English 1020

I had my final in English, this past Saturday, and as a part of the final, we had to do a little creative writing.

*GLEE*

Our teacher believed the short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?", by Joyce Carol Oates, was unfinished.  It was our job to finish it in a page and half to two pages.  Lets just say, for conversational purposes, that my first draft wasn't any where close to being able to edit it down to two pages.  I was ale to rewrite and get it to fit, and still keep my original idea (actually an add-on to my wife's original idea) in one piece.

Anyway, I had a blast finishing off the story, and in my ending one of the characters, Arnold, is shot, and he retorts back, rather quickly "You son of a bitch!" which got a gasp from my classmates.

Why?  Well, during our first class, we had to introduce ourselves, explain what we wanted from the class, and where we saw ourselves five years down the road.  I explain that I was a Christian going after a Journalist Bachelors.  People gave me the stink eye, including the conservative in the front.  She asked me "Wouldn't you want to have a minor in theology?" to which I responded "theology doesn't explain the realness of God.  I can quote Greek, and explain to you that there are three words that describe Love, and that Jesus' birthright from David, but would that help you after your kid was murdered because of a drive by?  Would me knowing that the King James bible is so hard to read because King James wanted it hard to read help you understand why the world is so screwed up?"  There was silence and she smiled, as if I just answered fifteen other questions I was about to be asked.

I went to my seat satisfied.

So, back to my presentation.  I had used the "son of a bitch" twice more, and when I got back to my seat, this classmate behind me leans over and goes "That was really good, but I was surprised at your language."  I looked at her and was like "Really?  Oh, yeah the whole 'Christian' thing?" I didn't use finger quotes, but I did wave my hands like I was crazy, while saying Christian.

She nodded.

"I believe God gave us talents, and we're to use these talents, for Him, and if I hold back anything, I'm not doing either of us the justice I should be.  So, if I drop the f-word for emphasis of a situation, then I do.  I'm sure God understand my purpose behind it.  I won't go into a Samuel L. Jackson, curse induced rant, and there are other lines I won't cross, but God knows my reasoning.  I also believe that God is more mad at the fact that 30,000 people die, from reasons we can fix, in the same time it takes someone to complain about my usage of words in my writing."

There was silence and she smiled. "Wow, I never thought about that."

I liked the class as a whole, and it was cool to be able to speak so candidly about my faith in a real world setting.  So many times we get caught up in 'preaching' behind a pulpit, that we forget the chances in the normal days to get Gods message out.

Grace and Peace,
Jesse