On Brave Days an Atheist

Growing up,  religion never played much of a part.   Well more specifically, religion was never presented to me as a truism.  My grandmother is Buddhist, but my mom is agnostic and therefore allowed us to decide for ourselves what path we wanted.  She sent my sister and I to Christian sleep-away camp and me to a few years of Catholic school where our administrators were Sister Mary and Father Rick.  We celebrated both Easter and Christmas.   I used to set up the porcelain nativity scene under the tree each year until we moved our celebration to my aunt's.  

However, at family gatherings we still burned incense for our ancestors and made extra food or fake-money offerings on occassions like April 5th (Chinese tomb-sweeping day). I kind of liked the idea of communicating with my grandfather in the underworld and making sure he had good food and enough money.  To protect us from danger,  my grandmother gave us prayer tokens for our rear view mirrors when we started driving.  I don't really drive anymore, but I keep a pendant of the Goddess of Mercy in my wallet.

Religion became to me like a philosophy of which there are many viewpoints all of which can be right.   Would a Christian approach be better for this or a Buddhist?  Do I feel a need to go to confession today or meditate?  I agree religion is important because it is a way to deal with life.  I keep an open-mind though beyond tolerance.  We don't just tolerate other races or sexualities; we accept them.  The concept of God has become fuzzy in modern times anyways with so many interpretations.  Sure, sometimes you're right, but other times they are.  I don't think I could ever choose a religion because I would never be able to adopt all the theology that comes with it as unquestionable truth.  I would be ousted from all houses of worship for heresy.  However, to be Godless seems like one of the worst things to be these days.  You can't claim allegiance with any group and apparently atheist are also the minority that Americans would least allow their children to marry.  That's bad news for me unless I find myself another atheist!  Imagine a Godless nation of atheists? Extremists would bomb our homes and evangelicals would burn our important books--like maybe our diaries.  Well, that probably won't happen considering atheists are also the hardest demographic to identify because we won't even identify ourselves...yet.

On brave days, I would say I'm atheist, but on cowardly days agnostic.  I am responsible for what happens to me, but sometimes when things get tough you look for a little extra help.  On the flip side though, a recent conversation with a friend that was raised Catholic revealed that on bad days she can loose her faith in God, but on good days she remembers to thank him.  Get thee to a nunnery! Those Catholics and their confessions.

This brings me to a book that I've been interested to read for awhile ( and the point of this post).  It's called Confessions of a Buddhist Atheist, by Stephen Batchelor who is a disrobed monk.  Has anyone read or heard of it?! It seems like a peaceful, middle ground of thinking and at worst a unique story.  I'll definitely let you know my thoughts if I ever get my hands on it.

The Petty Foibles of Office Life are Universal

It's officially Fall, my favorite season and the beginning of a new TV line up to look forward to.  The show that's caught my eye is "Outsourced" a new comedy on NBC about an American guy that is forced to move to India because his management position at a call center has been outsourced to India.  There he encounters a parody of personalities and the quirky office culture of his new employees.  The show caught me instantly. Basically, any concept that explores and sometimes makes fun of cultural stereotypes, usually get me.  Harold & Kumar was a brave step and Modern Family is another of my favorites.  It is through observing, dissecting, and bringing to light this cultural hodgepodge of America(ns), that we can find understanding and hopefully laugh at ourselves.

I'm so glad that NBC took a chance with this show and I hope it does well.   God knows all we need is NOT another law or forensics or vampire-themed show.  " Outsourced" is refreshing and relevant to the issues of today yet most importantly funny and something we would want to end the day with.  The time slot after The Office draws a great comparison that, "Whether it's a paper company in Scranton, Pa., or a call center in Mumbai, the petty foibles of office life are universal( Washington EXPRESS)."  Maybe one day there will be room for an East Asian parody--and I mean something better than what Margaret Cho tried to do back in the '90s because let's face it, the All American Girl is never something we would ever want to be in this global society and her portrayal of Asian Americans were just down right two-dimensional and painful.

What's Old is New Again

Photos courtesy of DC Nine

It was Thursday night and my cousin and I were in need of a distraction.  As an avid reader, literary type--she always seems to know what's going on oppose to myself who usually exists in a bubble outside of my imposed list of responsibilities.   It's not that I actively buffer myself from the outside world, just that I know I am easily distracted and so the less irrelevant information the better.  That being said, I am not one that actively follows music or is even confident about her musical taste outside of satisfying myself.  However, on Thursday night we went to DC Nine (bar and music venue on 9th street) and saw April Smith and The Great Picture Show.  She was really good!   I believe they're based in Brooklyn now, but in all my years in NY I'd never heard of them until coming to DC.  

Smith's voice is unexpectedly powerful and although they've been classified from folk to country to swing, her musical style reminds me of Broadway musical performers.  It's got that energy and snappiness to it. Plus, she flirts with the audience and is a great showmen.  Her band, The Great Picture Show jams merrily behind her giving off that campy enthusiasm of the roaring 20s swing parties.  If you're a fan of the HBO series Weeds, you may already have heard their Terrible Things. If not, check it out here.  Hope you enjoy.

DC's More Soulful Side

Compared to New York, DC is not colored by the attitudes of fashion or the glitz of the financial industries. Instead DC is primarily a conservative city supported by the rational and scientific institutions like government, law, social non-profits, and so on.   In short, DC can be a little boring due to the nature of it's demographics and the fact that things close early.

However, as of late I discovered that DC does have a soulful, funky side behind the preppy cobblestone streets of Georgetown and the collegiate haunts of Adams Morgan and Dupont Circle.   The now revitalized hip areas of the U street and 14th Street corridors are historically and still presently Black American neighborhoods. The way I see it, the city is trying to preserve it's cultural heritage while still being cool and accessible to the public.  Maybe that's why there are such amazing little establishments like Bus Boys and Poets, a "restaurant, bookstore, fair trade market and gathering place where people can discuss issues of social justice and peace" so named after two opposing jobs held by Langston Hughes. And maybe that's why I was able to see free of charge the controversial Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio and local DC musician Matthew Hemmerlein.  The latter of which is amazingly talented acoustically or playing multiple instruments and managing the sound board as well with his toes.   His song No Fangs is a good example of this.  He's also kinda hot despite the Robert Pattinson-esque spray of untamed hair preceding him.  Check out his website here.

Matthew Hemmerlein on vocals and strings

They were really democratic about accommodating everyone to this free event so we were literally sitting at his feet on the steps to the stage.  This explains the weird angle of the photograph.

Kyp Malone of TV on the Radio

There are of course also speak-easies. This one is called The Gibson and is reservations only for crowd control purposes. It is nowhere as "secretive" as the New York ones though, hence the patio but they make really delicious cocktails. One of their specialties is a cocktail-gelato float like this cognac and champagne selection.  Maybe DC can be a soulful once it loosens it's collar a little.

Toto, I Think We're Back in Kansas

I haven't spent this much time at home since I was on summer break from college. Essentially this is what this is---summer break from work, right? Maybe. As much as I love my family, I spend a great deal of effort trying to be independent from them. No one wants to be like their mothers or be reminded of all the restrictions that youth once imposed before you were making your own money.  Aside from New York City being the best place for design in the US, this was the mindset that made me move away from home.

However, I did make the decision to stop working. I needed to reassess what I wanted in life; whether it was to trudge on as a slave to design for the sake of livelihood or locate my personal goals. Where was I headed and would time slip through my fingers before I had a chance to figure it out? Was New York City really the best place for me or was it a default location other than home?

Well, after 5 months of producing window displays and retail merchandising; 3 months of moonlighting as a corporate caterer; and another 5 months of wandering and mentoring youth in China, I can confidently say that life is fundamentally the same everywhere. It is the person that affects the experience. No mater where you are or what you're doing--perception or mindset really is everything. The concept seems simple now as I write it, but the grass is not greener on the other side or will it magically be greener in the future.  It is the person that waters that grass to make it green.  I don't mean to turn this post in to a philosophy debate, but I do believe we generate our own happiness and that appreciating the present saves you a lot of anguish about the past or anxiety about the future.  Now is all we have.

And so now I am home. And so now while I try not to obsess and agonize over the future of my career and my life, I am grateful to be with my family who are the foundation for everything I am. I am grateful to observe the slight childhood quirks of my two nephews despite the fact they wake me up at 7am everyday pretending to be marauding pirates.  I am grateful for home-cooked meals despite the fact that my mother tends to be an eccentric, experimental cook; and for a roof over my head even though my parents are pack rats and I can never find anything among the piles of clutter.  Finally, I am grateful to live in the DC area and hopefully will unravel a little about this city as an adult that I did not see as a child.