Out of Egypt:

even if no one reads this anymore...

...I'm posting anyway. I may have stopped posting but I haven't stopped livin', baby (as Matt S. might say).

Saturday night a friend and his band, the Onlys (not the "famous" one, so don't go Googlin'), rocked the Am. Legion in the Lanc with 80s punk stylings. Not really my thing, but they're good at what they do, particularly for a HS band. Too bad they'll probably break up after graduation.

A thought: white wine is better than burgundy. Less acidic, it would seem. Of course the burgundy was Carlo Rossi at $10/gal, so...

Tonight saw "Brazil" by Terry Gilliam. As bizarre as they said it was. I liked it, though some people didn't. I've never laughed at people on fire before. I'll be singing Antonio Carlos Jobim all night.

I had three cups of coffee at the WaHo, which is a bit too much for me. It makes me voluble. It really is a drug for one as abstemious as I.

On the way back, reminiscing about HS with some folk who are still in that scene. It did have its moments, I'll admit. Sometimes I wish I had taken advantage of there more while I was there. (I only did jazz band and musical senior year. Now I'll never get a chance to do that kind of thing again.) Hopefully, after two more years (maybe more, depending on my "credit problems" - that is, the "lost semester" - and if I can scrape together the cash now that my fund is no more) I won't say the same thing about college life, which already has been worlds better.

I need to get a job this summer. This pleasurable idleness is unsustainable, unless I want to beg money from my parents, who have needs a little more pressing than my own.

On Sunday, read an article in the NYT Mag about the sexual habits of (upper-class, white) teens in New England. Now there's a different world. My thesis: the rich are more immoral than the lower classes. Here in Lancaster County we have more groundedness, continuity, tradition - social inertia, to coin a phrase. Thus, even thus who have no real scruples about promiscuity are bound by an environment of inarticulate conservativism. Our job as Christians, individually and corporately, is to make that conservativism articulate. Perhaps, however, that's more difficult than it is to make conversions in places where Christianity-based values are wholly absent - for the same reason that Christ said, "I have come not to save the 'righteous,' but sinners." People who are fairly secure, who have the requisite amount of "personal peace and happiness," in Schaeffer's phrase, are less likely to hear the call of discipleship, since it takes them out of a state of relative comfort, rather than the existential lostness that defines the truly post-Christian world.

So there you have it, philosophical and personal reflections, all in one nicely wrapped package. Hope you enjoy it. Be back next week, or whenever I get access to a computer again. (This lack of Net is really killing me. Lord, teach me the difference between what I want and what I need.)

You live in Lancaster!!! That's where my folks live. I didn't really grow up there...they moved there when I was 16. I actually rather associate it with long, boring, lonely summers...the big excitement being going to Border's. what church do you go to there?

Posted by: Jeannette at June 1, 2004 12:55 PM

Yeah, I've lived here all my life, so that's a little different. Things aren't always so exciting around here, but at least I know people here. (Though post-h.s. that's going to be true less and less.)

Yeah, I like Border's too. For some reason, I've never grown to appreciate Barnes and Noble the same way.

I go to Faith Reformed, since I live in the Southern End (the Lancaster County of Lancaster County, so to speak). I'm guessing you lived more toward the city.

Posted by: Evan Donovan at June 1, 2004 4:24 PM