Nonsense, Drivel, and Balderdash

OK, so here is the deal. My favorite soft drink is Orange Fanta (followed by Dr. Pepper). So I was overjoyed when I heard that it was coming to the United States. Before I had even been here for 3 days I went out and bought one. What did I find out? This fanta is just another orange drink posing as a Fanta. Thats right. An impostor. Fanta in Spain (and all of Europe as far as I know) has 6% juice. This does not. The taste is noticebly different. I feel cheated.

The day has been unusually warm, or perhaps the rest of the summer has just been strangely cool in comparison. Of course, from the inside of my air conditioned retreat the weather always seems the same. Perhaps the sterility of the environment has been partly to blame for the feeling of numbness I have been having. I have not really been depressed, just tired. My soul has been uttering a constant sigh of resignation for the past 5 days. With nothing to make me feel like I have a mission to being here (last summer I had my RA job to look forward to), I have been haunted by the lack of ghosts. There have been no invisible voices telling me what to do or why I am to do it; just silent meaninglessness to my being here. Today helped me a bit. It is interesting how much people can help you. From what I have seen, there are many people around me feeling the same disjointed sensation I am also experiencing. Matt Austin put it this way " I feel like I want to be somewhere else, but I dont ...

I am back at school. I am less than excited to be here, but I don’t have any other option really. I have to finish school. Unfortunately (in some ways) my major is English, which limits the possibilities for its completion to a handful of countries. I mean, I suppose I COULD take English at the Universidad de Alcala, in Madrid, but that would be pretty stupid. So there are about 5-7 places in the world where English is the first language and I could get a decent education studying it. Arghh... if I was studying politics I could really study it anywhere... Either way... I am back, and I am trying to make the best of it. I am not living in underclassmen dorms anymore. I am now living in an apartment building full of seniors and the like. It is a very different atmosphere than the wild communal feeling of the freshmen living space. On the other hand, I have air conditioning and cable, which is nice. I also make my own meals in my kitchen which so far has been much better than the cafeteri...

I am back at school. I am less than excited to be here, but I don’t have any other option really. I have to finish school. Unfortunately (in some ways) my major is English, which limits the possibilities for its completion to a handful of countries. I mean, I suppose I COULD take English at the Universidad de Alcala, in Madrid, but that would be pretty stupid. So there are about 5-7 places in the world where English is the first language and I could get a decent education studying it. Arghh... if I was studying politics I could really study it anywhere... Either way... I am back, and I am trying to make the best of it. I am not living in underclassmen dorms anymore. I am now living in an apartment building full of seniors and the like. It is a very different atmosphere than the wild communal feeling of the freshmen living space. On the other hand, I have air conditioning and cable, which is nice. I also make my own meals in my kitchen which so far has been much better than the cafeteri...

Well my friends, I am four days away from being back at Gordon. Am I having a freak out crisis? You bet your pants I am. I am not really looking forward to going back to the good ol' GC. Dont get me wrong. I know that I am supposed to go back. My time is not yet up at Gordon. But every day I feel less obligated to go back. Maybe its because some of my best friends are not going to be there anymore. Or because the questions "who am I?" and "where am I going?" have been eclipsed by the mind blowing question "who is God?" I cannot say for sure why my education seems like a waste of time... but who knows. You must remember that it is four days until I leave and my emotional switch is turned on the highest setting. I have many reasons to want to return as well. I will have a snazzy apartment with cool people. I still have plenty of good friends awaiting my return. I love English and literature (though the quality of writing you find on this blog will not ev...

It is dark out. The moon is hiding somewhere tonight. I am sitting on some rocks looking down a long strip of beach in Cadiz. A single row of tall bright halogen lamps shines onto the sand. It is windy. The wind picks up the spray from the waves and blows it towards the land in forming a thin curtain of fog. The mist catches the light from the lamps, making the beach look somewhat ethereal as it reaches, glowing slightly, into the distant horizon. It is a weird highway, too sandy to be spooky, extending towards some spiritual world. I am at one end of the beach, which makes me wonder out loud, "am I at the beginning or the end of that highway?" As the question leaves my mouth, I realize how stupid a question it is. It seemed profound at first, but it proved to be absurd. Quite a lot of what I say is silly. So many of my desires are just as silly when viewed within the proper context. Our human point of view is so limited. We have no true concept of eternity. I spend so much ...

I just returned from Barcelona. It was a great time. I intended to stay for 3-4 days and ended up staying 12. Kenny was in the middle of leading a 24-7 prayer missions team there and I went thinking that I would just trail him around a bit and then leave when I got bored. Little did I know that I would enjoy my time there so much, neither did I expect David to be as entertained as he ended up being. In part I enjoyed trailing kenny around, but I suspect that if that was all I had done I would have indeed left after a mere couple of days. However, Kenny's team was in a sort of disarray based on exhaustion and a lack of enthusiasm and vision. So I ended up being put to work or putting myself to work with odds and ends that needed to be done (such as cooking, or helping with the cleaning, etc). This led me to want to stay even longer, because every time I did something I ended up working with someone I did not know very well. Of course, that meant that then I actually met them and lik...