Back to my Roots

It's been difficult to focus on my graphic novel this summer. Warm weather, yard work, family activities, and other sundry interests have conspired to reduce the frequency of blog postings. In addition, cranking out rough draft pages has slowed to a snail's pace. Revamping much of the premise of the work (alien narrators) hasn't helped, either. With the end of summer approaching it's time to gear up again for the delightful work of writing and drawing. For inspiration I'm rereading Ecclesiastes. Here are some random musings from chapters 1-7:

"Everything is meaningless" (1:2). I don't entirely agree with this statement; I find meaning in  friendships, family connections, learning, reading, helping people in my mediation/counseling practice, and more. But I am grateful Dr. Q was courageous enough to acknowledge that some things clearly are absurd. For starters, I'm the one with a misspent youth yet my virtuous wife is the one who contracts a debilitating disease. Absurd, absurd, absurd.

"Generations come and generations go" (1:4). The specter of death has haunted humanity since the beginning of time. For all the disagreement about the causes and consequences of death, we're all agreed: the grim reaper will devour all of us eventually. Even though life spans have lengthened considerably, we're all going to die. No wonder Ecclesiastes hasn't become a best seller.

"The eye never has enough of seeing" (1:8). Imagine if this were not so--the demand for new TV shows, movies, web sties, books, vacations, tours, and fashions would vanish. But the eye is never satisfied and therefore new visual content is produced every second.

"The more knowledge the more grief" (1:18). The modern explosion of knowledge has been matched by an explosion of anxiety, depression, fear, worry, despair, angst, and ennui. I often remind myself of the persons described in the New Testament, "always learning and never coming to the knowledge of truth" and "those who desire to get rich pierce themselves with many a pang." My appetite for learning is insatiable but the outcome is questionable. I simply learn how ignorant I am.

"Laughter is foolish" (2:2). This line doesn't stop me from laughing or making others laugh. But Dr. Q's point is well taken: at the end of the day is frivolity the best way to spend one's energy?

"What do I gain by being wise?" (2:15). For decades I've done my best to apply Hebraic and Christian wisdom to myself, family, and others. I'm happy to report that I, my family, and others have enjoyed many happy days. However, those happy days just as easily could be attributed to good luck, random events, the result of the law of large numbers, and the inevitable benefit of living in an affluent culture. The fact that wisdom has not been universally and predictably beneficial to one and all makes me question metaphysics. I like it that Dr. Q questions it as well.

"I must leave my things to the one who comes after me" (2:18). After my dad's death it was my unpleasant task to dispose of his belongings--tools, paintings, cameras, furniture, and more tools. The day of our auction was an Ecclesiastes day for me; people I never met drove off with glee at the tons of his belongs they got for a song; things my dad worked 80 years to collect, love, fix, clean, manage, move, store, and cherish. Makes me look at the cumber around my house--what stranger is gleefully going to drive off with my collection of volvelles, manuscripts, art work, and journals?

"Even at night his mind does not rest" (2:23). In a perfect universe we'd sleep through the night. Neither I nor Dr. Q live in a perfect universe.

"He has set eternity in the hearts of men" (3:11). Occam's Razor suggests positing a deity behind psychology is superfluous, cumbersome, and unnecessary. I know. I embrace Dr. Q's quote by faith, anyway. Logical positivists call such language poetry, unscientific, and invalid. I know. I embrace Dr. Q's affirmation by faith, anyway. New and old atheists call this belief superstitious. neanderthal, and hallucinatory. I know, I know. My passion for ethics, transcendence, and existential meaning could be a blip on my synaptic radar, a quirk of my DNA, and an unimaginative parroting of the culture I was born into. Okay, okay, I get it. But I choose to believe otherwise. I stand with Dr. Q (and several others) on this point.

"His friend can help him get up" (4:10). I'm astonished at how many cohabiting and married couples mess this up. Either one party is over accommodating or smothering, demanding or overly dependent, and they take turns being miserable. Key terms: pursuit, distancing, badgering, clamming up, aloof, preoccupied, lousy service, low tip, co created chaos. I am passionate about helping couples differentiate, get healthy, and merge lives in positive ways. Not, necessarily from a passion to "save marriage" or even to "reduce the divorce rates." I'm obsessed with this mission because we live in an enlightened, affluent, and educated world with MRIs, Mars probes, gene sequencing, SSRIs, smart phones, and Google, and yet 50% of couples still can't get happy together. What a puzzle!

"An old person is foolish if they no longer know how to take warning" (4:13). This cuts me to the quick because I'm warning averse. Not (I hope) because I'm stubborn, self righteous, or impervious to good advice. I'm simply inured to fear mongers, anxiety mongers, and cognitive distortion mongers who foster fear, worry, and panic. This is an age of anxiousness with warnings thick as flies. There's not a boy crying wolf; there's a whole media culture crying wolf. Lord, help me heed legitimate warnings, ignore stupid warnings, and know the difference.

"Stand in awe of God" (5:7). Fellow parishioners sing with passion, worship with enthusiasm, and  engage in church with fervency. I, however, merely stand during worship and sway several millimeters in each direction. I'm every worship leader's worst nightmare. I do not clap, belt out, chant, chirp, croon, harmonize, intone, lift up a voice, make melody, pipe, purr, resound, roar, serenade, shout, trill, troll, tune, vocalize, warble, whistle, or yodel. I do hum from time to time, however. 

"Who knows what is good for a person in life during their few and meaningless days?" (6:12). Answer? Fundamentalist preachers, paternalistic politicians, imperative control freaks, dogmatic pontificates, and advertisers. Other than that we're pretty much a live and let live society. 

"It is better to go to a house of mourning than a house of feasting" (7:2). In September we mark the one year anniversary of my dear wife's move into a nursing home. My daily visits are still emotional roller coaster rides for me. The infirm, ailing, and frail elderly are clear reminders of aging and death. I'm quickly disabused of imagining immortality on earth. Metaphors of mortality--smoke, grass, shadows--inspire wise and fruitful living. He who dies with the most love wins. 

"The end of a matter is better than its beginning" (7:8). Another reminder to keep chipping away at this project. It is, with several other endeavors, my life's work.

To be continued.

My References and Favorite Commentaries

Ecclesiastes Deserves Its Negative Reputation

In college I learned the difference between snarl and purr words. Snarl words grate on us, irritate us, carry a negative connotation. Purr words soothe, comfort, and assuage anxiety.

Neuro Linquistic Programming (NLP) puts great stock in paying attention to how many snarl words clutter our vocabulary. The theory being, replace snarl words with purr words and thereby improve one's outlook on life.

Qoheleth never got the memo. Here, for your reading enjoyment, is a list of the snarl words in Ecclesiastes. Read 'em and weep.

1.                  affliction

2.                  afraid

3.                  afraid of heights

4.                  alone

5.                  anger

6.                  angry

7.                  anxiety

8.                  anxious striving

9.                  appetite never satisfied

10.             bad

11.             bad smell

12.             bitten by a snake

13.             bitter

14.             breaks

15.             bribe

16.             broken

17.             burden

18.             cannot enjoy

19.             cannot understand

20.             cares

21.             caught in a cruel net

22.             chains

23.             chance

24.             chasing after the wind

25.             contend

26.             corrupts

27.             crackling of thorns

28.             crime

29.             crooked

30.             curse

31.             cursing

32.             danger

33.             days of darkness

34.             days of trouble

35.             dead flies

36.             death

37.             depriving

38.             desire no longer stirred

39.             despair

40.             despised

41.             destroy

42.             die

43.             dim

44.             disaster

45.             do not know the way to town

46.             drag

47.             drunkenness

48.             dust

49.             endangered

50.             ensnare

51.             envy

52.             error

53.             evil

54.             extortion

55.             fail to enjoy his prosperity

56.             faint

57.             fall

58.             fall unexpectedly

59.             fate

60.             fear

61.             few and meaningless days

62.             folly

63.             forgotten

64.             frustration

65.             goads

66.             great misfortune

67.             grief

68.             grievous evil

69.             grinders cease

70.             harm

71.             hate

72.             heavy burden

73.             house leaks

74.             idle hands

75.             injured

76.             injustice

77.             jealousy

78.             judgment

79.             know nothing

80.             lack sense

81.             laziness

82.             madness of folly

83.             meaningless

84.             miserable

85.             misery

86.             misfortune

87.             mistake

88.             mourning

89.             never satisfied

90.             no comforter

91.             no further reward

92.             no longer heeded

93.             no one can discover

94.             no one knows what is coming

95.             no one to help

96.             no pleasure

97.             no rest

98.             no sleep

99.             not content

100.         not finding

101.         not go well

102.         not plant

103.         not reap

104.         nothing gained

105.         offenses

106.         oppressed

107.         oppression

108.         overpowered

109.         pain

110.         perishing

111.         pit

112.         pity

113.         poor

114.         poverty

115.         prison

116.         protest

117.         provoked

118.         rafters sag

119.         realm of the dead

120.         rebuke

121.         revile

122.         rights denied

123.         ruin

124.         sad face

125.         schemes to do wrong

126.         severed

127.         shadow

128.         shattered

129.         shouts

130.         siege works

131.         sin

132.         sinful

133.         sinner

134.         slaves

135.         snake bites

136.         snare

137.         sorrow

138.         stoop

139.         stupid

140.         stupidity of wickedness

141.         taken in a snare

142.         tears

143.         times are bad

144.         toil

145.         toil of fools

146.         toilsome labor

147.         trap 

148.         trapped by evil times

149.         tremble

150.         troubles of your body

151.         unclean

152.         warning

153.         weapons of war

154.         wearisome

155.         weighs heavily

156.         wicked

157.         wicked madness

158.         wickedness

159.         without meaning

160.         woe

161.         wrong