new

new beginnings feel amazing to me simply because they’re new.

a few weeks ago, i read a rather sad article about how hp essentially fails hardware-wise after a number of years. this is after i’ve owned my laptop for a little under a year and can no longer hibernate/sleep without the internet ceasing to work, using the built-in mousepad without my cursor going berserk,  or seeing the BSOD every three days. i vowed to fix these atrocities over the holiday break simply because, my engineer brain will not allow me to own non-functional technology.

today, after figuring out that BSOD only happens when i connect to the internet or try to adjust my WLAN settings, i shut off my wireless capability and my laptop functioned flawlessly. but since a laptop without wireless is kind of like a cell phone that cannot make calls — i decided to restore my laptop to factory settings. four painful hours of system restore + backup + reset later, i have one fully functional piece glob of microchips with a shiny lacquer finish. jump for joy!

i love things that are new because they are new. no baggage. no excess of programs. clean desktop. no documents. (my MOUSE even works now!) how exciting is this?!

merry christmas, readers. christ has come to make us new.

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used to be

‘i used to think i had an anger management problem in college because i’d get frustrated at everyone all the time.’

‘you of all people do not have anger management issues. anger management is for people who have problems controlling their anger — they lash out. you’re the opposite of that, everything’s hidden…  you could hate someone and they’d never know.’

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from brooke

but while we’re waiting we could try saving the world — or are we storing that up for a raining day?
i’m anticipating the time when it’ll be my turn
it could be fun to try…  i think that i”ll save the world as a fun afternoon activity

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indecent

you thought we could be decent men in an indecent world.

i just watched the dark knight for the first time and the social commentary is endless. what an interesting glimpse into the fragility of the human condition.

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bruised

easily bruised but not bleeding. easily hurt but not showing. there are so many easy ways to hide what’s truth, what’s beneath the surface, what’s behind the buttoned up shirt and coiffed hair.

hello. how are you doing today?

i see the same people at work everyday. i see the same faces, the same offices, the same cubes. forty (+) hours a day, and they’re there. yet most of them – i know little about them besides their names, functional group, and maybe college.

good thanks – and you?

behind every face – a story. a past filled with hurt, pain embarrassment, shame, joy, accomplishment. a future with uncertainty, fear, doubt, and hope. intricate networks of friends, brothers, parents, significant others. and all i see  are smiling faces at work.

i’m doing alright. hope you have a good day.

what’s your story? what’s on your mind? how do you define yourself? what is your purpose?

questions that i may never fully know the answers so. but as i’m here, breathing, living, thankful to have just come home from broomball hosted by pathlights but with several coworkers — i’m willing to keep asking.

hi. how are you doing today?

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days

there are days when it feels like undergrad and school are years past. the people i interact with everyday, the work i do everyday, deadlines, fellowship i go to — all are so different from the concerns of the everyday from when i was at school.

it’s strange how stages of life come and go so quickly.

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for everything

this past weekend marked the first time i told my mom i may spent a good portion of the next decade overseas. i’m pretty convinced she thought i was kidding and somewhat shrugged it off, then made an offhand comment that as long as it wasn’t my long-term goals then it was alright. i thought for a while then slowly answered no, it wouldn’t be my long long term goal (since our home lies in a heavenly realm) but, i gave her the benefit of naivete and kept it at a simple no.

 

 

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abrasive

per request of a brother, i listened to matt chandler’s sermon on hebrews 11 & 12 linked through here. in perhaps what was the fastest drive from san diego to los angeles, this sermon surprised me, challenged me, slightly rubbed me the wrong way (mostly because i’m in the 20-some year generation that he slapped around a bit in the beginning). i love his exhortation that probably has woken up many in his audience that have been spiritually sleeping — if christianity is simply something i do rather than am,  this facade won’t last too long.

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sabai sabai

in thai exists this wonderful phrase, meaning quite literally ’same same.’ for the awkward outsider this makes little to no sense, yet to those who have spent considerable amount of time with thai people, students, culture, this phrase means something closer to ‘all the same, no worries, everything’s okay.’

i had this wonderful conversation with a friend the other day upon the nature of humanity. i argue that people are genuinely complex — made up of experiences, thoughts, hopes, fears, that set each person apart from the next. yet for my friend, everyone is… simple. people are different at times but overall guided by similar principles and desires.

with this conversation in the back of my mind, i started to read one of the eight books i checked out this past week: the year of living biblically.

“The Bible says, those with good sense are “slow to anger” (Proverbs 19:11). So when I get there at the same time as this wiry fortyish woman, and she practically sprints to the counter to beat me in line, I try not to be annoyed.

And when she tells the Mail Boxes Etc. employee to copy something on the one and only functioning Xerox machine, I try to shrug it off. And when she pulls out a stack of pages that looks like the collected works of J. K. Rowling and plunks it on the counter, I say to myself: “Slow to anger, slow to anger.”

After which she asks some complicated question involving paper stock…

I remind myself: Remember what happened when the Israelites were waiting for Moses while he was up on the mountaintop for forty days? They got impatient, lost faith, and were struck with a plague.

Oh, and she pays by check. And asks for a receipt. And asks to get the receipt initialed. The Proverbs—a collection of wisdom in the Old Testament—say that smiling makes you happy. Which is actually backed up by psychological studies. So I stand there with a flight attendant–like grin frozen on my face. But inside, I am full of wrath.

I don’t have time for this. I have a seventy-two-page-list of other biblical tasks to do.”

at this point i chuckle to myself because people are generally stupid and sinful and stupid again. sabai sabai.

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this one’s for you, bro.

today is thanksgiving. the first one i’ve spent at home with my family in years. but tonight i’m increasingly thankful for my little brother – someone who is always excited to see me when i come home, someone who’s never asked me how i’m doing in school or what my future plans are or how successful i’ll be in the future. someone who albiet, may be a tad spoiled as the second child, but is growing up to be a rather distinguished young man. so even though you’ll probably never read this — thank you for being you.

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