Redemption

Written 12/08/10.

I don't get the cross.

Or forgiveness, for that matter. Be honest with yourself - if someone you truly cared for consistently flaunted your love, what would you do? If everyone treated each other how we treat God, we'd hate each other. We get sidetracked by almost every shiny thing that pops up in our path; substitute almost anything for our time with our Lover. How can he keep forgiving us through that? How many times have I tearfully sworn love and loyalty, only to turn and slap God in the face the next day? How many turns will this take until it "sticks"? How many tears must flow to change my soul? How many mountaintops must I fall from until I learn to fly? The first lines from Chris Rice's "Clumsy" come to mind:

"I get so clumsy, I get so foolish, I get so stupid sometimes, then I feel so useless. But you're saying you love me, and you still wanna hold me, that you wanna be near me, that you're making me holy...still making me holy".

Yes we all know the Sunday School answer. God loves us just that much to forgive us every time we sin. Thank you so much. 

You know what? Forget our all-knowing mind for a second, and answer with your heart. How long must this go on? How long must I grieve the heart of God? Why does He redeem us? Relational pain is a horrible hell, but could you imagine going through it almost continually, every day, just because you love so many people that much? This is crazy. There are so many ways to explain "Oh, how He loves us"…but why. Why does God love us? Why does he forgive? Why did he die and go through hell for us? Why did he create humanity in the first place?  "For His glory". Well, crap. Right there we cross over into the deepest part of theology - the mind of God - and reach the end of human understanding. Sure, God is the only being in the universe that can justifiably glorify Himself, so what else would be more glorifying than an image of Himself?

Forget the mental gymnastics. I've heard them all my life. I'm not looking for rational answers, and I don't think you are either. Reason can impact the heart, but not change it.

From My Utmost for His Highest: 

"It does not matter who or what we are, there is absolute reinstatement into God by the death of Jesus Christ and by no other way, not because Jesus Christ pleads, but because He died. It is not earned, but accepted."

I don't get that. I live life by doing, by practicing and doing better and getting my work's due. And when I just mess up all the time, I ruin the one thing in my life that could save me. Continuing from Utmost:

"All the pleading which deliberately refuses to recognize the Cross is of no avail; it is battering at another door than the one which Jesus has opened."

But what does that mean? What does "recognizing the Cross" look like? What's the ten-step, ten-minute plan to overnight Cross recognition? I've heard the story of the cross so many times, but has my heart ever truly grasped the depth of the Atonement?

I think this just deserves incredulity. An passionate kind of disbelief that fuels our every action - a true realization of the power of the Cross. The insanity of the Atonement. And to let that grind our sense of self-ownership and any speck of pride into nothing. We are not our own, never were our own, never will be our own. It's never been and never will be  about us, and nothing we ever do can change the horrible blackness in our souls. I found something awesome on this.

"I think it means we serve a God who loves redemption more than we can possibly imagine. We may feel disqualified for his mercy. We may feel too dirty for his grace. We may feel only a series of white knuckle works will open back up his gates. But, that’s not what his love letter says. We are not shown a steady parade of heroes who became even more heroic in the hands of God. We are shown a parade of failures who found forgiveness. Losers who found love. Hopeless who found hope."

                                                                                - Jon Acuff

If nothing else, in realizing just what a hopeless loser I am apart from God, I've learned a bit of how prayer is such a fantastic answer to everything. So that's what I did. I prayed. God, I'm an idiot, I don't get this. Can you at least help pry open my mind to this? Sanctify my broken heart and heal my blind eyes to see your truth?

That very night I'd messed up again. The next morning walking to class, I felt myself sheepishly standing before God, yet again trying to crawl towards him; whimpering a pathetic "I'm…sorry" with all the above questions ransacking my mind. Not again, how can I go back again, what can I do this time? As the hopelessness began to creep over me, a sentence was distinctly heard:

"You've already been forgiven".

...and there was no question about it. 

At the Dinner Table

Written 11/23/2010.

It is neigh sacred tradition in the Shull house to hold devotions after dinner, a practice I hated throughout high school. But for the moment, forget my immaturity. The other night we had a fascinating discussion during devotions, and as per normal when my mind gets rolling, I felt the drive to write it down. Here you are.

I'll ask this: when criticizing Christianity, where do people instantly point? To the hypocrisy of its believers. Just take our treatment of each other in the church - why are there families painfully torn apart by the "body of Christ"? Why all the denominations, the infighting, and the squabbling over a verse or two?

Narrow the focus: drinking. There's some Christian dynamite for you. Put that word out in a church meeting and feelings will arise. I brought up some recent thoughts about this, and things started to become passionate at the dinner table. Then Dad whipped out his old leatherbound, highlighting two passages: Romans 14 and 1 Corinthians 13. Romans 14 attacks this subject head-on, and is a fantastic read as a whole. Some highlights:

"As for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him…why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God".

Hold on to that for a second while we throw one more color into the mix - 1 Corinthians 13:1-6. Everyone's heard verses 4-7, that "love is patient, love is kind" bit that's read at every wedding (even though that's speaking of a more universal than romantic love). However the first three verses here are what Dad pointed out:

 "If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing".

You can do everything there is in the world - be the smartest, the most accomplished, the wisest, and still fall short. In summary: you can be so "right"…but without love, you're still wrong.

A clarification - yes, truth is unchanging and rooted in the nature of God, and love is not rolling over sin blindly. What did Jesus say to the girl caught cheating on her husband? "Go and sin no more". He forgave her, yet still acknowledged the action as wrong, as a deed worthy of punishment and ultimately His death. There is a time for speaking truth in love. But Romans goes on to describe three examples of conflict for the church: drinking, eating meat sacrificed to idols, and holy days. Instead of a contextual analysis, I think there's a question that better gets to the point: why did God give us these gray areas anyways?

Dad had a theory: to test our love. To watch and see how we'll love each other in these "disputable matters". Examples? Predestination. Creation. Revelation. Baptism. Women in the church. Speaking in tongues. War. Alcohol. Prozac. Contraception. Music. Movies.

Church is community, one  in which many of us have grown and matured. Therefore, we link our personal history our personal churches and their beliefs, which in comparison inevitably lead to heated scuffles and hurt feelings. My dad's point: in moderation this is healthy and normal, yet when the dust settles, is the issue essential? Often - no…yet it is important. When the essential gets confused with the nonessential, chaos and hypocrisy spread. Yet why are we surprised - is not the bride of Christ Satan's biggest target?

St. Augustine had something fantastic on this:

"In essentials, unity. In nonessentials, liberty. In all things, charity."

I love that - it applies to so many aspects of life and our treatment of others (charity here meaning love in old English, rather than the act or mindset of giving something away).

"By this they will know you are my disciples...by your love for one another". Are Christians defined by their understanding and love for others, especially in difficulty, and moreso with each other in "nonessentials"?

Are you?

Out of Control

Written August 15 2008, the summer after high school graduation.

So I recently went through the Dominican Republic and Haiti for two weeks. It wasn’t with any group or association, just my brother and a friend of his, Andy. We experienced much, and have a good many amazing stories for future campfires. I wrote everything down in a Moleskine journal. While there’s obviously a lot of stuff written in that journal, several entries each day, there is one entry in particular that I would trade all rest for. This is that entry, translated from my shorthand and edited to make sense. 

July 22nd, in our room, Hudson’s house, night

Wow. I really don’t know what to say. We did a bunch of things after I last wrote, playing with more kids, seeing stuff, but that’s not important. I have learned how to run. Or, walk, rather, as I’m too little to run. I’ll start with something my brother said. We started talking about some of our deeper questions of Christianity, and the question of scripture and its application came up. 

“How do I know that verse was meant for me, and not for the Israelites in their specific time and place? Then, why does it matter? Is scripture inherent anyways? Does the God who supposedly spoke it really speak it? Does he even really love me? …Does he even really exist? Does life have a purpose anyways?

…and now I’ve put myself alone on this island, questioning the existence of God and the nature of the universe.”

He said that tonight as an example of how he’s gone about questioning our faith in the past. Questioning and testing your beliefs is a vital part of making your faith your own, but...where does it lead? I do know this: if you pursue doubt for the sake of doubt, you find darkness. And that darkness has plagued me since I took my first steps toward Christ.

I call it the Catacombs, after the Greek myth of the Minotaur. King Minos of Crete had these catacombs he would push people into – an immense maze, impossible to comprehend and plunged in darkness. The maze was special – it always moved you towards its center. In the center was the Minotaur – death. The questions are the Catacombs. The first one “opens a door to a dark room” as Andy put it, and the rest, instead of showing you the way out, plunge you ever deeper into the darkness, into the maze where at the center is the complete rejection of God and salvation – the Minotaur, and death. 

These questions, the Catacombs, have a covert purpose: control. All my life I’ve tried to understand with my mind – the whys, the hows, etc. I read and watched all the theories, the explanations, all telling me the reasons I should or should not believe what I believe. And all of it, all the feeble grasps at understanding, are my attempts to control – to define, shorten, limit, package, and shelve away anything that ironically cannot be defined or limited. We’re attempting to fetter the unfetterable – God. What we don’t realize is what actually happens – in the reaching up to chain that which is above us, our strength fails. The chains fall back on us. We deceive ourselves into thinking that we have been freed by defining this element of spirituality, caging ourselves in the process. Really, we define ourselves by that control. It’s the core component of who we are. But I’ve got news for you – the Christian life is the most out of control and freefalling life there is. And yeah, that still scares the crap out of me, as it should you – if by nature we are controlling beings, then the idea of being out of control is contrary to our very self. But that is the secret – to Deny Self, in the words of John Piper. And the secret to that? Let go. - some people call it Faith. When I came to that realization, I said something out loud - 

“I’m coming to see that faith is as big a part of my Faith as anything else is.”

Say it out loud a few times and you’ll get the irony.

All my life I have heard people use the word “faith”. Everyone has. It’s always been some…THING vaguely related to God and stuff, something that I really couldn’t put in concrete terms. But on the trip we started talking about something using that same word, “faith”, but it was something so different that I didn’t connect it to what I had known all my life. The way we were talking it and living it was much more to do about God providing somewhere to sleep, something to eat in a country where people go for days without eating, and water to drink when we had nothing resembling a purifier. That the next thing you put in your mouth wouldn’t bring a parasite along with it. That the darkness of the voodoo drums in the mountains were less than the light that protected us. It was so immediate, so simple, so uncomplicatedly real, that tonight I made that ridiculous statement. 

And that was the key – I stopped thinking, stopped doubting, and stopped bloody using my stupid head, and just…trusted. Trusted God in the fact that we would always have something to eat, somewhere to sleep. And in the letting go of those concerns, instead of losing everything, I found it all. Losing control, that thing so desired and worked towards, actually put me in complete peace. 

It’s precisely like love – when you love someone, what do you do? Or perhaps, what don’t you do? You’d never ask “So do I really love her?”, “Why do I keep doing all these nice things anyways?”, or even “Isn’t this just a bunch of chemicals all mixed up weird?” No. You just…love. Thoughtless, uninvited, unquestioned, selfless love. 

So when you try to control, to make perfect sense of things, you think, and stop trusting, stop loving, and become chained again. I’m beginning to see a small piece of this enormous sadness. God must feel like this when he sees his creation shackled in such a way. I have this image in my mind, and it’s more of a feeling than a picture, so I’ll do my best. The image is this – a human, naked and free, running through fields of endless joy, all the while lying in the blissful happiness of God’s arms. Nothing, no thing can stop this sprint to and from God – the walls, the pits, and the giants in life are transparent shadows, laughingly passed through. When we doubt (or fear, or any other sin in this case), we stop running. We look around us, and instead of passing through them, we push against the walls, shiver as we peer down into the pits, and quail at the giants. We then do everything in our power to imagine a creative way to bypass the obstacles, maybe climb over the wall, build a bridge over the pit, or maybe single-handedly beat down the giants. All this when we shouldn’t even be looking at the problems! Our eyes should, and were created to be on God, powered by a triune battery of faith, hope, and love. Love has been my focus for a few years now, and I believe I understand a few morsels of it. Faith I have come to see clearer in these past few days…marked by my “I don’t see how faith fits in with love” remark the first day I was here. Hope, I still do not understand, but I have faith (hah) God will reveal its place to me. 

“Hope without Faith is powerless, and faith without hope is purposeless.”

- Andy, just after writing this when I asked him about hope. I had to think about it for awhile.

Here’s my weak attempt at working Faith, Hope, and Love together. You must have the faith to let go, falling into the unsurpassed love of the Father where you cannot help but love back, with a well-rooted and secure hope that keeps you in giddy anticipation of what comes next, like a kid at Christmas. 

The morning after I wrote all this, I had a weird feeling, and tried to identify it. It was precisely like I had a huge crush on some girl, a girl I’d definitely be seeing soon. You know what I mean - that weird, bubbly feeling where you almost vibrate with anticipation. Only then I realized that it wasn’t over any girl, it was over God. In realizing all that was written above, I found myself in direct, relational contact with God, beginning to fulfill the purpose of my humanity. I was (and am)…in the beginning stages of a loving relationship with my Creator, which made me…giddy. How hilarious is that?

Author's note, four years later: I consider this piece to be a sort of "Part 1" to what I'm sure will be a lifelong journey with God. I hold Beyond Doubt as "Part 2" to the thoughts begun here. 

Midnight Twilight

Written 11/20/2009.

Last night, some friends and I were at the midnight premiere of New Moon. Jealous? Incredulous? Probably not. Driving back, a few of us noted (or hoped) that the movie might be a satire of the series. That, or the people filming this thing were as bewildered as anyone.

Producer: Alright, I got good news and bad news. The good - I finally read the book. The bad - we can't make a movie out of it. It's...shallow. It's depressing. Bella spends half of it staring at a wall. Then, wolves. Forget that there isn't plot development until the end, everything in-between is like author's private sexual fantasy.

Director: Throw in a bunch of hot guys in there and women will watch it. Lots of attractive, shirtless guys. And make sure the camera spends extra long ogling their bodies.

Producer: That's ridiculous. You mean no matter how slow the movie is or how blatantly we manipulate female emotions, as long we show enough shirtless men, they won't realize the complete lack of substance in the movie? ...Isn't that the same idea behind porn, just switching out girls for guys?

Director: Pretty much. Trust me, it'll work.

Producer: Work to the point of making millions and having the women foaming at the mouth in anticipation of the next movie, one that is certainly even more deliberately manipulative and pitiful? 

Director: Yep.

Producer: Even in light of the fact that it'll run over two hours, feel like ten, and force viewers to feel amazingly gypped at its end?

Director: Girls today are desperate. 
Producer: ...


Director: Hey it's not like anyone today knows what a real man is. And just in case anyone catches on to the porn thing, we'll distract them with inane amounts of awkwardly long scenes of Bella and Edward/Jacob staring at each other to constitute romantic intimacy.

Producer: Will the two say anything?

Director: Yeah, but it won't make any sense, so no one will remember it. As long as faces are awkwardly close and they seem like they're talking about deep stuff, you don't need actual emotion. The idea is just to repeat this stereotypical image of supposed love until it's believable.

Producer: Won't people be creeped out by Edward staring at everything? Namely at Bella?

Director: If they ask, we'll just tell fans that he's trying not to…eat her.

     
[silence]

Producer: …right. So moving on to the dysfunction and emotional abuse. Doesn't Edward pledge undying love to Bella, deny it the next day, then later tell her he'd lied again? And didn't he watch her sleep for like three months before they dated? Why would anyone want this guy? What is wrong with Bella, or women as a whole for that matter?

Director: Girls think Robert Pattinson is hot. That is all.

Producer: You mean if someone's attractive enough, they can be completely immature, selfish, an obvious relational black hole and still be swooned over?

Director: …did you ever go to high school?

Producer: Actually, I was homeschooled. Anyways, aren't there like…inconsistencies between the book and the movie? Like Jacob - wasn't he supposed to grow…to like 6' 6''?

Director: It's Taylor Lautner. Attractive men indiscriminately fall under the "Tall" category.

[Writer walks in]

Writer: Hey, here's the script. I had the brilliant idea of making Bella narrate these undelivered emails so the audience won't fall asleep as we watch her mope for half the movie. 

Director: That is absolutely moronic. No one will pay to listen to a girl read post-breakup emails for half an hour; find a workaround. Add flashbacks or abs or something.

[Writer leaves]

Producer: Alright, so what about Bella's obvious emotional abuse of Jacob? He spends all this time alone with her, actually loving her throughout, placing Bella above his own life, family, and even future, only to discover that she's led him on like a matador with a bull as she deserts him at the slightest word of Edward. And you can't just say "Edward's hot", because both Edward and Jacob are attractive. How do you explain that to the fans?

Director: …ah...hmm…

Producer: Terrific. So we're pretty much betting $50 million on the assumption that our target audience (of girls) isn't smart enough to actually think about what they're watching. Since when do women not over-think things?
Director: Hey, I don't know. It's not like there are actually women with standards anymore. 
Producer: ...good point. 
Director: And the book sold great. Tell the writer to copy a few more lines from it. The book sold millions; with all this crazy junk inside, it must at least be well-written, right?

If only we knew. But forget the execution; New Moon got me mad. It is disgusting. Afterwards I wanted something to fight, for a brother to wrassle, or for a tribe of orcs to suddenly rush down the hallway, bellowing foreign expletives and charging my lone self with sword in hand. Bluntly, the equivalent of Twilight for guys is a porno. And that summarizes Twilight as a whole  - emotional pornography. I once heard this defined as "idolatry of a perversion of reality". I like that explanation. Forget the shoddy cinematography, ignore the incoherent plot. New Moon deliberately ensnares, poisons, and abuses the core, the complexity, and the beautiful fragility of femininity.

Masculinity died long ago, and dies again with each divorce, with every click through a porn site. Something in me refuses to believe that femininity is lost as well. Did this idea spawn from personal experience, or disillusionment and cowardly hope? God knows. Disregarding my own frailty, one fact remains. Men cannot stand idly by while so many girls are emotionally captured and poisoned by this monster. I certainly won't. 

Overdramatic? Yep. Exaggerated? Sure. True? Yes. Can and will Christ remedy and cure the aforementioned one day? Yes, and I can't wait for it. But what will I do about it now? Or better yet - what can I do? Stand on street corners, argue girls down, picket movie theaters? No, that just exhibits the same of bestial and passive-aggressive masculinity in the movie.  

I think I'll try to pray. For culture and for families - the recovery of lost standards and the restoration of relationships.  Then I'll try to walk like I talk. I will try to study and learn more about what true masculinity is, then live it out in my own life. I will try to listen to the girls who rave about the latest emotional trash (because there'll be another book series soon), and get them thinking about their understanding of relationships. I will try to pursue women with clarity, communication, and confidence. I will try to foster a relationship of such love and respect with my wife that our kids will be instilled with the highest standards from our example.

Oh. I'll try to write about it, too.  

PS: found this the other day. Thought it was hilarious, in a sad way.

I Can't.

Written halfway through freshman year of college.

I can't be a genius.

I can't fight or wrestle.

I can't throw.

I can't do a good pistol squat with my right leg.

I can't bench 250.

I can't sleep responsibly.

I can't compose music.

I can't get myself to stop eating crap.

I can't talk to my roommate.

I can't stop hating big jocks.

I can't get my priorities straight. 

I can't do those awkward passing "hi" things to people you know but don't really know...you know?

I can't seem to find the energy anymore to be social.

I can't get over my stupid prejudices with people. Not racial, just personal.

I can't run a mile under 5 minutes.

I can't get my arms to bulk up. No matter how much I work out.

I can't stop saying or thinking "your mom" at any remotely applicable audible phrase.

I can't go back in time.

I can't hear things sometimes. Really, it's a diagnosed problem.

I can't remember peoples' names. 

I can't stop loving my niece. Even though I haven't seen her since Christmas.

I can't stop judging people.

I can't get good grades in my online statistics homework. Seriously, I want to shoot the idiot who rounded those answers wrong.

I can't respect someone simply because they're in a position of authority over me.

I can't stop giving in when I should stand tall.

I can't be a man whenever I actually need to be.

I can't pay attention in accounting.

I can't stand it when my room's messy.

I can't do something well without getting insanely focused on it. And usually getting made fun of from my intensity.

I can't stand it when people get bullied. And how I've become numb to that fact.

I can't do something I should if I don't want to.

I can't trust God.

I can't understand why writing helps. But it does.

STD Gun

Written March 31, 2009.

So awhile ago, my thoughts were drifting. And as it usually does, my brain settled on a rather peculiar subject. See, a friend of mine had been studying up on the more awkward elements of the human anatomy for class, and I was reading along as well. Of course, the first thing my eyes fell on had to do with the female anatomy, namely the uh…whatever the operation is that's the girl version of a vasectomy.  The book noted how women still produce eggs after the operation, then went on to other subjects. 

I was like "Hey! What happens to those egg things? Do they just travel on their merry way and just cluster up at the end there, and like create a huge cyst or something? That's…not cool!". So I went online and researched this, as I do with pretty much all life questions (like "how to talk to girls"…but that's a different story). So I got my answer rather quickly, and it's honestly pretty sweet - see, once the eggs reach the end of their path or whatever, they do indeed stop - but then the body absorbs them. The eggs become part of the body, and morph into other cells. How cool is that? I researched a bit farther, and found that the same thing happens with guys (just not with eggs, obviously).

So today I was thinking again. What if  we could reverse the process? As in, change normal cells into reproductive cells.  And even more interesting - what if it was a superpower? You could just touch somebody and impregnate them. After a few (or more) accidental babies, the government would lock the person up for testing. Take it a step farther - what if they managed to extract the genetic quirk that allowed for this superpower…and managed to put it inside a gun? It'd be like instant...well, rape. Random little kids in third world countries would just stab you with a needle and you'd be with child. What would happen if guys got stabbed, then? What happens if a zygote forms in a male body? And of course, some totalitarian dictator  would start infecting all the guns with STDs. Our soldiers would no longer get blown to bits - it'd just be like "BAM - you have an STD!" Then the UN would ban STD guns and...nothing would happen, because it's the UN. But eventually the guns would be limited to the underworld. I can just picture some future mob boss, surrounded by lackeys, cigar in mouth, leaning against a wall in some dark room. 

"Still won't talk, Johnny?" the boss smirked. The sole source of light in the room was a dim lamp, swinging tiredly side to side from the train lumbering by overhead. Slowly, slowly, he raised the weapon into the light. "…looks like we'll need to use Bessie to loosen those lips". The instant the prisoner saw the gun, he screamed, loud enough to pierce through the dirty rags in his mouth, loud enough to shake the confidence of all standing nearby. Perhaps realizing the severity of his intention for the first time, the boss looked at the gun - his hand was shaking like a boy on a first date. He slammed the hand onto the table. "NO!" he screamed, and took a stronger grip. "THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS TO THOSE WHO GO AGAINST THE FAMILY!" 

He pulled the trigger.

Reverse Cookie

Written February 16, 2009.

So I'm holding this cookie, except the chips are white and the dough is brown. I thought to offer it to the girl next to me, except I wondered what I would say. The first thing that popped into my mind was "hey you want to try a reverse cookie?" And then that got me…what would be the qualifications of such a "reverse cookie"? Would such a title be warranted by the mere swap of dough and chip colors? Perhaps by making the cookie primarily chocolate with bits of dough cooked into it? Or, delving even deeper into this issue, what if it was a spacial matter? That a true reverse cookie would simply be a situation where everything else is cookie dough, but with a small pocket of air in the center in the shape of a cookie? Would a true reverse cookie even exist on the same plane of time and space? I remember someone rambling about some theory that every time you think of something, it's instantly created on a parallel plane of existence. So has my reverse cookie come into existence by the typing of this sentence? And with this next sentence, is there now some spectral being eating my newly created cookie in this other dimension, laughing its head off at me?

That got me thinking. What if everything I looked at instantly filled with cookie dough? Including air and space? Like, utterly and completely just…became cookie dough? The person across from me, the carpet, the wood pillars in my peripheral vision, even the air between my eyes and the aforementioned? I'd probably run out of air to breathe rather quickly…but I could just eat myself an air hole, as long as I don't look at it. Eventually, after I wreaked havoc for awhile, the military would probably try to swarm me. And after they like lost a few dudes, they'd try to snipe me from long distance. Only some high-up officer would see the possibilities of my ability, and would order them to take me alive…so they'd try to bag me with tranquilizer darts. But I'd just stand in the middle of some field, creating walls of cookie dough to stop all such attempts. And just to be annoying, if I did get shot, I would die with my eyes open. In the end though, they'd probably put me to sleep somehow (maybe by dipping a Pollock work in ether and throwing it at me…or something else I couldn't bear to look at). And after many sad years alone, blindfolded in a laboratory somewhere, I'd be set free after they had their fill…and probably found someone more interesting - somebody that turns everything into packing peanuts or something. Then old, used, and tired, I'd end up in some cookie factory with a 24-hour guard until I died.

Hmm. 

Cave Adventure

Written 11/2007, for a High School AP English writing assignment.

Jeremy was home, and I was ecstatic. Even though he was only home for the weekend, I knew we’d be doing something crazy or illegal. Whenever someone asks me for a story, my mind always runs through one of the countless adventures the two of us have managed to find in our completely explored, suburbanized, and generally uninteresting America. Unfortunately, I am not allowed to recount the best of our stories, for reasons I’d best not say. I’m sure you can think up some good reasons for yourself. My brother and I have been best friends ever since our first adventure, which is, sadly, one of those stories that will remain unwritten. However, there was one completely legal adventure that we recently went on, and that one I’d be glad to tell.

One weekend, Jeremy swooped his way past our house, picked me up, and off we went. As usual, I knew nothing about our destination or goal. Now I'm sure most of you have been to a place like McConnell’s Mills - a place with lots of trees, paths, and creeks. Basically it’s where old people go to "enjoy nature", where dedicated runners go to train, and where those weird goth kids go to make out. Anyway, this place was our ultimate destination. Beforehand, Jay had been ominous as always, making me bring old clothes, buying a couple flashlights, and leaving a message on a friend's voicemail in case of "an emergency". After we parked in one of the higher parking lots, we started walking down some stairs, a usual routine for most tourists. I was rather annoyed, as I remembered several "character-building nature hikes" with my parents in that place, and said hikes were not what I imagined as an adventure. Just as I was starting to say this to Jeremy, he suddenly dashed off to the left, right along the rock face. He stopped in front of a odd split in the rock face and beckoned. Evidently there was a cave in this weird hole, and we were going to go inside and explore it. He walked inside the split, and pointed at the ground at the far wall. "It’s down there" he smirked. He was pointing at a hole the size of my foot. I didn’t believe him at first, but when I shined my flashlight through the hole, I could faintly see rocks, about ten to fifteen feet straight down. Being a lot smaller than Jeremy, I went in first.

I don’t know if any of you have ever done hardcore caving before, but in these kinds of caves you don’t get to stand up and walk around; it’s much more like a cycle of straining to get an inch of your body through a ridiculously small hole, resting, straining, resting, etc. In my opinion, the opening of the cave was one of the hardest parts - laying on your side, you had to inch your legs in first. Then you had swing them about ninety degrees to the left, almost like you were sitting, and madly stab about wall with your feet, looking for a toehold. Only once that was done could you begin to move your chest and shoulders through the hole, scrabbling for nonexistent handholds on the wall above you. During all of this, you had struggle not to impale yourself on a very long, hard, and pointy rock, which just happened to be put in the most inconvenient of places. Hopefully you managed to find a handhold somewhere, as without one you’d fall straight on some more rather pointy rocks directly below you, on the cave floor. Eventually, we squeezed though intact, and, finding absolutely no handholds to help us down, we both made the jump to the bottom without landing on anything inconvenient. There was virtually no light coming from the entrance of the cave, so at the bottom, we turned on our flashlights (which had caused us much pain in the process of entering the cave). 

We were in a long corridor about ten feet long, three feet wide, and twelve feet high. Directly in front of us, on a strangely natural rock platform, was a large candle that had obviously been used before. As we looked around, we realized there were candles everywhere - one in the wall to our left, one to our right, and even one in the ceiling. Footprints were everywhere in the mud floor, and none of them were from normal sneakers or boots. Just about then the wind picked up, and it made the cave sound with one of the spookiest howls I’ve ever heard - it really does sound like some sort of person, just like the fantasy books say. To our right was an absolutely enormous boulder. It was suspended about two to three feet off of the ground, creating a lovely little passage beneath it. Entering this passage, we noticed that the floor was sopping wet, with gray-green mud. Looking up, we saw that the underside of the boulder was mutilated by millions of small cracks, all of them dripping water. This water had condensed, and had thus formed stalactites, and stalagmites. Most of these connected straight to the floor, making an eerie stone forest. We squatted in the mud for a second, resting - only our hushed breathing and the fall of water droplets breaking the deafening silence of the cave. The floor began to slant upwards into the ceiling after about forty feet, so we looked for new passages. Jay saw another ridiculously small hole on our left, winding upwards, and up we went.

Squeezing ourselves up this hole was insanity. Jeremy’s chest is a lot thicker than mine, and once we were through the hole, he pulled up his shirt - his chest was covered with blood from the rocks. The room that we were in was a rough cube - about ten feet wide by six feet tall. There was a pool of water in the corner, and I helped wash a bit of Jeremy’s blood off with one of my socks. Once he stopped bleeding, we went back. There was a huge smear of blood on one side all the way up the hole. I stared at it for awhile, then sat down. Jeremy tried his cell...but no signal came through the rock. Though my flashlight was getting dim, I absentmindedly flicked it around the room. I froze - there was a sizable hole on the wall right next to us, and I quickly jumped over to investigate. By crouching slightly, we could practically walk upright in this hole. It lead straight to the ceiling of the first room, then ended at a hole - we could jump down, but the only way back to the rock pool was by the blood hole, as we called it. I turned around to go back, and immediately knocked over Jeremy’s flashlight - standing behind me, he had set it down temporarily while he took a few pictures. I fell down on my right knee, with the flashlight falling down through the hole onto the floor below, smashing into the rock with a painful crash. As I leaned against a rock to stand up, both of us realized that we were down to a single, dying flashlight, and both of us were injured in some way. The cave continued going in the opposite direction, but we had to get out. We jumped down (I landing quite painfully) from the opening onto the rock below, gathered up the pieces of the flashlight, and made to get out of the cave - past the stalactites, and past the candles. 

I still don’t know how either of us did it - there were only fingertip handholds, and the opening was far harder to access than before. I believe it had something to do with a base necessity that we had to get out, or we’d die. It was as simple as that. We struggled out, and, leaning against each other, stumbled up to the car. People stared at us like we were aliens or something - and I guess we must’ve looked pretty out of this world, streaked with mud and blood. I couldn’t help but smile at the irony of the situation - us with our matted hair, blood-spattered clothes, and exhausted bodies, compared to the tourists with their abercrombie shirts, digital cameras, and overhanging potbellies. We left then, drove back with a mix of euphoria and claustrophobia sweeping its way through our blood, and sure as heck never told mom about it. That’s the cave adventure with my brother, Jeremy.