I love my job. I'm incredibly blessed to be doing something that is interesting, and working with people that I actually enjoy working with on a regular basis. But some weeks, I really am just ready for Friday.
Today is one of those Fridays.
And to make it worse, it's one of THOSE Fridays where it perpetually feels like it SHOULD be X o'clock, but it actually is X-2 or X-3 o'clock. Add in the perpetual slowness of the day despite the fact that generally, it's not been a "boring" day, and you have yourself a recipe for a severe, bloated, rash-ridden case of the Fridays.
But hey, it sure beats the heck out of having a case of the Mondays!
Friday, May 11, 2012
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Racism, Trayvon Martin, & Philosophy
I, too, have been a victim of racism. I was an Asian kid in white-trash middle-America, and I was physically and verbally abused and descriminated against for no other reason than I had slanted eyes, and was too small to do otherwise. Even though I continually proved my academic prowess, I was almost held back a grade in two different schools. I witnessed horrific racial and gender-based threats and discrimination to my very small Asian mother. My family has been the target of death threats and religious descrimination, even forced to leave a town by vote of a church - where, you know, Godly people supposedly attended.
In short, while I don't claim to understand EVERYONE'S problems or be THE authority on racisim, I think I can safely say I understand some measure hatred in a very real way. This is something I have rarely shared with anyone, so please understand I am not trying to make excuses, only establish a basis of understanding.
What one DOES with that understanding, however, is where I think I philosophically differ from others. For all the hatred I've seen, witnessed, or just read about, I've also witnessed incredible acts of love and random kindness. For every racial slur I've had hurled at me, I've had as many words of kindness. For every teacher who tried to hold me back, I've had another teacher at a different time or place to encouraged me. And though hatred has often reared it's ugly head, I've CHOSEN to not simply ignore the good and the love of others that DOES exist.
As someone once wiser than me once said, Life is 10% what happens to you, and 90% how you choose to respond to it. While that may not be completely true, as Trayvon's family learned, I choose to believe in this philosophy because I believe that GENERALLY, at least in this society - this holds true. While a lot of things are out of our control, and while we don't have as much say in the way our lives should go as we would like, the ONE thing we DO have control of is how we choose to respond. I choose to keep my eyes wide open to that small slice of reality of which I am blessed to be aware - both the good and the bad. And while I will not dismiss or ignore the darker side of humanity, I CHOOSE, rather, to focus on the good that I've seen and witnessed, and the love that I've felt and shared, and the great people that I've been absolutely priviledged to get to know and love.
I fully acknowledge that there are those who have it, and had it, worse than me. I make no claim to understand their plight, or that my philosophy is for them. I do my best to empathize as best as I can with anyone who claims hardship, and I can only hope that, in general, people approach the world with their eyes open, seeing not just the black or white, but the full spectrum of complexity and color that is the world we live in.
Tuesday, March 13, 2012
Talk about frustrating...
WARNING: POLITICS OMGWTFBBQ
It is incredibly frustrating watching Santorum compete in the Republican Primary. On the one hand, I'm really happy to see that Mitt "Buy Me The Presidency Or Bust" Romney is unable to simply overwhelm the opposition with sheer cash - it gives hope that legitimate candidates could some day compete with established cash-rich opponents in our horribly dysfunctional election process. (I'll save that rant for another time.)
On the other hand, the person representing the Anti-Romney vote? Santorum. I mean, c'mon, really?? Santorum??
There should really be an option for "Vote of No Confidence" in our political system. If there are more votes for "Vote of No Confidence" than any legitimate candidate, then the bums and yokels that currently run and occupy the bowels of our political system simply can't take office. I bet THAT would give voter turnout the bump that it so desperately needs.
It is incredibly frustrating watching Santorum compete in the Republican Primary. On the one hand, I'm really happy to see that Mitt "Buy Me The Presidency Or Bust" Romney is unable to simply overwhelm the opposition with sheer cash - it gives hope that legitimate candidates could some day compete with established cash-rich opponents in our horribly dysfunctional election process. (I'll save that rant for another time.)
On the other hand, the person representing the Anti-Romney vote? Santorum. I mean, c'mon, really?? Santorum??
There should really be an option for "Vote of No Confidence" in our political system. If there are more votes for "Vote of No Confidence" than any legitimate candidate, then the bums and yokels that currently run and occupy the bowels of our political system simply can't take office. I bet THAT would give voter turnout the bump that it so desperately needs.
Saturday, February 25, 2012
Of Folk and Funerals
Today I looked upon a corpse. I also shook the hand of many-a-stranger, contemplated how dousing oneself in blood - holy or otherwise - makes one whiter than snow (and exasperatedly wondered why so many people are morbidly willing to SING about it, let alone contemplate it), assuaged a mentally stressed loved one, drove seven hours through the hills of Missouri, ate some cow, got a late-afternoon shut-eye, and failed to save the galaxy from the swarm - twice.
It was a strange day.
Let me back up a bit, to the part about a corpse. His nickname was Shorty, and he was my Grandfather-In-Law, on my wife's father's side. The last - and only - time I saw him alive was about 2.5 years prior, in the exact same cemetery, on a cool, eerily similar sunny day in the quiet heart of the Country. We were at my wife's Grannyma's funeral, on my wife's mother's side, a bizarre coincidence that I did not find in the least bit pleasant. That first meeting left me without much of an impression, simply because in the end, he was just another One of Dozens of people I interacted with for about half a minute.
Today, I learned more about Shorty than I did in the first meeting, despite the fact that don't have the power to commune with the dead, or at least none that I know of. I, of course, learned of such things through the most common of ways - speaker/s at the funeral service - but beyond that, I learned of Shorty by simply observing the vast number and variety of people who came to pay their last respects. There was the nervous but confidently chatty son, a man of many words and a story perpetually on the tip of his tongue. There was the slender brunette cousin lifted straight from an 80's magazine with her zip-up boots. There was the sarcastic, surprisingly nerdy cousin whom I heard mention the word "Silmarillion". There was the tearful, slightly-graying late-thirty-or-forty-something "tech-savvy" grandson who used a laptop to power the uncomfortably traditional southern gospel renditions of old-time hymns. There was the easy-going, candy-snorting, twenty-two year-old cousin who aspired to build a house and just live free and let life "happen". There were the small cadre of honest children, equally wearing the content of their hearts and their noses on their sleeves, ever ready to comfort a nearby adult or quietly grab another roll of Smarties (of which several rolls would be buried with Shorty, tucked away in his favorite used overalls). There was the sunglasses-wearing "rebel" grandson, who at the last second, asked to be a pallbearer as they were carting Shorty out of the small church next to the cemetery. There was a large representation of aging Good Folk, the kind of people who were as likely to chat boisterously as they were to sniffle quietly, in equal measure.
And there was the grandmother, to whom Shorty was married to for a long 66 years. The Matriarch of the Family, my wife would later describe her as. "Shorty was a pillar of the community, well-respected and loved, but don't let that fool you," she elaborated. "Grandmother shaped the family into what it's become." I had done a pretty good job of stonewalling myself to the powerful emotions swirling in That Room and under That Burial Tent, but when it came to the Matriarch, I couldn't help but tear up. 66 years. How do you cope with that? How on earth do you adjust to life without? My empathy was in full swing by the end of our two hours - not that she needed it. She struck me as a tough woman, always ready with just the right words for the situation at hand, even in as trying a time as her own husband's funeral. She was, indeed, The Matriarch.
What I really learned about Shorty was that, ultimately, he was surrounded by a host of interesting, hearty, loving Folk - people who were touched by his life, his faith, and his earthy, grounded personality. And what better way to go into whatever comes After than surrounded by Folk like this? His life left a mark - big or small -on every single person who visited that church and cemetery - even on slender city-dwellers who would later fail at saving the galaxy.
It was a strange day.
Let me back up a bit, to the part about a corpse. His nickname was Shorty, and he was my Grandfather-In-Law, on my wife's father's side. The last - and only - time I saw him alive was about 2.5 years prior, in the exact same cemetery, on a cool, eerily similar sunny day in the quiet heart of the Country. We were at my wife's Grannyma's funeral, on my wife's mother's side, a bizarre coincidence that I did not find in the least bit pleasant. That first meeting left me without much of an impression, simply because in the end, he was just another One of Dozens of people I interacted with for about half a minute.
Today, I learned more about Shorty than I did in the first meeting, despite the fact that don't have the power to commune with the dead, or at least none that I know of. I, of course, learned of such things through the most common of ways - speaker/s at the funeral service - but beyond that, I learned of Shorty by simply observing the vast number and variety of people who came to pay their last respects. There was the nervous but confidently chatty son, a man of many words and a story perpetually on the tip of his tongue. There was the slender brunette cousin lifted straight from an 80's magazine with her zip-up boots. There was the sarcastic, surprisingly nerdy cousin whom I heard mention the word "Silmarillion". There was the tearful, slightly-graying late-thirty-or-forty-something "tech-savvy" grandson who used a laptop to power the uncomfortably traditional southern gospel renditions of old-time hymns. There was the easy-going, candy-snorting, twenty-two year-old cousin who aspired to build a house and just live free and let life "happen". There were the small cadre of honest children, equally wearing the content of their hearts and their noses on their sleeves, ever ready to comfort a nearby adult or quietly grab another roll of Smarties (of which several rolls would be buried with Shorty, tucked away in his favorite used overalls). There was the sunglasses-wearing "rebel" grandson, who at the last second, asked to be a pallbearer as they were carting Shorty out of the small church next to the cemetery. There was a large representation of aging Good Folk, the kind of people who were as likely to chat boisterously as they were to sniffle quietly, in equal measure.
And there was the grandmother, to whom Shorty was married to for a long 66 years. The Matriarch of the Family, my wife would later describe her as. "Shorty was a pillar of the community, well-respected and loved, but don't let that fool you," she elaborated. "Grandmother shaped the family into what it's become." I had done a pretty good job of stonewalling myself to the powerful emotions swirling in That Room and under That Burial Tent, but when it came to the Matriarch, I couldn't help but tear up. 66 years. How do you cope with that? How on earth do you adjust to life without? My empathy was in full swing by the end of our two hours - not that she needed it. She struck me as a tough woman, always ready with just the right words for the situation at hand, even in as trying a time as her own husband's funeral. She was, indeed, The Matriarch.
What I really learned about Shorty was that, ultimately, he was surrounded by a host of interesting, hearty, loving Folk - people who were touched by his life, his faith, and his earthy, grounded personality. And what better way to go into whatever comes After than surrounded by Folk like this? His life left a mark - big or small -on every single person who visited that church and cemetery - even on slender city-dwellers who would later fail at saving the galaxy.
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