This last election was one of the most interesting I've ever been a part of due in no small part to the fact that it's the first one I've ever actually been a part of, and I'm proud to say my first vote was cast for Barack Obama. My pride wells up not only because he and his team made an awesome government website that I visit about five times day or because he personally delvers weekly video addresses to the public to keep us interested in Washington or even because of that wonderful, wonderful handsome multiracial face of his; though, frankly, I'm proud of all those things.
However, the one thing that's really got my chest puffed is the very real possibility that we are governed by the first clairvoyant president in history. The future is no mystery to Barack Obama. Take as evidence this response given by the President to NBC’s Matt Lauer in an interview before the this year's Super Bowl:
LAUER: Give me a score –- what’s the score going to be in this game?
THE PRESIDENT: You know, it’s tough to predict, but I think the Steelers are going to eke it out in a close one.
The outcome of the game? Steelers--27. Cardinals--23. Less than a touchdown.
So is Barak Obama a soothsayer? Only the next four to eight years will tell. I understand you may require more evidence of this, but it's certainly enough for me.
PS: To all those who wish to point out that Obama in fact incorrectly predicted the outcome of 2007's superbowl, just remember how the office changes people. Into prognosticators.
One of my favorite things to do is to listen to my grandparents tell me about how things were when they were young. In just the span of a few decades, thewhole world has changed, and so much of common knowledge has been turned on its head. My grandfather told me about the days he worked on the farm with his brothers and how they grew their own food. His family hardly ever had money, he said, but they never went hungry. It's impressive to me to hear about how much respect and knowledge he and his family held for the land they tended and that tended them. I even felt a little jealous of that kind of life. Even though we have technology, comfort, and convenience today that my grandfather could never have predicted back then, I don't think we're necessarily happier. Do we have more fun surfing the internet than my grandfather did playing football with a burlap sack full of rags?
But even though a lot has changed, I think a lot has stayed the same, too, and when I think of things that continue on, one of the things I think about is how happiness always seems to have come from the inside out, not the other way around based on how easy things are. Even though we have a lot more technology and convenience around us today, we still seem to have a lot of the same struggles past generations did before us. Like, for instance, people still judge others for being different than they are. Politics is still confusing. Poverty and hunger still hurts people around the world even though there's enough to go around. These and other things are issues that technology alone can't address; we have to address them in our principles first. As a scientist, I think it's easy for me to put a lot of hope in the acquisition of new knowledge, and that's going to being us a lot, no doubt about it, but we still have lot yet to conquer in the human spirit, and that's something more to do with meditation than experimentation.
Even in my twenties, my granddad's stories still fill my eyes with wonder and really give me a genuine hope that we can still do a lot of good just by the way the act and think, which has very little to do with modernness at all. We just need to remember that to whom much is given, much is expected, and that our time has given us some pretty awesome things.
Lately I've been getting interested in local history. Not necessarily local to me; at least not at first; but I began to get fascinated because I recently found a place to live in Birmingham, where I will be moving inside of two months.
Now that I know where I'm going to live in Birmingham, the specific address, I took a whole new look at that attractions map that UAB sent me in the mail almost a month ago. I found where my condo's going to be, and I circled it in red sharpie. Right under the circle I made, I noticed a very tiny drawing printed in the map labeled "Temple of Sibyl", and after looking it up on Google Maps, I found out it's only about a mile south of my room. It looked really interesting to me, even though there wasn't another word on the informative map about it. Who the heck was "Sibyl", anyhow?
After doing a lot of research I learned that the structure was built in 1929 by an great and eccentric ex-mayor of Birmingham named George Ward, on his estate on which he had built a huge circular home after an ancient temple in Tivoli, Italy (near Roam), originally built to the goddess of home and hearth, Vesta. So he named his home Vestavia, and it was so prominent in the landscape, that the entire area around his mansion became known as Vestavia Hills, and to this day, that's the name of the town. On the crest of a tall hill, like the crown of his estate, Ward built what he called Sibyl Temple, which was a beautiful gazebo that matched his home's roman architecture. A sibyl is a prophetess, and the particular one honored by this structure's inspiring building was the Tiburtine Sibyl, who prophesied in the temple next to Vesta's, but Vesta's temple is known for both Vesta and the Sibyl.
However, the structure wasn't just a gazebo. George Ward fully intended it to be his memorial headstone. He even built a crypt for himself in a cave underneath the hill of the structure, but he would never lay to rest there because of a change in the law. He was buried in a regular cemetery, and I bet his vengeful spirit is none too happy about it! But wait, it gets better.
After his death, George Ward's estate fell into disrepair, and the land was bought up. The entire house was demolished to make way for Vestavia Hills Baptists Church, a church named after a town named after the building they destroyed to make their church. In their infinite generosity and historical reverence, however, the church donated the gazebo to the town instead of destroying it too. The Temple of Sibyl was moved in the 1970's to it's current location, one mile south of my condo. Now it's a historical landmark and one of the town's most precious and important structures. It's the last remaining piece of George Ward's marvelous Vestavia.
You can't make this stuff up!
If you ever get a chance, I encourage you to google your home town. Knowing your local history makes your town so much richer to live in. I researched Fuquay--even little Fuquay-Varina!--and found some pretty amazing stuff. The internet makes it so easy, and the payoff is huge. I lived in Fuquay for most of my life, and I never took the time to read about it until now.
I've been reading a book this summer called How to Win Friends and Influence People, written by Dale Carnegie back in the 1930's. It's been in hearty print since it was published, and it's been for me one of the most eye-opening pieces of literature I have ever read, and it started with a considerable disadvantage with me. I am typically not a huge fan of self-help books.
I may never have read this book at all, but this year, I've been placed in several leadership positions with a frightening degree of responsibility that I've never experienced before. President of a Club, RA in Kitchen dorm... just as a seniorin College, I am automatically a leader and a role model to hundreds of people whether I like it or know it or not. As the thought of this became more and more real, it became embarrassingly obvious to me that my human relation skills are in dire need of a tune up. I needed help. So it was principally on Travis Hellstrom's advice that I began reading this book, and I have not stopped thanking him since. Now I can see why the praise surrounding this book is so overwhelming.
This book is very much common since, which, insistently, is not very common at all. I found the ideas very easy to grasp, very logical, and upon every chapter, I could not help reflecting on the many times, just off the top of my head, when this simple advice could have saved a situation or relationship. On rare occasions, I could even think of how I had accidentally followed the advice and how amazingly well it worked.
The book goes into great detail about the benefits of each point and possible applications. I haven't found anything in How to Win Friends and Influence People to be a waste of my time to consider. The chapters are short and very griping. I read each one twice before moving on.
Though I've learned a huge lot of lessons from reading this book, some of the best things it has taught me have been that everyone, like myself, has a desire to feel important and that sympathy without criticism, enthusiastic appreciation, true attempts at seeing things from the other person's point of view, and being, above all, sincere and authentic are the best and most effective ways to live at peace with other people and to receive mutually beneficial cooperation. I can't recommend this book enough.
I have also learned another vital lesson, one which I have been notorious in breaking, and that is: Don't get into arguments. The truth of that statement stings, because I have gone out of my way to wage arguments, not just with the people around me, but even with my own family, causing nothing but tension and hard feelings. It created a lot of tension, but it NEVER changed the other person's mind. That is truly something that can never be done by force. HaveI ever changed my mind because someone argued at me that I should? Of course not. Never. So why should I expect someone else to? As the Carnegie puts it: "You Can't Win and Argument."
I use this book's advice every day now. The suggestions aren't hard--they are, in fact, very simple--and even though it has been in print since 1936, every chapter is not only relevant, but intelligent and thrilling.
Relating to other human beings is one of the most important things we do in our lives. Why don't we study it like we study other things like math and science? Why is this so neglected? After getting such benefit out of that knowlege personally, I am seriously running out of answers to that question.
I am a giant fan of John Mayer's. I love the enveloping melodies he constructs and the bright lyrics that season them. But of all the John Mayer songs I listen to, Clarity had been to me the most head-scratching. I've listened to it hundreds of times, and attempted innumerably toachieve the enchanting "ooo OOO"s with, admittedly, comical results; but for the life of me, I could not understand what he was talking about. Surly It had to do with some girl, a pin-drop of heartache, or maybe it was a lay to his tortured, velvety-voiced soul? On that line of thinking I would circumambulate, coming around so many times I could see my own backside--but no conclusion.
You speak in riddles, John Mayer. RIDDLES!
But then I remembered something. Way, way back, long ago, when was still spring, I was sitting in Dr. Vaughan's British Lit class and we were discussing William Wordsworth's idea of poetry. Wordsworth wrote that he would had small epiphanies called "Spots in Time" during which he would be able to see thing in a new light and come up with amazing verse. He lamented, though, that they never lasted, and he could never predict when they would happen. Starting to sound familiar? If you're a John Mayer fan, you'll recognize this is exactly what the guitar maverick youth describes in his smash hit, Clarity!
"But This morning, there was a calm I can't explain. / The rock candy's melted; only diamonds now Remain."
"By the time I recognize this moment / this moment will be gone..."
"[...]And I will wait to find / if this will last forever, / and I will pay no mind / when it wont, and it won't because it can't. / It just can't. / It's not supposed to."
Listening to the song, thinking of Spots in Time, it now makes perfect sense to me. I don't know if John Mayer reads any Wordsworth, but it seems to be a concept very closely related to the kind of idea's present in Johnny's music, not to mention the name of the song itself. I don't think it has to do with a relationship specifically, even though it mentions one. I think that is more or less part of what he now clearly sees in his Spot in Time--his moment of Clarity.
This would be a fascinating idea for a research paper, right? But as I clearly wouldn't get a grade for it, I'll probably just be left as a fascinating idea. Haha.
I'm in awe of just how much there is to see in the world. I've never been to the Exploris museum before, but now that I've been, I wonder why it took me so long to go. I hadn't even heard of it, but it's definitely a place I would suggest visiting.
Sometimes it's truly amazing what the vision of one person can create. Just think of how many people that museum has touched. It makes me wonder how many people I can effect. Of those I have already, what has effect been? My hope is not to have my actions dictated by how they will effect other people, but to have my heart so bent on loving others that my actions will naturally fall into that category.
I mentioned today that I should start right now on a life's work. That way, when it is done forty years from now, I can look on it and see my whole life consolidated into a single vision before me. Hmm, I wonder what my life's work will be... A museum like Exploris? An exciting contribution to literature? An exact monochromatic equivalent of the Mona Lisa done completely in gram stained Bacillus Cereus--one cell at a time? I could do anything! Maybe I'll wait a few years.
After Exploris, we three took it up to Goodberrys, where I had an enormous chocolate-malt-and-marshmallow Carolina Concrete. The whole time I was eating it--well, at least all the time I wasn't thinking about how unbelievably delicious it was--I thought about how wonderful it felt to be right where I was with the people I was with at that particular moment. Travis and Danielle are among my favorite people, and similarly, there is no place on Earth like Goodberrys, the marvelous frozen custard shrine. There are so many things around to enjoy!
"The Travis was walking down a path and, noticing the gyre of a bird in flight, he stopped to watch on a fresh, green tuffet. Tired, the old man gently laid down his staff and cocked his head to stroke his aged beard. 'Snippage!' he said with a sagely nod, and then he died... My children, we can all learn something from the Travis."
I'm very tired right now. I've been reading Erasmus and the Age of Reformation for hours on end, and I know I'm not going to be able to finish it. Tomorrow must be dedicated to study, not simply to reading as how I have wasted today; though in all fairness, it is my own fault for waiting so long to start this book, and I must also admit that reading it may not have been a complete and total waste.
It is a biography of a man named Erasmus of Rotterdam, who though almost a god in his time, is now all but forgotten by the public. This man rarely felt financially security, but constantly an intense desire for freedom--not to mention a burning conviction for Christ's purpose toward the latter part of his life. In his later years he devoted himself to theological writings, expositions, and translations; and brought on the a great reformation in religious thought. He abhorred the soul-less rituals performed in church ceremonies and other practices that were unfelt and therefore lukewarm in Christ's mouth.
Erasmus praised the Latin language for it's beauty and greatness of expression and was deeply saddened by his time's barbaric use of it. This thought led him to write books such as the Adagia, which he would often revise and augment throughout this life, and which, through instruction on Latin proverbs, sought to teach the dark times this language he adored. He also later spent much time in learning Greek, which he would use with Latin to complete his life's-work: an edition to Jerome and The New Testament. How much he must have thought of himself to edit Jerome! but he supposedly edited with mastery.
Of all the things Erasmus ever wrote--all the great Latin and theological works--the only piece still read today for it's own sake is Praise of Folly, a satirical work that does not betray it's name. I must say, I myself am interested in reading it. It is funny to think this most immortal work was written in jest to his friend Sir Thomas Moore.
