Wii-tastic

Ben and I are the proud new owners of a Nintendo Wii. It came to us on Sunday, from (where else, but our favorite store) Target. It is a beautiful thing. If you have never played the Wii, please come over to our house immediately and try ours.

Here's what you need to know to understand how awesome it is. I have never in my life owned a video game system. As kids my sister and I were never allowed to have one, and we didn't particularly want one either. I remember one Christmas our neighbor got a new Nintendo 64, and so from time to time we would play with him, but it never tickled our fancy. Ben was also never a big gamer... B.W. (before Wii) all he owned was an original Playstation on which he played CoolBoarders 2.

Video games always seemed, to me, to be so solitary and exclusive. Going to someone's house who had a system usually meant I ended up sitting on the arm of the couch watching in boredom as a bunch of boys played Madden.

Then, one fateful day, I was at my friend Rachael's house and people were playing the Wii. It struck me as a very social game - people were taking turns playing one another in Bowling or Tennis, and others who weren't playing were enjoying just watching. Rather than taking away from the human interaction at the party, it was encouraging it! Not only that, but unlike other video games where for hours on end one sits slack-jawed staring at the TV moving only one's thumbs, the Wii had you on your feet, swinging your arms in tennis or baseball or, in what was seriously an aerobic workout, boxing! Plus, no previous skill required. Unlike even basic old games like Mario Brothers, in which I was seriously out-played by even young children, the Wii was highly non-threatening to a non-gamer like myself.

I knew instantly that the Wii could very well be the first video game system that I could see myself having. And thus began our hunt to find one - even though they came out before Christmas, they are still in hot demand. Ben got ours on Sunday at about noon - and it was the last one in a shipment of 12 that had come in that very morning!

We hooked it up and each created our Mii - the little person who represents you in all your games. And then we started playing. And it was as delightful as I had hoped. I sustained my first Wii-injury when, in a lunging backhand during Tennis, I stepped backward and banged my ankle into the couch. I discovered I am rather good at Bowling, and not so good at Baseball.

So the Wii is on at the James household, and you are all invited to come play with us! Wheeee! (Or should I say, "Wiiiiiii!")

A Sad Thing

I saw a very sad thing today and I just need to write it down.

I was driving to work and going behind a slow old man driver. I was getting annoyed and thinking of how I was already late for work. Then the car in front of me swerved into the other lane to avoid something in the road. All I could see was that it was some sort of roadkill. "Gross," I thought, and followed suit in driving around it.

As I passed it I saw what it was - a tiny baby deer, young enough to still be covered with white spots on its back. It had obviously suffered a very recent death, no doubt at the hands of someone like me driving 55 mph down the curvy back road.

It just made me think about how normally dead animals in the road are either so mangled that they are unrecognizable or are so common that the sight of it doesn't bother you anymore. A dead possum or dead squirrel won't ellicit much more than an "ew" from me. But for some reason to see the little baby deer's body in the road just made me sad enough to cry. Which I did. For about the next two miles. I cried for that baby deer even though I know there are thousands of deers and that what I saw is not that uncommon. I cried for that baby deer even though I know deer aren't exactly the brainiest of animals and that the baby's mom was probably over it already. I cried for that baby deer even though I know the real world isn't like Bambi.

And even though I know that animals don't "go to heaven" in the sense of humans I prayed that God had been there and comforted it upon its death. I prayed that as a part of creation which God made to glorify Himself, the baby deer and its life mattered to God and that perhaps that baby, and animals of all kinds, will be present in eternity. I don't know if that is true, but what I know of God's character makes me believe that it is.

This is the second entry in my series entitled "Driving: It's Just Not That Hard." Today I will be covering the very challenging topic of MERGING.

Merging generally refers to a situation in which one lane of the road is ending, forcing cars in that lane to get over into another lane which is still open:

As you can see in the above diagram, an accident will happen unless one of these vehicles moves. Every day on my way to work I watch as morons... er, I mean "driving-challenged" people float from the on-ramp into traffic with nary a glance as to the cars forced to jerk violently out of their way to avoid being sideswiped.

Please read this carefully: THE PRIMARY RESPONSIBILITY OF MERGING SAFELY RESTS UPON THE MERGER, NOT THE OTHER CARS! It is your job to take the initiative to use your blinker, to slow down or speed up depending on the other vehicles around you, etc. It is NOT enough to doodle your way into traffic, expecting that other cars will part like the Red Sea in order to make room for you. It is also NOT acceptable to merely follow the right-hand white line as it guides you merrily into another lane.

Is it nice if other cars let you over? Yes. Should they make every effort to give merging traffic room to merge? Absolutely. Is it your God-given right to plow into their lane simply because you waited too long and ran out of room? HECK-to-the-NO.

All this talk brings me to another point involving merging, and pardon me if I seem fussy but this one is just completely dumb and dangerous to boot. When you are nearing a construction area and you see one of those ENORMOUS FLASHING SIGNS that says "RIGHT LANE ENDS 500 feet" here's an idea: get over NOW! Nothing makes me wish I was allowed to ram other cars off the road than when a blithering idiot comes barrelling down the ending lane attempting to swoop in and merge at the last possible second. I will never, ever, ever, ever, EVER let you over. If I see you coming in my rear-view mirror, I will in fact drift over to take up both lanes thus preventing you from going any further.

There is a verse in the Bible that says, "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." This is a beautiful verse about God's creation is enough to make humans understand and see that God exists.

I feel similarly about merging. "For since the construction workers and road designers put up signs - bright yellow and orange and sometimes flashing - and these can be seen by your own eyes and comprehended by your brain to mean that you must take some kind of action about merging, you are without excuse in taking said action as quickly and safely as possible.

The only thing someone who is a bad driver could possibly say is that "they didn't see _____" or "they didn't notice ______." There is a fancy phrase for that called "not paying attention," and from what I understand it doesn't hold up so well under a court of law.

Who the heck is Lindsay Wagner?

So this summer, in the absence of our favorite tv series LOST, The Office, and others, Ben and I are enjoying delightful reruns. For me, X-Files. For him, Wonder Years. Our TiVo records both of these shows in the wee hours of the weekday mornings, and if you have ever watched something that is on at 2 am, you are familiar with the commericals for the Sleep Number Bed. And the spokesperson for this delightful product? It's "Actress Lindsay Wagner." And if you have seen this commercial, you probably asked yourself the same question we did, after the 15th time around... "Who the heck is Lindsay Wagner?"

Ben was content just to stop fast-forwarding through the commericals long enough to hear his favorite part, when Lindsay tells him how he can get "a more recooperative sleep." I finally broke down and came upstairs to my computer, where I looked up Lindsay in the Wikipedia of the entertainment world, good ole' IMDB.com.

I was pleased to find that not only was she a real actress, but an Emmy-winning one at that. She was famous in the 70s/80s for being on The Six Million Dollar Man, and then starring in her own spinoff, The Bionic Woman. Since then it has been pretty much downhill, but it seems like this Sleep Number thing is a sweet deal. I mean, sometimes it is the only commercial I see during an entire hour of X-Files. A little Mulder, a little Lindsay Wagner. A little Scully, a little more Lindsay. A little truth-chasing, a little chat with Linz. It's kind of comforting, in a way.

PS - In case you were wondering, her sleep number is 36. Like I said, I have seen this commercial a LOT.

You know what I love? When you go swimming, and you get water in your ears, and you can hear it in there for hours, making a sort of crunchy shifting sound, and then you come home and lay down and all the sudden the water frees itself from your eardrum and the little droplet that trickles out of your ear is all hot from being inside your head.* And you are like, "Ah, I can hear again!" There is something really satisfying about that warm little bit of water coming out of your ear, like when you pop your finger really loudly or successfully scratch an itchy spot on your back or lay down after a long day and feel your spine stretching and relaxing.

*Footnote: Today I went swimming at our office pool party and this happened and it was like every day of my childhood summers all over again.

DRIVING: IT'S JUST NOT THAT HARD

This will be the first in a series where I try to help people who seem to be bewildered and befuddled by the act of driving. Unfortunately, being a bad driver doesn't stop people from being ABLE to drive... sort of like being a bad parent.

If all this series of posts does is help me vent about the complete dolts whom I graciously share the road with each day, then that might be good enough.



Issue #1 - Turn Signals

With some skeptical exceptions, human beings are incapable of reading each other's minds. This can prove dangerous when operating a two-ton piece of machinery going 60 mph. You might be asking yourself, "How will someone know if I want to change lanes?" or "How will the person behind me know I'm not slowing down just to annoy them, but to turn?" Luckily, the makers of motor vehicles have, for the past several decades, installed in your car/truck/suv a special device designed to, in a way, convey your thoughts to other drivers. This magic tool is called the TURN SIGNAL.

The turn signal is a flashing yellow or red light that is located on both sides of your car's front and rear bumpers. By manipulating a lever near your steering wheel, you can illuminate either the right or left blinking lights. Inside your car you will hear a clicking sound to indicate that the lights are blinking appropriately. Once you have finished the act of turning or veering to the correct direction, flick the lever again and the blinking light will stop. This lets other drivers know you don't now intend to move in any other direction but forward.

Now I know you might be thinking to yourself right now, "But I KNOW where I am going... why do I need the turn signal again?" Please keep in mind, the turn signal is just that, a SIGNAL to other drivers. Short of rolling down your window and hollering about what your next move is, it is the best way to keep other drivers informed of your decision to fling your car into their lane.

So remember, I can't read your mind! If you use your signal, you are reducing your risk of me slamming on my brakes and screaming "What the ef are you doing you stupid moron" by at least 43%. And that is a good thing.

Thank you. The next entry in this series will cover MERGING, where I tell you how to increase your chances of me letting you over (hint: it involves your turn signal).

sweet

six fifteen and the beep-beep has commenced
i can poke the snooze button with my toe if I stretch
draw my foot back into the cocoon of covers
flip the pillow to find the coolest corner

and when I roll over there you are
little white shirt stretched across your skinny shoulders
and with the day creeping up on us
the sweetest thing is ten more minutes curled around your back

Wow friends, it has been a long time! This blog existed three years ago as part of a project for one of my classes, "Does Poetry Matter?" (The answer to that question is yes, and the previous posts are fairly interesting, if you have some spare time and care about things like alliteration and iambic pentameter.)


Anyway, I decided to repurpose this old blogspot as my new general thought-posting-place. Because, you know, it is important to post your musings in the vain belief that they deserve to be read. Also, I just really feel like there are not enough places on the internet you can go to read the thoughts and opinions of strangers. Good thing I started this back up again!


I have retitled this blog "overjoyed." The distinction between joy and happiness has been an important touchstone in my life... and if you don't know the difference, I hope you'll ask me. I think each time I post I'll try to share something that has recently revealed joy to me. Here's something for today:




We put up a birdfeeder in our backyard and, I'll admit, I was skeptical. Pretty much any birdfeeder I've ever had turned into a squirrel feeder, which then became a sad display riddled with holes from the bbs my dad would shoot at it to chase the squirrels away. Wow, that makes my dad sound crazy/redneck, and he is generally neither of those two things. He just doesn't like squirrels who eat all the birdseed.

I've digressed. As the picture above suggests, our birdfeeder has been a rousing success. It attracts, in particular, goldfinches. A male goldfinch is one of those things that you can't hardly believe is actually the color it is. When you color, as a child, rarely is anything actually one of the colors from the box of Crayolas. The sky is generally not BLUE and storm clouds are not BLACK and your face is not PEACH. But a male goldfinch is every bit YELLOW. More yellow, even, than the crayon. And though I am not a huge fan of birds, the sight of this yellow goldfinch on my backyard bird feeder stirs joy in me. The display of vivid colors in an often muted world is cause to be joyful.

I have grand plans for this blog... so stay tuned. I know you are trembling with excitement. Try to get some sleep. I'll post again soon...

This will be my last official blog for class purposes.

Tuesday evening I gave my presentation on Frost for our Undergraduate Research Symposium. For some reason I've had the hardest time getting papers out recently - I think I'm overwhelmed and undermotivated. Still, I have found it very interesting discovering the role that Frost created as an American poet. He was like a little poet-celebrity! Seems strange - I know I don't think of the poet as fulfilling that sort of role, and I'd imagine not many other people do, either.

Well, I've been trying to ponder whether or not our class solved any of the questions regarding what poetry is and how it should be manifested. I don't think we did! Still, we explored a lot of the options, including introducing me to things I didn't really know about. Before this class I had never heard or seen anything about e-poetry. I'll have to admit I reacted a little negatively towards it as poetry only (you can read my earlier posts about it), although some of it I really did enjoy. Much of it seemed like the multimedia art now found at many modern museums. I also didn't know much about spoken word poetry or poetry slams. I had these visions of beatnik poetry readings with djembes and snapping and people saying, "Be cool." I was really interested in the poetry slam.

One of the things that sticks out most to me was watching the video "What I Want My Words To Do For You." I had never thought of using poetry in these theraputic or rehabilitation settings. Particularly after hearing Trish talk about her experiences with the women and the Campus for Human Development, this idea seemed particularly intriguing to me. Next semester I'll be taking a class entitled "Writing in the Community" where we will hopefully continue to explore the way in which people can reclaim their lives through the power of writing.

Poetry certainly does matter. It matters a lot, and I think one of the ways that it matters most is in the way that people can relate it to their own lives. Though this might not be the most academic or high-brow function of poetry, it seems to be the most meaningful. Most people aren't great poets. When a person can find a poem that says what they feel and think, there's an attachment there that is both powerful and purposeful. In my research on Frost, it seems that people felt able to latch on to his poems as meaningful to their own lives. Whether or not they were accurate in their interpretation of a poem seemed irrelevant - they were attached to the meaning that the poem had to them, not the meaning someone else had ascribed to it. I appreciate that, and I often find it true for myself.

So go read some poetry. And share it with someone else.

These past few days I've been working on a paper which examines the great American poet Robert Frost and his popularity. No American poet has ever been so lauded, so acclaimed, so known, and so read. It makes for really interesting material. Frost had serious fears of failure and rejection, making recognition and praise extremely important to him. At times it seems like he found little purpose in anything other than the accolades of others. Whenever his poetry books or lectures receved less than glorious reviews, Frost often spun into periods of depression and illness.

He also created for America the role of the poet as a public figure, something I'm not sure we've seen in quite the same way since Frost. Frost spent the majority of his life, right up until his death at nearly 90 years old, traveling and speaking or doing poetry readings: an activity he called "barding around." People literally came out by the thousands to hear him read and to watch his spontaneous, humor-filled presentations. It seems very strange - imagine a poet getting such public attention today!

Frost often covered his insecurities and low self-esteem with big talk. In letters he would write of himself as "the only artist" or the only poet with "a theory." He claimed on more than one occasion to "not care what people think of my poetry, so long as they award it some prizes." At the same time, other statements - and his own behavior - indicate that the love of the popular reader was extremely important for Frost's own agenda as a poet of the people. He looked with disdain - or nervous competition - on the majority of his contemporary authors, and instead sought the praise of critics and academics, knowing that their good words would bring public success.

I find Frost interesting, because at first glance or skim, it seems his poems would be easy and simplistic. They bear none of the modernist trademarks that Frost loathed in his peers: no obscure words, or curious punctuation, or lack of capitalization, or unstructured verse. In form they are classic and familiar, and even in vocabulary they do not hinder the average reader. But in concept, in poignancy, in "sense of sound," and in complexity, they rival the best poems ever written. This is my favorite Frost poem, so far - although I know it is well known, I think it is very beautiful:


Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.