Using the Power of Timshel for Forgiveness

Joo and I hosted the annual reunion of the guys from youth group, which was fun as always. One of the guys made the comment that this was the first year it felt that each of us was truly travelling our own paths in life (John left Ohio for the first time to go to grad school in Texas, Andrew got married, Matt got his first real world job, and Dustin drifted back and forth between a job and grad school).


In addition to playing the new game we invented a couple summers ago (frisleyball), we had a treat when Drew and Laura Castle came over with their baby Roxie. After a couple of the guys held her, Joo gave Roxie to me to hold and said laughingly (but also ominously?) that it was a "test." Thankfully, Roxie fell asleep right away so that worked in my favor...

The boys and I spent our time catching up, eating delicious middle Eastern cuisine from Joo, watching Inception, discussing Inception, and challenging each other with spelling tests (not quite sure how that one started).

After the boys left, Joo and I headed straight over to the church where she had the kids make no-bake cookies in the shape of Korean characters (she's been teaching them their names in Korean).

We finally made some time to spend with Micah and Ariel after having wanted to get together with them for some time. They invited us over for a delicious pizza-making event followed by a riveting game of Blockus.

Micah broke a glass in what was perhaps the gentlest "smash" I've ever seen just by accidentally tapping his cup against the blender when he turned around. Being a bit OCD (I have a feeling that is one things many of the med school students share with us math students), he was extremely thorough in his cleanup.

The Korean church also had their annual Christmas performance, which was fun for Joo in two ways: for one, it was her first Christmas performance she had ever attended (this is the first year of her life when she has been going to church), and two, she got to help the kids get dressed and emotionally psyched up.

Perhaps the most unexpected incident over break occurred when we heard from Kyle and Suzie that they would have to move suddenly. There had been a little spat between their dog and their landlord's dog and - before they knew it - they had only three days to find a new place to live. It was a strange thing, both for them and for my own personal processing, since I know them to be an incredibly generous, loving, and tender Mennonite couple. Ironically, Suzie had just published a book on Peace with Herald Press. The whole affair seemed to fly in the face of the normal karmic balance of how life usually works.

But they were able to pack everything up, find a place on Craigslist and the Menno-crew gathered to work together on moving day (except for Thad and Kristen, whose car broke down on the way over to help out - I would say that it was a bad week for the Mennonites, except for a quick flashback from when I used to read excerpts of Martyr's Mirror- THAT was a bad time period for Mennonites). The most amazing thing for me in the whole move was observing how gracefully Kyle and Suzie handled the situation and even how positively they continued to speak about their landlord (something that I might have been able to do only after a month or two or forcing myself to forgive).

The move also allowed us to process concepts of possessions and simplicity (Kyle and Suzie had amassed a truckload of possessions, but Micah and Ari, as well as Joo and I, knew that we would have much more trouble with everything we owned). We discussed the 100 possession trend where modern people have been taking a Jesus/Buddha-like step and reducing their belongings down to almost nothing, giving most of their things away to charity. Here's one story in the New York Times although there are many more out there:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/08/business/08consume.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1

After the move, Micah and Ari had us all over to their place for chili and cheez-its; Joo brought some meatballs and Kyle and Suzie contributed some fresh bread and cookies from the Village Bakery... lots of yummyness :)

I also just finished my first fiction book in quite some time - East of Eden. After reading numerous academic articles and math text books, it was refreshing to relax into a story about Life and the story of humanity. Here's a brief quotation from the book that addresses one of the key themes of Timshel ("thou mayest" or, essentially, freewill):

"And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world."

The healthiest food in the world (or top 5 anyway)

For a Korean, "seeing red" is a good thing; in fact, it is perhaps one of the most satisfying sights in the world (as long as it's not their name written in red which forebodes disaster). And the most beautiful red object is a pot of freshly made kimchi. Actually, I take that back; a pot of six month properly-fermented kimchi is probably even more appealing. In any case, Joo has become the kimchi go to girl for the Koreans in Athens community as well as the chefs at her culinary school. Which means ever-increasing big batches of kimchi and even thoughts of opening a stand at the farmer's market at some point in the future.

She's even working on innovative new ways to use kimchi such as the kimchi sandwich shown below.

Meanwhile, on the other end of the U.S., her sister Jusu has done her share of making things this year too - namely TaeGeom (pictured below in his favorite sleeping position). He was born prematurely, but now has grown into a healthy, full-sized boy.

Some trailing pictures from Thanksgiving that didn't quite make the deadline for the last blog...

I was delighted to see the entire Longenecker family together in the same place for the first time since Chris and Alison's wedding five years ago. After enjoying hors d'oeuvres galore and sharing our favorite Youtube videos, we played a riveting game of Settlers of Catan and caught up a bit.

Joo and I rarely splurge on buying something new, with our philosophy being that only something crucial for health or relationships can take priority over budgeting. So, although we've talked about getting a desktop for over a year now, we didn't make the leap until a doctor inspected some numbness in my extremities and decided my hunched over posture on my laptop for several hours a day was causing it. So, now I'm not only more physically comfortable, but mentally too since it felt like a justifiable purchase :)

Joo's birthday was on the 16th and so Mom and Dad drove all the way down for the day and to give some wonderfully creative presents they had designed. Yes "they." Amazing, as Dad is very rarely inspired to give a custom-made gift, but apparently he hired someone to tailor a chef's apron. Mom made a fully-accessorized chef bear for Joo. It was a touching moment for both Joo and me to see manifestations of what thoughtful parents we have!

After doing a little celebrating at the house, we piled into the car and headed over to Eclipse - a new brunch store that opened up down the road a few weeks ago. They are participating in Athens' 30-mile club by pledging to get as many of their ingredients locally as possible. It was fun to hear the waitress say she could explain anything on the menu or tell us whose farms/gardens anything came from :) I think everything except the kalamata olives in my dish was within the 30-mile radius. Hmmm... I wonder how kimchi would taste in an omelette...

As we walk in fields of gold...

My school let out about three weeks earlier than Joo giving me a nice chunk of time to get caught up on my to do list. The first item on my list was to design a better to do list system since the scraps of papers and notebook pages tend to get shoved into a mysterious land of obscurity whenever we do a 30-minute lightning cleaning of the house. Enter Google Tasklist. I'm a googaholic anyway since it's the one thing that lays in the intersection of work, school, home, and friends and when I saw the little tasklist option on my gmail screen, I couldn't resist. Maybe this is the beginning of a new stage in my life... the stage of Compensation. Rather than trying to continually improve my short-term memory or organization, I'm finding it more time efficient to acknowledge these weaknesses and compensate for them. Which leaves more time and energy for things like helping Joo learn to rollerblade!

She did a wonderful job overcoming her phobia of falling down and having her finger sliced off (that's why she won't go ice-skating, although the phobia had extended to rollerblading). And I'm proud to say all 10 fingers remain after our first outing!

She's been advancing steadily in her culinary program as well. I'm not sure exactly how the classes are set up, but she's gotten to the point where I'm actually allowed to submit an unofficial order on the mornings of her lab days and, more often than not, the chefs allow and even help her with it!!! Here was the result on the day after I mentioned offhandedly how much I had been craving a nice bowl of French onion soup...

She does, of course, have a set schedule of foods she needs to make and her final exam is coming up rapidly. For the final, she will be given a mystery box of five ingredients and has 90 minutes from the moment she opens it until when she must have a final meal designed and plated up on the table. Iron chef, watch out!

In other news, we had a visit from Dave Whitsett on his way down to West Virginia. He is finalizing up the paperwork before heading off to South Korea to teach. Watching him brings back of flood of memories from my first weeks over in Korea and of some of the lovely aspects of their culture I can't wait for Dave to experience firsthand. Dave is fully geared up to make his own unique trail, however, as shown here by his practice with using chopsticks in EACH hand (seriously).

Joo and I have both started teaching positions at the Korean church on Sunday. I work with adults on English proficiency while Joo works with kids (the older one here is one of her students) on Korean proficiency.

We were fortunate this year to have two Thanksgivings - one of which was attended by some of my first cousins that I haven't seen in about seven years! Here's Heather with Abigail who has been busy finishing up her undergraduate research program at Stanford. She was telling me excitedly about her unofficial membership in the Fail Squad, a group of girls who have found themselves all coordinationally challenged, when she spilled coffee on her sweatshirt and had to go clean it up.

Another cousin I hadn't seen in awhile was Matthew Frederick and I had never met his wife even though I think they've been married longer than we have. He works as a musical therapist for hospice patients who are diagnosed as being in their final six months of life, and she works with HIV/AIDS patients. I bet the flies on their walls are teleologically advanced...

We enjoyed a warm evening at the Kurtzes (fueled by Merv's post-apocalyptic-preparation stack of wood that he's cut). The house had gone through so much renovation since we were last there that we almost didn't recognize it :)

Aunt Deb Groff had bought some quiltlike wooden puzzles designed out of scrap wood by my great uncle Claire Hollinger, and my cousin Geoff Kurtz spent a nice chunk of time trying to figure out a way to put it back asymmetrically.

Bob and Heather drove up for the day for Bob's first time to meet the relatives on my mom's side. Here he is admiring Uncle Merv's VW bug. We were all delighted to get the news of their engagement.

Creative juices were oozing from the Frederick gene pool in preparations for our lovely Thanksgiving banquet. Here were our appetizer decorations...

There was ample reason to believe that the turkey was spiked this Thanksgiving...

We enjoyed a lovely stroll through Uncle Herb's fields as he showed us how a nearby dam had rerouted the local river and shifted the entire landscape.

Aside from the picturesque landscape of Lancaster PA, we spotted two bald eagles along our walk. Here is one of them (although the zoom focus makes it quite blurry).

I was the backup photographer for the group family photo and covered the side and back views.

Our second Thanksgiving was at my parents' house a few days later where we had our annual pumpkin roll into the creek (only a fraction of the pumpkins are shown here).

I also received my monthly thematic Cheez-it supply from Mom...

And we almost had a very lovely picture of Mom and Dad, except for the hyperactive son doing some acrobatics in the background.

And so break is here at last... time to catch up on research, fellowship applications, my travel book, the blog (check), and some long-awaited R&R (reading and relaxation in my case!).