A Public Huddle

I've written it down. 

The P-L-A-N. 

The strategy.



There is something growing inside of me, something that has a lot to do with changing the course of this world. Learning more is teaching me to want to learn even more, to dig, to memorize, to yearn, to act. One day it will all culminate into something bigger than my front yard, or this city. It's something I believe that God is preparing.

I just told a friend that's how I feel: God started brewing something in me, but it hasn't yet come to a boil, it's not quite to the point of taking it out of the pot to serve. When He does, though, watch out!

Leave Your (teeny-tiny) Mark

I took a lesson from my new friend, whom I like to call Mister Itsy Bitsy.  I imagine he was minding his own spider-business, wandering around in his giant spider-world that didn't seem created for him, or for his career of crawling about on the ceilings of things.

"What's the point?" Mr. Bitsy was probably thinking. "What I do is so insignificant. All I do is crawl around, I make my bed in a strange place, one that seems perfect one day - all angular and corner-like - and then this giant hairy green animal connected to a stick (sustained by an even more alien thing I think I've heard called an Emily), comes and wipes me out when I'm out grocery shopping, and I have to start all over again..." 

What kind of a life indeed? Mr. Bitsy probably thought his life would never amount to much. The daily grind, spinning his bed, waiting for some grub, avoiding the vicious other-end of my broom, when he fails he spins his bed again... 

Then, without warning, he steps out of his back door, and leaps.... 

He took an unexpected dive, past the busily occupied face of the creature he only knows as an Emily because that's all they call me, those he observes from his seemingly-mundane kitchen window. 

I'm startled, he's just as surprised and in a blind panic, starts to run. I notice a teensy weensy spider-shaped white smudge and grab the proverbial rolled up newspaper... Wait! What is that? I lean in and squint at this phenomenon. 

Maybe I exaggerate, but I have a huge smile on my face, and I'm showing everyone that comes in my office this little smudge (still hasn't simmered enough for me to clean it up). It's just dust! In the shape of Mr. Bitsy. 

Maybe he lived a mediocre life, up until I squished him with my newspaper, but just one day out of his WHOLE life, he decided to jump, out into the unknown. Maybe it didn't last long for him (sorry Mr. Bitsy, I too, panicked), but he certainly left a mark, clear, fascinating, and unmistakably his.

Don't be afraid to leap, the moment may be brief, but you never know what the ripple effect could be, whose life you could impact.

Do you think your life is a little to gray? What kinds of chances can you take in order to make a difference in your tiny part of the world? 

Batman, America and Morality

So, I cannot be the only one who noticed the deep undercurrent of modern American patriotism in the Dark Knight Rises, but I seem to be unable to hold my tongue - so to speak. I wish to be brief.

The Batman is a symbol, he was always saying so in the now-famous trilogy. He was something to fear, but that same something is a protective entity. Something no one really understands, and the fear caused something unexpected for our hero: opposition. From the very people he was trying to protect.

There is a moral code. I believe in a global moral compas by which people all over the world, when they are honest, can sit down, quiet their mind and heart, can understand this: "Good and bad exist and as created humans we should all know the difference."

There are plenty of people who think they know what that code is, but I see too many people defending what they think is "right" or "fair" much more than they are defending what is inherently moral. I think that democrats have this sentiment down to a T -  though in their case I have heard more calls to INaction, than to action. There is also the plausible pov that the republicans have their trigger-finger a little to tightly wound, but in any case, or in this case at least, I will keep it uni-partisan, if I may.

There are internationally recognized objections to the way the United States of America handles affairs in relation to the rest of the world. I have come to the conclusion that just as Batman is a symbol for "cleaning up" the morally corrupt community, and actively does away with the purely cold-blooded, America, too, is that "hero." Not only unsung, but willing to take the flack, even the blame, for the biggest and most violent issues surrounding (not politics, not a country) humanity. As long as there is a moral watchdog, a defender of the poor, someone standing up for our ingrained moral code.

Loyal, unyeilding, not caring if those he helps "agree" with him or not, America is like the world's big brother. Remember, siblings, who always got the brunt of the punishment in your family? The blame? Remember how sometimes it was indeed Little Brother who "did it," but you kept your mouth shut?

I don't pretend to compare America to God, but in this case, the lighting on this scene, the shadows in the corners, that particular spotlight, appears similar to another scene, 2000 years ago...