Blog on the Lillypad
Saturday, July 17, 2004
A book lead for fans of Secret Radio: The Last Year of the War by Shirley Nelson
From the FFF, a poster by the name of Keith recommends, The Last Year of the War by Shirley Nelson, a novel set in the 1940's in a small Bible college that many perceive as a thinly disguised version of Moody Bible Institute. I have not read this book but have placed it on my wish list. From the reviews and from comments it looks like an expose of some of the "errors of culture" that several of us have pointed out in Fundamentalism. Click here to go to this book at the Amazon.com site.
Here's the book jacket blurb: "Jo Fuller, the daughter of agnostic parents, accepts Christ as her Savior during her senior year of high school and decides to continue her education at Calvary Bible Institute of Chicago. Jo's first year at CBI corresponds with the last year of World War II, and the pressures of life during wartime combine with adjustments to college life, separation from family and friends, and the process of maturation to create a period of crisis for Jo. The setting of the novel is the Moody Bible Institute, although a slight name change gives it some anonymity--and the author captures the character and the mood of the institution during the 1940s and portrays it realistically and with precision."
From the FFF, a poster by the name of Keith recommends, The Last Year of the War by Shirley Nelson, a novel set in the 1940's in a small Bible college that many perceive as a thinly disguised version of Moody Bible Institute. I have not read this book but have placed it on my wish list. From the reviews and from comments it looks like an expose of some of the "errors of culture" that several of us have pointed out in Fundamentalism. Click here to go to this book at the Amazon.com site.
Here's the book jacket blurb: "Jo Fuller, the daughter of agnostic parents, accepts Christ as her Savior during her senior year of high school and decides to continue her education at Calvary Bible Institute of Chicago. Jo's first year at CBI corresponds with the last year of World War II, and the pressures of life during wartime combine with adjustments to college life, separation from family and friends, and the process of maturation to create a period of crisis for Jo. The setting of the novel is the Moody Bible Institute, although a slight name change gives it some anonymity--and the author captures the character and the mood of the institution during the 1940s and portrays it realistically and with precision."
 | Secret Radio follow-up
I printed and spiral-bound the first 102 pages of Secret Radio 2.0 for Barry this morning (hat tip to Kinko's). That's the first 52 entries, which takes the reader to the middle of November in the story. This is the new version, so there are more entries than in the previous version, and new characters and events, though it is mostly the same story. |
I ran the manuscript up to Quail Ridge Books and got the opportunity, as it so happened, to meet Clay, one of the staff, who has written several of the famous Tick comic books and kid's books. I shook hands with him and told him how much I love The Tick (And to all you evil doers, I say, 'Stop all that evil doing!') I asked him a lot about the work itself, how he got into it, and I told him about Lilly in Secret Radio and her love of comic books. The heroes she creates are recognizably the inflated immortals of comic book lore, and yet you can also see that they are drawn from the fundamentalist culture. He thought this was a funny twist to the story. Clay gave me some great information on the way the comic book industry works, and I may add some details to SRv2 to make the reality more vivid.
Barry came in by then and was glad to see the manuscript. So far, most of my readers have been either people abused in fundamentalism or people who witnessed the abuse of others, and they read the book from a desire to know that somebody identifies with them. Just seeing it all in print is a catharsis for many people. Those are great reasons to read the book, and such reasons figure into why I wrote it.
Other people read it because they heard about it and are angry that I have written it (though I don't know if any of its detractors have read it through).
But few people (if any) have read it simply as a book. The mainstream readability of Secret Radio has not yet been evaluated. So I look forward to Barry's review and comments, if he has any.
Friday, July 16, 2004
 | Announcing: SECRET RADIO makes progress
Raleigh is home to Quail Ridge Books, a bookstore voted the best bookstore in the United States. Leading figures in Raleigh's cultural community wander in to the unassuming store, join the discussion groups, and sometimes even volunteer to shelve books. My own book group includes an architect who has designed buildings all over the Southeastern US and several professors from UNC/NC State. Our discussion leader, Barry, pointed out one of the clerks to me as the man who created the TICK comic books. |
Big name writers come in for book signings and Quail Ridge boasts far more prestigious names than the local Barnes and Noble or Borders. Discussion groups, lectures, and even recitals are common. The store management hobknobs with known writers and publishers alike, and the opinions of the different department heads are sought by librarians around the country.
Today, when I ran into Barry at the Quail Ridge Books as I was searching for A SEPARATE PEACE to add to my library, I mentioned to him that I am currently reading ELMER GANTRY. This led him to ask me about what I'm writing, and I told him about the problems of corruption and gross ignorance that go largely unchallenged in Fundamentalism. And I told him about SECRET RADIO and the controversy it has created.
He asked me if I could lend him a hard copy of it, and I said yes, certainly. Having the book read by anybody on staff at Quail Ridge is a tremendous opportunity. They know people, for one thing, and they recommend anything in any format that intrigues them. On one hand, I am concerned that SECRET RADIO is still in draft form. On the other hand, the door has been opened, and I will go through it. Supporters of SECRET RADIO, many of you have asked me to get it published. This could be a first step to finding the guidance from those "in the know" that will lead me to a publisher. I hope you will pray for this endeavour.
 | Adjustments
Okay, now I can shave my legs in the shower, paint my toe nails, fasten the straps on my sandals while crouching (instead of having to sit on a chair to do it), and pick up anything I drop on the floor. This gloriously liberated life comes at a price, of course. Monday nights through Friday mornings are devoted to working out in one form or another, mostly with the focus on either strengthening or stretching my back. But this week I really had to take stock of the constant chaos caused by my burgeoning schedule. There are piles of laundry all over the house; I cannot find my water bottles; I'm almost out of bread; in fact, I have no groceries aside from three bottles of carrot juice and some frozen Chinese dumplings. |
Last night after yoga class I was exhausted but so stressed from the out-of-control nature of my new fitness routine that I stayed up for a while to try to work out a schedule. It's simple: any time my gym bag has used clothing in it, I just need to put fresh clothing and towels in it and put it in the car. I've even toyed with getting a second gym bag and blow dryer so that I can have a backup on hand.
Last night's yoga class was hard in specific postures but overall it was not as difficult to get through. I don't watch the clock as I often did for the first few lessons. The most dismaying thing about the class was that when the teacher stayed with me to get me into textbook postures of the stances that require stretching the right hamstring, I was in such agony that I could not hold the posture for more than four or five seconds. (Did it just fine on the left side.) My right leg is still ultra-tight, all the way up to the spinal erector muscles that fasten at the top of he hip bone and form a sort of suspension system up the spine to support the vertebrae.
It's this ultra-tightness that has jeopardized my crooked back, putting more stress on it than the curve can withstand. Even after months of stretching by conventional means and using trigger point massage, I am still incredibly tight. So it's still a danger.
The good news is that yoga will get it to stretch. But I was surprised to realize how bad it still is. I can stretch my legs fine by swinging a leg up over any handy cross bar and leaning into the stretch. But the yoga stretches go much more deeply into the muscle.
Knowledge of a setback is sometimes disheartening, but knowledge itself always pushes us forward. And though I felt some discouragement last night to see how tight the leg and hamstrings are, I do keep making small improvements in each class. And I enjoy the class.
Thursday, July 15, 2004
 | Got Hubris?
The latest memoir of life in an IFB school, Hubris, by Jeffrey Smith, (which is a pen name, I believe) is on the web. It's definitely worth a read. In his FAQ, Smith makes clear that his work is slightly fictionalized, and he is not specifying the real church/IFB school he attended. |
HUBRIS is more brief, certainly, than TALES FROM THE TEMPLE by James Spurgeon and my own SECRET RADIO. Its brevity and episodic quality make it a lighter, faster read than its predecessors. (Great lunchtime reading at work, BTW, if you have a computer.)
Jeffrey Smith's pen is light and quick, and he tells his tale deftly. The few details he presents are stark and vivid, creating a slightly blurred but full color picture of the rulers of the small Baptist world he once inhabited. His tale lacks doctrinal reflection and---at one point---moral reflection. By the end of the "Busty" chapter, I definitely thought that Jeff was letting himself off the hook too easily, but his goal is to present a case about the cult-like leadership too common and unchallenged in IFB churches. In this purpose, he succeeds. [NOTE: Jeff told me he plans to update this section to further clarify the tone.]
His story rings with authenticity, and there is a plainness and simplicity in the straightforward telling that certainly makes HUBRIS a necessary newcomer to the small world of post-IFB memoirs and exposes.
Tuesday, July 13, 2004
 | Yoga! Yoga! Yoga!
Big progress on the Yoga front. The teacher suggested I try two nights a week instead of one. Adding a second class really interferes with the rest of my life, which was moving at a pretty brisk pace already. And yet after putting in an additional class, I am making better progress. Last night I started to get into the downward facing posture in a more efficient way. Instead of simply perching in the posture and trying to stay in the position, I realized that I have to force the weight to the backs of my legs to get the hamstrings and tendons to stretch the whole time I am in the posture. |
This increases the stretching quite a bit. It also makes the posture easier to hold. In each lesson, the teacher will tap along my crooked back as I hold some of the spine lengthening postures. She taps the same points each time, measuring the degree of deformity in the ribs of my right side. They stand up quite a bit from the spine. Last night she told me that the height disparity is decreasing as I maintain the postures now. At first, she could actually see the unevenness of my spine, but now the muscles are unbunching around the deformed ribs (which will never be made straight) and elongating.
This is actually a small start. I have months of training ahead to even be able to hope for a significant limit to back trouble. But even now I can shave my legs again in the shower, paint my toe nails, and wear flat sandals, none of which I could do a month ago. My bad back prevented all of those minor things. Bending or stooping it to the floor was incredibly risky, and my back required a lot of support in my shoes.
Yoga two nights a week has necessitated that I cut back the gym work from four mornings a week to three. It's still safe and wise to do the core body exercises at the gym and use the stability balls for stretching my back. But all this running around to do physical exercise is taking a huge bite out of my time. It seems that I am always either working out, washing/drying clothes, or packing up my gym bag for the next session. I live in Raleigh, work in Chapel Hill, and the gym is in Durham (next to Chapel Hill) and the Yoga classes meet Thursdays in Durham, and Mondays in Raleigh.
| Yet it's all progress. To be able to sit and write, or sit and read a good book is a wonderful treat. I am coming along in one of the other postures, again helped by my legs: the bow pose. You lie face down and raise up by arching your back, then grab your ankles and rest on your naval and hip bones (if you can). We do this one more than halfway through the class. I can hold both ankles and lift to an extent, though not yet to the ideal degree. Yet even done imperfectly, the posture seems to revitalize me (perhaps because it seems to open up the lungs), even though the back lifting exercises before it are exhausting. |  |
 | We had three men in the class last night, and they are all pretty butch guys. They made the most noise and one of them even whined a few times as he tried to hold a difficult posture, but their gusto in attempting the postures was admirable. My math teacher friend was there. She did the crow position just right and held it for nearly two minutes. I was very impressed. I am still in the newbie version of the crow, just resting my weight against the backs of my forearms and keeping my feet on the ground. |
