Tortoise and the Hare

Haven't posted b/c somehow my password was not registering with blogger...and now it does? I'll have to hurry up and post on all the Guatemala blogs I couldn't post on before before my friends (?) think less of me.

It's 3:20 on Saturday the 30th of June here, and I have very little to show for my day except a pretty good transcontinental conversation on the phone with K and some lunch at Haji Babba's. thank goodness she had plenty to say about what was going on in her life, cause I sure didn't. I mean, not relatively anyways. maybe if she was working full-time at mcdonalds or something, THEN i'd be the interesting one. relative to what she's doing, i'm the one flipping burgers.

not to say i don't have a lot of potentially good things going on. ochem is challenging, and i did in fact get the highest grade in the class on the first exam (only to do not so well on the second...the tortoise and the hare story sheds some light on this one). being enrolled in the class has certainly brought up some issues, which should be guessable for anyone who knows me well. I was talking to zach pirtle, a CSPO buddy of mine, about having a liberal arts education preceding my current science-centric one, and I must say I'm thankful. there's a certain type of stress inherent to taking classes in which you study material not at all relevant to your life as a person (and, for a lot of engineer/science-focused people, the personhood concept does seem to fade as the things learned become, somehow, imbued with higher status..."career-relevant"). this form of stress, i believe, doesn't take form purely from the difficulty of the subject - it derives from the potential meaninglessness and lack of narrative it can cause you to feel after days on end spent studying. here's where the liberal arts come in for me (as well as the influence of CSPO, no doubt). the ability to analyze science in post-modern or sociological terms enables the budding science major to realize the significance of the fact that while science is and continues to be an incredible way to understand the world in which we live, its discourse is one among many others and it derives its power from our participation in it. this activity subsequently allows us to claim that its greatness lies in its ability to come closest to approximating truth/reality to the highest degree. in so many words, as a post-liberal arts science major (well, a Biology and Society major, which is really not so removed from the arts after all, shoot), I appreciate the ability to recognize that the material derives its power from my participation in it. While studying the world of facts, I have to take responsibility for making it fit within a greater personal narrative. It's a constant struggle. But to come out on top, to master the facts and still realize that I was the one giving them their significance in the first place, is very satisfying. So, when the "lack of narrative" stress kicks in, I'm aware of what I can do to make it more meaningful. If I don't, it all gets funneled into the "justification by progress/get a job" story, which, while perhaps comforting in some odd, cold fashion, ends up having me forget about my own role and responsibility to create.

in other news, i've had a good time tutoring Celesta, yet another inspiring tutee who balances the life of mothering four children which a desire for learning which has driven her to do something the majority of women in her community do not typically aspire to: receive a college education. while the material itself, introductory sociology, was exciting, the most rewarding part of working with Celesta was the very apparent satisfaction she would express after mastering a new concept. this is one of those interpersonal experiences...i would feel a little bit of the glow she was exuding. i'm not sure this happens a lot in classroom or group-style teaching. tutoring this year has been a source satisfaction which stands out among my other accomplishments this year (which you could probably count on one hand). i'm not sure about this, but i think being a professor would be far from unfulfilling as a profession for me. now the question...what field? medicine beckons, both enticing and frightening.

as for CSPO, it's been pretty meaningful to be assigned the task of assembling a list of viable grants for all of the different faculty who are participating in Paul's Medicine and Media program. It definitely makes me feel like I'm more in touch with the bigger forces at work in the world of "corporate" university life. Now that tutoring is out of the way (Celesta had her final on Thursday), I can start putting hours into working for Jamey as well, which will basically be thesis-relevant work (read: awesome). I'm excited to get back into my neglected science/religion dialogue research.

A few weeks ago, my friend Laura, one of my companions on the South Africa trip, asked if I could play in her father's retirement party. I did so last night. It took place in a fairly ritzy art gallery in Scottsdale, and it was filled with Mr Tompkins' coworkers at the Foundation for Blind Children. Thirty years spent as the head of a successful non-profit is likely to leave one feeling very satisfied at the end of his tenure, and I didn't feel quite worthy to be the person responsible for the background music. I brought my violin, guitar, pedals, and Taylor's amp, and so was able to do a little Andrew Bird-style looping along with a little amateur jazz based on my recent explorations in the genre. I finished off with very liberal interpretations of Mozart's 4th Concerto in D (my audition piece for music school four years ago) along with the gypsy-inspired song - whose name I cannot recall at this moment - I played that same year. I think it's about time to buy myself an acoustic amp and start playing gigs more frequently. Music, after a year of tough academics, has proven itself to be clearly essential, especially if I am to survive the fast-paced life I'm about to launch myself into.

End of post. I must say it seems a bit shallow compared to the soul-searching stuff I wrote two years ago. My avoidance of the bigger concerns, however, is indicative of an overall mindset I've had about the role of faith in my life over the past three years. This year, though it has always been kept warm on the back-burner of my scattered thought processes, I've simply tried to fulfill myself through other means. This is due to a burning fear I have that faith has kept me locked in a state of victimhood and self-absorption when I could really have been out enjoying the unknowns of the world beyond belief's seemingly narrow halls and challenging myself to accomplish more. Clearly, I've been wrong about a lot of this; the end result has been a much-deflated, self-involved Tobias. Ironically, it has also resulted in someone who can more clearly present a stronger, more determined image to people around him (and to himself).

Alex and I are attending an Orthodox Church tomorrow which is run by one of his former grad-level religious studies classmates. While everyone knows that the act of going to church doesn't say much about a person's inner state, I'm hoping that at the very least I'll discover a bit about why I've become so lost this year and what I can do to reconcile my two opposing impulses. this is why i've stayed away from blogging for so long: i have to admit that everything's not so fine.

-t-