Gnosce Te Ipse

what do I follow a post like the post below with? Things that grow in the present I guess. Like the gorgeous spring which is all around my house. My neighbor's ridiculous hound dog which is baying, tied up, at eight in the morning. The final on Frankenstein I have to give this afternoon, (still need to come up with prompts, with questions); the slew of esssays yet to grade before my grades are due next Tuesday (actually, it would be nice to finish everything Friday). All this, too, is real. Somehow I've always believed life would get better, get easier, no matter the challenge. I know that will not always be true. I will someday die (well, if Jesus can be trusted, that will be the greatest beginning of all). When I began this blog just over a year ago I felt desperately lonely much of the time. Things at my church appeared bleak; I was home alone a lot; my karate gym had shut down without notice (allegedly because the sensei, a good guy to me at least and a well-trained...

Part One of this entry is here . Since I'm trying to name the different part of my suffering, and this also helps shape my narrative into blog entries, I've changed the title of my posts regarding my ocd to Mr. Doom. This just fits. I considered Mr. Terror, Mr. Loop, but something about Doom is just right. That feeling, that sense of impending catastrophe, underlies all things ocd. Obsessing feels like my own death is just about to happen, or that some great dread event is coming; a silent, singular apocalypse. So Doom it is. I left off when my stepmother moved in when I was 16, but I neglected significant content from before that time. One thing I mentioned only a little, but it deserves more treatment here: I had an intense fear of vomiting in public. My am. lit. class recently discussed Tenessee Williams' The Glass Menagerie; I had forgotten Laura, the borderline and fragile girl in the play, has the same problem: she vomits on the floor during a typing speed test her fi...

thanks, Scott, for pointing out that my entire blog has disappeared . Nothing but a white page. Cyber white-out. John Cage's blog. So this is a test; I'm making a new post and I'm going to try and upload the entire blog again, every entry, to see what happened. I haven't been doing anything to it lately, and all my posts are still on the server. Let's see if this works. Ah, yes, I'm back. I don't know what happened. How wierd. I don't archive any of this; I'm not sure how I'd feel it if was all gone for good. Guess I'd just start over, like always. So far, I am handling not getting the job/transfer pretty well. Things at my college continue to look good, at least in the near future. It may end up I don't want to move. Who knows. At least I made a couple friends on the faculty up here I will continue to see. And it's nice working where I feel appreciated! I did a faculty training last week (actually the day I found out I...

if something truly nefarious happened in my attempt to get the job, I would like to know about it; if I was weak in an area or two, I'd like to know where I could improve. Fact is, all I can say is that I did better than I thought in the first round (doesn't the fact that I became a finalist prove that), and that lots of faculty at that college think the president is an idiot. I guess I'm part of that faction now also. And beyond that, it's time to move on. I have a great job now that I can engage more closely. I've made a couple friends who work at the other college, and I can stay in touch with them and they live closer to me; that I count a gain. Of course, if things are really that whacked at their school, I don't want to work there anyway. What I really want to do is grow in my faith. More than any college work. Sure it's fun to do campus projects, to receive minor praise or congratulations for a job well done, to impact students (a part of my jo...

I didn't get the position. I know I got into the final five, and the president is supposed to draw two from the those five, but I do know I wasn't hired. I got the call yesterday morning. Can I count the many blessings of my current job: yes. In fact, it's a better gig, it's just so far away! And it was me who moved myself into the mountains, well, my wife and I, with an eye even then, back in 01, on the college where I just missed getting a position. There's a thousand things to say, but I'll just hit the big ones. First, thanks for all the kind comments to the two posts below; I just read them. Two, I woke this morning after a bad dream, a dream where someone from the college I applied to was showing me this long list of all the things I could have done better. And I'm anxious, sad and sick anxious; didn't C.S. Lewis say he was surprised 'how much grief felt like fear.' That's it. But it's not overwhelming, I'm hanging in, a...

okay, not acutally puking, but the call is supposed to come today (and it's nearly nine, so today is probably out) or tomorrow! I want this now, more than I wanted my current job because I didn't know anything about the campus, really. Now...the more I think about it, the more I want it. Oh gosh, I hope I get it. I thought I did very well in the exec. interview, though I was a little surprised to get that far. It sounds smarmy, but I really am very self-critical. I thought I blew the panel interview, did well enough to get to the presidential interview, and actually thought I did well there. But it gets random at this level, too. Well, I should know by tomorrow night. Either way, I'll be okay. Church continues to go well. Gotta run. t