For Brianna, Tyler, and Darion

As I'm sure everyone knows, on Saturday, there was a shooting at the Columbia Mall.  The shooter killed two workers at Zumie's and also himself.  I found out about it shortly after the shooting started, while the police were just getting involved.  Needless to say, much of Saturday was spent watching the news and frantically texting and calling everyone I know back home to make sure everyone was okey.  I knew several people who might have gone to the mall that morning.

I feel strange being thankful that nobody I know was hurt.  I feel grateful for this out of love for my own friends and family, but it feels like a betrayal to the family and friends of the victims.

I don't really have anything profound or eloquent to say about what happened; I am merely asking you all to join me in prayer for the victims and for the shooter, and for their families and friends who are grieving.  Especially for the orphaned daughter of Brianna, and for Darion's family—I don't think anyone saw this coming, and I can't imagine the pain they are feeling.  May God pour His peace into the situation.

Stanines (or, Statistics is silly)

As an undergrad, I took a statistics class in the math department, and bunch of my friends took statistics for psychology or statistics for engineering.  Whenever we'd try to compare notes, nothing made sense, because everything was labeled differently in the different fields of statistics.  There were some concepts that had several different names (sometimes even within the same field), which was confusing until we realized that we were actually talking about the same things.  Likewise, there were some names that labeled several different concepts, which was even more confusing, because we'd think we were talking about the same thing and then later realize that we were actually talking about different things.  We decided that the average number of names per item is one; the names are just distributed unevenly.  (We were too frustrated to figure out the standard deviation.)

So I had already come to the conclusion that statistics is a silly field.  Very useful, but very silly, especially in the names department.

And then this week in my Assessment class, I learned about "stanines", or "standard nines".  That's right, statisticians made up that name by smushing two words together, or blending, as linguists like to say.  Like "Brangelina" or "spork" or "linner".  (I have a good friend who wrote a rather long paper on the rules for blending in English, so I find the concept fascinating.)  This is hilarious!  Apparently it was first used during WWII by the US Army Air Force.  I can just imagine the statisticians sitting up late at night trying to decide how to divide up the normal curve:

Statistician 1:  Should we divide it into tenths?  That makes sense.
Statistician 2:  Too cliché.
Statistician 3:  Also, if we use an odd number, the mean will be contained within a category.
Statistician 1:  Fine, then let's try.... um, nine?
Statistician 3:  Oh, that's great!  Then all of our scores can be recorded with single digits!  I hate double-digit numbers, don't you guys?
Statisticians 2:  ...I guess....
(scribbling)
Statistician 3:  Hey, if we fudge these edge categories, all the middle ones could be a half of a Standard Deviation.  That's a nice unit!
Statistician 2:  ...Okey.... What should we call it?
Statistician 1:  How about Sta-nine?
Statisticians 2 and 3:  (blank stares)
Statisician 1:  Get it?  Standard nine—stanine?  Because they're standard, and there's nine of them!  Well, they're mostly standard, anyway.  Ignore the edge ones.
Statisticians 2 and 3:  Whatever.

In case you're wondering, a stanine is a unit of a half a standard deviation (except the two at the very edges), and there are nine of them in the normal curve (including the weird edge ones).  According to wikipedia, stanines are only used by the US education system and also the New Zealand education system.  And get this—there's another similar system called the "sten" system.  (I bet you can guess what two words are being blended there.)  The sten system seems unduly complicated to me; maybe I'll stick to stanines if ever I have the choice.

In conclusion:  Statisticians are bad at naming things.

A prayer for this very influential day

I would like to offer up a prayer.  Will you pray with me?  Even if you disagree with my opinion, I encourage you to at least read through the prayer to the end.

In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit:

Dear God, I would like to pray today for everyone who the world doesn't listen to, doesn't understand, and doesn't seem to value.  This includes people who are very old, people who have severe physical disabilities, people with mental illnesses and mental disabilities, women who have been abused and violated, men and women in prison, people awaiting the death penalty, people in war-torn countries, people who haven't been born yet, people who were born prematurely and are in the NICU, kids who are bullied at school, people with no homes, and even people who are just afraid to speak up because they don't believe they matter.  God, help them to open their hearts and realize that You love them unconditionally—that You love *every single one of us* unconditionally.  And that you are not a God who condemns, but a God who forgives!

Help us to value our brothers and sisters, no matter their status, no matter their age, no matter their abilities or experiences or opinions.  Please teach us to be compassionate toward every single person, that we might be Your hands in the world to bring healing and stop the hurting.

On this day especially I would like to offer up a prayer for healing in all the lives that have been affected by abortion and all related moral questions.  For every woman who believes that abortion is her best—or her only—option.  For every woman who has been mocked, ostracized, and judged for getting pregnant out of wedlock, especially those whose families were/are not supportive.  For every woman who has been raped or abused or feels marginalized or dehumanized or devalued in any way.  For every woman who has had an abortion—especially those who suffer from depression afterward.  For every clinician who has performed an abortion or been involved in the procedure.  For every child whose life has been ended by abortion—especially those whose lives were ended because of positive test results for DOWN syndrome and other "complications".  For the survivors of abortions.  For every child who feels unwanted by their family.  Dear Lord, hold all these people close to Your sacred heart and breathe healing into them; replace the negative feelings of shame, loneliness, and pain with Your positive grace and love.

Dear God, I know that those involved in the abortion industry really believe that what they are doing is good—they believe that they are protecting women from unnecessary suffering (which is a noble and worthy goal!).  I also know that our society hasn't really come up with a scientifically consistent way to define "personhood".  We have had this problem in the past, Lord, and by Your grace our society has made some positive steps forward during the various civil rights movements in our nation and our world.  I pray that everyone on *both* sides of the abortion issue has the patience, compassion, and respect to listen to the opinions of those who disagree.  And especially on a day like today, help us all not to judge other people for their opinions or actions regarding the matter of abortion.  Only then can we move forward as a society, Lord, to best protect those who need protecting.  I would like to offer up a special prayer that whatever decision is made regarding personhood that it is a scientifically sound/consistent decision that takes into account the value of a human life.

And on a positive note, I would like to thank You for every child ever born, and for every mother—and for every adoptive mother too!

Please help us to better value our children and our women, Lord, and to protect the life of every human person from conception to natural death.  Help guide us to make the best decisions to protect *every* person from death, from pain, and from feeling unloved or overlooked.

In Your Holy name, Lord Jesus, we pray for healing in this angry, broken world.  Amen.

It's finally happened!

I would just like to let you all know that I have crossed an important barrier in my life.  Yesterday, I had never done official speech therapy before.  As of today, I have.

That's right, I started treating clients today!  I'll be doing this four days a week for the rest of the semester.  I've got three sets of clients and things are picking up in the laboratorio and I've still got a full courseload, so I'm über excited and also über busy.  Apologies in advance for fewer drawings this semester.

Anyway, this was a super important occasion in my life.  Praise God!

*victory dance*

Delicious Chickeny Chili-ish Stuff

I got a rice cooker for Christmas, and it is kind of my new favorite thing.

Here's a fun recipe I made today (and it was warm and waiting for me when I got home from school!):

2 chicken thighs
1 can of black beans
about a cup of rice
two tomatoes, diced
half an onion, diced
half a large flour tortilla (ripped into small bits)
some water (I had to put some in for the rice cooker)
1 tbsp (?) garlic
1 tbsp (?) basil
1 tbsp (?) salt
1 tbsp (?) oregano
1 tsp (or more) paprika or hot pepper of choice
1 tsp black pepper
about 1/4 cup of olive oil

Slow cook; the chicken gets really tender that way.  Enjoy!  Serves three?  It depends how hungry you are.

Ol' Muddy Miss

The Mississippi River has been creeping into my consciousness, gently nudging itself into my fascinations over many years.  Starting with the fact that to spell it you have to say a poem.  Granted, it's a silly poem, but it's still a poem, in a way.  It's showed up in literature probably more than I remember; I can think of several stories centered around the Mississippi River.  My favorite is probably the story of Huckleberrry Finn and his long journey down the river with Jim.  And the one about the kids who try to smuggle an elephant via steamboat.  Occasionally, I liked to imagine myself on a steamboat traveling down the Mississippi River (or a raft, like Huck!).

I got to see the Mississippi for the first time (I think) when I went to my cousin's wedding last year in Saint Louis.  She wasn't much—the river, I mean—just a wide dark streak through the city.  But still, I was sort of intrigued.  I especially liked looking down at her from the famous arch, trying to follow her with my eyes as she slithered to the horizon and beyond.

Saint Louis is a cool city, from what little I saw.  We breakfasted in a casino, and the darkened room made me think of prohibition days, when a place like that would have been alive with jazz music and flappers and finely dressed gentlemen who were probably pretending to be richer than they were.  And that arch—the gateway to the west—at the same time admirable and extremely vain, simultaneously claustrophobic and sturdily comforting.

Today, as I flew from home to home (from Maryland to Dallas), I had a layover in New Orleans.  As the plane began to descend, I was glued to the window, watching the Ol' Muddy Miss snake through the city.  We flew over bayous with little tributaries like capillaries running through the muck.  The occasional lake/puddle glittered in the sunlight.  And then there was the Mississippi, unmistakable in her usual brown garb, sprawled all over the place, turning this way and that through the city.

New Orleans is a paradox by nature.  Geologically speaking, the southernmost wiggly bit of the Mississippi should have moved by now, but humans have done their best to keep her where she's at.  A lot of the city is in flood plains (hence the miseries of Hurricane Katrina).  And yet the city seems so vibrant, so determined, so alive.  So much music and so much language and so much food and so much art has come from there.  (At the airport, I ate jumbalaya, and now I'm determined to find a good recipe.  If takeout jumbalaya is this good, it must be divine homemade!)

The lady sitting next to me from Baltimore to New Orleans told me it's a horrible place during Mardi Gras, and to stay away from the French Quarters.  The man who sat next to me from New Orleans to Dallas told me he loves the excitement, and that he had just been staying in the French Quarter to really experience the unique culture of New Orleans.

I have spent so much time exploring the world outside the borders, I'm only beginning to appreciate the beauty that the US has to offer.  I think I might travel the Mississippi River someday.

I'll finish this post with a poem written by Tracy Butler.  Enjoy Lackadaisy Dithyramb, some thoughts on the fascinating Old Man River.

The "E" word

I am a middle East Coaster through and through.  I grew up learning that evangelization is oppressive.

From an atheistic point of view, evangelization is oppressive—one religious group tells another group to conform to the first group's ideologies and cultural practices.  It would seem that the first group has a superiority complex.  That point of view has unfortunately been supported by plenty of evidence—evangelization has historically been done very poorly by some religious groups.  However, it has also often been done very kindly and very well—a fact that history seems to ignore.

What?  Evangelization can be good?  This was difficult for me to wrap my mind around a few years ago.  Even today, sometimes the word "evangelization" causes me to cringe.  Its strong negative connotation is difficult to overcome.

Evangelization can definitely be seen as oppressive if the basic assumption of all parties is that God does not exist.  However, if anyone involved believes that God does exist, evangelization is a natural part of life.  It isn't an imposition of culture and ideology, but rather an invitation to know God more fully and enter into a deeper relationship with Him.   Whether you're Muslim, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, Jewish, etc.—if you believe that your religion is the truth, and that knowing the truth is freeing, it is only natural that you'd want to share your beliefs with people!  Similarly, if you are an Atheist and believe God does not exist, you probably want to convince others of this so they can fully understand that what you believe is the truth.

Evangelization is an intellectual invitation to explore the truth.  If there is such a thing as truth, then the best way to find out what it is probably to learn as much as we can—then, using philosophy and reason (and guidance from the Holy Spirit), we can decide what makes the most sense to us and why.  In this way, evangelization can be used as an intellectual tool for society as we all seek to know the truth.  

(Learning doesn't change the nature of truth, just our own knowledge of it.  Whether we all decide to believe different things or the same things, God either exists or He doesn't.)

What does the Bible say about this?  "Test everything and keep the good" (1 Thessalonians 5:21).  Test everything.  That means don't ignore your friends when they disagree with you—listen to what they have to say and really think about if it makes sense.  How can we be passionate believers if we do not test our beliefs?

For those of us who do believe in God, there is an added incentive—not only do we want to everyone discern the truth, but we also want them to get to know the God who loves them more than they could ever imagine—just the way they are.  We want to share the joy that comes from a strong relationship with God.

A few years ago, I was on a retreat in Kumasi, Ghana.  One afternoon, we were told to go around the neighborhood and "evangelize".  I was taken aback.  We were evangelizing?  On purpose?  Ghanaian Catholicism was more charismatic than what I was used to back in the States, but this was taking it to a dangerous level.  Wary, I collected my Bible and followed a group of my friends.  But instead of preaching fire and brimstone, we asked our neighbors if they wanted us to pray with them.  The leader of our group had some Bible verses ready—verses that invited people to have a positive relationship with God.  There was no theology debate, no philosophical argument—just encouraging words and prayer.  Everyone really loved it.  One lady even evangelized back, inviting us to her church.

In the barrio in Santo Domingo, evangelization took on a new sort of urgency.  The youth group there was reaching out to get kids and teens into the church and away from the gangs and drug dealing culture.  They really wanted their peers to come to the church and join a positive community fueled by the love and mercy of God.  The most likely alternatives were actually pretty dangerous.

And in Maryland, the group Christlife has helped me to begin to overcome my fear of the idea of evangelization.  The purpose of this group is to bring people closer to God, to build them up and help them to feel His love.  Christlife is dedicated to evangelizing in a positive way—inviting, encouraging.  We do this by praying, by having intellectual discussions, by listening to others' thoughts and ideas, and even by just being inviting and kind.  When we evangelize, we are acting not as teachers, but as servants and friends.  These are things I had previously never associated with evangelization.

Last year, I went on an ACTS retreat—and I was evangelized.  I don't even know how to describe how loved I felt on that retreat.  I never felt like I was being patronized or told I was inferior.  What I felt was that I was wanted—by the group of women I was with and also by God.

I have been evangelized many times by people of different faiths also, and it makes me feel good that they want to share their beliefs with me.  Even if (after thinking it through) I don't agree with what they're saying, I am grateful that they are reaching out to me.  It is a lovely thing to feel invited.

Last week during a Christlife gathering, someone said, "This mission—it's urgent.  People are perishing without Jesus every day."  

That is a sentence I didn't want to hear, because it calls me to action.  I would be much more comfortable returning to the old way of life, where I was taught to speak politically correctly, to never offend anyone.  The life where the name "Jesus" was rarely uttered in mixed company, and where at best I was called to defend my opinion for the sake of my own reputation.  But the mission is urgent.  I have experienced the freedom that comes with knowing God and knowing that He loves us so much He sent down His son to free us from our imperfections.  I have experienced the joy that comes with physical union with Him in the Eucharist.  Sometimes I am so filled with that joy that I think I might burst if I don't share it.

Sharing the love of God doesn't always mean having theological discussions or asking strangers if they want to be prayed for in the street (although both of those things can be beautiful).  Most often, it is more subtle—an invitation, an encouraging thought, being a witness in a tough situation, respectfully agreeing to disagree, humbly admitting our faults.

But sometimes it isn't subtle at all.  Sometimes we are called to be loud!

Evangelization is not evil—it is natural.  And I am trying not to be so afraid of it.  Pray for me, my friends, that I might learn how to best share the truth about God with others.  And that I learn that "spreading the Gospel" is a good thing—an invitation to experience God's love more fully.

Vocal Folds

What better way to start the new year than to play games with your larynx?!

The larynx is, after all, where the sound of your voice actually begins.  It is the source of your voice.  So let's start off the year by talking about where your voice starts.

Remember how I showed you guys my larynx model a while back?  Go ahead and touch your throat again to find it—remember it's the adam's apple in dudes.  Now I'm going to tell you about what's inside the larynx.

Inside of your larynx, you have two sets of vocal folds.  On top are the "false" vocal folds, which really just provide extra protection for the larynx.  The bottom set of vocal folds are the "true" vocal folds—they are the part of the larynx that vibrate when you make voiced sounds.  Remember how your throat feels different when you say "buzzzz" vs. "hissss"?  When you voice the "z" in "buzzzzzzz", your vocal folds are vibrating, flapping open and closed, open and closed.

 

The speed at which the vocal folds are vibrating provides the fundamental frequency of your voice—which is perceived as pitch.  If you are singing an A, at 440 Hz, that means your vocal folds are opening and closing 440 thousand times a second.

You want to know how they do it?  It's super exciting.

A long time ago, back in the cave days or something, people thought that each flap of the vocal folds was a muscular contraction—that the vocal fold muscles were purposefully flapping open and closed bajillions of times per second.

Now we know that's just silly—no nerve could tell the vocal folds to move that fast!  Instead, the muscles of the larynx hold the vocal folds tightly closed.  As air pressure builds up in your throat below the vocal folds, it pushes them open!  But the muscles of the vocal folds are still trying to hold them closed.  Thanks to the force from the muscles and also Bernoulli's principle, the vocal folds quickly return to their closed position.  You're still breathing out at this point, so air pressure builds up again and pushes the vocal folds open again, and then they close again, and you get the idea.  Lather, rinse, repeat.  Thousands of times per second.

Are you read for a fancy phrase?  You just learned the myoelastic aerodynamic theory of phonation.  Cool, huh?

And if you're ready for a pretty gross video, check out these gorgeous vocal folds!  This video gives a good slow-mo vision of vocal folds.  It doesn't have sound until the end for some reason.  It was taken by shoving a camera back into someone's throat; the bottom of the video is the front of the larynx (the epiglottis), and the top of the video is the back of the larynx (the arytenoid cartilages).

Happy 2014, everyone!