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Three Random June Thoughts

Tuesday 31 May 2005

One

June is finally here -- the month of our return. After four years in Poland, I’m moving back to America. After twenty-some years in Poland, Kinga is moving to America. Big transitions for both of us.

“You’re more European now,” she said last night, not commenting though on what I’m more European than. I suppose than I was. She mentioned the almost cliche change some Muslim men exhibit when, after marriage and returning home with their new wife, they suddenly revert to ultra Islam and become a new person -- much to the bride’s dismay. I suppose that’s what she meant -- more European than American, and her concern was about me becoming a fast-food bubba.

Two

In the process of packing, I found the old photos I’d taken before coming to Poland the first time, almost ten years ago now.

They were intended to be spare identification photos, though I doubt they’d suffice. Looking at them, I’m shocked at how much I’ve changed and how little I’ve realized that. I look in the mirror every day, after all, and so the changes -- receding hairline, more mature eyes, lack of the scars of adolescence -- slipped by me. I imagine that’s how it’ll be with Kinga as time passes. “What will she look like when she’s forty?” I ask myself, knowing the answer will still be “beautiful.” But it’s hard to imagine the marks time will make, and now I see it’s doubtful I’ll even notice until I look at our wedding album.

Three

Back to America. I haven’t been to the States in three years -- too-busy summers and a lack of money will do that to you. “Reverse culture shock” is something you hear about from time to time, and I’m wondering if it’s hovering there, a few weeks in the future. When I went back for the first time in 1998, after two years in Poland, the difference was profound. The quality of roads was something I’d totally forgotten about, so used to bumping along I’d become. The ability to understand almost everyone around me without trying felt almost like a dirty secret. “Do they realize I understand everything they’re saying?”

But most shocking was the choice -- fifty-seven varieties of everything. The entire row of paper products (paper towels, napkins, etc.) at Super Wal-Mart literally stopped me mid-stride. Channel after channel on the television, all in English. Restaurants for every conceivable palate and wallet.

And so I know the feeling of “My oh my” that awaits Kinga.

Health Care in Poland

Monday 30 May 2005

is a joke.

To begin with, there’s no private insurance to speak of because its’ too expensive. Insurance in general is expensive here. Almost no one here has his car insured against theft. Considering the fact that an inexpensive new car would cost me twenty months’ of my salary, that’s ridiculous.

There is free public health care for everyone, but that’s only in theory. In practice, a lack of physicians and a lack of motivation (i.e., low salary) on the part of practicing physicians mean long waits for appointments (a matter of months sometimes) and ineffective services.

When you visit a doctor in a public clinic in Poland, you probably won’t be asked many questions. The doctor will get his pittance no matter how well he serves you, so he’d just as soon send you on your way so he can get through the multitude of patients he has for the day. A cursory glance, a question or two, and then whip out the prescription pad.

Not only that, but supplies are non-existent. You have to go buy your own anti-toxin, for example, if you step on a nail. If you’re coming in for an extended stay in the hospital (i.e., to give birth), you have bring your own toilet paper. And so on.

So public health care is dismal. If you want to get better, you go to a private clinic — and pay.

Personal case in point: I had throat problems a couple of years ago. Several visits to laryngologist working at the public hospital produced few results. One visit to a private laryngologist all but solved the problem. The difference: she didn’t just jot down a prescription after a cursory glance at my throat. She performed a detailed examination, with lots of questions, then provided not just a prescription, but a regimen for throat care.

The problem is pay — or lack thereof. Doctors are flooding out of Poland, mainly to Scandinavia.

Covering

Wednesday 11 May 2005

I've been working on my cover letter for my teaching resume. I haven't written a cover letter in five years or so -- it's rusty, to say the least.

In a cover letter, you're selling yourself. Hire me! Here's why!

I've felt comfortable being a salesman. I once spent a summer trying to sell cutlery door-to-door. Vacuum cleaners would probably be an easier sale, but certainly knives are easier to sell than encyclopedias or religion.

Selling anything door-to-door is a hassle. It's an intrusion.

I was a waiter for a few months in 1996. A customer offered me a job selling mobile homes because I'd convinced him to buy a dessert. I twisted his arm and shoved his face into a pile of whipped cream -- that's how I did it. I'm not sure such a tactic would work with mobile homes.

Never did find out if I'd have had to sell the tires to go on the roof as well.

Still, being a waiter is easier than selling religion or vacuums door-to-door. The customer comes to you. The customer says, "Sell me something! Take my money!" Door-to-door means, "Excuse me. I'd like to take up your time now -- I know you're probably busy, but screw that -- and sell you something. Why, you've probably already got knives, a vacuum, and a faith, but mine's better."

Two girls once came to my door to sell me religion. It was in Boston, July 2002, when I'd gone back to spend the summer in the States. I'd been trying unsuccessfully to sell myself, but I couldn't do it -- I was still unemployed. It was hot and humid, and I just didn't feel like dealing with Mormons at that hour in that heat (the apartment didn't have air conditioning) and without a second cup of coffee. And really -- who could have more coffee when it's so hot? Sweat dripping off your nose into the French roast isn't appealing. So I told the girls I wasn't interested, even though I was. No, I didn't want to convert, but a game of dogma-chess is always fun. Well, they were Mormons -- dogma-tic-tac-toe.

So here I am, trying to sell myself without making it look like I'm trying to sell myself, even though every administrator who reads my cover letter is shopping for a teacher and knows that I'm trying to sell myself.

A Funny Letter in Polish

Monday 11 April 2005

W związku z otrzymaniem wezwania z dnia 31.03.2005 r. zwracam się z prośbą o wyjaśnienie następujących wątpliwości dotyczących wymaganego pełnomocnictwa:

  1. Kogo mogę / mam upoważnić?
  2. Do czego mam upoważnić daną osobę / instytucję?
  3. Przez kogo takie pełnomocnictwo ma być potwierdzone?

Jestem cudzoziemcem i zawarty w wezwaniu wymóg przesłania pełnomocnictwa jest dla mnie niejasny. Również nikt z najbliższego otoczenia nie potrafił wyjaśnić mi specyfiki owego pełnomocnictwa.

Niezrozumiały jest dla mnie również fakt, że ponownie muszę potwierdzać miejsce mojego zameldowania w Polsce oraz po raz kolejny wypełniać formularze dotyczące moich danych osobowych. Wszystkie wyżej wymienione dane posiada już Urząd Skarbowy w Nowym Targu oraz Małopolski Urząd Wojewódzki w Krakowie, Wydział Spraw Obywatelskich i Migracji, który wydał mi kartę pobytu na terytorium RP.

Living Church of God Tragedy

Sunday 13 March 2005

I'm in a bit of shock. I just found out about the shooting in Wisconsin, and I'm in even more shock about the church in which it happened.

The Living Church of God.

A splinter group of the Worldwide Church of God. The sect I grew up in.

I know many people in this group, though none in the area this deplorable tragedy took place.

A comment at a website about this:

Considering the fact that cults tend to become a magnet for the unstable and knowing the large number of unstable people that I’ve seen come through and still attending church, I’m surprised it hasn’t happened much sooner.

True. David Koresh, Jim Jones -- many others. Fringe groups lead to fringe behavior.

To put it lightly.

Robbed! Robbed, I say!

Thursday 03 March 2005

I once worked at an internet start-up. A “dot-bomb” as the cliche goes, for it eventually fell flat on its face.

I worked in IT the last six or so months I was there, and so I got email from folks I'd never heard from while working as an editor -- including the marketing director.

Almost four years ago, I wrote the following in my journal (names changed):

Nothing particularly interesting happened at work this week. In other words, no one got fired. We were induced with ice cream Friday afternoon to be a focus group for “[TheCompany]’s vision” and mission statement and all that jazz. It was David Gordon’s doing – he’s the new director of marketing (or marketing director – I forget which term he prefers and made me correct all references on the web site to). Even if I didn’t know what he does for a living, if I read a couple of his emails I think I’d fairly quickly guess that he’s in marketing. Everything he writes smacks of it – every other word seems to be from some book that might be called Power Words for Marketing Professionals or Words to Make People Remember You, both of which in fact would be filled with cliche© and ridiculous writing. Concerning the “About Us” page on our web site, he forwarded me an email exchange he had with Susan in which she said something about the existing text not achieving the desired effect, to which he responded, “I’ll wordsmith something better.” As I told Eric, it takes a hell of a writer to use "wordsmith" as a noun (which of course it is) and not sound ridiculous. To use it as a verb is absolutely ridiculous. “I’ll wordsmith something”?!?! I can just hear some guy with a comb-over in a marketing class saying, “Don’t ‘write’ anything – wordsmith.” Perhaps he also added, “Don’t ever ‘crap’ – poopsmith.” He also had me put the following punctuation in the email that professors get after getting a free trial:

The double colons are something, as he put it, he picked up recently. You don’t “pick up” punctuation. You pick up gimmicks; you pick up a gallon of milk on your way home for work; you try to pick up women – but you don’t “pick up” new forms of punctuation. He would probably argue that it makes you stand out. “Wordsmith” also makes you stand out, but certainly not in a positive way. And I don’t think profs are going to be sucked in with “clever” (ab)uses of punctuation. Maybe we could end all our sentences with a dash- That would make us stand out- aND THEN WE COULD REVERSE CASE IN EVERYTHING WE WRITE- lASTLY. WE COULD PUT PERIODS WHERE WE NORMALLY PUT COMAS. AND INTENTINALLY MISS-PELL WERDSS TU HELP PEOPLE REMEMBER US-

Username :: WE3F3KJD
Password :: YIRJ3L2N

To be fair, the double-colon thing is fairly common now. I have even used it -- gulp. Guess he was vindicated.

But there's no vindication for me. The Brothers Chaps stole my idea of poopsmith and are making millions with it. Well, at least a living.

Homestar Runnner, I hate you...

It’s the End of the World as We Know It

Wednesday 02 March 2005

In Trinity Broadcast Network's take on the end of the world, we see at the climax of the film the great battle known as Armageddon. Satan is there in full gargoyle attire, directing the Forces of Evil to destroy all that stands in their way. The bright light of Jesus comes and in a montage we see, among other things, Jews praying at the Wailing Wall.

The Real Video version of the video is available here. If you like B-movies, this one is for you. It's worth it at least to watch the final minutes, so cue it to 1:29 and make sure you don't have to urinate...

Huh? A great battle within a few miles and they're praying instead of running for cover?!

This "oversight" is symptomatic of the general Fundamentalist view of the Book of Revelation and the end of the world. The whole scenario is laughable: the Satan unites the duped world into an alliance with him. Those who resist meet on the plains of Megiddo and fight the greatest battle the world has ever seen, cut short by Jesus' second coming and the banishing of Satan to a bottomless pit.

It's Lord of the Rings. But to some people, it's a sure thing. In fact, you can see the rumblings of it already, with the United Nations or the European Union, depending on which breed of Fundamentalist you're talking to. Soon, a powerful leader will rise and start working miracles and uniting the world with his...

Wait. Let's think about it for a moment. It's the twenty-first century. What's going to happen if someone starts working "miracles?" Anyone hear of James Randi? What's going to happen if some world leader starts calling on people to worship him?

As for the apocalyptic battle that rages in the Middle East, the notion that all the armies are going to gather on the plains -- when was the last time you saw modern warfare conducted like that?

But that basic logic clashes with what the Bible "clearly" says, and so the True Believers stumble on saying that the end is just around the corner. Yet even Jesus seemed to get his timing wrong. Speaking of the end of the world in Matthew’s gospel, he says,

Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city: That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar. Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation. (23.34-36)

Later, he utters the same thing: “This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled” (24.34). So for almost two thousand years folks have been saying, “This generation won’t die without seeing the end of the world!”

But that’s neither here nor there. No man knows the hour and all that, but we do know the signs: rebuilding the temple; resurrected Roman Empire; 666; miracle-working world leader who calls himself a god. Or do we? There’s so much hopeless confusion and contradiction in the various end of the world scenarios that it’s difficult to keep a straight face hearing such nonsense.

No one seems to wonder, “Well, if all the pieces of the puzzle can be put together in such different ways, maybe the puzzle itself is broken. Or our understanding of it.”

I’d say it’s a little of both.

Answer 120

Friday 11 February 2005

Question 120: Would you accept $10,000 to shave your head and continue your normal activities sans hat or wig without explaining the reason for your haircut?

Admittedly, I sort of cheated with this question, because for years I’ve been all but shaving my head. The reason I give is pragmatic: it’s less work.

For a while, I was in fact shaving my head daily with a razor, which took about fifteen minutes a day, so the “pragmatic” excuse doesn’t hold. I suspect my male pattern baldness plays some subconscious role. The less hair I have, the less visible my growing circle of skin at the crown of my head.

I did have a friend once who, when I suggested he cut his hair similar to mine, reacted with such revulsion that one would think I’d suggested something more drastic and permanent – say, tongue splitting or something. In my youthful naivety, I kept contending that it was a vanity issue, but I see now that it is much more than that.

Our hairstyles speak before we open our mouths.

Along with clothes, they often construct entire personas before the individual even begins speaking. Rather, _we_ do the persona-constructing on the basis of the hair and clothes.

  • Greasy hair brings to mind poverty and a lack of hygiene. Their personality must be somehow defective.
  • A mullet leads to expectations of a Southern accent and a lack of cognitive abilities.
  • A poof – no, a bush – of hair precariously balanced above a girl’s forehead and wings of hair sprouting out above her ears screams, “This girl does not get out often.”
  • Perfectly styled, stylish hair is the mark of someone who spends a lot of time in front of the mirror in the morning.

Fight it though I may, such are the stereotypes and cliches I unconsciously create, and I suspect it’s not just me.

But it’s not just bad assumptions we make based on hair. That’s why the fashion industry exists – to help people make the assumption about us that we want them to make.

Hair and fashion are non-verbal communication. The question is, do we want it to be intentional or unintentional? After all, that’s the primary difference between being a slob and not.

It’s the communication aspect that gives the dimension of “Let me think about it” to the question. If it didn’t include “without explaining the reason for your haircut,” it’s a simple question: most everyone would agree.

“What? The do? Oh, some idiot agreed to pay me ten grand just to shave my head.”

For those interested in continuing and posting in a week on another question: Question 4:
If you could spend one year in perfect happiness but afterwards would remember nothing of the experience, would you do so? If not, why not? (Further question: Which is more important: actual experiences, or the memories that remain when the experiences are over?) Thoughts posted 18 Feb.

Then we can counter the visual communication of our shinny head with the verbal explanation. The “without explaining” means that our bald heads alone are the explanation.

For the sake of fairness, then, I’ll change the question to make it more applicable to me: “Would I shave the fashionable, boy-band-type verticle stripes into my eyebrows for $10,000 without any sort of explanation?”

The answer: most definitely not.

As a teacher, I unfortunately have to worry to some degree about my image. A slob does not garner respect, and so I wear a tie every day. Similarly, a balding man in his early thirties trying to look fifteen years younger would bring about, I suspect, unwanted effects, to say the least.

On the other hand, I’ll be leaving this school in a matter of months, so in the long run, it’s a moot point.

The Will to Believe

Tuesday 08 February 2005

The will to believe. Choosing to believe. Avoiding error. Seeking truth.

It all seems so simple from the outside.

I once chose to believe. At a point in my life, I went through the motions, hoping unconsciously that I could cultivate a belief (like a gay friend I had who was vaguely attracted to a girl, a feeling he hoped to “cultivate” into bisexuality) and knowing that I was fooling myself (much like my gay friend eventually admitted to himself).

And I did try. I wrote in my journal about belief and faith and the wonder of God’s love. I talked to friends at university about the marvel of forgiveness and what God did for us through Jesus. I prayed.

In early 1995, I began acknowledging in my personal journal the doubts I was having.

What is this thing, Christianity? It is the worship of a Jewish carpenter who lived two millennia ago. It is a religion based on a book, allegedly written by God's inspiration. Was Christ more than a radical social reformer? Were his miracles more than a fictional construction of the gospel writers?

No matter how much I want to believe, to feel the fervor that others experience, I cannot.

Could Christ be the creation of a codependent society? The ultimate father-figure who provides the love a fleshly father should give?

The lingering adolescence in my writing style aside, I was filled with clichés. Perhaps that was the problem.

Another few weeks passed and a faculty member of the college I was attending died from cancer. During the memorial chapel, I scribbled the following in my journal:

Death -- and my thoughts are again turned to religion. God is such an abstraction that I read about him and never feel him; not even death brings any real, any substantial emotion of which God is the source. The only feeling I get is doubt. Is that from God?

Doubt from God? It doesn’t seem possible, but from a liberal theology, it makes some sense. After all, if we can have Harvey Cox in The Secular City saying that God wants us to outgrow him and the whole “Death of God” theology of the sixties, why not divine doubt? Descartes, turned on his head.

Still later, again from my journal:

I find myself thinking of the whole God issue still. I am frustrated by the whole thing. I sit now in the library and just a moment ago I looked up at Rev. [Smith] and peered at his forehead, wondering what was in his mind, what books, what learning, what lectures. But mainly what beliefs. He firmly believes in God. He would stake his life on it, I would imagine. Yet that means nothing to me. No matter how important God is to him, God is still a mere abstraction to me. He’s a blurred, hazy idea, and little more than that. I can read Barth and Schleiermacher until I'm sick of them and yet it makes God no less concrete. I don’t believe in God. Not in a personal, substantial way. I read theology, talk about Christian ethics and doctrine, yet I don't really believe in the basis of it all. It’s not that I am an atheist. It’s not that I choose not to believe in God – I just can’t believe in God.

Many Christians would read that and respond, “You read only theology? What about reading the Bible?” Indeed – what about reading the Bible? The more I read, the less I found that I liked. &(insetL)I learned in graduate school that “Schleiermacher” means “veil maker” in German. Appropriate, most seem to think.%

Doing produces believing? Yes, and no. From my personal experience, I see that for me it was impossible. But I was “playing” (for lack of a better term) in the Protestant tradition, and there’s not much “doing” there. The “smells and bells” for the Catholic tradition bring all the senses into ritual. Indeed – who can really talk of Protestant “ritual” or “liturgy?” Perhaps that’s why charismatic churches are so attractive to some – full body contact.

Yet the ritual can be without meaning – empty repetitions. Jesus, according to the Gospels, found that in first century Judea.

It does seem to reduce down to the will. People choose to believe often by choosing not to challenge those beliefs. I’ve always found it odd that it seems more non-believers read theistic apologetic than believers read The Case for Atheism. It’s tempting to be smug about that, to say that, “Well, that just shows we non-believers are more open, more willing to challenge our worldviews.”

I’m not sure how I’d explain it, though.

Pascal, Kreeft, and the Will

Monday 07 February 2005

Most everyone knows Pascal’s Wager, drawn from a single paragraph in Pensces: belief in God is, in short, the safest bet. ("Read more on the Wager.) It’s interesting that people still apply it in earnest.

Most recently, I’ve heard Catholic philosopher Peter Kreeft use it in his 1995 Texas A&M Veritas Forum lecture.

One of the objections is the supposed inability to chose one’s beliefs. Pascal foresaw such an argument:

You would like to attain faith, and do not know the way; you would like to cure yourself of unbelief, and ask the remedy for it. Learn of those who have been bound like you, and who now stake all their possessions. These are people who know the way which you would follow, and who are cured of an ill of which you would be cured. Follow the way by which they began; by acting as if they believed, taking the holy water, having masses said, etc... But to show you that this leads you there, it is this which will lessen the passions, which are your stumbling-blocks.

Action precedes faith. Praying, meditating, going to Mass, all lead to faith. Crazy as that might sound, Pascal might indeed have a point. Polish writer Czesław Miłosz made the same point in The Captive Mind:

The Catholic Church wisely recognized that faith is more a matter of collective suggestion than of individual conviction. Collective religious ceremonies induce a state of belief. Folding one’s hands in prayer, kneeling, singing hymns precede faith, for faith is a psycho-physical and not simply a psychological phenomenon.

Every Mass Catholics cite the Apostles’ Creed in one voice:

I believe in God the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and earth:

I believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord; Who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried; He descended into hell; on the third day He arose from the dead; He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty; from thence He shall come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit; the holy catholic church; the communion of saints; the forgiveness of sins; the resurrection of the body; and life everlasting. Amen.

“I believe; I hear my neighbor beside me state that he believes; I am aware that my neighbor in front of me believes – we all believe. We all support each other in these beliefs.” That’s what I hear behind the words.

In that believing environment, which must be at least similar to Pascal’s environment, willing yourself to believe seems not only possible, but almost inescapable. Even as a “staunch” non-believer, I feel sometimes that tug toward belief, that desire not simply to fit in for the sake of fitting in, but to have what the parishioners around me seem to have.

There are two kinds of views on religion, wrote William James in The Varieties of Religious Experience:

  1. Seek truth
  2. Avoid error

For those who seek truth, the choice is obvious – bet on God. I’ve always been more the type to avoid error.