The end of finals…for now.

I finished finals yesterday. It turns out that the roughly 10 hours of studying I put in paid off. I answered all those questions to the best of my ability. Hurray. I won the game…only to play it again in another 3 months.

Not too much is going on. There are only a few guys left on the floor at this point and in general we’re all up to the usual shenanegins. Sometimes I feel like I’m a bad example when we’re supposed to be quiet during finals week and I am just as loud as my residents are during an intense game of Mario Kart…but I suppose I can’t be perfect. Right? Maybe certain people would think differently…I guess I should just fine myself or give myself a severe warning. I’ve only had to tell myself to be quiet a couple times though…I choose to be lenient. But watch out loud Chauncey. I’m watching you. I’ve got the authority to fine you. Be careful.

I’m steeling myself for biggish sorts of conversations over Spring break. My goal is to read one book called “no man is an island” by Thomas Merton and then to be able to do that: Not be an island. I find that I often hide myself behind multiple books during breaks in order to not have to interact or force interaction with people. I get really introverted. It’s odd to me that here at school I crave people to be around, but that at home I mostly want to read and not have to talk to people (when really I want the opposite).

I came to a realization the other day. I realized that we as people ruin a lot of valuable words. Here at SPU we have ruined some good ones. Particularly words like “community”, “intentional”, and “reconciliation”.  I don’t mean to say that these words are bad, but rather that in the course of our use of them we arrive at a place where people are using words that have lost their meaning. What do we mean for example by “intentional community”? Most people have a vague idea. However, I think that in general the way the phrase is tossed around rendering us as people wanting “intentional community” at a loss as to what exactly it entails. I think we’ve discussed concepts like this to the point that we no longer know what anyone means. Sometimes I think it’d be easier for everyone if instead of “intentional community” we said things like “going deeper with Jesus in a group”. If instead of just saying reconciliation we told people that the literal greek means “to exchange places with the other” then perhaps there’d be more of it. It makes me frustrated and perhaps a bit angry to see people who could benefit from the real definitions of the words we use, bogged down by the institutional form the words take on. I’d like to start a campaign. It’s an unofficial one. That means I will not be making signs and T-shirts and holding rallies.  Let’s call the campaign “People for Everyone Saying What they Mean”. We would make a point of only using big words that we’ve made clear to other people. If the words aren’t doing the job anymore maybe its time to use different words. Although, perhaps the fault doesn’t lie with the words. Maybe it lies with us. Can we still use these words and let people get what we mean them to understand?

I’m going to go play video games now. Good night, and good luck.