Grandpas and Grandmas

I have been blessed to have three sets of them. When I was little I thought of it as an advantage mainly from a Christmas presents and holiday gift/card standpoint. But now, I have been able to see beyond the material advantages which come from having three sets of grandparents, and view the relational and wisdom gleaning aspects as well. What follows is a sort of short form tribute to my grandparents. To my grandparents, I apologize for its deficiencies, inaccuracies, or limits to my understanding and knowledge of you. While my account falls far short of capturing your true selves, it is my best effort to honor you all.

Fred

He lived the closest and I see him the most. He plays golf and polishes his cars and paints his house and writes lists and talks about the old days. I help him with his computer and phone and we talk about how things used to be. We get burgers sometimes. He exhibits his love and care by always being there like when my car died and I had to get home, or when I wanted to buy a computer as a freshman and could not drive to the store, or when my friend and I needed an adult for both of us to go see Book of Eli. Full of smiles and seldom a frown, I always enjoy having him around.

Reconstructed Reflections: Going with God and Getting Through Grad School

Before you read 

Hello, first let me say a thing or five about this post. One, it is long sorry but hang with it, Two, read the footnotes they are there for a reason people. Three there are a lot of hyperlinks use them to help understand what is being referenced. Four this is sort of my attempt at postmodern writing so who knows if its any good but I was a blast to work on. Five I would love to hear your comments, spelling corrections, and thoughts in the comments below or on FB or Twitter.

[Adapted, expanded, and updated from an underwhelming attempt at blog writing circa April 10, 2015 while still in the trenches of Grad School.]¹

Aside

Yes, I write overindulgent self reflective nonsense from time to time and post it on my blog that has a pretentious name referencing a quote from my favorite president. Now that that is out in the open...

Introduction

Ten Months ago Ethan entered Grad School “little did he know”² the dire consequences this decision would have on his life in the coming months. In my application to grad school I wrote about how I wanted to teach kids the importance of history and its value as a subject to study. I wrote about how I came from a long line of teachers and would be carrying on the legacy into the third generation of public educators like my father and grandfather before me. Little did he know what it really meant to be a teacher. There was a chasm between my idea and reality of being a teacher.

I had snazzy black rimmed glasses teaching at a high school in the heart of north T-town. I taught engaging lessons full of rigor and authentic tasks. In the evenings and afternoons I would sip coffee and grade papers. In the evenings I would cook dinner, hangout with family and friends and attend concerts and cinema screenings at my favorite movie house. This idea was formed during my high school and undergrad years, not realizing that teaching is some of the most challenging and humbling work out there.

¹The original sections appear this color the revisions and expanded sections are the whitish. This format has been adopted to preserve, as much as possible, of the original tone and feelings that were present when this piece was originally written. The somewhat uneven style which switches from first to third person, stream of consciousness and snarky narration, interspersed with far too many footnotes can be attributed to the radically inconsistent styles my mind adopts while writing and thinking on a regular basis. In the months since writing this original piece my state of mind has radically improved.^a

a. Yes, I did get the idea to include all of the footnotes which you will see in this article from DFW’s use of footnotes in “IJ.” Also you have to manually etid the HTML to properly put in footnotes so I am going to use regular sized number for the rest of the post to save a tone of time. #lovefootnotes

²“I've written papers on little did he know.”  - Professor Jules Hilbert

What I will Miss: A Goodbye tale

Originally this post was written to be posted the night a I graduated. Due to internet connectivity problems tiredness, and the realization that I still had some loose ends to tie up its release has been delayed until today.  For those that I said “look for a blog post” almost a month ago sorry for the delay, this is what I was talking about. To everyone else here it is.

Today I graduate.  Tomorrow I leave to head back to the great Pacific Northwest.  This is both a happy and a sad experience.  In my 18 total months living in Fullerton California at Hope International University I have had a myriad of wonderful and challenging experiences.  I have thoroughly enjoyed my time here but am overjoyed to return home to my beloved Pierce County.  Despite my joy at returning home and starting my life post-bachelors degree I leave a plethora of people and things behind that I will miss dearly.

(The length and order of each of the following sections do not not do justice to the the friends I will leave behind. They are but a simple tribute to the some of the amazing people I know and love from my time at HIU.  THis list is in no way complete and the length of each section does not reflect any type of ranking system of importance of closeness of our relationship. Some things are just easier to put into words then others.)

My wonderful, joyous, beautiful, fantastic, hilarious, love of my life Sabrina Miller (not related. . . for now:).  While my home is in Washington I will not truly be home until you are here too and brings my heart north with you.  No one else in life has grown, challenged, encouraged, loved, and endured me more than you.

That pondering, inquisitive, Lord of the Rings enthusiast, math major, and solid, dedicated roommate Lorenzo.  From the moment I saw your face light up when he saw my Return of the King poster I knew that we would be good friends. Through the years we have stayed up incredibly late, purloined two couches, pondered the meaning of life, deity of Christ, theology of Moltmann (and Bonhoeffer), and explaining our love for Batman, X-Men and Lord of the Rings.  He shared his town and family with me when I had nowhere to go.  We had our run-ins and disagreements (the toilet),  but our friendship was always secure.  Why does California have to be so far away? Lorenzo Rodriguez, I am honored to call you my friend, please move to Washington ASAP!

One year: A Reflection

I started writing this blog while riding the train home in May of this year.  8 months later I have picked it back up and am finishing it. At the time I thought I was going to write a month by month recap of my life.  I now realize that that would be boring, rather presumptuous, and self centered to think that people care enough about my life to read what had happened to me every month.  So i include the only month that I wrote November of last year.  From there who knows what will happen.

November

The month I finally got settled into life at HIU, and it felt like home.  I wrote my initial thoughts about it my post HIU Life.  I wrote more blog posts that month than any previous, or since. I met a girl who was interesting.  She asked me to Sadie Hawkins.  I told her no, not because of her, but because I dislike events with lots of people and am a cheapskate.  I told her we could go do something else some other time if she wanted to.  Surprisingly she took up my offer and we made plans to go see a movie, but I got the release date mixed up, so we ended up going for a walk instead.  I stayed home during Thanksgiving break to save a few bucks, but I paid for it in loneliness.  I missed my family; I had always spent Thanksgiving with them.  That girl invited me to go to her aunt’s house for Thanksgiving, I had nothing better to do, so I said yes.

Is It Just Me? Pt. 2

So I wrote the a post back in May and titled it Pt. 1 and said it was “to be continued”. I have no idea why I did. Did I really think that I would come to some conclusion later or that it needed to be part of a series? Anyway, I left it open ended, so I feel I should bring the subject to a state of closure. This is in part because I have gained some new perspective in the area of communicating with people. The other reason is I hate leaving things unfinished.

As I reread my initial post several things stood out to me. One, why was I so hung up on getting people's opinions about things? Two, why didn't I formulate a plan to try and change the results I had been getting? Three, why did I not realize that the problem I was experiencing was a direct result from my poor listening skills?

When it comes to getting people's opinions I suppose that I am just interested in what people have to say. Sadly I think that, especially at the time of writing that post, I liked asking people questions, not so much because I wanted to know what they thought but because I could use my questions as a platform to introduce what I thought in order to showcase my knowledge to other people so I would look smart. I have a lot of pride in my knowledge and I used it to try and gain people's respect and attention. This method was not a conscious effort. I really did believe that I cared about other people and their opinions, when in fact, I had subconsciously learned a way to puff myself up and show off what I knew to others in an attempt to gain their affection.

To address my second question, I do not think I believed that I could be the major or main cause of the problem. I saw people’s lack of response as their problem and blamed it on what I thought to be passivity within my generation for talking about important issues. In reality, I can now see that I was/am a major part of the problem and that it comes from being a selfish conversationalist and a sub-par listener.

John Simpson

"History is a well told story"
                              -John Simpson

History, do you like it, hate it? John Simpson doesn't care. The only thing that matters in his class is that you show up, use "that three pounds of gray matter" and learn something.  If you are willing to give him those things, then he promises to make history relevant to your life.  

That line "History is a well told story" is how Mr. Simpson starts off the first day of the new quarter in every history class he teaches.  John Simpson will forever be a part of the story that makes up the history of my life.

Self Reflection

I have recently discovered that I have radically changed in the last two to three years.  The change has been gradual but its full effects are staggering.  It took a new environment for me  to see the changes for myself.  In the past I valued my individualism more than I do now.  I saw myself as the hero in a Louis L’amour Western needing no one other than myself.  Little did I realize how much I depended on the people around me.  I have become much more friendly of late.  I value people more.  In the past people annoyed me and even though I sometimes wanted to connect with them I did not understand how.  Last year was when the major change started happening.  I became a part of a group of misfits.  Almost everyone in our group had been looking to be part of a group but wasn't.  When we all ended up finding each other it turned into an almost magical experience.  With grand adventures and deep thoughts.  This group taught me the value of friendships on a much grander scale then I had experienced before.