john cusack

After work yesterday I bought some ice cream, watched High Fidelity, and ate that ice cream like a crazy man. During intermission I got a second bowl. It inspired me to post a couple "top fives."
Top five last tracks on album:
1. Empty Cans -- The Streets
2. A Wolf at the Door -- Radiohead
3. Reservations -- Wilco
4. The Good Times Are Killing Me -- Modest Mouse
5. Upon This Tidal Wave of Young Blood -- Clap Your Hands Say Yeah
Top five colors:
1. Blue
2. Green
3. Brown
4. Teal
5. Olive
Top five news sources:
1. New York Times
2. Seattle Post Intelligencer
3. www.realclearpolitics.com
4. gossip
5. www.canarynews.org
Top five movies made before 1980:
1. Marx Bros: Animal Crackers
2. Return to the Planet of the Apes
3. Marx Bros: Night at the Opera
4. Marx Bros: Night at Casablanca
5. The Borrowers


Now I'm going to watch Grosse Point Blank. This has been a splendid Saturday.

growing up a tiny bit

I remembered recently that growth comes through making mistakes and confronting challenges. And although it is painful to look back at myself during embarrassing, shameful moments, it is really beautiful to know that I am not trapped by those memories. They are in the past, and I am here, in the position to learn from my mistakes. Sometimes it's easy to be intimidated by "challenging" things, and give it a negative label. But they're probably good for us.
The most interesting information about people is not what happens to them, but how they respond to what happens to them. Often, we cannot control what happens to us, but we can control how we respond. I can feel sorry for myself, miserable, and ashamed or I can be grateful for what God has given me--which is so much.
It's been good to have a friend remind me of the dangers of guilt in my life. Guilt and conviction are two very different things and God calls us to the latter. Guilt is shrouded in the things of the past, which are fixed. No one is ever guilty for what he will do. But conviction reaches to the things of the future, which are open. In that way, conviction guides us to live well, but guilt distracts us from living well.
There are more challenges ahead, more "storms" on the horizon, and when I am confronted by them, I want to run straight into them. Because if I run away (as I have in the past) the storms will follow me, and the storm ends up lasting longer that way, since we're both going in the same direction.

This post

Swift beginnings lead to swift endings.

Listen and Speak

Since as far back as I can remember I've been taught the merits of good communication.  It helps solve problems, dismisses incorrect assumptions, relates communicators to each other, and the list could go on.  For my dad, who habitually simplifies everything, nearly everything that goes poorly is ultimately the result of i) selfishness or ii) bad communication.  Unsurprisingly, he is in the radio business.  Furthermore, philosophy trains its pupils to think and speak clearly, and in that discipline, I tend to dislike ambiguity, not only in philosophy, but in all of my life.  It's funny how what I study, as specific as that may be, informs the rest of my life, as unrelated as those may seem.  At this point, I'm not sure I could be more encouraged to be a "good communicator" and yet I find myself wondering if good communication might look much different than what I've always thought.  As a general rule, I've considered that which was unsaid yet to be communicated.  That is, conversation is the way to communicate.  Conversation is the exchange of messages sent by language.  I mean "language" very broadly, to include (in addition to the actual words): body language and intonation.

Two things: Is it possible to "over communicate"?  and do people communicate without conversing?

On the first, I think "yes" is appropriate, although I'm not exactly sure what consequences over communication leads to.  And for the second, I think I'm still discovering.  The simple answer is yes; a nod of the head communicates affirmation, squinting eyes communicate suspicion, none of these involve conversing.  But these are basic emotions / beliefs.  Language is designed to capture a complexity in communication that is otherwise absent.  This is really interesting because I am usually drawn to simplicity (other things being equal.) But not in communication, it seems...