burning like matchsticks in the face of the darkness

I arrived at Thursday morning prayer and took off my hoodie. Joan boggled, because I was wearing a tank top. I was going to the gym afterward...

Apparently this week I have been really rocking the "not as cold as everyone else," though. Tuesday I'd packed a sweater, but I wasn't ever actually cold enough to wear it, so I just wore the thin-material long-sleeved shirt I'd packed to wear underneath it. Thursday and Friday I wore a sweater but don't think I ever put my hoodie on over them in my various evening commutes (and certainly not in my cross-campus midday travels).

I was promised inhumanly frigid temperatures this weekend (e.g., seen on facebook Thursday evening: "‎4-6 more inches of snow tonight/tomorrow morning, followed by an Arctic blast with temperatures in the 0s, or even in the negatives.... I can't believe what a terrible winter it's been!"), but apparently that's just the overnight lows. (Though weather.com is currently predicting a high of 12F on Monday, so I may yet be uncomfortably cold.)

A facebook friend posted earlier today: "just heard on the local news that Boston has received over 4 FEET of snow in 4 weeks...that plus the super cold weather really makes me miss California."

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Various times Thursday evening I heard rumors of ~16inches of snow predicted for Friday [yes, on tu b'shvat!], but the actual accumulation was more comparable to the first above-cited facebook post. It started some time in the middle of the night and had stopped by early afternoon.

I sloshed through the light snow on my way to work Friday without incident, and walking around campus it was all glittery. And the plows were so on top of keeping campus clear. I think I encountered a plow every time I was outside on campus while snow was falling. (In contrast, the amount of shoveled sidewalk in Norwood was about equal to the amount of unshoveled sidewalk I've encountered in Medford/Somerville/Cambridge. Traffic was minimal enough that walking in the street was okay, though.)

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Attendance at Singspiration Friday night was low, nonetheless. (I counted 80 people. Joe F. said before we started that after years of packed houses, he's gotten spoiled, but he knows that in the early years -- we're in year 13 or something -- we would have perceived this as a big crowd; plus it's not about the numbers, it's about the spirit.)

The first soloist was a woman who apparently also has a ministry to women who've had abortions called The Heart of Forgiveness. I had mixed feelings hearing about this, but I definitely support 'meeting these women with love.' Continuing in his introduction, though, Joe F. also talked about having gotten a call from a Tennessee church about a family who had recently moved up here from Tennessee and were having a really rough time, asking did he know anyone who could maybe just visit them or something. And he put out calls to two people he knows (one of whom was this soloist) who then showed up and were a blessing to that family. Yes, this is what being church is all about.

The second soloist sang "O, What a Savior," and during one of the lines about praising Jesus' Name, I was thinking that the idea of someone who will save you, the idea of someone who loves you enough to die for you... these are powerful ideas that fill a deep need, and so at some level, whether any of it is "true" (nevermind all the nuances of theology we can debate for eternity -- says the girl who is reflecting on Trinity at Rest and re/New this Wednesday) don't really matter.

"It's my estimation that every man ever got a statue made of him was one kind of sumbitch or another. Ain't about you, Jayne. 'Bout what they need."
-Mal in "Jaynestown"

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Sara posted to facebook: Iron And Wine: Tiny Desk Concert : NPR

The second song he plays is "Big Burned Hand," which is a new song, and I had trouble following all the words, but the recurring/evolving line about the lion and the lamb is interesting.

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I have mixed feelings about the opening of "You Should Date An Illiterate Girl," but I really like some of the stuff from the second page:

The girl who reads has spun out the account of her life and it is bursting with meaning. She insists that her narratives are rich, her supporting cast colorful, and her typeface bold. You, the girl who reads, make me want to be everything that I am not. But I am weak and I will fail you, because you have dreamed, properly, of someone who is better than I am. You will not accept the life that I told of at the beginning of this piece. You will accept nothing less than passion, and perfection, and a life worthy of being storied.

( abortion, feminism, etc. )

( evangelical reaction to Bristol Palin's pregnancy, the Culture Wars, etc. )

From "The Libertarian Case for Palin" by David Harsanyi (via Ann Althouse):

Even when advocating for "moral" issues, Palin's approach is a soft sell. Palin does not support gay marriage (neither does Obama, it should be noted). Yet, in 2006, Palin's first veto as Governor was a bill that sought to block state employee benefits and health insurance for same-sex couples.

We cannot bore into Palin's soul to see her true feelings about gay couples, but, at the time, she noted that signing "this bill would be in direct violation of my oath of office" because it was unconstitutional. For most libertarians, the thought of politician following any constitution, rather than their own predilections, morality or the "common good," is a nice change of pace.

I'm not especially compelled, but I thought it worth noting.