Elisabeth Caterina

My mother is, surprisingly, not a woman I know an awful lot about. I realized this when I stumbled upon an open photo box filled with pictures of her and my dad long before i was ever a part of their life.

They looked so different. They smile differently, they have 'weird' hair and clothes, they are entirely different people.

And yet, something that is weird for me to realize, they were people long before i came along. Real people with real lives and loves and ambitions and dreams and faith and real things.

And all of a sudden I am part of their life.

This is my mother, a real person. Sometimes I forget that she is more than my mother and I disrespectfully leave her in my wake.

She smiles wide. She can take a joke. I haven't the foggiest clue what her favourite flowers are, because no matter what flowers you bring home, she always says they are her favourite.

She's that kind of person.

On thought.

I been doing a little creeping around the internet to assuage my curiousity, and discovered something strange. Well, not strange so much as new. I happened upon a blog that interested me, and decided to trace back to its very beginning. This young writer has been 'penning' thoughts since the beginning of 2003. That was six years ago, and a couple extra months for good measure. Six years ago I had no idea how to think, I thought the world revolved around me, and didn't try to understand who God is and what his relationship is to me. I felt and acted on it, and that's were it ends. This person has been writing poignant thoughts that mystify me because they are coming out of a mouth and a mind that is not only beyond my comprehension, but also a bunch of years younger than me. I have no idea what to do with that. Everything that this person thought when they were 15 I am just being introduced to and I am nearly in my 20th year. That weirds me out. I realize that I don't know how to read and I realize that I might not even know how to think.

how's that for a wakeup call?

Humeur enfantine

Qui a su que cela utilisant un traducteur en ligne apprendre la langue inadéquate dans une langue étrangère pourrait être tellement amusement ?



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All We Are Saying, Is...

I have a confession to make.

I hate green peas.

I hate them. My family all knows it, they have lived with me for a while. But still, whenever my family makes pasta stir fry or rice or potatoes or anything like that, I swear the thought goes through their head "Well, this is a perfectly good meal! How could I make Ben not like it? I know!" and then they proceed to extract a yellow tin of peas, break the cryogenic seal (because I swear these things taste like they went through the Ice Age) and then dump the greasy and slimy contents into a microwaveable dish -because they weren't mushy enough before!- and nuke the shit out of them until they are a huddled army advancing on my well-guarded pork chop from an outer fringe of my plate. I refuse to eat them, or even give them a chance at redeeming themselves. MY dad always says "Just line them up in your mouth, and then send them one by one down your throat." I imagine the Chinese go to him when they need new ideas for water torture.

My family just stares every time I systematically remove each pea from my meal, and I graciously decline to comment on their insensitivity for adding them in the first place. I have tried to like them, truly, and have attempted to imagine they are tiny angels playing in my mouth. But how can you eat an angel? so I project them back out, because these angels taste an awful lot like a certain sad-excuse for a vegetable.

Last night I can home from work at 8 and opened the oven a crack to see whether there was some sort food compiled on a plate intended for me to eat. And to my dismay a pile of peas, a mountain of peas engulfed a collection of garlic potatoes and a juicy pork chop. Guilt by association, and I closed the oven door.

The only thing worse than peas for dinner is cold leftover peas.

I will not give peas a chance.

Something to Show

After presentations made by two of my classmates of songs they had written and performed, and another wise man's 20th birthday, I've been struck with a crazy question: In my nineteen and a half years of life, what have I got to show for the time that I have been here? Certainly I have not made any forays into the dark and mysterious world of Independence (I still live at home with my mom...) and have not nearly left any sort of legacy or proof of my 'meaningful' existence behind were I to die on my four-second walk home from work this evening. This is merely an observation and not a plea for pity, but honestly, what have I got to show for the time that I have been placed on this earth by God? Is he proud with the mediocre work that I've done, with the person that I have become in this short period of time? With 19+1/2 years behind me, and a brand new one ahead of me, how do I make the 'utmost' (as the aforementioned mother always says) of this huge opportunity which is my existence without royally fucking it up? I am not songster or poet, and a barely-credible artist, so I don't dare compare myself to those who are legititmate examples of these, but how do I change, both by being effected and also in affecting. I would like the thank the new prevalence of philosophy and the analytic view of life that those who study and teach philosophy have afforded to my new outlook on life. This seems like the opportune moment to put pen to paper or brush to canvas or throw clay to a wheel, or something. Where is this going? Really, I couldn't tell you if you asked me.

Fill in the_____.

Have you ever felt that something is telling you that where you are looking is the wrong place for what you are trying to find, and that there is nothing where you are right now? How do you make the move? Would you wait until there was something? How do you reconcile the desire for the familiar, and the desire for that which provides a form of catharsis or completion? Where is your home?

Only at Christmastime

This Yuletide season, I'm looking forward to a number of things that I might be able to do. Among them are:reading a book that I want to read and don't have to read, painting, walking in the cold, watching a movie without feeling guilty, enjoying gifts regardless of what they are because someone went shopping just for me, eating food I normally wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole (olliebollen, gingerbread, eggnog) and then realizing why I hate it and never eating it again until next Christmas, chilling with my family and doing dumb-family things, cleaning my room, thinking about peace, criticizing the consumerist holiday practices of North America, participating in them, reflecting on the real reason for Christmas, anticipating the December 25th morning service at my church, and sleeping.
I really think that this Yule I will actually find rest, and enjoy it for the quiet vacation it could be.