Trying to Out Smart Youtube

Youtube won't let me post the videos I make - these cheesy picture slideshows.  So... I thought I would post it here.  Enjoy... or don't... its up to you.

A Wonderful Waste of Time

One of the things I will miss greatly when we move back to Sioux Center is our proximity to Target Field.  While we could jump on the 3 bus and be there in about a half an hour... we tend to buzz down Hennepin Ave.  - we're there in less than 15 minutes.  It's a great ride in... through the hip part of the NE Minneapolis St. Anthony neighborhood... past the Gay 90's... past the strip clubs... and we're there.  Baseball heaven.  More than once we've grabbed some pizza at Pizza Luces before or after the game... and my kids enjoy the street entertainers - this last time we saw a guy with an amplified flute playing the Twins fight song.  They were mesmerized.

Since we've been living up here I've spent time scouring Craigslist for cheaper tickets.  I must admit the sucky start to the season was a God-send for us.  Ticket prices plummeted (Minnesotans are finicky like that... the only losers they embrace are the Vikings.)  So this past Monday I found some cheap bleacher seats - front row right field.  It was a makeup game from April 22... Earth Day... so the Twins were wearing these strange green caps.  Lets just say "global warming" made an appearance.  It was hot.  Like 115 degree heat index hot.  And we were sitting on these metal bleachers literally cooking our asses off.  No matter - we had a great time.  The kids ate (and spilled) their nachos while guzzling a souvenir soda.  We watched some baseball (the Twins lost), the kids laughed at the between innings shenanigans, and we visited the gift shop to look at overpriced stuff my kids begged me to buy.  We moved around - looking for shade - finally ending up in the upper deck where some kids in front of us mercifully shot us with their water guns.  We ate some peanuts... watched more baseball... and went home.

I know baseball isn't for everyone - especially in the era of ADD and fast paced gizmos.  I realize that football and basketball have a different appeal - faster paced with more scoring.  (And I know some people think all sports are pointless...)  What baseball has, however, is a different sense of time.  It's not dictated by a clock... there's an all together different pace to it.  Baseball, by its very nature, includes a lot of wasted time.  Batters stepping out... pitchers throwing over to first... speed spiting, crotch grabbing... all taking place between the "action."  But this is what I like about it... its a chance to go sit around with my kids - wasting time - watching these spontaneously choreographed parts of the game unfold.  It provides the opportunity for weird conversations - my son asked me one time while we were watching a game if a bird has ever been hit by a baseball.  (There were some birds diving in and out of the 3rd baseline.)  So I told him about Randy Johnson obliterating a bird with a fastball.  Let's just say he obsessed about it - all the way to the 5th inning... asking question after question... his 7 year old brain piecing things together.  The next morning I showed him a clip of it... he hasn't brought it up since.

What's my point?  In an age where everything and everyone seems to be running at breakneck speed - a baseball game provides an opportunity for "wasting" a beautiful afternoon or evening at the ball park.   Target Field... we're gonna miss you.

Making Space

One of the "most excellent" (to quote Bill and Ted) aspects of doing PhD work has been becoming aware of authors and thinkers I most likely wouldn't have found on my own.  We all tend to get stuck in our little ruts - it's inevitable - and the life of an academic is probably no different.  Through my coursework I've discovered ideas and authors I wish I'd known about sooner.  In that way I can't help but always think I'm late to the party... by the time I catch on to this or that "movement" everyone else has moved on to something else.  No matter - better late then never.

One author I actually discovered on my own this past semester is the late Jesuit thinker Michel De Certeau.  I was reading through the footnotes of Cavanaugh's Theopolitical Imagination and there it was... The Practice of Everyday Life.  I quickly went on Amazon - saw it wasn't that expensive - and ordered it.  I haven't finished it yet - but what I've read thus far has been rich.  De Certeau has provided me with language for speaking about the constant struggle against the dominant forces of culture.  While global capitalism may certainly be a pervasive, homogenizing, force - De Certeau does not leave us helpless - there remains the possibility of subversive action...of making space that evades the panoptic eye of modern institutional life.  This has been helpful for thinking about a theological perspective of ministering to young people.  The tendency - and I'm certainly guilty of this in the past - has been to see young people as subject to the fatalistic forces of popular culture... that they are constantly being duped by technology and consumerism.  Some in youth ministry emphasize the need for unplugging... for moving from one form of enculturation to another - that of the Christian community.  While there are aspects of this perspective that, I would argue, still need to be taken seriously - what De Certeau has helped me think through is how many forms of popular culture are actually modes of subversion - taking what consumer capitalism gives us and turning it into something totally unexpected and challenging.  In some circles the tendency has been to look at the message of popular culture - the meaning - as a way to speak Christianly about cultural engagement.  But there is something also about the mode... the process... the alteration that needs thinking through.  This is what I've learned from De Certeau.  Now... what this means for youth ministry - we'll see... I have a dissertation to write.