Walking Tall, Walking Strong

I feel that I could write for hours trying to explain the significance of what God has done for me. But for the purposes of upbuilding and encouragement I think that something short and sweet is just the sort to treat.

A little known personal history would probably help to set the stage for those who do not know me well. For the last five years I have had a variety of knee problems. The initial issues sparked while I was still in high school while I was working at a small pet store. The first doctor initially diagnosed one condition (osteochondritis dissecans), suggesting that I had damage to the cartilage in my right knee causing a popping noise when I squatted. It was probably caused by a handful of things -- heavy lifting at work, jumping from a high spot onto concrete, my involvement in baseball and kickboxing at the time, etc. Regardless of what caused it, the doctor offered physical therapy, which helped for a bit. But the popping never really went away. I would try stints of physical therapy twice more over the next few years with the same result that the immediate pain would temporarily alleviate but no doctor could find what the real cause was.

Fast forward a few years to three months ago. I started having knee pain again, but different and more severe than before. On a trip home to Northern California I saw a new orthopedist, who initially didn't have an explanation. That was until he saw the new MRI that showed that I had a complex medial meniscus tear. Again, the offer was physical therapy and pain medication. But this time surgery was offered as a permanent solution.

Surgery meant I would have to uproot myself from the niche I've made here and move home. For a while I felt like whether or not I stayed or moved was dependent on whether I went for the surgery or begged God to heal me.

Two weeks ago, I approached a friend on the Rock Harbor Fullerton prayer team about getting prayer for my knee after the service. He grabbed one or two guys who grabbed a couple more and before I knew it, a half dozen brothers in Christ were intensely beseeching the Lord on my behalf while I sat perched on a speaker. It was powerful and it was impacting. Apart from my knee, it helped to clear up some of the issues with which I had been dealing, especially with regard to God showing the path he has for me in moving or not moving home. God healing me or not healing me would not inhibit or determine the plan that he has for my life.

I got home from Rock Harbor that night and realized, my knee didn't really hurt. It felt kinda loose and weak, but I really didn't have any pain. The next day I got up and walked to work completely pain free. I had been in a small car accident the week before that let me without a means of getting to work except for my own two feet. God brought me to the lowest point, walking three miles a day on an injured knee, dealing with aching pain. And then he healed me.

I've been pain free since that day. Every passing day my knee seems to get stronger. I had always been a skeptic, and still am about many things. But God can and does heal, no doubt about it. I desire to live every day in a relationship with this God who loves me, this God who healed me. What faith I had before has been revolutionized in light of how I have seen God tangibly work in my life. Because of that I feel comfortable just sitting, basking in the love of the Father.

Again, this is my prayer: "I ask for the grace I want; here I ask Our Lord for grace not to be deaf to His call, but alert to fulfill his most holy will to the best of my ability."

I'm going to walk to work tomorrow. And I'm going to thank the Lord every step of the way.

Spiritual Therapy

Tonight was a bit of a rough night for me. And while I've wrapped my mind around most of it, maybe writing about it all will help it to coalesce. If you've bumped into me in the last few weeks or asked how I am or how things are, you probably regularly got the response, "busy" or "tired". And that's the truth. I feel like I've given that response a thousand times. Somehow between all the work, church, and sleep, the peril of my present situation never really sunk in. Well, that changed tonight.

I took a trip home a week ago, 389 miles, to the east bay area in northern California. For one, I wanted to visit family and friends, to spend quality time. Second, and probably of more eminent importance, I went to get my knee checked out by an orthopedist. The appointment was a long time coming, so we were prepared for it, even clearing authorization for an MRI with insurance before the appointment itself. Over the last two months, my knee has been bothering me more and more -- a little more aching, a little more pain; a little more popping, a little more locking. More and more to the point that it was the worst it had felt in over three years. I've had many appointments and doctor's meetings in the past. Every one of them has given a different diagnosis but always recommended the same remedy--anti-inflammatories and physical therapy. Each time the pain would go away but the popping would remain. After three bouts of physical therapy, the treatment has gotten stale. At some level it seems like a diagnosis on par with 16th century physicians suggesting blood-letting for most illnesses. In other words, "I don't know what's wrong with it, but maybe this will do something."

After the preliminary X-rays, this doctor didn't have a conclusive answer either. But, being prepared, we went ahead with the MRI. The following Monday, now back in southern California, I got a voicemail message from the orthopedist with his and the radiologist's diagnosis. I had torn my medial meniscus. Both of my parents have had surgery on their menisci before, so it's familiar territory. He laid out a few possible options for treatment. First, the usual dose of physical therapy and regimen of anti-inflammatories (how original!). Then there's the surgical option. It's a very real option and a strong possibility.

I've been trying since Monday to get in touch with the orthopedist, to talk to him directly and ask questions about the severity of the tear and overarching prognosis. As with most doctors, he has been more than difficult to get in contact with. I would appreciate a returned call given how much is riding on his diagnosis and recommendations.

And there really is a lot riding on it. Getting surgery on my meniscus means rehabilitation and recovery. It means time off work. Simply put, I wouldn't be able to afford to live in southern California if I had this surgery. I would have to move home. And that reality tore me up tonight. I'm not attached to my job too much. But I'm finally getting involved in Rock Harbor and forging a group of friend. Moving home means that I'm closer to my family and certain friends. It means I would be able to go to the seminary that my former church is starting up. There are opportunities there that interest me. But I'm torn between the two options and the lack of clarity as to what I should do ate me up tonight.

I went to a prayer training meeting on Thursday night. There was opportunity to pray for one another, so naturally I asked for prayer about my knee and for clarity on the current situation. The consequence was not greater clarity, but rather a medium with which to measure my options. I believe that God can heal. I believe that God can heal me. I believe that God can heal the tear in my meniscus. I still need to talk to the orthopedist directly, but it has added a wrinkle to my decision making. If God heals my knee, I will stay in southern California and pursue finding a full time job while getting more involved at Rock Harbor. If not, I'll move back to northern California, likely to undergo surgery to repair my knee.

That reality hit me like a truck tonight. What a weight! Leaving my job, leaving my friends, leaving the life that has manifested down here -- all dependent on God healing my knee! It brought me almost to tears, not because I'm afraid of one thing happening or the other, but out of frustration that I do not know what will happen. Talking with John helped calm me down and think through it all. He asked directly, "what do you want?" The truth is that I would be okay with either situation. I desire to do the will of God. I want my desires and thoughts to line up with his desires and thoughts. I want my wants to be the same as what God wants for my life. But to want the same things I have to know what God wants for my life. And the only way I'll know that is if God heals my knee! It's frustrating beyond belief. But that's where I am right now--a time of waiting and transition, "yearning for grace and hoping for peace."

"I ask for the grace I want; here I ask Our Lord for grace not to be deaf to His call, but alert to fulfill His most holy will to the best of my ability." - Ignatius of Loyola

Taking the Red Pill

You know that feeling in sleep when you're partially conscious and not completely unconscious? You're not functioning but still lie prostrate while starting to awaken. That's where I was when I first heard that the World Trade Center was attacked. When I was thirteen I had a clock radio for an alarm that went off in the early part of the morning. While in this subconscious state I heard "the World Trade Center has been hit". As crazy as it might sound, I fell back asleep for another fifteen minutes or so and dreamed of plans hitting large buildings. I didn't know what the World Trade Center was or how it was attacked. But it was vivid. I woke up and told my mother who turned on the television to find the news on every channel. Commercial planes had been hijacked and flown into the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

I was in 8th grade at the time and had an early morning Spanish class. Most classes would open up with turning in an assignment, one or two people getting berated by Mr. Cepeda for not having the assignment completed, and on to rigorous linguistic training (which were also berated for). But that didn't happen this morning. This morning the TV in the portable room was on full blast. We sat in relative silence watching the footage. When one questioned if we would be doing anything else that day, Mr. Cepeda replied, "No, you need to see this. From this day forward, your lives will never be the same."

And he was right in more ways than one. Perhaps the infamous line from Morpheus in the Matrix epitomizes the feeling -- "Welcome to the Desert of the Real". I guess everyone has that kind of loss of innocence at some level. You get your first dose of reality outside of your own scope. For me I found there was much more than Spanish, Sportscenter, and Sunday church services. There was a great big world with many people who looked upon the United States with disdain and would wish harm upon its citizens, military and civilian kind alike.

I suppose every generation has a defining moment. For one it would be the assault on Pearl Harbor or Normandy or the bombing of Hiroshima. For another it might be the Kent State shootings or the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. or JFK. These events are so violent. As such, they shake a human being to the very core. They invoke what Slavok Zizek would call "the passion for the real". It doesn't necessarily take a person with a passion for the real to enact such an event. On the contrary, I think that often times these events are generated out of ideological difference. But the passion for the real truly comes when ideological difference clashes against ideological indifference in merciless violence.

In the aptly named, Welcome to the Desert of the Real, Zizek talks about how such an event opens up the desert of reality where we see beyond ideology, beyond media, and beyond whatever filter through which we view the world. Reality is brutal, cold, and utterly simple. In the wreckage of the twin towers, you see a bit of what reality truly is. As abstract as that sounds, I think that what comes out of viewing reality without an ideological filter are genuine human emotions--violent compassion and shuttering bitterness. You have compassion for the victims and their families. You have bitterness and hostility for the perpetrators.

Earlier this year Osama bin Laden was killed, finally. I considered writing this piece back then but held off for a number of reasons. I recall a number screaming that justice had been done while others wept, feeling a sense of peace. I don't know what justice is any more than Thrasymachus or Glaucon. I admit I felt a sadistic reward at the thought of his death, but wonder that I should ever rejoice at the death of another human being. I still have mixed feelings on the matter.

Regardless of how you feel about the attacks or bin Laden's demise, there's so much more to take away. The attacks transformed my generation and brought me into the desert of reality for the first time. But the value of such an anniversary is to remember those real human emotions, the compassion and love that poured out. It serves as a reminder to put off ideology and to look to one another with love and compassion. And if there's a lasting effect that 9/11 has had on my life, it's evident in two things -- I'm a non-ideological Christian and anti-partisan towards politics. The truth is that that message of the cross goes beyond the rule of any denomination or ideology. As flawed as a human being is, he (or she) should always strive to see reality for what it is and to see fellow human beings for what they truly are.

Title Track

This is the song after which the blog was named. I think the title represents what I aim for in my writing, while the lyrics say something much more beautiful.



Something Like Laughter - Five Iron Frenzy

People say they know a girl
Who's lost her way, she's always angry
No one bothers to ask her
What she hears or what she hopes for
The air is cold, she lives alone
And tires of being her only provider
She can't fathom grace tonight
No not tonight, it's not an option

Searching for more than mere tastes of living water
Tired eyes tend to wander, seek the light
Create in her a sense of awe that sees Your beauty
Let Your splendor flash with blinding light

Cities slowly suffocate
What once was bright is now moth-eaten
As young girls filter thoughts that once were
Fresh now worn and beaten
Clutching pity like a prize
To her side her fingers grow weary
He cares so much for sparrows
Won't He toss something out my way?

Searching for more than mere lies disguised as dogma
Tired eyes tend to wander, seek the light
Create in her a sense of awe that sees Your beauty
Let Your splendor flash with blinding light
Standing tall, all the aspen trees drink water
As the rain falls down like laughter from the sky

Doing Otherwise

In the spirit of fourth of July, I want to write a short piece on freedom. It's an idea that I've been musing over for a while now, particularly in the days surrounding this holiday. I've never really gotten into fourth of July for a few reasons, not to be discussed here. This year I worked all day and came home to eat an Italian dinner (if you call Hamburger Helper Italian). But with regard to freedom, I hope to keep this short.

Freedom is the capacity or ability to do otherwise. With regard to ethics, it is the choice to save one's self instead of another. In politics it is the option of choosing one candidate over another. At the simplest physical level, it is the almost passive decision to climb a flight of stairs two at a time, instead of one. In choosing sin, there is always the opportunity to opt for virtue, inasmuch as there is always chance to sin when pursuing a virtuous life. Even apart from such areas, there is freedom in every waking moment -- which cereal one eats in the morning, how fast one drives on the freeway, how one responds to ridicule or encouragement.

I said that freedom is the capacity to do otherwise. In any given scenario, there is always another option. No matter how monotonous the day feels, you are never obligated to continue on as you were, to regularly make the same decisions day after day. Freedom violently contrasts with obligation. Sometimes I think that we need a radical display of freedom to break the cycle of regularity, to break free from what is expected of us. Even in the bleakest of times, when it seems as though there is no safe way out except the easy way--there is always the opportunity to bear down, toughen up, and find a way to persevere. The soldier paralyzed by fear, wishing for nothing more than to be miles away from harm's way, must decide to fight on or to fall back. Choosing neither leads to certain death. Even in choosing neither, it is still a free choice to not choose. This is freedom--simple and extravagant.

So often, especially around holidays such as these, I hear about how blessed we are to live in a land with freedom and opportunity. But here is the unpopular truth: You can't legislate freedom. Freedom is inborn into every fiber of my being. In virtue of being a person and having consciousness, I have this capacity. Yes, I gain many benefits from living in this country that I am thankful for--that I have the ability to write this without fear of persecution and contempt (at least not by the state). But even if I lived under severe oppression and darkest tyranny, I still would have the capacity to do otherwise. The freedom that whispers in the ear of brute adversity is infinitely more beautiful than the freedom that is met with open applause.

Writing this is an exercise of freedom. I could be off watching a movie, out to see fireworks, or sleeping quietly. But I chose to do otherwise. The choices that I have made are mine and mine alone. In light of this fact, whatever consequences that come of this freedom are also mine and I am responsible for them. Freedom endows responsibility. I am responsible, not for what I could have done, but for what I did. I chose this school. I chose this job. I chose to live in this place. And with those things comes so much more. I love this freedom, because if I wake up tomorrow and forcibly pick it all up, I could choose otherwise and pursue a different direction.

I choose otherwise.

Down below in the resistance
Sheer defiance builds in cadence
Pure and passionate that's right
There's nothing here to lose

Real change doesn't come a mandate
Real love you cannot legislate.