sweet Phoebe, do not scorn me ...

PHEBE
I would not be thy executioner:

I fly thee, for I would not injure thee.

Thou tell'st me there is murder in mine eye:

'Tis pretty, sure, and very probable,

That eyes, that are the frail'st and softest things,

Who shut their coward gates on atomies,

Should be call'd tyrants, butchers, murderers!

Now I do frown on thee with all my heart;

And if mine eyes can wound, now let them kill thee:

Now counterfeit to swoon; why now fall down;

Or if thou canst not, O, for shame, for shame,

Lie not, to say mine eyes are murderers!

Now show the wound mine eye hath made in thee:

Scratch thee but with a pin, and there remains

Some scar of it; lean but upon a rush,

The cicatrice and capable impressure

Thy palm some moment keeps; but now mine eyes,

Which I have darted at thee, hurt thee not,

Nor, I am sure, there is no force in eyes

That can do hurt.

(Painting: Adolphe-William Bouguereau (1825-1905). Excerpt: Shakespeare)

Laura Policeman And The Gothic Soup

that's the newest band name idea -- courtesy Joy. Thank you, Joy.

My new band

I recently heard about a website that creates band names for you (www.bandnamemaker.com). You are asked to enter a "key phrase," and from this phrase, the special Band Name generator proffers several band names for you to chose from.

Hmmm. What word to feed the generator? I thought and I thought. Then it came to me. Wholesome. Perfect. I gleefully typed it in, and awaited the results with baited breath.

And they are in!

"Wholesome Bikini Chief And The Superb Disease."

"Wholesome Bikini Hobo."

"Nameless Naughty."

I like each of these band names very much, so much so that I want to start a band now. Or perhaps a dance team.

Atom. Atom.

TILLIE: He told me to look at my hand, for a part of it came from a star that exploded too long ago to imagine. This part of me was formed from a tongue of fire that screamed through the heavens until there was our sun. And this part of me -- this tiny part of me-- was on the sun when it itself exploded and whirled in a great storm until the planets came to be. And this small part of me was then a whisper of the earth. When there was life, perhaps this part of me got lost in a fern that was crushed and covered until it was coal. And then it was a diamond millions of years later -- it must have been a diamond as beautiful as the star from which it had first come. Or perhaps this part of me became lost in a terrible beast, or became part of a huge bird that flew above the primeval swamps. And he said this thing was so small -- this part of me was so small it couldn't be seen -- but it was there from the beginning of the world. And he called this bit of me an atom. And when he wrote the word, I fell in love with it. Atom. Atom. What a beautiful word."

(from The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, by Paul Zinfandel.)

(photo from the amazing http://wink.nixone.com/archives/862. I haven't figured out how to link yet).

Did I forget to mention?

Also, running is fun. Especially when you have running partners/roommates like this one.

Running, thinking and the joy of mediocrity

Yesterday, I ran 12k to support 40+ formerly homeless men and women who were also running in the Colfax Marathon here in Denver. I ran the last leg of our relay, so I got to cross the finish line. This felt great. As a bookish person who received her lowest college grade in Badminton, feeling athletic -- experiencing triumph in my muscles -- was very cool and exciting. When I rounded the corner, I saw colorful banners, I heard drums beating, and my heart swelled. I stared at the back of the man who I'd been shadowing the whole race, and decided that I would beat him. So I cranked up Joss Stone, threw my head back, and sprinted as fast as I could.

Here's the thing, though. In my excitement, I mistook something that wasn't the finish line for the finish line. (The line I assumed to be the finish line was actually a blue name-scanner. Announcers read your name from it as you approach the end of the race, and share it with onlookers). So, I stopped after this pseudo-finish line, sweating, panting and very pleased with myself. Woohoo! I flashed a big, charming smile at my friends and the photographers. Except they all started screaming at me to keep running, you idiot.

-----------

Running has really made my life better; I have more energy, and I feel more strong and capable in general. Now, I think I understand why running has proved a very useful tool for our men and women as they struggle to achieve sobriety and self-sufficiency; the benefits of running spill over to all areas of life. First of all, training with a team helps runners to rely on others, and to practice discipine and commitment in community. Second, with every step, runners have to really engage with their own weaknesses, their desire to give up. After physically wrestling, and winning, they feel stronger in mind, body and spirit, and empowered to achieve other goals as well. Third, a long run includes easy patches and rough patches. Expecting and preparing for difficulty might help runners/recovering addicts to prepare for dog-days, when the high inevitably wears off, when practicing sobriety becomes gruelling, depressing and lonely.

As I ran, I ruminated. Really, I thought to myself as sweat poured off my body, as the sun scalded the back of my neck, really I can see why a "journey" or a "race" is such a fitting metaphor for life. Like a good story, a race draws its worth and intrigue from conflict, from pushing (all types of conflict: man v. himself, man v. nature, man v. others (competitors)). Also, in a race, time figures heavily, even tyranically, just as it does for so many characters who wrestle with mortality. And, as I ran, I remarked to myself that the dynamic metaphor of a journey allows authors to project characters' shifting mindsets on the changing landscapes outside.

I thought all of this while I was running. Seriously. As my feet pounded the pavement, I pondered over the metaphors that shape our consciousness. Which is maybe why I neglected to cross the real finish line, which is maybe why I got a B- in college badminton.

----

Looking back at my time at Wheaton College, I see now that as an undergraduate, I believed that you should only study a discipline if you could master it. For example, in theatre, I was profoundly unhappy when I wasn't the star. When I got cast in roles I didn't want, I withdrew. I wasn't able to have fun unless I felt like I was the best. My competitive spirit prevented me from seeing that the discipline of WorkOut (our theatre ensemble) was changing my heart and my mind for the better. A second example is exercise: I never ran with people who were faster than me, because it made me mad.

Similarly, from attending some leadership seminars and observing goings-on in my own workplace, I've noticed that the current trend in management is to capitalize on your employees' strengths, and to ignore their weak spots. (Marcus Buckingham, Tom Rath). I suppose this strategy makes sense from an efficiency standpoint. And helping people become the best that they can be is a very worthy goal.

But isn't it dangerous to limit yourself to activities you feel safe and comepetent doing? And isn't it good to learn how to fail or fall? Yesterday, I didn't care about my mediocre race time, or losing to the man in front of me; I was happy just to have ran 7.4 miles in support of a worthy cause. So now, I am wondering about the soul-benefits of an average performance. I wonder about the joy in being content to merely tinker, to dabble, to have a hobby. For anyone -- a writer, baker or candlestick maker -- a hobby requiring discipline (for example, running) expands your sense of what you can do, and helps you in your real "calling" -- or, if you don't care for this terminology, helps you accomplish what you want to achieve in your vocation of choice. Me, I'll never be an amazing runner. Neither will most of these men and women; after years of malnourishment and breaking down their bodies with drugs and alcohol, they'll never run a 3 hour marathon. But running, even painstakingly, gingerly, or slowly, is worthwhile if it gets people out of their heads, helps them feel stronger, helps them to escape homelessness or addiction, or helps them to have fun. So, hobbies, even ones we're no good at, maybe even especially the ones we're no good at, teach us how to be gracious in mediocrity.

Hobbies also teach us how to fail. In engaging a hobby, we escape the sphere of concrete achievement, and live in a new, expanded space where we are free to tumble, to get scraped up. To make mistakes. Who cares ... it's just a hobby! And in falling, we grow stronger. By contrast, when we are trying to get the lead, to write the best essay, we refuse to fall or fail. We hold on too tightly, too determinedly. For example, sometimes I feel my writing is so measured, so careful, so safe, so ... fearful. What would it feel like to write like I run -- gleefully, and with abandon?

Footnote: I read an essay last night by Joyce Carol Oates on how the benefits of running spill over into her writing life. http://www.nytimes.com/library/books/071999oates-writing.html Listen to this: "Running is a meditation; more practicably it allows me to scroll through, in my mind's eye, the pages I've just written, proofreading for errors and improvements. " What strikes me here is that Ms. Oates isn't really running when she's running, is she? She's writing -- her feet just happen to be moving simulataneously. Always, always thinking about a writing project strikes me as very "artistic" -- the author haunted by her art -- but also nightmarish. No rest. When I run, I think I'd like to run for running's sake, for a little bit of a break from words.

The system is down!

Ha ha ha! I've sidestepped the filter. Where there's a will, there's a way.

(Photo is of WWII spy Virginia Hall by photographer Jeff Bass).

"Someone wonderful"

When A. came to the farm, he was still harried by questions of meaning and purpose. “I felt like I was coming out of a nightmare,” he says softly. “Was I really on the street? Was that me? I had been panhandling for money. This hurts so bad. You know the stinky guys you see in parks? That was me. That was me. That was me. That’s how I was living. So much pain for all the stuff I’ve done in my life.”

Some of A.'s new friends could see that his spirit was every bit as bruised as his body. With this in this mind, they suggested that he get – of all things - a haircut. A new haircut as a remedy for despair? It does sound funny, but these friends reasoned that if A. could look into the mirror and see a fresh, well-groomed person, he might be inspired to pursue sobriety and new life. A. remembers, “They took me to get a haircut, and we took all the hair off. I thought, ‘the old person has to be gone.’

He breaks into a grin.

“I came back out. One woman looking on began to cry. She said, ‘I knew there was someone wonderful under all that.’ ”

Delinquency

I haven't posted for a long time. Why? Because my workplace now blocks "personal websites" with its filter, and my own home computer has kicked the bucket. Well, I think it has. It makes a loud wooshing noise and refuses to perform the simplest tasks. After all, it is a 2003 Dell with virtually no RAM, so I'm grateful it had held out so long.

Now, I'm stealing a few minutes on my roommate's computer before beginning an online book discussion with a group of teenage girls on Jane Eyre. I am excited to begin and to see how the chat medium affects and shapes our conversation. I've never discussed books online before, and I haven't been thirteen for awhile, either, though I remember that time of life very keenly, in the pit of my stomach.