friend, and is always using his lifeskills. He is a wonderful addition to [our school], but especially our classroom." Child #1 had a nearly perfect report card.

Child #2 hasn't received a written report card yet, but from what my wife heard at the parent/teacher conference, she should be getting a near perfect report also. She struggled initially with the expectations of a higher quality school, but she seems to be doing really well now. I'm proud of her for working so hard even when it seems so difficult.

Child #3 had a perfect report card except for handwriting. Can't fault him for that; my handwriting is awful. Teacher comments: "[Your child] is a very hard worker who is smart and funny. ... [He] likes to learn new concepts and strives for perfection in math. ... Overall, [he] is a delight! He consistently gives his personal best throughout the day."

Well, this father's heart warmed right up when he read some of those comments. I love my kids and it's great to see them recognized and valued by others. And I'm so happy that they're doing well in school. Education is super important to me and I'm glad they're tasting success in that area of life.

Hebrew

I love languages. Being religious, I have long had an interest in Hebrew and Greek because of their connection to the Bible. Having learned German and a little Spanish, I am really interested in Latin as I've come to see the relationships between the three languages I speak (caveat: my Spanish is really bad) and I understand the power of knowing the language that influenced all of them heavily.

I won't claim any significant expertise in Hebrew, Greek, or Latin, but I've dabbled a bit in studying them to help me understand the Bible better and for other purposes. I thought I'd share a couple of interesting things I've learned about Hebrew.

As I understand it, ancient Hebrew had no markings for vowel sounds and the pronunciation of Hebrew words was largely transmitted orally through the years. Modern Hebrew now has such markings. The ancient Hebrews had a word for God that they wrote as JHWH (transliterated to Latin letters), but they considered the name of God too sacred to utter, so they never spoke it out loud. Consequently, we don't know how they pronounced JHWH. Two variants on the pronunciation are commonly used today: 1) Jahweh, where the w is pronounced like a v; and 2) Jehovah. The former seems more likely to be correct on the first syllable, but the second is more commonly used today. No one knows for sure how JHWH was pronounced, so both versions seem to be acceptable. The translators of the King James version of the Bible often translated JHWH as 'Lord', though a few instances of Jehovah can be found.

This leads to a lot of interesting insights on names and words found in our Bible. For example, Hallelujah is a combination of two words 'Hallelu' or a form of 'Hallel' meaning 'praise' and 'jah' or a shortened form of JHWH (Jahweh or Jehovah). So Hallelujah = Praise Jehovah or Praise God.

Names like Isaiah and Jeremiah and any names ending in -iah, -jah, or -ia (all versions of 'Jah') contain a shortened form of the name of God (JHWH). For example, Isaiah means 'salvation of God' where I presume Isa = salvation.

Another name for God found in the Hebrew is Elohim. This is really interesting because the 'im' suffix indicates the plural form of a noun. The singular form is never used, but is thought to be Eloah. Much like JHWH is shortened to Jah for creating other words, the name Elohim is often shortened to El to create names like Samu-el, Ezeki-el, Dani-el, Isra-el, etc. Israel, for example, was the name given to Jacob after he wrestled with an angel and means 'God prevails' or 'one who prevails with God'.

I love languages. I think it's fascinating to learn things like this about Hebrew because of the knowledge that opens up about so many things in the Bible. But it's also just fun for me to learn about languages for the joy of learning. I don't know why, but I get a kick out of it. I think maybe I'll spend some time studying languages after I retire.

Another cool little Hebrew factoid: much like our word for the family of letters we use to make words derives from the first two Greek letters (alpha + beta => alphabet), the name for the Hebrew family of letters is a combination of the names of the first two Hebrew letters (alef + bet => alefbet). I can pronounce the names of the Hebrew letters, but I can't write them. In fact, some of them look so similar, I wonder how people can distinguish them quickly while reading! I suppose you get used to it like anything else.

I think it's fascinating to compare the Hebrew, Greek, and Latin letters and see similarities in names, sounds, and letter shapes. Like Latin has influenced so many of the modern Romance and Germanic languages, there were older languages and dialects that influenced these ancient languages and account for their similarities. But that's about as far as my knowledge goes right now. I would love to learn more about the origins of these ancient languages someday.

Soul Surfer

At Emily's suggestion, we watched a movie last week called "Soul Surfer". It was REALLY good!

It has some of our favorites actors in it and the story was really inspiring. It's about a girl who is competing in surfing competitions and while surfing one day with some friends, her arm is bitten off by a shark. The story deals with how she copes with this event and it's really beautifully done. Ultimately, she teaches herself to surf with one arm and continues to compete.

My daughter broke her arm last week and she's learning to cope with limited use of one of her arms. It's been pretty challenging for her. But it's temporary. Watching that movie and seeing that young woman's courage was really inspiring for me. The movie is based on a true story and the actual woman really does seem as courageous as the movie portrayed her. That woman lost the complete use of her arm for the rest of her life. The psychological toll that must have taken is beyond my ability to comprehend, but I got a taste of it watching the actress deal with it. It was really cool.

I think the best part of the movie was when she went on a mission trip and found the resolution of her difficulties through helping other people. I think there's a beautiful truth there - it seems that what is often required of us in order to overcome our problems is to forget our problems and help someone else deal with their problems. I don't know why that is exactly, but I think it has something to do with learning to love others. To love them so much that we forget ourselves. I think that may be one of the fundamental purposes of this life. Love and friendship are so important.

If you haven't seen the movie, you might want to check it out. I love it when the entertainment industry produces such positive, uplifting material.

Communicating with Children

Bill Cosby recorded an awesome standup routine called "Himself" that I used to listen to when I was a kid. I still have some of it memorized. There are lots of family/marriage/parenthood jokes and they're great because they really ring true.

Among the many nuggets of wisdom he shares is the idea that children are brain damaged. If you haven't seen it, I'll let Cosby explain it to you himself:



When my children were babies, I couldn't communicate with them very well at all. I would sometimes try to reason with them saying things like, "Look, I know you're tired, but crying about it isn't helping." or "I know you're uncomfortable, but I've got to tell you - you'd feel a whole lot better about yourself if you'd stop pooping in your diaper." For some reason, they never really responded to those bits of parental wisdom. But as they've gotten older, I find that I'm able to appeal to their reason more and more. My oldest can have a pretty intelligent conversation with me and I can make logical arguments with him that he understands. I compare him with my youngest who repeats the same acts of disobedience over and over and seems, at times, an awful lot like Cosby's "I dunno!" brain damaged child.

And then I thought of myself and how I sometimes repeat the same stupid mistakes over and over and over again. And I think that God must look down on us sometimes with a smile and a shake of his head and think "Brain damage!". It occurred to me that this experience of being a father could be leading me to a much greater understanding of what God sees when He looks at us. There are times I get frustrated with my children when they repeat the same mistakes over and over again. I don't think God gets frustrated with us. But I imagine there are times when His attempts to communicate with me are about as effective as my attempts to communicate with my dog, who in all respects, is even more retarded than my brain-damaged children. When I talk to my dog, I imagine he hears his name, a few command words like "come", "go", "sit", etc and the rest sounds like the teacher in the old Peanuts cartoons.

The only downside for me in this analogy is that my dog really seems to try to understand me. When I'm talking to him, I have 100% of his attention and he seems to hang on every word. Maybe I should try to be as faithful to God as my dog is to me.

More Jobs at the Old House

Last weekend, a friend came to help me finish up the work on our old house. We finished a little bit of work on the retaining wall and then filled in some cracks in the cement stairs leading to the house. The fun part was taking down the playset and fitting it in the van. I'm guessing my friend is really good at tetris because he got the whole thing in there, which was great. We had a few tools we had to leave behind because they wouldn't fit (e.g. ladder, wheelbarrow), but the whole playset went in one trip. It was great! And thanks to him, we were done in time to get home for dinner. Without his help, I probably would have left around 9 or 10.

It has been a lot of work, but we're finally done and we're probably going to close this week. I'm so thankful this is working out for us and I look forward to owning only one house again. And I'm thankful for friends who are so willing to drop everything to help out.

Till We Have Faces

Some years ago, I read a book by C.S. Lewis called "Till We Have Faces". It's my favorite of Lewis' works. I'm sure you've read a book or seen a movie where you're led to believe something - a certain paradigm for viewing the world and particularly whatever story is being told - only to have that paradigm dashed near the end. I had that experience with this book the first time I read it. I bought into the story Lewis was weaving and took the part of the main character without regarding the hints Lewis was dropping of another reality. Near the end, I had a pretty dramatic wake-up call as I saw what had actually happened as the main character realizes the same things I was coming to understand. Lewis is a master storyteller.

I recently picked it up again and read through it, knowing how it ended, and savoring the two opposing viewpoints as the story weaved itself so beautifully in my mind. I enjoyed it so much that I read it a third time shortly after I finished the second reading and even more interesting ideas presented themselves to me as I went through the exercise again. I am in awe of Lewis' talents as an author, an artist, and a philosopher. I'm grateful he was able to capture some of that philosophy for me to enjoy years after his death.

The story is a retelling of the Greek myth of Cupid and Psyche, but with a very interesting twist. It's Lewis' twist that gives the story its power. And it sets the stage for Lewis to share with us some of his thoughts on life and on God. But his philosophy isn't in your face in this book. You could read the book and just enjoy it for its symbolism, beauty, and genius. But if you're interested in his philosophy, it's a lot of fun to tease it out as you read. And if you're like me, it may take multiple readings to really grasp what Lewis is trying to say.

One of the things that struck me on my last reading was Lewis' thoughts on love. And it occurred to me that what we call love is very often something different. It usually has elements of love in it, but often it's mixed with greed, jealousy, pride, and even hatred. Near the end of the book, as Orual, the main character, is forced to examine her life and motives, I felt compelled to examine my motives and I have determined that much of what I often call love is really selfishness. I think we're born with a great capacity to love as children, but it's mixed with a very self-centered view. This selfishness seems to be so ingrained in our natures that it would take a miracle to change us into loving creatures. As Orual says, "I was ... ugly in soul ... greedy, blood-gorged. But if I practiced true philosophy, as Socrates meant it, I should change my ugly soul into a fair one. .... [But] a horrible memory crept into my mind of those days when I had tried to mend the ugliness of my body with new devices in the way I did my hair or the colours I wore. I'd a cold fear that I was at the same work again. I could mend my soul no more than my face. Unless the gods helped.".

If I say I love my wife, that's probably true to a large extent, but if I'm honest with myself, my feelings for her are mixed up with the good that I derive from the relationship and a selfish desire to have her near me for the way she makes me feel and the benefits I obtain from being with her. That may not necessarily be bad, but it's easy for that to become something negative if I'm not motivated by a pure love - the kind of love that says "I want what's best for you even if that brings pain to me." Orual is faced with a decision where she ultimately chooses something for someone else and she selfishly makes a choice that brings misery to everyone. She's not an evil character, but near the end of the book, she undergoes a transformation that teaches her (and the reader if he's paying attention) about what love really is and she experiences a kind of revolution and cleansing of the soul that prepares her to meet God (or the gods) and her loved ones after she dies.

There is so much to this book and I've given it a very inadequate review here. I can't even explain the meaning of the title of the book without giving away something that might make the book less powerful for you. But I highly recommend it. And if you have a chance to read it or if you've read it before, let me know your thoughts. I feel like I'm a little better man for having worked through it a few times.

Thanks Lewis for the life you lived and for your wisdom that you've shared with me over the years. I hope you have found the beauty you were seeking.

Retaining Wall

The buyers of our old house asked for a few repairs, one of which was the replacement of a rotting retaining wall. I've been toying with replacing that wall for years, but never had the desire/guts to do it. I decided to go ahead and tackle it now that someone else asked for it as a condition of sale. I seriously underestimated that project.

It took me the entire day yesterday. My muscles ache, my hands and arms are scratched and irritated, and I've been humbled by some extremely heavy railroad ties. But I did it. Here's a low-quality picture of the new wall with a few of the old ties sitting by the new wall. Some of the lower ties were in decent shape, so I left them alone. You can see a small color difference between the old and new. I had already hauled away most of the old wood when I remembered I hadn't taken a picture. It looked a little more impressive before, but you get the idea.

The third row from the top is one eight-foot railroad tie. I can't pick up an entire tie by myself. All I can do is pick up one end and move it around that way. After several unsuccessful attempts to get that sucker on top of the wall and several silent prayers, I tried pushing it up the side of the wall. I got it even with the top of the wall, but couldn't get it on top. Then the idea came to me to let one end rest on the tie just below the top and swing the other end around and lift it enough to get it on top of the wall. A little more sweat and blood and I got it pushed into place. It's hard to explain how it worked, but after struggling with it for about 20-30 minutes, I was able to get it where it needed to go.

Every time I take on a new project, things come up that I wouldn't have imagined tackling and the project becomes more difficult and takes longer than I originally estimated. This project was no exception. I had to bring most of my tools from the old house. I ended up borrowing several tools from a neighbor like a reciprocating saw (my circular saw didn't quite cut through the entire width of the railroad ties) and an axe so I could use the butt end to slam the spikes into the railroad ties (that darn rubber mallet just wouldn't cut it). I should have used this as an excuse to buy a sledge hammer, but I didn't want to run to the store again.

My biggest mistake was underestimating the weight of the ties. A little research online tells me new ties might be 150, even 200 pounds. Maybe I'm weaker than I thought, but they seemed like more than that to me. All I know is they're HEAVY! The guy at Lowe's told me he had a friend who at one time carried two of them, one on each shoulder. I have never been and never will be that tough.

Another fun things that popped up was the failure of my extension cord. I had a long cord and a short one. The long one didn't work, so I used the short one for a while, but found it didn't reach far enough to do what I needed. I debated going to the store again (already sick of doing that), trying to repair the cord, or finding some other workaround. After a minute of debate, I sat down for about 15-20 minutes and spliced and taped the wires where the cord had been cut. I hadn't factored that little adventure (one of many) into my original estimate. But it worked.

Anyway, the wall is done; Brett is sore; and he feels pretty dang good about it. Another Saturday should wrap up some small cement repair projects and the disassembly and loading of our old playset so we can set it up at our new home. Our youngest has been praying for several things every night for weeks. Among them are pleas for help in selling our house and help in bringing our playset to our new house. The buyers wanted the playset, but partly because of those prayers, I negotiated to keep it. I figured if God was willing to answer that first request, I could help with the second. It's worth a little extra work to help answer those sweet little prayers. Funny how something like that can tug at my heart and make me do something I wouldn't normally have done.

Missing Teeth

My youngest had an accident a year or two ago where she injured her two front teeth. Recently, my wife noticed a cist-like growth on the gums just above one of the teeth, so one dentist visit later, and ...

no more teeth! I think the abscess is gone now too. The bad news is that the loss of those teeth is a little premature. The good news is she'll be able to sing "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth" a little longer than most kids. Lucky girl.

A few days after the teeth-pulling adventure, she smacked her face on a shelf at the grocery store. I still don't really know how that worked because I wasn't there, but Emily can tell you more about it. She ended up with a really big green bruise above her left eye. I'm pretty sure she looked like an abused child for a few days. Thankfully her eye is looking much better.

Life knocks you around a bit, but thankfully almost everything heals with time and patience. I think with God's help, those things that don't seem to heal with time may end up being healed someday too.