When I walk through another wing I always look into other girls' rooms. I like to see how others make this rabbit hole of a room into a home. Many of us arrange the furniture creatively. We use clippings from magazines, catalogs, greeting cards. We buy fake flowers to put in plastic cups, strands of Christmas lights to frame the mirrors. Almost every room looks mismatched and kitchsy. But every room becomes comfortable and homey.
I used to think of these rooms as cell blocks or closets-- too small and uncomfortable to live in forever, or even for four years. Now I think of my small room as a place to come back to, my only comfortable place. It is my tatami, my place of meditation and solace. When I return home I will no longer have this space. I don't have a room at home. I sleep in the guest room.
I am not returning home. I am leaving home. In four years this town, this college has become my home. In one year this room has become my home. My wingmates have become my sisters. My chaplain is my pastor. My professors are my parents and friends.
But now, whether I am ready or not, they shove me out the door. Once again I feel like someone has torn off my beloved training wheels. Gone?! How can I survive now? I become frustrated, angry, and scared. I’m not ready to balance on my own. What if I need this support for another semester, another year? But just like Dad, my professors and friends here at school know me; they know what I need. I need the training wheels to come off. Eventually I will learn to ride alone, free to discover, free to fall, free to live.
Where does the word "stereotype" come from? A stereo plays radio stations and compact discs. A type is, well, a kind of something. "Stereotype" sounds like it should mean a kind of music player.
Sometimes I wonder if I am a stereotype, if I fit a mold. Maybe I am the stereotypical nonconformist: cuts up in class, wears mismatched clothes, makes random noises, doesn't do her hair, doesn't shower. Do all those things fit into a category? Could people say, "Oh, she's just like all those other girls, bouncing up and down and yelling for no reason. She makes me sick"?
I am a band geek, stereotypically. I make jokes about other instruments (that's like a bassoonist with short thumbs) and musical terms (you're stuck in mezzo-land). My fellow band geeks and I eat together, practice together, live together, cry, laugh, whine together. I'm pretty sure people feel like outsiders when they're with us. But its our life.
I am a music theory nerd also. I take to insulting people by calling them hemiolas or picardy thirds. I compare every other field to music-- architecture, biology, writing, math, law. I actually enjoy full compositional analysis. I love correcting theory homework.
I am not your typical female, however, what with the not showering and mismatched clothes. I seldom wear makeup. I pick scabs. I occasionally pick my nose. I am not disgusted by talk of bodily fluids, sex organs, or exotic foods-- even at the dinner table. I am loud and blunt. I'm kind of a boy.
But then I'm not. I need affection. I like girlie romantic comedies. I like making jewelry. I love purple. I enjoy good-smelling perfume, soap, candles. I sometimes like to dress up. I flirt.
I am not the stereotypical American teenager. I don't own a cell phone, a TV, a car, or a computer. I own less than twenty movies, less than 100 CDs. I despise network television most of the time. I also despise fast food and organized sports.
Do all these things add up to some kind of category that another human being can fit into? And what does that mean-- should that person be my soulmate or my nemesis? And how many people need to enter into a category before one can justly label it a stereotype? 20,000? Seven? 6 billion? Maybe I'm just your stereotypical "doesn't-fit-the-mold." Or is that too presumptuous?
What women want men to know: be as romantic and wonderful as Jane Austen's Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice and you will make women's hearts melt: GUARANTEED.
When he finishes atoning for the holy place and the tent of meeting and the altar, he shall offer the live goat. Then Aaron shall lay both of his hands on the head of the live goat, and confess over it all the iniquities of the sons of Israel and all their transgressions in regard to all their sins; and he shall lay them on the head of the goat and send it away into the wilderness by the hand of a man who stands in readiness. The goat shall bear on itself all their iniquities to a solitary land; and he shall release the goat into the wilderness. Leviticus 16:20-22
This was a section of scripture discussed this morning in church. The pastor asked us to imagine ourselves as one of the Israelites, watching Aaron describe all the people's sins as his hands are on the scapegoat. I can imagine feeling painfully ashamed. Aaron knows everyone of my sins, and he says them out loud for the whole community to hear. But by placing them on the goat, the goat takes the sins into the wilderness, never to be seen again. God gave the Israelites a vivid picture of how God forgave them. Though they are full of shame and sin, God removes that sin from us forever, never to be thought of by Him again.
Pastor said that the sacrifice that accompanies this scapegoat is for broken people. I was comforted by that idea, because I know today more than ever that I am so broken. I need that sacrifice to bring me back to God. In fact, this sacrifice is called the atonement sacrifice-- making us at-one with God once again.
I wrote the following satirical nursery rhyme earlier this week, but Blogger would publish for some reason. It relates to this message, in a way:
A student named Ruthie sat on a wall. This student named Ruthie had a great fall. And none of her teachers and none of her friends could put broken Ruthie together again.
Although I feel broken beyond repair, God forgives my sins so that I can come back to Him.
Name: Ruthie Home: Japan About Me: I want to know who God is and what his truth is. I love getting lost in beautiful music and cloudless star-filled skies, especially in the fall. I hate being bored. I like big cities. I want to travel the world. read more
Name: Ruthie