Headlines are the hardest part

In case you didn’t hear, I have a job now! I work for the Foothills Sun-Gazette newspaper as a reporter! I had given them my resume several weeks ago, then checked back with them two or three times to see if they had looked at it yet. Finally, they arranged a day and time for an official job interview. When I came back for the interview, I discovered it was less of an “interview” and more of a “welcome to the Foothills Sun-Gazette” kind of meeting, which I didn’t know about. I came bringing five writing samples and a mind ready to answer whatever questions I might be asked. Instead, I’m handed a manilla folder and told that it is my hiring packet. The editor told me to come in at 1:00 tomorrow to start work, and that was it!

In my first week there I did more re-writing than actual writing. I’ve now done several re-writes of press releases into article form, as well as re-writes of police reports into short paragraph story form, into a section called “Crime-lines.” I also did one over-the-phone interview to get more information about a car show in Porterville, and a face-to-face reporter assignment where I took pictures at a ribbon-cutting (yes, I get to do some photography too!), then interviewed the new business owner (that article can be found here). Though this is only about my third week at this job I’ve found that they are slowly giving me more and more assignments. I guess that was nice of them to sort-of ease me into it, but it’s a little scary to all of a sudden be given responsibility for six stories in the paper, all but one of which need interviews with people either over the phone or in person.

I like one-on-one conversations with people, but one of the scariest parts of this job is making the phone call. Once the conversation has begun, I’m fine; it’s just the idea of me being outgoing and calling contact after contact to get a story. It’s also a little scary when I have to go in-person somewhere all by myself. I find that I am the one who has to go introduce myself to people, then I have to be the one pressing them for answers to questions, or being directive and telling people where I will be taking the picture. This job is forcing me to me more extroverted, which I guess isn't necessarily a bad thing. It's getting me out of my comfort zone.

I also feel like my editor and publisher are either testing me or putting a lot of faith in me. Either way, they are often pushing me out on a limb by myself (in a good way, I guess). For example, yesterday I had go to a sort-of press conference all by myself. I wasn’t told what questions I should ask, so I had to come up with some on the spot. It’s a kind of trial by fire, but I guess it will get me used to reporting very quickly. I’ll be learning from a lot my own mistakes for a while.

The job also has a very fluid schedule. I can clock in and clock out whenever I want, as long as I get all my hours in for the week. This means that if I get all my hours for the week done by Thursday, I can take Friday off - kind of like homeschool. I also find that it’s hard to plan too far ahead, because I never know when I am going to get a last-minute assignment to take pictures of a fire or take notes at a board meeting. This also makes it hard to commit to doing another play or musical. I was asked if I could possibly be in Encore Theater’s production of But Why Bump off Barnaby?, in which I would have played Barnaby, but this fluid schedule really won’t let me commit to something like that right now. Plus I was feeling exhausted after having just finished Oliver! and Beauty and the Beast back-to-back.

One of the perks of this job is that I now have a press pass! Suddenly, I now have access to places many people cannot normally go, and I get to meet with people that many do not get the opportunity to meet. I must be careful not to abuse this power. Like I said in my last post, with this job, “people won't look twice when I want to go somewhere dangerous and start asking questions…” And I must say, it is extremely difficult to not make myself think of Peter Parker or Clark Kent whenever I’m taking pictures or doing an interview. I also have the nerdy glasses that both of them wear. Although when I take them off I don’t become a superhero, my vision just gets slightly blurry. But of course, I have still worn my Superman shirt underneath my dress shirt. Did you really think I wouldn’t?

Another cool part of this job is that I get to write real stories. I get to interview real people in the real world who have stories to tell, and I get to help them make sure their stories are heard. It is also helping me learn how to look for stories and how to ask the right questions that will lead to stories. This is a skill that could help in the future if I ever write for TV or movies. But for now, I'm writing these stories in a form I am not quite familiar with. I’m only really used to writing academic essays, creative writing pieces, or blog posts, so news articles are a new thing to me.

For the most part it’s pretty simple; I put the most important parts at the beginning of the article, starting with a “lead” or “hook” that gets the reader interested. Before that is my new twitter handle @MNewman_SGN (which stands for Sun-Gazette Newspaper), before that is the deck, or sub-headline, and then the very first part is the headline, which seems to be the hardest part. The editor told me that headlines generally should be six words at the most. The headline also has to do the job of catching the reader’s attention and telling the entire story of the article in only a few words.

I like coming up with titles for blog posts - I think I get that from my dad who always says he spends way too much time coming up with sermon titles - but headlines are different. Unlike the title of a blog or a sermon or the chapter of a book, which gives an idea of what the whole thing is like, a headline has to grab the reader’s attention long enough to lead to the deck, then the hook, then the rest of the article. I’ve been told this is where I can be the most creative, but so far that mostly just seems to involve dumb puns. Last week I rewrote a press release about the Kruse foundation which donated a bunch of money to help buy meals for impoverished families. I titled the article “Kruseing to end hunger.”

It's cool to feel like you belong somewhere, and that's a little bit how I feel right now. I just have a good feeling that God wants me in this job right now. The day I gave the newspaper my resume, I was actually heading somewhere else, when the thought randomly came to my head that I should stop by the newspaper and drop off a resume. After I was hired, I found out that the day I dropped off my resume, the editor and publisher were feeling very short-staffed and thinking they would probably have to hire someone else. I’m not sure why God wants me here, how long it’s going to last, or what’s next, but all I know is that I’m here now, and I’m going to do the best I can for His glory. Plus, if my job, salary, and hours stay exactly the same, it is likely I will be able to pay off my school loans entirely in around 3-4 years. This is assuming, of course, that nothing will change - but change is the only thing I can be certain of.

By the way, I never did get a call back from Save Mart, but at this point, I’m fine just working at the newspaper.

Nerdy updates

There is finally an update on the Chronicles of Narnia film series!!! Though the film still seems to be stuck in what is known as “development hell,” The Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair now has financing and distributors! The film will be produced by TriStar, eOne Entertainment, The Mark Gordon Company, and the C.S. Lewis Company, and it will be distributed by eOne Entertainment and Sony (the official press release can be found here). The screenplay is being written by David Magee (who wrote the screenplays for Finding Neverland and Life of Pi), but nothing has been announced as far as director, cast, or release date. It is my speculation that the very earliest this film could be released is late 2018, but it’s more likely to come out sometime in 2019 or 2020.

The history of the Chronicles of Narnia film series is a long and complicated one, but a helpful guide to it can be found in an older blog post here. That essay was initially written April 22, 2014, and this is the first real update on the movie since then, more than two years later!

Although, one piece of sort-of new was announced, during a press conference a few months ago. Mark Gordon, one of the producers of the film, said that The Chronicles of Narnia: The Silver Chair would serve as a reboot to the Narnia film series. This (probably) doesn’t mean that they will be re-making the three movies that have already been released. This very likely means that The Silver Chair will serve as a "re-quel," meaning that it is a sequel to the first three movies, but also will help to "reboot" the series so that more can be made after this. This is a trend among several movie franchises today. Star Wars: The Force Awakens, Jurassic World, and Mad Max: Fury Road, are just a few of the many films today that are sequels of movies released a long time ago.

Because of his age, it’s unlikely now that Will Poulter will return to play Eustace Scrubb, which is too bad, because he was one of the best parts of Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Also, since this is an entirely new production crew and company as the last three movies, I honestly don’t know if Liam Neeson will return to voice Aslan, but I very much hope he does.

Even though this will be a sort-of reboot to the series, I very much hope they use the same logo, and keep the same musical themes, if only just for the sake of continuity. Assuming pre-production continues on The Silver Chair, it will eventually get released. Then, if it makes enough money, the film series can continue. But which film would be made next? A safe bet would be The Magician’s Nephew, which was almost chosen as the fourth Narnia movie instead of The Silver Chair.

Nerdy update part 2:

Take caution! This contains SPOILERS for Harry Potter and the Cursed Child: Parts 1 & 2. Read at your own risk!

I have now finished reading Harry Potter and the Cursed Child: Parts 1 & 2. It was a very quick read - I probably could have read it all in one day had I not been busy with rehearsals for Beauty and the Beast. Plot-wise, the play was decent, though not quite on par with the rest of the books. But there is one aspect of the story that I had mixed feelings about.

This story seemed to change the Wizarding World’s established rules on time-travel. Near the end of my review of X-Men: Days of Future Past, I went on an extended tangent about the two main types of time-travel used in stories. I wrote that one type of time-travel follows the “whatever happened happened” approach, while the other follows the “time can be re-written” approach.

The “whatever happened happened” approach is the idea that no matter what anyone does regarding time-travel, the past cannot be changed, and the future cannot be re-written. Everything is as it is, and it will always stay that way, no matter how much people mess around with time. This is the approach to time-travel that was taken in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. When Harry and Hermione go back in time to save Buckbeak and Sirius, they see themselves. They even interfere with themselves when Hermione throws a rock at Harry’s head. But this was not new. They had already done it; they just weren’t their other selves at that point. When the executioner brings down his axe, it was always a pumpkin - it was never Buckbeak’s neck. And Harry already knew he could produce a powerful patronus to defeat the dementors, because he had sort-of already done it. Everything that happened already happened. No matter what anyone does if they go back in time does not affect the future, because everything has already happened.

The “time can be re-written” approach is self explanatory. Time-travel has a cost. A little change in the past can mean a big change for the future. Going back in time has the potential to create an alternate future, which it almost always does. This is the type used in movies like Star Trek (2009) and X-Men: Days of Future Past.

In Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, when Albus Potter and Scorpius Malfoy go back in time, they come back to find that many things have changed. And when they go back again, the future is changed to a post-apocalyptic-type world where Voldemort is alive and well. The future is saved when they go back in time again to block the spells that had changed the future in the first place.

Though it was kind-of fun reading these alternate futures, especially the one where Cedric Diggory had become a Death-Eater and killed Neville Longbottom, this type of time-travel does not agree with the type presented in Prisoner of Azkaban. Maybe this is due to the fact that J. K. Rowling did not actually write the script for this play; the script was written by Jack Thorne. J. K. Rowling’s name appears on the book only because the play is merely based on a story written by Rowling, Thorne, and John Tiffany. Thorne clearly enjoys playing with time-travel in this play, and it is fun to read, but I can’t help but be a little bit bothered that previous rules concerning time-travel in this universe were seemingly ignored.

Also, the whole idea of Voldemort and Bellatrix Lestrange having a child together was a little weird as well.

Overall, still an enjoyable Harry Potter story, so long as you don’t try to understand the time-travel too much.

The Room Where it Happens

Last time I wrote in this blog was in March, and I was feeling discouraged and stuck. I feel slightly less stuck now, even though not much has changed. In this blog post I will continue to write about my job situation as it relates to the present, the hopeful future, and the unlikely future.

Jobs I May Get Soon

Well, one answer to prayer from my last blog post is that I have a job interview next week for a reporter position at my local newspaper! This job is only part-time they said, but I would be happy with any kind of income right now (as I currently have none, unless I try to sell more things on eBay). They told me I need to bring to the interview some samples of my writing - at least one essay from school and at least one blog post from here. I’m still deciding which ones to bring, though I probably won’t bring them this post, as I’m writing about it right now.

The people at that newspaper are nice, and the lady who works at the front office seems to like me. Each time I go to visit the paper to ask if they’ve seen my resume yet, she encourages me to aggressively pursue this job. Maybe they just really want someone my age to work there; some fresh blood to liven up the paper. Not to say the newspaper has been lacking, but newspapers in general have severely lessened in popularity, due to the steady increase of online news sources.

I think I would enjoy being a reporter for a newspaper. I like writing, I like telling stories, and I like investigating. Plus, it might make me feel a little like Clark Kent :D “I gotta find a job where I can keep my ear to the ground. Where people won't look twice when I want to go somewhere dangerous and start asking questions…” (Superman/Clark Kent, when he decides to become a reporter at the end of Man of Steel).

And while I am preparing for my upcoming interview at the newspaper, I am also awaiting a call back from Savemart (a local grocery store) for an interview there. That job would also only be part-time, but it would be a job nonetheless. The position they are looking for is a “service specialist.” I would be the person who helps puts groceries into paper or plastic bags, then asks if the customer needs any assistance taking them to the car.

A job at Savemart is not exactly what I had in mind when I graduated with an English degree, but there is a potential benefit. If I get a job there, then later decide to move to Los Angeles so I am closer to all the movie industry jobs, my job at the Savemart here might be able to transfer to a Savemart in the Los Angeles area. Of course, a job at the newspaper would also be a good starting ground for a writing position in the movie industry as well…

Jobs I Would Like to Have in the Future

I like visiting movie news websites like Screenrant and reading articles about various movies in production. I recently read an article which gave a script update on the upcoming films Avengers: Infinity War and its newly renamed sequel “Untitled Avengers”, from screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely [by the way, these two are my heroes; they wrote all three Captain America movies, and the first three Narnia movies (someone else is writing the 4th)]. In this update, they explained a what the writing process is sometimes like:

“When we lock ourselves in a room with the Russo brothers and a couple of execs from Marvel, one wall has cards for movie one and the other wall has cards for movie two and another wall has little baseball cards of every character still alive in the Marvel universe… And then we looked at that began to shuffle the cards around.”

I want to be in the room where it happens. I want to be one of those people shuffling cards around, creating stories. I don’t know if I necessarily want to be the one physically writing the scripts, I just want to be part of that group of writers and directors, inserting my ideas and bouncing off the ideas of others. I think I do better with collaborative storytelling than on my own.

I’ve mentioned in previous posts that I am working on a comic series loosely (like, extremely loosely) based on Kim Possible. These comics began in 2002 and have continued on and off again since then. I am the one who physically writes, draws, and colors everything, but I do most of the writing with my brother (with the occasional input of one or both of my sisters). When it’s just me I can get some of the story done, but if I’m talking through the story with my brother, the ideas come out much faster, and it’s a lot of fun. I like to think of these comics as some kind of practice for the future, whether that be collaborative storytelling, storyboarding, or scriptwriting.

I love stories of every kind, but I’m especially a big fan of movies. My siblings and I could easily quote almost entire scripts of our favorite movies, and many of our responses back and forth to each other are often movie or TV quotes (not always intentionally). Another one of our favorite things to do is to film scenes from movies, sometimes shot-for-shot. Below I’ve posted a video my sister and I made about a year ago. This is an almost shot-for-shot remake of a scene from Spider-Man, centered around the character Norman Osborn:

This was made just for fun and is obviously not meant to be professional. Before filming this video I watched the original scene from the movie a couple times, then made quick sketches of what each shot should look like, labelling each shot. After placing props around the house, my sister and I then walked through where each shot would be filmed, and I showed her where would be the best places to stand so that she would not be seen in the mirror while filming. She also recorded my voice on her phone and played it back while filming the shots where I am talking, but my lips don’t move. This was shot using my iPhone 5S, then edited on Windows Movie Maker.

This is something I love doing; I just wish I could get paid to do it. I want my English major to count for something. Plus I’m too stubborn and proud to work at a fast-food restaurant and prove all the naysayers right that all an English graduate is good for is saying “Would you like fries with that?” I just wish I knew how to get into the movie business! I feel like I’m on the wrong side of the computer screen; I want to be the one writing and directing movies, not the one reacting to them or reading articles about them. I may know a lot about the movie industry from movie news websites and Wikipedia, but I can never fully know or experience the art of professional movie making until I’m in the room where it happens.

Jobs That are Basically Impossible, but Would be Fun

By the way, if you don’t recognize that last line (also the title of this post), then you are not familiar with the musical that has swept the country this past year: Hamilton. This musical marks the first time (at least in recent history) that a Broadway musical has become so popular or gotten so much media attention. In addition to this, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, a new play set 19 years after Deathly Hallows, just opened in West End. The script for this book is now on its way to becoming the best-selling book of 2016. Both of these are helping reignite the public’s interest in both musical theater and drama. Something which is either good news or bad news for me; someone who also has a keen interest in theater.

The bad news is that more and more people will be wanting to participate in professional theater; a field that was already extremely hard to get into, but will now be made even harder by this oncoming surge of newcomers. The good news is, however, that more opportunities will also probably open up as well, to accommodate everyone.

As I said, professional acting of any kind is extremely hard to get into, but that is also something that interests me very much. Since graduating from Cedarville, I have been a part of four theatrical productions, the most recent of which, Theater Arts Alliance’s production of Beauty and the Beast, is actually semi-professional - meaning that I am under contract with them and I will get some financial compensation from the profits the show is sure to make (you can get tickets here).

So, is there a way to say “I think I am a good actor” without sounding vain? Several directors and assistants at Encore theater have told me so. I have to be careful though; comments like that have a bad habit of going to my head easily. I can’t let my imagination get the better of me, and I can’t let a highly unlikely future in acting cloud my thoughts or my better judgement. But even so, I sometimes like to think acting professionally in theater could lead to acting professionally in films, which could lead to writing professionally for films…

Well, back to reality, even though chances are I will never be a professional, I greatly enjoy theater and I’d like to audition for more plays and musicals in the future. Coming up at the end of this month are auditions for the musical White Christmas. I love the movie, and the music is great, but I get the feeling that a musical like this would only be fun if I got a lead part (which is unlikely at this theater, because so many more talented people audition there). Next spring at Encore Theater, they will be putting on the musical Pippin, which unfortunately is not about the character from Lord of the Rings. I don’t know much about this musical, but one of the directors of Oliver! (a musical I was in earlier this summer) told me he would very much like it if my sister and I auditioned. There are many other musicals I would love to be in as well. The Music Man, Les Misérables, West Side Story… I eagerly look forward to the day when the rights for Hamilton are available so that smaller theaters like the ones around here can put it on. I very much want to be in that someday, but I’m willing to wait for it.

Prayer Requests

I don’t always remember to pray, and I often feel bad about it, but then my parents have told me in the past, that God doesn’t love me any less even if I forget. But when I do remember to pray, and if you have time as well, these are the things I need prayer for:

• that my interview at the newspaper would go well, and that I would be able to get that job
• that I would also be able to get the job at Savemart as well
• that God would provide me with money to make my next school loan payment, because right now I have basically no money and no source of income
• that God would guide my future and lead me towards the job that is right for me
• that God would guide my thoughts; that I would think only what is true, honorable, just, pure, and lovely (Philippians 4:8), and not worry about the future

Thanks for reading and thanks for praying! I’ll try to update my blog more often, especially after I hear back from my job interview.

Stuck

I’m stuck.

What’s keeping me that way?

How do I get from where I am (a nobody from nowhere) to where I would like to go (possibly a person who helps make movies in some way)?

I have also not forgotten my dream of going to England again and possibly doing that program where I get to stay at C.S. Lewis’ house. I left a piece of my heart there, but I don’t know what to do with it now.

I sort-of have a job, but I don’t like it. I don’t like subbing, and I don’t want to go into teaching. I know teaching is an admirable position, and I wouldn’t mind being a tutor of some kind so I could do more one-on-one teaching, but I don’t really have any interest in trying to control a huge class of kids (of any age). I don’t want to get teaching credentials because I would actually like to do something else with my life. Those with English degrees do actually have jobs other than teaching (don’t ask me what, I haven’t figured it out yet).

I feel like I have some kind of story inside me that wants to come out. Maybe multiple stories. I would like to get into a kind of job where I can explore different areas of storytelling so I can figure out exactly what I want to say and how to say it.

Let’s explore the different fields in which I might help produce a story:

Books/Novels: Who knows? I may write a book someday, but I feel like this would have to be after I have done some other kind of writing first. This would definitely not be a starting point.

Storyboarding/Comic books: Since around 2001 (when I was about nine) I’ve been on-and-off working on a comic book series that was originally based on Kim Possible, but has since then evolved into a highly elaborate fan-fiction that I could never publish because I would be breaking hundreds of copyright laws. I like to see these comics as a kind of practice for something I might do in the future. Over the years I’ve become more skilled in quickly drawing out scenes as I envision them in my head. I have figured out where to start and end scenes and where to leave a good cliffhanger.

Screenwriting: This field may be a little easier to enter, though I have no experience writing screenplays. I think I’m more of a person who works with others to discuss what works and what doesn’t work in a story. I’m actually currently helping edit a screenplay that a friend from Encore Theater wrote. Mostly what I’m doing is correcting the grammar, but I’ve also offered suggestions on how to change the story. This person also knows some people in Los Angeles (where all the movie jobs are), so this could turn into something helpful possibly.

Acting?: I’ve now done two shows with Encore Theater in Tulare, and I will likely audition for a third. It’s a small community theater, but they produce great shows (all of which are family-friendly, which is nice). During the last show, one of the directors made a point of telling me how well I was doing. She was amazed at how well I could act two totally different parts in the two plays I had been in. She mentioned that many in the theater board of directors kept coming up to her asking where she had been keeping me all these years. I think this is something I could turn into something as well. Of course, I would be competing with the millions of others who want to make it big with acting just to be famous.

Do I want to be famous? Sure; who wouldn’t? I’d like to show the world that a kid from a lower-middle-class family in a small town who went to a small college can make it. I would just need to make sure my ego does not get in the way. As long as I keep my focus on glorifying God, I should be fine. And with God, all things are possible, right? Even things like being famous or being rich? I realize, of course, that it is no shame to be poor, but it is no great honor either. I also know that being a nobody to the world does not matter, because to God I am worth far more than the riches of the world.

I know that God is everything I will ever need and I know that He will supply my every need. I know that He can do anything and I know that all the answers I ever need are found in Him and His Word. But still, it’s aggravating “knowing” all the answers to my problems while still feeling totally lost in life.

I have so many things I would like to do with my life, and none of them are happening right now. How do things happen? How do I get from point A to point wherever?

I don’t know what’s going on with my life. I don’t know what I’m doing now, and I don’t know how to get where I want to go. I don’t even know where I want to go! My life has been kind of a mess ever since I graduated. I’ve been barely able to pay off my school bills as they’ve been coming, so there’s no way that I could get an unpaid internship somewhere, or live somewhere else apart from home. I’m stuck here. Here where there are no seemingly no ways to get into the kind of job I would like to get, or even ways to get into jobs that would lead into jobs I would like to get. In addition, apart from my family and a couple families from church, I don’t really even have friends in this area; at least, friends my age. I miss Cedarville. Not the work necessarily, but the way of living. Everything there is planned out for me. I know exactly what I’m doing every day and I have clear goals. I also have a group of friends who are like a second family, and I’ve been horrible at keeping in contact with them, despite how sorely I miss them. I would buy a plane ticket and visit but I have almost no money, and when I do get money, I need it to pay bills to the very school I want to visit. Maybe this could all be solved if I made a lot of money getting a job working in the film industry or something like that? But I can’t, remember? I’m stuck.

Destiny

When I was around six years old, still living at my old house in New Jersey, I distinctly remember having a moment of self-awareness. I was walking about our hillside backyard thinking to myself when suddenly I had a thought. “Who am I?” The question was much more loaded that it sounds. I can only describe my epiphany as this: it was like I suddenly realized that I was controlling my own body, that I was seeing everything around me from my perspective, like my eyes were now cameras filming a real-time documentary shot in first-person. I realized then and there that I must be the subject of some great story waiting to happen. Why else would I be here? Maybe I’m seeing myself in this life because I will one day be President of the United States? Maybe I have some great destiny, captured through the lens of my video-eyes, that will one day be worth watching by others. Maybe I’ll have a life that will really mean something.

In the five months since graduating Cedarville University with a degree in English, I’ve been pretty aimless. I had no job lined up or anything really planned for when I got back home to California. It was nice to have the distraction of the musical I was in for the first couple months of summer, but eventually reality caught up to me. I am an adult, I have bills to pay, I have a life to live, whatever that means.

I’ve always been afraid of the future. But I didn’t realize until post-graduations how much there really is to be frightened of. How long will I live with my parents? What kind of job(s) will I get stuck with? Will I ever get married and start a family? What am I doing with my life and how do I get there? (Can time machines be a real thing now?)

As a Christian, I know the “Christian answers” to many of these questions. Yes, I know that I should strive to glorify God in everything I do, but what do I do? I know that I am supposed to trust God for future things because He has seen the future and knows exactly what it looks like, but I sometimes wish I could just be there already. I don’t like looking into the ominous black void of my future that every day seems just one day away. At school the only future I had to worry about was homework and what classes I would be taking the next semester. The real world is totally different than I expected, and much scarier.

I am reminded of a great quote from the TV series Merlin: “No young man, no matter how great, can know his destiny. He cannot glimpse his part in the great story that is about to unfold. Like everyone, he must live and learn”

In my mind I still have a little bit of that call of destiny that I first noticed when I was six: that call to greatness. I realize that I must take the slow path, making mistakes that will help me to learn on the way. I suppose only God knows where that path leads.

To Teach, or Not to Teach?

After about a month and a half of subbing in the school district here I’m really not sure I want to be a teacher, even though I know it’s what everyone wants or expects me to do. Every time (and I mean every time) someone asks me what my major was at college and I reply “English,” they always respond with “Oh, so you want to be a teacher?” To which I inwardly reply: “……..”

Now I’ve known for a while that this probably isn’t something I want to do for a job, but now I’m becoming more convinced of it. I signed up to be a substitute teacher partly for the money (school bills start coming next month) but mostly for the experience. I guess maybe I want to humor the people who assume I’m going to be a teacher by putting my foot in the water and seeing what a job in education is like.

Last week I had a particularly hard class to sub for, but I endured it as I always do by taking in the knowledge that I likely will not have to sub for this particular class again anytime soon. But at the end of that school day I got talking with a teacher there who explained to me that substitute teaching is one of the hardest jobs in the world, saying that she would only be a sub if she depended on the money to keep from starving. But she also encouraged me to keep at it. Subs are in big demand right now, and they’re really an integral part of the education system. That convinced me to stick around for a while longer, though I’m still fairly certain I will only be doing this until, at the most, the end of the school year.

But as far as teaching goes. I’m still very unsure. I don’t know if my stubbornness is clouding my judgement - that I’m only against teaching because everyone expects it, or perhaps I seriously do believe that I’m not cut out to be a teacher, but I am conflicted by the expectations of others and of my desire to have some kind of job in writing for TV or movies.

Now I know that teaching and subbing are totally different, but maybe I’m just scared at the idea of being a teacher. I’ve realized after a few bad days of subbing, that I’m not great at controlling large classrooms. I don’t know how to be assertive, and I don’t like getting mad. (I was forced to act angry a few times in the musical I was in during the summer, but that was acting, and even then I didn’t enjoy all the shouting and negativity). I have realized, however, that I rather enjoy the one-on-one helping of students with their work. Maybe I can get some kind of a tutoring job or something.

I’ve recently been reading through Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë. After leaving school, the title character goes to work as a governess at an estate, where her main occupation is tutoring a young girl that lives there. As a part of the job, Jane lives in the beautiful old house that I picture as being in a vast English countryside surrounded by trees. She seems to get paid well and her job seems simple, yet rewarding. I wouldn’t mind a position like that.

Homecoming

I’m not a fan of flying at all, but last weekend I endured the agony, knowing that I would soon be in one of my favorite places again: Cedarville University. This last weekend was Homecoming so naturally I revisited my second home and my second family there. It was a really quick visit, but great nonetheless. I had a ton of people I wanted to see and I’m pretty sure I saw most of them.

I spent most of the time with my old bro/sis unit, but I also got to spend time with some Ohio family, including my brother who is still at Cedarville studying pharmacy. I really enjoyed playing boardgames with him and his friends, then watching an episode of Doctor Who with him.

During the trip I visited many memorable places on campus, including the library where I basically lived last semester. I also sat in on a class: History of the English Language (HOTEL for short). I had taken this almost exactly a year ago, so it was fun to revisit the material, as well as see the teacher again.

What was nice about my visit  was that I was able to do many things with my friends that I couldn’t do my last couple semesters there (because I was busy writing 10-page papers every other day). It was cool, but also a little weird, to be in that environment again but not taking any classes. Another difference was that most of the guys I know moved to a bigger hall this school year, but it didn’t change too much. It was still mostly the same people, and that’s all that really mattered.

It certainly lifted my spirits to see all my friends again, and I’m sure them seeing me again made them happy too. I don’t really hang out with people outside my family when I’m home, because outside my family, I don’t really know people. I suppose that since I’m living here with no other current plans I should try to meet people in my area, but it was a pleasant distraction to be able to see my friends again.

Unfortunately I don’t know if I’ll be able to visit again in the near future. Plane tickets from California to Ohio and back are not cheap. But if you are one of my Cedarville friends reading this right now, know that you can always reach me for a text or phone conversation (if you have my number), or if you want to videochat/Skype (assuming the internet works here, which it often does not). In the meantime I’ll try to keep working on that bestseller so that I can buy you all plane tickets so you can come visit me for spring break next semester.

An Unexpected First Day of School and Other Stories

An Unexpected First Day of School

            Fingerprints have been completed, and it has been deduced that I am not a criminal. With that out of the way I was able to complete the application process for becoming a substitute teacher. The last thing to do was a TB test. After they poked my arm and determined that I did not have tuberculosis, they sent me straight away to the district office to turn in my final applications. The time was 8:45…

Alright, everything is in order. Are you willing to start today?

What

Well, I know you didn’t sign up to sub for junior high, but they really need someone to sub for this English class there.

Uh, sure? I mean, I did major in English…

Great! Here are your instructions you better get over there now class starts in five minutes go

            It was late-start Wednesday, so class started at 9:00. I had very little time to get dressed into fancy clothes, make my messy hair look somewhat presentable, and drive over to the school. Fortunately when I got there, I discovered that the teacher was still there, and would be there the rest of the week. They only needed a sub there to sit in and watch because the actual teacher was waiting on some kind of test results, so he technically wasn’t allowed to teach so they technically needed to have someone else there. This was easy for me; I was basically his assistant for about a week, grading papers or going around checking on in-class work. There was one day he didn’t need me at all so I read The Giver, a book they were going over in class.

            This was also good experience for me. I was able to observe the teacher, see how he handles his class in dealing with discipline and instruction. With this knowledge I felt I was able to sufficiently run the class when the teacher was actually gone one day the next week and the class was all mine. However, junior highers are ruthless and much harder to control than I thought. My throat really hurt at the end of the day because I had spent the whole time trying to talk over the kids who wouldn’t shut up.

            I only work if I get a call at 6:30 in the morning with instructions on where to go and for whom I am subbing. If not, I get to sleep in and watch more episodes of Star Wars: The Clone Wars (which I’m trying to finish so I can watch Star Wars: Rebels, both in preparation for The Force Awakens in December).

            This last week I only got called twice, both times to Kaweah High School, the continuation school for Exeter Union High School. For those who don’t know, a continuation school is where they send the kids who have failed too many classes or been sent to detention too many times. But based on my experience however, it seems like most kids were there because of attitude, not academics. Trying to control them wasn’t actually much different than at the junior high school. The kids who wanted to work, did, and those who didn’t, didn’t. The only difference was that I kept telling them to keep the profanity down and put their phones away. The junior highers didn’t have to put away any phones, just Kendamas, a yo-yo type toy of Japanese origin that is apparently the new fad.

            So now that I’ve subbed at the two hardest places to sub, going to the regular high school, or subbing at an elementary school will seem much easier (probably). I like that subbing allows me the opportunity to try out different age levels of teaching. I’m still unsure if I want to go into teaching at all, but this is a good way of putting my feet in the water. It’s a bit annoying actually that everyone assumes or expects me to go into teaching. There are many other things I can do with an English degree. I mean I guess I’m okay with possibly teaching, but I think I’m just so stubborn that I want to come to that conclusion myself. I would really love to work with movies or TV, writing scripts or creating stories or storyboards. I’m just subbing for now to begin paying off my impending school bills.

Other Stories

Fire is not always good

            I know that I often joke about my proclivity for pyromania, but in California right now there is an actually serious fire going on (which I did not cause by the way). It’s been all over the news, though I honestly don’t actually know too much about it. All I know is that it’s come dangerously close to many of my favorite places: Hume Lake Christian Camps, Sequoia National Park, and Wilsonia Village (where the family cabin is located). I would be really sad if I were never able to visit these places again. Though I appreciate fire on some levels, I do not like the amount of damage it has caused both in the mountains and down in the valley. The smoke and ash from the fire has travelled down and gotten trapped in the valley, causing the air quality to be even worse than it already was. If you are reading this, pray for rain. California needs it both for the fire and for the air.

Mac

            After much research and a lot of consideration on both sides, I have decided to go with a Mac for my next laptop. My old laptop isn’t broken, but it had been not performing as well for about a year. I figured I should get a new one before my other one breaks. There were a lot of reasons I chose this over a PC, though when I think about it now, I think one of the main ones is simply that I wanted to get a Mac all along anyway. I’ve never owned a Mac, so I figured this would be a good opportunity to try one out. Sure, Macs are a lot more expensive than PCs, but I figured that since I had the money I might as well. Plus, I still have a few months left of my grace period for my student loans. However, I noticed when I was looking for different models of Macs that most of them are now phasing out the inclusion of an internal CD/DVD drive. Most of them now are an external drive which must be purchased separately. Fortunately, I was able to find one that still had it included. What I ended up getting is a 13-inch Macbook Pro. I’m pretty happy with it so far. I purchased more hard drive space for this one because in my old laptop I always had a problem with running out of space. I still have a ton of things to figure out with this computer, but that will be my fun project to work on (since I’m not working on any homework).

Return to Cedarville

            Speaking of no homework, it’s been nice having a break from school. But one thing I miss about school is the people. The people I hung out with for the past three years became like a second family to me, and I truly missed them when I left in May. That’s why two weeks from today I will be there once again. Since most of my friends there are now seniors, this is really the best time to visit. Unfortunately, since plane tickets from California to Ohio are so expensive, I don’t think I’ll be able to visit more than once. I will be there from Friday, October 2 to Tuesday, October 6. While there I’ll divide my time between my old unit, my brother, former teachers and classmates possibly, and my uncle and aunt. If you’re reading this and you’ll be in southwestern Ohio during those days and you want to hang out, let me know! I don’t expect to write another blog post until after I’m back from the trip, so you will hear about it then.

Graduation, Big Fish, and the World of Tomorrow

School and Graduation

The last you heard from me, apart from blog posts relating to the New York City Missions Trip, was that I was about to enter the most perilous part of my journey at Cedarville. The only thing standing between me and graduation was one final semester of five English classes. Previous semesters where I had had two or three English classes were already tough enough, but as I look back on those now, they were not so bad. But this last semester was incredibly tough, the second half more so than the first half. Actually, it seemed like the semester only got harder the closer I got to the end. In the last week alone I had to write around 40 pages worth of research papers. Unfortunately towards the end of the semester I was forced to turn in a couple incomplete papers simply because I literally did not have the time. It’s not how I wanted to end my Cedarville career, but at least I survived. I was extremely worried during my last few weeks, and even several weeks after graduation, that I hadn’t passed all my classes. I received a diploma during the graduation ceremony, but I didn’t feel accomplished until my grades came in the mail, and thank God, the impossible happened: I had passed all my classes.

But despite barely holding on to life my last few weeks, when I had turned in my last paper, I felt great (though not quite as great as when I found out I didn’t fail). I submitted my last assignment on April 30, my birthday. About an hour after turning in my last paper my family arrived (minus Debra, who was in a play at the time). After getting lunch with them and showing them around the school, I had one last adventure at the Indian Mounds with Nat and Steve, hung out with other friends, then saw the midnight 7pm showing of Avengers: Age of Ultron. All in all, a great birthday. I graduated two days later, then flew home two days after that.

But now I’m feeling bittersweet. I’m extremely glad that I’m done with school (for now, depending on whether or not I go to grad school), but I’m also sad that I won’t be living with all my friends at school anymore. When I first left home for Cedarville I was heartbroken, but when I finally left my dorm for the last time and said goodbye to everyone, I felt the same way. They were like a second family to me. And unfortunately this sad feeling will likely only get worse when the next school year starts and I will remain in California. I do plan on visiting, however; probably in October sometime.

In an earlier post I talked about how the English major was not all that I thought it was, and I still believe this to be true, but I still believe it helped me, and will continue to help me in the future. I may or may not pursue a career directly related to the English major, but it helped me gain new perspectives on the world. One of my favorite classes I took during my last semester was American Women Writers. One of the biggest projects our class worked on was reading and recovering journals written over 100 years ago by Martha McMillan, a resident of the town of Cedarville. Through studying these journals, our class learned about the importance of an ordinary life. In reading her thoughts about day-to-day life, we got a new perspective on history. We also found that, in looking at her entire life from start to end (as if we were Fates looking at her cord of life), we were able to see the impact she made, however big or small, on her world. We learned that every life is important, even if they aren’t remembered 100 years after their death.

The inside of the journal I transcribed. This one detailed Martha's travels to California in 1904.

It’s interesting to see which figures history chooses to immortalize. With the other books we studied in this class, like Hope Leslie by Catharine Maria Sedgwick and Iola Leroy by Frances E. W. Harper, we read perspectives on history that we had never heard of before. I gained a new appreciation for writers that had previously been disregarded and I gained an awareness of the fact that we only choose to preserve those writings that seem most important to us at the time. Another book we read, Clovernook Sketches and Other Stories by Alice Cary, had previously been out of print, was re-published by the American Women Writers series, but since then has once again gone out of print. No one knows about it, so they don’t read it, so it gets lost in time. (Maybe this is part of the reason I would love to time-travel.) (Also, speaking of time-travel, I added an additional section to my review of X-Men: Days of Future Past to include the recently released Rogue Cut of the film. You can read it here.)

So the English major, and my whole college experience really, was good for getting new perspectives on life. I’m still not sure how what I learned will affect my life in the future, but I know God had me there for a reason. Only He knows whether or not my bachelor’s degree in English will directly relate to my future.

Big Fish

Here's the poster for the play I was in! Unfortunately, I couldn't find the version of the poster that had my name on it.

I suppose my English skills helped me know how to understand characters and stories, and maybe that’s why I was cast in Big Fish. I first heard about this musical (based on the movie by Tim Burton, based on a book) back in Cedarville when my Mom mentioned she would be playing piano for it. Two days after I graduation, I arrived back in California. I auditioned that same day. The flight got in around 11am, so I had almost the whole day to adjust to being home. After arriving, my mom mentioned she would be helping with auditions later that day and wanted to know if I would be interested in auditioning. “Why not?” I thought to myself, “I don’t know anything about this musical, but I don’t have any other plans for the summer yet.” I didn’t know what I was getting myself into, and I had no idea I would eventually be cast as one of the leads.

 I kind of think one of the main reasons I was cast is because I’m one of the few guys that actually auditioned. I know it was probably more than that (maybe I looked the right age or build for the character or something), but I didn’t have too much experience acting, and my singing isn’t great either. I felt bad for my sister, a theatre major, because her role in the musical was not as big, despite the fact that she’s been in way more plays and musicals than I’ve been in (before this I had only been in two high school productions in minor parts). There were several times during rehearsal when I questioned (in my head, not out loud) why I was cast, or why the directors didn’t trade me for someone else, especially when I wasn’t quite getting the songs or the scenes right, but I see now that I just needed some self-confidence.

Telling myself that I could do it, that I was going to do great, was essential for giving me the energy to hit all the high notes in my songs and staying in character in my scenes. When I struggled with singing during rehearsals, I would sometimes think to myself how bad I sound, which would only make me sound worse, travelling through the downward spiral I had been through so many times at Cedarville while trying to complete essays and assignments. I found that the way to fight this is to remain positive. My mom also gave me some great advice: know who you are performing for. God gave me this talent, and it was His will that I be in this musical. It only seemed right that I should perform for His glory. It’s kind of like when you are young, eager to show your parents a new trick you learned, saying “Look Daddy, look what I can do!”

That mindset certainly helped me through each performance. There were 13 shows altogether, and for the most part the show got better each night. It wasn’t too difficult to remember lines; most of it became muscle memory eventually. The same with the singing, though I struggled more with that. I had two big solos along with a couple other songs I sang in. The hardest song was one of the last in the show: “What’s Next.” The beginning was okay, but near the end of the song the notes get higher and higher, but not quite high enough for me to sing it in falsetto (head voice). What made it worse is that while singing this I had to run about on stage while pushing my stage father around in a wheelchair.

Me singing "What's Next" near the end of the musical. Photo credit to Linda Jarrett.

The character I played in the show is Will Bloom, the son of Edward Bloom. Will has grown up hearing awesome stories and adventures about his dad, but now that his father is dying, Will wants to find out the true versions of stories, to see if there is anything his dad was hiding about his past. The part I played was a really emotional one which was difficult (though not as much as the singing). My character gets really angry in a few different scenes, and those were especially hard for me to act out because I rarely get angry (and when I am angry, I don’t shout like my character does). I also had to express happiness at finding out my wife and I have a child on the way, and deep sadness when I find out that my father is on his deathbed.

It’s actually an interesting character study. This musical is a text just like any other book or movie and can be studied and read in a similar manner. Through getting into what drives Will and how he reacts to situations, I was able to understand more and more about his character and about the story as a whole. This was actually an important job, because on stage I needed to be in this character 100% of the time, which was a challenge at first, but eventually became quite fun.

The show as a whole was a unique experience, and it was fun being able to be a part of this with both my mom and my sister. It was also great being able to meet new friends through this show. I already miss being in this show and hanging out with them even though the show just ended four days ago. I’ll likely audition for more shows in the future. Who knows? Maybe I could make a career out of this…

Work and the Future

That’s unlikely, though. I’ve lived my whole life being told that I can’t get a job doing entertainment, be that drama, movies, music, or anything like that. I mean, people do have jobs like that, but finding success at something like that is difficult. For now I better find some kind of “real” job, because my school bills are going to start coming in a couple months, and I really want to be able to pay them.

At first I had considered working in Sequoia National Park again this summer, since I had so much fun with that last summer, but then being cast in Big Fish threw that idea out the window. I’ve really wanted to visit up there again, see my old friends, but the play kept me crazy busy. But maybe I’ll have time now.

After I arrived home, I worked with my Dad for a few weeks at his part-time construction job, but that became exhausting pretty quickly, especially when I would come home from a long day of work then leave for rehearsal half an hour later. Now that the play is over, I might go back to doing that again, but I also am pursuing a job possibly as a substitute teacher. About a month ago I took the CBEST, an exam which tests if I know enough basic knowledge to work in the school district. I of course passed, but I was disappointed that I did better in the math portion than the English portion…

The next step for me is to get fingerprinted to make sure I’m not a criminal. Fortunately, I’ve been careful about not leaving fingerprints at crime scenes, so that shouldn’t be a problem. Fire doesn’t leave much evidence anyway, right?

After that, I get a job as a substitute teacher, then who knows? Maybe I’ll go to grad school, maybe I’ll get a teaching license and become an English teacher, maybe I’ll get a job somewhere else completely random, maybe I’ll become a movie star and win an Academy Award. I honestly have no idea. I guess it’s a little exciting knowing that I have so much potential right now as a 23-year-old fresh out of college. The rest of my life begins now.

I’ll try to post on here more often than I have recently. Until then, keep me in your prayers. I only have one life and I want it to be good, but I also want to make sure it is glorifying to God.

New York City Evangelism: Post-Missions Trip Report

                If you are reading this right now because you got the link for my blog from a thank you note, apologies once again. It was never my intention to put this off so late, and I’m sorry for seemingly keeping you in the dark about how the trip went. Thank you once again for supporting me. I was able to get all the support I needed, both monetarily and spiritually.

                If you are reading this because you are one of the six awesome people I tagged in my Facebook post about this blog, I offer my apologies to you as well. I sincerely wanted to get this done as soon as I could, but the semester caught up to me before I got the chance. I hope this post brings back some memories and lessons from our trip together.

                As for everyone else, hi! Welcome back to my blog! I know, it’s been a super long time since I’ve posted in here… This blog post is primarily about my New York City Missions Trip in March. I’ll be posting a more general life-update post (hopefully) in the next week or two.

                When we got back from our trip the night of Sunday, March 8^th, I very much wanted to complete my blog post about the trip as soon as I could. But the next day, the semester struck with a fiery vengeance. I was all of a sudden swamped with more papers than I had ever written in my life, and countless books I had to read (most of which I unfortunately wasn’t able to finish). This blog post was always at the back of my mind, and I reeeaaallly wanted to finish writing it, but I sadly forced to prioritize, and school took precedence. However, before school caught up to me I had written about a third of this. I’ve kept most of that text since it was what I had actually written immediately after returning from the trip and it was all still fresh on my mind.

New York City Evangelism: Post-Missions Trip Report

The Empire State Building at night.

My missions trip to New York City was an unforgettable experience; one that I can only attempt to explain to you using words; really, you had to be there. One of the parts I loved most about the trip was how close I got to the other people on the team. I was joined on the team by six awesome people: Rachel Clevenger, Rachel Rowland (our team leader), Corinna Ward, Priscilla Files, Jordan Esatto, and Nate Mills. We had had a few team meetings before we left, but even then I have to admit that I was still working on some of the names on the initial drive to New Jersey. But during the nine days we spent together on the road, in subways and trains, serving in New York City, and chilling back in Hawthorne, I came to truly see these people as good friends, rather than just teammates. I am truly going to miss spending so much time with them. As for what the team and I actually did to serve on the trip, here’s a day-by-day run-through of what we did:

Saturday, February 28 – We left Cedarville around 8:30am, and ten minutes into the car ride we were already listening to Taylor Swift’s “Welcome to New York.” As I expected, the first part of the car ride was a bit quiet because people were either sleeping or not talking, because we didn’t know each other too well yet. But then we played “the question game,” which helped to break the ice a little. We only stopped a few times, so we made it to Hawthorne Gospel Church in New Jersey in good time; around 6:30. After settling in, we watched Phantom of the Opera (the 2004 film) in preparation for Thursday, then went to bed for our early morning the next day.

Sunday, March 1 – Every morning before 8:00 the guys and I had to vacate our sleeping area and walk to the missionary house where the girls were staying. We were staying above the Bible House in a place called “The Upper Room,” where there are some offices which open at 8:00 in the morning. In my devotional time that morning I read Galatians chapter 5 (mainly because my discipleship group is in that chapter now as well). We attended one of the services that morning and the pastor called the team and I up to the front to pray for us. Later, the sermon was over Galatians chapter 5, which I thought was a cool coincidence. A couple of the verses from this chapter that stuck with me the rest of the week are verses 13 and 14: “For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’” This resonated with me because the team and I were using our freedom, our spring break, not as opportunities for the flesh to sleep in every day, but we used our freedom to serve others.

After the service, I introduced myself to Pastor T. James Richmond. He was like a second father to my dad (and was even named after him), so it was neat to talk to him for a bit. After church we went to Rachel R.’s house for lunch, where we were joined by a bunch of her family, as well as my uncle and aunt who live in Hawthorne. It was awesome hearing all the family connections that existed, like the fact that her parents knew my parents, or the fact that some of them were once patients of my dentist grandfather.

After lunch we travelled to New York City where we helped serve dinner at the Bowrey Mission. The people there were all so kind. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it was nice to interact with such Godly people there. When our “boss” that evening, Robin, introduced herself, she asked if we all love Jesus. After explaining we were all believers from a Christian university she said “I can’t wait to get to know you all better in heaven.” That really stuck out to me. We didn’t see her again that week, but it’s cool thinking about the fact that we will indeed see her again one day. Though some parts about heaven scare me a bit, this is one of the many things I look forward to.

Monday, March 2 – Starting Monday, we began a schedule that we mostly stuck to for the rest of the week. We left Hawthorne Gospel Church each morning around 8:30, parked at a house behind a train station, then took a train from there to Secaucus. One of the conductors on that train, J.A. Smith was very friendly to us. He had a classic New Jersey accent and looked remarkably like Timothy Spall (the actor who plays Peter Pettigrew from Harry Potter and Nathaniel from Enchanted). From Secaucus we took a shorter train to Penn Station at Madison Square Garden in New York City. From there we walked a few blocks to a subway station where we took a few subways to the Canal St. station. After that it was only a couple blocks to the New York City Rescue Mission. We spent most of the rest of the week there, generally calling it the NYCRM (which we pronounced as “Ny-crum”).

Most mornings there I helped sort through and fold clothes the clothes pantry. Every day for a couple hours they would let the homeless in a few at a time to take up to (I believe) five items of clothing. Every day we would come back and find the clothes room messy again, but the work we did there helped make the homeless feel like they were shopping at JCPenney, rather than a yard sale. I usually worked there with Corinna, Rachel C., Rachel R., and a man named “G,” who was a graduate of the program they offer at the NYCRM.

(Left to Right) Rachel R., Rachel C., Me, and Corinna working at the NYCRM. Photo credit to @scotthuckphoto

During the middle of the day, the team and I went to Columbus Circle to do some street evangelism. I was teamed with Rachel C. and Corinna, and we walked around Central Park. None of us really knew what we were doing, and we all had to try and take turns starting conversations that would then lead to faith. I started a conversation with a man in the park who travelled to New York from Haiti. When he revealed he spoke French, the couple on the other side of him who were actually from France began speaking to him in French, so that conversation didn’t go very far.

We returned to the NYCRM that evening to help them serve dinner. I’m glad that Rachel R. asked us each night for one memory that stuck out to us from each day, or else I would not have written some of this down. One memory that stuck out to me that night was seeing an older man trying to understand why a Styrofoam cup was sticking to his hand. The man next to him explained that is was merely static electricity, but the older man could not understand how there could be electricity in his hand.

Tuesday, March 3

 In the morning I sorted and folded clothes again at the NYCRM. Then for a large part of the afternoon, the team and I helped at Manor Gospel Fellowship. Here at this mission, homeless people would attend a brief worship service while the carts they brought were filled with food by the workers in the back (including the team and I). The mission received huge donations from a supermarket, and our job was to sort that food into various boxes and crates then evenly distribute it into the shopping carts there.

The team and other workers filling up shopping carts with food at Manor Gospel Fellowship.
I'm not sure where I am... Photo credit to @scotthuckphoto

Later that night the team and I had dinner with Nathan, a church-planter in New York. It was a great blessing to hear his story and to interact with his family. In their apartment there was a ton of Batman-related books and things, which I thought was pretty cool :D

In one of the train stations on the way back we had a long wait, and since it was my turn to lead devotions, I gave a brief account of my life, following a similar pattern for “life maps” from Discipleship group. We got back to Hawthorne very late that night, though I can’t remember exactly what time.

Wednesday, March 4

After spending the morning at the NYCRM again, we then had day two of street evangelism. We split into the same groups again, but this time we walked around Grand Central Station. After maybe an hour of unsuccessful conversations, Corinna made Rachel C. and I practice on her, which seemed silly at first but was actually very helpful. Shortly afterwards a woman, Nicole, approached us. She had lost her purse and wasn’t sure what to do. She also had many questions about religion after reading The Shack, so we answered the best we could. The three of us talked to her for about an hour, then we prayed for her and went on our way.

Back at the NYCRM, we helped serve dinner again then stayed for the evening service. Rachel R. led worship with her brother Luke (he wasn’t on the team but was in the area), then she gave her testimony. At the end of the service, many of the homeless wrote prayer requests on cards which the team and I later prayed for. The handwriting on these cards was a bit messy, and the grammar was not great, but the words are heartbreaking: “I has a bad right leg and sometime I has bad luck. Please pray for me thank you. I all alone, I lost my mother 4 years ago.” “Pray for the NYC Rescue Mission and the need for food, clothing, finances. Jesus be glorified.”

Thursday, March 5

Thursday morning I switched places with Nate at the NYCRM. He worked folding and sorting clothes while I cut broccoli in the kitchen.  After helping prepare food, we served lunch to the people who lived there as a part of their program. It was cool being able to eat and fellowship with the mission team, the friendly people in the program, and the other volunteers who work there every day.

After lunch we went and saw Phantom of the Opera on Broadway, which was amazing :D This was our big “cultural experience item” which was already figured into the budget, plus we got discount tickets (because of some theater program Rachel R. is a part of). That evening we had pizza back in Hawthorne and enjoyed trying to guess each other’s middle names.

Friday, March 6

After missing the first train from Hawthorne, we eventually made it into the city where, instead of going to the NYCRM, we went and helped Brandon (whom we had met on Tuesday) with his ministry. For the first hour after arriving at his apartment, we stuffed plastic baggies with gum and cards advertising his church, the Gallery Church. After making a ton of those, we were each assigned a street corner where we were assigned to give away 125 each. This sounded difficult at first, but was actually not too hard. All it required us to do was stand there holding out handfuls of these baggies and yell “free gum!” After getting lunch at a place that was like Chipotle but with some kind of Asian food, we went to the NYCRM one last time.

After serving one last meal with them, we had to say our goodbyes to the wonderful staff we had worked with that week. James, one of the guys we got to know during the week, kept coming up to us over and over again saying goodbye, which we thought was funny but also made it sadder.

Saturday, March 7

Saturday was our tourist day, and was also apparently St. Patrick’s Day, but only in Hoboken, New Jersey. The trains both to and from New York were full of drunk people decked out in green.

Admittedly, a couple times during the day I wished I was back at NYCRM or helping with one of the other ministries in the city, but it was also nice to have a break and really enjoy the city.

Outside that entrance to the 30 Rock building that I've seen associated with SNL. I'm not sure why I'm making this face; I think this photo was taken by accident.

We started the day at Rockefeller Center, where we checked out the LEGO store there, an art store, and the NBC Studios store, though I didn’t get anything. We also stopped by that entrance to the building that I’ve seen associated with Saturday Night Live. Following that we had lunch at La Mela, a restaurant in Little Italy then we went to Strand Books, one of the biggest book stores in New York. I thought I would really like it, but it was actually far too busy and much too big for me. After the bookstore we went by Wall Street and Battery Park, then went by the bull statue around there. We ended the evening by walking around Ground Zero and the reflecting pools there. I was moved and saddened by the huge number of names surrounding those pools.

Sunday, March 8

We left Hawthorne about 8:30 Sunday morning. We occasionally switched up drivers and navigators, and when I took over as navigator at one point, everyone jokingly feared that I would cause us to drive off a cliff. We arrived back in Cedarville around 6:00. I had dinner, unpacked, then wrote the first third of this blog post.

The team + Keith (on the far left). He works for the missions office at Cedarville and visited us in New York along with the amazing photographer @scotthuckphoto who took this photo as well. Thanks again for taking pictures of us!

What Did I Learn?

                One thing this trip did was change the way I view the homeless. Before coming on this trip I obviously knew that homeless people are still people. Everyone knows that, right? But who actually believes it? While helping serve people meals, I saw something that I would see in the school cafeteria every day: people eating meals around tables and having a good time talking with their neighbors. Looking at one group of people made me think “That could easily be my friends and I.” But what’s the difference? I was raised in a home that has been richly blessed by two awesome parents who both hold jobs that allow us to live in a house, get whatever kind of food we want, and occasionally pay for other recreational activities just for the fun of it. I have been blessed with a loving family (both extended and immediate) who I know I could turn to if I ever fell into financial trouble. I have been blessed to attend a university that has supplied me with a degree, which will enable me to one day get a good job and have a steady income.

                Many of the homeless have stories similar to this, they have just had harder circumstances to deal with in life. Sure, some of them are or have been alcoholics or addicts, but I discovered that many of them just got caught in downward spirals.  It may start with losing a job or suddenly having to pay extra rent, but that can quickly turn into not being able to purchase new clothes or simple things like toothpaste, which can create difficulty in trying to look decent and presentable for job interviews.

                But inwardly, many of these people are just the same as me. God doesn’t care about how much money we make, or whether we live in a mansion or a subway station; he looks at the heart. I was astonished at how thankful and happy many of the homeless were. These people who didn’t have anything were thanking the workers at the Rescue Mission and even making sure everyone else got a chance to eat.

                I also thought it was great to see their personalities come out. These are actually people, just like us, therefore they have preferences just like us. Some may call a homeless man ungrateful for not wanting chicken with his rice and broccoli, but homeless people can be vegetarian too. And when a homeless man wants the vanilla cupcake instead of the chocolate one that has been handed to him, what other motive can there be other than he simply likes vanilla better?

                This trip also changed the way I see my future.

                To be perfectly honest, I’m still very unsure as to what I’ll be doing with my life now that I have graduated. I know some people always seem to have the next five years planned out, but that’s not me. I tend to take things as they come to me. I do like planning ahead when I can, but sometimes I just can’t. It’s also completely possible that I may not even do anything remotely related to my English major. God changes plans all the time. My dad grew up in New Jersey and majored in Biology at his first university; now he’s a pastor in California.

                One helpful passage I discovered during the trip was James 4:14-15, which says “yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.’” I’m not sure if God is leading me to missions or not, but I believe that through this trip He definitely opened up my eyes to see what mission work is really like.