Take a Flying Leap Day
Feb. 29th, 2008 12:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
penfield"Good intentions are, at least, the seed of good actions; and everyone ought to sow them, and leave it to the soil and the seasons whether he or any other gather the fruit."
- William Temple
Why is it that certain things are only tolerable once every four years? And always in the same year: Presidential elections, summer olympics and February 29.
I'm taking the day off from work today, ostensibly because I refuse to work on a day that seems totally made up, but really because I am expecting out-of-town guests. Together we will meet up and celebrate the 8th birthday (and 32nd year) of our mutual absentee friend, SKBK.
There are few compliments to SKBK that have not yet been paid, but I will try to distill what I admire most about her: she feels things, believes things and appreciates things deeply. It can be almost intimidating, sometimes even disconcerting, to witness the intensity of her conviction.
Have you ever seen the crowd at a sporting event, and noticed the one guy in the crowd who is being an absolute lunatic -- face painted, fully costumed, screaming himself hoarse -- cheering for his team? That is how I imagine SKBK feels about Social Justice, and it permeates her waking life.
It's not always such a great thing, really. Sometimes she will elevate her cause above her own well-being and turn selflessness into self-defeat. And the purity of her views will occasionally make white, male, meat-eating, instinctually ironic political realists like me feel like something the cat drug in.
And yet it is not discouraging, because you know it is rooted in love and honesty. The depth of that love and honesty is what her friends love about her. I think I speak for them when I say that she is what I'd like my conscience to be.
- William Temple
Why is it that certain things are only tolerable once every four years? And always in the same year: Presidential elections, summer olympics and February 29.
I'm taking the day off from work today, ostensibly because I refuse to work on a day that seems totally made up, but really because I am expecting out-of-town guests. Together we will meet up and celebrate the 8th birthday (and 32nd year) of our mutual absentee friend, SKBK.
There are few compliments to SKBK that have not yet been paid, but I will try to distill what I admire most about her: she feels things, believes things and appreciates things deeply. It can be almost intimidating, sometimes even disconcerting, to witness the intensity of her conviction.
Have you ever seen the crowd at a sporting event, and noticed the one guy in the crowd who is being an absolute lunatic -- face painted, fully costumed, screaming himself hoarse -- cheering for his team? That is how I imagine SKBK feels about Social Justice, and it permeates her waking life.
It's not always such a great thing, really. Sometimes she will elevate her cause above her own well-being and turn selflessness into self-defeat. And the purity of her views will occasionally make white, male, meat-eating, instinctually ironic political realists like me feel like something the cat drug in.
And yet it is not discouraging, because you know it is rooted in love and honesty. The depth of that love and honesty is what her friends love about her. I think I speak for them when I say that she is what I'd like my conscience to be.
blog birthday
Date: 2008-02-29 09:39 pm (UTC)Re: blog birthday
Date: 2008-03-01 05:35 pm (UTC)And I promise never to refer to you as the crazy face-painted lady; that's my name for the weird old woman who lives down the hall.