uppah

So today I look out into my backyard and I see my father raking leaves. This sometimes fails to impress me because my dad is usually so industrious and, heck, he’s been doing that kind of thing my whole life. But sometimes I take a step back and think “Damn. That’s a 72 year-old man.” At that point, I think, “Why aren’t I out there helping him?” So I go upstairs and put on some socks, watch a few Youtube videos (because that’s the type of daughter I am) and go to the backyard with a broom and join my dad in the yard work.

There are a lot of barriers between my dad and me. Not to be all I’m-an-ethnic-minority-woe-is-me, but on top of the generational barrier we all have with our parents, I also have pretty significant cultural and language barriers. This makes it hard to sit down and have a conversation.

How do I honour him? I truly believe he is a great man, but words only go so far. I would love to follow the paths he wants for me, but sometimes, I’m just not sure that’s the right thing to do.

So I’m sweeping up leaves with my dad. He’s not close by and we’re not talking, but I suddenly realize that I love my dad so much and it’s a joy to be doing the same thing as him. I realize that my dad is amazing, raking the leaves with the exuberance of a teenager in his first job. Trying to keep up with him is futile, and that futility is kind of awesome. By sweeping up leaves, I’m communing with my dad in a way I haven’t in a while.

I wonder if that’s the deal with obedience. I’ve always kind of thought that we obey God because that’s what we’re supposed to do; i.e. leaves have to get raked or it’ll get gross. But maybe it’s more than that. Maybe obedience can be worship if we realize that as we do it, we are seeing things more from His point of view when we serve as He serves.

My dad finished and left without saying too much. It wasn’t rude, it’s just the way he is. I don’t know if he was happy that I was out there, but I suspect he was, whether he’ll admit it or not. It didn’t really matter. What mattered is that, even though my dad wasn’t trying to tell me anything, for a second, I understood him.

lost

I don’t like Lost.

I’m sorry, I know a lot of people were really into it, but after faithfully watching two to four seasons, I just felt like I was being played and they were just making up things as they went along with no purpose other than to make the show last as long as it was allowed to exist. It’s not that I mind long drawn-out stories. Give me a six hours and the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice, and I am satisfied. It’s not like I want to skip to the end of the story right away, but I have to know there’s a purpose. I have to know that if I’m sitting through something, that the ending will be richer as a result.

This November, my life could change. As a consequence of being unemployed and actively trying not to be while living in my parents’ house, setting up projects that are still in the nascent stages, this month is about waiting – waiting to hear from this company, waiting to see if I got that thing, waiting for this event and what it will start. And, again, I start to feel a bit annoyed when I start to suspect that I’m just being strung along for no purpose.

I’ve grown. I keep on telling people that as I reconnect with people from my time in Korea, and I don’t know if they believe me, but I think I have. One way I think I’ve grown is that, for about 63% of the time, I believe that there’s value to things being drawn out. There’s value in me writing another cover letter, there’s value in thinking about what I’ll do when that company calls me, and there’s value in being available to my friends and family. This isn’t just time being killed until the next thing; this thing, right now, is important to the plot. (Unlike seasons 4 to 893 of Lost.) (Actually, I haven’t seen the end of Lost so don’t tell me anything in case I change my mind about liking it.)

grandmother

I’m sitting in my living room in Stoney Creek with my 92-year old grandmother.

I read this book once (and I won’t tell you which, because it might ruin the ending for you. Then again, perhaps I should give the author credit so he can gain repute by being referenced in my blog. Okay, never mind. That gaining-repute thing was stupid.) where the main character often goes to her grandmother for advice. The main character thinks “Oh, what a crazy old woman.” but mostly respects her and heeds advice. We find out at the end of the book that this grandmother is actually herself in the future.

Now, it is improbable that my grandmother is me in the future. Even though many have told me that I look just like my grandmother when she was my age, she is now about 5-feet and speaks very little English, so unless I really work on my Korean, forget my English skills, and shrink, I don’t think that she’s me. But there is something so striking about this marvelous woman slowly climbing the stairs: 92-years old with so many children, grand-children, great-grand-children, born in North Korea, going to Seoul (living down the street from my old apartment) and moving to Canada.

I was excited to see my grandmother because I learned a fair bit of Korean and maybe I could now have these in-depth conversations with my grandmother about her past and how she feels about life. But, alas, my Korean is nowhere near good enough to have that conversation and my grandmother’s hearing has weakened, so we continue to have the same interaction that we’ve always had – she holds my hand and says, “I lubba you!” Before we eat, I listen to her pray as she earnestly mumbles words I can’t understand for a number of reasons, and wonder how God feels like to her now, after knowing Him so long.

I haven’t blogged in about five months, but a few conversations with some old friends reminded me of its presence. But what can I say? I’m in a scary time, right now – no job, living with my parents, wondering what’s next (deja vu, anyone?). And I wonder, just what would future-me say? Or what would my grandmother say now if language wasn’t an issue? Would she say that everything will be alright? Would she spout off some Bible verses about God’s plan? Would she tell me to be a lawyer?

I suspect, though, that she’ll just say the same thing. She’ll just hold my hand and say, “I lubba you!”

running in circles

I’ve started running. I’ve resisted saying this because people who talk about their work-outs all the time are annoying. Also, I don’t want to compared to actual “runners” who run marathons, etc., because my achievements will inevitably fall short.

But I’m telling you, my friends, that I’ve started running, because I’m hoping that you will be mildly proud of me.

I tried running before. It never occurs to me to run unless I have very little to do, and this was the case in the months following my graduation from Sheridan. I was working at a cafe, I was trying to be an actor, and wondering if this was the Rest Of My Life. But in between all that, there wasn’t a whole lot to do, so I ran around the block.

I hated it. It wasn’t fun, but sometimes it was the only productive thing I did in a day, so I put so much pressure on running. I would mentally berate myself as I ran, cursing myself for not going as far as I thought I should. I’ve heard of running being a metaphor for life, so if I failed at this, it would imply the much greater failure that I had already suspected of myself. People talked to me about running being relaxing, and I wouldn’t understand this at all. For me, it was exhausting, inside and out.

Now, it’s different. Now, I’m just impressed with the fact that I doing it at all. I don’t need it to prove that I’m doing something mildly useful with my time. It seems like the less I need it, the more I am actually capable of doing it.

This gives me hope – hope that I’ve grown and hope that I will continue to grow. I mean, really, who cares about the running? What I really need to know is if I’m getting better at being human.

I’ll be going home in September to much of the same circumstances, not knowing what will come of the Rest Of My Life. These circumstances tore me up last time, but I pray and hope and trust that things will be different because I am different.

why i gossip

It starts with a stressful social situation. I need advice, but more than that, I just need to know my feelings are valid and that other people feel the same way. Ideally, they would feel the same way about that person, so I would know that I’m not a b!@#$. So I present my case to a close friend, and I get the little bit of “It’s okay/You’re okay” I need.

But somehow I end up doing it again with another person. This time, the friend isn’t as close, and the account of the stressful social situation gets a little bigger so that they will tell me “It’s okay/You’re okay.” A few friends/acquaintances later, my initial discomfort has become an all-out issue. It’s the topic at hand. When I have nothing to talk about, I talk about that person.

The irony is that I started all of this to make sure I wasn’t a b*&^@, but now I’ve become one.

I’m not saying that it started off bad, but my initial reasons were subtly replaced by something else, something sinister. I started off wanting validation and ended up defaming someone for my own stature.

This is why everyone should watch television. Then we could just talk about that. (Can’t wait for Community this week!)

sailor moon

I used to watch Sailor Moon. It was funny and exciting but I began to notice that every battle was the same: She’d get beaten up a little bit and then she’d break out her magic tiara (or wand depending on the season) and she’d win. Knowing the template, I wondered why she didn’t just start with the wand or tiara. We all knew how it would end up.

I’m beginning to see a trend in my life – one that starts with me trying to conquer my lostness or brokenness by clever self-analysis and willpower and ends with me in tears begging God to take it. I’m just like Sailor Moon, getting beat up until the very end when I take out the only thing that ever works.

Lent is over but I’m still in the process of understanding everything. If I learn my lessons, think of all the monsters that could be defeated!

lent 2011: indeed!!!!

The following is an article I wrote for my church Jubilee’s newsletter, The Hub. Thanks again for coming with me on this journey. I’ll still blog, but probably not as regularly, so you’ll still hear from me. Happy Easter!!

When I was about 10, I had the grand theological epiphany that Easter was a big deal.

“If Easter is when Jesus resurrected and Christmas is when Jesus was born, why don’t we have two weeks off at Easter too?”

My 10 year-old brain could only measure the significance of holidays by the amount of time we got off. This implied that Christmas was the most important holiday, followed by spring break. Easter was only as important as Labour Day or Victoria Day. Also, the lead-up was different. Now that I’m an informed adult, I know that the commercialization of Christmas is evil and Santa Claus isn’t reason we celebrate, but when I was a kid, the decorations and gifts and parties felt like joyful preparation. The preparation for Easter was people not being allowed to eat chocolate. It’s easy to see why I felt like Easter was not given enough gravity.

Maybe it’s easier for a secular society to accept Christmas. We can ignore the Incarnation of God part and understand Christmas as a great man’s birthday. Add some Christmas trees and we have a theme party. Easter is different. Someone came back to life. Someone died in a horrible way and then rose from the dead – not in a creepy half-dead kind of way, like a zombie or a ghost, but truly, Someone came back to life so that death is a totally different thing now. It’s not easy to ignore God in that story.

I learned about a Catholic tradition a few years ago. On Easter, a Catholic will go up to another Catholic and say “He is risen!” Catholic #2 will say “He is risen indeed!” But when someone prompts me with a “He is risen!” I go “Um… yeah! I mean… He is risen! I mean, He is risen indeed!” The words are strange to say. The word “indeed” is not one I use very often. To convey meaning, we enlightened people of the 21^st century use “:)” or “:’(” (or, if you prefer, “^^” or “TT”). My sister told me once that “indeed” is like using three exclamation points. Overpunctuation!!!?! Why this enthusiasm?!??!! And doesn’t it seem weird to say “He is risen” when someone just said it to you? What’s the point of telling someone something they already know? Why isn’t the exchange more like “He is risen!” “Yeah, I know!”?

After Christ resurrected, some dudes were walking down the street and talking about this crazy stuff that happened. Some other guy starts walking with them and he asks what’s going on. How could he not know? the other dudes think. Has he been living under a rock? (Well, no, not exactly…) So they tell him the story, but this new dude seems to understand the story better than they do, even though they’re the ones telling it. He draws some lines for them, reminds them of things that were said, mentions some Scripture and just talks to them as they went along. They get to where they’re going and they ask that new dude to join them for dinner. He says no, they insist, so he goes in and he breaks the bread. Something about that makes them realize, “Whoa! It’s Jesus!” Then he disappears.

“Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?” they asked each other, as if they knew the whole time.

Easter. I’ve been caught up in the way I’ve always celebrated and the things I’ve always known. Let’s just say what we know and realize that it deserves some extra exclamation marks, because the things I know, I don’t really know. The things I see, I don’t really see them. But, praise God, because His resurrection means that I don’t have to see things the way I have and I can know more truly what I think I already know.

He is risen!

He is risen indeed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

lent 2011: saturday

I’m always at a loss at what to call this day. Good Saturday? Easter Saturday? There’s nothing we’re really told to reflect on – yesterday was the crucifixion and tomorrow, the resurrection.

A few years ago, my friend Julia blogged about this particular day, about the day after loss and before reward:

Jesus in the grave: hanging in the infinitesimally fine balance between certainties.

-The Waiting Room: the eve of Easter Sunday

When I’ve been sad in the past, people have told me to rejoice in my sufferings, and then I told them to go away. That condescending truth that our lowest moments give birth to our best moments is something that is hard to believe or hear in those times. Only God can teach us these things and He teaches us by experience and this weekend, we celebrate when He also taught by example – showing us the lowest of lows and the highest of highs.

This may be my last blog post for Lent. Tomorrow is Easter and I’m planning on posting a piece I wrote for my church magazine, the Hub. If you are from Jubilee, it will not be new, but I’m sure all of you have better things to do anyway. Thank you so much for humouring me and supporting me by reading with me over this Lent.

lent 2011: good

I went to theatre camp once. It sounds dorky and it is. Especially for me who went during the summer after my third year of university, while most of my co-campers were finishing grade 9. While my university friends were doing internships for big engineering companies, I was at theatre camp.

One day, we were told to write something, anything on a piece of paper. I was feeling particularly angsty that day and I wrote a tearful railing at the cross. I was writing about the audacity of Christ – the audacity of him to die for sins I hadn’t even committed yet, to show me the consequences of my inevitable actions by this graphic scene. Of course, because this is theatre camp, we were then called to volunteer our honesty by reading our pages. I choked the page through tears – for catharsis, for entertainment or something. I was in an emotional time and this was an emotional topic.

When you read the story, it doesn’t seem like anyone really understood what was going on but Jesus. Everyone was horrified, scared, and/or angry. I remember those Hanna-Barbara cartoons where these archeologists would go back to Jesus’ time. I wonder if I went back, whether I’d be able to see what was going on and not be horrified/scared/angry too. I know what is going to happen in three days. I know how a world movement eventually gets started. But still, it’s hard to think of what happened and be okay with it.

It was messy but we nevertheless call this Friday good. Good, because without this death, death can never be defeated.

lent 2011: little brother

It’s almost like vanity to love your siblings – to love the people who are the most like you in the world. My brother’s in town and I’m so hyped so show him this city I’ve been living in for the 1.5 years. We’re going to eat lots of food, share lots of little stories, and laugh at lots of little things.

This is Passion Week. It’s hard for me to keep life in perspective while I’m so intent on spending every second with my brother, but I know very well that can go wrong. I can start to get possessive and entitled and sensitive, and I don’t want that either.

Thank you for my brother. Help me to reflect on you this week while enjoying the time with my favourite person in the world.