You're the one for me, Fatty!

In Korea, the older generation and the younger generation have opposing political views. As far as I know, all the younger generation have the same politics, and likewise with the older generation. One of my adult students told me this. He said that Korea was polarized. Another student replied that he thought polarized was an excellent word. We were talking about the generation gap, and he thought that the two generations were completely different and couldn't get along with each other, and that polarized expressed this because it brought in the idea of magnets. And this is how a metaphor helped me to think of the issue in a different way. I commented that actually the parts of magnets that are alike repel each other, and the opposites attract. So maybe, I said, the two generations are the same, both self-centered at heart.

'January Blahs?'

I know that the 'February blahs' are the most often referred to, but mine came a bit early I guess. The past few days, I've been experiencing quite a bit of blah. I'm not really sure what circumstances are causing it.... I just feel blah in general.
Our short vacation is now over and we both returned to work today, although kindergarten classes don't resume until Friday, so I have a few mornings off yet, I just have afternoon classes.
Today, I began the 'great clean' of the apartment, which could last some time. As some of you may know... the place in which we live is very dirty and disgusting... quite depressing to wake up to every morning. I suspect it is from build up of having men living here for years by themselves. I started with the kitchen, scrubbing the gas range and underneath of it (I don't think that it has ever been moved), and washing the cupboards inside and out. I then washed the food closet (which was completely black on the floor and bottoms of the walls)... we can now see the colour of the floor. I then cleaned the small corner with the washing machine in it. It was somewhat tiring, but seeing the black grime disappear was satisfying. Tomorrow I will tackle the main living space and the refridgerator. I have been wanting to do this for some time (since we moved in), but havn't found the time until now. I hope that this helps with the bug infestation that we've also been blessed with.
One of the teacher's from New Zealand finished his contract and went home for a few months, so we got a new teacher today from Ottawa, Canada. His name is Bradley. I have not met him yet, but Scott says that he is very nice. I saw him leaving work today, he looks pretty normal... long red hair, carries a skateboard etc.. Anyhow, he just got here two days ago I guess, and started work today, with no training or observing or anything. We got two days to observe when we came, so it's pretty bad I guess.

Well, I had better go, this is getting kind of long and boring
I hope all is well with everyone at home

Love Deborah

Howl's Moving Castle

I've finally seen Miyazaki's new movie. I've been looking for it since I came to Korea, but I've only found it in a few shops and it was expensive. I was thinking of going to a DVD bang (room) in Myeongdong to see it, but then last night our DVD store had it. I picked it up immediately, we brought it home and then went out to buy speakers for our laptop. Watching movies on this thing is terrible without speakers, and I expected beautiful music because the music on his last picture was beautiful.

I had high hopes, which is often a bad sign, because of course, it's easier to be disappointed when one has high hopes. But friends, I was not disappointed. This movie was excellent! Miyazaki's done it again! The animation was superb; the characters were loveable, quirky, cute and funny; and the whole world was insanely imaginative, from the beginning when Howl and Sophie trip across the towns rooftops, to near the end when Howl creates a new house and furniture is falling from the ceiling and rooms are popping into existence. The movie is also exciting; things happen so quickly that one is never bored.

As always in Miyazaki movies, the heroine is stunning while at the same time unremarkable. Sophie has never been beautiful, and in her words, "all I'm good at is cleaning." Chesterton said that in fairy tales extraordinary things happen to an ordinary boy and that in modern stories ordinary things happen to abnormal people. Howl is definitely a fairy tale, and in this way is similar to The Hobbit and The Chronicles of Narnia . Sophie is a young girl who works at a hatter's and isn't happy there. Because she's not the type of girl to complain, this comes out it a conversation with her mother. One night after accidentally meeting Howl, the Witch of the Wastes comes to the shop after it's closed. Sophie tells her to leave, and she does, but not before casting a spell on Sophie. This spell turns Sophie into an old lady, and she then runs away from her home at the hatter's shop. While running away, she finds Howl's castle, gets in and designates herself the new cleaning lady because it's so dirty. Thus it begins, and through the rest Howl tries to stop a war and Sophie tries to break her spell and the group of people inside of the castle grows and they turn into a extempore family. Because this post is getting too long, I merely say: It's terrific. Watch it.

Scott's Birthday

Yesterday was Scott's birthday. It was a pretty good day all in all and we both had a good time. I made Scott breakfast in bed... heart-shaped pancakes(corny, I know), fried ham and banana-blast smoothie. Then we read the second chapter of 'The Hobbit' together. We have recently (within the last two days) began reading this book... Scott decided that we would start having 'family reading time' where we read a book aloud.. one chapter a day. We have started with 'The Hobbit' because I have not read any of 'The Lord of the Rings' books and Scott likes them. We bought it at one of the biggest bookstores in Korea 'Bandi and Luni's bookstore'; they have a huge English section. A bit later, I went to the gym and Scott went on a very long walk. After the gym, I went on a mad search for birthday candles and found a weird kind of really long skinny ones, then I went to Baskin Robbins and bought an icecream cake. (I probably would have made a cake if we were home, but here we have no cake pans or anything of the sort). It was kind of a girly cake, all pink with a little angel on top... but it was the only cake that was not a Christmas cake, so it had to do.
Later, when Scott got home... hmmm... I don't remember, anyway, around 4pm I started making his birthday dinner. I made a three course tex-mex dinner (although the third course was icecream cake, which is not tex-mex, and I didn't make it). To start, we had Mexican corn soup with Rye bread, then for dinner we had taco salad and taco chips with salsa, cheese and beans. Anyway, it was pretty good and we were both very full afterwards. Then we had the icecream cake... when I took it out of the freezer the angel had somehow been decapitated, but we repaired her before lighting the candles and singing 'Happy Birthday'. The long skinny candles, were combination candle-sparklers, so they were kind of cool... Scott did not blow them all out on the first try. The icecream cake was strange... very different than dairy queen. It had no cakey, cookie stuff or fudge... just icecream, a mix of cherry and almond icecream, it was still good though.
Anyway.... just an update, I have to go, I'm a bit late.
For more birthday photos, check out our photo album link.

-Deborah

Merry Christmas everyone!
This will be short... as I'm sure everyone is quite busy. We had a very good Christmas, with lots of eating of course and fun times for everyone. Mostly this is just a note to let you know that we have posted our Christmas photos in our photos of korea album on this page... so if you would like to see more of what you see now.. just go into our photo album and enjoy!

Christmas Eve

Hello everyone,

Today we are preparing for Christmas and for the Cantata. I caught the bus outside of our apartment and went to Home Plus, a grocery store made by Samsung and Tesco. I had to get some whipped cream for our Christmas breakfast and our Christmas dinner. I also had to get the rest of the stuff for Deborah's stocking. While I did that, Deborah stayed at home and began making some cinnamon rolls. She had already baked a pie earlier in the morning, and it's a blueberry pie; we found the filling at the foreign food market in Seoul. Now that I've got all Deborah's stocking stuff, the only preparation left is for Deborah to finish baking the cinnamon rolls and the wreath of bread she's making with the left over dough.

To prepare for the cantata, I have to find some black pants and a white shirt. I brought neither with me to Korea. I've e-mailed Pastor Bill to ask him to find me these items, because he has all the connections. He hasn't yet e-mailed back a response and I have to leave in under an hour, so I'm unsure about what's going to happen. Anyway, practice begins at 2 o'clock, but the cantata isn't until 7. That's a long practice. Good folks, adieu!

"Love in the Ruins"

I read through contemporary novels much more quickly than I read through classic novels or poems. The Oddysey, for instance, took me several weeks to finish, even though it's not that large. In the middle of it I stopped reading. Love in the Ruins, on the other hand, a novel by Walker Percy, took me five days, and it's larger than the Oddysey. For the curious, here's a bit of what I love about Love in the Ruins:

 

     "Papa, have you lost your faith?"

     "No."

     Samantha asked me the question as I stood by her bed. The neuroblastoma had pushed one eye out and around the nose-bridge so she looked like a Picasso profile.

                 ---

     I wonder: did it break my heart when Samantha died? Yes. There was even the knowledge and foreknowledge of it while she still lived, knowledge that while she lived, life still had its same peculiar tentativeness, people living as usual by fits and starts, aiming and missing, while present time went humming, and foreknowledge that the second she died, remorse would come and give past time its bitter specious wholeness. If only-- If only we hadn't been defeated by humdrum humming present time and missed it, missed ourselves, missed everything. I had the foreknowledge while she lived. Still, present time, went humming. Then she died and here came the sweet remorse like a blade between the ribs.

 

Percy's novels are full of such What's-wrong-with-us passages. In this novel, Doctor Thomas More, a lapsed Catholic, invents a device to measure the ills of the human soul. He plans to use it to save America and the world, which he believes are falling apart in some sense. The tool, however, is mostly diagnostic. It can cure people but only for short periods of time. Chesterton said that for every author, there is one title from his books that can describe every book that he has written: for instance, Dickens's was Great Expectations. Similarly, Doc Thom More's device is descriptive of each of Walker Percy's novels. His novels, Percy said this, are "diagnostic." They examine and describe the ills of the modern soul. And every time I read one, I find myself getting excited and saying to myself, "He's right! He's right!" Also, they have wacky, fun plots, and they're really funny too. So, what's not to like?

Give thanks

I have a rash on my chest. I first noticed it this morning, but at the time I thought it was just from sleeping on my chest. It doesn't hurt, though, and it's not itchy.  My chest is mottled red, pink and white. We've just finished devotions, and we read about how Christ is Lord of creation; he commanded the waves and wind to stop, and they stopped. But not only can he control waves and wind, he healed a man of leprosy and Pete's mother-in-law of a fever. So, it's not like this rash is an accident. God himself decided to smite me with this gift. What can I do? Give thanks.

Haiku

Haiku, as we know it, is that type of poem which is too short to be worthwhile. When I had to learn haiku, I thought I ought to teach my teacher about it, because she didn't seem to recognize that it was a joke. But I think that haiku is perfect for capturing the short moments of beauty that we experience from time to time. Occassionally, common things become intensely beautiful, and it often last for mere moments. It could be anything, too: the steps leading into your home; the monotous neighbourhood when seen while sitting on the curb in twilight; water dripping from a rock; melted snow streaming downhill; McDonalds when you're walking around Sydney late at night trying to get a sundae; the sky slowly darkening over the lake while your friends are on the shore and you're doing the dead man's float; looking at the glistening pavement from an apartment balcony just after the rain; any number of things. Often these moments of beauty are couched in other, more extended experiences. Sometimes they come out of nowhere. At any rate, the haiku seems the perfect form to capture these moments. Read, for instance, "In a Station of the Metro" by Ezra Pound.

A small story

When I walked out this morning, I could feel that this world was against me. And how could it not be? It belongs to Him. The graceful curve of the road reminded me of His works, which the cold, bare trees had arisen hours earlier to proclaim. The wind, blowing through the trees like fingers on a harp, was singing, "Great and Terrible, Almighty and Cold."  I shivered, chilled with fear, and walked on. The sun, I could sometimes see it over the grimy buildings, was coming up over the mountain, leaping from the peak to the valley bed to warm our city like a husband his wife.

 

Even when filled with the warm, yellow sun, this city seems a waste. Our merriment is fakery; our laughter is veiled tears; our entertainment a mere soporific, leading to the sleep of death.

 

But while walking to work I saw a strange sight. A child was walking with her mother. In a tree, she saw a leaf that she wanted to get for her mother, so she darted to the tree and climbed it. She climbed almost to the top, for that's where the leaf was, and she stretched out to get the leaf. She stretched too far, and she started to fall forward. She swung her arms furiously behind her, trying to grad hold of a branch, but she missed them all. She fell forward; the mother screamed. The child started somersault to the ground, screaming to her mother for help. I thought child would break her neck, or get some serious injury; she was high enough. But when she reached the ground, it cradled her like a soft mattress. It bent to the shape of her body, took her into the earth a few feet, and then sprang her back out onto her feet. She then ran to her mother, grabbed her hand and they walked away happily, seemingly unsurprised by the kindness of the earth.

Cultural note

In Korea, Christians will often go to worship three times a week. There is usually a worship service on Wednesday night, on Friday night, and then on Sunday. Also, they have services every morning at (I think) 5 o'clock. Some people, I'm not sure how many, go to those. This is quite different from our Western culture, where we attend service three times in one day, two in a row on Sunday morning and another on Sunday evening. This is merely descriptive, though, and no one should take me to mean that Korea is more spiritual than Canada because they have Wednesday and early morning worship services.

 

I suppose our Wednesday evening prayer meeting is similar to the service, because at this we sing hymns, the pastor shares a message and then people pray. However, as far as I can tell (I never went), prayer meeting is not very popular.

 

Koreans are also very open about their problems. They always tell me when they are distressed, and what they are praying for, and what they want me to pray for. My co-worker who sits next to me asked me how my spiritual life was going, and I my first reaction was nervousness. I'm not used to answering that question. Mostly, I don't ask others and they don't ask me. I think that here I'm learning things about the communion of saints. But don't worry; I won't come back saying, "Oh, this is how they did it in Korea." If I do, you can all bludgeon me with maces.

 

I heard in a interview the other day that the secularization of North America hasn't demolished religion, as it has done in England, but has domesticated it. It has made religion private, and Christ our god on the mantelpiece. Moses, on the other hand, approached the bigwig and said, "God said let them go, or He'll smite you with plagues." Contariwise, I would try to apologize for my beliefs, almost as if saying, "I know it sounds dumb and unreasonable, but..." Dei gratia, I am slowly growing stronger in all of my beliefs. I can now take the offensive by mocking and poking fun at false beliefs.

Lord, teach us to number our days

 


Lord, teach us to number our days, that we may learn wisdom.

Every so often it's good for us to reflect on death. This picture is to stimulate your reflections.
 

Various quotes on nothing in particular

"Wherefore my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath: For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God" (James 1.19-20).

 

"Who doesn't like a parfait?" (The Donkey in Shrek).

 

"And above all things have fervent charity amoung yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins" (1 Peter 4.8).

 

"He that but looketh on a plate of ham and eggs to lust after it hath already committed breakfast with it in his heart" (C.S.Lewis).

 

"Children's children are the crown of old men; and the glory of children are their fathers" (Proverbs 17.6).

 

"Next time I see you, remind me not to talk to you" (Groucho Marx)

 

"Honour thy father and thy mother, as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee; that thy days may be prolonged, and that it may go well with thee, in the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee" (Deut. 5.16).

 

"The bible tells us to love our neighbours, and also to love our enemies; probably because generally they are the same people" (G.K.C.).

 

"Children begin by loving their parents; after a time they judge them; rarely, if ever, do they forgive them" (Oscar Wilde).

 

"I wonder what fool it was that first invented kissing" (Jonathan Swift).

Birthday party

This will be a fairly short post as I have class in fifteen minutes. I was alone at school all day. It was the kindergarten birthday party... they have one every month for all of the children who have had birthdays that month. Only one foreign teacher is required to be present for it and this month it was my turn. It's pretty easy, the birthday children hold candles and are paraded in front of the other children as the other children sing a korean song to them, then I shake hands with each of them individually and ask... what is your name? How are you? and How old are you? Some of the children answer, some give blank stares. Then myself and their korean home room teacher pose with each of them for pictures. The party only lasts for about two hours and then I had nothing to do until my afternoon classes at 3pm, so it was a pretty boring day, alone in the teacher's room for more than 3 hours with not much to do. It was interesting though, I guess.

Well, that's all for now.

ta ta

New job opportunity

Deborah, trying to waste some time, went to the Kellogg's website. There are some new cereals here in Korea, which are not available in America. They are various bean cereals. One is red bean, one is black bean, and the last is another variety bean. They are expensive, though, and we probably won't buy them. We are fairly cheap.

More to the point, on their website there was a section for careers at Kellogg's. At first I didn't take much notice of this, because hey, it's Kellogg's. Who wants to work at a cereal company, licking the covers of the boxes, thus activating the glue to keep the boxes shut? However, Kellogg's has just a new cereal box, one that will help them compete with their shrewd competitors, Post and General Mills. Also, this new, state-of-the-art cereal box can be considered Kellogg's entrance into the profitable market of technology.

This cereal box will keep the familiar cardboard exterior with pictures of their loveable mascots, such as Tony the tiger and the disjointed chicken, but will have a metal interior. It has eye-recognition technology, and, once closed, will open only once it has scanned the eyes of the owner. All it takes to program who the owner will be the owner is a quick eye scan. This all sounds wonderful, but they have met with some serious problems so far.

Kellogg's has released the cereal boxes for testing in several supermarkets. Some frantic cereal lovers have scanned their eyes into all the boxes, and now the boxes will open for no one but them. What's worse, Kellogg's hasn't created a way for the programming to be reversed, so these boxes are lost. They can only be destroyed.

Also, teachers have been having more than the usual trouble teaching children.  School children are crouching over and holding their stomachs, whining that they're hungry.  Apparently, their dads, whose eyes are the keys that will open the boxes, have already left for work by the time they get up. Some fathers have remarked that they do this on purpose because they're sick of sharing their cereal.

Another group that has been affected by the new boxes is the blind. Some have bought the cereal thinking that it was just regular Kellogg's. When they arrived home, however, they were unable to open the boxes. Some, probably because of empty stomachs, were enraged. The National Institute for the Blind is already trying to sue Kellogg's for unfair treatment of blind people. The Kellogg's representative for this issue made things worse when, obviously frustrated by the accusers complaints, he insensitively attempted to fob off the accussers by saying, "Nonsense! Go cry your eyes out."

Despite these difficulties, Kellogg's plans to continue with its new cereal boxes, and they are already developing new models with built-in mp3 players so that people won't have to be bored while eating their breakfast.

With this new technology, Kellogg's will need technical writers to write clear handbooks on how to troubleshoot with these boxes when there's a problem. With my philosophical training, I think that I am amply qualified for this job, and so I've sent in my application. Just an update on our potential futures.

Goodness

Over the past few weeks I've been stumped for writing. I've been knackered, as the English say. There was nothing to put on the blog. There were no ideas to put in the journal.  Happily for me, though, I've discovered the problem.

There was nothing to write because I was ignoring one of the biggest things in my life, namely, teaching. I quite enjoy teaching, and now that I've started writing about it writing comes easier.  Now, I'm writing about the things I'm thinking about, and not trying to write something great and profound about something I'm not thinking about. The problem was quite simple, really.

Now I'm writing in my journal again, but about ways to teach and ways to discipline, ways to run a conversation class and ways to get children to shut the h...be quiet (phew). It's actually quite fun, and it helps me to think of how I can serve my boss as though I were serving Christ.  To write about it helps me to put my whole heart and mind into it. I have often told us that we had to serve Mrs. Kwak as though we were serving Jesus in heavy sky-blue eye makeup and tinted glasses, but had disregarded it. Now I'm doing something that feels right. We'll see how it goes. I tend to begin with a bang and end with a whimper.

Not that my writing or thinking will be limited to teaching, but it's a good place to start, and to ignore in thought the greater part of my life is stultifying and foolish.

To all my dear friends,

I hope to talk with you later.

P.S.

I've recently read a great idiom for drunkenness, from the good folks at Credenda magazine.   www.credenda.org
"He's over in the corner, running for Congress."

Pepero Day

Friday, November 11th was Remembrance Day back home... but in Korea it was Pepero Day. Peperos are the long cookie like stick dipped in chocolate pictured here. On Pepero Day, one is to give peperos to the people you love. It is a huge commercial thing like Valentine's Day, every corner store and grocery store sell thousands of the cookies in all different sizes. You can get specialty ones from the bakeries as well.

Students and teachers are expected to exchange peperos as well and so as a result we ended up with piles of peperos from our kindergarten, elementary, and middle school children. At school, Scott made a rather humerous cultural error as he gave a box of peperos to his female co-teacher (blue teacher) out of politeness.... however, it gave his kindergarten students the wrong idea and they began chanting "Scott teacher love blue teacher... Scott teacher love blue teacher... he want to marry her".. they continued to chant it as Scott protested in English that no, it wasn't true, he loved Deborah teacher and he was married to Deborah teacher. Some of the students caught on.. but others continued their Scott teacher-blue teacher chant until the embarrassed blue teacher explained to them in Korean that Scott teacher was married to Deborah teacher. Oh the trials of Pepero day... I had no such problems, my co-teacher gave me peperos and no one thought anything of it... because we're both female.. it is quite another thing for a male teacher to give peperos to a female teacher.. so it was pretty funny.

They also celebrate Valentine's Day.. but it is only a day for Men to give chocolates and flowers and gifts to the women. They have a separate day for women to give gifts to men... it is called "White day". So, all in all, they have three "love" holidays.. kind of interesting.

So, that day went well. We are doing well in other parts of our lives as well, we bought a digital camera and have been taking pictures of the apartment and stuff, to show you all where we are living... we should have them posted soon.

Oh yeah, I have another nephew... Reuban Jonathan Dixon was born to my sister Sharalyn Dixon and her husband Jonathan Dixon... their third child after Caleb Andrew MacDonald Dixon and Kathryn Joy Dixon... we were very excited, his pictures look like he's quite the screamer... we can't wait to see all of our new nephews in person... unfortunately they'll be almost a year old before we get to hold them.
Congratulations guys!

In other news... very shortly, we're having quite a problem in our apartment with these little bitty brown bugs that are all over the counter and table and get into the cupboards.. they are attracted to bread products and so are always infesting our cereal etc... causing us to have to throw it out... they're driving me nuts! If anyone has any suggestions on how to rid ourselves of or improve this situation, we're open to them. The only thing I can think of now is to keep our cereal and bread in the refrigerator... but that might make it hard and stale. I spray with bug stuff like everyday and then wipe the bodies up with a cloth, but just hours later, the place is infested again... it's really gross!

Anyway, that's all for now, I guess I've started to ramble.

Kids say the darndest things....

Just kind of a short funny story to begin with... In one of my Kindergarten classes recently, one of the six year old boys came up to me and pulled on my shirt. "Teacher... Teacher" he called, I asked him what he wanted and he said "Ab-ra-haam... Lin-colnnn..... Ab-ra-haam... Lin-colnnnn..." and continued to repeat it a few more times. I said "what about Abraham Lincoln?" and he gave me a thumbs up sign and said "I like him" and then he went and sat down. So, it was a bit strange... but really funny. He must have thought I was an American or something and was trying to get brownie points. Don't ask me where a six year old Korean hears about Abraham Lincoln though?.

Well, that was my funny story. There's not much news in our lives right now... I've been pretty lonely lately and have been missing home a lot. Scott works late most nights and I don't, so I don't really have anyone to talk to. I've joined the gym though, in the hopes that it will take up some of the down time and make me healthier (I've been sick for going on two months.. pretty much since I got here... it feels like it might be getting better now though, I've been trying to drink more water and get more vitamin C).

In family news... My sister Sharalyn's third baby was due yesterday, but no action yet, so I've been told.. the doctor thinks that it will be late. Hopefully she'll have it soon though, everyone's really excited, especially Caleb and Katie.

Oh yeah, and we are buying a digital camera this weekend, so stay tuned for some pictures of our life in Korea.

Well, that's all for now I guess... talk to some of you later.

Climbing Dobongsan

This post is a little bit late, but two weekends ago we had quite the climbing experience. We decided to be a little adventurous that Saturday and go on a five hour hike of Dobong Mountain. This is a picture of it, it's pretty high. There are many different trails, some easier than others, but being "typically us" we did not take a map and so ended up on the 'wrong' trail. It wasn't really wrong... we weren't lost... however, we did end up on the mountain climbing trail, instead of easier hiking. We had no climbing gear... gloves, appropriate shoes, rope, etc.. and so it was quite difficult. At one point, we were climbing rock and it was a pretty narrow passage... the foot holds were also pretty far apart, Scott went up ahead of me, and I made it part way up. Unfortunately for me, half way up I realised that I couldn't reach the next foot hold with my short legs and I could not get back down, as I couldn't see the previous ones behind me. In short, I was quite stuck. Neither one of us knew what to do... so I stood, holding myself up for a few minutes, feeling somewhat panicky. Luckily, some experienced Korean hikers came along and saw us and hoisted me up from below... it was humiliating and definitely humbling, but it had to be done. They probably had quite a laugh about it later. Well, the hike was long and difficult, our legs got tired and our hands got scratched up, but the beautiful views were well worth it. If you look at the peaks in the picture, we actually made it to the top of one of those peaks and it was amazing.

Rowing Under Rembrandt's Bridge

Today, in an attempt to brighten my imagination, I looked at a painting by Rembrandt for a while. It was quite good, and worth the time that I spent just staring at it. I spent only about fifteen minutes, which is no great effort of concentration. Even that was a bit difficult, though. My mind kept wandering from thought to thought, and I had to keep bringing it back to the painting. It’s said that a picture is worth a thousand words. I’m sure someone could write a thousand words on this painting, but I’ll write only a few.

The subject of the painting is a small bridge over a small river. The bridge is somewhat in the background, and on the left there is a narrow dirt path leading up to it. I think that there are footprints on the path, but it’s tough to be sure; the picture isn’t the best quality. On the right side of the bridge there are some huts and a grassy expanse. Also, to the right of the bridge, even further in the background, there is a radio tower; no, wait, I think it’s a steeple. Yeah, probably a steeple.

The time is sunset, and only a bit of the painting is bright with the pale gold of the sun. A few tall trees in the middle of the painting are glowing golden green. The whole ground and the sky on the right of the painting are in darkness. In the sky there appears to be storm clouds. The contrast between the right and left parts of the sky is impressive and affecting, and the golden glow in the west makes the rest of the painting seem even darker. In the black clouds, though, there are flecks of gold paint. I’m not sure what this is, but I think maybe these flecks are also in the bright part of the painting but are there harder to see. These flecks of gold paint might be Rembrandt’s device for suffusing the very atmosphere of his paintings with golden light, for his painting “The Philosopher” is bathed in the same light.

In the river there are two rowboats, each with two passengers. I imagined myself in the boat that is passing under the bridge. This painting is beautiful, but I think that if I were in one of the rowboats that Rembrandt was painting, I wouldn’t notice the beauty around me. Being immersed in the beauty, I would have grown accustomed to it and forgotten it, like I forget about the air that I breathe or the wife I live with.

I just took a deep breath and it was sweet, oh so sweet. His beauty is all around you: in your cow patch; in the colossal trees by the old folks home; on the curb outside your house; in the wide expanse of diamond sky above your driveway; in the hills outside your dining room window; in the small patch of backyard where your dogs run around. Take a long look and you’ll see it.