Poor Life Decisions

Looking back over the last couple days, I can't say that things haven't been going well. I've kept up with homework, hung out with friends, and in general have been enjoying myself. Still, there are a couple of things I should not have been doing -- things that would make life a lot easier if I could plan better. They are, in no particular order:

• Deciding to do Camp NaNoWriMo in what I knew would be an extremely busy month, getting ten thousand words behind in the second-to-last week, and being inconsistent about filling that gap because of such silly things as "being tired," or "not feeling like writing." Consequently, for the last several days of August, I had to spend several hours every night writing very very quickly and probably very poorly in order to catch up. This was aggravated by
• Closing documents without saving because I got confused because I had too many documents open because I was trying to check my word count over various documents because I was disorganized because I need to figure out a better system to keep track of writing because I haven't bought Scrivener yet because I'm a poor college student. Consequently, I lost 2,000 words in a critical moment. This was stressful, since I had been
• Letting tiredness build up from sleeping six hours or less the past several nights, and then
• Playing the fifth game of mafia with people in my dorm when I really needed to go to bed before having to wake up very early the next morning, and then
• Deciding to play board games the next night with people I love outside my dorm, because obviously I hadn't had enough yet, culminating in
• Playing a three-hour game of Cities and Knights, in which my exhaustion was almost causing me fairly serious emotional problems, and which could and should have ended an hour and a half earlier.

Six short hours of sleep later, I woke up for my 8 a.m. class, really feeling pretty good for all that. But now daylight is telling me things I should be doing:

• I should read the play for which I need to organize and find props before tech weekend three weeks from now.
• I should take a nap today. Really.
• I should talk to the freshmen on my floor and make sure everyone's doing okay with the transition to college. I should also make some time to pray with them.
• I should  probably be doing homework instead of writing a blog post.
• I should figure out what happened to my Fit for Life syllabus.
• I should try much harder to find someone to permanently switch work shifts with me, since I have a class when I'm supposed to work.
• I should write some personal letters I've been meaning to get to for the past two weeks.
• I should take a minute to be quiet. That is all.

This sounds like a lot. But even in writing these lists, reviewing all the things that filled my time, I don't regret anything (well, except not writing earlier... that could have solved lots of problems.) But I got to be around really awesome people. I stayed busy. And I accomplished lots of things, despite having to work around many obstacles. Last week was great. But, in light of all this, I can try to make next week better.

C.S. Lewis Fangirling

The title of this blog should indicate that I like C.S. Lewis. If you didn't know anything about the Inklings, you might infer that I like C.S. Lewis because I go to Taylor University. (They don't ask you about it on your applications, but that's because they'll make you a fan if you aren't already.) And even if you didn't know that Taylor practically endorses C.S. Lewis as the fourth part of the trinity, you might simply be able to guess that I like C.S. Lewis because I am a Christian. Lewis brought deep theology to everyday life in such clear and beautiful language that even those who disagree with his message bow to his mastery. His works have place in the libraries of religious scholars and everyday Christian readers. C.S. Lewis is a king.

I first read The Screwtape Letters in high school. I was amazed at how deeply convicted I was in every chapter. I recognized something about me and my world in Screwtape's every sentence. It's a small book, but there's enough in there to think about for hours longer than it takes you to read.

Yesterday, I read The Great Divorce. The words were still fresh in my mind as I watched Anthony Lawton perform it on stage -- one man, many characters. No set. Just leaving you to imagine Heaven as C.S. Lewis explained it.

Not that Lewis pretended to be an authority on what Heaven was like. He considered himself very much an ordinary person. He always warned his readers that he did not know how everything looked or was -- but he could change one's way of thinking about Heaven, Hell, or God to a way much less distracted by biases. In The Great Divorce, his point was clear: we can't hold onto the things separating us from God. We can't demand the things we want on earth and expect Heaven, as well.

And then there's Narnia. And his theology books. Ones I haven't read, but am going to read someday. C.S. Lewis is an inspiration to Christian writers. After being under his influence, as it were, these past couple of days, I'm again in an admiring rush.

For Narnia and the North! For philosophy! For applied Christianity!

Thank you, Mr. Lewis.

Top Ten Interesting Things I've Learned

This is a post I meant to write a long time ago, right when first semester classes let out. Now I'm back at Taylor and very excited about it. Before I start my first full week of class (I had class today, but hey, it's a Tuesday) I want to put up a list of the most interesting things I learned last semester, in class and out. Perhaps you already knew these random facts, or maybe they don't seem so remarkable. In any case, they stuck out to me. In no particular order:

• Drinking milk or eating dairy products before singing doesn't actually do anything to your voice. This should have been obvious to me because the windpipe and esophagus are two different things. I've been told the milk makes mucus, but I've never really observed that milk has any effect on my singing voice, and one of the music professors told me this. I'm going to believe her so I can have my milk and sing, too.
• Having lots of time does not necessarily facilitate getting lots of things done. This is a widely-observed phenomenon among people who do NaNoWriMo.
• Contrariwise, having very little time makes you an extremely productive person. (It works for me, anyway. I need to keep busy if I'm actually going to finish revising my novel!)
• The Golden rectangle is everywhere, and it’s really fun to hunt for it. (Thank you, math class!)
• Fibonacci in general – awesome. If you know nothing about Fibonacci numbers, I hope you cover it in class at some point or do some research on your own. Start with Vi Hart's videos, if you like.
• How to use power saws. This I learned from theatre set building, and I think it will be very useful later in life. Perhaps it would be more useful to be able to handle a drill properly, but I'm still really bad at that.
• Satan and Lucifer weren't originally proper nouns.They're Hebrew words to which we've attached specific people, in this case the same specific person.
• How to use databases. This is an important research skill I'm still surprised I didn't learn in high school. Thank goodness for friendly librarians.
• How to use Photoshop. Part of me thinks this is kind of cheating to put it on this list, but as a person who likes art, I think this is also really useful.
• "Internet" is a proper noun and should be capitalized. For some reason, this really took me by surprise. Again, perhaps this should have been obvious, but I find it interesting that in our very Internet-oriented society, spelling and punctuation are dropped for lots of day-to-day communication to the point of ignoring the medium we're using. Or maybe it's more that the Internet is such a part of our lives that we take it for granted.

I want a better list next semester, so I need to kick learning into high gear. Perhaps I should start by sleeping for my first ever 8:00 a.m. college class tomorrow.

Musicals

I make fun of chick flicks. My sister hates watching them with me because if I don't like them, I do nothing but make fun of the characters and ruin all the romantic moments. It's a kind of sappy I can't stand. I can, however, sit through the cheesiest of musicals without a single insult. I will shed tears. And when the happy ending comes, as it inevitably does, I dance and sing around the house for hours afterward.

Taylor Theatre's current production is A Christmas Carol. I have about as small a part as there is (yes, yes, "there are no small parts in a show"), but I delight to be part of the production. Tonight, we got our first standing ovation. Then we had our cast party. I was on my post-musical kick, being hyper and singing all over the place, and then I heard the best news I have in a long time.

There is a musical of Lord of the Rings.

I'm pretty sure my heart stopped.

Over the next few weeks I'll listen to it over and over again and learn everything there is to know about it, but I doubt I'll get used to it. I will never lose sight of that joy I find in a good musical. My all-time favorite is Les Misérables. I'm pretty much obsessed, and the joy it gives me never goes away. Every time I listen, it's still wonderful. From the few songs I've heard of the LotR musical, this one seems to evoke the same kind of feelings in me. What beautiful songs! What a wonderful story!

One of the things that I think makes a really good musical, movie, or TV show that started as a book is that it keeps the feel of the original story while being successful in its own medium. Les Mis did that and then some. As a huge LotR geek, I pick at the movies a lot, but I love them and appreciate them.

Here's hoping the LotR musical succeeds in that way. My sappy heart could use another musical.