Owner: I am "The Man": Musings of a White American Male (WAM!) URL:http://keithbecker.blogspot.com Join Date: Sat, 17 Feb 2007 01:17:10 -0600 Rating:0 Site Description: My name is Keith Becker. I am a middle-class, twenty-something white American Christian male. I am one of the majority, one of the many who have so much going for them and yet do so little to change our world for the better. But I wish to be different. I Site statistics:Click here
I need you need me 1970-01-01 00:59:59 I came across this image on the PostSecret website. For those of you who don't know, PostSecret is a website where people can anonymously send in the secrets of their life, artfully placed on postcards for the world to see. WARNING: This website is extremely addictive. Browse at your own risk. (Almost as bad as Overheard in New York.) Anyhow, this particular picture got me thinking.The person in this picture said that every time he/she feels like committing suicide, someone does something that makes them want to live. The part that struck me is that this person has never said thank you. You know what that means? It could be someone I know. It could be someone you know. It sounds trite(and honestly, I am not a fan of things trite), but it really just goes to show how much the little things that we do can mean to a person.And you know what? Maybe we should start saying thank you. I can't even say if I have ever had thoughts of committing suicide ... I know that when I was ... depresse
Update! 1970-01-01 00:59:59 White House acknowledges that Bush was informed of the Dubai port deal from the mediageorge w. bush - WonketteAlright. I'm here again, updating my blog. I really should update more often, especially as I have no real excuse for not updating it. Anyhow, let's not mince words, my dear devoted readers. I've made mistakes, you've made mistakes, we're clearly both to blame here. Instead, let's move on to the quote that I've posted above.Does this quote strike anyone else as absurd? Sidebar: Now, I'm not one to take part in the pervasive "Bush-bashing" that goes on in the media and in political circles. Don't get me wrong, there are many things that I don't like about George W. Bush. HOWEVER, he is in office, and in all likelihood he will be until the end of the term. Therefore, simply bashing him is neither appropriate nor productive. What is productive is to discuss what he is doing, to petition the government for legistlation, to generally engage in intelligent discourse about w Read more:Update
This is a joke. 1970-01-01 00:59:59 I know, I know, it's been a long time since I've updated, and I know that some people are getting upset. In an effort to make this post more interactive, I thought that I would pose three different questions and hope that the people who read this blog (I know you exist) might answer some of them. Okay, here they are:1. Do you have any irrational fears, and if so, what are they?2. If you had a free Friday night to do anything in the world, what would you do?3. What are three characteristics that are common to people that you respect? What does it mean to respect someone? How do you treat someone differently that you don't respect? (I have to be honest, that question didn't come from me - can you guess who it came from?)Okay. That's all I've got. Here are some thoughts as I leave:- Spring break wasn't long enough, but camping with Tobin was great!- I am looking forward to this summer with no classes and 95 degree weather - bring on the sweat!- I really love my friends fr
A Call to Arms! 1970-01-01 00:59:59 OK OK so I know I've been terrible at updating. Maybe if more people RESPONDED I would be more motivated to update. In an attempt to rectify this, I am doing three things. a) I am ranting here in this post. I think this will probably do nothing to make more people respond to this blog, as they would have to READ this in order to see me ranting. But it makes me feel better. And ... b) I am posting a link in my away message currently to this blog. I think because a lot of people use AIM Triton now, they don't check buddy info. They just conveniently slide their mouse over my screenname. This method is great, except that they never glance at the link to my blog, effectively shut me out of their lives, and I begin to shrink into oblivion (which I think is somewhere in the Dakotas). Finally ... c) I am repeating some questions from last time, along with two new ones. My answers will be posted shortly (I'm giving myself a deadline of the next two days), but feel free to answ
Yes! I do yet live and draw breath. 1970-01-01 00:59:59 OK so I seem--read: understatement--to have a sort of like/hate/hate relationship with this whole blogging thing (meaning I sort of like blogging sometimes, hate it other times, and my readers (the dwindling few (ooh, multiple parentheticals) still not in delirium) hate me because I never update).Anyhow I have been spurred on by someone who still reads this (super quiz for bonus points: was it me, Tobin, or my alternate personality that does all of my work and writing while I "sleep"?) to update, and recommit to Write it all down. Quickly. So here's my attempt.Let me just say that Easter was fantastic. For those of you that don't know, Jesus Christ is alive and risen and I am head over heels in love with Him! Easter at Daybreak was fantastic, as was time with my family and Frisbee golf with Rich and Zack (man, that last hole was awesome, right Rich?). I also got a new phone!Here's a list (I love blogging list) of great things about My New Phone!: 1. First and foremost, I can call
Va - gi - na. 1970-01-01 00:59:59 Eve Ensler's The Vagina Monologues is back -- with three new monologues, a new introduction, and dozens of heartbreaking testimonials from young women around the country who have performed the monologues at their local colleges as part of a nation-wide campaign to stop violence against women, VDay. What started as a play has become a national phenomenon, the bible for a new generation of women.The Vagina Monologues | Eve EnslerSo today I'm in Baltimore again, this time attending Tobin's performance tonight in The Vagina Monologues--she's playing a six-year-old girl for part of it. How cool is that?--and I'm really looking forward to it. I don't know a whole lot about the play, except that it centers on the topic of womens' anatomy, particularly their vaginas. But it's part of a "campaign to stop violence against women," which is one of those things you can only be against if you are the Antichrist or a close relative of his.Thoughts for today:1) I think most people I know would
Friday Quote of the Day 1970-01-01 00:59:59 So here's my thought: Every Friday
I am going to post a quote from movie, famous person, book or maybe even a song. And since it is now Friday, here is the first one! This particular quote comes from the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I was inspired by Pat Brown's Xanga to add this quote, and I must credit him since he had it first. But I really do like it, and I hope you do too. The emphasis was added by yours truly, however.Frodo: I can't do this Sam.Sam: I know. It's all wrong. By rights we shouldn't even be here. But we are. It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger, they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that st Read more:Quote
I'm back. I think. 1970-01-01 00:59:59 OK so my initial attempt at writing a blog crashed and burned. As pointed out by a certain someone who will remain nameless, it has been (think
: Sandlot) for-e-ver since I updated this thing. Well I say that those days are gone! Actually, in all truthfulness, I'm not sure if I'm cut out for this blog thing, but I'm gonna keep at it for a while. So here are my thoughts for the day:1. I'm in Baltimore visiting Tobin. I certainly like her a lot.2. I'm excited to be back at Messiah and get a fresh start on things this semester, although I have to be a fantastic student this time, which is a good bit of pressure.3. I've been slacking on writing a lot in general lately, but I think I've been growing and learning a lot, which is most certainly more important.4. I'm excited about this coming weekend :-)Does anyone actually read this? I'd be surprised, because I haven't updated it in so long.
Class resumes tomorrow (but this post isn't really about that) 1970-01-01 00:59:59 There's not enough that we can do. You can't give enough money. You can't love the poor enough. You can't give enough of your possessions away to earn the love of the Father. Only Christ keeping the law on your behalf can do that. But if God does in fact love us that much, we are compelled to value the things that he valued. And Christ really had a special place for the poor. Matthew 25 shows how to judge whether or not you have real faith—faith that can justify you before the Father. When we look at the hardest people in our culture to love, how do we love them? So although the record is about action—no doubt about that—it's action in the context of liberation in Jesus.[derekwebb.net]I start classes again tomorrow
at Messiah. As I said in my last post, I'm looking forward to being back and getting a fresh start on a new semester. I need to be someone who is hardcore about school and homework this time around. A few thoughts:1. My earliest class this semester is 9:10, Read more:resumes
my (im?)maturity 1970-01-01 00:59:59 Is maturity relative or comparative? For example, can you only have maturity if there are two or more people to provide a contrast, e.g. "she is more mature than I am, but I am more mature than he is"? Or is there some "absolute" level of maturity, e.g. "I am mature"?And just what is maturity, anyway? The reason it's linked so conventionally to age is because in general people mature as they grow older. I find this notion a little bizarre, that we try to measure maturity by how many times the earth revolves around the sun. But the reason I said it was erroneous is because you can get an 18 year old who is more mature than, say, a 26 year old. But by what measure of maturity? The way they talk? The way they socialize with people? How they think (and how would you verify that anyway)? The way they respond to problems? Those all sound a bit like criteria for intelligence. Is an intelligent person necessarily mature?idleThinK [v3]: a faint blue idea of order | MaturityI've been thinking
Ooh, Update! Tasty. 1970-01-01 00:59:59 Well it has been suggested to me by someone that if I REALLY A) Like blogging and B) Want people to read my blog and maybe even (*gasp* the Holy Grail of Blogging) respond to it, I should just update consistently. Hence, here I am, a mere TWO DAYS after my last update!I'll give all 2 or 3 of you a second to recover from that shock.Anyhow, I figured since it has been a good, oh, 3 weeks since I posted them, now might be a good time for me to answer those questions that I put up earlier. So without further ado, my answers:1. Do you have any irrational fears, and if so, what are they?This is a hard question for me to answer. I think the closest I can come to a good answer is that sometimes I am afraid when I am standing in the shower and washing my hair that someone will be standing there whenever I open my eyes. I think it's because I feel so vulnerable, naked and with my eyes closed. Other than that ... when I was younger I used to think (I mean *really* think) that all the othe Read more:Tasty
, Update
Almost Done ... 1970-01-01 00:59:59 So this year of school is really almost over. It's been a heck of a year. First semester was pretty terrible, but I'm back on my feet and trucking along. I've gone to see Tobin virtually every weekend this year and it has been awesome. I haven't really experienced such an enriching relationship until now. I know that Christ is my bread of life and my rock, but spending time with Tobin has definitely brought me closer to Him, which is fantastic, and I think I've come to learn more than ever that it's ok to depend on someone, even need them.I went on a school visit today, to Foose Elementary in Harrisburg. The class that I observed had health class with their gym teacher, who is a real jerk. The guy says things like "contribute to the class for once in your life" and "you're a mess man, straight up" to FOURTH GRADERS! I mean, ridiculous. Re-donk-u-shmous. It totally wasn't my place, as I was an observing college student, but if I was involved in that school in any kind Read more:Almost
Sweetest Birthday Ever. 1970-01-01 00:59:59 Yesterday was my birthday. It. was. Awesome!Many thanks to all of you who helped to make my birthday special. Here's a list of the things that I loved about this birthday, the things which made it far better than any birthday I've had to date:1. Tobin. I mean, and I don't curse, damn. She made my birthday rock my face off! First, it turns out I love the candy Smarties (I didn't even know this until recently), and so she made me a Smarties bouquet, attaching them to a letter opener, which made me laugh and was incredibly cute (Tobin, I know you hate being labeled with the word cute, but sometimes you are, and it's a good thing).Next, she took me to this fantastic place called Longwood Gardens -- the picture doesn't do it justice. The place has a huge outside area, where all the trees and gardens are decorated with Christmas lights during the holiday season, and the inside sanctuaries are wonderful too, with great smells and really cool flowers, like orchids with what Tobin Read more:Birthday
, Sweetest
Organization Craze! 1970-01-01 00:59:59 So lately Tobin has got me going on this kick of organizing my life. I'm not blaming her or anything ... in fact I guess I really started it myself when I asked my parents for a gift card to Staples for Christmas so that I could get a filing system (really just a big tupperware container with hanging folders in it).From there, I now have my filing system, a budget plan worked out, I have a planner that I'm using regularly, and I ganked (is that a word, really?) an unused 60-day organizer/calendar/thing from my current place of business, the Chester County Book Company (the thing hadn't been used since October 1994, no joke). My life is starting to become organized.Can I tell you a secret? Seriously, lean in close.It feels pretty damn good.Now don't get me wrong. Forcing myself to write down everything in my planner and on my calendar drives me freaking insane sometimes. And the filing system has gotten off to a rocky start as well. This certainly doesn't come as naturally t Read more:Craze
, Organization
Bono Talks Tech 1970-01-01 00:59:59 Not a whole lot of time to BA-LOG, but check this out:Bono Talk 2005 A little outdated, I know. But seriously. Who wouldn't follow Bono around if they had the chance? Too bad he's not American ... he'd be one helluva revolutionary WAM.More later, but for now ...Peace.
President Bush ... The Devil? Wha??? 1970-01-01 00:59:59 Greetings, brothers and sisters!So I was watching CNN today, and I came upon something rather interesting: Apparently, Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, in a speech at the UN General Assembly, declared that President
George W Bush is none other than the devil himself.I pontificated over this for a moment. Could Bush and Beelzebub be one and the same?It was a tempting idea, but Bush clearly cannot be the devil: he's simply not popular enough! It is an unfortunate but widely-known fact that the devil has an approval rating well over 40 percent.Hahaha seriously though, I don't hate Bush. I just think we need a new President.----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------That tangent over, here are some fun facts about what I've been up to lately (sorry for the length, I'm feeling wordy):1. Classes are going fairly well, although my children's literature class has turned out to be quite a workload. Oh well, I can't complain, conside Read more:Devil
, President Bush
How I Am Like Spider-Man 1970-01-01 00:59:59 Hello All,I'm back, after all the craziness that has been my life. I still am having a hard time processing the fact that Nate is gone. I think it would be different if I saw him all the time, but for me Nate has been one of those friends that I just saw once in a long while. That being the case, I still feel like I could give him a call at any point. And as my friend Justin so aptly said, it's the times that you realize you can't ... that's when I miss Nate Graybill the most.So for a while my life had been feeling a whole lot like this:But just lately it's been feeling a whole lot more like this:So it's out: I love comic books. Particularly Spider
-Man. The thing is, for me they're not always just escapism or fantasy. In fact, I almost always find I can relate to my "friendly neighborhood Spider-Man" ... I've always wondered that is. Why do I relate so much to everyone's favorite wall-crawler? Maybe it's the neuroticism; Spider-Man and I are both known for a tendency to
Tease Me Once ... 1970-01-01 00:59:59 Just recently I've been thinking a lot about the concept of teasing--sarcasm, mockery and the like.This spawned out of a conversation I had with Tobin and her mother Rosemary. We were discussing when it becomes acceptable to tell someone that you are offended by things that they say, if ever, and I mentioned that I told my current roommates at one point that I'm not a big fan of derogatory comments about or related to homosexuals (e.g. "you're gay," "that's gay," "you're such a fag"). As a Christian I am consistently, extremely frustrated with the way the Church and my fellow Christians respond to homosexuals, focusing much more on the fact that homosexuality is considered wrong by the Church instead of the (infinitely more important in my thinking) fact that Christ loves homosexuals the same as he loves everyone else. This thinking is what prompted me to make this T-shirt:(Back reads: "And so do I.")Anyway, the conversation led from there to talk about teasing in general. I t Read more:Tease
What Life Is 1970-01-01 00:59:59 I'm thinking that this might be the first in a series of posts, on different topics (What Life Is, What Love Is, maybe What Strength Is, etc.). I got the idea when reading one of my favorite running philosophical dissertations, The Amazing Spider-Man. Aunt May gives Peter the skinny on what life really is:(Click the picture to enlarge it so you can read the text)copyright 2007 Marvel, Inc.Anyway, I have had so many thoughts about life in my short stint on this earth, and I'm sure many of you have interesting and provocative thoughts on the subject as well. It's such an intriguing and broad and stupefying topic. Life can be completely wonderful or completely awful, although I would venture that no one has a completely wonderful or completely awful life, in totality.Why are we alive? I'm a Christian, and so I believe God created us, made us stewards of this earth, gave us responsibility and one rule to obey but we screwed that up: enter sin and death and pain. But why life on e
Tangent: The Art of Omission 1970-01-01 00:59:59 I'm going on a tangent because I don't feel like writing about strength or love or any other thing that might fit into "What _____ Is."Recently I was reading quotes online and I stumbled across this one, penned in a letter by 17th-century French scientist and philosopher Blaise Pascal: "Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parce que je n'ai pas eu le loisir de la faire plus courte." Which of course roughly translates to:"I am sorry for the length of this letter, but I had not the time to write a shorter one."At first glance, this quote seems baffling. What the heck is Pascal talking about when he says that he didn't have the time to write a shorter letter? Isn't length the equivalent of hard work and therefore good writing? After all, in the world of academia we are given ranges of pages (ex: 5-7 pages) or words (ex: 1500-2000 words) for writing papers, and a "good" paper is one that falls in the upper end of the length requirements.I believe that this is a tragedy and tea
Humorous-ness. :-) 2007-03-29 04:36:00 Several funny things about me:When I'm in the shower, I often don't like to close my eyes because I'm literally afraid someone will be standing there when I open them. I think it's because it's such a vulnerable situation, being stark naked and all. This feeling is amplified after I have been scared, like following a horror movie.If I'm walking alone down the street or in a parking lot late at night, I'll put my keys in my right hand so that there is a key pointing out between each of my knuckles. This is so that if I was attacked suddenly, I could inflict maximum damage on my assailant.I still consider myself a blogger. Hah!That is all.Peace.
Countdown to Spider-Man 3! 2007-04-02 21:33:00 I'm going to see Spider
-Man 3 on opening night I think, and since Tobin will be in England then, I'm going to see it in an IMAX theater with her later!! :-)Oh and you'll want to check out the final trailer for the movie.Peace. Read more:Countdown
Please Give Feedback!! 2007-06-24 23:54:00 OK let's just pretend I never stopped posting. Cool? Cool. Now I have a dilemma:A friend of mine here at school in West Chester (his name is Roshun Pai if any of you know him) recently made the assertion that he could walk 100 miles in three days.I quickly told him at first that I was willing to bet that he could not, but after more consideration I am unsure.Do you think he could do it? He would be allowed to run or stop and eat or sleep if he wants to (he's only hurting his time), and he would have to complete the distance on a flat track. He is of average athletic ability but certainly not a distance/endurance guy.So basically: Can the average person keep up a pace of 33.33 miles per day for three straight days?Please
answer! We're having a vicious debate!! Read more:Feedback
Recommend Site To A Friend
