The truth is that I am not as nice as I assume I am.
We live life based upon a set of assumptions about ourselves, otherwise every moment would be too overwhelming to survive, and not just for those with the emotional range of a teaspoon.
However, sometimes I find myself in situations where I am decidedly not the person I assume, and it is uncomfortable. I say things that are unkind. Or I interrupt people. Or I talk endlessly about myself and don't really listen to people. Or I even encourage them in negative thoughts, conversations, and behaviors. Then I think about it later and realize my actions were contemptible. I realize that I had no business to say or do what I did, and I wonder how I let myself get out of hand, because I'm supposed to be better than that. My self respect is intact because I wake up every day assuming that I am not the sort of person who does those kinds of things.
So today, most of all, I am thinking about the ability to re-evaluate my life and repent. The Lord gave that blessing to me, because I sure need it—and that is what I am most grateful for. Today hasn't been about a gluttonous turkey fest (my fam went out of town, and I stayed behind to be with my sister, who had to work; I cooked a nice meal, without any turkey, and was just happy to be able to do something nice for someone else for a change). It's been about what I can do to change my attitude, my thoughts, my words, and my deeds and actually be the person He wants me to be.
Bad experiences don't mean anything if you don't respond to them with faith, so my leap of faith is starting now, with being thankful for the people I usually talk badly about. There are people who have hurt me deeply; I have allowed their choices and/or personalities to make me angry. But it's not my place to get angry, it's my place to be grateful, for the good and for the bad.
The truth is also that I happen to be one of those people whose life is overwhelmingly full of good things over bad things.
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. I hope you have as much to be grateful for as I do.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Saturday, November 5, 2011
A Truth Universally Acknowledged
This is going to be a long, somewhat pretentious post.
I think people assume I like Jane Austen a lot more than I really do. Occasionally, a friend will assume that I have even gone as far as to read some of the endless (brainless) Jane Austen spinoff books. I must admit to having read one of them, Jane Fairfax. It was awful, and I will never touch another one again, even if it isn’t a bodice-ripper, which most of them are. For the record, Jane Fairfax was a tame, if stupid, retelling of Emma, from the point of view of the titular character. Can you see that working?
The fact is that when it comes to literature written by women, I prefer Charlotte Bronte, George Eliot, Elizabeth Gaskell, and even Virginia Woolf. My favorite book in the world will probably always be Jane Eyre, and Middlemarch, Daniel Deronda, and North and South will remain in the top 10. I can’t say I will re-read Virginia Woolf often, but when I read The Waves, I wanted to underline the entire text, it was so beautiful.
However, I do love Jane Austen and will freely admit to having read all of her completed works, including Love and Freindship and The History of England, comic pieces she wrote in her teens—some of them multiple times. (No, I have not forgotten how to spell. She wrote the novella before spellings were standardized, and that has always been its official title.) And if you want a good, solid spoof, her early works are screaming at you. There are few books I could classify as being funnier than L&F and HofE.
Sometimes I come across recommendations for books on Amazon.com, and I can’t seem to leave them alone. Eventually I add them to my wishlist, and at some point they end up in my hands. This was one of them. I resisted for a long time, but temptation got the best of me, and I caved in a big way.
But it was thirty-three chapters of what I love best! I make fun of myself often and roundly for liking to read the introduction to a book just as much as I like to read the book itself—and I can’t seem to get over a mania for Norton Critical Editions of classic works—because of all the fun literary essays in the back. With that explained, what could be better than an entire book of literary essays by intelligent people—most of them great fiction writers themselves—about Jane Austen? My favorites were probably by Lionel Trilling, who I am guessing is a famous Jane Austen scholar. He started one of his essays by recounting the creation of a university class focusing entirely on Jane Austen, and realizing it was so full the only fair way to pare it down was to have each student come to his office for an interview. He was startled and dismayed to find out that not only did all these students come and interview, but they were not at all put out by having to justify their reasons for taking the course—in essence, they had to persuade him of their worthiness to be on the roll in the first place. What followed were bribes, letters of reference by former professors, and desperate pleas … and in the end, those who were excluded were very bitter. What other college class could create such a scenario?
Other essayists included Virginia Woolf (of course), Susannah Clarke (the incomparable author of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell), C.S. Lewis, Eudora Welty, and E.M. Forster, just to name a few. I must say, too, that these people know how to write a good essay. I didn’t get tired of reading about the same person or the same six books until the very end. And even though I was heartily glad to have gotten through the entire collection, I was a little sad there wasn’t more.
Talk about pontification.
One of the greatest things I take away from this experience is a greater appreciation for a writer who can capture the comedy of everyday life. It is quite fair to state that there is nothing in Jane Austen’s work that is paradigm challenging, or that stands out as making them essential to the canon of great literature. This is even more true if you are coming from the perspective of a male.
But as a woman, Jane Austen is worthwhile for several reasons, the most prominent of which is that her work shows, in a way that is light-hearted and amusing, issues that women have dealt with and continue to deal with no matter what era they live in. What do you do when the people you are hanging out with are giving you a bad reputation? What do you do when the sister you love is destroying her future? What do you do when your family members are idiots? What do you do when you don’t have any money but you still want to be respectable? What do you do when it looks like the only respectable life is earned through securing the hand and heart of a respectable man, but there are so few respectable men to be found? What do you do when you have a sincere desire to see everyone around you happy, but they are constantly stepping on you? What do you do when someone you love and trust disapproves of a decision you made?
Real dilemmas, tackled in a hopeful and fun way.
Jane Austen looks at the small picture, focusing on three or four families in a country village. She lived through the war with Napoleon. She had a family member lose a husband to the guillotine. She wasn’t stupid or unaware of the big picture.
But she wrote about relationships, because for women, everything boils down to relationships. Shakespeare writes about kings and princes, Dickens writes about great philanthropists and adventurers, Dostoyevsky writes about the philosopher. They are great authors, and their works are much more striking as contributions to a societal significance. Jane Austen, well, she helps people feel connected.
I think people assume I like Jane Austen a lot more than I really do. Occasionally, a friend will assume that I have even gone as far as to read some of the endless (brainless) Jane Austen spinoff books. I must admit to having read one of them, Jane Fairfax. It was awful, and I will never touch another one again, even if it isn’t a bodice-ripper, which most of them are. For the record, Jane Fairfax was a tame, if stupid, retelling of Emma, from the point of view of the titular character. Can you see that working?
The fact is that when it comes to literature written by women, I prefer Charlotte Bronte, George Eliot, Elizabeth Gaskell, and even Virginia Woolf. My favorite book in the world will probably always be Jane Eyre, and Middlemarch, Daniel Deronda, and North and South will remain in the top 10. I can’t say I will re-read Virginia Woolf often, but when I read The Waves, I wanted to underline the entire text, it was so beautiful.
However, I do love Jane Austen and will freely admit to having read all of her completed works, including Love and Freindship and The History of England, comic pieces she wrote in her teens—some of them multiple times. (No, I have not forgotten how to spell. She wrote the novella before spellings were standardized, and that has always been its official title.) And if you want a good, solid spoof, her early works are screaming at you. There are few books I could classify as being funnier than L&F and HofE.
Sometimes I come across recommendations for books on Amazon.com, and I can’t seem to leave them alone. Eventually I add them to my wishlist, and at some point they end up in my hands. This was one of them. I resisted for a long time, but temptation got the best of me, and I caved in a big way.
But it was thirty-three chapters of what I love best! I make fun of myself often and roundly for liking to read the introduction to a book just as much as I like to read the book itself—and I can’t seem to get over a mania for Norton Critical Editions of classic works—because of all the fun literary essays in the back. With that explained, what could be better than an entire book of literary essays by intelligent people—most of them great fiction writers themselves—about Jane Austen? My favorites were probably by Lionel Trilling, who I am guessing is a famous Jane Austen scholar. He started one of his essays by recounting the creation of a university class focusing entirely on Jane Austen, and realizing it was so full the only fair way to pare it down was to have each student come to his office for an interview. He was startled and dismayed to find out that not only did all these students come and interview, but they were not at all put out by having to justify their reasons for taking the course—in essence, they had to persuade him of their worthiness to be on the roll in the first place. What followed were bribes, letters of reference by former professors, and desperate pleas … and in the end, those who were excluded were very bitter. What other college class could create such a scenario?
Other essayists included Virginia Woolf (of course), Susannah Clarke (the incomparable author of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell), C.S. Lewis, Eudora Welty, and E.M. Forster, just to name a few. I must say, too, that these people know how to write a good essay. I didn’t get tired of reading about the same person or the same six books until the very end. And even though I was heartily glad to have gotten through the entire collection, I was a little sad there wasn’t more.
Talk about pontification.
One of the greatest things I take away from this experience is a greater appreciation for a writer who can capture the comedy of everyday life. It is quite fair to state that there is nothing in Jane Austen’s work that is paradigm challenging, or that stands out as making them essential to the canon of great literature. This is even more true if you are coming from the perspective of a male.
But as a woman, Jane Austen is worthwhile for several reasons, the most prominent of which is that her work shows, in a way that is light-hearted and amusing, issues that women have dealt with and continue to deal with no matter what era they live in. What do you do when the people you are hanging out with are giving you a bad reputation? What do you do when the sister you love is destroying her future? What do you do when your family members are idiots? What do you do when you don’t have any money but you still want to be respectable? What do you do when it looks like the only respectable life is earned through securing the hand and heart of a respectable man, but there are so few respectable men to be found? What do you do when you have a sincere desire to see everyone around you happy, but they are constantly stepping on you? What do you do when someone you love and trust disapproves of a decision you made?
Real dilemmas, tackled in a hopeful and fun way.
Jane Austen looks at the small picture, focusing on three or four families in a country village. She lived through the war with Napoleon. She had a family member lose a husband to the guillotine. She wasn’t stupid or unaware of the big picture.
But she wrote about relationships, because for women, everything boils down to relationships. Shakespeare writes about kings and princes, Dickens writes about great philanthropists and adventurers, Dostoyevsky writes about the philosopher. They are great authors, and their works are much more striking as contributions to a societal significance. Jane Austen, well, she helps people feel connected.
Inequality
I have probably been reading too much mass media lately, because I find myself very cynical about the future. But one morning a few days ago, as I was doing some cooking, I was reminded of a story told by one of the speakers in General Conference not long ago. I’m going to paraphrase that story.
Two men shared a field that they both worked to plant, tend, and harvest. One of the men lived alone, while the other one had a large family. One day, perceiving an inequality, the first man decided it wasn’t fair that he should get a half share of the harvest when he had only himself to provide for. So he went out in the night and transferred a large portion of the harvest to the pile of his neighbor and went to bed happy. Meanwhile, the second man perceived an inequality. He decided it wasn’t fair that he should get a half share of the harvest when he had so many sons to help him and his neighbor was all alone. So he went out in the night and transferred a large portion of the harvest to the pile of his neighbor and went to bed happy. In the morning, when the discovery was made what had happened in the night, they talked it over and were touched and amused, and they parted friends.
What strikes me about this is that neither one of them had very much—they were just simple farmers—but both of them were able to see that they had blessings beyond those of their neighbor, and their first thoughts were of sharing. I would assume that the sonless neighbor would have shared food from his own table if there were ever any want in the house of his friend. I would assume that the family man neighbor would have taken in his friend in their waning years so that he wouldn’t suffer old age uncared for.
This story wasn’t about a Utopia, or an idealistic dream of world peace and equality. There wasn’t any protesting or sitting around in parks. It wasn’t someone demanding his rights or shirking his responsibilities. Neither one of them went to the government to demand that their neighbor’s taxes be raised, and neither of them whined that they had less and should therefore be entitled to more of a share. Neither of them sat in opulence and judged the other’s difficulties or asked for a loan to buy something that would make their workload lighter. They didn’t give away anything they didn’t have. They didn’t complain that they didn’t have money to hire someone else to do the heavy work. They didn’t call each other a liar or a hypocrite; they didn’t blame each other for not having more of a harvest.
They worked hard, they thanked God, and they loved their neighbor.
The American people are generous. I think maybe not all, but most, want what is good for their neighbors as well as what is good for themselves. And if that isn’t true, well… we have a hard road ahead of us. But I, for one, would wish to live my life like those two fine farmers, refusing to see myself as less fortunate than my neighbor, and striving to always eradicate what inequalities I can.
Two men shared a field that they both worked to plant, tend, and harvest. One of the men lived alone, while the other one had a large family. One day, perceiving an inequality, the first man decided it wasn’t fair that he should get a half share of the harvest when he had only himself to provide for. So he went out in the night and transferred a large portion of the harvest to the pile of his neighbor and went to bed happy. Meanwhile, the second man perceived an inequality. He decided it wasn’t fair that he should get a half share of the harvest when he had so many sons to help him and his neighbor was all alone. So he went out in the night and transferred a large portion of the harvest to the pile of his neighbor and went to bed happy. In the morning, when the discovery was made what had happened in the night, they talked it over and were touched and amused, and they parted friends.
What strikes me about this is that neither one of them had very much—they were just simple farmers—but both of them were able to see that they had blessings beyond those of their neighbor, and their first thoughts were of sharing. I would assume that the sonless neighbor would have shared food from his own table if there were ever any want in the house of his friend. I would assume that the family man neighbor would have taken in his friend in their waning years so that he wouldn’t suffer old age uncared for.
This story wasn’t about a Utopia, or an idealistic dream of world peace and equality. There wasn’t any protesting or sitting around in parks. It wasn’t someone demanding his rights or shirking his responsibilities. Neither one of them went to the government to demand that their neighbor’s taxes be raised, and neither of them whined that they had less and should therefore be entitled to more of a share. Neither of them sat in opulence and judged the other’s difficulties or asked for a loan to buy something that would make their workload lighter. They didn’t give away anything they didn’t have. They didn’t complain that they didn’t have money to hire someone else to do the heavy work. They didn’t call each other a liar or a hypocrite; they didn’t blame each other for not having more of a harvest.
They worked hard, they thanked God, and they loved their neighbor.
The American people are generous. I think maybe not all, but most, want what is good for their neighbors as well as what is good for themselves. And if that isn’t true, well… we have a hard road ahead of us. But I, for one, would wish to live my life like those two fine farmers, refusing to see myself as less fortunate than my neighbor, and striving to always eradicate what inequalities I can.
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