subterranean homesick alien

Title courtesy of Radiohead. The title was *almost* courtesy of Spinal Tap. I nearly called it "D-minor, the saddest of all the keys." And then that made me think i should call it--i'll make this family friendly--"l.m.l.p."

Sophomoric humor aside, for me this photo evokes terrible sadness and loneliness. Just like the song of the same title.

learning the moves from the master, johnny robot.

this is the first and only photo i've ever posted taken by someone other than me. I do so because it reveals so nicely why i am indebted to this young man--a man who, despite what you might gather from the photo (or, say, from talking with him), now studies at princeton.

Here’s how life works: i gave him knowledge and wisdom (on, for example, why drummers make the best student workers, or why baptism by immersion is almost like cheating because its symbolism is so obvious it requires practically no faith at all). in return from him i learned how to make computer noises and dance like the white man i am. i also learned this phrase: "conversational tyrant." i will not tell you to whom he applied it. (hint: i'm still bitter.)

Let’s face it: I got the better deal in the bargain.

This is a limited edition posting that will soon be taken down.

my three little christmas monkeys

have no fear. this picture is a month and a half late, not ten and a half months early. i'm not walmart, you know.

like father, like daughter

a keenly developed appreciation of the bizarre.

asking questions until the question answerer goes insane.

a need to qualify every answer with eight counterexamples.

I wonder….where did she get those traits?!? Hmmm….

best of all, she thinks i’m perfectly normal, even terrific!! recently she said, “dad, i know why you like taking pictures of me so much.” (I have taken more pictures of her than any other person.) “it’s because i don’t automatically smile like all the other kids do, isn’t it? it’s more interesting when someone doesn’t smile, isn’t it.”

“That’s my girl!!! Come over here, you!!”

my ripe little plum

such a tender and loving heart this one has. to paraphrase one of my colleagues, her heart is like a perfectly ripe plum--in equal measures sweet and easily bruised. i fret for that little heart trying to stay true to itself in our sharp-edged and indifferent world.

little miss ornery in the morning

and this one. do i worry about her?

not so much.

though i do wonder how her reign will be judged by history.

i'm on the top of the world....

....lookin' down on creation....

sorry for getting it stuck in your head. but have a great day!!

christmas in 2007, pt. 1

christmas in 2007, pt. 2

stephen redux, no. 1

here’s what i can say about this glorious series of stephen-themed pictures. first, no animals were harmed in the making of these photos. however, i can make no such claims with respect to stephen’s soul. second, photoshop use was extremely minimal—basically i converted a few pictures from color to black and white. i did not digitally impose any photos on other photos. (actually photoshop use was nonexistent since i don’t use photoshop. i use the low-end software that came with my camera.)

stephen redux, no. 2

stephen redux, no. 3

stephen redux, no. 4

stephen redux, no. 5

stephen redux, no. 6

18 degrees

Title courtesy of my oldest daughter.

So the next few pictures result from our recent cold snap. (Yes, the low was 18 degrees.) It turns out it’s easier to take pictures of ice when ice is available. Twice last week it snowed--flurries, but no accumulation. For a few minutes at least my daughters experienced pure joy—giggling, and pushing each other, and running around with their mouths open, trying to catch falling snow. I never know how to use the word “frolic,” but I’m pretty confident there was some serious sister-frolicking going on outside.

When the snow stopped my middle child told me it was because they had eaten it all up. And I thought, hey, that’s a pretty cool kid strategy: rather than being morose because the snow ended, take ownership of it. “Sure it ended; we ended it. And that’s why we’re full. But I COULD use some hot cocoa.”

That’s how they roll.

incredibly tiny ice swirls

I had not detected these pretty little bubbles and swirls when I took the picture--I discovered them only when I enlarged the image on the computer. Something about seeing these little images emerge from nowhere reminded me how the importance of accidental discovery in contributing to a rich life can hardly be overstated.

And then I thought how we, too, need from time to time to peek beneath all the layers of lies and clichés and routines and habits that shroud of us from ourselves.

You know, with the help of digital photo manipulation software.

And then I thought this: the robots will definitely win.

Oh, there’s no doubt.

icebergs in the sandbox

icy fault line

I asked my oldest daughter what I should title my photos. Mostly she wandered around the room, walking in circles, offering silly suggestions. Here's one of her suggestions for a title, and I quote: "You should call it, 'Oh, it's a far, far better thing that I do than I have ever done, and it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known--it's a cruel world….because of marshmallow peeps.'"

I went with my own title, as seen above. Not that there's anything wrong with hers. Marshmallow peeps are but one more sign of a sad cruel world.

bum dee dee bum bum....

bum bum

building and moon

I have taken only a few photos of the moon. It's too hard; I don't know how to do it. In fact, I find a fair number of subjects beautiful but too challenging to capture well in photography:

Fire. The moon. Rocks under flowing water. There are several others. Capturing the excitement of anything moving--wind through the grass or trees, for example--doesn't translate well to photography unless you capture a moment that dramatically conveys the shape and direction of the motion. It's definitely not one of my strengths. Plus I don't know much about the mechanics of a camera. So...I just avoid those kinds of photos.

I posted this picture not because it's especially good--it is just the best photo of the moon I've taken. I think you need to contrast the moon with a terrestrial object to give the moon some visual context. I don't know--not really, anyway.

Helpful hints, anyone?

shoes under the bench

Recently my student worker said, “you know, I think your office is pretty revealing about your personality. The outside of your door is covered with cynical and ironic cartoons and photos, but the inside of your door—what you see—is filled with your children’s drawings and artwork. I think you present a jaded exterior to the outside world but are really a squishy sentimental guy.”

To which I responded, “ummm…….yeah.......ummm......well, you caught me.”

Self-portrait as Louis XIV

glass spiderweb and girl

Fern No. 1

Fern No. 2

Fern No. 3

my hand

Hands. I love them.

pew symmatry

shadow

Watercolor painting in three minutes!!!!

First, take a digital picture of a nighttime scene. Then convert it to a negative. Then amplify the colors.

Voila, there you have it: McArt.

lit from below

into the blue

my own personal little wednesday addams

in the hallway ("from no eyeball...)

(....to") self-eyeball

Eyeballs are the window to........to........to.........to just everything! (Except for cars and buildings, in which cases windows, and not eyeballs, are the windows.) Eye contact is really really hard to maintain because, well, who wants to disclose one's soul to....anyone?! Including to oneself, in the return gaze?

Answer: no one.

Or, at least, no one should. And by "no one," I mean "not me."

Eyeballs are the miracle of the universe.

Well, eyeballs and the brain.

And Bach's music.

And aspirin.

And Lincoln's prose.

And Herbert Von Karajan's hair.

And game six of the 1985 World Series!

water splashing into sink basin

the photo came out fuzzy. i'm glad it did. i pumped up the colors and amplified the contrast.

one after another

down, down, down.

NOT a self-portrait

Reprobation

The first comment left on this post asked, "In favor of or in fear of?" Rather than responding inside, I will respond here. Here goes:

both.

and neither.

first, both.

in my experience fear comes from the following: (a) a threat; and (b) a sense of hopelessness in light of the threat.

that pretty much sums up reprobation, no? it is the perfect marriage of the most awful threat imaginable coupled with perfect hopelessness. because god chooses the elect as he chooses, and he chooses the damned as he chooses, and one's volition in that calculus is about as meaningful as 15 spf sunblock at ground zero of a nuclear blast.

so fear, for sure.

"in favor of,' well, i suppose that doesn't matter. reprobation-- or whatever name one wants to give it--is a thread that runs throughout the bible from genesis to revelation. those who wish to deny it may do so, but they must deny the bible along with it. or at least deny one of its central themes. so insofar one holds (a) the bible to be a work that is to be read plainly and, where at all possible, literally, and (b) the bible speaks truth, then the real question isn't so much of approval as assent to truth. i suppose if one adds (c) that the god behind the bible is a good god and worthy to be loved, then it should prompt us to see reprobation, finally, as good.

but i do not. i see it as twisted and sick. At least I do today.

so, for me, neither is also true.

as far as fear goes, reprobation releases one from fear in a way. calvin and edwards both speak of the assurance that the doctrine of predestination gives to the elect. one need not trust in one's goodness because the victory has been won on one's behalf. the victory is secure because god's grace is efficacious. but the reverse holds true as well. if one is not saved, then there is nothing one can do about it. being dead unto one's sins means, well, that the deal has been sealed. why fret? enjoy with abandon the earthly moments that you have.

easier said than done, of course. hell's a pretty hard thing to block out of one's mind.

and as for being in favor of it in the sense of finding the doctrine agreeable to my simple sense of ethics or in the sense of recoginzing in it the attributes of a glorious god worthy of my love, well, that's a whole 'nuther ball of wax. i feel like were i put on the spot to represent calvin or edwards (or even Thomas) on the doctrine of repropbation, i could provide a pretty convincing intellectual tap dance: I’d speak of god's unimaginable and ineffable holiness; I’d speak of his perfect sense of justice; and of our own grotesque "throats as open graves"-level of wickedness; and how god's sovereignty demands his utter control over the entire arc of history and how giving humans a share in their salvation would necessarily thwart god’s plans; and how justice requires (demands!) punishment of the wrongdoer; and how by our nature we hate god with the burning hatred of a thousand suns and how we want nothing remotely as much as to harm him and to live apart from him in the slime of our wickedness; and how our sin against an infinitely good god requires eternal punishment as recompense; and how god's grace cannot be squandered on those who would choose damnation.

and on and on.

and on.

i know the drill.

but i don't feel it. I mean if god is our father. If…

when my children err or sin against me or against others, i do not cast them out. I punish them insofar I think they can benefit from that punishment. but the universe does not capsize when they are left unpunished. They may learn a bad habit from lack of discipline, but I mean, come on. i do not have one child to cast away and another to lavish with tender affection.

of course the analogy is imperfect.

of course.

no, i'm not perfectly holy like god, who cannot abide the tiniest mote on the end of a hair's worth of sin in his kingdom.

but neither am i perfectly loving like god, but i love my children enough to keep them within the fold of my love.

christ's parable of the prodigal son strikes me as truer to the model of a worship-worthy god than the god depicted in the more reprobation-friendly parables. the son sins against the father and his brother. he comes back in shame. the father runs to meet him. no punishment. I don’t know about the justice in that story, but I can see the love.

that's what i want to believe. if ours is a god who relishes and delights--and GLORIES--in the torment of his creatures for the sake of justice, well, that's certainly his divine prerogative. but insofar what he wants is to be glorified for his attributes, well...

Nietzsche says that when people do harm to him, the beauty and merit of justice is that it providee him the sublimely pleasurable gift of allowing him to inflict harm back on them in its name.

Is it surprising that before Nietzsche studied philosophy he first studied theology?

blue swirls and red sphere

apple

From a Great Height

Title courtesy of Radiohead.

without form, and void

Alcohol Wonderland

I couldn't think of what to call this picture. I asked my middle child to look at it and come up with a title. This was what she came up with. She said it looked very "wintery and nice."

Tomatoes

AA Battery

double dipped