Tomorrow's Itinerary*

1. Go to language school.
2. Download THIS with high expectations. Listen.
3. Go watch France vs. Croatia at my first football game, Stade de France**, begin undoing my antijockness.

*Non-exhaustive
**Trivia: Stade de France holds 80,000 people. The town in which I live holds 40,000 people.

Try Again

You've got it backwards, Google Ads.
But maybe this is a good sign of how many emails I've been writing in French?
(Don't be too impressed....it hasn't been that many.)

Quittance

Got a piece of mail from our landlords. The paper inside said "QUITTANCE" in big scary letters.

For a minute or two we thought we were being evicted, which in some ways would just feel like par for the course.

Turns out quittance just means receipt. They got our rent check.

Whew.

Raising a Grammar Nerd

On the train, I said to the kid, "Man, this train is moving slow, huh?"

He said, "SlowLY, Papa."

I kid you not. And I have never been so simultaneously ashamed and proud.

Sure the kid can't speak in complete sentences yet, but at least he apparently knows how to use a good adverb.

Poetic Life

I talked with 4th and 5th grade students on Skype the other day, answering one question after another for 30 minutes straight. Two boys asked a question together because wondered the same thing: "Do you miss teaching?"

I didn't answer quite this way, but the answer is: most days no, some days more than I can stand.

And with spring weather comes the intense desire to teach physics and poetry. I miss teaching.

I like poetry--if you've been visiting this page for a while you probably know that--but in most of my circles, I'm usually a little embarrassed to admit it. To most people, especially in the Evangelical church, poetry is at best too complicated and at worst just plain weird.

I'm not much of a poet and I don't even read poetry very often. It's complicated for me too, it takes some work. But I guess the reason I keep coming back to it from time to time is that there are emotions in life that must be expressed somehow. It's the same reason we sing in church, because your average spoken sentences and paragraphs simply cannot fully portray the glory of the Lord.

(And for every 99 poems that go over my head, the 1 treasure I find tends to make it worth it--like that line from TS Eliot shared here the other week that continues to send my mind reeling.)

So I was surprised, yesterday, to find John Piper talking to his staff about the importance of poetry. I guess I knew he liked poetry--but enough to be talking to his staff about its importance? That doesn't seem like him. Isn't poetry just a hobby?

Most in Evangelical circles would laugh at me for my love of poetry, but they wouldn't dare laugh at John Piper, would they?

He quotes Leland Ryken: "At least a third of the Bible is written in poetic form. Its prevalence shows that God wants people to understand and enjoy it."

We are obliged to know something about poetry to at.the.very.least understand the Bible in its fullest. But I have a feeling, with Piper, that there's even more to it than just that...in appreciating the world around us, in expressing ourselves, in communicating God, in communicating with God...

So, April is coming, and if you still live in the United States, it's National Poetry Month again. Maybe it's time to find a few things to read. Maybe you should try your hand at writing a thing or two.

On Being Less Eloquent and Less Polite than a 10 Year Old

The three of us entered our apartment building with our cart of groceries. A boy, appearing to be about 10 years old, who lives on the fourth floor, entered with us coming home from school.

We took the elevator because of the groceries. He took the elevator because he lives on the fourth floor.

He greeted us so assertively, so politely, so eloquently by saying, "Bonsoir!"

I choked back my "Bonjour!" and changed it to "Bonsoir!" just in time.

We rode in silence, which I guess is typical for an elevator, but it was really because I was speechless.

We got off on the 2nd floor and he said so assertively, so politely, so eloquently, "Au revoir! Bonne soirée!"

To be honest, I really can't remember if I said anything in response. One third stunned by his sweet elegance, one third with a total mind blank of what to say and how to say it, one third wrestling a cart of groceries and a two year old out the door, I was mostly speechless.

(I've realized recently how much of our communication right now actually consists of awkward gestures and incoherent grunts and mumbles. We think we're saying something--some sort of mix of English and French in our minds--but what comes out in the speed of the moment are really just odd stutters and stammers. So when a boy says "Goodbye, Have a nice evening" your head says something like "Goodbye...Bonsoir...Goodnight..Bon soiree...Have a good day...no, it's evening now stupid...Merci...good evening...salut...what's the word for...Bonjour...You too...thank you...toi aussi..." and in the midst of flipping through all of that, it's hard to tell what actually really comes out in the end of that split second. To top it off, we sort of randomly wave our hands in the air along with it as if that makes things more clear. Or, the split second passes without us saying a n y t h i n g at all---the other person wonders why we're so rudely mute and we think of what should have been said several minutes later.)

I've met plenty of scary 10 year olds in my day, but I'm not sure I've ever been so intimidated by one. Oh, to have the class and the eloquence of a 10-year old!

An Open Letter to the Pickle Companies of America and Europe

Dear Pickle Companies of America and Europe,

America, you have some of the best pickles in the world. But you make us fish for them with hopeless stabs of forks that are too short. It's a frustration.

Europe, you have invented the ingenious pickle-lifter, so that consumers can grasp their chosen pickle from the top of the jar with ease. But your pickles really aren't that great. It's a disappointment.

Therefore, I propose a simple and fair trade. Pickle lifter for the pickle recipe. Even steven. Everyone wins. The world rejoices.

Think about it.

Sincerely yours.

If you want to know the embarrassing truth...

I guess I haven't shied away lately from telling the embarrassing truth, so why stop here.

First embarrassing truth: I've never watched The Godfather.

So when I was invited to watch it with a bunch of other guys who spoke English and would provide the spaghetti and cannoli, how could I turn it down?

Second embarrassing truth: Those of you who know me well know that there is very little chance of me staying awake while watching a 3 hour movie on a Friday night. The week is exhausting, the couch is comfortable, the chances are slim. I'm just a sleepy guy.

And so that was my worst fear, going in to meet these strangers for the first time, going to watch this classic movie for the first time, and being that guy who sleeps through it.

But two plates of spaghetti and two large cannolis only make matters worse.

So I tried to fake it as best I could, but I'm pretty sure at least the guy next to me saw me jolting myself awake every few minutes.

Third embarrassing truth that I remembered just now: As I dozed, in that preliminary dream-state, I heard the characters in the movie start to speak French.

On Not Knowing One's Place

And the light shone in darkness and
Against the Word the unstilled world still whirled
About the centre of the silent Word.
-TS Eliot


When Israel was a child, I loved him,
and out of Egypt I called my son.
The more they were called,
the more they went away;
they kept burning offerings to idols.
Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk;
I took them up by their arms,
but they did not know that I healed them.
I led them with cords of kindness,
with the bands of love,
and I became to them as one who eases the yoke on their jaws,
and I bent down to them and fed them.
My people are bent on turning away from me.
-The Prophet Hosea

On Knowing One's Place

By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread,
till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken;
for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.

For my days pass away like smoke, and my bones burn like a furnace.

Remember that my life is a breath

For my life is spent with sorrow, and my years with sighing;
my strength fails because of my iniquity, and my bones waste away.

Man who is born of a woman is few of days and full of trouble.
He comes out like a flower and withers; he flees like a shadow and continues not.

He remembered that they were but flesh, a wind that passes and comes not again.

O LORD, make me know my end and what is the measure of my days;
let me know how fleeting I am!

For he knows our frame; he remembers that we are dust.

So teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom.