Erika’s post about “modern American attitudes towards crying” reminded me of a quote that stuck in my mind years ago when I read Letters to an American Lady by C. S. Lewis.

I am very sorry indeed to hear that anxieties again assail you. (By the way, don’t “weep inwardly” and get a sore throat. If you must weep, weep: a good honest howl. I suspect we — and especially my sex — don’t cry enough now-a-days. Aenas and Hector and Beowulf, Roland and Lancelot blubbered like schoolgirls, so why shouldn’t we?)

Grrr. I really enjoyed that book and I love Lewis, but I get frustrated with the Eurocentricity of his thinking. Anyway….

There are countless examples of people in the Bible, men and women, showing their grief. They cried an awful lot (for a quick start, see cry, weep, wept). And they didn’t stop with crying. Their expressions of grief would be considered worthy of Bedlam by modern, “civilized” folk. What would you think of someone ripping his clothes and covering his head in ashes, howling at the top of his lungs? I know I would probably think, “Nutcase!” But I shouldn’t. David writes a great deal about grief in the Psalms and the Son of David was not afraid to show his tears either.

I used to think tears were like money: the more there were, the less they were worth. That quote up there, among other things, including a certain friend who encouraged me to cry a lot, made me the blubberer I am now. Strange how being strong and standing on your own makes you weak and acknowledging your own weakness (and showing it in tears) and utterly depending on God makes you strong.

One more thing about Miwaza I forgot to mention: she is an amateur tattoo artist. I really like the tats she’s done for me.

Update: Here’s her work on one of my totally ripped brothers, Ben Zedek.

Miwaza created several graphics for this blog which you will see here soon. For now, I’ve added her blood-on-metal background. She is a good friend and former student, deacon’s daughter, powerful sister to five siblings, church photographer, amateur Garageband composer and movie director and blogs her work. Check it out!

My response to the comments on the history post below got kinda long.

It irks me to know Satan is snickering at people who profess faith in God and are bored with history because it’s a list of facts. Being bored with history is being bored with God.

The Dane:
Yep, you’re right. History is a fabrication in that it is our limited and twisted perception of what God has done. Being finite has given us extreme tunnel vision. Maybe we see so little of the Truth that it is tantamount to a lie. But that doesn’t mean we can or should stop telling stories because we are creatures made in His image, who ought to walk as He walked (1 John 2:6). Christ was a story-teller. Telling stories is part of what it means to be human.

Josh & Sarah:
History ain’t simply girly, but it’s probably more girly than certain of us might want to think. It is as girly as the gloriously pink and pastels painted into the sunset or the J.Lo colours on a peacock’s feathers. It is as girly as the jewel-bedecked skirts God commanded the priests to wear in the temple and the sweet, sweet perfume He loved to have in His house. Each of us see history from a different perspective, and so each of us see it in a different light, different garb.

In a sense, the facts of history are as scientific as the facts of chemistry. You can know the facts of history as well as the facts of chemistry, listing as everything you think probably happened like you can list everything you think you saw in the lab experiments. A coroner can dissect a corpse, noting a person’s height, weight, condition of all the internal organs, blood type and pH, DNA, and figure out the person’s habits and everyday life, but not know the person at all.

Just like God made each of us and we can never even start to know all there is to know about each other, He made history and our telling of it doesn’t even begin to be true unless we start and end the story with Him. And anyone who doesn’t marvel at it doesn’t understand it at all.

I bleed. I bleed. I bleed inside and out. Tears taste like blood. It hurts, a searing pain. In the dark, tears feel like blood. I bleed.

I used to have a friend who was suicidal for a while. Had scars here and there. Thin scars from hesitant scratches and deeper ones that criss-crossed over each other. Scar arm rings, scar patterns. For my friend, letting blood flow was release. The pain brought peace. I think it also brought a feeling of power. I touched the scars and understood the pain, the peace, the power … and the loneliness. Cutting oneself is natural. (Sin-)Nature calls for outward manifestation of the inward.

Peoples throughout history, believing power is in the blood, would drink the blood of powerful foes. They cut themselves in sacrifice to their gods. Blood marks life or death, seals oaths. It is the only price for sin. It is the ultimate sacrifice.

Life comes through death. For half the human race, the periodical finger-tremblingly, mind-numbingly painful flow is life and death. It is a release from P-M-mess. Every month is a miscarriage, death flaunting its power and pain. Every month there is hope for new life. Deflowerment is a sacrifice, the bloody sealing of a life-long love-oath. Mothers rejoice to sacrifice blood in giving birth.

Living oblivious to blood, buying bloodless meat instead of hacking our food to death, has taken us away from remembering what is pumping inside us. Really, we’re walking blood-bags. The Bible is a bloody, bloody book, demanding blood, every day, every month, all year. But no amount of blood was enough, until the Serpent, the Hen, the Lion, the Lamb, the Man. All blood points to the most precious, most powerful blood, the greatest pain ever endured, greatest sacrifice ever made, the defeat of death, the victory of Life.

I’d always wondered. Why must I bleed? Why must I hurt? I don’t wonder anymore. To cut oneself, to cut others, to seek blood is perversion because it denies His. The Man of Sorrows knows all sorrow. And remembering He knows sorrow takes it away.

I am blessed to bleed. I remember He bled for me. I am marked with His blood. That life-blood is the only thing that makes me precious. I drink Him every week. And soon enough, I will be with Him, blessed to bleed no more.

There’s a sociological term for what I am: “third culture kid.” Wheeeee! I had some fun poking around Google Blogsearch and found this. So many applied to me it was scary.

You Know You’re A Missionary Kid When . . .

You can’t answer the question, “Where are you from?” (Never could. I don’t expect I ever will.)

You speak two languages but can’t spell in either. (Well, sort of. I speak 3, but can’t read or write in 1.)

You flew before you could walk. (Yep.)

The U.S. is a foreign country. (Sure is.)

You have a passport, but no driver’s license. (LOL.)

Having four distinct seasons other than: dry, very dry, rainy, very rainy, is a new experience. (Yeah, sorta.)

You have a time zone map next to your telephone. (Have had time zones on my desktop for years and years!)

You would rather eat seaweed than cafeteria food. (Heck, yeah.)

Your life story uses the phrase “Then we went to …” five times. (My parents weren’t the kind of missionaries that moved all over the place. We stayed put. One church, one place.)

You watch nature documentaries, and you think about how good that would be if it were fried. (Not exactly.)

You frequently say, “I don’t know. I was out of the country.” (Politics, TV shows, fads, pop music, you name it, I had no idea what people were talking about.)

You think in grams, meters, and liters. (Of course.)

You feel uncomfortable in school without a uniform.

You embarrass yourself by asking what swear words mean. (Not just swear words. All kinds of slang.)

You wince when people mispronounce foreign words. (Yesssssssss.)

If someone asks what school you went to, you reply, “depends on the year.” (No. Home schooled all the way.)

You speak with authority on the quality of airline travel. (LOL.)

You go to the U.S. and get sick from a mosquito bite. (No. But got freaked out by how big the mosquitoes were.)

You worry about fitting in, and wear a native wrap around the dorm. (ROTFL. Yes.)

You are afraid to ask what you are eating, but munch away, with a smile on your face. (Mhm.)

Walking miles to and from school is “normal.” (3 miles one way.)

You send your family peanut butter and Kool-Aid for Christmas. (Skippy Extra Crunchy, please.)

You watch a movie set in a foreign country, and you know what the nationals are REALLY saying into the camera. (Yes.)

National Geographic makes you homesick. (Every time.)

School gets cancelled due to flash flooding.

Tropical fruits aren’t imported. (Some are, some aren’t.)

You have strong opinions about how to cook bugs. (Yeah. Don’t.)

People simply don’t understand.

You live at school, work in the tropics, and go home for vacation.

You watch National Geographic specials and recognize someone. (Not yet.)

You don’t know where home is. (Heaven.)

Strangers say they can remember you when you were “this tall.” (Bajillions of strangers.)

You have friends from or in 29 different countries. (Hyperbole, but, yes.)

You do your devotions in another language. (Yep.)

You sort your friends by continent. (I do!)

You keep dreaming of a green Christmas.

You tell people where you’re from, and their eyes get big.

“Where are you from?” has more than one reasonable answer. (Or none.)

The nationals say, “Oh, I knew an American once…” and then ask if you know him or her.

You are grateful for the speed and efficiency of the U.S. Postal Service. (Oh, yes! It was exciting.)

You realize that furlough is not a vacation.

You’ve spoken in dozens of churches, but aren’t a pastor.

Furlough means that you are stuffed every night … and have to eat it all to seem polite. (Ugh.)

Your parents decline your cousin’s offer to let them use his BMW, and stuff all six of you into an old VW Beetle instead.

You stockpile mangoes. (Yummy.)

You don’t know where home is. (Not on earth.)

You know what REAL coffee tastes like. (Not Starbucks.)

The majority of your friends don’t speak English as a first language. (True.)

Someone brings up the name of a team, and you get the sport wrong. (Always.)

You believe vehemently that football is played with a round, spotted ball. (What’s football?)

You don’t know how to play Pac-Man. (I honestly had no idea what it was until I looked it up just now.)

You know there is no such thing as an international language. (Right.)

You know the difference between patriotism and nationalism. (*nods*)

You tell Americans that democracy isn’t the only viable form of government. (Personally, I favour constitutional monarchy … or some kind of government incorporating a modern updated version of the Witenagemot back.)

You realize what a small world it is, after all. (Tiny, tiny. Especially if you’re a Christian.)

You never take anything for granted.

You know how to pack.

All preaching sounds better under a corrugated tin roof.

You know raw fish tastes better than cooked. (LOL.)

When guests come to your house and bring a fish as a gift.

Going to the post office is the highlight of your day. (Not really.)

When you sing songs to yourself in a language other than English.

When you mother gets excited over finding Doritos at 7-11.

When on deputation you have memorized Dad’s messages.

When after the church service you look for a slide projector to put away.

When wearing shoes in the house sounds disgusting.

You get excited to find cokes are on sale for only 99 cents.

You carry Bibles in two languages to church. (Yeah. It’s double heavy.)

You watch an English language video and read the foreign language subtitles. (Always.)

When you dream in a foreign language.

On your 18th birthday you still don’t have a driver’s license. (I still don’t.)

You send out birthday invitations in a foreign language.

When you carry a dictionary everywhere you go. (In my laptop.)

When your five foot tall mother is taller than most of your church members.

Your Dad scolds you in a foreign language. (LOL. Yeah. It’s convenient to have a secret family language.)

When you don’t know how to count American money. (C’mon. It’s confusing.)

When you go on furlough your Mom buys everything in the store. (Not everything.)

When adults want to pay you to teach them English. (That’s how I’ve made a living for over a decade.)

When you can’t find shoes to fit your feet in any of the shoe stores. (Not since I was 12.)

When you would rather sleep on the floor than on the bed. (It takes some practice to fall asleep on those American beds.)

When the family gathers around the computer to check the e-mail. (LOL.)

When you enjoy getting together with other MK’s and talking about old news. (Only other MK’s I know are my brothers.)

When all your clothes have been worn by someone else. (For most of my life, yeah.)

When at your yard sale the 80 year old man next door buys your mother’s culottes.

When your friends know more English grammar than you do but can’t understand English conversation. (True, until I started teaching English grammar. LOL.)

When you find a seven-year-old picture of yourself on someone’s refrigerator. (Freaky, that.)

When you know how to send a fax using an international call back service. (Used to know.)

When you have carried the same dollar bill in your wallet for four years.

When you write in your diary in a foreign language. (Yes.)

When driving on the right side of the road gives you the willies. (Mhm.)

When the traffic light turns from red to blue.

When eating with chop sticks seems natural. (It is. Why do people put metal in their mouths?)

When eating spaghetti with chopsticks is easier than using a fork and spoon. (Much easier!)

When you have explained the difference between “The cow is on the field” and “The cow is in the field.”

When you take a shower before taking a bath. (Of course. Or else the bathwater will get dirty.)

When you call senior missionaries grandma and grandpa.

When the message on your answering machine is in two languages. (When we had one, yes.)

When you move into a new house you take a gift to all your neighbors. (Always.)

When earthquakes seem normal. (No biggie.)

When your Mom sends you out to sweep the street in front of your house. (Doesn’t everyone?)

You speak to different ethnic groups in their own languages.

When you pull into a gas stand and expect people to come running out screaming welcome! (They scream, “Irasshaimaseeeee.”)

You consider parasites, dysentery, or tropical diseases to be appropriate dinner conversation. (LOL.)

You tell people what certain gestures mean in different parts of the world. (Yes.)

You have stopped in the middle of an argument to find the translation of a word you just used. (ROTFL. Ah. The trouble of arguing with people who don’t have the same vocabulary.)

You calculate exchange rates by the price of Coke. (I don’t like Coke.)

You would rather have a Land Rover Defender than a Lexus.

You enjoy textual criticism of customs forms.

I miss Mulder and Scully and I think this blog looks good with a black background once in a while.

I am taking a few courses at a Christian college online, and one of them is basic American history. The author of the history textbooks, whom I believe to be a brother in Christ I will be blessed to spend eternity with, is driving me out of my mind. Granted, that is no difficult task, but let me treat you to some of nuggets of his philosophy of history, bearing in mind he has a B.A. in education, an M.A. and Ph.D. in history, and he is a professor, lecturer, and author of 13 books and over 500 articles on history.

Every story with some basis in fact is history. Every bit of gossip either purports to be or is history. All that has ever happened to a person is history. Virtually every joke, every anecdote, every cartoon, every witty saying…

You get the idea. He gives a painstakingly precise explanation of how important it is to understand civilization in order to understand history, giving definitions of the word and even its etymology.

Civilization is an advanced condition of human arrangements and achievements … the conditions which make such an advanced state possible … civilization, as a concept is closely related to the city. One word, “city,” derives from the Greek word, civitas, which is the root also of “civilization.” That is no accident, for there has never been a high civilization without cities.

The Greek word for city is, in fact, polis, and the word civitas is actually Latin.

And then, my favourite quote so far.

History is an account of things that actually happened.

I was still amused at this point, and tried to get on with my homework. In my head, I kept hearing him singing like Billy Flynn,

Study history, history, facts, actual facts, and you will learn, you do, you learn, ’cause it happened, oh yes, it did, it did, it did, it really did, really did, really, really, history happened, it did.

He speaks of history as some kind of science, which can be learned like the table of elements.

One of the ways that history enriches is that it is the story of actual people, actual events, and some sort of actuality in the past. History is concrete, not abstract … We [must deal] with the factuality of history … students sometimes wonder how we know all that we assert to have happened in history … My point is that a great deal of trouble has been taken to prove the correctness of many alleged facts, and, in many instances, the evidence is still available for any who would make the effort to verify their accuracy. That is not to say that every statement in a history book is indeed factual.

For all that he seems to want to pin down the facts, he can’t quite manage it to convince himself of it. “… some sort of actuality … concrete, not abstract … facts … evidence … accuracy … not to say it is all factual.”

Ask anyone who has had to mediate a dispute, whether at toddler or international level, and you know simply determining the facts is often extremely difficult, not to mention people’s motives. When dealing with intelligent men with strong opinions who relate what they saw as happening, concrete history liquifies into mystery juice. What are “facts,” anyway?

Here is the inimitable Mencken, in his Minority Report, Note #138, on the unknowability of history.

The unreliability of history is one of the crying scandals of civilization. To this day no really convincing account of the origins of the Civil War has been written. Worse, there exists no adequate history of the United States. When historians began to turn to so-called “sources” they undoubtedly made a step towards accuracy, but it is now evident that most sources offer no more than special pleading, and hence are almost indistinguishable from what are now called pressagents’ hand-outs. James Ford Rhodes apparently made a further step when he began to mine contemporary newspapers, but it is hard to believe that anyone forced to read American newspapers during World War II will ever believe in them again. In all probability it will be eternally impossible to arrive at the precise truth about the majority of salient historical events. At best, only half of the story can ever be known. Worse, there is little indication that historians, as a class, have any actual desire to establish even that half. Those of the academic moiety seldom lift themselves above the level of mere pedagogues, and those outside the fold are commonly highly prejudiced partisans. It would be hard to imagine honest history being written by Woodrow Wilson on the one hand or Henry Cabot Lodge on the other, yet both have respectable places as American historians, and are in fact rather more reliable than most. The best are probably chance bystanders - for example, Gideon Welles. Welles set up his famous diary, I suspect, because he was uncomfortably aware that what was generally believed about the Civil War and its chief actors was not true. But having written it, he began to realize that the truth was not generally relished, so he kept it secret, and it was not published until 1912, a third of a century after his death.

Autobiography, though it always makes interesting reading, is hardly more to be trusted than academic history. It seems to be almost impossible for a man who has had a hand in great events to tell the truth about them. Even the narratives of such realistic and iconoclastic fellows as William T. Sherman and of such dull, unimaginative clods as U. S. Grant are full of palpable evasions. If Woodrow Wilson had written his autobiography it would have been a genuine marvel of false pretences. Even among the official histories, it would have stood out in that respect. Less puissant men sometimes make an effort to tell the truth, but save in a few exceptional cases they do not know what it is.

If history is just facts and nothing more, where does it take us? When the “facts” conflict, which they do often, if not always, whose account should we accept and on what basis? How should God-fearing people relate to history? None of this is dealt with in my “Christian” history textbook. The book is Christian, not Muslim or Mormon, insofar as it acknowledges Christ and the Cross to have “actually happened,” but it is the kind of “Christian” that Satan enjoys watching. (I wanted to copy and paste this whole book here, but I decided against it. Hehe.)

Though the author did not intend it, I am sure, to me his attitude towards history feels ultimately blasphemous because it does not acknowledge God as Creator or Christ as Lord of history. History is not a bunch of “facts” that just “happen.” History is the handiwork of our Triune Creator, glorious and mysterious.

It is a story … about love. The love of the Father, Son, and Spirit for each other, love they have poured out on us. Learning history is learning about God, our Father and our King, and the Spirit Who dwells in us.

A few days ago, The Dane blogged about the LibraryThing.com, a site for cataloguing personal libraries. It’s free up to 200 books and then there is a $10 lifetime fee, which I was more than happy to pay for such a great service. Most of the time, just typing in the ISBN is enough to add a book to your library, but you can add books manually, too. The site grabs book info from the Library of Congress and the international Amazon sites (.com, .uk, .ca, .fr, .de, but not .jp). You can also export (CSV) and import (del.icio.us) your library. I’ve added the widget on the left which lists the latest updates to my library. :D

So far, my library contains the books I’ve bought from Amazon, and then I’ll have to add the ones I bought used. One thing that I’m looking forward to as I add more books is seeing who has the same books I do. When you login and go to your profile, there is a list of users who own the same books.

Each user also gets a tag cloud and an author cloud. (I didn’t know those things were called “clouds” but it sort of makes since when you see them.) I can’t wait to be all done! As much as I enjoy typing ISBN’s, right now, I’m wishing for a little army of assistants. You’ll understand if you see this is what my room was like a few years ago, and I have collected more books since then.