Vantage Point

Vantage Point, originally uploaded by a b franzen.

Jane Addams thought that one's vantage point is of utmost importance both in understanding them and their social position in life, but also in making any kind of advance in terms of social change. This is, however, a highly complex thing to nail down. It is unrealistic to expect social change to be implemented and then naturally be internalized by the wider community.

But how is it that we can effectively know one's vantage point? Groups of people are far from being ubiquitous in terms of their identity, and it is often very unclear where the impulses of change are coming from. Even then, we do not share all of our self with all people. That is, certain people only know certain things that we chose to share with them. In these terms, it is obvious that there never can be a clear vantage point to be known.

The more that I learn and think about things, the less clear the world seems to become. There is always the same general outline, but in some ways, it is typically the fuzzy edges that are both most interesting and matter the most.

Divergent Consensus

Divergent Consensus, originally uploaded by a b franzen.

We went to the fair this weekend. I have some pictures, but they are at home and not processed. It was good to hang out with Sara for a bit, AND we got to eat some Texas Deep Fried Pecan Pie. It was crazy crowded though, and seemed like the point of the fair was more about making money that it was about making community. What happened to the good old days?

Instead of fair pictures you get the classics. Some are better, some are worse. Depends on whether you prefer to hold to social theories more in a dogmatic sense, or whether you are more comfortable with flexibility. Seeing as how it is social theory, you would think that everyone would welcome flexibility, but alas, this is not always the case. I would think that people generally are pretty flexible in how they see the world, but it seems that most flexible ideas are better defined as stringent. Stringent flexibility, that is, as opposed to flexible stringency. Alright, enough for now, ha!

Reminder...

Reminder..., originally uploaded by a b franzen.

Can't wait to see you for more than a few hours this weekend. Hopefully there will be some elephant ears...

RAIN!

What the... the weather here has been totally crazy since we arrived. This summer was in like the top 5 hottest summers since TX has been keeping the records. Right now, it is unusually 'dreary' here, they say. So far this month, there has only been two days that there has not been some precipitation. What is up with that? More that than, there has not been much sun out either. It does make it a little bit of fun to leave and return to Dallas as the city looks cool with the tops of the buildings lost in a thick veil of fog.

Today it rain. Again. This time though, it was crazy heavy rain (ok, truth be told, there is not much middle ground when it comes to rain here). B's drive was all under like 3 inches of standing water and everyone on the highway was only driving like 40 mph. This time, unlike that last time I complained about it, it was for good reason. The rain was so heavy that I think the visibility was only like 50 ft or so. Sure is a good thing that we got Rex's (sara's car) trunk all sealed up! Also a good thing that I wore my Chacos today. The road I had to park on was a veritable river!

In a Tight Little World

In a Tight Little World, originally uploaded by a b franzen.

I was reading Simmel today and got to thinking... I wonder if it is necessarily the case that the more 'cultured' and educated a person is, they less they are able to be their self around other people. Experiences are so individual, and the more breadth one gains, the more distanced from others people are in a way. So, in order to continue to relate to other people, the more our interactions must be generalized. That is, all that we are cannot be brought to bear in all of our interactions with others because they have no connecting point of reference. How much of our 'self' is left behind for the sake of relationships? Who knows, but Simmel would think that there is a sort of built-in tension of individual and 'other' in every interaction that we have.

It is kind of funny, but in order to keep up with the 'book' photo project, I think I may need to start taking pictures with piles of books in them...

Read American Evangelicalism if you are into a) Evangelical movement, b) extension/fine-tuning of rational choice theory, c) subculture identity construction. Read Acts of Faith if you are into a) rational choice/economic models of religion. Am just getting into Simmel today, so not sure on that one yet....

Colorado Bend waterfal

Sara wanted me to put up these pictures for her quick tonight... the long awaited pictures of the water fall we went to. Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you, this was indeed in TX. like sara said, who would have thought...


Here is the side of the falls.

The side of the falls again....

The trail leading down to where the previous two pictures were taken...

A, ahhh, not so good picture of us. But hey, there are fall behind us and we hiked there in the rain. So, it is cool.

Here are the falls closer up. they were pretty sweet!

students

working with students has been very interesting so far. some really care a lot about their education, their grades, and whether they are getting things in class. others care about their grade and little else. some are not even at that point. some ask for help and listen, some ask for help and obviously don't listen, and some should ask for help and don't.

our class is working on a large paper, piece by piece through the semester. this last week the first big part of it was due. I got a crazy number of emails and people coming by to talk about it (remember, this is relative to the number i usually get, so it isn't really all that crazy). one who came by was visibly stressed and worried about this paper. we talked over things a bit and i gave her some pointers and some examples of what we are looking for. she looked so scared of it that before she left i asked her if she was alright just to make sure she wouldn't cry in the hall or something like that.

i just graded her paper last night and it was one of the best ones in the stack. it was kind of funny, but i was totally proud of her. i was very happy to see her paper. she pulled through, actually listened to what i said, put the time in, and did a great job. it is just funny to me because i have never really worked with students like this before, so the experience of helping her get it and excel was new.

some of the other papers on the other hand....

Who'd have thought

Here are some pictures from our trip. I love waterfalls, but Aaron had told me to lower my expectations when online it appeared there would be a waterfall where we were going as we are in Texas, but a short hike through some sprinkling rain besides dying cactus we ended up at quite a pretty site and I admit, I was impressed and my expectations were far exceeded. Not sure if the pictures do justice to it.

You can sorta tell how wet it was. A real nice state park though, along a river


What a wonderful weekend to get away (despite the rain). I am on hematology/oncology right now which I am really enjoying, but sometimes the sadness gets to me, so it was nice to have 2 days off to relax and not think about sad kids for a bit. Unfortunately, lots of the ones we see in the hospital have a pretty poor prognosis. Leukemia (the most common cancer in kids) has a 95% cure rate and most do really well, but we end up seeing more of the ones coming in for relapses or worse kinds of tumors with much worse prognoses. It is strange, because day to day you don't think about. You manage the acute issues like their fevers or getting them to eat better and feel privileged to take care of such cute kids, but every once in a while a mention of the future hits you....will these kids even have a future? One of my patients I sent home last week came back today with relapse of her leukemia. Overall because of various things she probably didn't have a great prognosis anyway, but now it is even worse. These parents amaze me though. Most of them (and most of the kids as well) have such a strength. I guess they like me, probably just live day to day managing the acute issues and trying not to think about the long term too much. Haven't had a patient I know well die yet, but it is bound to happen and I am sure there will be a blog about it. Sorry for an ending downer to a beginning of exceeded Texas expectations.

Ok....not letting me upload more pictures, so i'll try to put them in another post.

Stand Out

Stand Out, originally uploaded by a b franzen.

This is from the Grapevine Grapefest that we went to a few weeks ago. It was totally an expectation let-down. Maybe it would have been more awesome if I had gotten a hand-dipped corn dog and shook the hand of the man on the stilts. Yep, that's how we roll in TX. Our wine-fests even remind you that you are in TX.

In other news, camping this past weekend at Colorado Bend State Park was awesome. TX hill country really is pretty nice. On the down-side, it rained. A lot. On top of that I forgot my camera, but we did have the point and shoot. We will hopefully get some pics of that up soon-ish.