The Thinkulum

Yesterday was my brother’s birthday. He turned 24. He had a party in the Stupe after the college orchestra concert (which was really good, by the way), but in his invitation e-mail he didn’t tell people it was his birthday–on purpose! We were supposedly just celebrating April 22. People could come to celebrate–and I quote:

– a fine night of symphonic music
– the upcoming end of the semester
– Earth Day
– the passage of the Coinage Act (1864), placing the words “In God
We Trust” on all US coins
– or, any other April 22 event of your choice

But most of the people knew it was his birthday by the time they got there. 😉 The cake was a clue. I had a good time meeting and talking with his friends, and I stayed for a while even after he left. Ah, if only I could do more of that kind of thing, just go places and hang out with interesting people.

As I was leaving my apartment to go to the concert, my neighbors were standing outside as if they were waiting to go somewhere. I thought maybe they or someone was grilling dinner, as the people here sometimes do, because I smelled smoke. But as I came out of the side walkway of our building, I saw the smoke floating past in billows overhead, and my eyes followed it back across the courtyard of the building next door, where I saw flames licking the door and window frames of the upstairs corner apartment. Fire engines were already sitting at the curb, and other tenants were standing outside watching. I stood there with my mouth open for a few seconds, but since there was nothing really for me to do, I continued to my car. A woman walked past me weeping. I figured she must have lived there.

As I drove away, I thought about how devastated and helpless the family must feel. Having your home and possessions destroyed must cause a sense of loss on many personal levels, but it has to be bewildering even from a purely logistical point of view. I mean, you suddenly don’t know where you’re going to sleep tonight or how long you’ll have to wear the clothes you’re in now, and after the immediate concerns, huge waves of life-rebuilding details are waiting to surge over you. I felt helpless in December when my car wouldn’t start in the in the library parking lot. It was during a really bad snow storm, I don’t have a cell phone, and the library was closing. And that problem was a relatively simple one that was eventually solved after I got over my initial paralysis. It must be a thousand times worse when your home has just been consumed.

And I thought about the fact that I was driving off to enjoy a concert and a birthday party. What a contrast. Here I was going on with my everyday plans while other people were experiencing tragedy at that very moment. I didn’t really feel guilty about it. If I had been needed at the time, I probably would have stayed. I knew I would be helping later because this kind of thing had happened last year, and the apartment office had collected food and clothes, etc., for the victims.

What I thought more about was the remarkable fact that when tragedy strikes, the whole world doesn’t stop because of it. Those who are close to the tragedy deal with it, while the complex wider world of goes about its life, most of it (such as all the people at the concert) not even aware that something terrible has happened in one small corner. I don’t think this is bad really. It’s important for people to help each other, but if everyone dropped everything all at once to help only one small group, that would really be a disaster. So yes, life goes on because it pretty much has no choice. And various pockets of it pause to restore order and health whenever its needed, and then those parts continue on their way, and other parts are given the job when problems arise somewhere else. I’m on the edge of this one, so it’s my turn to help out a bit.

Well that wasn’t too bad. I was right that they could carry the conversation by themselves. 😉 Now that I’m trying to get back into connecting with people again, I’m finding that when I’m with strangers, I usually stay pretty quiet because I don’t have anything to say, but there are one or times in the conversation where I do have something to say, and I’ll chime in until the topic changes. That’s pretty much how it was this time. Or you could divide the evening into phases and say that that’s how it was in each phase.

We had dinner at about 4:00, and then after that we watched a movie one of the guys and his roommate had made, and then some of the people finished a game of Monopoly they had been playing, and while the last two finished that we played Catch Phrase and finally Mafia with everybody. I loved Catch Phrase because it was a word game. I’ve played Mafia before, but now that I’m interested in game design I filed it away as one to study. I don’t like playing it that much, because I’m a bad liar, but it would be interesting to study because it has to do with deduction and deception.

It was nice to get to know the people in my brother’s life better. And if they have me over again, I’ll be more comfortable going in.

Happy Easter everybody! The title of this blog post is a Greek word that means “Rejoice!” It’s the way Greek-speaking Christians greeted each other in the early centuries of the church. The reason for rejoicing was the resurrection! And it’s pronounced “KY-reh,” not “chair.”

Our church is having three services today. I meant to go to the early, 7:30 one to help balance out the crowd, but as usual my willpower lagged behind my good intentions and I didn’t get up. Furthermore, I took too long to get ready and would have slid into the second service at the last minute, if not a few minutes late. So instead of doing that I’m just going to go to the third service. It’s funny how I never get used to disappointing myself.

The family my brother lives with has invited me to dinner at their house. Isn’t that nice of them? I hope the conversation isn’t awkward. I haven’t spent much time with them. I imagine they can keep a conversation going by themselves, though, so I guess I’m not too worried.

my website!! The Thinkulum is one today!!! 😀

Well, hello. 🙂

Lately my time has been taken up by music theory and the NIV Audio Bible Dramatized. I believe I’ll actually make it all the way through the Bible now. I’ve gone from creation to David, with a detour through Job, in just six days. It’s kind of a chore, though. People seem to like this audio Bible, but I am not impressed. It’s pretty torturous to listen to, in fact. But it will get me through the Bible, which was my goal. I hope to have a detailed review for you later.

I read Allen Forte’s Tonal Harmony in Concept in Practice about a year ago but got distracted by other things before I got very far into the exercises. Now I’ve picked it back up and finished marking it, and I’m typing out my synthesis of the material, which I’ll probably use as a basis for further research. I’m very interested in how music works, and especially tonal music&emdash;why there are eight notes in a diatonic scale with specific interval patterns, why a triad is made of two thirds, things like that. I’m also reading Musical Structure and Design by Cedric Thorpe Davie. Maybe this time I’ll get around to the practical part and actually write some music.

My other essay is pretty much done. I’ll be posting it soon.

I feel a bit better now. I got some nice phone calls and an e-mail from a friend I haven’t talked to in a while.

It’s my birthday, but I can’t say it’s been very happy. I’ve been depressed thinking about the impermanence of life (and no, not because I’m getting older). I suppose I’ll get over it eventually.