Pilgrim Notes

Page 14 of 72

Inception in a World of Real and Unreal

Leonardo DiCaprio in Inception

Richard Weaver wrote, “Ideas have consequences.” GK Chesterton once said (and I paraphrase), “There is a thought that brings all thought to an end.” Christopher Nolan’s “Inception” is a mind-bending trip through dream world upon dream world upon dream world, exploring the consequences of ideas and the power of ideas to bring our world(s) to an end.

Many of Nolan’s film wrestle with ideas about our perception, and the struggle to discern the real from the unreal. Both Batman films (Batman Begins and the Dark Knight) immerse us into a dark world where the hero (Batman) must face an ambiguous evil that disrupts the mind and turns the world upside down. In a strange way, it reminds me of 1 and 2 Kings. In his commentary on Kings, Leithart suggests that these books may really be considered wisdom books because they tell story after story where the ruler is thrust into ambiguous settings, and is called upon to make a decision.

The prime example is Solomon. Being forced to choose between two woman who both make claim to the same baby. Solomon needs wisdom to shed light in a situation where good and evil are not clearly in the light. Nolan’s films reveal characters thrust into those same murky places that confuse the mind. His characters need wisdom to know how to choose, how to act in the middle of the mess.

Ebert sees a connection between Inception and an earlier Nolan film, Memento. I agree. The story of Memento is told by a man with short term memory loss. His blind sight is our blind sight. At times, the film is disorienting as we try to make sense the story in his world. His body is covered in tattoos. Gradually, we realize that these tattoos are his memory. It is not until the end of the movie that we understand the story we’re in.

Memento tells a story backwards through bits and pieces of narrative, fleeting images, a body marked with memory. All these questions come alive in his newest film. Inception follows a man and his wife into a confusion of reality between waking and dreaming. As the lines blur, discernment about what is real and what is not fades.

There are multiple points through “Inception” when we the viewer almost lose our bearing. We are experiencing the chaotic struggle of the characters caught up in a world that intertwines fantasy with reality. While Inception delves inward toward a Jungian subconscious dream world, it explores themes that are just as real in our waking world.

The premise of the film rests on the idea that we can enter into another person’s dreams and learn ways to extract their secrets or even suggest new ideas. This is not the simple dream combat of Dreamscape from the early 80s. This dream tinkering requires a team of professionals: an architect to build the world, a druggist to control the dream state, a forger who is a master of becoming other people in dreams, a researcher who prepares the details, and of course the action man who steals the idea or in this film attempts to plant an idea.

All this inner exploring can be confusing. At one point, the viewers of the film are submerged in four different dream worlds occurring at the same time. All these worlds have been created through ideas. All these worlds have the power to entrap, deceive and threaten life itself. These worlds are supposed to be about the inner world of dreams, but these inner worlds are not so very different from our outer world.

In the movie, they created symbolic worlds or worlds that carried and expressed meaning, even hidden meaning within a person’s soul. Our dream worlds are filled with all sorts of fascinating images and structures and people. Memory and meaning are blended in fantasy where it is difficult to discern what really real or true. But this isn’t just our dream world. In our waking world, we face the same challenge to discern the real from the unreal.

We live in a world where ideas give birth to homes, clothes, cars and entire cities. The power of a spoken idea is the power to set worlds in motion. As Weaver and Chesterton pointed out, ideas have real power, and some ideas can lead to the end of ideas, to the end of our world.

In this film, Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) is trying to plant an idea in a man’s mind through his dreams. He knows this can be done because he has done it before with disastrous effects. Cobb himself is a man tormented by the power of deception and guilt to twist the waking and dreaming mind into confusion and limbo.

In this film, we see how ideas can twist our perception and our ability to know the true from the false, the real from the unreal. We see how some ideas can lead to the distrust of every idea.

In his day Chesterton realized there were ideas being planted in people’s mind that would eventually spring up and cause men to question rationality itself. In other words, he saw the danger of some ideas that would lead us into such a state of confusion, we’d be trapped in a limbo.

These ideas were not planted through dreams because the real place of influence is not through our dreams but through our ears. Speech has the power to change the world. To create the world. False speech twists the world into a confusion between the real and the unreal.

Hitler built a world on speech that twisted the real and the unreal. This speech took form in bodies, buildings, books, tanks, and war. Augustine built a world on speech in submission to Christ. The words he speaks in “Confessions” and “The City of God” still resound and still take shape in lives, cities, and societies.

As a rhetorician, Augustine understood that speech touches to heart and the mind and the body. Classical rhetoric is about learning how to speak. Quintillion said that rhetoric is the “art of a good man speaking well.” Great rhetoric integrates the mind with the emotions and moves the body to act. What is often called rhetoric in our world today is simply a shell of what once was a great art, thus it is often seen as manipulative and dishonest.

As I watched Inception, I thought about the power of speech. I thought about how wrong ideas can cloud out ability to perceive our world. Our perception can be distorted by anger, hurt, pride, and self ambition. False words can cloud our ability to see what is really real. But I also thought about the power of true speech to rebuild a world that is crumbling.

Paul writes to a people in Corinth who are being seduced by an idea that suggests the physical world is unimportant and only the spiritual is of value. He sees the danger in this idea. He proclaims true speech over false speech. He challenges the distorting power of false ideas with the true idea. He proclaims gospel (good news). He proclaims resurrection: the bodily resurrection of Christ and the bodily resurrection of His people.

In so doing, he reaffirms a real world. A real material world that really matters. His words still resound in people who need the wisdom of God to make wise decisions, speak wise words and act wisely in a world that confuses the real and unreal, the significant and the trivial, the true and the false.

Hear O Israel

July 8, 2010 / dougfloyd / 9 Comments

Shema (image by Yaniv Ben-Arie used by Creative Commons)

Lately I’ve been thinking aloud about listening. I’ve been talking about the different forms of listening like empathic listening, active listening, ethnographic listening. Along the way, I’ve made a bunch of mental notes, and I’m having a hard time keeping up with them.

I remembered a story about listening while I took a shower this morning. It seems I always remember things while in the shower. Sometimes I wonder if I might find a lost set of keys by simply taking a shower. Anyway, back to the remembered story.

Shortly after Kelly and I were married, she noticed a peculiar habit of mine (one among many). I pointed at food during our meals. We would be talking about the day’s events when I would point at the bread. She handed me the bread, and then I’d point to the butter.

At my folks house, she noticed everyone pointed during the meal. After about a month, she asks me, “What’s with all this pointing during the meal times?” No one had ever asked me, so I never even thought about it before.

“Well, my dad likes to tell stories, and he doesn’t like to be interrupted. So in my family, we just started pointing at food instead of asking someone to pass it.”

I grew up listening to my dad’s stories. And in many ways, I’m a better storylistener than storyteller. People tell me their stories. And I like to listen.

But listening is not always easy.

I don’t like the telephone because it’s too easy for me to get distracted from listening. Without the person in front of me, my mind wanders so easily. A friend is talking on the phone. He is trying to remember a mutual acquaintance. “Old so and so. What was his name?”

As he continues talking, all I can hear is, “old so and so.” Only in my mind’s eye, I see the words, “sew and sew.” I see a big pair of scissors opening and closing. Then I see them up on an old Cas Walker building on Broadway. The neon scissors are opening and closing as they cut prices. I hear Cas say, “Shop at the sign of the shears.”

Sign of the shears. That sounds funny. What if the big scissors were atop the Sears building on Central? “Shop at the sign of the Sears.”

I’m slipping. I see a flashing neon light over a steakhouse, “At the Sign of the Steers.” I tumbling down into Alice’s Wonderland of Rhyme when suddenly me friends’ voice breaks the fall, “So what do you think?”

Think? Oh great. What was he talking about? I scramble. “Well, what do you think?” he starts up again. Whew, that was close. I must concentrate. Pay attention.

Like I said, listening can be hard.

Back in Jesus’ day, the Pharisees were a bit hard of hearing as well. They kept misunderstanding what he said. When he told the story of Israel and God’s purposes for His people, He told it in a way that sounded different.

“What is he up to?,” some of them queried suspiciously. They didn’t trust him. Then again, they didn’t trust his Father either. Isaiah told Israel as much. He warned that they would become blind, deaf and lame like the idols they trusted.

One day a Pharisee asks Jesus what is the greatest of the commands. Jesus replies, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.” He responds by reciting the “Shema.”

Israel recited, prayed and even posted this command in the Mezuzah they placed in their doorways. Shema comes from the Hebrew word for prayer. First and foremost, the Israelite must hear.

As Jesus speaks, he is not simply repeating Moses’ age old command. He is the Word Made Flesh. And he is the Son of Man who truly obeys the command. He hears and obeys.

As Jesus speaks, it is with the same power and authority of God as He spoke at creation, “Let there be Light.” And there was light. Jesus says, “Hear O Israel.” Even as he speaks the power of God is present to heal deaf ears and mute tongues. When man can no longer hear the Word of God, he loses his power to speak as well. His words fall like powerless chatter.

As we read the story, Jesus’ word, “Hear O Israel” steps out from the page and breaks into our heart. He is speaking directly to us. We are the deaf ones. He is restoring our hearing, and He is engrafting us into Israel. When He says, “Hear O Israel,” we are included.

His Living Word breaks into upon our deaf ears, giving us ears to hear. For only in “Hearing” the Word can we believe. “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God” (Rom 10:17). Now oddly enough, this makes me think of a science fiction movie I recently watched called, Moon.

In the story, one man lives on a moon station with no other humans. He has been working there for almost three years and will soon finish his commitment and get to return to earth. But there is a problem. Everything his believes about his world is wrong. He is bind and deaf to what is real, and it will take another voice outside himself to reveal this.

We are like this man working alone on the moon. We have limited knowledge of our world. At any given moment, our perceptions are limited and distorted by our own feelings and responses to the events around us. We misunderstand ourselves and the people around us. We hold grudges; we struggle against bitterness; we remember too many sorrows and not enough joys. We are incapable loving perfectly.

Jesus calls out, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. And the second, like it, is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ (Mark 12:29-31).

He breaks into our self-contained world with His Word of Truth, His Word of Life. He says, “This is the way, walk ye in it.” And acknowledging our complete inability to obey the Father, He answers the command. Jesus, the Son of Man, responds to the call of God and He Loves the Father with all His heart, soul, mind and strength. He loves his neighbor as himself (see John 15:12).

So we rest in Him. We live in Him. We love in Him. By His Spirit, He heals our deaf ears, He anoints our blind eyes, He leads us step by step into a world of truth beyond our distorted perceptions. Through His healing touch, I learn to listen to people around me. I learn to hear them as He hears them. I learn to love as He loves.

He keeps speaking through His Word. He keeps transforming me in His Spirit. He keeps leading me into the love and glory and life of His life in the Father, Son and Spirit.

20 “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, 21 that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, 23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me. 24 Father, I desire that they also, whom you have given me, may be with me where I am, to see my glory that you have given me because you loved me before the foundation of the world. 25 O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. 26 I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them.” (John 17:20-26)

Moon and Summer Hours

July 6, 2010 / dougfloyd / 0 Comments

Sam Rockwell in Moon

Last Friday I enjoyed a double feature, watching Moon and Summer Hours. On the surface, both films seem like worlds apart–literally. With nods to 2001 Space Odyssey, Blade Runner, Solaris and a host of other sci-fi greats, Moon tells the story of relationship, survival and sacrifice through one’s struggle to survive a lonely outpost on the the moon. By contrast, Summer Hours follows the intimate interactions of French siblings as they eat and talk amidst a collection of fine art and thriving plants.

I enjoy watching two films at a time. The similarities and variations in the films raise questions that I might not have noticed in isolation.

So to paraphrase Tertullian’s biting question, “What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem?, ” I wonder aloud, “What does Moon have to do with Summer Hours?” in response, I offer a few thoughts below. Just a warning before you proceed, there are spoilers in my post. So if you haven’t seen the films and want to be surprised, you might bypass my comments.

Moon
Moon opens with commercial promising an abundance of energy for almost all people on the planet to enjoy. As it turns out, the moon provides a source of harvestable energy the planet Earth. Cut to Sam Bell, running on a treadmill with his playful, “Wake Me When It’s Quitting Time” t-shirt. As it turns out, it is almost quitting time.

Sam (Sam Rockwell) is at the end of a three-year commitment, and he’s about to wake up. There’s something about working alone for three years (and no live feed from earth), that is about to drive Sam crazy. From the bright white interior of the moonstation, the videos from earth, to the stark blackness outside the moonstation, many of the images in Moon communicate isolation.

His only companion is the moonstation robot, GERTY, who expresses his feelings via a mini-monitor with emoticons. Sam records his work and his mental state on the videocam. He is weary and ready for home. “Three years is too long for this commitment.”

On a routine mission, Sam crashes in the side of a Helium-3 harvester. We join the disorientation of Sam as he awakes in the recovery room and wonder alongside him, “How did he get there?”

Sam begins waking up to the fact that he’s not Sam. We follow Sam as he clambers across the moonstation like a baby learning to walk. He IS a baby learning to walk. He eventually discovers and rescues the other Sam, dying in the crashed moon vehicle. We puzzle alongside him, as he realizes the other Sam looks like him, has his memories and claims to be the real Sam.

The Sams gradually awake to the realization they are but clones of the original Sam, and that many more clones stand ready to replace them after a three-year interval. GERTY assists Sam in this discovery when he learns to ask GERTY the right questions.
The film turns into a beautiful exploration of Blade Runner’s question, “What does it mean to be human?” We watch the two Sam’s struggle with the bitter reality of their predicament, we also witness genuine human compassion and self-sacrifice. Sam Rockwell offers a stunning portrait of inner angst, the human tenacity of struggle for life, companionship and the tenderness between two humans.

Summer Hours

Summer Hours
Unlike the harsh visual contrast throughout Moon, Summer Hours is a visually soft film that captures the organic unity between humans and their creations in the midst of a welcoming landscape of plants and flowers and trees.

Instead of one person and one machine, we are immersed into an extended family of grandmother, children, grandchildren and a housekeeper. The film opens to children playing and running through a lush, green landscape. They are full of life, laughter and play.

Their parents reminisce, toast to life and celebrate the birthday of their mother Helene. They give her three gifts: a Philips cordless phone set, a soft afghan, and the first press of a book featuring the collection of art she has preserved during her life. Helene discusses the art collection with her son Frederic and encourages him to oversee that sale of this collection once she is gone.

After the children and their families leaves, Helene sits looking at her new phone in the twilight. This scene fades out like other key transitions in the film: the light gives way to shadows and then darkness. We since the day is ended for Helene, and it has.

As the light rises on a new, Helene is gone, and the children are deciding the fate of her estate. The film follows the gentle tension between Frederic who wants to preserve the art collection and the estate, and the other two siblings who prefer to sell it.

Life is Transition
While both films differ in style, substance and setting, I think they both explore the challenge of transition or change from different angles. Moon reveals a world that has tried to use clones instead of people to power their moonstation. Yet the clones are always trapped in a three-year interval, and they are exterminated after three-years.

Those who manage the moonstation have tried to create an endless three-year cycle to power their programs. In one sense, Moon is a sci-fi film about using technology to stop or resist change. The clones are expendable.

Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy suggested that when the parent refuses to speak to their child (the new generation) and chooses to preserve only the past, they have become decadent. Decadence always requires the sacrifice of the next generation.

This world has come up with a convenient form of sacrifice: clones. One problem. The clones awake to this dark truth, and like all humans fight to live. But I would suggest that it is not the drive to live that ultimately reveals their humanity.

Both Sams struggle with this threat to their existence. Yet instead of viewing one another as competitors for survival, they discover companionship. They play ping-pong together. They share their duplicates memories with one another. And ultimately both men are willing to sacrifice themselves for the other.

In the end, the older Sam convinces the younger Sam to escape to earth while he sacrifices his dreams and hopes of survival. As the film ends, a reporter’s voice talks about the newly arrived clone on planet earth, and there is a sense that the old Sam has sacrificed his life to change the future.

In this act, he fulfills what Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy suggests is the power of change, the willingness to die/sacrifice to create the future.

While Summer Hours tells a tale about art and family and French culture, it is also telling a tale about change. In the first scene, children are running across the lawn and through different settings. They are in transition.

Virtually ever scene shows the main character going through doors, moving around, walking from inside to outside and so on. The film pulses with constant motion of people as well as the continuous interplay of light and shadows across windows panes and more.

The art collection is divided up, sold to private collectors and museums and given to some French museums (to reduce the tax burden). The art pieces that seemed part of the family background are decontextualized in the museum and sadly seem a bit lifeless.

The family is changing. Two of the siblings, Adrienne and Jeremie have chosen to leave France and building lives in America and Asia. Sylvie, Frederic’s daughter, is transitioning from childhood into adulthood. While Frederic seems a bit wistful, he adjusts to the transitions.

The film is lyrical movement of family and people and even objects in transition. While there is a sense of loss, there is also a sense of hope at the world ahead. In the final scene, Sylvie has a party at the old house before it is sold. Instead of an image of complete teenage debauchery, we see the old house come back to life and people laugh and dance and talk and move all through the house.

The camera follows Sylvie as she wanders through the crowd finding her boyfriend. Soon they are wandering through the fields. She pauses and laments the loss of this house that her grandmother had told her would always be there. Then she and her boyfriend climb over the wall of the estate and playfully run off into the trees.

In both films, the future breaks into the present in unexpected ways. In Summer Hours it is bittersweet, yet playful and lovingly intimate as a family learns to step forward into a new world. In Moon, change means sacrifice and death for one man so that another man could live. Both films continue to play upon my imagination as I think about the pain and joy of stepping into tomorrow.

Prophetic Faith

July 2, 2010 / dougfloyd / 1 Comment

Moses the Prophet of the LORD (photo by rorris via Creative Commons)

I will sing of steadfast love and justice;
to you, O LORD, I will make music.
I will ponder the way that is blameless.
(The Holy Bible : English standard version. 2001 (Ps 101:1–2). Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.)

This morning as I reflected upon Psalm 101, I heard David singing. He is singing back the Word of God’s covenant faithfulness. He is singing about the “way that is blameless.” What is the “way” that he is pondering? Before we can begin to understand what David means, we must understand how the revelation of TORAH provides a foundation for everything in Scripture that follows it. By TORAH, I am referring to the first five books of Scripture. In TORAH, the LORD speaks His people “into being” through His servant Moses.

Thus Moses in rightly understood as the first and greatest of the Prophets (prior to the end of the ages when John the Baptist and Jesus Christ appear). The TORAH is God’s revelation, God’s Word, God’s breath, quickening the children of Israel into the people of God. The Ten Commandments in some ways captures the heart of TORAH. In Deuteronomy 5, after Moses speaks the Word of the LORD in the Ten Commandments he says,

³³ You shall walk in all the way that the Lord your God has commanded you, that you may live, and that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land that you shall possess. (The Holy Bible : English standard version. 2001 (Dt 5:33). Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.)

The “way” includes obedience to the Word of the Lord. Per Deuteronomy 6,the “way” includes love of God, fear of God, meditation upon the commandments, obedience to the commandments, teaching of the commandments, living the commandments in the family and in the community. In one sense, “way” refers to the Word of God enfleshed in God’s people. It is obedience the commandments. This obedience is rooted in the life that comes from God’s Word alone.

God’s Word is not just a set a written texts, it is His Living Breathing Word, blowing through His servant Moses and calling forth the people of God. Just as the LORD breathes into clay and forms Adam, the LORD breathes into and through His people to bring life and righteousness and power and glory. This WORD is not simply ideas, but enters and enlivens human form. Adam comes to life. Israel becomes a people. Ezekiel speaks (blows) over the dry bones and they come to life.

As the ancient Israelites meditate upon TORAH, they soak and read and speak and sing and act the WORD of the LORD. They dwell in the Life-giving Breath of God. This prophetic faith was never meant to simply be carved into stone. The stone is but a memorial of the real carving, shaping, forming that the WORD of the LORD does as He breathes into the hearts of His people. It is prophetic is the truest sense of the word. “Prophecy” is the wind, breath, word of God that creates, brings light, brings life, and fulfills God’s Will. Ours is a prophetic faith because it is rooted in the creative breath (Word) of God.

6 And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. 7 You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. (The Holy Bible : English standard version. 2001 (Dt 6:5–9). Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.)

From the very beginning, His WORD was given to shape us into His image in our hearts. Circumcision pointed ultimately to the heart being shaped for love and life,

6 And the LORD your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live. (The Holy Bible : English standard version. 2001 (Dt 30:5–6). Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.)

Just as the Spirit hovers over the waters of the deep at Creation, He hovers over the heart of man, blowing, speaking, convicting, shaping us into being as the Image of God. But the heart of man turns away of this Living Word.

17 But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, 18 I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish. (The Holy Bible : English standard version. 2001 (Dt 30:17–18). Wheaton: Standard Bible Society.)

Simply having the Commandments carved in stone gave Israel no magic power. The stone was not a talisman that protected them from enemies. The stone was simply a reminder of the Living, Breathing Word of God sent forth to transform their hearts. But in turning toward idols, they turn away from Life and toward lifeless images made of wood and stone and other lifeless, breathless objects. Thus they have hearts of stone.

David sings about the way that is blameless. He is singing about trusting in this Life-Giving, Spirit-Breathing Word of God blowing forth from TORAH and obeying it (echoing it in our thoughts, words and deeds). The Old Testament tells a story of humanity resisting, rejecting and turning away from the Word of God. It also tells the story of God’s mercy and faithfulness and promise to fulfill His Word in His People. When God enters into history in Jesus, the Word is made Flesh. Jesus fulfills the Word in Heart, Soul, Mind and Strength. He reveals and fulfills perfect love.

Like David, we continue to sing His words. The Psalms quicken us to rehearse, echo, breath the Life Giving Word. His Word will not return void. But calls us out of darkness and into light that the life of Jesus might shine out even in our own lives. We turn to Him who is the Way, the Truth and the Life. We call upon Him. We trust Him. We abide in Him. And by His Spirit of Grace, He Who is the Way will present us blameless before the Father.

Note: I made a few minor updates on the post I originally put up earlier today.

After Parting

July 2, 2010 / dougfloyd / 0 Comments

Photo by greekadman (used by permission via Creative Commons)

I continue to soak in the glory of Michael O’Siadhail’s poetry. In “Elegy for a Singer,” he writes one line that pierced and exposed my heart at the same time.

“…but know
that always after parting
I cherished you…”

One of the greatest treasures in my life is a meal and conversation with a few friends. And yet, I never feel that I sufficiently express my gratitude to the friends who spent their valuable time and presence in my life. After parting, the words of gratitude burn inside.

So as I read O’Siadhail, I can only echo the simmering love revealed in his words to a friend. I am rich for I have dined in the presence of glorious people who fed my soul and continue to strengthen my memories.

The Beautiful People of Charleston

June 23, 2010 / dougfloyd / 1 Comment

I met Lanis at Charleston's Candy Kitchen.

After spending a few days on the beach, our whole family boarded three cars and all 14 of us caravanned from Myrtle Beach to Charleston. Might as well get a little culture (Southern style) while on vacation. A two-hour drive for my family is still a bit long, so we took a pit stop about 40 minutes away from Charleston for restroom “rest” and snacks. We stopped at a large gas station/general store (sorry no pix).

Visiting the Men’s Room
One by one, the men headed back to “our” room, which was at the back of the store. As we stepped through the door of the men’s room, we stepped onto a loading dock at the back of the store. My first response was to assume I entered the wrong door and turn around. Nope. I was right. The men’s room door opens onto a loading dock. Immediately, I wonder if the men are expected to find some outhouse out back.As it turns out, the men’s room was behind another door on the dock. If you’re ever 40 minutes outside of Charleston, this is good fun watching the puzzled faces of men as they step onto a loading dock in search of the restroom.

A 14 person pit stop takes about 45 minutes of stopping, snacking and looking for stragglers. I think we waited about 10 minutes for Andy (my brother-in-law) to come out of the store who happened to be in his car waiting on us. Once we discovered that we were all really present (as present as possible), we shifted into drive en route to the “Holy City.”

Fort Sumter
As we rolled into the city, a sign pointed left to Ft Sumter, so we obeyed. When I walk through a museum, I try to read all the words on the signs. It’s my form of penance for years spent reading comic books instead of my history books. I’m hoping to learn all I missed before I forget it.

As I meandered through the exhibits, I was stuck by beauty of these people. The families of Charleston play a fundamental role in the formation of these United States of America (even though we often fail to recognize all the ways they contributed to the forming of the fledgling nation). In so many ways, these were beautiful people with beautiful stories and beautiful dreams. And yet…

the stain of slavery bleeds onto every page of this multi-layered tapestry. As a Southerner myself, I wonder how could so many devoutly religious people defend a system that dehumanized an entire race of people. How could they be so blind? But even as the words stumble out, I am struck with a deeper, darker question, “What is our blindspot?” This generation so easily looks back in judgment on the cruelties of early ages, but are we to assume a race of people has finally been born without blindspots? I doubt it.

Before this turns into a game of political finger-pointing at what group is blind and immoral, let me clarify to say that I am so very blind. If anything, Ft Sumter reminds me that I have the same capacity to dehumanize and fail to see the beauty in the people (and world) around me.

Lord have mercy.

Soon our stomachs won over our minds, and the whole Floyd clan scrambled away from Sumter and toward sandwiches.

Floyd Clan Dining at Tommy Condon's Irish Pub

Rackshaw
After a delicious meal at Tommy Condon’s Irish Pub, we boarded “rackshaws” (pronounced pedi-cab) and quickly learned the difference between a taxi and a tour. Thinking we were getting a carriage drawn tour of Chareston for the low, low price of $4.50 a person, we lined up outside of the restaurant awaiting our “prince charming” so to speak. After about ten minutes, we noticed several rackshaw drivers sitting across the street waving at us. Turns out our carriage turned into a pumpkin before we even boarded.

They convinced us to take a chance and “ride the rackshaw.” So we did. Admittedly, we had a nice ride circling the block. In fact, I really like Larry (the guy who drive Kelly and I). He even told us a few interesting points of interest about Charleston. As it turns out, most drivers were silent. As licensed “taxi” drivers they were not licensed to give tours. If you want a fun little “green” taxi drive in Charleston, these guys fit the bill. If you want a tour of the historic city, look elsewhere.

The Candy Girl
By the time we finished our taxi, the snacks from the morning and the lunch from 15 minutes ago, were already starting to fade. With out “active pace,” we needed refueling. There’s nothing like sugar to strengthen a weary soul, so we ambled over to Charleston’s Candy Kitchen. From the moment we walked in the door, we were treated to candy corn, pralines, glazed pecans and gelato samples. This has to be one of the friendliest stores I’ve ever visited. It goes to show that sugar really does make you sweeter.

The young lady who greeted us upon arrival and departure was named Lanis (see picture at top of page). She wins the award for “friendliest of the friendliest.” In fact, her hospitality reminded me of the warm welcome I received several years earlier from “Uncle Ben.” A legless, faith-filled kind seller of incense who welcomed us to Charleston in 2006 with outstretched arms and a heart of love.

Lanis revealed that same joy-filled sparkle in her smile, her demeanor and her words. She told me that she was studying women and gender in college with hopes of eventually serving women and children in Latin America. As I talked with Lanis and listened to her passion for mission and service, I kept thinking about my walk through the Ft Sumter museum. She’s one of the beautiful people of Charleston.

This grand old city has known prestige and grandeur as well as struggle and pain. The conflicted story of slavery stains its past, and yet the beauty still shines around every corner. As I think of Charleston, I am reminded of a world that is filled with real and awful suffering. But as a person of faith in Christ, I do not believe suffering and human cruelty has the last word. Rather, I behold the God who pour himself into the brokeneness of human life and healed it from the inside out. He restores beauty into His good and wondrous creation.

So Lanis reminds me of beauty and love and kindness and self-giving. In her, I see a glimmer of His making all things new. Once again, I am reminded that wherever I turn and whomever I meet, has been created in His image. Oh that the blindness of prejudice and envy and jealousy might be healed so that I can see in and through the light of His glory, beholding the beauty of His handiwork throughout all of His good and glorious creation.

Greg, our tale-teller and tour guide

The Fabled Carriage Ride
After this exhausting day of eating and riding, we finally took respite in a nice leisurely stroll through the streets of Charleston aboard a horse-drawn carriage. Greg, our part historian/tour guide and part PT Barnum, led us through the city with tales of the glory of this city and tales of his life. Ever the showman, Greg recounted stories of Charleston’s yesteryear, Charleston’s shipping community, Charleston’s role in the Revolution, and Charleston’s dedication to libation.

Along the way, he also recounted his own rich Southern heritage and his successful bet to live in Charleston for a year without electricity. By the end of the ride, our eyes were dancing with dreams of days gone by and a sense that magic still happens in along these lanes. if you ever visit Charleston be sure to take a carriage ride with Greg and ask him to tell you the story of Eli Whitney.

As the day came to a close, we feasted on Bubba Gump’s shrimp, then boarded our motorized carriages for an evening drive back to Myrtle Beach, to our awaiting beach house, and to dishes of ice cream for all.

Charleston Skyline by Night

Family Vacation

June 22, 2010 / dougfloyd / 2 Comments

Floyd Family Vacation 2010

Last week I shared a house with the 14 people in my family. Parents, siblings, nieces and nephews ate together, played together, fought together and lived together in close quarters for seven days. It’s been well over 20 years since I went on family vacation, and back then only five of us packed up the Bonneville and travelled to the beach.

I was delighted to play with my nieces and nephews, and I was enriched by the simplicity of just spending time with family. The simple act of “spending time” together is pure gift. Oh that we might see the real gifts instead of the false ones.

Six years ago, I dedicated a blog to my beach vacation. This year, I’ll simply record a few moments from the week on this blog.

The Night Will Never Stay

June 9, 2010 / dougfloyd / 4 Comments

Night Trees with Stars (photo by jpstanley via Creative Commons)

As I’ve stated before, poetry softens my heart to listen. So I often start my time of reading and reflection with a poem. Currently, I am soaking in the penetrating words of Michael O’Siadhail. Today’s poem was such a treat that I wanted to share it with you. In this poem, O’Siadhail alludes to a poem by Eleanor Farjeon,

The Night Will Never Stay.

The night will never stay,
The night will still go by,
Though with a million stars
You pin it to the sky,
though you bind it with the blowing wind
And buckle it with the moon,
The night will slip away
Like sorrow or a tune.

With her poem in the back of your mind, listen to the words, phrases and images of O’Siadhail as he explores the turning of seasons, of night to day, of dark to light.

Springnight

Framed by our window, trunks and branches
of chestnut trees are handbook illustrations
of arteries, veins charcoaled on a frosty sky.

Unnoticed tee-shaped shoots fuzz the outline.
After a winter’s wait an increment is sprung
in slow motion, growth catching us unawares.

Night is falling. The foreground darkens.
A trial of mauve clouds along the skyline
tones into the murk. A change of scene.

I gaze. You, my love, are tucked in sleep.
On edge, I begin loneness of a night;
all eyes and ears I’m keeping this watch.

Starlight throws a window oblong on our wall,
a screen where homing cars project the trees–
slowly, then rushing back in previews of dawn.

The night will never stay. A half-refrain
from the primary reader unreels in my mind
like a mantra. Will a bird come on cue?.

A distant lemon streak. The trees blush.
In my vigil a world is disclosing its meaning:
wonderful terror, terrifying wonder of waiting.

Meeting in a Time of Tweets

June 8, 2010 / dougfloyd / 0 Comments

Frederik de Klerk & Nelson Mandela (92) (photo by World Economic Forum va Creative Commons)

The other day I commented on Nicholas Carr’s article “The Web Shatters Focus, Rewires Brains.” I mentioned a positive opportunity and a negative challenge inherent in emerging forms like the wired world of the web. One breathtaking aspect of this emergence is the possibility for connection people from all races, languages and countries.

Over the years, I’ve been blessed to form and sustain many lasting friendships across the web. My life has been enriched and challenged and expanded through conversations with people around the world. Some of whom I’ve never seen face to face.

While I see negatives in this webbed world, like the dark side of tribalism (with little patience to learn the language of other tribes) and the tendency to reduce real rhetoric and argumentation to the sloganeering of bumper stickers (which really helps no one), I also see great potential for learning how to talk, how to listen and how to connect across our “boundaries” in space and time.

In a time when we can shoot off pithy answers before thinking about the human recipient, I thought it might help to consider some folks who thought, spoke and modeled much about how humans should and could relate.

Some of the writers who deeply challenged me to think about conversation and dialogue and thinking and action are Martin Buber, Hans Urs Von Balthasar, TF Torrance and Eugen Rosenstock Huessy. While there are distinctions and disagreements in their thought, I see correspondences that might be helpful for us as we think about relationships or about moving through space and time in love.

I am going to summarize a few ideas from each man thought I recognize anything I write in such limited space is woefully incomplete. Today, I want to highlight a few thoughts from Hans Von Balthasar who focused on three essential properties of being: truth, goodness and beauty.

For now I am going to bypass his overall argument and simply focus on these three transcendentals in relationships. I confess that I am adapting his use of these in relation to God, and for now, I want to use them in relation to humans. Von Balthasar focuses on the types of knowledge I gain from truth, goodness and beauty in relation.

Truth – In one sense, truth is focused upon the credible and accurate witness. Truth focuses on both the observable and the logical. On a basic level, I meet another person and based on their appearance, I make instant decisions as to their gender, age range, possibly their status, and their race. I observe them speaking, acting, living before me.

So the knowledge I gain from truth is observable and thus objective. Other people should be able to make similar observations with similar conclusions. While this may not seem especially significant in relationship, it is deeply significant. For sadly, we break and lose relationships often on the basis of knowledge that is not credible from witnesses that cannot be trusted.

When I encounter another person, I listen, watch, observe. I must be cautious about information given me about another person. I might ask myself, “Do I trust this person as a credible witness?” “Is this person in fact the direct witness or are they relaying third hand information?” “Does this person have vested interest in my opinion the person in question?”

While I may not be able to answer these questions completely, it might help me to pause over indirect observations. Also, I might questions my own observations. When I have made a judgment about a word or action, I might ask myself self, “What did I actually observe?” “Is is possible there are multiple causes for the action I’ve observed?” These type of questions might help me to realize that even my own deductions can be suspect at times.

The danger of “truth” is that knowledge can be reduced to mere facts, categories, ideas, laws. Without the balance of “goodness” and “beauty,” truth flattens relations into mere formalism.

Goodness – In relationships, Von Balthasar understands “bonum” as the interior light I experience. In relation to God, he speaks of hearing the proclaimed/historical witness (truth) and then the inward response of faith (goodness). Whereas truth focuses upon outward sign (the observable person), goodness focuses upon the signified (the value of the person).

I hear about Jesus Christ (outward, physical life), and I believe he is my redeemer (inward response). I meet John and instantly I feel there is a connection. I believe this inward, subjective response is how Von Balthasar is using goodness. When I meet other people, I not only observe them outwardly, I make inward judgments: good, bad, nice, friend, foe, and many other much more subtle inferences.

This is why I am attracted to Kelly over Jane. This is why I make friends with Bill instead of Harry. This is why I instantly trust the words of Tim, but pause over the words of Robert. This intuitive knowledge is real knowledge that shapes my actions, but it is inward, subjective knowledge. This type of “Goodness” is present in all relationships. My value assessments may be wrong and later have to be corrected, but act of making those assessments is part of the processing in forming relationships.

The danger of goodness is that it can become utilitarian and hedonistic. Outside the balance of “truth” and “beauty,” “goodness” can become pure narcissism as all relationships exist only to further my own goals and desires.

Beauty – The knowledge I gain from beauty is distinctly different from truth and goodness. I cannot grasp or take hold of this knowledge. Beauty is the mystery of unity between form and content. Content is not behind form but within it.

Let me put it this way. I mentioned this idea of “interior light” in goodness. Beauty is the interior light within the person in front of me. It is the realization of their depths as a person. Let me give a few examples.

At one-year-old, my niece already exhibited a will. I’ve watched her choose to allow my mom to pick her up while rejecting the advances of someone else. Of course, they could still pick her up, but they couldn’t change her will by physical force. Something unique and deeply mysterious about her cannot be controlled no matter how little she is.

Each person has an external, definable form. We can ask them a series of questions and might attach certain personality characteristics to them. And yet, there is untold mystery in every human being that cannot be forced out, seized, examined under a microscope or fully controlled.

As a person turns toward me and chooses to reveal themselves, suddenly a turn of the head, a look in the eyes, a handshake, a hug, a word, or simply a silence can reveal something about that person that simply cannot be seized or captured in a test tube. This something. This mystery. This uniqueness. This is beauty. In this revelation, there is a beauty that is independent of my desires, independent of my facts and figures, there is a beauty, wonder, a glory that simply is.

I cannot even seize the moment with a picture. It simply breaks forth in the very form of the person. And in this encounter, I step outside myself. I encounter someone who changes me in the encounter.

Von Balthasar writes that the beautiful makes the demand upon me to “be allowed to be what it is.” I let go of attempts to control and use. I simply rest in the presence of the beautiful other. Von Balthasar quotes Schiller, “Beauty is freedom in its appearing.”

This freedom is a freedom to enter into relation. It is the freedom of God to become man and reveal Himself in the particularity of Jesus Christ. I cannot force His revelation, but he can freely choose to reveal Himself to and in me.

In all my human relations, there is the possibly for a beautiful encounter. I’ll return to this idea of the beautiful encounter, as I reflect upon Martin Buber, TF Torrance and Eugen Rosenstock Huessy in future posts.

Living in the World of the Wide Web

June 4, 2010 / dougfloyd / 5 Comments

Photo by dhammza (via Creative Commons)

My brother Jeremy paused momentarily from twittering, facebooking, ipadding, and conference calling to send me a link via Google chat to Nicholas Carr’s article, “The Web Shatters Focus, Rewires Brains.” In a manner most apropos, Carr published the piece in Wired. After reading his article, I wonder if we might should called it ReWired instead.

As you probably guessed from reading the title of his article, Carr writes about how the web is changing the way we think (and I don’t just mean our opinions). His key idea is that the brain moves between “working memory” and “long term memory.” Web surfing operates in working memory but do to the overwhelming influx of data disruption, our brain keeps reorienting between competing streams of data. Thus we experience “cognitive overload” (think of the dread spinning wheel on your computer).

This cognitive overload means that we transfer less information to long term memory and gradually lose or weaken our ability to process ideas deeply. Or to put it in the words of Patricia Greenfield, we weaken our capacity for “deep processing” that underpins “mindful knowledge acquisition, inductive analysis, critical thinking, imagination, and reflection.”

The impact stretches into our non-surfing time because our brains actually begin processing differently. Drawing from Michael Merzenich’s pioneering work in the field of neuroplasticity, Carr suggests that “our online habits continue to reverberate in the workings of our brain cells even when we’re not at a computer. We’re exercising the neural circuits devoted to skimming and multitasking while ignoring those used for reading and thinking deeply.”

This brings to mind Malcolm Gladwell’s “Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking” and Michael LeGault’s reply, “Think! Why Crucial Decisions Can’t Be Made in the Blink of An Eye.” There is a real tension between the instant message multi-tasking, hyper-frenzied world and the analytic, thoughtful processing that takes time.

As I read Carr’s excellent article, I wondered how people negotiated changing mental processing during dramatic shifts in history. The pre-Socratic world negotiated a dramatic shift from story to abstract reasoning. The Reformation world negotiated a dramatic shift from a memory-based oral culture to a book-based written culture. If the brain is plastic, then these shifts surely had disruptive impacts as well. I would suggest that good and bad probably came out of each shift.

Some things were discarded that may need to be rediscovered. Yet at the same time, other things were introduced that served to catalyze many positive developments.

In many ways (exceeding even the Internet), we are in the midst of an epochal shift that will most likely continue throughout our lifetimes. When it comes to the Web, how might we learn to negotiate the threat of cognitive overload and then possibility of losing our capacity for analytic thought. Can we cultivate both deep diving as well and surface snorkeling?

As I read Carr’s article, I thought about Wallas’ four stages of creativity thinking: Preparation, Incubation, Illumination, Verification. Preparation is the process of gathering information. In some sense, it does carry this idea of overwhelming data. And the data is not necessarily all interrelated. Information may seem to have no connection at all. And yet, in a process that some have called “bisociation” the mind forces disparate ideas together. The result may be unexpected, surprising, and even enlightening.

This stage of creativity seems to correspond closely to Carr’s description of web use. And in that sense, the web is an excellent place for “surface snorkeling” massive amount of data. This can lead to surprising, new and often dramatic new ideas and shifts that might be associated with the “Illumination” or “Eureka!” stage of creative thinking.

But per Carr’s piece, the web may actually contend with the “Incubation” stage. This is the opposite of collection. In the mystic sense, it is the time of purgation, of luminous darkness. It is the great waiting. It is the pregnant pause. In a world of constant data overload, how might we craft “pregnant pauses” in our lives?

We may take a page from Chang Tzu and learn the mystery of the useless tree. There is a time (and a desperate need) to stop, turn off the computer, turn off the ipod, turn off the television and simply breathe. The restorative power of cultivating times of silence and deep breathing can nourish our brains and our bodies.

We might also read long articles…out loud. Or pause over a poem. Living in a culture that seems to despise poetry, we could the value of waiting over words, reading and rereading words until they come into focus.

We might write a long article or write a poem. The process of write can help us to slow down and organize our thoughts. We might try thinking again. Of course, we are always thinking. But cultivating times of intentional thought. My professors used to suggest two hours of thought for every one hour of reading. When I’ve followed their advice, I read much less but oddly enough, I learned much more.

Like an egg resting beneath the hen, the incubation period seems like wasted time. But then the shell breaks open revealing a tiny chick. Many of the great ideas that changed the course of the world, broke into this world suddenly and surprisingly.

We might also intentionally look backwards to the Pre-Socratic world or the pre-Reformation world and try to see through their eyes, hear through their ears, and feel through their hands. We cannot fully do this, but we can at least try. For instance, I think all of us might benefit from spending time learning about and practicing ancient mnemonics. Our deep memory capacity seems greatly diminished compared to our classical and medieval counterparts.

By looking backwards (at these earlier cultures) and looking forwards (into the possibilities of our connected web world), we might begin learning how to act. We might get ideas on how to negotiate this challenge and blessing of a web of information that circles and encircles and continues encircling our world.

Then we might realize (more often) the final stage of creativity: verification. This is the realization of the idea. The movement from abstraction to action. It is the idea embodied. In Christian theology, this is the Word made Flesh. We might not simply be able to reference all the cool sites and techniques on gardening. We might actually plant a real garden.

Reflections along the way.