Xmas 2007 is over! Whew. It was not too bad, though I was worried all day about the money situation I posted about a couple of days ago. I got to eat a little more than my diet normally allows, but today my wife is back to being strict and I only got to eat one mini peanut butter cup from all the treats I got yesterday! She did make a delicious dinner tonight though, beans in peanut satay sauce and veggie burgers with ajvar spread.

I think the coolest present I got yesterday was the TV Ears system. When we watched Tin Man over at my in-laws’ house a few weeks ago, I couldn’t hear the dialogue at a volume my wife was comfortable with. Their HDTV doesn’t do captions properly, so my usual way of keeping up wasn’t an option. Fortunately my father-in-law has a massive A/V system, and he was able to wire up some headphones and I could listen that way. They were big and bulky though, and I lost outside sound because I couldn’t hear it over the TV sound in my ears. So my in-laws got me the TV Ears set, and now the TV volume at home can be at a comfortable level for A and I can still hear it! Plus the TV Ears allow outside sound too, so it’s a great solution overall.

I’m a little unsettled by a recent post over at gBlog…if you go look, you’ll see what I mean. It’s right after one of my posts, currently on the front page. It makes me all squirmy and I want to respond somehow but I don’t know what to say.

I’ve heard of the Creation Museum a couple of times before, mostly just news articles announcing its existence. But then I heard an article on BBC’s Newshour that really brought home for me just how creepy this place is. They include audio clips from some of the museum’s exhibits, and interviews with one of the staff, and it is just so distasteful to me. I wanted to share it, so I took the stream of Newshour and put part of it into an mp3 file.

BBC Creation Museum Article

Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get this transcribed for my deaf friends - I did try but it just didn’t work.

It’s December again, and Xmas decorations are popping up all over. My aisle has some tinsel and ornaments on a few cubes, the next aisle over has ornaments on every cube. The flowers in the planters in the hallway are now red with green leaves, the door-decorating contest is in full swing, and there’s a giant Xmas tree in the main atrium, which will have its own special lighting ceremony this week.

I am seriously considering putting up a little Hanukkah decoration in my cube. I don’t know what it will be, and I don’t have a color printer so it won’t look too great, and I’m not even really intensely Jewish. But I do have Jewish heritage, and I was raised Unitarian Universalist, and the entirely Xmas-related decorations are kind of overwhelming. It’s time for a little diversity up in here. I just have to find a good printout, and maybe some magic markers.

The morning started with me hitting snooze a time or two, and then when I got up I checked out of the hotel and brought my bags to my car. I got coffee at 7-11 and headed for the workshop. I was a block or two away when I noticed a few women standing around in yellow smocks. I thought “oh boy, they’re going to be handing out literature,” but as I approached I saw their smocks read “Planned Parenthood Escort.” As I approached the intersection, I was astonished to see several dozen protesters reciting the rosary, along with a great big picture of the Virgin Mary and so forth. I went up to two of the escorts and asked them about it; apparently every third Saturday this group comes down after their 7:00am mass to do this. It turns out that the building where my workshop was has the surgical center for all of Planned Parenthood Southeastern Pennsylvania, and abortions are done on Saturdays…hence the protest.

I chatted with the escorts for a couple of minutes and they offered to walk me in; I didn’t think I needed it but I let them come along. They ended up leaving me, though, to join a phalanx of escorts that was hustling a young woman into the building. Most of the protesters just kept saying the rosary, but a few walked alongside the woman and begged her not to go inside. They tried to shove literature at her, but she kept her head down and ignored them. The protesters aren’t allowed into the PPSP courtyard, so once we were past the gate the escorts broke away and the woman continued inside with her male friend. I was right on their heels and I could see that the woman was crying; her friend had to go up to the receptionist because she was too upset.

I went upstairs to the workshop room and dropped off my stuff, and I took a cell phone picture looking down onto the crowd. A couple of other students were already there, and one had ended up with literature in pretty pastels while the other had been presented with a tiny stuffed dog that had a note tied around its neck saying something about “don’t kill your baby.” I decided to go back downstairs to gawk a bit (from the safety of the courtyard), and I ended up taking a couple of pictures. As others arrived for the workshop, some were escorted and some were not; the protestors were telling every female walking in - including obvious staff members - that they didn’t have to do this, etc. Another woman from the workshop had a real camera with her, and she took pictures too; I gave her my email address so I will get to see them. One workshop student who was watching with me said she wasn’t sure she wanted to be in a building where abortions were being performed, but she ended up coming in anyway. When the deaf workshop participant arrived, she was guided by several escorts and I followed her into the building because it was almost 9:00 anyway. I explained on the way upstairs what the protestors were there for.

When the workshop began, we spent the first half-hour talking about the protest. The facilitator explained that there is rationale for doing the workshop on protest weekends, and rationale for not doing so; if they are at the same time, she has reasons for warning the participants on Friday, and reasons for not doing that. She hadn’t warned us because she wanted to see how we would respond, because as interpreters we could potentially encounter things like that and it’s good to have examined your feelings beforehand.

The workshop itself was about domestic violence in the morning and interpreting practice in the afternoon. For lunch I had a roasted tofu sandwich I’d bought the night before…at 7-11 of all places! The deli case there had multiple vegan sandwiches from a Pennsylvania company called Moshe’s; I was very impressed, and the sandwich I had was delicious. When the workshop ended I hightailed it back to my car and got on the road as quickly as possible, stopping only to pay $50 (!) for parking and only once along the way for gas.

A friend of mine posed the following question in his own journal:

I’m doing a project, and I’d like to hear from all of you why you’re not a Christian. I’m looking for thoughtful, heartfelt replies and not, ‘because I’m Buddhist instead’ - why are you Buddhist and not Christian? Also, please do not send ‘because christianity is dumb’ or ‘christians r dumb’ or ‘u r dumb’.

The easiest answer is because my heritage is Jewish, by genetics and by religion. My uncle had a bar mitzvah and my mom was Jewish until she married a Christian (my stepdad) when I was four years old, at which time we converted to Unitarian Universalism because it was a “middle ground” for my parents. (Okay, this is kind of oversimplifying it, but this isn’t the point.)

I was raised Unitarian Universalist, and I’m glad for it. One thing I like about UUism is the freedom to believe. I don’t want a large faceless entity telling me what to believe and how to think. I choose to make those decisions on my own. Having always been an outsider, my perspective on Christianity is that you must believe a certain way, or something bad is going to happen to you. I sometimes entertain belief in karma (do good and life will reward you) but I also sometimes believe that life is just whatever it is, and sometimes you get stuck with crap. Believing in a negative, though, goes against the hope I have for humanity. Nobody is doomed to any fate, regardless of their sins against society. I don’t condone murder, obviously, but I also don’t think murderers will go to hell - I simply don’t believe in hell.

I don’t believe in God, either. Growing up I was always an agnostic, and I deeply questioned the existence of a “big policeman in the sky.” Today I am an atheist, because I don’t believe in any power higher than myself and other human beings. We are all gods unto ourselves, and there is nothing mystical or supernatural controlling the path of our lives.

I will admit, though, that I sometimes wish I were religious, that I did believe in God. I see people blame God for their illness, the death of a loved one, and other bad things. I would love to have that ability to blame someone other than myself (or bad luck) for things like that. But again, I don’t believe in God, so I pretty much have to figure “well, shit happens” if something isn’t going well for me. However, in addition to envying those who can turn to God for support, I also applaud that they can do so. If someone’s child is dying and they feel praying will help the child get better (in addition to medical care), they should absolutely pray. I don’t begrudge religion or prayer to anyone - I think it is a wonderful resource for many people, it’s just not the thing for me.