When all we have is taken

A general theme on my blog seems to be the need for honesty during times of difficulty or adversity. So it's no wonder, when you consider this in combination with my love of all things C.S. Lewis, that I was overjoyed over the weekened when I read his "A Grief Observed" and found myself reading a better expressed version of many things that I had thought over the past couple of months. Lewis once said that a friendship often begins with the comment, "Really? I thought I was the only one," or words to that effect. I suspect, based on the number of common thoughts that we have both had, that he and I would probably have been good friends.

For those who've never heard of it, "A Grief Observed" is essentially the journal that Lewis kept in the time after his wife died of cancer. It is by far the most honest and moving thing he ever wrote. The writing is amazingly personal, something we wouldn't normally associate with that fairly jolly, very academic and very British writer most famous for writing about fauns carrying umbrellas. It's the most heart-on-sleeve stuff he's written outside of "Till We Have Faces", and all the more for being about him, not a fictional character. And, at points, you feel like despairing along with him. The man who wrote one of the 20th century's most reasoned discussions of pain and faith seems, halfway through this small (but not slight) memoir to be on the verge of losing his faith, or discovering that, while God exists, He isn't very nice at all - a fear, I must admit, that I've had more than a few times this past year.

Of course, he doesn't lose his faith - if he had, we would no doubt have heard - but the resolution he arrives at by the end gives some fairly concrete assurance for those of us who still worried for a moment. And it's the kind of resolution that Job reached, before his fortune was restored, and that Habakkuk found when he was able to declare that "though the fig tree does not bud/and there are no grapes on the vines...Yet I will rejoice in the Lord". And it's only an acceptance that can be arrived at after a night of wrestling with angels and with God - not because God needs our anger to remind Him of what is right, but because dishonest rejoicing means nothing to Him. He'd rather that we told Him what we thought and then fell asleep in His arms than pretended to be fine but died on the inside.

Thankyou, Clive Staples Lewis, for once again reminding us all of what matters most.

From crayons to perfume?

So last night was the Year 12 Formal, the end to a very, very long and largely disorganised week. At my school, the Year 12s don't rampage through the suburb, but they do slowly disappear from class. In other words, this is the way Year 12 ends - not with a bang but a whimper.

But then, last night arrived - and what a bang it was. My more devoted readers may recall a post I wrote last year about the awkwardness of being a young teacher at a High School formal function, and of the etiquette of dancing at such functions. Well, last night was, I'm pleased to announce, much less awkward, perhaps because more teachers in my age group were actaully present, perhaps because the students seemed happy to be sharing the night with us.

Now, at such functions I understand it's customary to expect at least one song by Lulu, or someone of that ilk, or at least a handful of kids on their desks saying, "O captain my captain". Sadly, none of that happened. But I did have some photos taken with students, and a few that were very eager to dance with me. One even came and sat next to me to have a chat at one point. And, in a week when I've not been at all sure how much I want to do this job, that was a nice way to finish. It made me think that, if these are the relationships I've built up in only two years, I'd like to stick around to see what kind of relationships can be built in the years to come.

Kick me when I'm down

The last 48 hours have been a bit of a disaster zone in my life. You know those days when it really just doesn't seem to get any better? Well, I feel like I've had two of those in a row. The hardest thing about it all is that nothing that desperately bad has actually happened, it's just that...well...nothing really good's happened to lift the general feeling of crapness that so much around me is producing right now. I know I'm being affected much more by circumstances than they, in and of themselves, warrant, but knowledge like that isn't especially useful when nothing changes the way I feel - like I can hardly stand up.

So how do you connect with God when that's how you feel? When he, in his infinite power, is doing remarkably little to change things. He's there, you know he's there, and you know that he's good through it all. But that doesn't alter how you feel.

I'd like to remember verses like, "A bruised reed he will not break/And a smoldering wick he will not snuff out" (Isaiah 42:3), and they're true, in spite of everything, yet this fact remains - I may well stay bruised or smoldering for some time yet.

I saw her at the anti-abortion demonstration

Or at least, I think I did. My eyes were wandering across the crowd at Parliament House, looking for familiar faces, when I saw someone that I was quite certain I knew. What a common experience with celebrities - I mean, it's like we know them, isn't it? Particularly when they starred in recent, hugely successful Australian mockumentaries.

No, it wasn't Chris Lilley. And that would be a "he" anyway, you imbeciles. No, it was Bec, Jai'me's "hot Asian" friend - at least, I think it was. And there was a brief surge of pride in me when I saw her, holding a baby - perhaps hers? - for a friend to photograph. Because, while the general public would love to make sweeping statements about what kind of people are "anti-abortion", there may be plenty of people we like and respect who count themselves in that number. We may in fact have enjoyed watching some of them on our TV screens - in a very irreverent, controversial, and, yes, left-wing, show. I may have been one of the only lefties there that day; most of the politicians there certainly seemed to be on the more conservative end, but I couldn't be sure. But does it matter?

Sometimes, there are more important concerns in life than what others will think of us. Unless we can see that, there's a bit of Jai'me in all of us.

When it isn't just a movie

It's been a little while now since animations stopped being "just for kids". Anime did a good job of dispelling that myth, and Richard Linklater and company have done their bit to keep the art-house animation up and running. Over the past few days, I have bizarrely seen two grown-up animations, both, coincidentally, revolving around the Middle East, and both autobiographical. The first was the delightful, quirky and surprisingly moving "Persepolis". In that case, the animated form was logical; it was, after all, adapted from the director's autobiographical graphic novel. The second, however, was the most alarming, and by far the most inventive use of animation in cinema since "Waking Life" came out; for, with Ari Folman's devastatingly brilliant "Waltz With Bashir", it seems that animations can now also be documentaries.

The purpose behind the animation in "Waltz" was a little unclear at first, though the opening sequence with the vicious dogs charging through an Israeli street was quite spectacular, and no doubt very difficult to do otherwise. Given that much of the film concerns hallucinations and dreams, the surrealism of the animated form is quite effective. Nevertheless, this would have to be the first film to use real audio recordings of interviews accompanied by animated images - and the question is, why? A clue is given when Folman talks to his first interviewee, who agrees to be sketched, but not filmed. Perhaps it was at that point that Folman got the idea for this masterpiece - to sketch, not film? But the initial sketches have evolved into some of the most amazing visuals to hit our screens since, well, "Waking Life". There's nothing even slightly sketchy about this film.

Yet there's another kick in the guts that comes with the animated form of the film, namely that it would be more or less unwatchable if it had used live footage. Indeed, when Folman does switch to real images of the massacre the film concerns, I found myself, though previously glued to the screen, now unable to look. But what is most frightening about this film is that the animation makes it feel, somehow, unreal. When a tank drives down a narrow Lebanese lane-way, crushing the cars that are parked on either side of the street, you think, "That wouldn't happen, would it?" But this film is all about the realities that are too traumatic for us to accept.

When the film finished, my friends and I could not speak. I drove them home in complete silence. My discomfort on leaving the cinema was mostly because the film, though amazing, had still felt like a film. Only it wasn't. It was animated, but every bit of it was real. And that's the problem.