a plea for disagreement

Okay, so I was reading a blog today, and I came accross an extremely (I think I use that word too much) disturbing GIF.


It was about gay rights (which is not our topic today), yadda yadda yadda, and ended with these two panels. Yes, that is Josh Hutcherson, AKA Peeta in the Hunger Games movies, but whatever.....AVENGERS. (Just had to get that out there)






Does that disturb you? I am seriously creeped out.


And futhermore, we're not gonna let anybody say anything bad about anyone.


WHAT?


It's almost like living in a dystopian novel, where no one is allowed to say anything bad about anyone else. They already label "hate crimes" in some countries. And in the early 19th century "libel" (or saying anything about the ruling party) was a crime.
I believe that disagreement helps shape us. for as C.S. Lewis says, "You are a soul. You have a body." Not the other way round.

Proverbs 24:6 ~ "For by wise counsel thou shalt make thy war: and in multitude of counsellers there is safety." (i.e, not just one accepted view) 

How will we know the truth if we can't test it against untruth (rather irrelevant in a post-modern society sadly)? In America we still have the Constitutional right to say whatever we want, however loony it may be. If you want to say that you think gay marriage, abortion, or government interference is wrong, you should certainly be able to say so, without it being labeled as a "hate crime" or what-have-you. Conversely, the opposite views can say what they want. The truth is still there. Everything is biased one way or another.

I mean, hate IS wrong, but it only hurts the person hating, so unless it leads to unlawful acts, whose business of it is if you hate something?

It is only when people sit, think, and argue that the true course of action can be determined. Like Socrates. Like Jesus pitting His truth against the Pharisees and Jewish leaders. WHY do we believe a certain thing about a certain issue? 

The type of thinking that the estimable Josh displays leads to a creepy Orwellian society, where no one thinks but merely receives (e.g. public schools) and everyone doesn't care anyway because we're all distracted  by the endless predigested entertainment through our televisions, computers, iPads, iPods........

True thing, that.

Truly disturbing.

And I'm aware this really wasn't one of my most logical or best written posts, but bear with me, okay?

My dad got to come home from the hospital today, so we are all happy about that. Please keep praying for his recuperation. :-)

TTFN, ta-ta for now, if I may quote Tigger.

~ Diana


P.S. AVENGERS. See what I meant about endless entertainment? Still, May 4th IS coming.

dear boys: a link up

(Okay so this is a blog link-up thing where you write a letter to...boys?!?! I'm going to try this anyway, even if I'm late to the party)

Dear teenage boys,

we're not beautiful (warning: long post!)

I feel compelled to debunk the saying that we're all beautiful, at least on the inside. "Be yourself." (True, you should be "yourself", but sometimes it is more important to the do the right thing.) 

What-EVER. *insert snarky teenager voice*

We aren't beautiful....

screenshots are dangerous things...

 ...In the wrong hands.

gender roles + SNOW!

Time for a serious post. You may not agree with me over this, but then you don't have to....but please, keep it civil if you comment.




* * * * * * * * * * * * 


The original "gender roles" were thus: men took care of women who had the children.
Today, we in America live in a very advanced, civilized society. It is considered permissible for both sexes to many things which would have been frowned upon two hundred years ago. For example, women are lawyers and politicians, both jobs which were traditionally left to the men.


Is this a bad thing? As long as we keep in mind the original model, and don't adopt a personal "I can do whatever I want and hang the consequences!", I don't think it usually is. An exception when women are encouraged to do things they really aren't able to, as affirmative action in government jobs does: create *diversity* and limit efficiency (wait, we're talking about the government...) because those women simply aren't right for the jobs, and got in not because of their grades but because of their sex or color of their skin.


However, speaking from a Biblical as well as practical worldview, some vocations simply are best left to men. Military combat is a prime example. 
The time-honored model is for the men to fight, and the women to stay at home and take care of the kids, and keep the country going so that the men have something to fight for. This makes sense from a purely biological sense because males are *usually* physically stronger, and are better at keeping an army together. Also, when you introduce women into a male-dominated institution, it can be distracting = less organized fighting = less effective = we lose.


So one can conclude that America today has made a dangerous innovation on a model that has been working more of less for thousands of years. Only time will tell what the long-lasting effects will be, but the short-term effects have seriously endangered the welfare of what used to be world's greatest military.


Another time-honored institution in which the male/female roles have worked together with great results is the family: by which I mean a father, a mother, and varying amount of offspring. Sometimes this gets messed up, and the child(ren) are left with either only a mother, only a father, a step-mother or father, or neither. In each case it is a sad situation, but not really hopeless, as the children can still thrive and grow up to be happy, useful members of society. :)


But a truly ominous situation, another one of those 'dangerous innovations' that well-meaning people introduce upon thousands of years of various ups and downs is the public acceptance of same-sex marriage. 


This issue really isn't about feelings, love, or because we just don't "like" gay people, but because this is making a perversion normal. Being "gay" is a choice (must be or else it would have been bred out of the genetic line); or at least a problem you can fight against. This may sound idealistic, but we always have to fight against something that's tempting us, be it large or small.
All I am saying is that if as a society, and in the public schools, we accept this as a norm, then we will end up with a distorted society, and blurring of gender roles. (which are pretty messed up already)


(As a Christian, I'd like to say that God has a plan for everyone, and what might be right for one person isn't always right for another. [It's called "conscience"])


But on a larger scale, if we continue to blur or switch gender roles, we will be less efficient as a country, and may become non-existent eventually, because we won't know who we are!


 * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 




Whew!!! After numerous distractions I finally finished writing. 
And its SNOWING. *sigh* Winter is coming, folks. It sure looks pretty though.

photo credit

Does anyone want to take me skiing? Please? I'm terrible at it, but it sure is fun!
The chickens and sheeples were very much confused by the snow. Honey the Lab loved it!

photo credit

 

photo credit

my  edited photo!

Auf weidersehn. I can't decide if I like this font better than this one. Talk about stupid decisions....

i've got good news, bad news, and a book suggestion!

- BAD News first, to get it over with. Basically, the bad news was this. THIS. In concise wording, a flood of the general area around which my famiglia situated. We are on top of a high hill, so the only excess water affecting us was in our cellar, but the area down town, right on the Susquehanna river, was devastated. Literally. For those of you not familiar with rivers, think 14-foot high water under bridges, and entire river-facing streets were deluged under 8-feet expanses of dirt brown water. 


Hundreds of people in the area are still without electricity (thankfully we have it) and internet. We just got it this afternoon, obviously, as you are reading this.


- GOOD news. (Yes, I am in the right mind to write good news. Three days without internet or hot water have cleared my mind of the hubris and general depression my last blog post was written in)


Kayleigh May Beck******* was born on Wednesday, September 7th at approximately 7pm, to Gayle and William, my sister-in-law and brother. We are all extremely excited to welcome her!!!!



       

Anyway, as I was saying, very exciting news. Certainly smiley face worthy! I don't like to bandy them things around my blog like annoying tennis balls, but this event is worthy of a few more.  

Moving on, we come to the book suggestion. I finished Arundel by Kenneth Roberts---you should really read it. (Whoever happens to be reading this at this time, and providing you haven't read it already which I seriously doubt)
Arundel was historical fiction at its finest. Fast paced, meaty, and exciting. Solidly researched and well-written. I'd recommend it to anyone 12 and up. It would make a nice thick change from the usual revolting YA novels many teens read in their spare time. (If they have any in this age of homework)
As I don't feel like writing a synopsis, go check it out yourself.


Whew. Fine weather we're having today.


Carrots I planted in the spring:

 Silkie cockerels I'm trying to sell:

 A eagle-eyed EE pullet:

 And an eternal photographic theme, flowers!

Finis.

food for thought

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer'd it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest -
For Brutus is an honourable man;
So are they all, all honourable men -
Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
You all did see that on the Lupercal
I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
Which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And, sure, he is an honourable man.
I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then, to mourn for him?
O judgment! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And I must pause till it come back to me."

~William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar

our need for music

Been busy here, fellow carbon-based life forms. Will try to post one *good* post a week during the school year.
So many things I could post about: my upcoming birthday, the ban on DDT and malaria, the decay of popular culture, music, what love really is, or I could post a recipe for chocolate milk which will make you die. (In a good way, that is, not a bad way!)
Well, I think I shall have to pick......music.


                                               ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 
(being rather a perfectionist, I HAD to make the divider another color!)


Music: It can feed your soul or kill it. It can change hearts or harden them. It can get your adrenaline pumping, or bore you half to death.*


Why does the human mind seem to need music? It isn't essential for life, and neither can we eat it. The answer may lie in the fact that men (and here I mean the entire race of man, not only the male portion of it) do not consist of merely their physical bodies. We are the (proud) possessors of immortal souls as well, created by a higher being as was the body.  And this soul needs food as much as our bodies do. No, we can't feed our brains cheeseburgers. In fact, the brain exercising and soul growing is in fact the hardest part of being human. It is much easier to change our physical bodies then to change our hearts. Thus, it would stand to reason that feeding our souls nourishing meat and drink would also require more mental work than not feeding it, and staying the way you are now for eternity.


But I digress...to return the subject at hand (and not wander off into a theological and metaphysical** quandary), my hypothesis of why we need (and, to assuage that need, create and perform) music, is that "real" music feeds our souls. And by "real" music, I mean hard music. Classical music,*** generally, or any true or beautiful music which may not appeal to you at first, depending on your level of education, peers, or family.


Forgive me for using a cliched example, but this could be compared to....food.**** You could think of classical (or difficult) music as the meat, or in a vegan's case, soy protein, of the diet. And the more vapid, less deep music, or "music" as the case may be, as dessert, candy bar, marshmallow, poison, or everything else.


Or think of it this way: If you can train your ears to enjoy deeper things: good literature (as opposed to light-n-fluffy reading, Dick and Jane, or romance novels*****), great music (hey, there has to be a reason it has survived so long!), healthier food (your body needs to eat sometimes too) or harder things in general, you can still enjoy the less fluffy stuff (sometimes).
 But if you are only trained to the fluffy (sometimes in the complimentary sense)) stuff, you will have a hard time understanding the deeper stuff. 


Which will you choose?


And as a final note, your soul's worth lies in your own hands. It is your own choice what you make of yourself; whether you feed your soul with the good stuff, the meat and drink, the soy protein****** which will enlarge you mind, or keep on stuffing the junk food into your mind, the effects of which may not be visible right away, but will eventually accumulate in something far worse than a sick body: moral and mental decay!


Finis.


FOOTNOTES:


*For instance, country or pop music.
**What a fun word to say: metaphysical! I <3 long words.
***Classical music hasn't actually been proven to make  you smarter, but it can't hurt IMHO. And it doesn't distract you from your work with silly lyrics.
****.....Always a good thing. Especially with chocolate or frosting. 


***** "Oh George, marry me, darling, or I shall throw myself off this cliff!"
******Yuck. Save soybeans, eat more cow. ;-) 


(These footnotes were fun to write!)


OKAY. Now that I have attempted to convince you of the importance of "real" music in the grand scheme of things, I feel liberated to jabber on about my personal music preferences.


Never having been much exposed to more popular and recent music as a young child, I grew up thankfully old-fashioned in my music tastes. Now that I am older, the more I see of popular music  today (2011) the less I am impressed with few exceptions. Some of it seems to be a sort of opiate of the masses, keeping them distracted from bigger issues, and some of it is just obscene, and some of it is just dumb, at least to me.

For classical composers, my two hands-down favorites are Beethoven, and Mozart. (NO, I did NOT forge their signatures. I got them off Wikipedia)





For me, Beethoven portrays the most timeless passion, strong beauty and mystery in his music. His themes are always fresh and new sounding, never dated. My particular favorite of all of his works I have listened to thus far is his Piano Concerto #4. It reminds me of the power and inscrutability of the ocean. His pieces are rendered even more amazing by the fact that he was deaf when he wrote some of them! Personally, Ludwig Beethoven was said to be a strange and turbulent character, proof that God can work through all of us! 
I'm planning on listening to every single one of his symphonies. No, stupid, not all at once.





And Mozart's music is just....beautiful. His music with its often incredibly melodies reminds me of a dancer, light and airy on her feet, skipping through high soprano pieces and darker, heavier pieces with perfect ease. His music sounds like his signature looks. And I am a fan of some of his opera music (from, at least those I have listened to!) Being a kind, thoughtful person,I will post links to Voi, Che Sapete (one of my favorite pieces to sing) and L'ho perduta, me meschina (another fun piece to sing). I can't say I've listened to a ton of Mozart; will have to sometimes.


Chopin is nice for something different.


On to singers: I can't say I have a favorite singer. I do enjoy opera, which while not for everyone, is thoroughly dramatic, tragic, romantic, melodramatic (I enjoy amateurly over-acting scenes) and beautiful. 
Favorite pieces at the moment:


Una Voce Poco Fa from the Barber of Seville (Rossini) as sung by Maria Callas.
Casta Diva from Norma can't remember who composed it?!
Nessun Dorma from Turandot 
O Mio Babbino Caro 


Anyway, I also like a select few Broadway musicals: namely, My Fair Lady and Man of La Mancha.  The former because it is hilarious, and the latter because it reminds me of these goofy goats, and I like the music!


I listen to jazz with der Vater sometimes too, which is okay, but puts me to sleep, sadly.


But my absolute overall just plain FUN music HAS to be Gilbert and Sullivan. Hilarious, extremely fun to both sing and act, and witty lyrics and also alliterative agony. 


What music makes you, dear readers, the most happy?


Auf Weidersehn!


~ Diana


"Serve the LORD with gladness: come before his presence with singing."
Psalm 100:2

the blogger returneth......

So I did! Just got back from L.I. Long, boring trip. But the baby shower was pretty nice; I'm glad I went, for the sake of my as-yet-unborn niece. *insert smile here* And we had a nice visit with some old friends, and I got to go to the BEACH!!!! 


Anyway, I just wanted to inform my readers of the aforementioned fact, and of an interesting idea, at least for the eccentric amongst us. Notice that I mean a REAL eccentric, who chooses not to follow the herd, not a pseudo-eccentric who follows the eccentric herd. It seems being weird/eccentric/odd/nerdy/geeky/you-get-the-idea is the *cool* thing now.
 On Facebook you regularly see things like "Im insane and proud of it!". (Note the incorrect spelling) You shouldn't be proud of being insane....and if they really were insane, why would they be on FB? Oh. That brought up another train of thought....

Rather than being proud of being eccentric, I suppose we should strive to be "normal" in God's eyes: doing what is right and living the way we believe instead of taking the easy route and following the herd, like sheep. Except for sheep, following the herd is life or death. For us, it is also life or death; but the other way round!


Alright, time for a quote break!!!!!!! [An excess of exclamation points: sure sign of an enthusiastic young female humanoid!!!!!!!!!!!] 

"Merely corroborative detail, intended to give artistic verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative."

~ W. S. Gilbert

"But thou, O LORD, art a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head."
                        ~ Psalms 3:3


[Side note: I have an incurable tendency to spell Psalms "Pslams!" Very annoying word to spell!]


"If you were me, then I'd be you. And if I were you, then I'd hide somewhere far, far, away."
                       ~Artemis Fowl 


[Yet another Side note: only one of the above quotes is meant to be taken seriously!]


What?!?! No photos?!?!? 





The above is Fire Island, NY. I've been there myriad times. I do like lighthouses!
I've also been to this one:



My gracious, that was very random.
So, auf weidersehn, my dear readers, I must depart. 


~ Diana