State of the?

So the State of the Union address was Tuesday, and I'm slow posting a response. Given the fact that I haven't posted anything since November 2005, I reckon that will only seem reasonable. Look for more posts soon on less political topics. . . .

This semester, I'm teaching Advanced Rhetoric, Grammar, and Composition to a bunch of students who have so far tolerated beautifully my rants and raves and random observations about the rhetoric we encounter daily. This week there has been a lot more ranting and raving than usual, though. This week alone, we had the verbal and visual rhetoric of both the State of the Union address and, today on campus, regalia day (woot).

Tuesday afternoon in class, I asked my students to watch the speech and plan to consider the rhetorical implication of Bush's annual repetition that the "state of the union is strong" as well as all that standing and sitting business that happens sometimes on both sides of the aisle and sometimes on only one, sometimes happens by special guests surrounding the First Lady and sometimes happens by demonstrators invited to attend and then invited to leave. Then that evening I sat down to watch and hear some more interesting rhetoric.

Bush likes the rhetorical power of connecting the current war in Iraq to WWII, and such a connection is conveniently (for him) romantic. If only to shove out the other connection the American public might make (to the Vietnam War), Bush made the claim as often as possible. Such a claim also strengthens the "us vs. them" mentality that allows Bush to make transitional threats to Iran and Palestine, as though they are children who have done their daddy wrong (and who can forget that that daddy has a military he likes to wave around) rather than governments who have done the human race wrong. Similarly, and on an interesting grammatical note, he kept referring to "the terrorists" as though all such folks belong in a specific identifiable group.

Bush likes to harp on the idea that the reality of global terrorism justifies America's democratic imperialism. Though I gladly welcome the annihilation of terrorism across the globe, I do wonder why the administration thinks it has become America's job to convert others to democracy, and so insistently. But clearly, an administration with that kind of global authority also has enough local authority to keep up its lately named "Terrorist Surveillance Program." Bush claimed previous presidents did the same and had court support, and a not-so-careful listener would have presumed he also had court support too, but he skipped that "sorry for breaking the law" part.

But on to the fashion report. Louisiana governor Blanco looked so old and nanny-like, maybe because Bush spent so little time commenting on hurricane relief and she worried herself into old age right there in the chamber. And then Virginia governor Tim Kaine almost delievered the Democrats' response. . . . Oh wild eyebrow! Oh liftable left! What a caterpillar.

College Profs Get Free Books

Today the mail folks delivered a heavy white box from Galaxy Press to my desk. I get free books all the time, so this didn't exactly surprise me. Most books I order as review copies, which means I would like to consider adopting them for some course. Some publishing companies with whom I have previously corresponded send me books I haven't requested, though, like Rhetoric: A User's Guide (this sounds terrific, by the way), which I also received today. My personal thanks to Longman for reading my mind; perhaps I'll use this for the grammar class next spring.

I have never, however, corresponded with Galaxy, much less ordered anything from them, so the package surprised me. It also intrigued me: apparently the people at Galaxy package boxes like my Grandma Esther does, with lots of tape. So, after a half hour (plus break) cutting and slicing, the package opened to a letter that started "Dear Educator: We are writing to introduce you to the works of the New York Times bestselling author, L. Ron Hubbard." Enclosed were four books plus a DVD:

1. The massive tome Battlefield Earth, with a frightening picture of green-eyed John Travolta staring me down from the cover.
2. Writers of the Future, Volume XXI, which claims to be "The best new science fiction and fantasy of the year" (that's this year, 2005, in case you want to add this to your Christmas wish list) and includes "winning illustrations." I hate to think of Volumes I through XX.
   
3. A DVD called "Writers and Illustrators of the Future" that I hereby recommend for the next Springs of Grace Youth movie night.
   
4. The hardback To the Stars, whose cover is blindingly silver.
   
5. A coffeetable book entitled Master Storyteller: An Illustrated Tour of the Fiction of L. Ron Hubbard that retails for $49.95 ($75.95 in Canada, eh).

I think these trump the free books I got from the Mormons last week:

1. Why I Believe, a collection of Mormon testimonies from such celebrities as Orrin Hatch, Gladys Knight (no Pips), Won Yong Ko, and Steve Young. Okay, I didn't really know who Won Yong Ko was.
2. A coffeetable book entitled The Mission: Inside the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, a really lovely picture book indeed.

Now, aside from the fact that anyone can purchase the Scientology books online but the Mormon books do not seem available for typical capitalistic purchase, what's the difference between these gifts? Neither seem proselytizing in nature, though Galaxy Press does want me to consider teaching these books in creative writing or science fiction courses. Both include coffeetable books, though neither will occupy space on my coffeetable. Perhaps I should regift them this Christmas. Watch out, family.

When I Get Older, Many Years From Now

Since my husband has written on my ten-year high school reunion, I figure I should. So here goes.

The places: "casually mixed" at a tavern, skipped the school tour, attempted a rained-out Revel picnic, finally truly enjoyed the cocktail party at the same place where we had our wedding reception. There's something anticlimactic about having a date at a cocktail party because you and the hubby get all dressed up, go somewhere fancy, the entire time talking with other people, and go home exhausted, wishing the entire time that just the two of you had gone to dinner and sat at a small made-for-two table. But I haven't seen many of these people in ten years (hence the title of the event), so what are you going to do?

The people: more attorneys and more degrees from Ivy League schools and more "So, what are you doing now?" conversations than I care to count, many people married to other people I could have picked out of a crowd as perfect for them, and others married to peculiar people who are perfect for them but unpredictably so. Lots of children, ranging in age from 10 (oh my) to 4 months (and she, super mom, uses cloth diapers). Lots of future politicians, lots of future cool nerds and also just nerds.

The conclusion: musing about the nature of public high school and friendships in general. Of my high school friends and acquaintances, I have remained the best of friends with one, have maintained sporadic correspondence with another, and have occasionally seen another five or so around town or at weddings. Some of these people attended preschool with me and we learned in classrooms together for 15 years, but we never emailed each other in college and I now have better relationships with their mothers, whom I merely see in Target or amid an afternoon run.

Our high school thrust people together because they lived in the same town and had similar intellectual aptitudes, and many of us have a tremendous collective history because of educational backgrounds that go farther than the "Excellence in Education" (insert our founding principal's southern Spanish accent here) we received in those hallowed open-air pavillions. But when we left for the wide world of college (and most of us did), we had the tremendous liberty of choosing our own friends. At college, you develop some of my most lasting friendships from a fairly self-selected group of people, and you only gotten better at selecting companions in the years after. Maybe it's just because you get older and wiser and cooler (not "cool" like you defined it in high school but like real people mean, like "more well-rounded and self-aware").

Nevertheless, Go Mustangs! Even if you smirk when you say it, you must have some kind of group cry for a ten-year reunion. Just because we never said it for real doesn't mean it isn't true. After all, we were a "performing arts" school and the Mustangs were really metaphorical for the angst we all felt at being anti-stallions, each of us a "small hardy naturalized horse" after intellectual prowess, which meant squashing wild athletic losers. Do note, however, the great attempts by our soccer teams (girls' soccer began my freshman year) and tennis and, of course, fencing (it's a lifetime sport, people, even if I'm not spending my lifetime still doing it). If we had had a real mascot, it would have gotten more rally for the debate team and Model UN than for athletic contests.

Festival of Faith and Writing: Here I Come

Calvin College's biannual Festival of Faith and Writing is officially brewing for next April and I need to go. Not only will my favorite Irish Catholic novelist be there, but my favorite Greek Orthodox poet will be there, and my new favorite hornrimmed nonfiction writer (Lauren Winner, mentioned below) will also be there. Plus other people of faith and writerly affections.

Their Call for Papers invites attendees to write on festival writers or themes, like literary representations of the transcendent or the role of religion and writers in the public realm (from policy to art). I have a couple of ideas: something connecting Winner and sexual violence, or some literary consideration of alienation that suggests it is good when it reminds us that this world is not our home. But if you have suggestions, feel free to post them; I'm all eyes and brain.

The Narrative Genesis of Rita: A Credo

So Centenary shut down when Rita threatened, presumably (you'd think I'd have an "in" to the reasoning here since I work in the big man's office, but I don't) because they worried about losing power because of her great winds. Easier to shut things down before chaos has opportunity to ensue than manage chaos once it ensues. On the other hand, the sunny and clear weather that Monday and Tuesday brought the Shreveport-Bossier area sure did seem fine for class going, and my canceled Richard III last Friday night left me in a blank-verse bind.

Nevertheless, 2 days off = 2 days off. I celebrated by cooking and reading, among other things. . . .

Cooking: baked linguine, poppy seed chicken, chocolate pie, mom's sweet potatoes and apples, mom's stew. Hardly anything in the world makes me feel safe and warm (even if it's 90 degrees outside) like the smell of my mother's stew simmering all day long.

Reading: Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Colossians, and Lauren F. Winner's Real Sex: The Naked Truth About Chastity. The first book is in preparation for Centenary's book club meeting this Friday at Java Junction. The second book is what I'm teaching the college chicks at 7 am every Thursday. And the third book was a gift that has now officially made Lauren F. Winner my favorite Christian female writer; in fact, she might be the only one I think is actually good. Sure, you can find lots of female writers out there, and many write decently enough. You can also find lots of Christian writers out there, but few of them write decently at all.

Winner has a strong theological foundation for her discussion of the contemporary church and the communal nature of sex (yes, she really argues this, and it's rather compelling), our current phobia about discussing real issues and engaging in hard accountabilities with the Christian community. That foundation is the story of God, for which He made everything visibile and invisible. It's the narrative of redemptive history that heralds Jesus as alpha and omega, hero and lover, Word and redeemer.

I've been noticing that story of Jesus' supremacy lots lately in Scripture and in the world, and I've been telling and retelling that story often, with practical application not only to sex and sexuality but to typing and technology, magnolias and mathematics. After all, Katrina and Rita have made me love God's story, the one Paul sings in Colossians 1:15-20, more than ever before:

The Messiah is the pre-existent lord: He was before anything else, and He is lord regardless of everything else. The Father designed creation to demonstrate His lordship--the image of God suddenly had stuff to be lord over, and He ordained a time within redemptive history when that image of God would take on flesh and become the only perfect human being, living in stark contrast to the rest of us fakes. He lived like we were all supposed to live because the fullness of God dwelled gladly in Him, and He died for our sakes so that we could be reconciled in peace with the Creator, so that we could be alive to righteousness, so that we could actually be the real human beings we were made to be, so that we could share the inheritance of the saints in light, so that the Messiah is shown as having preeminence over all things.

As such, my identity is now in Him; my story is His story. The story of how I came to be doesn't begin with Temple, Texas, and my dad's old Monte Carlo, and how my parents could see the Scott and White Hospital from the end of our street, and how they drove to a small town and bought the chair that's now in my living room the week when I was born. Rather, the story of How I Came to Be is the one summarized above--that starts with the preexistent lord and ends with the preeminent lord, that writes me as just another glorious page in the exaltation of God.

Everything I do needs that filter. Jesus is the narrative genesis of everything from waking to sleeping, breakfast to dinner, food to leisure, academia to work, vocation to ministry, cosmos to romance, flora to fauna, sex to chastity. I need to think about reality through this story: the reason I do x or y is because Jesus is lord of everything.

Funny thing is, Katrina and Rita know that better than I do. Hopefully Rita's two days' vacations have shoved me into some better thinking and living than last week.