First Impressions

I have been watching the OC. Yep, me, the teen soap opera cynic has been hooked onto one of the shows I had assumed a waste of my time. I feel like quite the hypocrite.

Here's the thing. There are many good things about this show. Put aside all the teen drama and girl troubles of Seth, and let's just move on from Marissa's experienced Mom, this show has some good lessons, and some excellent examples of what it is to be a good person.

To start off I would like to say that I am rather impressed with the marriage of Seth Cohen's parents. They are put through a lot, and in the end always manage to stay faithful to one another. This is one of the best Television marriages I have ever seen. Here's my top 3.
1. Heath-Cliff and Claire Huxtable (the Cosby Show)
2. Sandy and Kirsten Cohen (The OC)
3. Charles and Caroline Ingalls (Little House on the Prarie)

The show also teaches some great morals. It deals with the pain and brutality of gossip, the deviance of stealing, and even the reconciliation and social make up involved in 'paying for one's actions.'

Although I find some, if not many of what is portrayed in the show far-fetched and no where near reality, I also have to respect the fact that I come from a small town, so for me to judge this Californian lifestyle is totally presumptuous. This I realized when I saw the episode where Ryan goes and visits his hometown on Thanksgiving.

And then, as I thought about it further, I began to realize how often I judge real people based on the stereotypes of these shows. I mean, I don't know the stories of everyone I interact with everyday. Yet, it's so easy to just slap a label on a person, like a stamp on a letter, and pass them off into the post office of society. Judge then dispose.

I know this is one of my worst attributes. I am way too apt to judge a person, sum them up based on first impressions, or just impressions and then consider myself an expert. The truth is that everyone has a story to tell. Everyone's lives matter, and the outward appearances of who they portray themselves to be are not always correct. The old cliché, never judge a book by its cover rings much truth.

Drama will always be what you make it, but at the same time, give people a chance, much like I sucked up my pride and found a ray of goodness in the OC. My life may not be like that, but who knows, reality isn't the same for everyone.

Financial WHAT?

Cheers to starting off a new semester. I feel bad for bragging about this, especially since everyone else I know is paying left, right and centre. I can't lie, apart from the fact that in four years I'm going to have to pay OSAP back for part of what they have given me, I can't help but snicker at the huge financial aid I got for school.

Originally, I had it all planned out. I worked, made money between February and August, with a few weeks I needed off. I figured I had made a good sum of money and calculated almost to the exact amount how much money it would cost me for my first year here. I knew what I'd be paying, in what intervals and when.

I am so unbelievably thankful right now for the aid I have gotten. I don't have to pay a cent for this semester. I didn't have to pay a cent for last semester. God is good.

On the one hand, I'm thrilled I got this extra money that I wasn't expecting. On the other hand, I kind of wish it had gone to someone who is still paying. I know that most of my dormmates are paying for the year out of their own pockets, taking out bank loans, etc. I had saved up the money to be able to pay for what I knew wasn't coming from OSAP and Redeemer scholarships, and now that I got two more grants (the 'you-do-not-pay-these-back' kind) which sum up more than I figured I'd have to pay out of my own pocket, I'm actually making money this year by coming to University.

On the bonus side of things, this makes affording the mission trip to Mexico over reading break a lot easier...in fact, the check I got from the Government of Ontario's Ministry of Education/Finance whatever is officially paying for that trip. And then some.

I feel blessed, mostly. Confused, but blessed.

On a completely different note, I took a nice trip down to student services today. I went to the registrars office to change a course. I found yesterday in class that I really didn't like my professor for the class. This sounds pretty bad, but if I don't like a prof, or a teacher, I will not do my best in the course. It's a respect thing for me. Why should I try and impress them if I don't like them right?

Yeah, I know its not the right attitude, and had it been any other course, I might not have cared, but English is my major, and so I need to be in a class that I enjoy. Especially if its poetry. It was a productive day for me. Second semester is shaping up to be pretty okay.

Grammar Lesson

University Profs should not have to give a quick grammar lesson everytime they assign a paper.

Example:

Then/Than
In case you don't know, here's the deal with these words.
Then: used in reference to time. A person did this and then they did this.
Than: This is a comparison. Simple.

My personal favourite is that my Prof thought it would be necessary to let everyone know that you cannot pluralize a word using an apostrophe and then 's'. Last time I checked, it was still adding an 's' or 'es' to the end of a word.

And then there is always the difference between there, their and they're.

University students should know this. In fact, I don't think a child should be allowed to graduate elementary school until they know the difference between these sorts of words. Grammar is tedious, but I learned it in elementary school. Everyone else should have too.

Missing

A teenage boy from my town has been missing since New Years day.

His name is Wesley McLeod, and he's 18 years old. Tall, brown hair.

Readers, I ask that you would pray for his family, and that God would reveal a good ending to this horrible situation. I cannot imagine what his family is going through.

Redecorating

I thought I would give my blog a little bit of a makeover. I was getting tired of the Orange and Green, and the header wouldn't let me add the photo I wanted. So, voila! *cuts ribbon to new blog.*

Welcome to BK-redecorated

The Pursuit of Happyness.

We've all seen this movie. Will Smith took us to new lengths of rising to the top, along with the beating question our society just can't stop struggling with, 'What makes me happy?'

I've found that in the past few years, Hollywood has taken a new turn on the movies they produce..at least some of the times. Sure, we still are confronted with those psychotic thrillers and zombie-scary movies that make us jump, and whether we like it or not, there is always going to be release of the 'dumb jock movie' and the 'chick flick'. However, those aside, take a look at those movies that have recently hit the cinemas and video stores. We seem to be on a fast track for the true pursuit of 'happyness.'

Will Smith portrayed the bitter truth to working up in the world. We watched him and his son battle through the harsh realities of corperate promise and compromise. Through homeless shelters, bad jobs and miserable divorce. We watched him lose it all to regain a sense of meaning in his life and ultimately a reason to smile.

A few weeks ago, I was confronted with a different film, dealing with the same sort of question. Stranger than Fiction, which casted Will Ferrell, Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Queen Latifah and Kristen Chenoweth, deals with an entirely different pursuit of happyness. Although the main line of the story was that Harold Crick (played by Ferrell) was hearing the voice of an author in his head, and feared that this author (Thompson) would kill him off, and sets out on an adventure to save himself, the real point of the story served in the act of saving himself from the mundane. The mundane was, ironically, a corperate life, where he counted the number of brush strokes it took to clean his teeth, counted the number of steps it took to get to the bus, and the number of seconds it took to ride the bus. Of course, by the end of the film, we've watched Crick find happiness, fall in love, and make life worth living.

And then last night, I went to the theatre with the intention of seeing 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button'. It was sold out, so the consensus was to see 'Yes Man' instead. Despite a few scenes which were crude, and could have been taken out altogether, the movie was incredibly well done. Again, we see a character who is unhappy with his current life, and is told to embrace all the little opportunities. In so doing, Carl (played by Jim Carrey) would not be allowed to say 'no' to anything. Instead, he would agree to do everything that anyone asked him to, and thus learned to live a better life.

And then, we take a completely different spin on all this Hollywood Happyness stuff. Sure, we've seen the very depths of poverty and the overcoming story of a man against the world. We see the 'Bartleby, the Scrivener' reference come through in the mundane fighting comedy as depicted by Smith and Ferrell. But then, we are also faced with a multitude of dramas, sitcoms, documentaries in the comforts of our own home. Everyone is looking to be happy. Whether its the gang from DeGrassi trying to figure out how to find joy, or the latest soap opera, where the ultimate and unattainable goal is to make everything 'okay', or even Oprah or Ellen giving away extravagent gifts in the name of charity, it is all about the pursuit of happyness.

There are lyrics in the song 'Soak up the Sun' by Sheryl Crow. They say 'its not having what you want, but wanting what you've got.' These are incredibly profound. I look at these as a perfect summary of the desired happyness that our society longs for. We are a post modern world stuck in the cubicles we created for ourselves in the name of progress, and all we have to show for it is bigger TVs and smaller smiles.

Happyness and joy are two different things. Joy overflows, and wells up and just can't be held in, it is a way of life, a gift from God, and a pleasure in all things. Happy(i)ness is temporary. It seems quite based on material things, the flash of a smile, the quick fix. It leaves us wanting more. Joy is fullfilling. It is a lifestyle.

In this pursuit of happyness, it is so evident that our world is screaming out in pain. Screaming out for a savior. We are winding down the Christmas season, we have made our New Years resolutions, in the effort to make our lives better. The only One who can change our life is Christ. He's already come. Joy comes through him. In living for Christ, we are charged to spread the news about his coming, to share the Gospel truth, but at the same time, to be content, whatever the circumstances. 'It's not having what you want, its wanting what you've got.'

So where is your pursuit for happyness? Are you escaping a mundane existance? Because if that's the case, you should be looking for joy.

On which note, I feel I should inform you that each of the characters in the movies listed above found a joy, and not just 'Happyness'.

Olibollen!

I have no idea if that is how it is spellled, but it doesn't matter. Everyone knows that the best tradition in the world is Olibollen on New Years day (Or Eve, depending on who you are).

My sister decided to take on the smelly task of making these yummy New Years treats..and what a treat they are. Someone had apparently made a joke to her about the fact that Olibollen is an old lady's tradition. Kristen decided that it wasn't and that she was going to make her own Olibollen.

They are best with a good helping of Icing Sugar and made with raisins. We didn't do AppleFlappen this year though. No one here is much of a fan for those.

And here is a shout out to Sherilyn and Chad. I will alway remember last year when Asher ate about 10 olibollen and at least as many appleflappen. The retired aged people in the church just kept feeding them to him. It was very cute.

Happy '09 everyone!

A Thing of the Past

I always enjoy looking back on every year. It's important for us to look over our pasts and learn from what we have done. There is no point in trying to change what has happened.

We've all done it. We sit there on New Years Eve and ponder the previous year. We sum up all the peculiar moments, that for whatever reason stick out in our memories as important, and then we replay these moments in our minds, thinking, 'what could I have done differently?'. I know I do this every year, and it's okay.

I know that there are some fights I have had that I could have handled better, disagreements I should have just kept my mouth shut about, even second-guessing myself where not needed. I'm 19 years old, to me, everything is life or death.

Well, not actually life or death, but you get the jist of that. I'm one of the many people who is going to reflect on the past year, and then make a New Years Resolution, as if that is going to help. I always like the resolutions to lose weight, or stop eating a certain food, or get organized. The ones where people try and change a distinct part of who they am..those are my favourites. Those are also the least successful. I remember one year, my New Years resolution was to eat an apple every day. That lasted about a week, before I got sick of the taste, and remembered why I didn't eat apples every day in the first place.

This year, my resolution is perhaps an enhancement of who I already am. I love to read, but I never have enough time to read everything I want to. So this year, I'm making room. My goal is to read 1 book every two weeks, which I think is a good idea, especially after school work, and extra currics, 26 books a year seems reasonable.

In the mean time, as I say goodbye to 2008, all its rays of sunshine and flakes of snow. Every tear, every smile, every glitter in an eye. It was a good year, full of new experiences, old memories, and grand finales.

Goodbye 2008. You've been good.

Typewriter!

My most cherished gift this Christmas wasn't really a gift at all.

I recieved my Grandpa's old type-writer on account of the fact that after many years at their current house, they have bought and are in the process of moving into Wrinkletown, which is my affectionate name for Trillium Village, the old folks housing in town. I have always had a passion for creative writing, and there is something really cool about typing on typewriters. My Grandpa's typewriter was one of those kinds where you can see the letter hit the peice of paper and the ink strip leaving a mark. It's really very cool.

I have really wanted this typewriter for about as long as I knew it existed. Its so much for fun to write a story on a typewriter, and the sound it makes is so much more the sound of creation, than the noise of a keyboard.

Perhaps it is the fact that computers and keyboards have always been associated with homework assignments for me. The first time I ever used a keyboard was at school, in a computer lab with some of those 256 mb hard drives..and the cute little ink blue screens, with the one wordprocessing program and packman..because that's all the harddrive could hold. The very first time I used a keyboard, I was trying to type up a homework assignment in grade 2. My spelling was notoriously horrible, and my sentences were generally weak. But I was in grade 2, so really, what can you expect?

But this typewriter.

This typewriter has so much history. And not just from what I know of it.

I remember my sister and I used to type up letters to Grandpa and Grandma on that typewriter after school on Mondays. We would sit in the basement and giggle, while Grandma was upstairs making supper. Mondays were our favourites. Mondays were the days we went there because Mom and Dad both worked. In the mornings we would have oatmeal with sugar and milk on it, and pulpy orange juice (which I never liked) and toast with Grandma's homemade jams..strawberry Rhubarb and Marmelaide. And sometimes she would have those really dry Dutch round bread toast things..they tasted good with the jam too.

Grandma would usually then clean up the dishes and Kristen and I would go upstairs and brush our teeth and hide all the multi-coloured soaps that she had in the towels and under the sink. Then we would go to school.

Grandpa would pick us up after school and we would have tea and cookies when we got home. I remember one afternoon, we taught Grandpa and Grandma how to do Long Division. To heck if I can still do that stuff, but it was fun at the time. And then, after homework at the kitchen table, we would watch the Sound of Music, or Anne of Green Gables, eat carrots and celery sticks, and crochet one single line of wool. Usually just to see if we could get it long enough to fit from one end of the house, all the way up 2 flights of stairs to the closet door at the end of the hallway.

The best days were the ones when you were too sick to go to school. You would get to stay at Grandma's and have soup, and watch TVO kids all day. It was the best.

I think that the typewriter represents all those years at Grandpa and Grandmas. The house they are moving out of is the only one all of the grandkids have known. My being the oldest and all, I have the most memories of this house, and perhaps one of the biggest attachments to it. I have so many stories of that house. So many fun times with Grandpa and Grandma. Now that they are moving, its nostalgic.

When I find some fresh ribbon for the typewriter, I might just compose a list of stories of all the times I had at the Grandparents' house. All of them. Perhaps, too, this typewriter is a little peice of my past, of that house, of that time in my life, that I won't ever have to let go.