Dear Burritos:

You are, quite possibly, the purest possible proof that creation is fundamentally good that has ever existed. Delicious, soul-cleansing packets of pure delight, you are a healthy, hearty meal that can be enjoyed at any time of day, in community or solitude, joy or heartache. With only minimal thought, you welcome any ingredients that seek shelter in the warm embrace of your tortilla.

Beans and rice, tried and true staple of cultures across the globe provide a wholesome and energizing base for the experience. Sauces that boggle the mind and tantalize the senses, ranging from chunky to creamy, from spicy to sweet to tart, accentuate all facets of your being. Vegetables, whether mundane or exotic can be accommodated with the slightest effort. Meats of any and all varieties, be they braised, roasted, or grilled, act as the star of the show for some, but they are far from necessary amidst your bounty. Dairy and even eggs have their place in your construction. Truly, no ingredient is beyond your grasp, as is no beating heart.

You do not care if we devour you ravenously with our bare hands, forgoing even a plate, or if we smother you with oozing cheeses or chili sauces before thoughtfully picking you apart with a fork. You can be bought wholesale, prepackaged in supermarkets or lovingly and painstakingly prepared by hand. You can be found in restaurants ranging from the mass-market to the artisanal. Even sidewalk vendors and food trucks know the joy you provide the masses. On hot days, you bring us refreshment, and on cool days, you transport us to a sunnier place.

I know we haven't been together in several days, burritos, but we will be again soon. And, on that day, you will remind me what it is to live.

In Which The Littlest Hobo Nearly Discovers Brunch

In The Littlest Hobo's mind it was, as always, the nicest day imaginable. He listened to the majestic howls of the coyotes below him mingled with the gusting winds that threatened to topple the very tree that was keeping him free from their jaws. Once more, he marveled at the act of athleticism that had allowed him to vault, against all odds, to his current perch. It truly is wondrous what physical feats a person, even one as small as The Littlest Hobo, can accomplish when fueled by adrenaline born of sheer, magnificent terror and a desperate will to live. Blessing compounded upon blessing, The Littlest Hobo celebrated the presence of the neighboring gas-producing bog that kept those pesky owls away from this region of the forest. Truly, this was, at least for now, the safest of havens against the myriad conspiracies of nature.

Without any further distraction The Littlest Hobo could have sat for hours contentedly reflecting on his great fortune, but he was brought out of his meditative state by a louder-than-normal rumbling of his sad, shrunken stomach. Suddenly jolted to his senses, our diminutive friend recalled the purpose of his current journey. He had only ventured into a region filled with so many dangerous creatures in an effort to expedite his arrival in a neighboring town where he had heard great wonders awaited: There was a restaurant in this town, or so he had heard, that specialized in serving breakfast and lunch at the same time. For weeks, The Littlest Hobo scraped up what money he could find before, deciding that 73 cents certainly ought to be enough to cover his costs, he set out to witness this phenomenon for himself.

Now, The Littlest Hobo had the only vaguest ideas of what breakfast and lunch were. Those occasions on which he was able to eat two meals in as many days were always among the pleasant surprises to him. The idea of eating two meals simultaneously was a dream so glorious he could scarcely comprehend it. "What on earth would one choose to consume on such an occasion?" he wondered. "Perhaps a crust of bread and a handful of peas!" As he salivated uncontrollably at the very thought, The Littlest Hobo nearly passed out from the increased dehydration. This was an event he simply had to experience.

Using his trusty hat to harness the howling winds, The Littlest Hobo managed to glide in an uncontrolled, tumbling fashion from tree to tree, escaping the forest without further encounter with the growling beasts that infested its labyrinthine floor. Before he knew it, he had escaped and once again reached the highway just outside of town. As he wandered the city streets -- delightfully devoid of coyotes, owls, ocelots, or any other dangerous creatures -- The Littlest Hobo eventually came to a diner with a bright red sign that read Mel's. Recognizing the name as that of his goal, our friend wandered right in.

After several minutes spent gaining the attention of the hostess, he was promptly seated at a booth that may well have been even cozier than the branch in which he had half-dozed the prior night. All signs pointed to this being the world changing moment he had expected it could be. "I'll have the brunch, please," The Littlest Hobo insisted, earnestly hoisting his smallest of fortunes towards the gruff looking woman who had come asking for his order.

She would have gladly taken the inadequate sum offered in exchange for such a meal, but, much to her dismay, the waitress had to inform The Littlest Hobo that it was, in fact, 4 o'clock in the afternoon, and that brunch was no longer being served for the day, and is there anything else his precious little heart might desire? Alas, there was nothing else that The Littlest Hobo's precious heart did desire, and disappointment threatened to creep in and fill the hole that this mystical "brunch" had left there.

Just then, however, he noticed another customer happily slurping away at a plate of spaghetti. So enamored was The Littlest Hobo with the slurping and the spinning and the pleasant redness of the sauce that he immediately asked to have the same. Now, even by the standards of highway diners, Mel served an atrocious plate of spaghetti, but such trifles are of little importance to The Littlest Hobo. He happily ate a whole 5 noodles before collapsing into a deep sleep. As he slumbered, the restaurant closed around him, nobody noticing the boy of prodigiously small proportions curled up at Table 6.

Hacking, Piracy, and "Freedom"

Warning, strong language ahead.

This shit has got to stop.

As an advocate of Free Software and the uninterrupted flow of information between individuals, I'm all for more open standards and practices. As a fan of the creative process and human advancement in general, though, I'm increasingly of the opinion assholes who think that they should be able to do whatever they want with technology deserve to be put in jail.

Yes, patent law is a mess -- especially in regard to software patents. Yes, Copyright has been bloated to an extent that unrestricted use of creative products is now nearly non-existent. Yes the DMCA is an overly-restrictive piece of legislation that often keeps us from being true owners of our possessions. That doesn't mean vigilantism is acceptable, and that's exactly what this shit is.

All the rhetoric about the initial hack being in response to Sony's removal of the option to install Linux on the PS3 is BS. People wanted to have more complete ways of accessing unpaid content on the system, and they would have gone about doing it even if they could still run a secondary OS. It's juvenile and fueled by an absurd sense of entitlement that seeks to actively deny the existence of anything remotely like a commodity in the digital world. After all, if it's all just infinitely reproducible ones and zeros, why should there be a cost?

You see, boys and girls, if you had even the most basic economic background (or a hint of common sense and self-awareness), you'd know that there's this thing called "profit motive". The only reason Sony has any reason to make PS3s is because they can make money off of it, and since they don't make a whole lot of money on the system itself, they rely on licensing fees for the games that are available on it. The only reason companies have incentive to make the games that Sony pulls most of its profit off of is because they know that they can still pull a reasonable profit for themselves.

If somebody finds a flaw in the system that makes it trivial to play games or consume content you don't actually own, then the companies that make those games have less incentive to do so, Sony has less incentive to make new systems, and none of us actually get any new content to enjoy on our newly "freed" piece of technology. So, when you go about trying to spread your exploit and the accompanying gospel of economic non-participation as loud and fast as you can instead of making Sony aware of the flaw, they are going to use their entirely legal (if not entirely reasonable) rights to try to not only stop you but to pump you dry in the process.

The response to this is not to say, "Oh, Sony is an evil megacorporation that wants to force us to actually pay to enjoy the material they produce!" and call them names while maliciously attacking their servers with your illegally acquired bot-nets. The response is to go, "Wow, that guy really should have seen that coming" and go on buying or not buying things based on your sense of the reasonableness of their market value.

So, all of you little script kiddies out there, go to hell and get a job. If you think things are too expensive, go without for a change. There are so many cheap ways to consume all of the media you could possibly want that you really have no excuse. If you think that the systems are broken and favor corporations too strongly, get involved in the political process like a goddamn adult.

Angst Mash-Up

There is a pain
deep in my heart
that can be known by no-one
except me.
It cries out, demanding
my attention
and my affection.

This affliction rends
my very soul.
I cannot share it,
but nor would I want to.
Because then, knowing
that my pain was seeing other people,
jealousy would consume me,
leaving me even more alone.
With myself.
And my pain.

And then,
my beloved pain,
we would sit
in awkward silence.
I would long to forgive,
to embrace you once again,
to find my identity in you.
But you, unwilling
to apologize, always
making excuses --
the way you once
helped me to --
would keep us apart,
just as you once kept
me apart from
the world.

Wait!
I am still apart
from the world.
I am still making
excuses.
You, my lovely,
unknowable pain,
are still keeping
me isolated.
And safe.
You have not cheated.
Yet.

I sit, in the rain
and gloom of my heart
and I weep.
In joy.
And in pain.

Why I Don't Care About Heaven and Hell

The notion of Hell is theologically troubling for lots of reasons. At the surface, it basically asks you to accept one of two things: Either we have an omnibenevolent God who has created billions of people over history for the express purpose of delivering them to eternal torment, or we have an omnipotent God whose greatest will -- that all should come to know and love him -- can be thwarted by mere mortals. This conundrum has probably turned more people away from faith (in the traditional understanding) than just about anything else; and it has led plenty of theologians to attempt to find new and creative ways of eliminating the issue, virtually all of which also fall on their faces at some point.

Several weeks ago, certain circles of the internet were agog in news that Rob Bell, pastor of Mars Hill, one of the most prominent mega churches in the country, was publishing a book, Love Wins. In particular, the hullabaloo was related to the book's description, which suggested an endorsement of Universalism (the notion that everybody is granted eternal Salvation). I haven't read the book, and I highly doubt I will, but based on what I've read since its release, it sounds as though it's largely laying out what I was introduced to in my Calvin College philosophy studies as The Doctrine of Second Chances.

Essentially, this doctrine turns Hell into a sort of Hell-Purgatory mash-up from which suffering souls can repent, accept Christ, and be granted entry into Heaven. There are lots of obvious theological problems with this idea -- the fact that it stands in direct contradiction to scripture for one (the parable of Lazarus and the Rich Man, most notably). It also seems to stand in direct opposition to the traditional definition of Hell -- a place of complete absence from God. It would seem that, without the presence of God, one could not recognize His Goodness.

This is all well and good, but it doesn't seem to be what most people are up in arms about. I'm sure that a man as respected as Bell knows all of these complaints and others perfectly well and has found clever ways of interpreting scripture that try to sidestep them. Instead, I see way too many people who are opposed to Universalism not because of Theological reasons but because it makes them ask the following questions: If everybody goes to Heaven, what's the purpose of being Christian? If there is no eternal punishment, why am I trying to be good now?

This sort of thinking just makes me sad. It suggests that being "good" is some how onerous. That it would be better if we could all just be selfish and greedy and follow our basest instincts. It endorses the view of life as some sort of balancing act in which we want our good deeds to outweigh our bad deeds by a wide enough margin that we will be let into heaven. By this view, not only can we "earn" Salvation -- one of the fundamental ideas against which Protestants rallied in the Reformation -- it suggests that we can somehow put God in our debt, an absolutely ludicrous notion. More important, though, this line of thinking denies fundamental truths that we attest to: That we were created good and to be good. That sin is an aberration that we are meant not just to avoid but to despise. That true joy and peace rest in returning to some semblance of Communion with God.

If we embrace these truths, the question of "Why be a Christian now?" becomes an easy one, even in the face of Universalism. Because God first loved us and we are called to reciprocate that Love. Because every additional moment we spend in even limited awareness of God's Grace is a moment of greater joy than we can find in any other way. Because now is when we are amidst creation and able to help take a stand against the evils that have tainted it. Because it is what we were created to be.

If you call yourself a Christian and spend your time worrying about where people are going to spend eternity at a level that goes beyond the academic, please, take a moment to think about how you're living your life. Odds are it isn't particularly Biblical and you might want to re-examine where you're going by your own standards. Stop worrying about your "reward" for all the suffering you're putting yourself through by trying to be good because, if you're doing it right, the work -- hard as it can be -- is its own reward.

Lessons Slowly Learned

I struggle a lot with guilt. I try my best not to rationalize my decisions or hide from their consequences, but I'm not always good at doing this in a healthy way. I obsess over trying to be better, trying to be the person I'm supposed to be. I get hung up on penitence, unwilling to forgive myself until I'm convinced that all blemishes of my wrong-doing have been rectified (an impossible task).

Not very long ago, I spent upwards of two years of my life feeling such a persistent and crushing guilt over my inability to do this sufficiently that it nearly broke me. Then, one day last summer, when everything was at its apex and I was feeling especially horrible and worthless, somebody I respected gave me a hug and told me that I was a good man. I felt true absolution for the first time in my life and spent the next 48 hours spontaneously coming close to tears as I dealt with what that meant:

I cannot make myself better. On my own, I am incapable of being good. The same holds for you. What we can do is this singular good thing: take our focus off of ourselves and let God's Grace take root. Through that Grace, we are allowed to do all manner of good, but it is not something that can come when our concern rests on ourselves. Freedom from guilt and from fear comes only from ignoring our pride and our insecurities and being servants to one another. That this is something we can do no matter how sinful and hideous we may feel, as I apparently did that day last summer, is a testament to God's goodness and Love.

Love, like Grace, is not something we earn. It is something we are allowed and given in spite of ourselves. It is utterly inhuman, embracing faults and failings, freeing us to move beyond them instead of demanding retribution or justification. We are free to give it because it has been given to us, but it is not something that we can seek. The very idea of seeking Love is absurd. The act requires us to be so focused on ourselves that we necessarily lose our fleeting sight of what Love is.

I forget all of this, though. I allow my insecurities and my guilt to get the best of me and restore my focus to myself and my wants. I consistently fall into the trap of thinking that salvation and redemption are about me. That whatever good God allows me is for my sake and my glory rather than to glorify Him and His plan. I return to the belief that my ultimate goal is to be able to do good without Grace instead of being more immediately receptive to it. Hypocritically, I think that even though I can somehow find the ability to love my friends, fallen and fallible as they are, I am incapable of being loved unless I am something approaching perfect.

When this happens to any of us, all we are capable of spreading is hurt. As such, I have realized that, next time I allow myself to be overly caught up in my own desires and insecurities and, in doing so, bring stress and pain on those close to me, I will not to turn it into an issue of my own inadequacy. I will, instead, use it as a reminder that I cannot be so important to myself. That it is only in properly Loving that I can recognize the Love that God and others have for me.

Academia Redux

After my post on Academia a couple of weeks ago, frustrations compounded to the point that I was within inches of calling grad school quits after this semester. Fortunately, I've got level-headed people around to talk with, and I came to the conclusion that some of my apathy and irritation are likely springing from not having made a solid enough effort to find passion in my work.

Over the coming weeks, I'm going to make a much more serious effort to do the work I need to be doing for my research, and that is going to require processing a hell of a lot of information about problems in concurrent computing. Considering I process things almost entirely verbally, writing is a great outlet for this, but I see no reason to bore most of you with this stuff.

So, if you are a strange person who wants to know more about what I'm thinking about my research, I'm starting a new blog, much as I did with my senior project in undergrad. It can be found here, and updates should be commencing (late) tonight with an overview on what I feel to be the essential difficulties with using physical metaphors for shared memory systems and a quick look at where I'll be starting my reading.