It is a good thing to sing all the time, because then the transcript of your life will seem like a musical.

If only people with photographic memories could get their minds developed. 

Today I rediscovered that my bad memory always wins.  Given the reality of that fact, I have to rediscover this quite frequently.

Look at all the confetti we have—this calls for a celebration!

I want my wedding to break into a musical at the vows.  Bridesmaids and groomsmen will act as background singers and dancers as my future wife and I break into song to confess our true love.

Before you boast about how far you have to drive in the snow to work or school, make sure there are no penguins around: 

“Can you believe this weather,” said Bill, sitting down in his desk, “It took me twenty minutes to get here today.”
“Tell me about it,” Darla agreed from her desk, “but the worst part is how cold the steering wheel is,” she finished, shivering at the thought.
Suddenly a nearby penguin chimed in, “I walk seventy miles, and then I stand in the same spot in subzero temperatures for three months.”
Bill and Darla turned to the penguin, stared for a long moment, then quietly returned to their work.

Latarrrz people.

“I can help you here,” the bank teller called to me.  I walked up to her and explained, “Yes, I am simply in need of a PIN number.” 
“I can’t help you with that, we’re not even allowed to see them.  You’ll have to see one of our bankers,” she responded, indicating behind me.  Turning around I saw the only working banker busily engaged with a woman at his desk, and thus I found a chair by the door, grabbed a magazine, and began to wait.

Unfortunately the woman left before I had finished a most interesting article, and the banker strolled up to me while asking in a friendly manner, “How can I help you?” 
“Just need a PIN number is all.”
“Come on back, we’ll take care of ya.”

He pulled up my account and let me enter in my PIN number of choice on the little keypad they have.  The computer wouldn’t accept the new PIN for some reason though, and and so he called someone to figure it out.  After his brief phone call he explained the situation to me.

“Alright, so here’s the deal.  Your PIN won’t start working until midnight tonight.  After that, you’ll be good to go.”
“Oh, okay.  Well, I’m just trying to log onto my account online, and I forgot both my PIN and my account name and password, either of which will help me log on.  So there is another avenue of attack.  Can you just find my account name and password?”
“Oh yeah, sure.  Let me just look it up here real quick.”
A few moments went by as his nimble fingers worked at the keyboard. 
“Ok,” he started, ”Your username is ‘ihatechasebanking1.’”

ihatechasebanking1—complete shock instantly flooded my mind at the words.  Time slowed down to a near halt.  Every one of my brain cells froze in place as they heard the news that has just arrived.  The banker immediately looked over at me after reading it off the screen, seemingly in expectation of some kind of an explanation.  For a moment my expression looked like it would if in the morning I had opened the front door to get the paper, and the world outside was not my normal suburban neighborhood, but the Cretaceous period, full of dinosaurs and volcanoes.  The banker and I stared at each other with nonplussed faces for a moment—and then it hit me.

It was a month ago, very late at night, and I was trying to pay my first ever credit card payment.  This required finding papers with account numbers, figuring out how to find the visual to a check online, and trying to discern the numbers at the bottom of the blurrily displayed check.  All of these, especially amidst a time crunch, became especially frustrating.  By the time it came time to make an account name, and when the first few account names I normally use were already taken, my mind found the situation a convenient avenue for expressing the somewhat less than benign feelings I was experiencing toward my bank.

Little did I know this seemingly innocuous peccadillo would eventually set up this most interesting situation a month later, in which I would learn from a Chase banker himself that my account name was ‘ihatechasebanking1.’  The feeling was not unlike what I suppose the main character at the end of an episode of The Twilight Zone would have felt.

“Would you like to change that today?” he asked a few moments later.
“Yeah, let’s go ahead and change that,” I pulled myself out of my laughter to respond. 

Another round of random thoughts.

The only times you really look at something is the first time and the last time you see it. 

Interpret the behavior of others charitably.  If you don’t understand what it is someone is doing, think it is a good thing for a good reason rather than a bad thing for a bad reason.  For it is better to mistakenly think that someone is good when they are in fact bad than to mistakenly think that someone is bad when they are in fact good.  This way if there is good in the world, you will be sure to appreciate it.

The longer you live the less it becomes up to you who to be.  People begin to expect you to be how you have been in the past.  Thus, it is good to do many different things so that you widen the range of how people expect you to be.

A person may claim they are weak when really they are lazy, or claim to be lazy when really they are weak.

We rate people, that is, how they act, against a standard we hold in our heads.  But the actuality of their decision was amidst different options that they had in their head, which you know nothing about.  Some decisions are more laudable than others, but we do not know when this is because we do not know the options and considerations that were involved. 

When you see a person you don’t know, it seems like they could be anybody.  But once you get to know them, eventually you can not imagine them being any other way.

I had a pretty funny day today, but I am being unproductive.  I think I will go read a book.  Everyone have a great night!

Lately it’s been hard to remember the distinction between life and death.

Our words prove we’re alive, but our actions prove we don’t know it.

But I don’t want to be numb to the beauty of this world.

It’s cold, but there is weather at all.

I’ve been bruised, cut up, and scarred, but I’m alive.

I’ve been hurt, but I can know just one true friend.

But most of all, just to wake in the morning and remember that everything is built on grace.

Why have this body and landscape of life at all? 

If I die tomorrow in a car accident, God is still good, and I’m happy for the life He allowed me to have.

Random thoughts.

Every person is a reporter—asked, ‘How are you?’ a person must report their thoughts.  Conversation is the art of reporting your thoughts well.

The distinction between words and meaning is crucial.  When a person says, ‘Boys are so selfish’ what they actually mean is that ‘I have had experience A and experience B, and so on, and in these experiences I apprehended that the person involved was both 1) a boy and 2) selfish.’  They do not actually mean that all experiences by all people everywhere are such that people always experience boys as being selfish.

Instead of asking many things directly, we test them indirectly.  Instead of asking ‘Do you love me?’ we call them in the middle of the night and tell them we need their help.  Instead of asking if someone is afraid of the dark, you turn off the lights.  Instead of asking if someone is talkative, you go around them and say a few things, and wait to see what will happen.

The sound of me having nothing to say and the sound of me choosing to not say something are very similar.  I find that people often confuse the two.

It is so cold outside.  It is basically negative absolute zero.  But there is a snowball fight at our school campus tomorrow!!  Okay, ciao tutti!

I was busy thinking of excuses for being late. 

I have the worst luck.  Example: one time I was driving on a three-lane street towards a row of traffic lights, and the traffic light above each lane turned red at the *exact* same time.

It’s weird that whenever lightning strikes the earth, there is always someone with a very large camera taking a picture of it.

If we ever find life elsewhere in the universe, the question of long distance relationships will take on an entirely new meaning.

*I* wanted to be a kleptomaniac for halloween.  You stole my idea!!

The depth of a friendship is proportional to the amount of steps in the handshake. 

It is a good idea to break up by phone, because then if they get emotional and start going off, you can raise your voice as though you’re in a tunnel and start saying, “OK…yeah, OK…we’re breaking up…sorry, we’re breaking up!” *click*

And lastly, a weird paradox: I always unwant to do all things equally, and therefore whatever I do, I am infinitely happy.

All throughout the day we are having some primary experience—talking to a friend, eating breakfast, walking to class.  But while that is the telescopic focus of our experience, there is also an entire list of exterior propositions that we are unconsciously registering. 

While getting things ready for tea I may be setting the table cloth, getting out the tea, warming up the kettle, but underneath all these activities there is much content taking effect:

1. I am rushing to get ready for tea.
2. I am stressed.
3. Saul is very kind (since he is busy making scones for everyone)
4. Our house seems dreary.
5. It is dirty in the kitchen.
6. Getting ready for tea is exciting.
7. No one else offers to help get ready for tea.
8. I am unsure who is coming to tea.
9. I am glad tea gives people a reason to come together.  

Long lists of ideas like these are always happening in our minds, and based on what is happening the list will change in content.  If you are around a funny person, things like ‘I am stressed’ and ‘Life is very sad’ and ‘I don’t like people’ will drop off the list temporarily. 

When you die, people will say at the funeral what entered onto their list of exterior propositions about you most frequently.  ‘Oh yes, Alex was very kind, he always was going out of his way for people.  The room was always more cheerful with him in it.’  In this way, all of life is simply spent determining what will be said at one’s funeral. 

I am simply elated about this idea; it helps me define life better.  I may think ‘What is on my list right now?’ or wonder ‘What propositions do I add to other people’s lists?’ 

Hmmm…I have already been accused of overanalyzing things once today.  Maybe I should wait ’til tomorrow to post this. 

The ability to imagine possibilities is the root of much of our experience.

Fear.  (Various times.)

It is possible that I could fall off this ledge I am walking along and fall five hundred feet to the ground and land very hard on the ground and die.  *shivers*

It is possible that that semi-truck might not see me next to him and thus will merge into my lane and push me into that concrete wall and it will be a terrible crash and I will die.  *widens eyes*

It is possible that there is a very large spider in the basement that could crawl into my blankets while I am sleeping and I will feel it with my feet and start screaming and never be able to sleep in a blanket again.  *shrieks*

Intellect.  (In the hot Italian summer.)

Josh opens the freezer and holds up his water bottle exclaiming, “WHAT! Why does a third of my water disappear everytime I try to freeze it?  What is happening??”

Suspicious indeed.  And he has remarked that this has happened quite frequently in the last few days.  He seems sincere.  What to think?

Josh does not get very good grades, but it is possible that he is a very good actor.  Perhaps he only filled it up two-thirds to start, and then claimed the water disappeared to trick us.  “No way, Josh! How did the water get out, the bottle is solid!  Do it again, I guarantee it won’t happen.” 

He fills it up all the way in front of us and puts in the freezer, but much later he takes it out when it is frozen and a third is gone again.  Perhaps he went back and poured it out while we weren’t looking?  How tricksy is Josh?  Would a person consider it worth it to trick people into thinking the freezer made his water disappear? 

Water does many tricky things; how does it get on the outside of glasses in restaurants?  So…who is the tricksy one here, science and water, or Josh?  What is the probability he has been acting for several days, carefully controlling our perceptions?  What is the probability this is one of the many things that happens in science that I don’t know about? 

“No way, I don’t believe it!”

A HA! CAUGHT!!  You have been pouring out the water, Josh.  What an act!  What mischievous scheming!!

Action.  (The other night.)

“Alright Melody, time to get off.”
“Aww, just a few more minutes!”
“You said you were just checking a few things.”
“Yeah, yeah, just a few more things.”

I am in the kitchen, having been calling to her, and I pause to myself.  The paths of possibility are clear; the future is such an interesting idea.  I could kick Melody off the computer now, or I could let her stay on a few minutes longer.  Either could happen, which one will?  The former would benefit me more, but the latter is kinder.  Surely allowing her a few more minutes is not the infinite inconvenience my original, self-centered intuition suggested?

Every morning we wake to subconsciously wonder, “What will happen today?”  In that way each day starts a canvas of infinite possibility, slowly painted until we go to sleep thinking of how it ended up.  But the whole of life is the greatest experience of possibility; once over, we look back at the enormous mural and think, “And that was one of all possible lives.”

Jobs.  We need to jobs to make money to give things to other people.  Also so that we can learn to work diligently, and in a good spirit.

Friends.  We have friends to share in life together, to bear one another’s burdens, to encourage one another during trials, to comfort one another in pain, to sharpen one another in character.

Food.  We have food so we can meet with other people to eat it together, and so we can share it with others who have little or none.

Shelter.  We have houses so we can invite others in, and give them company and food, and become friends with them. 

Life.  We don’t just have a life for these things, but to know the God who created the world.  He has been here in the past, and you will meet Him in the future.  But He is presently here as well, in all you see around you, so that any person so willing can seek Him out and find Him now.