Money and a Passport

Seething

There are few things in life that I can say, unapologetically, that I hate. Miracle Whip is one of those things.

Somewhere in the mind of a slightly demented Kraft chef there formed this idea for a mayonnaise substitute. I can respect those who do not like mayo, but when they reach for the Miracle Whip in its stead, I give them a stern and disapproving glare. My own sister is one such person, a champion of "the whip" and bologna in particular. When I tell her that I cannot tolerate such blasphemy of condiments in our home refrigerator, she asks what is wrong with it. Let me name the ways.
1) It's a cheap, dirty imitation of a condiment that is real and much better in its natural state.
2) It's proprietary. Only Kraft can make it. I don't trust proprietary condiments.
3) What some refer to as its "tangy zip," I refer to as it's "nausea-factor."
4) I can't prove it, but I think it's at fault for our current economic downturn.

The bottom line is this. Miracle Whip is the Elvis impersonator of sandwich spreads. It takes the worst of mayo's career and parades it around in diamond studded leather jackets and smells funnier than it should. No one likes an intrusive and annoyingly inaccurate Elvis impersonator, am I right? Maybe that will help those of you that don't share my distaste to understand the feeling I get when I see Miracle Whip.

Horror.

Why can't Black friday be followed by rainbow Saturday? Rainbow Saturday is when all the crazy-awesome sales would be.

This is Your Last Defense

A stamp is forever.

I went to the post office today and noticed that if you want to buy more than one stamp from their vending machine, you must purchase "forever" stamps.

First of all, this is a blatant lie and the American public should not tolerate it. Forever stamps CAN NOT POSSIBLY last forever. They are made of paper and biodegradable for heaven's sake. Besides that, I'm sure they won't even be considered legal postage in a mere 80 years. To make my point I have decided to purchase a small number of these stamps and save them to use in 50 or so years. Someone in the "Postal Service of the New Republic of Americanus" will get it and be astonished that anyone would actually use such a treasured artifact of North American history in an attempt to mail out a bill.

Also, they may wonder why I don't use my thought processor chip to send the bill automatically when I think about needing to pay it. Then they will realize that in the modern age of intelle-transporting letters and goods, there is no reason why his job or the Postal Service even exists anymore. He will lobby in the Congress of the New Republic for reform in the communications sector to cut wasteful spending such as keeping a useless post office open when we can beam our packages telepathically and also fry a chicken via a similar use of technology. The motion will be approved and it will be named the Nathan Sloan Initiative to Dismantle Obsolete Governmental Services, or NSIDOGS for short. To commemorate my great achievement they will release a six piece commemorative set of stamps - which they will quickly recall and destroy a couple of days later. What an ironic mistake on their part!

If my sandwich had feet I'm sure it would run but thankfully it's incapable of defending itself in any way.

Mini-Universities

Yesterday I was perusing blogs online and ran across the blog of Death Cab for Cutie bass player, Nick Harmer. He seems like a pretty cool fellow even outside of playing in one of the most amazing bands ever. Apparently, he has been swept up into the fashionable world of tilt-shift photography. Tilt-shift faking in Photoshop is a technique that you use to make full size photos look like incredibly detailed scale models. Intrigued, I spent some time miniaturizing a few locations that I've been this year. Here you see the campus commons at UNCW and UNC's football stadium. Aren't they cute?
Original photos are the handi-work of Joe Blanchard.

Sunburn in December

So this may be a bit politically charged, and if so, I apologize.

Recently there has been a big to-do over some comments that some NC State students painted on NCSU's free expression tunnel. From what I can gather, they put up some nasty, totally ill-spirited comments about President-elect Obama right after the election. Something about "getting rid" of him I believe - just insert several racist remarks and you get the picture.

Now, good old Mr. Government got involved and determined that not only were these boys not posing a real threat to the soon-to-be-president, but they were totally within their legal right to be racist idiots. Imagine that, a place where people are free to be anything, even complete and total jerks, so long as they are all talk and draw the line before infringing on other's rights.

Well, there is now talk that the NAACP and a member of student senate (among others) want to have the boys expelled in spite of their clearance with the government and an official written apology to the university at large. I'm not stupid, I know that had to apologize but come on, they didn't do anything deserving of expulsion. The sign outside of the tunnel clearly states "Free Expression Tunnel," I know because I've seen it many times. If you'd read some of the other highly inflammatory things I've seen in there, you'd know that it's generally understood to be a place where you can say anything without fear of censorship and punishment. I am not in any way condoning the poor taste and hateful belief's of these individuals. I think it is really sad for them that they're so limited in their ability to appreciate and love people who are different from them, if you want to know the truth. My biggest fear is that through incredibly unpopular free speech such as what these boys voiced, we will bit by bit chip away at our constitutional freedoms. I may hold some ideas that are very unpopular someday, and so may you. Isn't it nice to know that we can always say what is on our minds regardless of who doesn't like it?

In summation, I just don't want to see NC State and other universities, places that are known as the breeding ground for new ideas and free-thinking, become a stagnant and sterile environment in the interest of not hurting someone's feelings. I can't help but walk by now and, in my mind, read the sign as the "98.7% Free Expression Tunnel." That would be a tragedy.

Slurred Speech and Raisin Bran

Mountains of Snowy Cakes

This morning I woke up at 6:10 to the sound of my phone alarm and half crawled, half collapsed on top of it about 7 seconds later. For a split second, I thought my life was over; then reality set in and I staggered into the shower.

By this point I'm assuming that Joe and his wife must have already taken their showers. I hopped in and soaked myself just as the shower head squeezed the last drops from the water heater. I finished up in two minutes and jumped out shivering like a paranoid chihuahua. It was going to be one of those days.

I layered my clothing because today was pancake day - the day when we serve free pancakes to hungry students on campus for three and a half hours. I knew the high was 40, so I was not hopeful, but any joy in my heart soon faded as I walked outside to find heavy flakes of snow drifting all around me.

"Surely Joe will realize that no one will want freezing cold pancakes in the snow," I thought, "he'll cancel like any sane person."

To my horror and disbelief, I watch as Joe virtually skipped to the car with glee. Then, for the next hour, I grimly waited for someone to state the obvious, that we had to reschedule. No luck. The colder and more miserable I felt the more Joe acted like a character in an old Disney movie, complimented with a singing chorus of woodland creatures. I hope I'm not alone in this, but when people are overly happy in times like these, it tends to irk me even more.

Todays lesson: even when you think your day sucks, realize that nothing is written in stone. I didn't want to go out there. I didn't want to be cold - just being honest. I didn't complain openly about any of this but I certainly wasn't an overly cheerful servant either. Most importantly, I got over it.

Once we got out there the snow stopped and my layers held in strong. Before I knew it, I'd forgotten about myself and was busy taking in the event. It's always a lot of fun to get reactions out of people when you harass them about taking your pancakes. Favorite lines that we yelled to the crowd were:
"Free Pancakes, get them while they're free!"
"Free Pancakes, if they were any freer, we'd have to call them freecakes!"
and
"This is not a pancake mirage. These pancakes are absolutely real and waiting for you!"

I sincerely hope that days like today will rub off on me and I'll take their memory to my bad days in the "real" real world. Even if it's a little obnoxious when your down, optimism can do good things.

Al's terra-cotta smells like hazelnut and mud.

Calcified Mittens

What's up, Doc?

I've been sick. Furthermore, I have been since May of 2007 because every 6 weeks or so, I seem to get sick again. This has been a major problem for me as I seem like a sickly old grandma to all of my friends who have watched it happen time and again. Finally, after my latest bout, I decided it was time to pay the family doctor a visit.

When I got there I was surprised with how quickly the nurse took me back into my little room. Usually I spend about a half hour in the waiting room reading up on everything from last year's summer edition of "Ducks Unlimited" to "what you can do about your fibromyalgia." Unfortunately, once she shut me up in that little closet I fell into the wasteland known as - the doctor is busy, (aka: he's in the break room and really doesn't want to get up right now but he'll be there in 30 minutes). Long story short, I waited nearly 25 minutes on one of those uncomfortable doctor's bench/bed/i have no idea what they are, things. It was not pleasant. For the entire length of time I had nothing to do but memorize the flyer on mammograms, (EVERY YEAR AFTER 40 LADIES!) and listen to the crinkling noise the paper sheet underneath me made every time my weight shifted in the slightest.

Hark! What noise doth emit from the room with the nurses' desk? I believe it to be none other than the doctor himself!

He came in and was his usual friendly doctor self. I like this guy most of the time. After our exchange on how life was treating us, I proceeded to spill my entire theory of never getting better after that horrendous sickness in May of '07. My speech was epic. Certain rehearsed lines were delivered with considerable gusto. He squinted and made a half-frown. In about 30 seconds he obliterated my story and informed me that I had a chronic allergy problem. Basically, I will have to take Zyrtec every day of my life like a birth control pill.

I don't know if this will fix the problem but in the very least, maybe I will be able to relate better to women who are attempting to avoid pregnancy. I'm not sure how that benefits me, but I'm looking for a sunny side over here.

Sadly, Chamomile is a flower, not a delicious meal expertly camouflaged to protect it from hungry predators.

The Envy of up to Three Towns

Tonight we helped the homeless and I discovered just how much of a homeless poser I am. When people ask me where I'm living I usually say something like, "Wherever people will let me," or, "from sofa to sofa," or, "up at the Hotel California." After the requisite blank stare I explain that while my permanent address is with my parents, I'm sort of 'homeless' because I have no regular schedule or place where I'll be sleeping from day to day. If I said that in front of an actual homeless person they'd probably slap my four dollar latte right out of my hand and all over my Weatherproof jacket, (and rightfully so).

We went down to Capital Square, (the name I just invented for the block on which the old capital building stands), and stood outside for about 30 seconds. Soon someone told us that all the homeless people did what anyone in their position would do on a night when it's below freezing outside: they went to the shelters. There we were, a bunch of do-gooders with no one to accept our goodies. Actually, Betty from the shelter happily took all the coats, blankets, and plush over-stuffed kittens - of which there was a surprising amount. We all huddled in a mass on the sidewalk and three people prayed. These were not your typical "it's cold we need to get out of here," or "I'm really thinking about how good this chicken smells," cursory prayers; they were the full-on "elderly Baptist pastor at the end of his best sermon of the year" type of prayers that seemed to go on forever. With every second that passed, the biting cold of the wind made me long for the marginally warmer, yet windproof car.

On the ride back I couldn't help but think about how much it would stink to actually be homeless, but also wonder how people end up there. Are they really just that bad at making decisions? Are the handicapped? Are they all addicted to alcohol and other substances? Why aren't they at least homeless in Miami? It is so cold, but I am happy to know that there are so many organizations out there which are already helping them. God is good but he could be do so much more if we would let Him.

If a Boston Cream Pie got into a fight with a New York Cheesecake, the aftermath would be ugly...
yet delicious.

Line of Best Fit

It has been nearly three months since I started working with CCF in Raleigh. Something doesn't seem right about that. Normally when there is a perceived time discrepancy it is because I feel like the time has gone by faster than in actuality, but with CCF in Raleigh I feel like I've been here a lot longer. So much has happened in just three months, and from the looks of the ministry schedule that we went over this morning in our staff meeting, there is so much more to come before the semester is over.

I'll spare you the boring and overly detailed recap of everything thrilling or, in the very least, noteworthy and condense it down to an incomplete list of realizations I've had thus far:

1) I've realized that it is quite possible to keep in touch with people who live more than two hours away by seeing them one or two times a month and making use of facebook.
2) I've realized that NCSU, while fascinating to me as a mega-institution of our state, is certainly not the place I should have gone to school. I was much better suited as a UNCW student.
3) Caswell people have a way of sneaking up on you no matter where you go.
4) Books really are the gateway to learning - the trick is finding books that you're interested enough in to fully engage mentally.
5) Table Tennis is almost frighteningly addictive.
6) Relationships with people will almost certainly make you less productive in your personal pursuits.
7) No ice cream is better than ice cream from the cows of NC State's Ag department.
8) The "Old Capital" is still used by the Governor and Lt. Governor.
9) Home is a luxury.
10) When you leave a place and come back, it's going to be different. So just enjoy the new 'way' that it is.

I'm also quite sure that I'm growing a good deal in my walk with Christ, but seeing as how I'm still in the middle of this period of growth I'm going to hold all comments on it until a later time. It's been really good so far, though.

Fall and the Fallen

Breathing in that wonderful fall air! I Just got back into Raleigh from a weekend in Wilmington. It's never quite what I'm expecting when I go back there, but it's always really nice. I hung out with Jacob, who I hadn't seen since this summer. I went to Carolina Beach and talked to a lot of my CCF friends for a while around the campfire before retreating back to the warmth of Jacob's apartment in Wilmington.

Funny story.

I get back in and ask Jacob where I can sleep.
He says, "Uh, the couch, or one of my roommates rooms. I don't know how Brian would feel about it, I don't think he would care, but I know Wayne wouldn't care. They're both out of town for the weekend.

Wayne doesn't really have a bed, it's just a floor mat with some sleeping bags on it. I push his sleeping bag to the side, throw all of my junk down on his floor, and spread my sleeping bag over the mat. At this point I'm pretty exhausted so I think it took me about 5 minutes to fall asleep.

I wake up to a banging on my door. I roll over and through bleary eyes I can see light in the room and someone entering. Under his breath he is muttering to himself things like, "Ugh, this is so weird. What the..., this is weird." I blink a few times and realize that this is not Jacob.

"Hey, man. What's up?" I ask.

"Uh, Hey," he responds.

"Wayne, I presume. Sorry for taking over your room," I say.

"Yeah man. I came in late last night," he says.

I feel my stomach sink. Jacob said he wasn't coming back. STUPID! Why did I listen to Jacob?

"I must have come in at, like, one in the morning," he told me, "I was like, 'what the hell? There's someone in my room.'"

He isn't angry, but I can tell he is still upset. I apologize again. He doesn't seem to hear me and continues with his story.

"Yeah, I had a girl." he says.

My stomach sinks a little more.

"And to top it off, Jacob's door was locked," he continued, "so I had to go outside and beat on his window to wake him up and find out what the hell was going on."

"Dude, you should have woken me up," I told him in my best nonchalant and innocent tone, "I'd have moved out to the couch for sure."

At hearing this, almost all of his irritation seemed to melt away. He told me it was "straight" and we ended up spending the morning playing video games and talking. The whole time his girlfriend slept in a lump under some blankets. I never saw her, but every once in a while she'd breath funny or shift around.

This is why you never sleep in your friends roommate's beds - unless you want to get to know them under awkward circumstances.

My Official Concession

My fellow Americans,
I am writing to you in the early hours of this morning, November 5th 2008, to make my concession of defeat to my former opponent, President Elect, Barak Obama. I would like to thank all of my supporter in this race who put their faith in my leadership for years. Yes you, (the one person who voted for me), are my rock and I can say with complete sincerity that is has been a tremendous honor to run in this historic election. Despite our differences, I encourage all Americans to look past those things that serve to divide us stand behind the man who will soon become our executive.

To my friends who have spent sleepless hours worrying about the outcome of this election, I extend a challenge. A challenge to truly "ask not what your country can do for you." May we never forget that true change happens on the streets and in the hearts and minds of the people of this nation. You can vote for a person because of the beliefs they hold and the legislation they support, but that legislation can never make a person see murder and injustice, pain and persecution, hunger and desperation in the way that our relationships with one another can. Look around - where you see injustice ask yourself in what place it truly exists. Does it exist in a law book, a policy, or a war? Is it written on mere paper, or is it written on the hearts of the people who live in the house next door or work in your office? My friends, it is time to talk to those we disagree with and just as importantly, to listen. Only through talking, listening, and loving will true change for the better take root.

Goodnight and thank you!

-Nathaniel Sloan
Omega-3-Free-Radical-Party candidate for President

Sandy Man

Earlier today I got a phone call from what sounded like the least enthusiastic student at UNCW asking if I would like to donate to the alumni fund. I graduated less than 6 months ago, boy do they start early. I tried explaining to the fellow that I lived on cracker's and my parents soy milk and that a $150 donation just wasn't in the cards. He then pushed a smaller donation with all of the enthusiasm of a disenchanted dairy cow in his voice. I listened patiently then thought this.

"I enjoy shrubs"
"Excuse me sir?"
"Yes, I think the landscaping is my favorite thing about my experience at UNCW, the shrubs in particular."
"Yes sir, we have a full-time crew of profess..."
"In fact, what if I told you that I'd be willing to donate $2,500 as long as you can guarantee it will be invested in shrubs?"
"I don't think I can do th..."
"I would like it to be called 'The Nathaniel Sloan Shrub Garden for Student Relaxation,' and I would like it to be situated somewhere along Chancellor's Walk."
"Um."

The conversation ended quickly.

Lone Some

If there is one thing I hate, it's being lonely.

If there is something that I hate slightly more than that, it's feeling like I'm wasting my time.

These are two seemingly unrelated things that I've managed to draw a correlation between when I more than likely have no business drawing it. Nonetheless, it's done and now I think about it often.

Today I woke up. I stared at myself in the mirror and patted my belly a couple of times before hopping in the shower. When I came downstairs I reclined in a chair and read facebook and wikipedia in the hopes that someone or something would pop up and give me the stimulation of interaction that I need. Here I am at the end of the day and I feel that I've accomplished absolutely nothing of real worth, (ironically, I voted today).

Two years ago I was stricken with depression and grief when the girl who was my whole world dumped me like a sack of moldy, annoying potatoes. I realized that in placing so much emphasis on her and away from friendships, I had neglected to procure new relationships or sustain my old ones. Out in the cold with almost no one to turn to, I was forced to get creative. I had to distract myself from the depression, distract myself from the loneliness, and move on.

Naturally, I became a guitarist. Not just an annoying, sit in the back of the room and play indiscernible versions of 'Freebird' kind of guitarist, but a, (kind of), real guitarist: The kind people wouldn't mind listening to. Ok, maybe that's a stretch - but it was a feat for me. Also in that time I wrote creatively and came up with new ideas for videos and movies that I would later attempt to make. I did a lot, and not only that, but what I made was uniquely mine. All of this happened because it was all that I had. A strange person in a newly foreign land.

Moving on has seen me change in a lot of ways. Most obviously, I've become more centered in my faith in God, though out of necessity not my own pious superiority. I've made new friends and become a relative master at getting people to at least pretend to enjoy my company. If you give me a warm cup of coffee, I can cradle it with smiling eyes and chit-chat about anything - linoleum floors if that's what you're passionate about. A few years ago this would be unheard of. Little by little my heart healed as I filled its vacancies with swams of new people.

The thing about people is this: they are time consuming. I go weeks at the time without playing guitar. My other pet hobbies barely get off the ground before I send them, smoldering, into a pile of rejected dreams. Most importantly, I'm not making something of myself the way I always hoped I would. I've traded the power of pain, which led me to make and do so much, for the security and comfort of people. I don't have to get creative anymore because I don't need distracting. I have friends now!

And I'm thankful.

But I can't get this out of my head. Maybe I need to be uncomfortable again. Maybe being really unhappy, submitting myself to that loneliness that I've tried so hard to escape - maybe that's the only way I can become the man I need to be.

Maybe it's time to be a foreigner again.