Cheer Up
In this information-heavy age, we spend our days surrounded by statistics. Many of them aren’t particularly cheerful. We hear about the hundreds of thousands dying in this war or that one, the millions suffering from AIDS, malnutrition, or bad water. For every cause, there is a sheaf of numbers attached, columns of zeroes screaming for attention. You’d be forgiven for thinking that quality life on Earth is on a downward path. This is certainly a commonplace perception. It is also, thankfully, wrong.
Just So You Know, You’re Not Immune to Love
So, I’m sitting in a room, okay, and I’m watching bits and pieces, all these people, coming and going, starting and stopping, watching them. I see these birds, you know, the kind of birds that just swoop, that seem to swoop, that seem to swoop all day, diving for nothing but the sake of flying and soaring around. I see these trees, like these BIG TREES, growing up from these concrete blocks people walk along and I can see this because there’s a window, a huge pane of glass that seems to hide nothing from this view.
Learning
Our daily experience is of a local world viewed through many expectations, and for good reason; it would be overwhelming to approach every social situation as totally new, without an ability to make predictive use of dispositions attributed to others. It is this ability to consistently form accurate expectations of the behaviour of others which allows us to find comfort in a home community.
Joy
The topic of joy is both simple and difficult to discuss. Rick Warren, a famous pastor in the U.S. says, “I have found that happiness is fleeting, but joy abides. Happiness comes and goes, but joy [endures] forever”.
Telling Stories
I wish I could tell you a story about what joy is. As a Christian, I’m told by our subculture and its traditions that I’m supposed to know joy deeply. So deeply, in fact, that I wouldn’t be able to resist sharing it with you. I think you know the kind I mean: something like being overwhelmed with a genuine sense that things could not possibly be any better at the moment.
10 Advantages To Being A Laurier Grad Living In China
1. Hearing about the WLUSU election scandal from the other side of the world.
2. Not having to contribute financially to the new Hawk; therefore slightly happy about its return.
3. When asked to think of a ‘chant’ to perform in front of a large audience of ESL teachers for a competition, I had a wealth of O-Week options to choose from and settled on “P-A-R-T-Y, party hardy woo-hoo Laurier!” (etc.) and subsequently won the competition.
Most Of Us Have Roommates
Most of us have roommates, and most of us have roommates that we often just want to slap or snap at. Sometimes though, we find ourselves in the presence of a very special person with the profound ability to enrage and engage us.
Reflections
I wouldn’t call myself a cynic – just a deconstruction worker.
That said, you may have noticed throughout this year’s issues of Blueprint that I write and rant a lot about the counterculture. I consider myself to be a part of the counterculture, but lately – especially this year – I’ve become increasingly frustrated with and pessimistic about all things alternative.
How to mimic the lifestyle of your upper/middle class, white, suburban parents in 15 easy steps
I was recently re-acquainted with a particular means of pursuing Joy in life, and the following is the product of that.
1) Attend a post-secondary institution. Begin to accumulate debt. Ideally your program has either the word “business” or “commerce” in it.
2) Meet a nice guy or girl while there.
Conversation on the Eye
1: “Just breathe. Tell me what you see.”
Inhale.
2: “I see a vast ocean… an ocean as deep and violent as any of the raging seas in any of the books ever written or stories ever told.”
1: “What of the water?”
Jealous Creatures (Truth-Joy)
Jealous creatures seek joy
but spit lava-hot hate
down side streets in our neighbourhood.
They dig tunnels
and rake minds with grit stained fingertips.
For this we disown them.
Lethe
O and E. A Lament.
Lethe, slow and grey,
Slides past my feet
While the willow above me
Weeps leaves into the water
Marble Palaces
If I had the time
I would bury all the gold back into the dirt,
Ripping shine off awe-taking marble Palaces like –
crash; pockets and holes
Full of sharpened diamonds and crusted scabs.
