(Basically my life)

Once I remembered my username, I remembered the password as well.

Life is crazy. That's pretty much the gist of it.

Popular sentiment these days would have one believe that the line Janis Joplin belts out in "Me and Bobby McGee" is the truth about freedom these days: Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose. Of course, the insinuation is here that maybe it's better to be "attached" to something, that somehow freedom isn't all that it's cracked up to be. However, even in this simplistic rendering of "freedom", it goes to figure that if one has nothing left to lose, they are in the position of being open to gain anything.

In honor of Independence Day, in the U.S., the 4th of July, it does well to actually speak a little about freedom and why it is so important. In this sense, it's not that when one is "free", he or she has the ability to do "whatever you want", but more to the point, that one is not made a lifelong slave to forces outside of one's control. The Founding Fathers of the U.S. understood this keenly, having been subjects of the British Crown, and having felt that their calls for self-determination were increasingly falling upon deaf ears, they decided that it was imperative to throw off these bonds subjugating them.

This was not a decision that was taken lightly, and, if one is to believe the words of the Declaration of Independence, it was one made when American colonists felt as though there was no other recourse; that King George was a tyrant that could not be reasoned with, who felt that he was above the law that he, as King, was supposed to represent.

And so, reading through the Bill of Rights, for example, the unifying theme here is freedom. In Amendment 1, spelled out are the rights to free speech, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom of association and assembly; in short, freedoms to do and say that which pleases him, which is not what a slave can do. With the 2nd Amendment, the point is less about guns or weapons, but about the right of someone to defend himself - after all, when one is a slave, one has no little to no right to assert himself, even if he is being gravely wronged. The 3rd Amendment, though many see it as kind of irrelevant these days also falls into this pattern, because it asserts that one's property cannot be used as though it is government property. It's no surprise that the 4th Amendment, then, deals more explicitly with the sovereignty of one's domain and property, for how much easier is it to enslave someone than by depriving one of his property? These are rights enumerated as general freedoms given to all.

Beginning with the 4th Amendment, we transition into rights granted persons suspected of law-breaking; the 4th amendment continues on to guarantee that searches and seizures can only be conducted with a warrant obtained on approved and specific suspicion, the 5th deals with the right not to self-incriminate, as well as a suspect being free of "double-jeopardy", that is, a person need only to face a court for an offense once, rather than possibly having the same offense haunt them even after being acquitted. The sixth, seventh, and eighth continue to deal with the rights of the accused, which, again is the sort of treatment one can only expect when all people are equal in the eyes of the law and when all people have their own little island of sovereignty when it comes to the respect of how individuals conduct their lives.

The 9th and 10th Amendments, when seen through the lens of freedom, deal with the relationship between the individual and the state; that the Constitution, in many senses, is a document restraining the government from claiming itself sovereign over the individual. This is why many see the Constitution as a document of "negative liberties".

Yet in all of this talk about freedom, why is it so important? Many people still find it easier to let the course of their lives be determined by others and find comfort in not taking the risks necessary to live as a free person. One answer can be found in the Declaration of Independence, which boldly states, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." In short, God created man to be free, and therefore it is man's right not to be enslaved by those who would, by infringing on his God-given rights, would cause him to be enslaved.

Now, to those who have very little understanding of the Bible and of Christianity in general, it seems ludicrous to assert that God created man to be free. After all, isn't Christianity all about all the rules one must adhere to, seriously cramping the way one would want to live? Isn't the Bible more or less the handbook of all the "rules". And who can be expected to follow rules that were made all those years ago? Hasn't our society "matured" past that? I touched a little bit upon this in a previous post (http://mituns.dreamwidth.org/8604.html), where basically I make the case that by following Christ, one finds lasting freedom.

Furthermore, I would also make the case that one of the overarching themes of the Bible, both Old Testament and New, is about freedom, both individual and societal, and the consequences of misusing this freedom is not just the downfall of individuals (say Adam or Samson) but also of nations (such as Old Testament Israel, but also Sodom and Gomorrah, for example). It may seem counter-intuitive that lasting freedom comes from submission to God, but in this same theme of freedom, we see in the New Testament that through Christ, we can attain the ultimate freedom; in this life, the freedom to be able to exercise self-determination, self-reliance, and self-accountability, and in the next the freedom that heaven is. Surely it is quite unique on the face of the earth that a nation should be established that espouses this God-given freedom as the basis of its founding!

Surely, too, this ultimate freedom is something so precious that not only is it worth fighting for, but also worth dying for, because we know that even death will have no hold on us and that there is little else that we can "give" our posterity that is so precious. Nothing left to lose, indeed!

One day, when I was a senior in college I ended up talking with an older, international student in the basement of the library. We talked about a range of things and I think that it was interesting to him to get the perspective of an American, but by the time I had to make it to my next class (or whatever it was I was going to) I was pretty creeped out, and I made sure I ducked into a building I really wasn't headed to so that this man wouldn't know where I was going.

The reason for my discomfort? In the course of the conversation, he, of course, was trying to ascertain my status. (I say "of course" because it's a very run-of-the-mill question in college.) The conversation went on, but he started to try to make the point that it was only with the experience of sex could one have any true "perspective" of the world. This wasn't some passing comment or throwaway line that he was parroting, but a sentiment that he seemed to be really stuck on.

Now, the sentiment itself is creepy enough, but probably the creepier part is that the insinuation seemed to be "Hey girl, why don't you leave the library with me and let me give you some "perspective" on the world." Of course, after relaying the story to some of my close friends, gaining "perspective" came to be a running joke among us.

As creepy as the whole encounter was, I can't necessarily say that this man was doing anything but repeating what secular morality would have people believe. In days past, Descartes reasoned, "I think, therefore I am," which, among other things, indicates the supremacy of reason in the human being. These days, that mantra seems to have been changed to "I have sex, therefore I am," which is a complete reversal of the supremacy of the intellect to the supremacy of emotion.

At least with Descartes', the premise is universal; even if we don't understand exactly what goes on in the minds of people who have had extensive brain injuries, for example, it's difficult to say that there is nothing going on there. However, with the latter premise, not only does it fail logically, as there is no "magic perspective" or "personhood" granted to one for having sex, it doesn't take into account that there are tons of people, such as children, who shouldn't be having sex.

The Biblical standard for sex is that it's something that is reserved for married couples. For as long as I can remember, popular culture has rebelled against this, characterizing it as prudish and unrealistic, while feeding us a constant diet of why it is "okay" for people to have sex whenever they want. After all, One doesn't even need to go into the moral implications, however, to understand that when sex is reserved for marriage, it brings both partners into an equality that merely "succumbing to the urge" cannot.

I sincerely believe that the promotion of all sorts of promiscuous sexual behavior is not just one way to try to mock Christian morality, but also is a means to make people slaves of their own passions. After all, a person who has been trained to "do what feels good" has hardly built up the sort of moral fortitude needed to forgo pleasure when times would call upon this individual to stick to logic to accomplish a "higher" mission.

First of all, a big shout-out and "Thank you!" to Bookworm at Bookwormroom.com for her lavish praise about my last post. I'm still blushing. I guess the inspiration for it came from having lived most my life, like Bookworm, in a place where people are overwhelmingly politically liberal. For all their talk about caring about others, when one tries to (non-politically) bring up a topic where someone has been done an injustice (because you'd think, "hey, those caring liberals"), the response is usually a pat, "Well, sucks to be them" or "I'm glad it's not me!", which pretty much ends the conversation.

But here's the real post: :)

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About an hour after lunch the other day, I went into the kitchen to fix myself some tea, and Asher followed me, wanting a treat.

Now, he had eaten really well at lunch, saving no room for a treat right after lunch, so I had no problem giving him a treat at this point.

Tabitha, seeing this, asked me, "Mommy, can I have some candy like Asher?"

I replied, "No. He didn't have his treat right after lunch, so he's having it now. You had Sweet Tarts."

She interrupted me, "No, not Sweet Tarts. Bottle caps. And I didn't have any bottle caps."

At this point, I really wanted to laugh, but it took some doing to calm her down and to explain again why she wasn't getting a piece of candy at this point in the day. Children, by nature, are self-centered. It's a part of self-preservation. As children get older, though, it's the responsibility of the parents to teach children a code of morality, at the very least. However, at her age, she still basically understands right and wrong as "this is a yes-yes" and "this is a no-no" in the sense of things that she is or is not allowed to do. When it comes to things like answering my question about whether she already had candy, she understands that how she answers will bring about one of two results - a "good" result and a "bad" result. By saying she has not had candy, she is hoping for the "good" result. At her age, I don't even think it's quite fair to call it lying.

During the first Presidential debate in 2012, Mitt Romney made a hard-hitting point that just because somebody repeats something over and over again, as children do, it doesn't make it true. Yet it seems like there are more and more adults that have never lost that self-centeredness, and have never learned the morality in the difference between a right and a wrong answer, and answers which they hope will produce a "good" outcome or a "bad" outcome. My opinion is that this is probably why we have so many shameless pathological liars these days - and the sad thing is that they're probably not even aware anymore of what the truth is. (Could this also be called "result-oriented approach"?)

If Asher were to see the "missing child" poster of Bryeon Hunter, I'm sure he'd be excited. After all, Bryeon is wearing Lightning McQueen pajamas, and for little boys of a certain age, Lightning McQueen is pretty exciting. When we go shopping, Asher manages to see his favorite characters all over the place, be it the videos themselves, clothes, party favors, or coloring books, and I always need to keep an eye on the cart to make sure that he doesn't lunge out to grab things like this.

When I see the same poster, I see a dear little child, very close in age to my own son, who already looks apprehensive about life.

And it's no wonder that this little child would, considering what his "mother" and her boyfriend put little Bryeon through. In the end (allegedly), they beat him to death, dumped his little body in the Des Plaines river, and then lied about it, claiming "three Hispanic men" made off with him.

The sheriff's office, along with volunteers, searched the river for Bryeon's body, but with storms and a swelling river, didn't find it.

Enter Robert Larson. Now, he doesn't come into the situation as a complete stranger to search and rescue, being as he trains dogs to be able to search out survivors of catastrophes and bodies (when it comes to that), but as a man, and as the father of a young boy himself, he made it his mission to find the body of Bryeon Hunter. Eventually he did, after pouring hundreds of hours of his own time into the effort. He believed, as decent people do, that even if there was nothing more that could be done to help Bryeon in life, his little body still deserved some form of respect - the same sort of respect his caregivers did not give him in life. As he said, too, there is nothing that this little boy could have done to deserve what happened to him. As much as I've dealt with plenty of frustration as a mother, I also know this to be fundamentally true.

Unfortunately, there are far too many children who live through situations like this, and the problem is only getting worse. One of the biggest factors in child abuse is the lack of an intact family, but particularly in cases where there is a mother and a "boyfriend", the chance of child abuse skyrockets. This is no exception.

Of course, this is an inconvenient fact for many, and even in the article linked to there, one of the women interviewed didn't want people to think that she was saying that people ought to "go back to the past" where there are mores about marriage or sexuality or cohabitation. Yet it seems to escape most people that these mores, whether they came about by religious influences or not, were there, in particular, to help protect who were the most helpless in such situations.

And of course, there seem to always be the people who would like to scream "racism" in every situation. One of the most tired arguments is that had the mother had more "support" things wouldn't have turned out this way. One can't be serious in saying that $50 more a month on her EBT card or "greater access to daycare" would have changed much about the kind of monster of a person she turned out to be.

Yet it was a total stranger, a white man, who spent hours and hours trying to give her son some shred of dignity that she could not afford him. As with people who screech about abortion, that "all pro-life people care about is the baby being born, not the mother or the child growing up", this is patently false. I'm sure that if Bryeon's "mother" had shown up on Mr. Larson's doorstep, out of the blue and asked him to take her son because she couldn't, he wouldn't have turned her away; in fact, the hours it might have taken to help find someplace better for this little boy would be much easier than spending so many hours hunting for a body. But it didn't need to be Mr. Larson either; I don't know anyone who would have turned away a child in such desperate need, and I do know of others who actually have been there to take in kids whose parents, for whatever reason, couldn't take care of them for a time. People do love and care about little children, regardless of race, and it's a shame that we live in a day in age where this is a point that needs to be made in the face of all the race-mongering that goes on in our society.

God bless Mr. Larson, who not only had the ability and the opportunity to do good, but also the will to actually do it. I commend him greatly for it. Mr. Larson's compassion for this little boy also reminds me of a woman - Mary Peck - who made it her mission to claim and bury the remains of 4-year-old Jerrell Willis, whose mother and stepfather beat him to death, and then dumped his body under a bridge in Philadelphia. Nobody knew who this little boy was, and so she waited seven years to be able to do this, burying him with a headstone, something that she would eschew herself. She never knew what his name really was, as she died before the case of this child's death was solved. Even as a widow battling cancer, you can't convince me that she wouldn't have helped that little boy in life, had she been given the chance. (Mrs. Peck also reminds me of Joseph of Arimathea, in her "quiet way" who is celebrated by the Orthodox today.)

At the very least, it is faith that gives us some comfort in knowing that these poor children are with God, where their unbearable pain is no more. In the meantime, let us resolve to also do what we can where we can.

One of the more oft-quoted statements of Jesus is "the poor will always be with you". It comes in context of a woman anointing the feet of Jesus with an expensive perfume, and Judas complaining that it would have been better for the perfume to be sold and the proceeds given to the poor.

From this statement, I don't think it's overreaching to extrapolate from this that there will always be need; that no matter what we do, there is always someone who can use a helping hand. As Christians, we should always be ready and willing to help others out. Many people have tried to point out the difference between helping others through personal charity and being forced to through government compulsion, and it is a very valid point, but it really only scratches the surface.

The larger problem is that, particularly because there always be the poor among us, there is always a need for something. There are also different ideas about how to satisfy these needs.

For example, I happened to hear about this place in northern Idaho on the radio once, called Kinderhaven. I guess that up there, the situation was that if somebody was arrested and they had kids that needed to be cared for, the kids either ended up staying with the parent in lockup or they ended up sitting at juvenile hall until other arrangements could be made. Somebody decided that neither of these options were terribly good, and set up a licensed home where children - from birth up to mid-teens - could be brought until they could be taken care of by others. It's a great idea, and certainly fills a need. It is also a charity, and as such, depends on donations to continue this important work. I daresay, though, that it runs more efficiently than a government entity, and does more for the kids, the donors, and the staff than if it were just another government agency.

However, not everyone thinks like this. There is a young woman who runs one of the biggest databases of missing people in the US. She does this completely on her own and does a fantastic job with it. She also has an accompanying blog. One day she was commenting that many families of missing people - especially the families of kids - end up in pretty rough shape after someone goes missing: Among other things, many parents lose jobs (and healthcare) because they spend so much time away searching for their child. In any case, the tenor of the comments started out with, "Oh, it would be so nice if there were someone there to help them," to "The government ought to do something to help these people." A couple of the people there seemed to be taken aback when I said that it sounded like a wonderful charity idea, and I think I also mentioned that they could get started with it themselves.

What was striking was that with the people in the latter example, the idea that the government might take some more money from them was okay, but that it would be too difficult to do something privately. Of course, some of this comes from the idea - which is totally against what the Christian faith teaches - that the individual does not matter, and cannot do anything of consequence on one's own. In this mindset, the only way to effect change is doing so by using the overarching "structure" of government. In this way too, one never has to be the lone voice, the one fool in the wilderness.

However, the problem is, as I stated before, that there always is a need, whether it's a place for kids to go when their parents are in trouble, or if it's support to families of missing people, or creating a place for kids to get out of the house and play on rainy days. The structure of government - any government - is not such that it does very much effectively, and the more needs it tries to satisfy, the more poorly it satisfies all the others. The effect then, is not of the empowerment that comes from giving freely to charity, and people's lives being changed for the better because they recognize that love, but rather that those who pay for the government become slaves to it as its scope becomes greater, and those who receive its "benefit" learn to not only consider it an entitlement, but learn to hate those who support them.

My husband and I thought that potty-training Tabitha was going to be a snap. We brought home the little potty, and the first time she sat on it, she seemed to have an innate grasp of what she was supposed to do.

That was over a year and a half ago, and Tabitha is still in diapers. For some reason, she has it in her mind that she absolutely does not want to use the potty. This is starting to become a problem, because, being tall, the sizes of clothes she wears are starting to not be accommodating to wearing diapers.

For the last several months, though, Tabitha has been fascinated with bicycles, and desperately wanted one. Every time we go to a store like Wal-Mart or Target, she wants to go over and see them. She's of an athletic enough disposition that I'm sure she'll have no problem riding one of her own.

And so, we came up with the idea to tell Tabitha that if she starts using the potty, she can have a bicycle. We assumed that this would be a motivation to her to get rid of the diapers.

So far, we've been quite wrong. It would be hilarious how she's changed her tune about wanting a bicycle if it weren't so sad that she'd give up on something so precious to her over something so trivial as potty-training. She still wants to visit the bicycles in the stores, but now she's convinced herself that she doesn't need one. She'll look in books with pictures of bicycles and tricycles, and point to the tricycle and say things like, "I have a tricycle, and I can have fun with that."

Now, I'm sure that this issue with potty-training will work itself out. It's not like she'll be 15 and still walking around in diapers. However, it strikes me as crazy that even at three, when something seems like it will be difficult, instead of rising to the challenge for the greater reward, she is trying her hardest to convince herself that she is satisfied with the status quo. It also serves to remind me how often we do this in our own lives, but unlike potty-training, there are many things that we walk away from entirely because we're so uncomfortable with the effort needed to attain bigger and better things.

Andrew Breitbart was, among other things, a compulsive tweeter. Just before his untimely death, nearly a year ago, he tweeted Apologize for WHAT?. This was in conversation with somebody, but as it was his penultimate tweet, and summed up so much of his philosophy, it became a rallying cry for many.

There are many well-known sayings about dealing with "differences of opinion". One of the most common is that "There are two sides to every story." Although usually not stated, the insinuation here is that no one is completely at fault for a disagreement; that both sides are obviously coming from some sort of rational position, but that there is a lack of communication between the sides that cause the conflict. The assumption here is that some sort of mediation can resolve the difference in opinion.

Another saying is "It takes two to tango." This saying insinuates that a disagreement or conflict has come about, and it has only continued to the point that it has because both parties are engaging in behavior to prolong the conflict. Hence, the assumption made is that if (and most often, only if) both parties change their behavior, the conflict can be resolved. This totally negates the very common occurrence where one party is constantly causing annoyance and harm to the other.

When there is an occasion of one party aggrieving the other, and that party finally deciding that they will take a step of an apology, although the apology may be sincere, it is often only for some small portion of said aggrievances, and there is very often the expectation that the other party apologize too. Not only does that fit into the idea of "it takes two to tango" but it leaves the aggressive party feeling some sort of moral equivalency - he is sorry for what he did, but he has also received an apology for the wrongs done unto him, which in his mind, proves that wrongs were done him.

So many of us fall into this trap over and over again. It's not that we shouldn't be generous to others, and, if we are Christian, it isn't that we shouldn't be quick to forgive. However, under the guise of generosity and forgiveness, and "keeping the peace" and "harmony" many of us, when expected to apologize for "our part" in a dispute, want the dispute to be over so badly that, like those tortured with days-long sleeplessness by the KGB, are willing to apologize for anything, including existence, promising to never again transgress in such a manner.

This is no way to live, always afraid of offending others. In the sphere of international relations, it is called a "negative peace". There is no way to walk through this life with any type of moral conviction, without someone having a problem with it. The choice we have is whether we stand strong in what we believe, or do we capitulate in order to "make nice". The specific situation Andrew Breitbart referenced is a little bit different, but "Apologize for WHAT?" is fitting in any case where one has honestly come up against someone whose purpose is to hurt or destroy the other. Sometimes it hurts terribly to keep up this stance, but ultimately, betraying one's self hurts a lot more.

Sofia the First is a brand-new show from Disney, which debuted Thanksgiving weekend, and has begun a weekly run. From an adult point of view, everything about it screams formulaic Disney - Sofia is a little girl who has lived a normal life until her mother marries the king, and now she has to deal with learning about being a princess while dealing with her step-siblings, talking animals, magic jewelry, big poufy dresses. Of course, Tabitha loves it.

On a recent episode, Sofia, along with her step-sister, are going to have a sleepover. Of course, the step-sister invites other princesses, but Sofia invites a couple of her commoner friends. Conflict ensues as Sofia's friends, instead of trying to be more like the princesses, run rambunctiously around, roll their hair up in pine cones... . Finally, after Sofia begs them to behave themselves for the ball, they walk out because they are "bored". Sofia has to run out after them, and apologizes. The moral of the story, of course, is "you can't change who you are" and that everybody should be accepting of everybody else.

I, on the other hand, saw it a different way. Even though nothing the girls did was terrible, being invited to a sleepover in a castle, one ought to have expected that they would have been on their best behavior, which they obviously were not. Sofia's pleas to them to act better fall on deaf ears, and when they partially comply, at the ball, regardless of the fact that Sofia is finally a little happier, they leave because they don't like being "bored". That hardly seems like the actions of true friends. To make matters worse, after Sofia begs them back, the princesses come back and want to do the crazy things too because they are also "bored".

Every one of us is created to be unique, and there is value to learning to love and respect people for the people they are. However, this philosophy has been twisted by many to make it seem that what people do cannot be helped because of the people that they are. Therefore, in this case, the girls cannot be expected to behave better because they are commoners, and the better behavior would be a betrayal of the girls' "self". (And who wants to be mistaken for stuck-up rich people?) As such, we cannot make any judgement on the girls' behavior, because their behavior is a function of who they are, and not to like the behavior is not to like them. And so, "Love the sinner, hate the sin" is not at all possible in this situation.

These are the messages that are being broadcast to the littlest sets of eyes and to the youngest minds, and this sort of messaging is effective. I'm not saying that this alone would have me forbid Tabitha from watching it again, but even at three, recognize what this message is, and know to rebut the show as we're watching. As a matter of course, I talk to her about lots of things, including what is expected behavior in places. I know she understands, too, because just the other day she started talking to me about the things she can do in church. This isn't to limit her "fun" or "who she is" but to teach her to walk in the ways of a more fulfilling life.

Numbers are funny things, and I suppose I've always been partial to leap years, particularly because they are divisible by four. Superstition has attached itself with both numbers and calendars, so even though I think it is ridiculous, 2012 is a "better year" than 2013, merely by the "likability" of the number.

This is not to say that 2013 comes in without its share of trouble and trepidation. Around the world, many people are already dreading what 2013 may have in store, be it tyranny or war or disaster or disease. 2013 will undoubtedly have much of this.

And yet, the calendar is still a construct, used to organize and record what goes on in man's days. The sun goes up and the sun goes down, unaware of what markings are used to keep track. Waking up thing morning in 2013 is not much different than a day ago in 2012, at least for most, and as people, we've aged a day between the old year and the new.

For many, though, the battle lines have already been drawn, and whether 2013 is a year in which the powder kegs explode remains to be seen.