[faux] wes anderson film festival.
I love Wes Anderson films. To me, they are probably the most creative forms of cinematography ever created. You may not think so, but hey, you’re entitled to you opinion.
Anyhoo, I was surfing the net (as the youngsters say) and came across Room Service [go here for deliciousness]. Room Service is a store in Cleveland that is dedicated to…the people of Cleveland. They put some pretty interesting things on their blog and I came across a graphic designer, Alex Cornell, who was working on a piece for a graduate course he was taking. He created all of the promotional material for a Wes Anderson film festival only it wasn’t real.
Alex thought of everything. From posters to records and DVD’s to a film trailer. It was almost entirely created by him.
Check out some of his work…
Front of faux album of wes anderson music
The same
A bus stop advertisement
A taxi advertisement
A poster promoting the film festival
There are a lot more at his site that you should probably go and visit. Here is another link that you might find interesting as well!
And now, my favorite part is the trailer he created to promote the film festival (Wes Anderson style…of course!)…
Enjoy.
speechless.
I am in my first Seminary class & I am learning many things. Some things are a “refresher” course from my undergraduate and some are brand new concepts that I had never heard before now.
Last night, I was reading about the Thomastic Argument for the existence of God (riveting stuff…I know!). This view talks about cause and effect. I am an effect. I am here because of a cause (my parents). When I become a parent, I will become a cause as well. My parents are both a cause and an effect because of their parents and so on and so forth.
What does that mean for God. Well, God is an uncaused cause. He is not limited by time, nor space. It gives a whole new meaning to The Alpha & The Omega. He was there when He created time and He will be there long after the last period is placed within the story of redemption. There is no beginning for God, He simply is the beginning. No one created God (effect), but He did create everything (cause). Thus explaining the uncaused cause.
This reminds me of a talk I once went to in Cleveland. Rob Bell was presenting and he stated something that I had been taught before but never actually really paid much attention to. He stated that when God called Moses up on the mountain, He used very specific language. God said to Moses, “…be on the mountain.” What God was saying was for Moses to not worry about how much energy he was going to exert when getting up on the mountain and don’t worry about the journey down the mountain. When you are on the mountain, be on the mountain. Be present, be fully here where you are.
Now, this was a great reminder for me. Since I am a created effect (and soon in the near future) will be a cause, I am limited to where I am in the present. I cannot travel back into time and I cannot see into the future. I only have the here and now! I only have the present. What a fascinating created universe of time, space and matter we live in! I have no other choice than to be fully present where I am right now! Through the tragedy and through the triumph, God wants us to be in those things.
So, I ask you…
Are you fully present right here, right now? And, does being here in the present cause you to be speechless?
I am speechless.
blimp.
Here’s a picture I took on Sunday outside of our church. The blimp was headed downtown.
gustave dore.
I love art.
I love the feeling I get when I look at a piece of art. There’s something inside of me that says, “yes”. Gustave Dore (pronounced: Gust-aa-v Dor-e), a French literary illustrator makes me say, “yes”. He is probably my favorite artist. He has done illustrated works for “The Divine Comedy”, “Dante’s Inferno”, Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven” and the French Bible. One of my favorite pieces is the illustrated piece of Amos. His attention to detail is impeccable and you can almost see the anguish and reluctance in Amos’ face over telling a group of people their short comings (see the book of Amos).
Here are a few of Dore’s pieces of work. Some are from The Bible and some are from other famous literary pieces.
Oh, and by the way, Amos will probably (hopefully) be my next tattoo (a partial sleeve perhaps).
Enjoy…
Amos
The Great Deluge (The Flood)
The Creation of Light
Paradise Lost
Dante’s Inferno (The Titans)
write.
I have been writing quite a bit lately. In my off blog time (not intentional…just lazy), I was able to write and reflect on what was going on around me. I wrote about my internship in the hospital, the future and prayers. My moleskin pages have seen a more vulnerable side of me. To me there is something about physically writing that helps me to focus and reflect on certain things in life that make perfect sense and things that don’t make sense at all.
I love that I can choose to either publish my thoughts or keep them private. I hope you have an avenue to write. Whether it’s a moleskin or a blog, I hope you have a way of expressing your thoughts and cherishing the thick & thin times you experience.
quotes.
I was perusing one of my new favorite sites and found some great quotes found on…what else, t-shirts!
Enjoy!
breathe.
It’s really been a busy 5 months. Probably not as busy as some of you out there but for Cathi and me, it’s been pretty crazy. In January, I enrolled in a class at one of the hospitals in downtown Cleveland. The class I took was a clinical pastoral education course. This is a class for those who are interested in going into full-time chaplaincy within the health care field. I thought it would be something that may peak my interest and it has turned out to be one of my better decisions of 2009.
Through this course, I have learned many things. This experience taught me many things about myself that I had known for sometime but usually always discredited in my life. I have realized that God has given me a very overwhelming passion for mercy. I used to think that mercy was always a sign of weakness and I used to try to push that out of my life so I could focus on other things. My daily internship at the hospital would no longer allow me to do such a thing. I have fallen in love with mercy and realize that the gifts that God has given me are the gifts I must embrace and hold onto tightly (unlike the “thoughtful” gift of XXXXL boxer shorts I got one year for Christmas…”really grandma, they’ll work great…really they will!”)
As a result of this, I have been working closely with our church leadership to transition out of my ministry within this field and pursue chaplaincy as a full-time ministry. Whether that be state side or international, we’re ready for it. Our last Sunday at Church of the Hills will be on June 21st. After which, I will go to Seminary full-time to pursue my Masters of Divinity (which is necessary for most chaplaincy positions). I will hopefully continue as an intern somewhere within a hospital. It is my desire to continue to sharpen my skills and love people who are hurting and lonely.
Right now, we are looking across the country for jobs. I am enrolled in Luther Rice Seminary in their online graduate program which will allow me to go to class virtually anywhere. Cathi just graduated with her Masters Degree in Social Work and is looking across the country for a position within the clinical field of Social Work. Quite honestly, we have been so busy with all of this transition we have barely had enough time to breathe. I am so very proud of Cathi and cannot wait to see where God is going to continue to use her for His glory.
Through this time I have given my moleskine a good work-out. I have been able to write quite a bit. I know that really hasn’t reflected within this blog, but I hope to share some of the things I have been writing in the near future.
So, we’re at the starting line with our fingers on the chalk line and our foot in the holsters waiting for the gunshot.
Ready, set, breathe.
too much time on your hands
Remember when you were in college and had nothing to do? Yeah right!!
Oh to be in college again.
the memory sketch
Here is the memory sketch I wrote for my Grandfather’s funeral. I had the honor and privilege of speaking at the service and this is what I had the privilege of sharing with family and friends…
***
To me, Papa was more than a Grandfather. He was a teacher, a leader, an artist, and a friend. I have so many fond memories with Papa but there are a few in particular that my mind continually returns:
I saw Papa as a teacher and perpetual student, especially when we would spend the evening at Nenay and Papa’s – he would let us sit and listen to him communicate on his HAM radio. All of us would sit for hours through the night, just watching him tap away on his mores code machine talking to people all over the world. Through this, I realized that Papa valued learning, for he was always inquisitive and was constantly interested in learning more about anything he could.
Papa taught me about leadership every day of my life. However, he also taught me about having fun. While I was in college, I would come home on summer break and work at the family business. During our lunch break or after a long days work; I could hear Papa in the back yard, getting his exercise by jumping up and down on his trampoline. This showed me that it didn’t matter what age you were, there was always room to have fun!
Papa was also a very talented artist. Not only was he gifted in painting and sketches but also musically. He played the guitar, the harmonica and a little bit of the piano. I remember nights where Nenay and Papa would babysit us, he would bring over his sketch book and drawing pencils and we would draw and sketch houses, and boats and trees for hours. Mine never really looked as good as his, so I usually would end up copying what he was drawing…and by the end of the night our hands would be covered in charcoal, our hearts were full of memories and the house was full of laughter.
Papa was my friend. If you have ever celebrated a birthday, holiday or family get-together with us, you would know that those nights would always be wrapped with Papa’s hilarities. Papa brought us the family tradition of gathering around the table after everyone had eaten and listen to the most recent poetry he just memorized. We knew that moments of laughter would fill the air after his recital had finished. Within those moments, we all felt as though we were the best of friends.
If you walked into Nenay and Papa’s house, you would typically hear the radio playing. Usually, they were listening to one of two programs. It was either classical music or a radio program known as A Prairie Home Companion. One of Papa’s favorite authors was Garrison Kiellor, the well known author and creator of this show, which he and I would often talk about after listening to the latest radio program. I find it most appropriate to close with a quote from Garrison Kiellor who once said, “Thank you, God, for this good life and forgive us if we do not love it enough.” I know that Papa loved his good life. He showed this by being an excellent teacher, leader, artist, and friend. I know he would want each of us to love this life just as much as he did.
my grandfather [aka: papa]
Yesterday morning while I was getting ready for a meeting, I missed a very important phone call. I got a call from my mom saying that my grandfather had passed away. Now, I knew this day was coming. My grandfather had been suffering from cancer for about the last year. The cancer had spread to most of his body and there was no repairable surgery that could be done because he also had many aneurysms. The doctors did not want to do any type of surgery for fear that it may cause one of the aneurysms to burst.
Yesterday, at about 7:10am my grandfather passed away when one of the aneurysms burst. In a way, his death was quicker than expected which was probably good because of the amount of pain he would have experienced because of the cancer. But, on the other hand, it was quite faster than what we had expected.
My grandfather was a character. He was an entrepreneur, a poet, a veteran (world war II), a painter, a musician, a sailor (he owned his own sailboat), an explorer, an actor and a comedian in his own right! But most of all, he was papa. He was the guy who was the healthiest in our entire family. During the summer months, when I was home from school and worked for our family business, I could many times hear my papa in the back yard jumping up and down on his trampoline. He loved to swim in the ocean and would spend hours swimming laps on a Saturday morning in the ocean.
My grandfather was a journalist during World War II and was stationed all over Europe which is where he met his wife. He grew up in Indiana and moved to Florida after returning from the war where he and his wife settled down, started the family business, had three great children (one of which is my dad…obviously) and spent much of his waking life hanging out with his grandchildren and making them laugh!
I loved my Grandfather. I love my Grandfather and I will continue to love my Grandfather and tell my children of what an amazing papa he really was.
Emmett Stegall ~ 1920 – 2009
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