Monday, July 28, 2008

Rambling on about Stuff

We had the most beautiful display last night -- a lightning show from an oncoming storm. Hunk O Man and I watched it as we drove home from the movies. We actually had a date.

We saw "The Dark Knight" and "The X-Files." I was disappointed in both movies. But the Light Show from God made up for it on the way home.

I am a huge fan of Sci-Fi. Although there isn't much good on television, there is great stuff in print and occasionally in movies. My favourite movie of all time is Star Wars -- the one that came out in 1977. I've faithfully watched all the Star Trek series until "Enterprise" -- just couldn't get into that one. I liked X-Files while it was on television, and liked the first movie. I loved the series "Beauty and the Beast" until the very last season, when it just got stupid. And my favourite television show currently is "Battlestar Galactica."

The thing I like about Galactica -- or virtually every Sci-Fi thing I read or see -- is that it's about everything familiar to me -- politics, human relationships, everyday life problems, parenting -- all put into an unfamiliar setting. I love the juxtaposition of these two things. Simple things like murder mysteries take on a whole new light when the victim has been shot out of an airlock into dead space.

My favourite episode of Star Trek: Next Generation is "The Measure of a Man," the one where some scientist from nowhere wants to disassemble Data, the beloved android crew member, and study him in order to recreate him. This opens up a huge discussion through the show about the rights of humans, the rights of non-humans, what constitutes a person, views on "disposable people" and slavery, who gets to be the judge when there is no standard judicial forum available, and ultimately, laying down one's life and will and identity in order to save a friend.

This was some of the best writing I have ever heard or seen in my life. I am not a fan of Whoopi Goldberg -- but she has some of the best lines in it. If you ever have the chance to see it, you should. That makes me wonder if it's on YouTube. I should investigate that.

This X-Files movie was supposed to be about all these sorts of things -- the complexities of human relationships amid a sci-fi setting -- but it failed me miserably. I left the theater thinking "that's it? Just a story about Frankenstein?" Of course Roger Ebert says it's much more -- but honestly, I thought all that sappy angst about when to give up was kind of trite.

The Dark Knight was just, well, dark. We didn't see the end of it. We left to catch X-Files.

I think I am getting to an age when I just don't want dark things in my brain anymore. I'm finished with that phase of life when I am curious about the darkness. I'm not afraid of it, especially after reading today when Paul says to the Corinithians "It's all right to have a childlike unfamiliarity with evil; a simple no is all that's needed there." (I Cor 14:20, from "The Message")
A simple no. Can you imagine? Just saying no to evil. I suppose that's what I want to do as I get older. Fill my brain with the things of God, like that lightning show last night. The amazing things are found in goodness, rather than the unseen mysteries of darkness. I wish I'd realised this when I was 20. I think I would be a better person today.

Ok, brief ramble is over. Back to the homemaking and parenting and sewing and decorating.

And praying for the latest folks killed and wounded in a bomb blast in an Istanbul marketplace . . .

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