by Heather Donckels
I’ve read a fair smattering of Christian fiction in my lifetime. By Christian fiction I mean the paperback novels with pictures of beautiful young women on the front and dramatic questions under the titles: “Can she fulfill her dreams without losing the one she loves?” After reading four Christian novellas of this type in early high school, I realized that often Christian fiction is Christian in name only. Though the pages of these stories were sprinkled with prayers and a few Bible verses, the characters behaved in ways that made them indistinguishable from unbelievers.
Since reading those novellas, I’ve had an interesting relationship with Christian fiction. Even though I don’t like it, I sometimes stroll down the Christian fiction aisle at a bookstore, waiting for something different, something radical, to catch my eye. But nothing ever does. It’s all the same. The girl eventually gets the guy, and they live happily ever after.
There are many reasons why Christian fiction drives me up the wall, but for now, I’ll ignore the stale plots and actual quality of the writing and focus on aspects that, I believe, have even more significance. As stated above, I’ve found that much Christian fiction is Christian in name only. Many of the characters in the stories I read were more concerned with chasing after Mr. or Mrs. Right than pursuing a relationship with the Lord. I’m not saying that characters should be perfect Christians; that wouldn’t be realistic. However, I do think that fiction labeled as Christian should show genuine Christians fighting to pursue the things that matter. Often, in spite of the Bible verses, prayers and spiritual breakthroughs, Christian fiction is not edifying. Honestly, do you read a Christian romance novel for the spiritual truth or for the love scene? Now tell me, how will a love scene draw you closer to Jesus? Likely, it won’t. It may give you nice feelings, but it won’t bring about any change in your life. There’s nothing inherently wrong with romance or love scenes, but should a book that focuses on these be labeled as Christian? Often Christian fiction — and Christian art in general — gives easy, unrealistic answers to life’s problems.
A recent Christian film, “Facing the Giants,” demonstrated this tendency of Christian art. In the movie, the protagonist and his wife are unable to have children. However, after the protagonist places his complete trust in God, his wife gets pregnant. Life does not always operate on this blessing theology. Sometimes trusting God doesn’t bring success, but it does bring a person closer to God, a benefit greater than earthly prosperity.
The question then rises: What sort of fiction should a Christian read? Personally, I’d suggest almost anything besides Christian fiction. There are so many classic and contemporary works of literature out there that have been largely ignored by modern evangelicals. These works are mostly secular, but I believe that in our times, it can be more profitable to read a secular novel than a Christian one. The secular ones show us our world with all of its imperfections — the immorality and paganism, the poverty and injustice — and force us to see our depravity apart from the grace of God. If we consciously filter secular literature through the grid of Scripture, we can practice discernment while reading and strengthen our ability to distinguish between right and wrong. Also, reading secular literature increases our ability to relate to unbelievers. If we can understand their literature, we will better understand their philosophies and be able to more effectively share the truth with them. As Christians, we cannot wall ourselves up in completely Christian worlds. We must get out and understand our culture if we are going to change it.
Friday, May 4, 2007
The Mending: A Poem
by Dr. Grant Horner
I shall tell you then.
I was busy that morning, busy about the given books
And counting that which needed counting
When the hurried, even frantic knock came undesired to my door
There was much to do; The Great Day was upon us
And as always (when you are busy with the things of
He Who Cannot Be Named)
One can never quite get all those little things done
That need the doing!
So that knock was the last thing I needed
Yet dutifully and with visible gravity
My face appeared opposite his who pressed into the frame
Of the passageway. We stared at one another:
The highest of men, with the greatest of privilege and power,
And this one who
served below.
I told him (rather brusquely,
As I later thought) that I could not be bothered with trifles.
If I (I said) should condescend to come down
From this Place
And solve every little problem, then who
Will keep the important things?
Who will rule — all that needs rule?
It was then that I chanced to notice the portent of his face
Carved in a single deep line
Harrowed into his sunned brow
Anchored, I thought, in the very skull, the bone itself.
I knew him (vaguely) as one of those lower kind,
Perhaps a re-maker, a harmless drudge making and remaking,
Look, write, look, write, look again,
Performing no original task, no new thought, just repeating
Repeating, remembering. Or perhaps not. Just a messenger?
What could be more bothersome, petty, than
A messenger at the door
Knocking
When there is much to do? Much preparation, much work!
But the face, the face.
Drawn, stoney as one who had seen
Something. Pale — no, less than that. As one who had seen death
Itself, or something like it. He spoke brokenly
Of a thing broken and torn.
What was that to me (I ask you) if a thing of supposed consequence
Be torn? Mend it.
But the face, the face.
So I came to the Place. You would think by the look of
Them that their slight world had been ripped as
The thing itself.
None would enter. ‘This is not,
This is not disobedient sons, strange fire, unjust Disaster.’
Yet fear had gripped their little minds, fear and…what?
Whatever it was, I would not be subject to it —
Or anything else.T
he people looked to me, looked to me, and can you even
Imagine what this is like? They looked to me, surrounded
By beauty and glory, making (for them) all things
Possible.
And when they look to me, how my heart does rise and swell
Filled with a sense of weightiness, and weight.
Weight.
I entered that Place. It was so
Ordinary. By now, I mean.
One would have thought it
just some room, anonymous, a place
of no import, a place to meet, perhaps,
or eat, sit, even sleep.
Yet…
One could linger here (though perhaps not rest) and
Gaze blankly at…what? There was nothing there.
No one. Not even a chair in which to sit and rest
One’s tired and aching bones after hours of laborious service!
And truly…
This has been a season of disturbance: petty annoyance,
minor rift, small tremor. Our captors
Senatus populusque romanorum
Have pressed us beyond measure. It is as if
We have no king but Caesar.
Now, that…that is power.
Now, staring at the Place, I could not help but wonder. . .
What the view would be like
from There.
Could I sit There, finally at rest from all the years of service,
and cry out
‘It is I, it is I, it is I’
And quaff the admiration of liquid eyes, limpid eyes
Always looking up expectantly, fearfully
When returning from the entering, once in 12 moons.
What might that be like? I am,
they say,
But a step from God.
And such a small step!
Even within the grasp.
Well! One thing is clear. We must mend the tear.
After all, no cloth fails tearing, in the end.
As if determined from the beginning . . .
All we weave Is torn asunder eventually.
As if made for the tearing.
I myself will mend it. None must enter here; none must look
Within. The mystery must remain the mystery; we who have
(On occasion) glanced furtively into the place while holding forth
The Required,
have seen — nothing. Nothing at all.
We, at least, know.
So I must stand in, close the gap, and keep the mystery,
the mystery,
Hidden.
None must know.
And all things will continue as they have from the time of
Our Fathers.
I shall tell you then.
I was busy that morning, busy about the given books
And counting that which needed counting
When the hurried, even frantic knock came undesired to my door
There was much to do; The Great Day was upon us
And as always (when you are busy with the things of
He Who Cannot Be Named)
One can never quite get all those little things done
That need the doing!
So that knock was the last thing I needed
Yet dutifully and with visible gravity
My face appeared opposite his who pressed into the frame
Of the passageway. We stared at one another:
The highest of men, with the greatest of privilege and power,
And this one who
served below.
I told him (rather brusquely,
As I later thought) that I could not be bothered with trifles.
If I (I said) should condescend to come down
From this Place
And solve every little problem, then who
Will keep the important things?
Who will rule — all that needs rule?
It was then that I chanced to notice the portent of his face
Carved in a single deep line
Harrowed into his sunned brow
Anchored, I thought, in the very skull, the bone itself.
I knew him (vaguely) as one of those lower kind,
Perhaps a re-maker, a harmless drudge making and remaking,
Look, write, look, write, look again,
Performing no original task, no new thought, just repeating
Repeating, remembering. Or perhaps not. Just a messenger?
What could be more bothersome, petty, than
A messenger at the door
Knocking
When there is much to do? Much preparation, much work!
But the face, the face.
Drawn, stoney as one who had seen
Something. Pale — no, less than that. As one who had seen death
Itself, or something like it. He spoke brokenly
Of a thing broken and torn.
What was that to me (I ask you) if a thing of supposed consequence
Be torn? Mend it.
But the face, the face.
So I came to the Place. You would think by the look of
Them that their slight world had been ripped as
The thing itself.
None would enter. ‘This is not,
This is not disobedient sons, strange fire, unjust Disaster.’
Yet fear had gripped their little minds, fear and…what?
Whatever it was, I would not be subject to it —
Or anything else.T
he people looked to me, looked to me, and can you even
Imagine what this is like? They looked to me, surrounded
By beauty and glory, making (for them) all things
Possible.
And when they look to me, how my heart does rise and swell
Filled with a sense of weightiness, and weight.
Weight.
I entered that Place. It was so
Ordinary. By now, I mean.
One would have thought it
just some room, anonymous, a place
of no import, a place to meet, perhaps,
or eat, sit, even sleep.
Yet…
One could linger here (though perhaps not rest) and
Gaze blankly at…what? There was nothing there.
No one. Not even a chair in which to sit and rest
One’s tired and aching bones after hours of laborious service!
And truly…
This has been a season of disturbance: petty annoyance,
minor rift, small tremor. Our captors
Senatus populusque romanorum
Have pressed us beyond measure. It is as if
We have no king but Caesar.
Now, that…that is power.
Now, staring at the Place, I could not help but wonder. . .
What the view would be like
from There.
Could I sit There, finally at rest from all the years of service,
and cry out
‘It is I, it is I, it is I’
And quaff the admiration of liquid eyes, limpid eyes
Always looking up expectantly, fearfully
When returning from the entering, once in 12 moons.
What might that be like? I am,
they say,
But a step from God.
And such a small step!
Even within the grasp.
Well! One thing is clear. We must mend the tear.
After all, no cloth fails tearing, in the end.
As if determined from the beginning . . .
All we weave Is torn asunder eventually.
As if made for the tearing.
I myself will mend it. None must enter here; none must look
Within. The mystery must remain the mystery; we who have
(On occasion) glanced furtively into the place while holding forth
The Required,
have seen — nothing. Nothing at all.
We, at least, know.
So I must stand in, close the gap, and keep the mystery,
the mystery,
Hidden.
None must know.
And all things will continue as they have from the time of
Our Fathers.
For the Prostitutes: A Poem
by Rachel Thompson
The streets are always visible
Your job is never done
Your hope is a just a word
You’ve never learned to pronounce
I tremble because I can’t understand
I’m scared of you — for you
And you’re just walking the streets
Trying to afford cigarettes and socks
It’s just one more day to finish
And you find a novel in someone’s grocery cart
The world you’re lost in is your own
Did you forget — you are alive
I see a painted shell that keeps walking
My heart bleeds soft blood
You’re heart can’t even be cut
It’s grown thick scar tissue from all the wounds
You don’t even remember receiving
And I feel I’m accomplishing little
When I tell you of Jesus love
His love that understands every cell
That caused His death and our life
I just see lifeless…blank eyes
Your giggle and tight skirt hit me in the stomach
I want to yell and scream and break through
It’s just something I can’t seem to do
The smells must have rotted your soul
And the physical act, any dream of modesty
And you look at the white middle-class
I bet you’re thinking “You don’t even know”
How do you drown out your thoughts?
Who sucked your body of emotion, of trust?
And you don’t have time to talk
You’re working, and you’re so good
So good at convincing yourself it’s just life
While I am being cherished, body and soul
I want you to feel something unselfish in an embrace
And your eyes to shine like they probably did
But we exchange few words
You always have to walk the block once more
I wouldn’t know what to say if you told me
That’s how much I don’t understand
I’d probably cry, I’m sorry
But love has left my heart unprotected
It doesn’t shrivel up like you’d think
It gets bigger and the beat harder to stop
But you just keep walking…
And I want to die for you tonight
A Single Act of Hatred: A Story
by Michelle Morley
It’s strange how one’s life can change so dramatically because of a single act of hatred. I only realized this after that one act was carried out.
In 1934 I was 16 and was living in the town of my birth, Green Briar, Mississippi. It was just about as south as you could run without running smack dab into the ocean. Actually, Green Briar never was green; the sign that welcomed visitors to our little town was terribly misleading. It was all nicely whitewashed and depicted a lovely green valley. However, this was far from the truth since everything in Green Briar was covered in a thick coat of dirt.
I was no different from the average boy, except for the fact that I have been and always will be a girl. My momma died giving birth to me, so my daddy raised me the way he thought best: as a boy. I would hunt, fish, wrestle and josh around with all of the other boys. You couldn’t pick me out from all of them. I dressed the same as they did, wearing overalls and a cotton shirt. The only way anybody remembered that I was a girl was my stick brown hair in a single braid that reached below my shoulders, which I mostly tucked under my hat.
I was good friends with all of the boys, but I was especially close to Silas, a black boy my daddy took in when I was six. (Because there weren’t any black folks in Green Briar, Daddy figured he was abandoned further up the river in another town and then wandered to our house.) We were always together. Color was never an issue between the two of us or Daddy. We would run together, talk into the wee hours of the morning, and fish together at our favorite spot at Bracken’s Pond. He was a good friend. He would listen to me, offer me good advice, and wait around patiently until I got home from school.
But the townspeople never seemed to tolerate our happy friendship. They would glare at Silas and me as if we were diseased. “A nice little white girl like you shouldn’t be ‘round the likes of him,” the men would say. The girls would say, “Robin Cole, you should be ashamed of yourself, first disgracin’ yourself by actin’ like a boy and then bein’ friends with that boy.” I found out later that every single white man who hailed from Green Briar (except for Daddy) was an active member of the Ku Klux Klan. They would go into other towns to find people to prey on and to carry out their dirty work. It didn’t surprise me much when I found out. One day in July however, everything changed.
There was one particular man who everyone in Green Briar admired, except for Daddy, Silas and me. His name was Judas White, and he was about 45 or so. He was the judge and executioner for Green Briar. He stood up straight, combed over his grey hair, and carried with him the thickest whip and oddest Bowie knife I have ever seen. They said he was the best poker player in Green Briar; he could bluff his way out of the weakest hand. But what I feared were those eyes — golly those eyes. His left eye was blue, but the color was so washed out it looked almost white. His right eye was a reddish-brown color that looked as if it would gladly send you to hell if it could.
Silas and I had the misfortune of meeting Judas in the general store while we were buying a barrel of flour. He glared at me for a moment and then glared at Silas for almost a minute. He set his jaw, bumped me and then spat in Silas’s face. Silas acted as if nothing had happened and calmly wiped the spit off his face with his sleeve. The store owner was gossiping about Daddy, Silas and me to one of his friends. “That feller Cole must’ve been nuts! First raisin’ that otherwise pretty girl of his like a boy, and then takin’ in that nigger as his own and lettin’ him call him Daddy! Everybody knows that niggers are nothin’ but —” Then he stopped when he saw my shadow. Silas and I didn’t mind gossip about us, but when it came to gossip about Daddy, we couldn’t take it. Silas stared at the store owner, and I simply gave him my angry smile. We paid for our flour, and the store owner went back to jabbering about other people’s affairs. Silas went to go do something — I can’t remember what — and walked out of the general store. I was trying to balance the big barrel of flour on my hip like a baby, but it kept slipping, so I went to ask Silas if he could carry it for me. What I found outside would change my life forever.
Silas was walking down the street when Judas tripped him. Judas clutched his knee as if it was in pain. His face became redder than a freshly-painted steamboat. “What do you think you’re doin’, you dirty, ugly, clumsy, filthy nigger? You rammed into me without even lookin’ at me! You almost knocked me over, and it’s amazin’ I didn’t break any bones.” Silas was the one in real pain; I had never seen his face so twisted before. He tried to stand, but each time he tried, Judas’s hand shoved him back down into the dust. Silas then spoke up. “Suh, I ain’ nevah hahmed you befo. Why should I now?” Judas’s eyes were ablaze. “Are you callin’ me a liar?” he shrieked. “Imagine that! A nigger callin’ me a liar!” “No suh, I didn’t call you a liar neither. Actually, you pushed me down. I didn’t e’en touch you.” Judas was enraged. Nobody dared to call Judas White anything negative without paying dearly for it. Judas jumped on Silas and started landing heavy blows on his quivering frame. Other men who were there got in on it and started to beat Silas too. I dropped the flour and bolted towards the pile of angry, wrestling men and tried to pick them off Silas one by one. I heard the horrible sound of a knife being unsheathed and a muffled scream. Then all the men walked away from Silas and went back to their business as if they had done nothing more than glance at a dead dog in the street. Judas walked off and started laughing as if he had won some great victory over an incomprehensible evil. I saw why he was laughing. Silas, my closest friend, had a Bowie knife in his belly. His warm eyes were fixated on something unseen. I cradled him in my arms, and he started coughing up blood. My tears fell down on his face as I wiped the blood away with my hair. He looked at me and stroked my face, and as he tried to speak, I watched his soul fly to heaven. I sobbed for the first time in my life that day. Silas was gone.
Judas looked over at me smugly and muttered, “Nigger lover,” and strutted off into the distance. I glanced at the knife’s handle, and for the first time I understood that odd design. I had seen it many times, but never realized it depicted a skeleton suffering in hell. I felt helpless, angry, heartbroken and vengeful all at once. All I could do was wail. I took his body in my arms, and with all my strength, I dragged him to our favorite tree by the pond. I cut some of his hair that I loved to play with when we were little and cut a lock of my own. I placed them intertwined in a handkerchief and hid it in my pocket, next to my heart. Though Daddy couldn’t show it like I could, he was just as heartbroken as me. We buried Silas at our favorite spot. We talked it over and figured that we couldn’t do anything about it because Silas’s murder amounted to a lynching. And in Green Briar, no one did anything about lynchings. You might even say that murdering a black man was legal. We talked about the things that hurt us most, about how some people could do the things they do. But I never could tell my daddy about what I’ve always kept wrapped up so close to me. When it comes to love and hate, I’ve come to realize how much can be hidden in the human heart.
It’s strange how one’s life can change so dramatically because of a single act of hatred. I only realized this after that one act was carried out.
In 1934 I was 16 and was living in the town of my birth, Green Briar, Mississippi. It was just about as south as you could run without running smack dab into the ocean. Actually, Green Briar never was green; the sign that welcomed visitors to our little town was terribly misleading. It was all nicely whitewashed and depicted a lovely green valley. However, this was far from the truth since everything in Green Briar was covered in a thick coat of dirt.
I was no different from the average boy, except for the fact that I have been and always will be a girl. My momma died giving birth to me, so my daddy raised me the way he thought best: as a boy. I would hunt, fish, wrestle and josh around with all of the other boys. You couldn’t pick me out from all of them. I dressed the same as they did, wearing overalls and a cotton shirt. The only way anybody remembered that I was a girl was my stick brown hair in a single braid that reached below my shoulders, which I mostly tucked under my hat.
I was good friends with all of the boys, but I was especially close to Silas, a black boy my daddy took in when I was six. (Because there weren’t any black folks in Green Briar, Daddy figured he was abandoned further up the river in another town and then wandered to our house.) We were always together. Color was never an issue between the two of us or Daddy. We would run together, talk into the wee hours of the morning, and fish together at our favorite spot at Bracken’s Pond. He was a good friend. He would listen to me, offer me good advice, and wait around patiently until I got home from school.
But the townspeople never seemed to tolerate our happy friendship. They would glare at Silas and me as if we were diseased. “A nice little white girl like you shouldn’t be ‘round the likes of him,” the men would say. The girls would say, “Robin Cole, you should be ashamed of yourself, first disgracin’ yourself by actin’ like a boy and then bein’ friends with that boy.” I found out later that every single white man who hailed from Green Briar (except for Daddy) was an active member of the Ku Klux Klan. They would go into other towns to find people to prey on and to carry out their dirty work. It didn’t surprise me much when I found out. One day in July however, everything changed.
There was one particular man who everyone in Green Briar admired, except for Daddy, Silas and me. His name was Judas White, and he was about 45 or so. He was the judge and executioner for Green Briar. He stood up straight, combed over his grey hair, and carried with him the thickest whip and oddest Bowie knife I have ever seen. They said he was the best poker player in Green Briar; he could bluff his way out of the weakest hand. But what I feared were those eyes — golly those eyes. His left eye was blue, but the color was so washed out it looked almost white. His right eye was a reddish-brown color that looked as if it would gladly send you to hell if it could.
Silas and I had the misfortune of meeting Judas in the general store while we were buying a barrel of flour. He glared at me for a moment and then glared at Silas for almost a minute. He set his jaw, bumped me and then spat in Silas’s face. Silas acted as if nothing had happened and calmly wiped the spit off his face with his sleeve. The store owner was gossiping about Daddy, Silas and me to one of his friends. “That feller Cole must’ve been nuts! First raisin’ that otherwise pretty girl of his like a boy, and then takin’ in that nigger as his own and lettin’ him call him Daddy! Everybody knows that niggers are nothin’ but —” Then he stopped when he saw my shadow. Silas and I didn’t mind gossip about us, but when it came to gossip about Daddy, we couldn’t take it. Silas stared at the store owner, and I simply gave him my angry smile. We paid for our flour, and the store owner went back to jabbering about other people’s affairs. Silas went to go do something — I can’t remember what — and walked out of the general store. I was trying to balance the big barrel of flour on my hip like a baby, but it kept slipping, so I went to ask Silas if he could carry it for me. What I found outside would change my life forever.
Silas was walking down the street when Judas tripped him. Judas clutched his knee as if it was in pain. His face became redder than a freshly-painted steamboat. “What do you think you’re doin’, you dirty, ugly, clumsy, filthy nigger? You rammed into me without even lookin’ at me! You almost knocked me over, and it’s amazin’ I didn’t break any bones.” Silas was the one in real pain; I had never seen his face so twisted before. He tried to stand, but each time he tried, Judas’s hand shoved him back down into the dust. Silas then spoke up. “Suh, I ain’ nevah hahmed you befo. Why should I now?” Judas’s eyes were ablaze. “Are you callin’ me a liar?” he shrieked. “Imagine that! A nigger callin’ me a liar!” “No suh, I didn’t call you a liar neither. Actually, you pushed me down. I didn’t e’en touch you.” Judas was enraged. Nobody dared to call Judas White anything negative without paying dearly for it. Judas jumped on Silas and started landing heavy blows on his quivering frame. Other men who were there got in on it and started to beat Silas too. I dropped the flour and bolted towards the pile of angry, wrestling men and tried to pick them off Silas one by one. I heard the horrible sound of a knife being unsheathed and a muffled scream. Then all the men walked away from Silas and went back to their business as if they had done nothing more than glance at a dead dog in the street. Judas walked off and started laughing as if he had won some great victory over an incomprehensible evil. I saw why he was laughing. Silas, my closest friend, had a Bowie knife in his belly. His warm eyes were fixated on something unseen. I cradled him in my arms, and he started coughing up blood. My tears fell down on his face as I wiped the blood away with my hair. He looked at me and stroked my face, and as he tried to speak, I watched his soul fly to heaven. I sobbed for the first time in my life that day. Silas was gone.
Judas looked over at me smugly and muttered, “Nigger lover,” and strutted off into the distance. I glanced at the knife’s handle, and for the first time I understood that odd design. I had seen it many times, but never realized it depicted a skeleton suffering in hell. I felt helpless, angry, heartbroken and vengeful all at once. All I could do was wail. I took his body in my arms, and with all my strength, I dragged him to our favorite tree by the pond. I cut some of his hair that I loved to play with when we were little and cut a lock of my own. I placed them intertwined in a handkerchief and hid it in my pocket, next to my heart. Though Daddy couldn’t show it like I could, he was just as heartbroken as me. We buried Silas at our favorite spot. We talked it over and figured that we couldn’t do anything about it because Silas’s murder amounted to a lynching. And in Green Briar, no one did anything about lynchings. You might even say that murdering a black man was legal. We talked about the things that hurt us most, about how some people could do the things they do. But I never could tell my daddy about what I’ve always kept wrapped up so close to me. When it comes to love and hate, I’ve come to realize how much can be hidden in the human heart.
A Response to "God in the Living Room"
by D.K. Holland
The following essay is a response to “God in the Living Room,” an essay by Cole Jeffrey published in Vol. 6, No. 2.
The sum total of meaning in a work of art is more than equal to its parts. In every art form, from painting to photography, the artist attempts to communicate and the viewer attempts to interpret a message beneath the oil or silver comprising the medium. That being said, the distinction often made by viewers of art remains one of “high” versus “low,” pitting the physical medium against the inherent significance of a given piece. Eerily close to Plato’s Theory of Forms, the belief that the material world reflects a shadow of reality contextualizes the general understanding of art in contemporary culture.
With the default position of Greek philosophy deeply imbedded in Western thought, many people suffer from an inferior understanding of art’s makeup based on the platonic split between the work of art and the ideal it attempts to represent.
Cole Jeffrey, in his essay “God in the Living Room,” asserts that “if we only look at a statue, then we will just see a piece of rock carved and chiseled into an image. But if we see the statue, then we will have our minds carved and chiseled into something by the sculptor.” Jeffrey correctly observes that art has both a tangible substance and a higher ideal. Like Plato, he believes that the eye and the mind work in tandem, but also separately, in the perception of a statue. According to this reasoning, the statue of David has at once a physical image recognized by the eye and a certain “David-ness” that appeals only to the sensitivities of the mind, if it can be perceived at all. What this “David-ness” means varies from person to person. But according to Jeffrey, only the human mind can respond to seeing the real statue.
Jeffrey bases his ideas on Plato’s thinking and unfortunately misapplies the concepts found in the Theory of Forms. In so doing, he wrongly assumes that art is inherently steeped in ambiguity. In “God in the Living Room,” there is a disparity between Jeffrey’s description of emotional reaction and the cerebral understanding of art. Jeffrey does not fully explain what he means by “receiving” art. This eventually leads to frustration when trying to pinpoint what he means by “thinking about what [art] can give us.” Try as he might, Jeffrey’s platonic view of a painting would lead him to see only oil and canvas, leaving the ever-present undertone undefined. Since one’s experience and knowledge differ from that of another observer, there remains the possibility for minor disagreement about the deeper meaning of a piece. Conversation concerning the artwork would circle round to an end with two unaltered, extremely limited original opinions and no conclusion. This scenario seems to be nothing more than the proverbial banging of one’s head against a wall.
Allow me to suggest an alternative. The idea that a moment in time can be captured through human endeavor is known as mimesis, a Greek term meaning the representation of aspects of the sensible world. The viewer viscerally perceives this representation as separate and complete, and the artwork essentially becomes its own autonomous world. Every form of art involves the creation of a mimetic world, whether two-dimensional in painting or photography or three-dimensional in film or drama. This new world is more than a thing with corresponding thought-provocation. It is a separate universe the viewer can explore. With this idea of mimesis in mind, art’s purpose becomes twofold. Sir Philip Sydney, in his Defense of Poesy, enumerated these two purposes when he stated that a poet’s station is to “teach and delight.” Sydney wrote in response to a flagrantly anti-art sentiment proposed by his Puritan peers, specifically Sir Stephen Gossom. In his work, The School of Art, Gossom sarcastically condemned the creation of poetry as well as other arts. Interestingly, this condemnation was based on arguments in the works of Plato. In The Republic, Plato had called for the removal of all poets from his utopian society on the basis that they did not “tell the truth” about the world around them. This assertion appears to be sensible in light of Plato’s belief that the true form of the world cannot be fully captured with the mere words of a poem. Gossom took Plato’s argument one step further and stated that poets were liars, often targeting Sydney personally. Sydney carefully crafted a thorough response, graciously leaving out Gossom’s name in favor of allegorical pseudonyms.
In Defense of Poesy, Sydney describes an artist’s station as teacher and one who brings delight. Poets, according to Sydney, do not invent subliminal messages to deceive and lead listeners away from the higher ideal. On the contrary, artists manipulate their chosen mediums to illuminate the viewer. This allows the viewer to connect diegetic aspects of the artwork with ideas and truths already known. Sydney recognized that man does conceive of abstract forms, but saw that in art these abstractions do not necessarily exist separately from the work of art itself.
In light of Sydney’s astute observations, Jeffrey’s diagnosis of art’s purposes can be seen, not as erroneous, but hasty. The platonic outlook of dividing meaning from substance is in some ways unavoidable. Humans naturally tend to look for a deeper meaning in all things, and their quest for sub-textual information is too fruitful to deny that art is simply material. Since art is a facsimile of reality, no piece can be completely without a “shadow.” A separation between what can be seen and what can be imagined invariably makes for inquisitive viewers. However, the goal of art is not to encourage this schism between imagination and substance, but to close it. In order to promote a broader understanding of the world, artists will continue their attempts to impart to viewers more than pieces that cause emotional reaction. The creation of a mimetic world in which characters or objects act in ways that allude to other areas of life is the surest way to break away from ambiguous and pedantic views of art.
The following essay is a response to “God in the Living Room,” an essay by Cole Jeffrey published in Vol. 6, No. 2.
The sum total of meaning in a work of art is more than equal to its parts. In every art form, from painting to photography, the artist attempts to communicate and the viewer attempts to interpret a message beneath the oil or silver comprising the medium. That being said, the distinction often made by viewers of art remains one of “high” versus “low,” pitting the physical medium against the inherent significance of a given piece. Eerily close to Plato’s Theory of Forms, the belief that the material world reflects a shadow of reality contextualizes the general understanding of art in contemporary culture.
With the default position of Greek philosophy deeply imbedded in Western thought, many people suffer from an inferior understanding of art’s makeup based on the platonic split between the work of art and the ideal it attempts to represent.
Cole Jeffrey, in his essay “God in the Living Room,” asserts that “if we only look at a statue, then we will just see a piece of rock carved and chiseled into an image. But if we see the statue, then we will have our minds carved and chiseled into something by the sculptor.” Jeffrey correctly observes that art has both a tangible substance and a higher ideal. Like Plato, he believes that the eye and the mind work in tandem, but also separately, in the perception of a statue. According to this reasoning, the statue of David has at once a physical image recognized by the eye and a certain “David-ness” that appeals only to the sensitivities of the mind, if it can be perceived at all. What this “David-ness” means varies from person to person. But according to Jeffrey, only the human mind can respond to seeing the real statue.
Jeffrey bases his ideas on Plato’s thinking and unfortunately misapplies the concepts found in the Theory of Forms. In so doing, he wrongly assumes that art is inherently steeped in ambiguity. In “God in the Living Room,” there is a disparity between Jeffrey’s description of emotional reaction and the cerebral understanding of art. Jeffrey does not fully explain what he means by “receiving” art. This eventually leads to frustration when trying to pinpoint what he means by “thinking about what [art] can give us.” Try as he might, Jeffrey’s platonic view of a painting would lead him to see only oil and canvas, leaving the ever-present undertone undefined. Since one’s experience and knowledge differ from that of another observer, there remains the possibility for minor disagreement about the deeper meaning of a piece. Conversation concerning the artwork would circle round to an end with two unaltered, extremely limited original opinions and no conclusion. This scenario seems to be nothing more than the proverbial banging of one’s head against a wall.
Allow me to suggest an alternative. The idea that a moment in time can be captured through human endeavor is known as mimesis, a Greek term meaning the representation of aspects of the sensible world. The viewer viscerally perceives this representation as separate and complete, and the artwork essentially becomes its own autonomous world. Every form of art involves the creation of a mimetic world, whether two-dimensional in painting or photography or three-dimensional in film or drama. This new world is more than a thing with corresponding thought-provocation. It is a separate universe the viewer can explore. With this idea of mimesis in mind, art’s purpose becomes twofold. Sir Philip Sydney, in his Defense of Poesy, enumerated these two purposes when he stated that a poet’s station is to “teach and delight.” Sydney wrote in response to a flagrantly anti-art sentiment proposed by his Puritan peers, specifically Sir Stephen Gossom. In his work, The School of Art, Gossom sarcastically condemned the creation of poetry as well as other arts. Interestingly, this condemnation was based on arguments in the works of Plato. In The Republic, Plato had called for the removal of all poets from his utopian society on the basis that they did not “tell the truth” about the world around them. This assertion appears to be sensible in light of Plato’s belief that the true form of the world cannot be fully captured with the mere words of a poem. Gossom took Plato’s argument one step further and stated that poets were liars, often targeting Sydney personally. Sydney carefully crafted a thorough response, graciously leaving out Gossom’s name in favor of allegorical pseudonyms.
In Defense of Poesy, Sydney describes an artist’s station as teacher and one who brings delight. Poets, according to Sydney, do not invent subliminal messages to deceive and lead listeners away from the higher ideal. On the contrary, artists manipulate their chosen mediums to illuminate the viewer. This allows the viewer to connect diegetic aspects of the artwork with ideas and truths already known. Sydney recognized that man does conceive of abstract forms, but saw that in art these abstractions do not necessarily exist separately from the work of art itself.
In light of Sydney’s astute observations, Jeffrey’s diagnosis of art’s purposes can be seen, not as erroneous, but hasty. The platonic outlook of dividing meaning from substance is in some ways unavoidable. Humans naturally tend to look for a deeper meaning in all things, and their quest for sub-textual information is too fruitful to deny that art is simply material. Since art is a facsimile of reality, no piece can be completely without a “shadow.” A separation between what can be seen and what can be imagined invariably makes for inquisitive viewers. However, the goal of art is not to encourage this schism between imagination and substance, but to close it. In order to promote a broader understanding of the world, artists will continue their attempts to impart to viewers more than pieces that cause emotional reaction. The creation of a mimetic world in which characters or objects act in ways that allude to other areas of life is the surest way to break away from ambiguous and pedantic views of art.
Seattle's Homeless: An Essay
by Katie McCausland
I hurried down the wet plank and onto the back of the small passenger ferry that ran from my town of Port Orchard to Bremerton. It was my first day of work, and I wished I’d dressed warmer as I took one of the last seats on the exposed deck of the boat and made a sad attempt to wrap the tail of my scarf over my knees. The salty wind whipped through my hair, and I was amazed at the beautiful sunrise coming up from behind the towering forests of Kitsap Peninsula that quickly grew smaller as we pulled away from the dock. The sun warmed the gray clouds to pinks and oranges that contrasted against the clear blue sky. I began to think that catching the early ferry might not be so bad after all.
Fifteen minutes later, I tramped onto the Bremerton docks with the rest of the passengers. However, I paused to curiously examine a man who was waiting to go back to Port Orchard. Everything about him said he was homeless — his long, tangled, salt and pepper hair, his dirty, shabby jeans and his old plaid jacket. My attention was caught though, by a birdhouse attached to a string that hung around his neck. It was a small wooden birdhouse, clearly damaged and faded from the Seattle rain and wind. If I didn’t know better than to talk to the homeless, I would have liked to look inside the birdhouse and see what kind of bird he had in there. “Don’t mind him,” a small, middle-aged Filipino woman advised me, noticing my interest. “He don’t keep no bird in there. He keep the money he begs for. He used to carry it in jar, but the others break it and steal his money too much. Now he try to fool the people with his birdhouse. If you ask me, he should get a job. I come here and get my nursing degree, and now I make the money myself.” I nodded, replied “Oh,” and kept moving toward the larger ferry leaving from Bremerton’s terminal to downtown Seattle.
Once on the Seattle ferry, I found a booth near a heating vent and curled up to go to sleep. I had taken this ride so often that I wasn’t anxious to look out the window. The boat would pull out of Bremerton and cross the Puget Sound towards Rich Passage and then move on to the piers of Seattle. It would pass several big red navigational buoy towers, bobbing cheerily in the cold water. On a sunny morning like this, a few sea lions would be fighting to jump up on the bases of these towers to sun themselves. Large homes lined the shore, set against rolling hills covered in brownish-green brush and a backdrop of evergreen trees. On the beach a few of the timid shore birds might run up and down, quickly pecking at the wet sand, then racing away from the approaching waves. It all looked the same for that hour-long ride.
Once we docked in Seattle, we were greeted by a crew of seagulls who landed on the deck to beg for food. They angrily fluffed their wings and tried to peck their way closer to the passengers. A few tourists displayed their naivete by feeding the seagulls, creating a larger, noisier flock of birds as the pigeons and nearby crows joined in. An irritated ferry employee shooed the birds away and threw a dirty look towards the tourists. I was carried off the ferry by the bustle of commuters who went in different directions with looks of determination on their faces. They didn’t notice the cries of the workers in the fish market, how the sun sparkled and gleamed on the side of the cruise ship that had docked a few piers down, or the graffiti showing off the artistic talents of the local street kids.
I followed this oblivious group into the pedestrian tunnel leading out to the streets of Seattle. I was immediately taken aback by the strong smell of urine. Apparently the tunnel doubled as the local restroom for the homeless and a home as well, judging by the dirty sleeping bag crumpled nearby. I did my best to hold my breath, and silently cursed my high heels for crippling me from walking any faster. This was when I first saw Smiley. I was waiting at the corner of Marion and First, right by Starbucks, which happened to be his corner. His deformed purplish-red nose and ears (and slightly intoxicated state) testified to his alcoholism. From his looks and the long thin braid hanging down his back, I guessed he was probably Native American. I wondered how this 50-something man was able to survive. He stood there in nothing but a tattered t-shirt and jeans, while I could barely stay warm enough to function with my scarf, wool coat and layers of sweaters and shirts.
The thing that most surprised me was how he chose to occupy himself: smiling, not asking for money, but merely holding a bent cardboard sign that said in sloppy black marker, “Smile.” He looked at me, almost begging me to smile with his glazed-over brown eyes. I averted my gaze to the light and quickly crossed the street when it turned green. I knew it was better not to encourage the homeless to bother you. If I was going to see him often, I didn’t need him trying to talk to me every time I waited at that light.
I hiked four blocks uphill and then another four through the hotel district to the historic Fairmont-Olympic Hotel where I was employed by a watch boutique. Smartly-dressed bellhops nodded at me as I walked by, while valets ran around vehicles and assisted guests with their luggage before driving the cars off. A couple of bank employees stood outside the back of Wells Fargo, smoking next to a sign that pointed to an Asian deli located down a shady-looking alley. I crossed the street to the Fairmont Hotel, happy that this area remained relatively free of bums and suspicious characters.
I hadn’t been working more than a few hours before I was sent down the street to the warehouse to bring more stock to the watch shop. I didn’t mind though; I needed some fresh air. One of the benefits of the continual rain in Seattle is that it keeps the air clean of smog. The sidewalks always provide one with plenty to look at. The tables and chairs outside of cafes attract gray pigeons, bobbing their heads and cooing at the customers, hoping for a stray crumb. Asian tourists run around with cameras, asking those passing by to take their picture. And I always have a hard time not staring at the costumes the “artsy” women turn out in, with their bright stockings, crazy windblown hair, and fluttering peasant skirts. Confused groups of elderly tourists grabbed anybody who would stop and inquired where Pike Place Market was. I stopped only to greet the old Jewish man who ran the hot dog stand on the corner of Fourth and Union (because you never know when a friendship like that might come in handy) before reaching the warehouse.
“Oh man, look at that!” I heard our repairman, Ryan, yell as I scanned the shelves for the box to a watch I was pulling. The shipping manager and I rushed into his office and found Ryan in his usual stance, leaning against the window. We all peered down five stories to the sidewalk across the street. There on the ground lay a heap of rags that might have once been a man, but now was so lifeless I was sure someone would come along and throw it in the dumpster at any moment. “Wait, here come the bike patrol dudes. They’ll pick him up for sure.” Ryan pointed as two policemen came coasting around the corner. To my surprise, they stopped and talked to each other only for a moment before directing their attention to a pedestrian who seemed to need directions. An ambulance began wailing in the distance. Surely it was coming to pick up the poor passed-out man, but as it drew closer, it rumbled by in a hurry to help someone else. I strained my eyes to see if the man was breathing. “How long will he be there?” I asked. “I don’t know, a little while. I’m pretty sure that storeowner will get really upset if he has a homeless man dead outside his store. It looks bad for business, you know.” Ryan responded absently as he turned back to his ringing phone. “Do you really think he’s dead?” “I don’t know…Hello? Yeah…I’ll send her. Hey Katie, Sara says to hurry back down there with that watch.” I glanced out the window one last time before leaving. I found it odd that humanity would just sweep past a man who might be dying.
That was the thing with the homeless; they didn’t seem to have any connections with anybody. Nobody really cared what happened to them. I wondered if I should have done something, but I quickly pushed the thought out of my head. He was, no doubt, just drunk or a drug addict who was finally getting what had been coming to him for years. Nobody cared about the homeless for a good reason — they didn’t contribute to society; all they really did was try to leech off of other people’s sympathies.
I felt relieved when the time came for me to leave. Eight hours of being in uncomfortable dress clothes made me eager to get home. The sun was setting behind the city and the air grew chilly again. I wanted to stop and stand in between the buildings where the last few warm rays of sun were able to reach, but I had a ferry to catch. That’s the only problem with taking a ferry; you’re always in a rush to catch it. If you miss it, it will be a good hour or two before the next one comes.
The same determined crowd that had pushed me off the boat now trotted down the steep hills of Seattle, everyone once again oblivious to the world. I loved soaking in the sights of the city. White horse-drawn carriages meandered along the waterfront carrying couples cuddled in the backseat. A few shopkeepers watered their flower boxes and swept their storefronts before closing and joining the crowds towards the ferry. People coming from Pike Place Market had their arms loaded with colorful bouquets and fresh produce. The only thing I disliked was the squealing and hissing of the buses as they lurched by, trying to make all their stops on time. A few frazzled individuals dressed in business suits sprinted towards their bus stop, waving their arms and yelling for the bus to wait. I had nearly been knocked over by one of these people as I was crossing the street when I ran into Smiley again. He hadn’t moved an inch from his corner. He still waited, imploring anybody to smile for him. He waved and thanked those who were brave enough to take notice of him. I looked his way, and he caught my eye. “Oh won’t you please take me home with you?” he pleaded, giving me a rather toothless smile. Unsure of what to do, I gave him a weak smile and tried to pass him as quickly as possible.
When I entered the pedestrian tunnel, I was surprised to find the offensive smell of urine replaced with that of a cleaning agent. A man who would become a very familiar figure to me that summer was working away in there. I called him Mr. Clean. He stood inside the tunnel, scrubbing the walls. He didn’t work energetically or cheerfully, but at a dreary, steady pace, like a tired donkey that plods along, not because it wants to, but because it’s a duty that must be done. He took no notice of the people passing him or the curious looks he received, but continued spraying and scrubbing. His appearance wasn’t one that suggested an individual with a clean streak. He had the same tangled gray hair, the same lanky, malnourished body, and the same worn, leathery skin as any other homeless man. Yet underneath this ordinary appearance was a man who had resolved to make his home clean.
From that point on, every day I saw Smiley and Mr. Clean. Mr. Clean spent all of his mornings reading and cleaned in the evening. The only thing I ever saw him read was a faded green Gideon New Testament. I often wished that I could stop and talk to Mr. Clean. He fascinated me. It didn’t surprise me that he had a New Testament, because most of the homeless often read and can even quote a little Scripture, but I wondered what Mr. Clean thought of it. I also wondered how he survived. I never once saw him panhandle, beg, eat or drink anything. And why did he always clean? Living as a homeless man was one of the dirtiest lives he could’ve chosen. Where did he get his cleaning supplies? He had several bottles with different colored liquids, but I couldn’t figure out where he kept them. In the morning I never saw them poking out from his shopping cart. Despite my desire to talk with Mr. Clean, I knew he never spoke to anybody, not even to himself. The few times I had tried to get his attention, he just went on cleaning or reading.
At first I was disgusted by Smiley. On several occasions I heard him making lewd comments to women. Later, I noticed that he only said nasty things to women who ignored him. To those who would acknowledge him, he put on that huge toothless grin, and sometimes, if you were really special, he would mockingly give you a flourished bow. But Smiley’s mind was not right, and he could not hold a conversation. I remember near the end of the summer, Smiley passed out from drinking too much. The next day I asked him how he was feeling, and he just gave me a blank stare and held up his sign. I smiled, he bowed, and I continued on my way.
On my last long ferry ride from Seattle to Bremerton, I stared idly out the window. Huge dark clouds began rolling in, turning the soft colors of sunset into cold, bluish-grays and greens. The forests were no longer a rich emerald green, but black, and the houses that had seemed so brightly painted on sunny mornings turned dull under the clouds. A few of the braver seagulls who were catching rides back to Bremerton stepped under the covered side of the deck and huddled together for a little body heat.
I thought about how through those trips to Seattle I had really grown attached to Smiley and Mr. Clean. Because of them, my view of the homeless had been significantly changed. They’re not all societal leeches looking to use other’s emotions and sympathies for their own benefit. But they are all sinners, like me, who are in desperate need of God’s love and grace. It’s not often that two people you’ve never held a conversation with change you, but that summer, those homeless men changed me.
I hurried down the wet plank and onto the back of the small passenger ferry that ran from my town of Port Orchard to Bremerton. It was my first day of work, and I wished I’d dressed warmer as I took one of the last seats on the exposed deck of the boat and made a sad attempt to wrap the tail of my scarf over my knees. The salty wind whipped through my hair, and I was amazed at the beautiful sunrise coming up from behind the towering forests of Kitsap Peninsula that quickly grew smaller as we pulled away from the dock. The sun warmed the gray clouds to pinks and oranges that contrasted against the clear blue sky. I began to think that catching the early ferry might not be so bad after all.
Fifteen minutes later, I tramped onto the Bremerton docks with the rest of the passengers. However, I paused to curiously examine a man who was waiting to go back to Port Orchard. Everything about him said he was homeless — his long, tangled, salt and pepper hair, his dirty, shabby jeans and his old plaid jacket. My attention was caught though, by a birdhouse attached to a string that hung around his neck. It was a small wooden birdhouse, clearly damaged and faded from the Seattle rain and wind. If I didn’t know better than to talk to the homeless, I would have liked to look inside the birdhouse and see what kind of bird he had in there. “Don’t mind him,” a small, middle-aged Filipino woman advised me, noticing my interest. “He don’t keep no bird in there. He keep the money he begs for. He used to carry it in jar, but the others break it and steal his money too much. Now he try to fool the people with his birdhouse. If you ask me, he should get a job. I come here and get my nursing degree, and now I make the money myself.” I nodded, replied “Oh,” and kept moving toward the larger ferry leaving from Bremerton’s terminal to downtown Seattle.
Once on the Seattle ferry, I found a booth near a heating vent and curled up to go to sleep. I had taken this ride so often that I wasn’t anxious to look out the window. The boat would pull out of Bremerton and cross the Puget Sound towards Rich Passage and then move on to the piers of Seattle. It would pass several big red navigational buoy towers, bobbing cheerily in the cold water. On a sunny morning like this, a few sea lions would be fighting to jump up on the bases of these towers to sun themselves. Large homes lined the shore, set against rolling hills covered in brownish-green brush and a backdrop of evergreen trees. On the beach a few of the timid shore birds might run up and down, quickly pecking at the wet sand, then racing away from the approaching waves. It all looked the same for that hour-long ride.
Once we docked in Seattle, we were greeted by a crew of seagulls who landed on the deck to beg for food. They angrily fluffed their wings and tried to peck their way closer to the passengers. A few tourists displayed their naivete by feeding the seagulls, creating a larger, noisier flock of birds as the pigeons and nearby crows joined in. An irritated ferry employee shooed the birds away and threw a dirty look towards the tourists. I was carried off the ferry by the bustle of commuters who went in different directions with looks of determination on their faces. They didn’t notice the cries of the workers in the fish market, how the sun sparkled and gleamed on the side of the cruise ship that had docked a few piers down, or the graffiti showing off the artistic talents of the local street kids.
I followed this oblivious group into the pedestrian tunnel leading out to the streets of Seattle. I was immediately taken aback by the strong smell of urine. Apparently the tunnel doubled as the local restroom for the homeless and a home as well, judging by the dirty sleeping bag crumpled nearby. I did my best to hold my breath, and silently cursed my high heels for crippling me from walking any faster. This was when I first saw Smiley. I was waiting at the corner of Marion and First, right by Starbucks, which happened to be his corner. His deformed purplish-red nose and ears (and slightly intoxicated state) testified to his alcoholism. From his looks and the long thin braid hanging down his back, I guessed he was probably Native American. I wondered how this 50-something man was able to survive. He stood there in nothing but a tattered t-shirt and jeans, while I could barely stay warm enough to function with my scarf, wool coat and layers of sweaters and shirts.
The thing that most surprised me was how he chose to occupy himself: smiling, not asking for money, but merely holding a bent cardboard sign that said in sloppy black marker, “Smile.” He looked at me, almost begging me to smile with his glazed-over brown eyes. I averted my gaze to the light and quickly crossed the street when it turned green. I knew it was better not to encourage the homeless to bother you. If I was going to see him often, I didn’t need him trying to talk to me every time I waited at that light.
I hiked four blocks uphill and then another four through the hotel district to the historic Fairmont-Olympic Hotel where I was employed by a watch boutique. Smartly-dressed bellhops nodded at me as I walked by, while valets ran around vehicles and assisted guests with their luggage before driving the cars off. A couple of bank employees stood outside the back of Wells Fargo, smoking next to a sign that pointed to an Asian deli located down a shady-looking alley. I crossed the street to the Fairmont Hotel, happy that this area remained relatively free of bums and suspicious characters.
I hadn’t been working more than a few hours before I was sent down the street to the warehouse to bring more stock to the watch shop. I didn’t mind though; I needed some fresh air. One of the benefits of the continual rain in Seattle is that it keeps the air clean of smog. The sidewalks always provide one with plenty to look at. The tables and chairs outside of cafes attract gray pigeons, bobbing their heads and cooing at the customers, hoping for a stray crumb. Asian tourists run around with cameras, asking those passing by to take their picture. And I always have a hard time not staring at the costumes the “artsy” women turn out in, with their bright stockings, crazy windblown hair, and fluttering peasant skirts. Confused groups of elderly tourists grabbed anybody who would stop and inquired where Pike Place Market was. I stopped only to greet the old Jewish man who ran the hot dog stand on the corner of Fourth and Union (because you never know when a friendship like that might come in handy) before reaching the warehouse.
“Oh man, look at that!” I heard our repairman, Ryan, yell as I scanned the shelves for the box to a watch I was pulling. The shipping manager and I rushed into his office and found Ryan in his usual stance, leaning against the window. We all peered down five stories to the sidewalk across the street. There on the ground lay a heap of rags that might have once been a man, but now was so lifeless I was sure someone would come along and throw it in the dumpster at any moment. “Wait, here come the bike patrol dudes. They’ll pick him up for sure.” Ryan pointed as two policemen came coasting around the corner. To my surprise, they stopped and talked to each other only for a moment before directing their attention to a pedestrian who seemed to need directions. An ambulance began wailing in the distance. Surely it was coming to pick up the poor passed-out man, but as it drew closer, it rumbled by in a hurry to help someone else. I strained my eyes to see if the man was breathing. “How long will he be there?” I asked. “I don’t know, a little while. I’m pretty sure that storeowner will get really upset if he has a homeless man dead outside his store. It looks bad for business, you know.” Ryan responded absently as he turned back to his ringing phone. “Do you really think he’s dead?” “I don’t know…Hello? Yeah…I’ll send her. Hey Katie, Sara says to hurry back down there with that watch.” I glanced out the window one last time before leaving. I found it odd that humanity would just sweep past a man who might be dying.
That was the thing with the homeless; they didn’t seem to have any connections with anybody. Nobody really cared what happened to them. I wondered if I should have done something, but I quickly pushed the thought out of my head. He was, no doubt, just drunk or a drug addict who was finally getting what had been coming to him for years. Nobody cared about the homeless for a good reason — they didn’t contribute to society; all they really did was try to leech off of other people’s sympathies.
I felt relieved when the time came for me to leave. Eight hours of being in uncomfortable dress clothes made me eager to get home. The sun was setting behind the city and the air grew chilly again. I wanted to stop and stand in between the buildings where the last few warm rays of sun were able to reach, but I had a ferry to catch. That’s the only problem with taking a ferry; you’re always in a rush to catch it. If you miss it, it will be a good hour or two before the next one comes.
The same determined crowd that had pushed me off the boat now trotted down the steep hills of Seattle, everyone once again oblivious to the world. I loved soaking in the sights of the city. White horse-drawn carriages meandered along the waterfront carrying couples cuddled in the backseat. A few shopkeepers watered their flower boxes and swept their storefronts before closing and joining the crowds towards the ferry. People coming from Pike Place Market had their arms loaded with colorful bouquets and fresh produce. The only thing I disliked was the squealing and hissing of the buses as they lurched by, trying to make all their stops on time. A few frazzled individuals dressed in business suits sprinted towards their bus stop, waving their arms and yelling for the bus to wait. I had nearly been knocked over by one of these people as I was crossing the street when I ran into Smiley again. He hadn’t moved an inch from his corner. He still waited, imploring anybody to smile for him. He waved and thanked those who were brave enough to take notice of him. I looked his way, and he caught my eye. “Oh won’t you please take me home with you?” he pleaded, giving me a rather toothless smile. Unsure of what to do, I gave him a weak smile and tried to pass him as quickly as possible.
When I entered the pedestrian tunnel, I was surprised to find the offensive smell of urine replaced with that of a cleaning agent. A man who would become a very familiar figure to me that summer was working away in there. I called him Mr. Clean. He stood inside the tunnel, scrubbing the walls. He didn’t work energetically or cheerfully, but at a dreary, steady pace, like a tired donkey that plods along, not because it wants to, but because it’s a duty that must be done. He took no notice of the people passing him or the curious looks he received, but continued spraying and scrubbing. His appearance wasn’t one that suggested an individual with a clean streak. He had the same tangled gray hair, the same lanky, malnourished body, and the same worn, leathery skin as any other homeless man. Yet underneath this ordinary appearance was a man who had resolved to make his home clean.
From that point on, every day I saw Smiley and Mr. Clean. Mr. Clean spent all of his mornings reading and cleaned in the evening. The only thing I ever saw him read was a faded green Gideon New Testament. I often wished that I could stop and talk to Mr. Clean. He fascinated me. It didn’t surprise me that he had a New Testament, because most of the homeless often read and can even quote a little Scripture, but I wondered what Mr. Clean thought of it. I also wondered how he survived. I never once saw him panhandle, beg, eat or drink anything. And why did he always clean? Living as a homeless man was one of the dirtiest lives he could’ve chosen. Where did he get his cleaning supplies? He had several bottles with different colored liquids, but I couldn’t figure out where he kept them. In the morning I never saw them poking out from his shopping cart. Despite my desire to talk with Mr. Clean, I knew he never spoke to anybody, not even to himself. The few times I had tried to get his attention, he just went on cleaning or reading.
At first I was disgusted by Smiley. On several occasions I heard him making lewd comments to women. Later, I noticed that he only said nasty things to women who ignored him. To those who would acknowledge him, he put on that huge toothless grin, and sometimes, if you were really special, he would mockingly give you a flourished bow. But Smiley’s mind was not right, and he could not hold a conversation. I remember near the end of the summer, Smiley passed out from drinking too much. The next day I asked him how he was feeling, and he just gave me a blank stare and held up his sign. I smiled, he bowed, and I continued on my way.
On my last long ferry ride from Seattle to Bremerton, I stared idly out the window. Huge dark clouds began rolling in, turning the soft colors of sunset into cold, bluish-grays and greens. The forests were no longer a rich emerald green, but black, and the houses that had seemed so brightly painted on sunny mornings turned dull under the clouds. A few of the braver seagulls who were catching rides back to Bremerton stepped under the covered side of the deck and huddled together for a little body heat.
I thought about how through those trips to Seattle I had really grown attached to Smiley and Mr. Clean. Because of them, my view of the homeless had been significantly changed. They’re not all societal leeches looking to use other’s emotions and sympathies for their own benefit. But they are all sinners, like me, who are in desperate need of God’s love and grace. It’s not often that two people you’ve never held a conversation with change you, but that summer, those homeless men changed me.
Breaking Down the Walls: Editorial
By Debbie Stampfli
When I was nine years old, my room fell apart. Literally.
In one moment on a cold January morning in 1994, my drawers full of books flew out onto the carpet, my glass figurines tumbled from their shelves, and my furniture fell over onto the floor and on top of my bed.
It wasn’t just my room though. The Northridge Earthquake hit our entire neighborhood in a severe way — mainly because my family lived only a few miles from the epicenter. Some chimneys collapsed, and most incredibly, nearly every single one of our neighbor’s fences and walls were knocked down, including ours.
As a result, if you looked outside through our backyard, you could see into nearly every other backyard in the neighborhood. We were suddenly taken away from our comfortable, fenced-in environment, and forced to see into the backyards of people we barely knew. Stranger still, when the boundaries of our backyard opened, we suddenly became host to a number of animals. We began to regularly see squirrels, possums and mice in the days that followed. Our patio table even became home to a pure white dove that we affectionately named “Snowshoe.” After a while, he knew us so well that he would eat Saltine crackers right from our hands.
Although our world was shaken in a terrible way, it was also opened in a strange and beautiful way. After the earthquake, the busy main street we lived on became an unconventional neighborhood. Everyone had to come out of their homes eventually that day, and the most common phrase spoken that morning became, “Are you guys okay?” I wondered if those words would have escaped anyone’s lips if our “worlds” had not been tangibly broken.
In the same sense, I wish we would all become this shaken. It is a terrible thing to go through life in the center of a busy world with fences and walls and barriers keeping us apart from it. We become trapped behind our own fences, unaware of the world that is just next door, full of broken people and even beautiful white doves.
I’ve come to the point where I’ve realized that this is one of the defining marks of our culture. We live for ourselves and rarely see what is going on outside what interests us. When I was driving past a bus stop the other day, I saw an older woman with frazzled dark hair and disappointed eyes, holding her face in her hands. I knew she had grief that this world would categorize as unfixable. And I knew I would never see her again. Granted, it is impossible to take into consideration every pained person we come across. Yet, to ignore them altogether and dissolve into our own self-centered worlds is a tragedy. Some might call this condition apathy, but I think they are being far too kind. It is merely a symptom of our self-consumed culture: egoism, to be sure. Moreover, it demonstrates the complete lack of compassion that has taken us all captive. Instead of being aware and concerned for others, we are exclusively centered on ourselves. And by shutting out the world around us with a frame of indifference, we lose a whole world of unexpected beauty as well. Instead of building taller fences and thicker walls, we should long for earthquakes that take us into worlds we would have nothing to do with otherwise.
In spite of the destructive effect of the earthquake, my family gained a wonderful pet dove and a few new neighbors — things I wouldn’t have noticed in any other circumstance. Likewise, oftentimes when we lock ourselves behind fences instead of letting our walls fall down, we miss the important things, the simplistically beautiful things, and the imperfectly lovely things. But even more so, we need to desire “earthquakes” in order to get out of ourselves and observe those around us. If our worlds have to be shaken in order to transform us into observant and sensitive individuals, then so be it. Better a world of fallen fences than apathetic egomaniacs.
When I was nine years old, my room fell apart. Literally.
In one moment on a cold January morning in 1994, my drawers full of books flew out onto the carpet, my glass figurines tumbled from their shelves, and my furniture fell over onto the floor and on top of my bed.
It wasn’t just my room though. The Northridge Earthquake hit our entire neighborhood in a severe way — mainly because my family lived only a few miles from the epicenter. Some chimneys collapsed, and most incredibly, nearly every single one of our neighbor’s fences and walls were knocked down, including ours.
As a result, if you looked outside through our backyard, you could see into nearly every other backyard in the neighborhood. We were suddenly taken away from our comfortable, fenced-in environment, and forced to see into the backyards of people we barely knew. Stranger still, when the boundaries of our backyard opened, we suddenly became host to a number of animals. We began to regularly see squirrels, possums and mice in the days that followed. Our patio table even became home to a pure white dove that we affectionately named “Snowshoe.” After a while, he knew us so well that he would eat Saltine crackers right from our hands.
Although our world was shaken in a terrible way, it was also opened in a strange and beautiful way. After the earthquake, the busy main street we lived on became an unconventional neighborhood. Everyone had to come out of their homes eventually that day, and the most common phrase spoken that morning became, “Are you guys okay?” I wondered if those words would have escaped anyone’s lips if our “worlds” had not been tangibly broken.
In the same sense, I wish we would all become this shaken. It is a terrible thing to go through life in the center of a busy world with fences and walls and barriers keeping us apart from it. We become trapped behind our own fences, unaware of the world that is just next door, full of broken people and even beautiful white doves.
I’ve come to the point where I’ve realized that this is one of the defining marks of our culture. We live for ourselves and rarely see what is going on outside what interests us. When I was driving past a bus stop the other day, I saw an older woman with frazzled dark hair and disappointed eyes, holding her face in her hands. I knew she had grief that this world would categorize as unfixable. And I knew I would never see her again. Granted, it is impossible to take into consideration every pained person we come across. Yet, to ignore them altogether and dissolve into our own self-centered worlds is a tragedy. Some might call this condition apathy, but I think they are being far too kind. It is merely a symptom of our self-consumed culture: egoism, to be sure. Moreover, it demonstrates the complete lack of compassion that has taken us all captive. Instead of being aware and concerned for others, we are exclusively centered on ourselves. And by shutting out the world around us with a frame of indifference, we lose a whole world of unexpected beauty as well. Instead of building taller fences and thicker walls, we should long for earthquakes that take us into worlds we would have nothing to do with otherwise.
In spite of the destructive effect of the earthquake, my family gained a wonderful pet dove and a few new neighbors — things I wouldn’t have noticed in any other circumstance. Likewise, oftentimes when we lock ourselves behind fences instead of letting our walls fall down, we miss the important things, the simplistically beautiful things, and the imperfectly lovely things. But even more so, we need to desire “earthquakes” in order to get out of ourselves and observe those around us. If our worlds have to be shaken in order to transform us into observant and sensitive individuals, then so be it. Better a world of fallen fences than apathetic egomaniacs.
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