New silly poll up. Living by committee. I'm slightly biased towards ice blue. I'm not a fan of pink, but the metallic rose color isn't bad, either. It's not as vile as pink usually is. Got some money for christmas/birthday, and I'm considering spending it on a Nintendo DS lite. I have a regular DS, but its battery is going, the wifi is iffy, and it's not bright enough to use during the day. (Which is primarily where I use a Nintendo DS: on a bus. Since I don't drive, I take a lot of buses.) So it would make sense to upgrade to a DS lite, which has a brighter screen. (And is smaller.) I've done the research, and the Japanese unit isn't an issue, since they aren't region locked. Also all I need is a US power adapter.

I posed my question to my nieces, and I'll see what they say, although I think Niece #1 will go for pink. Niece #2 may go either way. Nieces #3 and #4 aren't verbal yet.

And speaking of buses, here's a song ("Joe Metro") from the local hip-hop duo, Blue Scholars about riding a bus. I recognize a lot of the places in the video (Pioneer Square, U District, International District.) The apartment he's walking out of? That's across the alley and across the street from Chez Garpu. He's not really riding the 48 in the video, either. The 48 doesn't run in that neighborhood and doesn't use wires. He's also walking along "The Ave," which is near me and the University Bridge, which spans the shipping canal and leads into north Seattle.

Why are movies about music, specifically music in schools, so horrible?

Case in point: the movie "Music of the Heart." (Or "Mr. Holland's Opus.") First, someone that abusive should never be around children. (Assuming Meryl Streep's portrayal is anything like the real person.) There is never a good reason to yell at children. Let me say that again: when teaching there is no reason to yell at children. I've had music teachers that like to scream at classes, and those people should never, ever be around kids. (That's another post for another time.)

Secondly, they all portray western (read: pre-19th century) instrumental music as the pinnacle of culture. Computer music, tape music, and the like have been around since the 1940's. Never mind, of course, that there are other cultures out there, with their own musics. Or, never mind, that there are lots of things to do within the discipline of music that doesn't involve playing anything (music theory, musicology/music history, composition.)

Third, they all portray western (read: white, pre-19th century, male, instrumental music) as some sort of universal. I've taken enough anthropology and ethnomusicology classes to know that it ain't necessarily so. Our version of music wouldn't be recognized as such among some cultures (say among indigenous South Americans). Other cultures don't have a term for "music" that isn't separate from speech, for instance. And that's not even getting into the plurality of music that exists just within our society today.

I think one reason why I'm attracted to the computer music end of things is it's almost Zen-like insistence upon the physicality of sound. At some level, sounds are mathematical impulses, quantifiable and tangible. It doesn't seek to be anything other than itself. The new age bins and hymnals we love to hate are littered with music that tries to be something it's not. I think if music is expressing the transcendental (if it expresses anything at all), it's because it's grounded in itself. You can take it apart, analyze it, see what makes it tick, and it's still wonderful. Try doing that with "On Eagle's Wings." (Apologies to anyone who likes that song. It's a convenient target.)

I have the complete 4-volume set of the Liturgy of the Hours published by the Catholic Book Company (ICEL, approved for the US and Canada.) The books are almost new (albeit a bit dusty), and I haven't used them in over a year. (I really prefer the Benedictine form of the Divine Office.) Since I got the set of breviaries of the older rite (c. 1953), I really haven't used the ICEL ones.

So if anyone's interested in them, let me know. I paid $36 apiece for them, and amazon sells the set for $140. I have no idea about used books, but I'd entertain anything fair.

But first: The strangest and coolest thing I've seen this week (courtesy of a friend):



Yep. Korean instruments, turntable, beatbox, and breakdancers on Pachelbel's canon.

In other news...I've discovered that I really don't like the ICEL version of the Divine Office. I really do like the Benedictine one, but the hours I can do (Lauds and Vespers) make it really repetitious. So I'm considering adapting the problematic hours (Matins, the little hours) into some sort of four week cycle, while the others stay the same. We'll see. Might be a huge project and cost prohibitive, considering what they charge for printing on demand.

You know you're Catholic when...

...you type ewtn.com instead of espn.com, when trying to check football scores. And I don't even like EWTN.

Oh well. Cheesy win, Pats, but even a cheesy win is a win. Shame that the Giants beat the Packers, because I was hoping to see the Packers creamed by the Patriots. Yeah, I'm still bitter about Seattle's loss last weekend.

My Oblate Story, Part 2

Thanks for the comments on the first part of this...such things aren't easy to talk about, since part of the way people like my family keep power is to make people like me question their perceptions of the situation. You start to wonder if it's just you, and you're stretching things out of proportion, but that's part of their game. Promise the rest of the story isn't so bad.

When we first set eyes on The San Joaquin
Was like a friend we always knew
The gates swing open so far and wide even God could drive through
We worked the crops from dawn to dust shared along the way
I never will forget it until my dying days

We were Bakersfield bound and the California dream
Down the road lay the promised lands our fields had all turned green
We were Bakersfield bound like so many gone before
Just to cross our River Jordan and reach the other shore (Chris Hillman, "Bakersfield Bound")

So when I stepped off the plane at LAX to start at CalArts, it did feel like I'd reached the Promised Land. There couldn't have been a better fit for me than CalArts, and I realize a lot of it is looking back at it through rose-colored glasses. It's not that there weren't troubles--there were. A lot of months I'd be living off of $60 a month for groceries. I ate a lot of beans and rice. CalArts is a performing arts school, and as such it's a completely different environment from an academic one. It's rigorous, but in a completely different way, and nothing in my schooling had prepared me for it. While things are loose and laid back, it's also fiercely competitive.

But things came easily. Pieces I wrote seemed to flow. I had a group of people around me, who were just like me. (Most of them I'm still friends with, and we still keep in touch.) A lot of writers on Benedictine life describe how one's life should be an extension of the Eucharist, and that, like everything else came easily. My life seemed to be bathed in the same glow I'd see reflected off of the mountains at sunset. The relationship I had with teachers was deeper than a meeting of minds. I've written about Lucky a bit here. I was the most regular with respect to the Divine Office than I've ever been, not to mention other observances that go along with being Catholic.

It didn't really matter that I couldn't find a regular Oblate group who'd take me, since my days in California were numbered (I was planning from the get-go) to go off to grad school. Plus none of the groups met near me, and the monastery nearby insisted on group contact. (It's their program, they're free to establish whatever parameters they see fit. They're a good group of guys.) I had my community, and they encouraged my contemplative nature, even if they didn't belong to my particular faith.

It was at CalArts that I discovered Timothy Leary, Richard Alpert (ahem), Aldous Huxley, et al, who seemed to speak about being a contemplative within the lay world better than some traditional spiritual writers did. I learned about Balinese music, and the sky seemed to be the limit. (I didn't get into computer music until UW. There I was strictly instrumental.)

When it was time for me to move on to UW, I didn't want to go. But there was also the danger: many CalArts graduates found they were unable to go anywhere else, and chose to live close by, never really growing. It's a pull I still feel, and I still have a habit of trying to describe where I am in terms of how unlike CalArts it is.

Next time: Seattle.

My Oblate Story, Part 1

oA Benedictine Oblate is a lay person, who lives according to the Rule of St. Benedict in so far as their station in life will allow in some sort of formal association with a particular monastery. My first exposure to the Rule of St. Benedict was during a class at Augie about community as part of the honors sequence. It was a decent class, and the study of the Rule culminated in a two-day trip to New Melleray Abbey, in Iowa. I was struck by something there, but I wasn't sure what.

And the Lord, seeking his laborer in the multitude to whom He thus cries out, says again, "Who is the one who will have life, and desires to see good days" (Ps. 33[34]:13)? And if, hearing Him, you answer, "I am the one," God says to you, "If you will have true and everlasting life, keep your tongue from evil and your lips that they speak no guile. Turn away from evil and do good; seek after peace and pursue it" (Ps. 33[34]:14-15). And when you have done these things, My eyes shall be upon you and My ears open to your prayers; and before you call upon Me, I will say to you, 'Behold, here I am'" (Ps. 33[34]:16; Is. 65:24; 58:9).

What can be sweeter to us, dear ones, than this voice of the Lord inviting us? Behold, in His loving kindness the Lord shows us the way of life. (Rule of St. Benedict, Prologue.)

It wasn't until I'd made the acquaintance of the new Catholic chaplain at Augie, a Benedictine nun, that I learned of Oblates and that there was a group who met nearby. I attended their monthly meetings regularly, and it felt like a dream that there were people like me, who were living the kind of life I thought was closed off. Finally the summer before I was to go to California, I was to be enrolled as a novice, a year before one makes a final commitment as an Oblate.

I've never publicly told this part of the story before, and I owe the sisters an explanation. It's hard writing this, and a part of me thinks that I'm making it up. Perhaps it's time that I admit that this demon has no power over me, metaphorically speaking, or perhaps it still has some hold. I was to spend some time with the community I was to become an Oblate with during an intensive silent retreat. It sounded like heaven, with plenty of time for meditation and silence. When I told my family about it, they didn't take it well, to put it mildly. They were convinced I was joining a cult and absolutely forbade me to go.

There were hours of interrogation about my motives, and that summer I was virtually imprisoned. I had no way of getting there--I didn't have a car, and there wasn't any transportation between cities in that part of the state. There were other threats about psychiatrists, since they thought my personality had changed (maybe it had and they weren't listening.) When interrogation didn't break me, then there was open scorn and teasing about my becoming an Oblate. What I was called doesn't bear repeating, namely because it's also an insult to the many religious I know.

I'm sure if you ask my family, they'd have an entirely different version of this story. That's how their types keep power. I didn't have much time to myself for prayer that summer. I memorized many of the psalms, so that if my books I used to cobble together a version of the Divine Office were taken away from me that I could still pray some of it. I had a copy of the Rule of St. Benedict hidden--the small $3 version--on me at all times. I'd do lectio divina late at night, when my family was asleep, and I learned about walking meditation on my own. The summer previously I'd obtained a medal of St. Benedict, which that summer I wore under my clothes constantly. I knew I had to keep my head down, convince my family of my normalcy, so that I could make it to California, where I eventually moved. I haven't been back much, and that summer marked the first real break with my family. (I have limited to no contact with them now.)

(I promise, this story gets happier. Sorry to end on such a downer, but I need to get up in a few hours for work.)

Funding poultry empires

So I got some money from the family...at first I wasn't going to cash their checks, but I figured if I'm going to be the evil granddaughter, then I might as well have some fun with it.

I know Aloysha over on Cascadia Catholics posted about Kiva.org, too, but it's a nifty place. The most you can donate is $25. For that, you invest in someone's business in the form of microloans. Of course, you don't get interest on the $25 when/if you get it back. But when you get paid back, you can reinvest it.

I used to make rosaries. I haven't in awhile because I just didn't have the time, and because a lot of the rosary making groups on the web are either the not-so-nice kind of traditionalist, or they're just into making profits. I still pay my dues to Our Lady's Rosary Makers, but I just haven't had the heart to get back into it. (You can see some of the ones I've made here. I think it's public.)

I started making rosaries back when I had walking pneumonia one summer, and was feeling better, but not well enough to do much. Boredom set in, and I sent off for a beginner's kit. Then I started looking around for communities online, and I found the Rosary Army.

OK, the clue that they use the term "army" in their name should've clued me in. But they're really the Something Awful of the rosary-making world on their forums, without the comedy of Something Awful. If you don't like EWTN, don't dote on the Theology of the Body, and don't snark on other denominations and religions, you aren't a good Catholic.

So if you have someone (me), who joined their forums for the social aspect (I don't like cord rosaries, and I think wire ones that don't use premade chain are every bit as strong), who readily identifies as a feminist (I believe women have choices about their lives), is getting an advanced graduate degree (when most of the forum derides academe as liberal claptrap), thinks the notion of "culture wars" is fundamentalist bullcrap, and can't stand EWTN, there will be sparks. So, yeah, I'm done with them. Sad thing is, they seem to be the dominant type of catholics out there on the web.

And I'm working on a Benedictine Oblate post. Lot of stuff to sort through on it, and I'm trying to get it into something remotely interesting to read. (Unlike tonight's mental dump.)

At work, so not much time, but I had another thought about the Opus Dei book I've been reading. I think what bothers me the most is their concept of contemplation. Sure, one's life can be a kind of living prayer, but it isn't contemplation, per se. As one of the priests at my parish so aptly put it, contemplation is "resting in the embrace of the Divine." Seems like the average Opus Dei member is kept too busy to shut up and listen--they fill their lives with so much noise, whether it's in the form of a devotional or attracting other people. Sometimes the words need to stop, and one can be filled with noise in silence. Maybe that's the reason for their snark against other religious orders.

LOTRO, linux, and more Opus Dei

A jet-lagged linux geek is a dangerous thing. I've been running "Lord of the Rings Online" in linux for awhile (water effects aren't as good as in windows, and you have to patch via windows). I hadn't figured out how to get it in windowed mode until this morning. Funny what happens, when you uncheck "full screen" in the display options of the program...Screenshot was taken outside of the Lagging Pony in Bree.

Granted, when I read more of Allen's book on Opus Dei, I was stuck on a tarmac at Boston, my flight delayed by over an hour, when I had only an hour to get to my connecting flight (Which was in a different concourse, since I was flying a codeshared airline from ORD). I'm about two-thirds of the way through the book. Also in the interest of full disclosure, I'm really really jetlagged.

On the one hand, I get the notion of one's life being an extended prayer. I like the notion of sanctification of work, and I do believe people are called to be contemplatives in lay life. However (and this is a big however), I can't help but be creeped out and a bit pissed off with how Opus Dei perverts those notions.

Why the secrecy? They can claim it's just privacy all they want, but why do their members hide their affiliation? Sure, it's nobody's business, but if it's something beautiful in your life, don't you want to be a witness for it? Secondly (and sort of along the lines of the first), their recruiting techniques leave a lot to be desired. It seems like the one consistent thing in the book is that they prey on people with a literal understanding of their faith or those more likely to already be on the fringe or marginalized. That's a cult's recruiting tactics, especially when combined with isolation.

And you really don't want to get me going about the whole "well women are better at domestic things, because it's their traditional role" circularity, either. Granted, the plural of anecdote isn't data, but I don't have a domestic bone in my body, as visitors to Chez Fork can attest. Is it because I've been "masculinized" as they say, or is it because we all have different gifts? For instance, the Frood is much more domestic than I am. Conversely, you really don't want him doing the cooking (although he's getting much better.) There are other things I'm content to let him take care of, but there's nothing biologically based in the ability to cook, for instance. I know a couple fathers, who're stay-at-home dads, and they're awesome parents. Should their children be deprived, because it's not their traditional role?

The issue of mortification is the least troublesome to me, honestly. I understand the value of ascetics, and sometimes you just can't help suffering. Offering it for some other purpose is a laudable thing, I think. But deliberately seeking out suffering? I'm with Thomas Merton that one's asceticism should be for the purpose of enjoying the world and life we're given. Opus Dei reminds me of the line from "Dogma:" "You don't celebrate your faith, you mourn it."

Couple of good articles...Crystal found this one about Opus Dei. Wow, remind me not to drink their kool-aid. Of course after dyeing yarn with kool-aid, there's no way I'm drinking the stuff anyway. The Allen book is a bit better, the more I get into it, but it's still awfully apologetic.

Here's an article about a documentary on Delia Derbyshire, which I hope is at the SIFF this year. She was a composer/engineer who worked for the BBC Radiophonic workshop back in the 1960's, and (with Ron Grainer) wrote/created the Doctor Who theme. She also did a lot of the music for it, AFAIK. Sadly during her life, she didn't get much credit. If you can find the BBC documentary "Alchemists of Sound," there's a few clips of her. (It's on google video here.)

ETA: there's a downloadable link to "Alchemists of Sound" here. If you're the least bit curious about what I do, that's the basics. (Things are a bit different now, because I'm digitally manipulating sounds, not physically manipulating tape.)

New silly poll up. If they're giving me the functionality to do silly polls, I might as well take advantage of it. The last one was split evenly among the fandoms.

So a few months ago, in one of my wanderings to Half Price Books, I picked up John Allen's book on Opus Dei for a buck. Now in the interest of full disclosure, I'm not a fan of Escriva. The whole drill sergeant spirituality doesn't do it for me, and the notion of blind obedience makes my inner Benedictine cringe. Also in the interest of full disclosure, I've only read parts of the introduction and the first chapter.

I was hoping for more of an anthropological study, or something truly neutral, as the title suggested. Instead, it feels very much like an apologetic. Parts of what I've read are interesting, but other parts are disturbing. How do you argue with someone, when they insist that the traditional role of a woman is wife and mother, and then justify it by saying that the role is the traditional role for a woman? If you'd say that about any other marginalized group of people (say the "traditional" role for a person of color), you'd be flamed into next week, and for good reason. Choice is one thing, and if that's what a woman chooses, fine with me. But they don't even give their members that choice.

Perhaps I'm being too hard on it--I've read the first chapter, after all. But if they're really after the sanctification of the ordinary, why all the secrecy? I was in the process of becoming a Benedictine oblate--more on that later--and everything was transparent. You can find oodles of information on oblates, including the liturgy involved, on the web. If you ask a given Benedictine community who their oblates are, they're happy to oblige. Yet Opus Dei hides their members in secrecy, saying that non-Opus Dei people don't understand. They aren't helping themselves, here.

Secondly, I'd like to know why ex-Opus Dei members are all remarkably consistent on their stories. I've read a lot of accounts from former members, and they all agree on certain things. You don't find the same sort of internal consistency to people who're blowing things out of proportion or falsely remembered memories.

I'll probably finish the book one day, but maybe not now. Things are too divisive and fundamentalism too prominent in our society for me to be objective on the book.

Got the post-holiday blues? Feeling a bit of blogging malaise? Another blogger got you down? Check out the game, Burnout 3: Takedown. It's totally marketed towards males under the age of 25, but there's something for everyone in crashing cars and driving like a maniac. I'm no good at traditional racing games, but I'm not bad at this one. There's no redeeming value in the game, nor is there any intellectual content, but sometimes you need a bit of mindless drivel.