Something to Think About

One of the first things I learned when I entered the Interior Design Program at The University of Alabama was that in certain philosophies of interior design ornamentation should carry meaning, an idea which certainly appealed to me. This was a response against those earlier design philosophies such as French Rococo which said that if a little ornamentation was good, more ornamentation was even better.

The subject came up when I was on Spring Break Outreach with Chi Alpha at Florida State University my Senior Year of College.

We had done a mime routine a bit earlier, and were fitted out in black clothes and white make-up. I wandered with one of our guys around the green searching for students to talk to.

"Why the white make-up?" a young man asked. We explained to him what we had been doing, talked a little bit about University life, as well as our designated courses of study, those things all students have in common. There was a pause, and I said to him, "You know, in interior design I learned that all ornamentation should carry meaning, and yet here I am wearing white make-up. It has no meaning. In a sense this make-up is a violation of my principles as a Christian, one of which is to be honest and transparent in the way that I face the world. What do you think of that?"

From the outside this may not seem like much of an evangelical message, but I believe it opened up the conversation and showed this guy that we were willing to treat him like an actual person we had met instead of as a stop on some imaginary evangelical pilgrimage. (It must have been the work of the Holy Spirit, because I am not very evangelical as a rule.)

I'm thinking about this incident in a couple of ways as we approach the subject of relationship evangelism at Grace Church in the following weeks.

In one sense I'd like us to discuss how ornamentation carries meaning in our lives as Christians as we face the world from day to day. Lauren Winner has a lovely little book called Mudhouse Sabbath that applies to this in some ways. It talks about ways that certain Jewish traditions can be profitably incorporated by the Church.

The other way I'd like to discuss this is in terms of different evangelical techniques that we have tried, the ways that they have been effective, when they are appropriate and when they are not. Mime, for example, can work beautifully in some cases, and in others it may be offensive (in a detrimental way: remember not all offense is detrimental) because it uses artifice to convey an extremely didactic message.

Discussion?

To Be An Example, Part II

I have so many half-baked ideas in my mind about things to write about right now that I'm not certain I can avoid making a muddle of all of them. So I'll start with something I threatened to write about before: the other area in which I have felt that I needed to be an example.

Nursing in public.

I have mostly avoided this subject up until now because of it's sensitive nature and the fact that I am writing to a mixed audience. (This actually became a hot issue not long before Parker was born. Baby Talk magazine issued a controversial cover that pictured a nursing baby. They got all kinds of negative press for doing so, and several critics unjustifiably described the photo as pornography.)

After Parker was born I really had to fight to nurse him for physical reasons. Because of this, and because the right to nurse in public had become such a public issue, I felt that it was my duty as Parker's mother, and as a Christian, believe it or not, to demonstrate to others that it could be done, in public, with discretion. I wanted other mothers to know that if they needed to nurse in public it was alright to do so. And I did.

I know this (nursing at all, nursing publicly, nursing for more than a few months) isn't the right decision for every woman. There was a principle involved, and I personally felt that I had to take it on.

Of course as old as Parker is now, public nursing really is an impossibility. I will however share a story that occurred just before Christmas. Anna had invited me and Parker to join her for lunch on campus. School was pretty much out, exams were mostly over, so there were still people around, but not as many as you would typically find. It was almost time for me to leave to pick up Michael from work, we were on the quad, and Parker was READY for a nurse.

Guess what I did. I publicly and purposefully, in love of course, embarrassed my little sister. Right there on a park bench I plopped down and fed my baby. Mostly we went un-noticed. However, there was this one guy who walked by with hands thrust deep in pockets and eyes turned up to the sky. I said to Anna Grace, "That guy knows exactly what I'm doing."

"And he's determined not to see," she answered.

Note: This was on a college campus where people were most likely to be offended with the least excuse.

Two-Buck Chuck, and How I Know I'm Not An Alcoholic

I was given these two bottles of wine sometime approximately a month-and-a-half ago, and tonight I finally opened one of them. It was an inexpensive Cabernet Sauvignon affectionately referred as "Two-buck Chuck," bottled for Trader Joe's. It is very--grapey--and I don't know whether that's supposed to be good or bad, but at least I can tell what it is I am supposedly drinking for a change.

So tell me, what is good wine supposed to taste like? The experts are of no use in this area, because they already know what they are looking for in a good wine. They know good taste from bad, a familiarity with which I am not currently endowed.

What does dryness mean? What does "sweet" mean when it comes to wines? It apparently doesn't mean the same thing it does when referring to un-fermented grapes, or orange juice, my typical drinks of choice. It isn't as though I were actually trying to impress anyone with my taste in alcoholic beverages, is it? Because if that were not the case it would only matter what I liked, and not what was considered "good" by anybody else.

I gladly admit a weakness for sparkling beverages in most cases.

I mock myself and try to make a joke at the same time. I try this often, and it is difficult to tell, when writing, whether or not the joke succeeds.

(My policy is to never drink any alcohol until after Parker has gone to bed for the night. I don't want to take a chance on his needing to nurse too soon after alcohol has been consumed. This has knocked me out of enjoying the free wine at Northport's Art Night on more than one occasion.)