Thursday, December 22, 2005

You Can Never Go Home Again

This post is on location at my parent's house in Grand Prairie, Texas.

This afternoon I drove "home." I say "home" because Home is Abilene, Texas where I have spent the majority of the past decade and "home" is Grand Prairie, Texas where i spent the majority of the previous two decades and where my parents still live.

Everytime I come to visit, something has changed. Except to me, one who visits so infrequently, it seems as though a lot of things have changed. Because this is the place where I grew up though, it seems more than a bunch of new buildings. It appears as though the fundamental nature of the universe has been altered. This town is the place of my memory, and now that memory is disconnected from reality.

I love holidays, and I love spending time with my family at holidays, but I do not enjoy going "home." It reminds me that even the most fundamental things in the universe are changeable and not always for the better.

Tuesday, December 20, 2005

Supernatural

This one goes out to all those hard science people out there:

I am a historically, literarily, theologically bent fellow. As such I have very little problem accepting/assiging mystery to the world around me. I have been wondering, however, how do my friends in the sciences deal with the supernatural? The aim of the sciences is to measure, categorize, and define the world and thus (it appears to me) erase mystery.

Discuss . . .

And the Winner Is . . .

The winner for my [renamed] Winter Reading Project is Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. Melissa Jerkins who recommended it has history on her side as she and her husband Nathan are the ones responsible (and probably culpable) for recommending such classics as Steven King's The Gunslinger; Herman Wouk's The Caine Mutiny; and they are singularly responsible for my acting career.

Thank you all for your wonderful suggestions which I will also attempt to read as well.