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| This is where this is now:
dulacian.blogspot.com
-Zack
"Just stop putting so much stock in all of this stuff and live your life for those that you love"
-I'm still waiting for, Relient [k]
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| I think I'll update on Thursdays, around 10 a.m. this semester. Well, this week at least, but I'll always have this awkward break-time and very little to do. I.S. isn't getting this hour of my time. But that does not mean I do not have to write. 50 years from now, I imagine I'll have accomplished every academic goal I could ever have. And still, I will have to write.
I've not seen any of the oscar best picture nominees, but was 2008 really that bad? I've only heard of three of the directors prior to today, none of them are first-time projects, and only Gus Van Sant has shown he has any sort of filmic genius about his movies. That being said, short of Elephant, he's generally given in to theme over form and makes "intellectual" films that don't do his capabilities justice. Unless Elephant was a pure aberration...but I don't want to believe that. And Fight Club is ridiculously overrated as a film, so don't start talking about that...even if it is fun to watch, lets be serious about how visually interesting it actually is...which is not so much at all. I guess this was to be expected, after No Country For Old Men and There will Be Blood. Either of those films could win any year in the past five years...maybe longer. Short of last year, which restored my faith in the "academy," I've been terribly disappointed. Maybe my disappointment truly rests in American film.....
And that's why I'm writing my I.S. on the director(s) I am. As far as I can tell, they're the only ones that make films without catering to politics or societal mores. The Coen Brothers don't need gay characters, race relations, or post-colonialism to be respected, and they don't even care to be respected. If it weren't so hard to make a film, which I must admit it certainly is, I would say they are the only true artists in the business today. I know that's not actually true, but it looks like it, when artistry always falls behind controversy and hipness. This decade (going back 10 years, so, Shakespeare in love to now), "The Departed" and "No Country for Old Men" have been the only great films to win the award. And I even like a lot of the other films, and I certainly love Clint Eastwood (Million Dollar Baby).
This sort of thing has always happened. High Noon lost to "The Greatest Show on Earth" because the Academy felt sorry for De Mille. At least old man Cecil B. is a great director though....even if that isn't his best work by any stretch of the imagination. In 1995, which is this years closest rival for bad film years, Braveheart won. Granted, it was a year bad enough that Babe got nominated, but Braveheart doesn't deserve nomination most years. It's a fun movie to watch, but honestly, it's almost a bad film. In 1990, Goodfellas lost to Dances with Wolves. While I'm not the biggest Kevin Costner fan, Dances with Wolves isn't terrible (although we all known it was nominated and won because of its "sensitive" portrayal of First Nations People, who, at the time, still got called "Native Americans", but Goodfellas lost to something. Goodfellas. That's top ten American films of all time material right there. I'm not going to go on forever with this....but Citizen Kane wasn't nominated because of politics.
It's an historic fact that the Academy sucks at handing out awards and sometimes worse at nominating. That being said, it's right a lot too, and while I can't always agree, it's still a rush to pick a favorite and see what happens. 2008 was a bad year for movies, and coupling that with the political side of the awards makes for one of the least interesting oscar races I can find according to the Wikipedia archives. I know I can't speak much til I see them (and I hope to do my best to see them all between now and the awards, but I doubt that happens, if I see any), but this is looking like 1995 all over again.
I probably should have posted this on my film xanga......maybe I'll simul-post that part. Yes, I will do that.
In the meantime, I'm near the end of my second week of my last semester at Wooster.
As weeks go, it was better than the first.
As days go today hasn't been bad and yesterday was great.
As books go, they go quickly these days. Charlotte's Web yesterday, the House at Pooh Corner today. If I don't finish it today, then tomorrow as well, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory this weekend. I love Children as Readers, but it's going to skew my book statistics for the year in a major way. I guess that will make up for the lack of academic books coming this fall.
Speaking of this fall, I have no idea where I'll be, but I'm excited to find out.
I'm going to the Henry Ford museum Saturday. It should be fun, and my I.S. should duly suffer. It will be okay...it just means I've got to have a great Sunday. And I can have a great Sunday, I'm certain. I don't really know what to do next, but I think I can figure it out. Well, I know what I'm going to do next, even if it's not quite the right thing.
I figured out that I've got like, 40 or so days of class left at Wooster. That's kind of strange.
But exciting.
Strange but exciting is the motto of being a senior in college.
And I'm doing largely better than a lot of other seniors. I don't mean to brag, but to show just how weird being a senior is. I feel it, but there are a lot of people that aren 't even as sure about I.S. and the future as I am, and they've got to be in the state of limbo all the more. Unless it's my relative success thus far on I.S. that lets me take that step back and look to see it all, wide-angle lensed and all.
I'm learning about fire right now. Not anywhere specific, just in my life. It means something, and I'll find out someday what it means. Hopefully sooner rather than later, but certainly eventually regardless of the timing.
I can't decide if I feel like I'm floating through life, riding a runaway mine cart, or prancing about rolling hills. I don't think it matters, as its a metaphor, and a metaphor isn't real. But the feelings are, to quote a friend out of context and a bit off the mark.
I guess we've got a new president too. His going to disappoint. Not that he'll be bad. Well, I don't know yet. But I do know that no human, no set of humans, could live up to the expectations this campus has for him, and thus, probably a lot of the nation.
I happened upon a facebook status Tuesday that read "<name forgotten> has the joy that only hope and Obama can bring" Well, I am sorry, name forgotten, but your joy is incomplete and SO MUCH SMALLER than the joy you could have.
Because it's not even real. Not EVEN real.
Because the only real hope and joy that there are come from Christ.
I'm probably writing that to the proverbial choir. But can you imagine how joyful people that get that excited about a man could get with the true hope and joy that comes from Christ? I'm fairly unexcitable. You could call it jaded or experienced...I just know it takes a lot to make me truly amped. If you don't believe that, you're probably an InterVarsity friend, because I can't help but be totally excited at conferences and in InterVarsity events, because Christ is often present and we're serving him. And that is true joy. All else is so fickle. So very fickle. I guess I've largely lost the ability to find joy in the simple things about life. But I'm okay with that, because I find joy in something so much more free, so much more accessible, and so much greater.
-Zack
"And I'm on fire
Burning at these mysteries"
-On Fire, Switchfoot
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| Sorry for saying I would have a new entry for yesterday and probably another by Wednesday.
I don't know when I'll get to it.
But I've got now, 3 ideas. Why not now? Not the right mindset. I just realized that if I had said not the right state of mind, you might suspect it to be chemically altered, whereas mindset doesn't have that connotation.
I've realized a lot lately, but I don't know how to explain it, and I don't know to whom I would be explaining. Nonetheless, I've got to keep this thing existing because sometimes I just need it. I just need to create something, sometimes. There's a lot going in my mind, a lot of the time, and I don't understand it, until I construct it. And that means "blogging," although, when it comes to content, I'm not sure this is a blog as blogs go. Sure, technically it is, but the sort of following or purpose that goes with "blogging" isn't there. I'm post-modern enough to create it and Christian enough to write it without readers. I doubt you understand that, but I don't either, I just know it's true enough to type. And I just said true enough.
Ah, there is something in that intersection I might be exploring for the rest of my life. But I feel like it's cutting edge research most aren't capable of realizing, much less exploring. And there I go again....it's not about comparing, but I do, we do..it is done.
Sometimes, in Wooster, I feel stranded, in Wooster. Don't worry about the grammar, just use the commas.
Usually, at home, which means Ottawa, because it's necessarily vague (because I know the waves will come) for the time being, I feel trapped and forgotten.
I don't know how much either is true in either place. But envision the predicament, if you can and will.
Knowing a lot of things generally means not knowing enough of anything....that's how I feel everywhere.
Why couldn't we be free anyway?
After all, where are we going?
I once pinned much of my hope on a video game that will never come out. We'll never know how the saga ends, but I can love the 30 hours that we do have, right? Endings, what are they any way? Anticipation for what could be could be better than what would have become. I think God knows that, and that's why so few of many of our hope for the future come true. There are beautiful people in the world, and I once believed in love at first sight because of it. But I don't anymore, because I believe in love at birth, that we'll one day discover. "I might be wrong, but it's propelling me forward and seems to work better than conquest, connection, luck, and confidence ever could."
I wrote that at 2:35. It's 2:36 now, and I realize that I wrote that in the period of what was then the longest stretch of singleness I'd had since a gap between my junior and senior years of high school. The longest stretch is now the current moment.
Oh, that putrid current moment. It tires me, yet I can never catch it, not quite. Oh, not never, or ever. Whatever.
Save it.
Bottle it.
Serve it.
Savor but save.
I've taken rabbit trails my whole life. Indeed, I'm not sure I know any other path, and now, I'm afraid I'm running late:
We've got all night, just to make it alright.
Would you take a walk with me?
I'll give you all I've got, just spare me your time.
And I'll promise you won't want to leave.
Are you, are you falling for me?
This time, we'll find what we both need.
There's an old oak tree.
We can swing and sway.
You hold on to me.
(you're so far away)
When I look at you.
You're so far away.
Oh, So far away.
Oh, if you could just let go.
(Would you relax) with me just for awhile
I'll take you out of harms way.
Like these branches that shelter the rain.
We can lay here in our own shade.
Are you, are you falling for me?
Just watch, the two of us will see.
There's an old oak tree.
We can swing and sway.
You hold on to me.
(you're so far away)
When I look at you.
You're so far away.
Oh, So far away.
There is so much that I could give to you.
Just say you want me to.
I know these words could break the ground.
And in the mean time our leaves will turn.
But rest assured, we'll get through anything.
Are you, are you falling for me
Like I, oh I'm falling for you?
There's an old oak tree.
We can swing and sway.
You hold on to me.
(you're so far away)
It's just you and me.
We can get away.
We can get away.
(you're so far away)
(In this place)
We are happy here.
Oh in every way.
Oh and we just let go.
Just let go.
Just let go.
Just let go.
I once heard a story of a girl who caught an oak leaf after years and years of trying. It was from God, of course. But then I heard that she never got quite past the place she caught it. Well, she had left, but not for long ever. It's alright though, because her staying was from God, as will be her leaving, and I'm sure that if God can drop so simple a goal as an oak leaf into her lap, then he will drop so many more blessings according to their time and season.
I've never caught an oak leaf, but I know I love the fall.
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| Something significant tomorrow.
Two ideas.
One of them tomorrow.
Maybe both by...wednesday?
-Zack
"The day I learn to fly I'm never coming down. On perfect wings I'll fly so high above the clouds."
-Heaven Knows, Rise Against
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| Before High School I was all about Punk.
The musical genre.
I got out of it, thanks, in large part to Anberlin.
At one point in time, Freshman year at Wooster, I got back into it. That lasted for about a week.
Every once in awhile one of my old songs will come up on WMP, because I generally just shuffle everything. I usually skip it, and wonder if I'll ever actually intentionally listen to punk again.
Then Rise Against caught my ear again today....and I'm intentionally listening to punk again.
I guess we never know ourselves all that well.
I used to wonder if Rise Against was a Christian band when I first heard "Like the Angel" on Tony Hawk's undergound....I found out they weren't. I've thought that about a lot of bands and been wrong.
At least in the case of Rise Against, it's because you can hear the longing for the Kingdom in their lyrics...and they just don't know it.
I thought the same about the Flobots too....turns out they aren't "christian" in the traditional sense for a band, but realize that Christ is the only way to change the world.....God is everywhere and everyone longs for him....but not everyone acknowledges that, and that is pride. Oh, the things can realize with God-installed Gospel-goggles.
-Zack
"Never asked for much, truth be told I'd settle for a life less frightening"
-Life Less Frightening, Rise Against
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