Absurdity

Gun’s Quote-of-the-Week:

“Even though you can't expect to defeat the absurdity of the world, you must make that attempt. That's morality, that's religion. That's art. That's life.”

-Phil Ochs

This weekend, I hosted 23 members of my family for a pre-Christmas dinner since we all have Christmas plans that do not involve our being together. I was hosting because I asked to.

Why would I do such a thing? In order to motivate myself to clean my house. You see, having so many people over meant that I would finally have to take care of the huge piles of paper everywhere. It meant organizing my bedroom… at least a little. It meant going through the boxes of stuff that were just sitting in my living room. This is my motivation; put yourself in a situation where action MUST be required, or else I simply will not perform the action.

Nothing was done Saturday morning. My reasoning suddenly seemed, uh, flawed.

Then mom came to the rescue. It was as if she knew that I wasn’t going to be ready. (It was if she knew that I was absurd enough to try to pull this off.)  In a matter of two hours, the bedroom, the desk, the living room were all in order. We could start cooking after that, and, of course, she did the cooking, too. The absurdity of me planning a family event to get me to clean my house was counter-balanced by the absurdity of my mother doing it for me. I’m 28 years old and my mom cleaned my house.

We all had a great time and it was fun to be able to get everyone in one place, if even cramped. Apples to Apples was hilarious and the food was fantastic.

Then again, the whole reason for the Christmas season was because of an absurd mother. A 14-year-old virgin, engaged, no less, got pregnant. Her pregnancy was not the result of her boyfriend at the time. She rode on the back of a donkey – a DONKEY – to a town several miles away while she was nine-months pregnant. When she got there, she was refused at an inn. She instead decided to stay in the stables where she gave birth, and to top it all off hid her kid for years afterwards because of a nightmare she had where the king of her country wanted to kill the baby. Let’s not forget about the fact that this whole baby-before-marriage scenario would have mandated her stoning at the time. Minor detail.

Our world would be very different if that mother decided not to accept the above absurd proposition from an angel that just happened to show up and explain the whole ordeal. It would seem I am not the first first-born son to cause a great deal of angst and anxiety among his mom.

I love the end of this quote: “That’s life.” Yes, it is. Apple was absurd for dreaming up the iPod. The Wright brothers were absurd for thinking they could invent a flying machine. Our parents are absurd for having children that will endlessly consume them for dozens of years of their life. Through their respective absurdity, we push our world forwards, leaving the next day better than the first. Sometimes it means pulling off a family dinner.

Sometimes it means bearing the Savior of the world.

Merry Christmas.

…and that’s why it’s a Gun’s Quote!

Foundations

Gun’s Quote-of-the-Week:

“Life is made up of pluses and minuses.

The pluses give us hope.

The minuses give us strength.”

-Unknown

The past two weeks have been replete with dropped balls, frustration and stress. I do not at all like being this way. Not during December. Not during Christmas. This is a time for joy, peace, hope and love. Not blood, sweat and tears. We can save that for the other 11 months, thank you very much.

2011 has been a very hard year for me. There is no good reason as the following happens to all of us. It started with a new job that was very difficult to transition into and challenging to maintain. It seemingly took forever to get on my feet. Still not 100% sure I’m actually on my feet, to tell the truth. There are more good days than bad, but it is so hard to have to walk into a situation and not know what is going on. Lack of experience is one of the most frustrating attributes I have ever encountered. There are just so many questions out there that I don’t know the answers to. Yes I’ll learn, but this past year has been learning the hard way.

It was the second week of January when I had a car wreck. Nobody was hurt, maimed or killed, but my insurance dropped me. Getting new insurance significantly cost more, and I paid for the repair out of my own pocket trying to get my original carrier to not count the wreck. That didn’t happen. Then the transmission went out. The radio quit. The dash lights have burned out. Now the check engine light is on. Again.

The senior class that I grew to love in my youth group graduated in May. It was the first class that I spent all four years with as a volunteer. I had no idea that was going to be so hard. Transitioning into the new group of freshmen after so many that I love left for college was much more difficult than I imagined. All of a sudden, there were a ton of kids that didn’t know my name and I didn’t know theirs. In a way, it felt like I was starting over.

Then there was, of course, the loss of one of our own teens due to suicide.

I could continue my lamentations for 2011 but if you have any sense at all you should have stopped reading them half-way up already. Suffice it to say I’m done with this year. I hope it burns with the heat of 10,000 suns in raging fires of hell while I sit and watch it from above while eating kettle corn. I’ve never been a huge fan of New Years. This year, I’m having a party. I may even smoke a cigar.

(I will never smoke a cigar.)

There are enough pluses in 2011 to give me a real sense of hope for 2012. A lot of ground was broken. There were a lot of new starts. There was a lot of foundation work. There’s a girlfriend. (True story!) My hope is that with the extra strength that I have gained from all the minuses, I can quickly build a strong house on top of that foundation and bounce-back from all these setbacks. Indeed, there are times when you have to tear down before you can build up. This is my time.

My sincere hope is that you can do the same. May your pluses and minuses grant you the hope and strength that you need to carry on always.

…and that’s why it’s a Gun’s Quote!

Acne

Gun’s Quote-of-the-Week:

“If I didn’t have acne, I would be a model.”

-Adam Loya

Adam, I’m not going to lie, I absolutely love quoting you. Of all the teens, you honestly crack me up more times than any. The above quote is why I have a Virtus-approved man-crush on you.

For those that need context, (As if that were necessary…) Adam came walking into Blackdog, our local coffee shop wearing is classic Adam-Faux Hawk. A group of us were talking about it and how good it looked. Adam, without hesitation, acknowledged his pristine hair, and then simultaneously stated that if he didn’t have acne, he could be a model.

Oh, brother…

…and that’s why it’s a Gun’s Quote!