Forward

It’s really nice outside. I’m sitting on the sidewalk outside the Islington Library, uploading a Coldplay CD that I just checked out a few minutes ago. When it’s done, I’ll do the same with the Beatles CD, put them in the drop box, and go back to the Highbury Centre.

My final paper is due tonight at midnight. As it stands, I have 2 full pages. I’m a bit behind where I’d like to be, but I’m not worried. I’ve been in worse situations before. If I stop letting myself get distracted, I’ll probably be able to finish the paper by 9:30. So I feel ok with my time. Ok enough to write a note.

The weather is beautiful. Not a cloud in the sky. I like clouds, but I like blue too. And the sky is really nice and blue today. There’s a light breeze to keep the stale, nicotine-filled air moving. These Londoners sure like their cigarettes, I can tell you that much. It’s sunny out. My transition lens became full-blown sunglasses in seconds.

I had a nice walk to the library. I listened to Muse and the Decemberists. There were a lot of people in the parks. It was nice. I stopped at Tina’s ice cream truck and waited in line for a while. The little girl in line behind me was impatient. She kept kicking my heels, as if I was the reason she had to wait, and not the dozen or so people ahead of me. She was cute though. 4, maybe. I got a double vanilla cone with raspberry sauce and rainbow sprinkles. It cost £1.60. The double cones are pretty cool. It’s a cone that has two cups at the top, so you can have two different flavors of ice cream. It’s fun, but it looks like male genitalia. If you’re able to ignore it, like I do most of the time, it’s no big deal. If you have to think about it, no matter. It’s a great laugh, trust me.

Out goes “A Rush of Blood to the Head”. In goes “Please Please Me”. I’m disgusted at how long it’s taken me to get these two CDs.

I can’t believe the program is over in 2 days. I’ve been here in London since January 15. Obama wasn’t even sworn in yet. I’ve grown so much these past few months. Intellectually, academically, spiritually, socially, personally. Not physically, though. I’ve lost a lot of weight from a lot of walking and little eating. I wear my belt two holes tighter now. But other than that, I’ve grown a lot. My mind has never been so full. My friend Elisa, in the East Meets West honors program, told me she feels like a teacup with a fire hose aimed at her. God knows I can relate.

Whoa, that Beatles CD is already done. And the brick wall is making my back itchy. I’ll finish this up at the Highbury Centre. See you in about 20 minutes.

Ok, so like I was saying, I’ve grown a lot academically. I’ve probably read more for school these past three months than I have for my sophomore, junior, and senior years of high school combined (especially because I didn’t do anything senior year). I’ve read Plato, Socrates, Galileo, Freud, Darwin, Dante, Descartes, Voltaire, Aristotle, Wordsworth, Whitman, Eliot, Keats, Yeats, Aquinas, Abelard, Aristophanes, Augustine, Marlowe, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Marx, Hume, Sappho, Sophocles, Swift, Sartre, Thucydides, Goethe, Luther, Erasmus, Locke, Milton and lots of others whose names escape me. I’ve studied history, philosophy, literature, poetry, art, architecture and music. (I won’t get into all the artists and musicians). I know that I’m a 19th century Romantic through and through, and I know that postmodernism is indefinable. I know art, too. I can discern a Turner from a Canaletto and a Rubens from a Constable. I’ve had a lot crammed down my throat, and I hope I remember it. I’m keeping all the books, though. So that’ll help.

The opportunities I’ve had this semester were once-in-a-lifetime. I know what the interior of Westminster Abbey looks like. I’ve seen Van Gogh’s self-portrait. I know that English bacon and chicken is gross but their bread and cheese is great. I went to Canterbury and Cambridge. I walked through Hampton Court Palace and the ruins of Roman Baths. I was very lucky this semester. Oh, and I went on about half a dozen trains. Not counting the Underground, mind you. Trains. Choo-choos. I went to King's Cross and Talyllyn Railway, suckers.

I’ve grown a lot socially, I think. I mean I hope I did. My social circle in London was drastically different than it was in high school. At South, I was part of an eclectic group of every race, religion, sexual orientation, and drug preference you could imagine (In case you don’t know, I was white, Christian, straight, and no thanks). I stood out by not wearing black pants and eyeliner (though by the time we graduated, I think only Steve kept up the tripp pants and eyeliner. Way to go, Steve!). All of us made sketchy jokes and swore like sailors.

Here in London, my friends consisted of very white (except Eri), very conservative, very homeschooled (again, except Eri), Christians. Boy did I have to adjust. I think I did an ok job of shifting gears. I was a little raunchy at the beginning of the semester, but I think I was able to contain my sketchiness well enough for my friends to still like me. I hope I did. Every now and then, a joke would set itself up too great and I’d have to say it. But I think I ended up doing ok in that regard.

That’s not the only way in which I had to shift gears socially. I learned a lot about my shortcomings this semester. Something I realized was that I have this annoying need to be right all the time (I wrote a note about it called “Right is Wrong” back in March). But it’s true, I’ve got to be right. And I’m sure that turns off a lot of people. But since I learned that about myself, now I can try to change it. So that’s good.

I’ve grown spiritually too. I have the guys’ Bible study to thank for that: Danny Kim, Evan, Ben, Adam, Steve, Tall Dave, and Zeke. It was the first time I’ve ever had anything like that. I had youth group in middle school and the first part of high school, but it was with a bunch of girls. I had Joe Paul at South, but he’s just one guy. It was great to have a whole group of guys in a room, wolfing down digestives, learning about God, bearing their sins, offering prayer requests, making jokes. We went through James this semester. It took forever, but it was good. I hope to God we continue the group at Houghton next fall. God knows I need them.

I’ve grown a bit in my personal faith too, I think. It’s hard to measure progress sometimes. I know I’ve gotten better about reading the Word and praying. I had a lot of long prayers in the shower. That was good. But I get distracted so easily. Music, books, friends, movies, the internet, cartoons…all these things distract me from spending time with God. And I had less of these distractions this semester since most of my friends and DVDs were back home, which is probably partially why I grew closer to God. But I need to drop a lot of that stuff, and hopefully I’ll be able to focus more on God and less on them this summer. It’ll be hard because I’m getting alllll my stuff back when I come home, but I’ll try.

London has taught me a lot about church. I took the opportunity to go to all sorts of services. I went to Catholic services in gigantic cathedrals and revivalist, non-denominational services in gymnasiums and auditoriums converted into sanctuaries. I’ve gone to churches where the service was televised and I’ve gone to churches where there were more kids than adults. I went to Baptist, Anglican, Catholic, Church of Christ, New Frontier, non-denominational, and one other that I’m not even sure what it is. I still don’t know what my beef with the church is, but it’s there. And God will reveal it to me eventually. It’s either a good thing that the church makes me uncomfortable, and God will use that to help me change the church, or there’s nothing wrong with the church and I need to get over my issues with it, and God will help me do that. Either way, when I get home, I’m going to change how I do things with church. I’m only going to go to Harris Hill every other week, and on the other weeks, I’ll go to Nativity or the other one nearby (Presbyterian?). The reason for that is because I get too distracted by all my memories at church. Instead of listening to the sermon, I just sit there thinking about Jordan, or Sunday School, or the Schuhs. It’s not healthy faith-wise. Also, I get too involved with the people at Harris Hill. Most of them, I’m too attached too, and I focus on them more than the sermon. A few of them are fake and false and "churchy" and I know it and it upsets me, and then I get mad at me getting upset because I don’t want to be judgmental. It was different going to church in London because I could focus on the sermon more, and not get distracted by memories or people I know. So yeah. I’m scaling back attendance at Harris Hill. I’ll go a couple weeks in a row when I first get home, because I miss people like mad. And then I’ll alternate between them and another church. And when I do go to Harris Hill, I’ll still sit in the narthex most of the time. I just need to figure some things out, especially since I might be a pastor myself someday. That’s ironic, huh?

Well, here’s the deal. It’s 7:03 and I have 2 pages on my paper. I’m not worried, like I said before. But I just want to get it over with. I need to do laundry and pack and a lot of other crap. I think it’s amazing how I can struggle for 3 days with a 5 page paper, and hammer out a 3 page post in less than an hour and a half. Fan-freaking-tastic. Well, I’m off for now. I might have time to pop off another note before I leave for Dublin on Monday. If I do, great. If I don’t, I’ll see you when I get home on the 30th. I can’t wait.

Oh crap, I forgot! On my way back from the library, I was in the mood for some ska, so I put on the O.C. Supertones. This song came on called “Forward to the Future”, and it pretty much perfectly captured where I’m at in life right now. The refrain is a bit corny, but come on. It’s Christian ska from 2000. It should be expected.

It all went by so fast/I’m always looking back/On some golden day/But nothing gold can stay/Older yes and wiser some/I am what I have become/But am I becoming what I want to be/And as we go on with the rest of our lives/Don’t forget from where you came/

Look forward to the future/What you wanna be/Look forward to the future/Grace, integrity/Look forward to the future/The things you want to do/Look forward to the future/Faith and honesty/

Wistful as a wishI sit and reminisce/Off people that I knew/And old friends that I miss/Older, yes and wiser some/Looking at how far I’ve come/But is where I’m going where I want to be/And as we go on with the rest of our lives/Don’t forget from where you came/

Look forward to the future/What you wanna be/Look forward to the future/Grace, integrity/Look forward to the future/The things you want to do/Look forward to the future/Faith and honesty/