Safe Haven

I was thinking about my favorite movies, and especially what makes them effective in terms of pathos. The writer sets up for the things he wants you to feel; he or she seeds the ground, so to speak, so that when the big climax comes, it doesn't feel forced, cheap, or silly. One of the great things about the troika of William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, and DeForest Kelley--better known as Kirk, Spock, and McCoy--is that those actors spent a lot of time thinking about their characters in relation to the others. What would it be like if I were this guy, and these other two guys were my closest friends in the universe? Everything you would say, or could say, changes as a result. In the greatest scene in Star Trek history--the climax of The Wrath of Khan--the whole thing was set up by another scene in Spock's quarters. Kirk just found out that someone has blocked his radio transmission with Dr. Carol Marcus, as they tried to find out who is playing games with Marcus's Genesis proje...

I'm not the "Resistance," if you didn't know. For some, the presidential absurdity that is Donald Trump afforded them the opportunity to shout what they already believed even louder than they did before. One of the dangers of being politically engaged, and specifically in something that you're truly passionate about, is that you might think more people are with you than actually are. Not that what I think is--or ought to be--is determined by how popular it is, but depending on the audience, I try to calibrate what I'm saying to be at least in terms that those people will agree with, and understand. Persuasion can be an act of love, and a cooperative act of walking together, if you do it right. I'm not saying I'm good at it, but I do try. Still, to this day, I agree with Mark Shea more than I disagree. I believe there is probably a moderate pro-life Democrat in there somewhere. Like a lot of us, he was a Republican at some point in the past, because a...

I've always had a big bathroom. Ever since I was 12 years old, I've had a giant bathroom. It comes with the territory I guess, as a person with a disability. When I moved out of my house into an apartment in the city, I got another giant bathroom. Maybe it's not as big as the other one, but it's big enough. Most people spend a lot of time in there, for reasons both obvious and less obvious, and it got me to thinking. I remember a music video from the time I was in high school from that pop singer, Jewel. She's singing her song in the bathroom. Actually, it's a public one as I recall, and I wouldn't say the video is worth your time, on the whole. Still, someone asked her about it, and she said, "A bathroom is a sanctuary." She's right, you know. When Jesus said we should go into our inner rooms and close the door, and pray to our Father in heaven, it carries a deeper meaning than simply to go someplace private. After all, you can pray anyw...