Heads I Win, Tails You're a Lying Bigot

I just read a fascinating article on Huffington Post. It’s written by Shane Windmeyer, a “Nationally recognized LGBT leader in higher education; bestselling author; executive director, Campus Pride,” and it details his contact and eventual friendship with Dan Cathy, of Chick-fil-A “Guilty as charged” fame. Shane discusses Campus Pride’s opposition to Chick-fil-A, the initial surprise phone call he received from Dan (and the hour-long personal conversation it preceded), the numerous in-person meetings he had with Dan, and the “respectful, enduring conversations” they had and the “kindness and openness” Dan constantly and consistently showed. The story culminates in Dan inviting Shane to the Chick-fil-A bowl, which was apparently quite a meaningful experience for Shane. It ends with a call for hope, for the respect, kindness, and “human decency” evident in this relationship to continue and grow between people on both sides of the issue.

Now I know what you’re thinking:

How dare Dan Cathy pretend to befriend a homosexual? Right? And how naive must Shane be to be taken in so completely by this idiotic bigot’s cunning and guile?  The nerve of Dan, to claim to respect someone as a person and still believe that person is living a sinful lifestyle? How dare he?

At least, that’s the response of a significant portion of the comments. While the comments section seems to have mellowed over time, there are still many, many gems to be discovered: A quick skim of the comments during the writing of this post revealed these fine specimens.

• “D Cathy got what he wanted by giving you a feel good moment, and he got none of the downside. He got his pocket gay just as he wanted it. Smart.”
• “Please don’t use your Leadership and Influence to dupe others in the same way that Mr. Cathy has duped Shane. “
• “They’re using you, sir. They are still giving to anti LGBT groups. They still hate you. They’re worried about the impact to their bottom line. They aren’t your friend.”

And these are the mild ones. Let’s take a closer look at the article and see what could have sparked such a strong reaction. First, Dan Cathy takes it on himself to personally contact a high-profile LGBT activist to talk one-on-one with him, during which he comes across as “awkward at times but always genuine and kind.” Dan talks honestly with him, “listening intently” to Shane’s concerns and real-life accounts of the negative results of Chick-fil-A’s public stance. Dan even confesses naivete concerning the unintended consequences of his actions. Dan “embraced the opportunity to have dialogue and hear [Shane’s] perspective,” expresses “a sincere interest in [Shane’s] life,” and “expressed regret and genuine sadness when he heard of people being treated unkindly in the name of Chick-fil-A.”

Now, I know this sounds a lot like what the LGBT community has been asking for: respect, understanding, a recognition of mutual humanity. But one single detail makes all of this meaningless: that Dan “offered no apologies for his genuine beliefs about marriage.” This fact, seemingly a source of respect on the part of Shane, becomes incontrovertible proof to the HP community that Dan Cathy is a villain of absolutely epic proportions, unknown outside of bad books and worse movies: His out-dated beliefs and his obvious, hateful bigotry are outdone only by his sheer animal cunning in so completely hoodwinking a member of the LGBT community for the purposes of either damage control or increasing sales even further.  (Ironically, Shane Windmeyer, by consequence, becomes the unwitting dupe, the naive chump who is taken in wholesale, who needs to be rescued from his delusion of mutual respect and friendship with the dastardly enemy.)

Let’s leave aside the fact that, sales-wise, there’s literally no damage to control. Let’s leave aside the fact that the easiest way to sell still more sandwiches would probably be to go progressive and adopt a catchy, universalist slogan. Let’s even leave aside the fact that conservatives are under fire for demonizing the LGBT comunity, and now a homosexual man is under fire by the same people for not demonizing Dan Cathy.

I’m not going to go into that, because at heart, this is yet another mixup of love and tolerance. Because Dan Cathy does not toleratehomosexuality, because he calls it wrong and sinful, it literally doesn’t matter at all what else he does. As long as that one fact remains true, the secular world will affirm that Dan cannot love a homosexual man, cannot even be friends with him. Because Dan does not toleratehomosexuality, he cannot truly befriend someone who engages in it, who identifies himself as a homosexual. Because Dan believes homosexuality sinful, any appearance of friendship or respect towards Shane is false, deceitful, and manipulative, using Shane as no more than a pawn.

This is because the world sees love and tolerance as one and the same thing. This is obviously false, however, and everyone, even the angriest HP commentator, can see the difference in day-to-day life. If a friend has a broken arm, it is tolerant of me to leave him be: However, it is loving of me to insist that he see a doctor, even if he doesn’t want to. If my grandmother has a mental disorder, it is tolerant of me to affirm her when she says she doesn’t need medication, that nothing’s wrong: But it is loving for me to see that she gets help. Now, love entails a lot more than just that, clearly: it entails care and compassion, a real, personal, and selfless investment in the beloved by the lover. My point is merely that in these cases, and countless others, love is not only distinct from tolerance, but actually diametrically opposed to it. The difference is obvious: Tolerance is apathetic and passive, willing to leave things be, while love is urgent and active, seeking always the good of the beloved.Tolerance is merely the world’s straight-to-VHS rip-off of love: The picture on the cover might be similar, but the content couldn’t be more different–or more disappointing.

The same holds for this situation. There is no doubt in my mind that Dan Cathy loves Shane Windmeyer. And his love is revealed exactly where the HP community sees it as ending: In affirming that Shane’s life is not right, and offering to show him what is. We Christians believe that sin–all sin–harms the sinner. We believe that homosexuality is a sin, and that it harms the one who engages in it. Dan Cathy’s love for Shane shows in the fact that he respects Shane as a person, values his friendship, and still does not tolerate his homosexuality–not out of fear, or bigotry, or hate, but out of love.

Grace in Television

Why is it that there are certain television shows that, despite sharing common themes, could hardly be more different:? How I Met Your Mother and It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, for example, initially struck me as being, on the surface, quite similar. A group of friends in the big city, focusing on their entanglements, romantic and otherwise, with a heavy emphasis on bar life… At first glance, they’re practically the same show! And yet my wife Anna and I just finished watchingHIMYM’s entire run for the second time, whereas I’ve only ever watched 5 episodes of Philadelphia, and each one left me feeling kinda sad.

Dr. Who and Torchwood is another, even more striking example.Torchwood is actually a spin-off of Dr. Who, and the content and setting is, in many cases, very similar. But Dr. Who takes place in a universe full of wonder, where the utter impossibility of a happy ending only makes that inevitable happy ending more marvelous… whereas Torchwood, despite taking place in the same universe, ended its run by taking an unwilling child from the arms of his screaming mother and literally torturing him to death in order to save the planet from aliens.

Finally, the story of the recent film adaptation of Les Miserables has a great deal in common with the 1967 classic Cool Hand Luke. A man is put in prison for a frivolous crime, punished far beyond reason, under the control of a cruel taskmaster, trying again and again to escape but each escape only makes things worse and worse, until finally the main character dies with a smile on his face. Despite these similarities of plot, the tone and atmosphere of the films could hardly be more different.Luke declares the doctrine of a pointless, cruel world, the best response to which is unflagging coolness; the world will kill you eventually, but best to mock it till the very end. Les Miserables, however, despite death and hopelessness on a scale far exceeding the plights of a single man, reminds us again and again that suffering is not meaningless, that our actions can shape the world, and that death is not the end.

But what is the cause of such division? Why does Ted’s (seemingly endless) adventure of meeting his wife enthrall me and Anna, whereas we can hardly make it through an episode of Philadelphia? Why is the Doctor so very happy, and Jack so very sad? Why is Luke left with only a legacy of mocking coolness, and why does Jean Valjean sing triumphantly of the light awaiting the wretched of the earth?

The answer, I think, is a sense of hope. Philadelphia recognizes the essential sadness of existence; Torchwood, the horror and cruelty; andLuke, the essential unfairness and futility. But the others dare to go further. There is deep sadness in HIMYM, but the very title and premise of the show promises that at the end, all of this sadness is redeemed. There is horror and cruelty in Dr. Who, but it is always overcome. And life is unfair to the wretched and downtrodden of France… but to call their struggle futile is to entirely miss the point.

This is, of course, why some prefer shows like Philadelphia. A show about broken, tired people, doing the best they can in their broken, tired lives; sometimes it’s enough, often it’s not. There is no hope for happiness: Not real happiness, anyway, nothing beyond the momentary pleasure that sex and alcohol can provide. And to those who feel that this hopelessness, this futility, accurately reflects reality, thenPhiladelphia is doubtless to be preferred to naive, childish shows likeHIMYM.

They have a point: this is, indeed, how life used to be. The bar life ofPhiladelphia is eerily reminiscent of another, much older account of the hopelessness and futility of life.

But no more, as of 2,000-odd years ago. Because that’s when Love Himself came into the world to give us hope again, to heal our wounds and redeem our souls. We now live in a world that, though broken, will be fixed; though sorrow is real, it will be wiped away; though pain is all around us, it will be ended. That is the world that HIMYM, Dr. Who, andLes Miserables portray, and for that, I love them.

They recognize hope. A hope of redemption, of an undeserved and unexpected happiness waiting for those who only need to reach out their hand and accept it. A hope, at bottom, of a grace that goes beyond the cold, hard, “facts” of existence, that defies the “realism” and cynicism that so attracts our culture today. These shows remind me that Christ came that we might have life, have it to the full, and that we might celebrate in living. And God bless us, he even brought the drinks.

More Than "The Hobbit"

Gandalf the Grey: “Those are goblin Wargs! They will outrun you!

Radagast the Brown: “These are rhosgobel rabbits! I’d like to see them try.”

What kind of movie combines the epic music, breathtaking vistas, and heart-pounding fight scenes of a Hollywood blockbuster with the silly songs and antics of a children’s book?

This movie. And it works (Mostly. Almost entirely. Seriously, it’s reeeeaaaaally close, and I can’t think of a way they could have done it better).

But let’s get down to business. Netting a measly 65% on Rotten Tomatoes, it’s evident that many reviewers have a beef (or mutton, if you’re a troll) with the film. Whether it’s the high frame rate (admittedly a horrible, horrible decision that does nothing to enhance the film and much to distract from it), or the slow, deliberate pacing, it’s evident that many reviewers were expecting something different, and were disappointed with the actual product.

And I will admit that the first 15 minutes filled me with a terrible sense that the reviewers might be right. The high frame rate (48 FPS as opposed to the standard 24) makes the opening minutes of the film seem amateurish and jerky, more like an extremely well-done fan video rather than something coming out of Hollywood. Some points in the “Fall of Erebor” sequence in the beginning reminded me most of the old Narnia movies (the good ones, not the new ones), while other points made me think more of what the video game is sure to be like, wondering when the “cut-scene graphics” would fade into the in-game graphics, and I would pick up the controller to cut my way free of the wreckage.

It was disconcerting and disheartening, to say the least. Nothing about the opening sequence captured the same realism and drama as the storming of Helm’s Deep, or even the many smaller battles of the LOTR trilogy. The high FPS practically screamed “fake” to my poor, indoctrinated eyes and brain. But just as the dwarves–consumed though they were by rage and sorrow at their lost homeland–shouldered their burdens and soldiered on, I, too, decided then and there that I was going to enjoy this film, darn it, and nothing could stop me.

And I have to say from that point on, the film did get progressively better. Although Frodo’s exchange with Bilbo struck me as slightly unnatural, there were some extremely nice touches connecting the story of the Hobbit to the events of the later trilogy: The remembrance/story-telling takes place early on the day of The Party with which the Fellowship opens, and after Frodo’s unnecessary (but thankfully brief) interlude, we witness him heading off “to wait for Gandalf,” holding his book. Bilbo, watching him go, blows a single smoke-ring… and with that, the “real” movie begins.

The dwarves? Brilliant. The dinner scene? Fantastic. The first song, in which the dwarves taunt Bilbo with threats of grievous crockery harm? The intro is a little forced, but the song itself is well-executed but verysilly (as, indeed, any adaptation seeking to preserve the spirit of the book must be). The second song, in which the dwarves lament their lost homeland? Haunting and breathtaking. Rivendell was wonderful, as usual, but Goblin-Town caused me to utter a quite audible “whoa-haha! Look at that!”, much to the amusement of my wife and the irritation of the other moviegoers.

To my surprise and joy, the movie retains many of The Hobbit’s particular quirks: A paragraph detailing the exploits of the rock giants, never again to be seen or mentioned, is transformed into a tense 10-minute interlude of mountains fighting other mountains, with the dwarves caught, quite literally, in between. The trolls are delightful (a term never before used about trolls, but certainly applicable here), and there are many chunks of dialogue lifted whole from the book itself and inserted, quite successfully, into the film.

But of course, no book gets transformed into a movie without somechanges, and a book that’s rather short to begin with  can expect even more transformation when turned into three movies. As someone who really, really hates the two latest Narnia movies for the many [too many negative adjectives to list] changes made to the story, this had me worried as I sat in the theater.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I found myself not only accepting but actually nodding in approval at the vast majority of the changes. The book itself is isolated, and only a concerted effort after the fact can bring it into the larger Middle-Earth narrative. The movie attempts to eliminate that sense of isolation: this is, from the very first scene, a tale of Middle-Earth’s larger battle against the darkness.

Almost all of the changes and embellishments in the film can be traced back to this single motivating idea.  Thorin’s distrust and even hatred of the elves (even the elves of Rivendell) finds its roots not in The Hobbititself, but in the larger narrative that the movie reveals–and in that context, it fits extremely well. The same applies to the discovery of the Ring itself: The audience is never under the illusion that the ring Bilbo finds is anything less than the world-breaking Ring of the trilogy, whereas the book treats it as nothing more than an interesting and useful trinket. The re-taking of Erebor is important as a personal quest of the dwarves, but the quest is much more important as a means of defeating the great power of Smaug before it can be joined to the even greater power of the mysterious Necromancer.

The Necromancer! Discovered by Radagast, believed in by Gandalf and Galadriel (and maybe Elrond), scoffed at by Saruman… even though we only get a brief glimpse of this shadowy figure, accompanied by the characteristic scream of the Nazgul, we are appropriately terrified of him (as is Radagast). Although he merits but a handful of sentences in the book, we already know that he will play a much larger role in the next two films.

This first installment left me happy with the decision to expand the story. The movie (as I had hoped) is fantastic. The project is, thus far, a resounding success. The Hobbit is being transformed from an isolated and amusing tale into one more amazing and epic battle in the yet more amazing and epic war against the greater darkness of Middle-Earth.

The End of the Great Depression

“What exists now is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done; there is nothing truly new on earth. Is there anything about which someone can say, “Look at this! It is new!”? It was already done long ago, before our time… I, the Teacher, have been king over Israel in Jerusalem. I decided to carefully and thoroughly examine all that has been accomplished on earth. I concluded: God has given people a burdensome task that keeps them occupied. I reflected on everything that is accomplished by man on earth, and I concluded: Everything he has accomplished is futile—like chasing the wind! What is bent cannot be straightened, and what is missing cannot be supplied.”

Ecclesiastes 1:9-10, 12-15

The world of Ecclesiastes is old, stale, and hopeless. Solomon, husband of many wives, victor of many battles, possessor of great wealth, wonders if any of it is worth it. If the wise die in the same way as the foolish, if the rich suffer the same fate as the poor, if the good man fares the same as the evil man, why even make an effort? Even his last words carry the same sense of melancholy and hopelessness. “The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for that is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.” Fear God and obey him, because it is your duty: it will not help you in life, it may not help you in death, you will still die the same as an evil man… but it is your duty nonetheless.

And that was the end of the matter. There was nothing more to said, nothing more to be heard, because even the words of the wise were vain and meaningless.

And then something happened that had never happened before. A new star appeared in the heavens and a company of angels sang to the shepherds of Bethlehem, because God had been wrapped in swaddling clothes and was lying in a manger. A living child had been born into a world of skeletons. Here, finally, was something new, something that that was not vanity and a chasing after the wind.

God was a child. He had friends, he played games with them, he skinned his knees, he was hungry and thirsty and tired. And then God grew up and was a man. He was sarcastic and biting towards some people and utterly kind and gentle towards others. He was enraged at the misuse of the temple and driven to tears by the death of a friend. He had friends and ate and drank and slept under the stars when he could have had an angelic canopy.

And as we think about these things we must remember one simple truth: God does not do meaningless things.

And this does not just apply to his “kingdom work.” The ultimate proof of this is his very first miracle in John 2, unplanned and spontaneous. This is evident from his response to Mary: “What does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come.” Such a response indicates that the forthcoming miracle has nothing to do with “his hour,” his primary purpose. But he does it anyway. He has the jars filled with water and by the time the first cup reached the master of the feast, it is no longer water but the finest wine that had yet been served.

God does not do meaningless things. There were any number of ways to make his disciples believe in him, if that was his only goal. There were many ways to demonstrate his power, his authority, his deity. He could have made the water disappear: he could have turned it into grape juice (as some Christians fervently wish he had). But instead he chose to turn it into wine, and not  just any wine; he turned it into the finest wine of the feast, wine so good that it made all the other wine pale in comparison. We must acknowledge this amazing truth: that God did something not just to further his mission, not just to make his disciples believe in him, but to help people celebrate a wedding with the best wine of the feast, the ultimate example of extravagance.

God does not do meaningless things. And that means that the world of Ecclesiastes is gone forever.

Because of Christmas, everything is no longer vanity and meaningless: instead, everything assumes a colossal importance. Even “neutral” things like eating or sleeping become full of meaning when we consider that God himself has done these things as well. When we eat, even a snack, we are reminded that God has done the same. When we sleep, we are reminded that God did too. When we attend a wedding, we remember that in doing so we walk in the footsteps of Christ.

Life is full of meaning: I might even say full to bursting. Serving God is no longer a mere duty; it is instead a privilege, an honor, a gift, as we walk this new world and think of Christ taking his first steps in Bethlehem.

The Great Depression

The Old Testament tells a lot of stories. Sad, heartbreaking stories; miraculous, uplifting stories; and stories of life, love, friendship, and epic heroism.  But behind all of the stories, behind the travels of Abraham, the trials of the Israelites, behind even the victories of David and the temple of Solomon lies what Blindside calls the Great Depression, what T.S. Eliot describes as the land of the hollow men. Behind all of the stories lie the sin of Adam, the wail of Ecclesiastes, and the Valley of Dry Bones.

The sin of Adam haunts everything. Every birth, every field, every death is a reminder that mankind and even the very ground itself is cursed: All men die eventually, and what then? Dust, mere motes of earth floating for a while in the breeze, waiting to be dispersed. The kingdoms of man, built with blood and sweat, will last but a little longer than those that built it. Everything fades.

And worst of all, nothing can be done about it. It’s possible to forget about it, for a time. It’s possible to lose sight of it in battle, in worship, in life. But it is always there, waiting to be remembered again. And that’s what Ecclesiastes is: Ecclesiastes is the book that the wisest man in the world wrote when he ran out of distractions. Ecclesiastes is what happens when war, women, and wine lose their novelty, and the greatest intellect in the world is forced to look, really look at the world, and ask what good it all is.

And  he comes up empty. He searches all the world–wisdom and folly, indulgent pleasure and productive work, righteousness and sinfulness–and finds nothing but a huge, terrifying void. Mankind throws everything it has into life and fails to make a single dent in the ever-looming Nothingness. The sun rises on hopeless humanity toiling away at their meaningless existence and by the time it sets, there has been no change. Well, no change save one: everyone is now one day closer to death, to Sheol, to the place where good and evil alike must inevitably go, never to be seen again. Almost all of Ecclesiastes can be summed up in one verse: “What is bent cannot be straightened, and what is missing cannot be supplied.”

The wisest man in the world sets out to find meaning, and he comes to the conclusion that there is none. Existence is a dull, bleak thing, not to be thought of because the thinking of it is too terrible.  And Ezekiel’s prophetic vision of Israel offers a similarly bleak diagnosis. “The hand of the Lord was on me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and placed me in the midst of the valley, and it was full of bones. He made me walk all around among them. I realized there were a great many bones in the valley and they were very dry… Then he said to me, “Son of man, these bones are all the house of Israel. Look, they are saying, ‘Our bones are dry, our hope has perished; we are cut off.’”  Israel, the Chosen People of God, the singularly blessed nation, is no more than dusty bones. Their hope has perished, and they are utterly cut off.

Skeletons, going through life hoping to one day not be skeletons… but knowing, at the bottom of where their hearts should be, that such a thing is entirely impossible. Skeletons chasing the wind, clutching at it with bony fingers, collapsing into the dust into which, with a little patience, they will soon dissolve. This is the state of the entire world before the first Christmas. This is the state of every man, woman, and child before Something New came into the dead, never-changing world and changed it forever.

“Mystical, Profound, and Truly Wonderful”

“The mystery of Christ runs the risk of being disbelieved precisely because it is so incredibly wonderful. For God was in humanity. He who was above all creation was in our human condition; the invisible one was made visible in the flesh; he who is from the heavens and from on high was in the likeness of earthly things; the immaterial one could be touched; he who is free in his own nature came in the form of a slave; he who blesses all creation became accursed; he who is all righteousness was numbered among transgressors; life itself came in the appearance of death.”

-St. Cyril of Alexandria, On the Unity of Christ

Cyril calls the Incarnation many things: “Mysterious,” “truly wonderful,” “incomprehensible,” “profound,” a “strange and rare paradox.” Turn to almost any page in his treatise and you will find him extolling the many and varied virtues of Christ’s “holy, wonderful, and truly amazing birth and life.”  And the reason for this rampant rejoicing, this extravagant ecstasy, this passionate, persistent, poetic praise? Simply this: “he who is and exists from all eternity, as he is God, underwent birth from a woman according to the flesh;” in the Incarnation, “God was in humanity.”

To Cyril, the Christian faith hangs on the fact that the being named Jesus, who was born into a dirty stable from a human mother, who walked with dusty feet along the paths of Judea, who was hungry, and thirsty, and tired, was and is utterly and completely God and utterly and completely man. In the being named Jesus of Nazareth we see God and man in one person. 

And the picture of God painted by the Old Testament demonstrates how stunning, how incomprehensible, how graceful and marvelous such a union is.  God laid the foundations of the world. He determined its measurements. He has commanded the morning since there was a morning to command. He has created marvelous things, including man from the dust of the ground. He speaks out of the whirlwind, out of the storm, out of a blinding, radiant cloud.

His arm is strong, his voice is thunderous, his place is on high. He is a pillar of fire that lights up the dark. He is waited on by seraphim who eternally sing his praise. He is All-Sufficient, Lord of Hosts, the Holy One of Israel. His very name is so holy that it cannot even be spoken. He is God, and not a man.

And then the Most High God is born in a cave, below even the ground. The God that spoke out of the whirlwind cries out from an empty feeding trough. The Shepherd of Israel is chided by his parents. The creator of heaven and earth learns to help his father craft chairs and tables. The All-Sufficient One hungers and thirsts, and falls from weariness. The Lord of Hosts is a wanderer, with nowhere to lay his head. One of his names is spoken with scornful familiarity by those who dare not utter the other.

“God was in humanity.” Every word here is vitally important to the Christian faith. God, in the full sense of the term, in all majesty, power, and divinity, fully entered into humanity in a way that had never happened before. God was born of a woman. God was truly human.

A Lifetime of Memories

“For Mackenzie, Christmas 1996,

May you always be as brave as Aragorn, as wise as Gandalf, as compassionate as Frodo, and as loyal as Sam.

Love, The Fruguglieties

God Bless you!”

I don’t remember the first time I read The Hobbit, but I do know that I read it from an ancient, yellowing copy given to me by my father, and several pages had fallen out and been hastily stuffed (approximately) back into place by the time I had finished, to be lost and regained upon each subsequent reading. I remember many of those later readings, but alas! The first was too early, and has been replaced by memories of (doubtlessly) lesser importance. But I do remember the first time I readThe Lord of the Rings. I read it from a red leather-bound book given to me as  a Christmas present by my Auntie Anne (a fellow Tolkien fanatic) when I was eight years old. I read it (I believe) in 14 days, and I remember because my parents had told me that I would receive a certain sum of money upon completion, a portion of which would be taken away for each day the book remained unfinished (it wasn’t a bribe: I think it was more of an experiment to see how fast I could finish it).

In any case, it was utterly unnecessary. I don’t remember how much money I eventually earned. But oh, do I remember the reading…

I remember sleepily marking my place not just with a bookmark but with a hastily-pencilled-in star to mark the precise paragraph at which to resume reading, and then turning off the light and lying down for bed… only to finally re-don my glasses just a few minutes later, turning the light back on and continuing far into the night. I remember anxiously awaiting further news of Merry and Pippin, and being confused at reading of the same event from different perspectives (Wait, but the Uruk-hai were just destroyed… did Merry and Pippin get captured by another maurauding Orc band?).  I remember walking into my dad’s office, massive tome in hand, begging him to tell me if Frodo was really dead.

I was eight years old, and I remember much of it like it was yesterday. The book, of course, has not made it through this journey unscathed. Looking over it now, many of the pencil-stars remain. The pages are stained not with blood or tears, but with the food and drink which were not nearly important enough to warrant putting the book down to consume. Certain pages are marked with not one, but two or even three distinct dog-eared creases from multiple readings. The spine hangs off of it, completely detached from the front cover. Yet the golden inscription on the front, the inscription of the doors of Moria, remains as brilliant as the day I unwrapped it… as do my memories.

And I remember the silly Hobbit animated movie, in which the elves of Mirkwood are strange, blue creatures and death is symbolized by the spinning, spiraling spectacles of someone discovering the “rotate” function for the first time. I remember the somewhat more seriousFellowship animated movie, which extended into The Two Towers, complete with a preview of The Return of the King which was never to be fulfilled (to my knowledge).

And then, exiting the theater for a movie I don’t even remember, I saw a face and a hand holding a golden ring. Running up to the poster, uttering frantic  disbelieving  half-sentences, then reading the text below and exclaiming that Yes, it is, it’s happening in December Mom we HAVE to see it we HAVE to tell Dad. And we did tell Dad, and we saw it together. I don’t remember who else saw it with us (logic would dictate we were accompanied by my younger brother Oliver), but I remember seeing it with my dad, that first time and then again and again in theaters and at home, as (mostly) everything we had imagined impossibly came to life in front of us. And then anxiously awaiting The Two Towers and The Return of the King, and buying the movies at least twice because in a house with eight children, movies just don’t last very long.

And now it’s happening again. Sweet folksy metaphor,  it’s happening again.  A month ago, when my dad came to visit me and Anna, I showed him the trailer for The Hobbit on YouTube, and he was as excited as I was. In another month, we will see it together; my dad, my wife and I (and whoever else wants in). The memories will continue.