Items tagged with: seeing

Items are tagged with a keyword if their content touches on the topic in a significant way or, if the tag is a name, the item has some connection to the name (e.g., a quote, creative participation, location).

Lenses Remember old-school 3D glasses? The ones with red cellophane for one eye and blue for the other? If you watch an old 3D movie without them, an excellent thing happens: You immediately know something’s wrong. The image is doubled, the colors are off, and it looks all wonky. But this is much better than something being be wrong and you don’t know it. Else you might sail along in […]

Living the Status Quo Ante

Jesus and the Way
What kinds of things do you hear people say when they speak of the Christian life? Do they — do you — center on God's rules and justice? Do you center on God's heart for human flourishing? Both are part of it, but the focus makes a world of difference. And focus requires a lens through which to see.
I have not been to our old spot since you went away. I trust what you said, that you will come back, but by now it feels like the waters flow without me. I know you get the notes I send to you, but I wish it were possible for you to reply. I remember the things you told me, but I long to again hear your voice. Or maybe […]

We Will Meet Again #1

Digital Art
Welcome to the Brazilian rain forest. This is a digital art piece based in photography, paired with a short bit of prose.
I have long had mixed feelings about songs that celebrate my country, and so here I offer alternate lyrics to USA’s national anthem. Although still quite rough, I could wait no longer; I wanted to share it now, on USA’s Independence Day. Here’s the thing: The songs I know are all laud and glory, yet over USA’s gestation and lifetime, there have most certainly been numerous cases in which our […]

Back Side Star-Spangled Banner

Diversity & Exclusion
I have long had mixed feelings about songs that celebrate this country I love, and so here I offer alternate lyrics to USA's national anthem. The USA story is not all laud and glory, but neither is it disdainful at the level some shout and spout. USA's reality is a complicated mix of these two extremes.
Crossing Red Square, I heard two women, clearly mothers, agree that they wanted their children to be happy. The fathers, apparently, wanted the children to be high achievers and that would be fine, said the mothers, so long as. Just then, I tripped over nothing. This would not have been unusual except that spirits don’t trip. The mothers didn’t realize I had bumped into them. They were concerned, the mothers. […]

Mother of Russia

Short Story
Crossing Moscow's Red Square, a wandering mother longs to know about the happiness of a son she has not seen for decades. She listens to others, observes the Square, and seeks to find him.
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Why the film is worth your time If religion is a poison (as Hitchens would have it), Godspell is an antidote. Playfully serious, musically excellent, and rich in spirit, the film romps through New York City exploring and embodying wisdom from the Bible’s Gospel According to Matthew. If that already puts you off, stick with me a minute before you decide against it, because the film is a lot of […]

Watch This: Godspell

Before Viewing Film Guide
In 1970s New York City, eight twenty-somethings are shoved, yelled at, and indoctrinated by force into the city's fast-paced, me-first grind. A colorfully and curiously dressed man calls them together at Bethesda Fountain, where they play in the water and go romping, teaching, singing, and living life to the full.
Context and summary Toward the end of February, 2021, a major US-national media entity published a short interview of a US senator (fewer than 1500 words). Interviews can be news done well, and there were good parts of the interview in question, yet it stumbled into three major errors that fail as news: The interviewer, whom I’ll refer to as J, failed to take the interview where J — and even […]

Real Fake News, No. 1

Public Discourse
As one style of Real Fake News, "use the interviewee as a prop" offers several ways for media folk to make it seem the interviewee is saying things that they're not, to push an agenda, and to avoid real issues by introducing off-topic, vague, and sensational content. Here we break down a recent media report.
The Beatles, for their part, lasted three years after saying “all you need is love.” For us it was only two. “What’s next? The art museum or the ice cream shop?” It was a typical choice we’d pose to ourselves, walking the town of a Saturday. “As you wish,” the other would reply. Or, “Where shall we live? Uptown or East End?” “Vacation in Jamaica or Rome?” Whatever the question, […]

You’re Wrong About Love

Flash Fiction
The Beatles, for their part, lasted three years after saying "all you need is love." For us it was only two. This possibility was not in our minds as we walked the town on a Saturday.
How the film enriched and changed me Hirokazu Kore-eda’s intimate observation and deliberate pacing in After Life draw me beyond its central notion (choosing a single memory from one’s life) and into a longing to be more often fully present in all the moments in my life. I want to be more fully alive and aware so I might see and feel the significance of each moment and every memory. […]

After Life: Finding Life Before Death

After Viewing Film Analysis
Seeing the film After Life, I want to be more fully present for and more deeply experience each moment. I want to be more deliberate about how I find meaning and significance, grounding it in community and camaraderie with the people around me, both momentary relationships and lasting ones.
Why the film is worth your time Imaginative, compassionate, and perceptive, Hirokazu Kore-eda’s After Life creates a crucible of sorts to distill a person’s life down to its essence — specifically as the person identifies, in hindsight, the most significant event in their life. The film puts 20 or more characters in its crucible, exploring a kaleidoscopic landscape of lives and memories. After Life is very much worth the time, […]

Watch This: After Life

Before Viewing Film Guide
After Life movie poster: Five Asians stand on plain dirt ground with a cloudy sky of blue in the background.
After Life creates a crucible of sorts to distill a person’s life down to its essence — what was the most significant event in their life? The film puts 20 or more characters in its crucible, exploring a kaleidoscopic landscape of lives and memories.
Way back in second grade, I was good at math. I enjoyed it; it felt good to be good. One day I brought home a test result (oh my! a test…how abusive!). My parents’ reaction was positive, understandable, and well-intended, even loving, but it sent me far enough downhill that I intentionally failed the next test. I simply marked down mostly what I knew to be wrong answers. What was […]

Beyond the Roller Coaster

Who We Need to Be
Having failed a second grade math test, intentionally, I now better understand why I love deeply entering a film's world to experience its odyssey and the destination to which it takes me.
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The street, loud with traffic and wind, was respite to Isak, the noise proceeding through his blond skull, rattling from his mind the fading echoes of the coldness of his girlfriend’s parting words. The gray sidewalk passed steadily beneath his feet, growing darker until the street lights came on, then a bit lighter and brown. Rarely did his eyes rise from that surface. I should head off any assumption that […]

Up I See Colors

Flash Fiction
[revised] Isak wanders in central Stockholm, the noise chasing away unwanted echoes in his mind.