Farewell

I have decided that it is time for me to discontinue The Elfin Ethicist. In fact, I knew several months ago that I would end it around this time.

I began blogging early in my undergraduate career, while I was still a teenager. (That was probably a mistake.) Over the months, The Elfin Ethicist has revealed my moments of creativity and boredom; fear and optimism; irritation and joy; pretentiousness and silliness; and immaturity and, I hope, some growth in understanding. My audience has changed as I have changed, and the site seems to serve a different purpose now from what it once did, if any at all.

Interestingly enough, my subtitle is more appropriate than ever.

Because The Elfin Ethicist bears the scars of my undergraduate years, because it no longer has a clearly defined target audience, because of my desire for a clean break as I begin my graduate studies, and because I anticipate having little time or confidence to post this year, I am stopping now.

Of course, I do not anticipate leaving the blogosphere entirely. I will still be reading weblogs and commenting occasionally. And someday, I may start writing for the web again.

Goodbye, everyone. It's been interesting.

Being a good neighbor

A couple of weeks ago, I decided I should buy a large bag of cheap candy. I consider myself, after all, a reasonably civic-spirited sort of chap, and it occurred to me that I might get Halloween visitors this year. They might expect candy.

However, I am also a citizen of deep moral conviction. I simply could not encourage the youth of this city to participate in such a wicked, not to mention dentally dangerous, celebration. And I don't particularly like visitors anyway. So last night, I turned off both my inside lights and my porch light to discourage anyone ghoulish from dropping by.

So now I still have this great big bag of candy. Civic-spiritedness should work out this well for everyone.

Selected scenes at Syracuse

For once, the weather was good for photographs this morning, so I took a few pictures of my part of campus -- while we still have leaves left.

The university's department of public safety uses this building.

But have you read Vizzini?

Barista 1: "You ever read The Republic, by Plato?

Barista 2: "Sure."

Barista 1: "I just got through reading it."

Barista 2: "Good book, huh?"

Barista 1: "Yeah, lotta good stuff. Smart guy."

Nifty

I get a student ID card with "Grad" written on it, and all of a sudden I get to keep library books for 16 weeks.

First day of classes

This afternoon, I had my first graduate class ever. But it doesn't really count. It is just an undergraduate course with an option for graduate credit.

My first real graduate class begins in about an hour.

Orientation continues

Our department had hazardous materials training today. The new history grads (joined by the new geography grads) gathered in a conference room to hear a talk by someone from the university's environmental health office.

What sorts of hazardous materials are handled by history and geography TAs, you ask? Well, mostly Windex and Static Guard, to judge from the lecture. I am happy to report that I now know where to find a material safety data sheet for them both, in case of an emergency.

In fact, I'll show you my lecture notes:

I. Don't sniff the glue.

II. But if you do, be sure to check the material safety data sheet.

III. Wait until a university win to buy your T-shirts. [The bookstore offers discounts based on how well our team scores.]

IV. Watch out for nuclear reactors. [Apparently, a custodial team once ran across one we didn't know we had.]

Scattered update

I am finished with TA orientation, which kept me busy at the university between Wednesday and Friday. Although I will not work as a TA until next year, the training was helpful not only as preparation for my eventual role but also as a good introduction to graduate life in general. Department-specific orientation activities will begin later next week.

The weather has been warm and sunny -- too warm for me, since I resent having to wear short sleeves. Of course, all the natives love the heat, even while predicting (with their typical perverse pride) that this year's warmth will mean an especially harsh winter. Today, however, the sky is gray and weepy, and the air is humid but cool.

Turandot was on the radio this afternoon. I treated myself to that and a bar of dark chocolate, between trips to the cellar to take care of the laundry.

Please stand by

This is a post to let everyone know that I am doing quite well in my new Yankee apartment, where I am awaiting the fall semester. I hope to post some pictures of my beautiful surroundings, as well as some brilliant thoughts on historical topics, when I get a better Internet connection. This space is likely to be quiet for a few more weeks, though.

Northward

In a few hours, I will be heading toward my new grad-student life. I'll have some Internet access along the way, but I probably won't be able to post anything here for many days. In the meantime, please remember to check out the thirty-sixth History Carnival, which Laura James will host at Clews The Historic True Crime Blog on 1 August.

Until next time!

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.

-- a certain hobbit

Booklorn

So far, I have packed four boxes of books, each box weighing 20 to 50 pounds. I anticipate filling another three or four boxes. That represents only a fraction of my library, but I am being picky. Complete Works of X takes priority over Selected Works; anthologies beat individual compositions; primary literature trumps secondary literature; and scholarly writing sweeps all else from the field. I want no dead weight on the shelves of my new home.

Oddly enough, leaving behind so many books is cathartic. It serves as yet another visible and reassuring sign of growing up; I can trace all of the volumes left on my bedroom shelves to specific earlier phases of my life. Many of these abandoned books will be useful to me again someday, but for now, most of them are barely even interesting as a distraction. I did not expect to find the separation so pleasing -- like losing baby teeth, getting a new backpack, or outgrowing a favorite shirt.

Back in East Texas

I'm back one more time in the vicinity of my alma mater, spending the weekend with friends for old times' sake and in order to watch some plays at the Texas Shakespeare Festival. We saw Coriolanus tonight; I think it lived up to its reputation as one of the apocryphal (read "campy") plays. With Pericles, School for Husbands, and Harvey to go, everything should be much more cheerful from now on.

Hymn in Honor of Our Ancestors

Sirach 44:1-15 (NRSV)

Let us now sing the praises of famous men,
our ancestors in their generations.
The Lord apportioned to them great glory,
his majesty from the beginning.
There were those who ruled in their kingdoms,
and made a name for themselves by their valor;
those who gave counsel because they were intelligent;
those who spoke in prophetic oracles;
those who led the people by their counsels
and by their knowledge of the people's lore;
they were wise in their words of instruction;
those who composed musical tunes,
or put verses in writing;
rich men endowed with resources,
living peacefully in their homes --
all these were honored in their generations,
and were the pride of their times.
Some of them have left behind a name,
so that others declare their praise.
But of others there is no memory;
they have perished as though they had never existed;
they have become as though they had never been born,
they and their children after them.
But these also were godly men,
whose righteous deeds have not been forgotten;
their wealth will remain with their descendants,
and their inheritance with their children's children.
Their descendants stand by the covenants;
their children also, for their sake.
Their offspring will continue for ever,
and their glory will never be blotted out.
Their bodies are buried in peace,
but their name lives on generation after generation.
The assembly declares their wisdom,
and the congregation proclaims their praise.

My ethical philosophy

According to the Ethical Philosophy Selector:

1. St. Augustine (100%)
2. Prescriptivism (90%)
3. John Stuart Mill (90%)
4. Jean-Paul Sartre (88%)
5. Kant (88%)
6. Aquinas (87%)
7. Ockham (81%)
8. Spinoza (52%)
9. Jeremy Bentham (51%)
10. Nel Noddings (49%)
11. Ayn Rand (44%)
12. Epicureans (43%)
13. Plato (41%)
14. Aristotle (32%)
15. Stoics (20%)
16. David Hume (16%)
17. Cynics (10%)
18. Nietzsche (9%)
19. Thomas Hobbes (0%)

Moving forward

Today I got a nice, shiny new university email account. I decided to celebrate by updating my AHA membership information so that it will be correct when the next directory gets printed.

It won't be long before I, swamped with work, will look back wistfully at this carefree summer and wonder why I was stupid enough to sign up for years and years of additional schooling. For now, however, the prospect of independence and access to university resources is what keeps me sane. A funny paradox.

American memories

WPA poster, c. 1937

Geekery

Thought the first:

I keep starting on new books and articles. At this point, I think it might be wise to try to finish something before I start the next one. But which one to finish first?

Thought the second:

The National Geographic Bee is on right now in the other room. I probably shouldn't watch. Those little kids make me feel so stupid.

Happy Mother's Day

I didn't forget it. Honest.

Jaroslav Pelikan 1923-2006

Word is circulating that Jaroslav Pelikan, the greatest contemporary church historian, died yesterday of lung cancer. He was 82. According to OrthodoxWiki, the funeral will happen Wednesday.

My first contact with Pelikan's work came in the form of this lecture: "The Predicament of the Christian Historian."

No historicism about the West and no exoticism about the East could excise that specific history, the history of Jesus and of the movement that came out of his life and message, from the history that had produced the members of [Adolf von] Harnack's audience at the University of Berlin in 1900, who could be and were ignorant of it but who could not be and were not unaffected by it in a fundamental way. As he put it in his opening words, "The great philosopher of Positivism, John Stuart Mill, once said that the human race cannot be reminded often enough that there was once a man named Socrates. He is right, but it is more important to go on reminding the human race that a man named Jesus Christ once stood in their midst."

But there was a more substantive and fundamental reason as well: the history of Jesus and of his message carried that force also because his sayings and parables uniquely "speak to us through the centuries with the freshness of the present." ...

Was it "the Christian historian" as historian or "the Christian historian" as Christian, perhaps even "the Christian historian" as theologian, who was speaking in pronouncing such judgments? It is the predicament of the Christian historian to live in that tension; for, as I have suggested elsewhere, every historian must be a polyglot, speaking one or more of the dialectes of "past-ese" and simultaneously communicating to contemporaries in "present-ese."

Upcoming attractions

For those in the Austin area:

University of Texas Press Annual Outdoor Book Sale

This Friday (10 a.m. to 6 p.m.) and Saturday (10 a.m. to 3 p.m.). I've been there the last two years, and I have no intention of missing it this year. UT Press will be selling lots of brand-new (and some slightly damaged) textbooks for cheap, all outdoors under a big tent, which somehow makes the hunt more exciting.

2006 Summer Film Series at the Paramount Theatre

From 24 May to 8 September. I'm not as impressed with this year's lineup as I have been with some previous seasons, but I'm sure that won't keep me from enjoying it.

The Great Longview Marketing Tour

Amidst the chaos of preparing for a wedding and a graduation, a few of my college friends and I found time last week to accomplish something we had wanted to do for years. Gallagher, Martinez, Wheeler, and I piled into a car and set out on the Great Longview Marketing Tour, documenting the quirky advertising we had noticed during our stay in East Texas. We'd been driving by these signs week after week for four years; we decided we had to share them with the world before we lost the chance forever.

Click on the thumbnails to get the full effect.

Finished

It is done! I am now a former LeTourneau University student, bearing a BA in history-political science and a BS in business administration.

Furthermore, my friends Rachel and Wheeler are married.

I am full of contradictory emotions. I may never see some of my friends again (and two of them are now united in a way that will take some getting used to), and I have left a place that had almost come to seem like home. But I am also free to start a new life in a new place. For the moment, I am back in rural Central Texas, hoping for a little peace and quiet. For the Wheelers, I wish a similarly peaceful summer and a marriage that will grow ever stronger.

Seven days to degree

And now I'm totally done with my undergraduate work. Just now, I completed my last business assignment (a team presentation to a local nonprofit organization). I've earned my degrees.

Eight days to degree

I just got out of the last class lecture of my undergraduate years.

Going to Syracuse

My visit to Syracuse University required careful planning. After a few false starts -- originally, I hoped to use spring break for the trip, but our schools had picked the same week for vacation -- I found a relatively clear week in my schedule. I raced to complete that week's assignments early, drafting a research paper in record time the night before I was scheduled to leave. That Monday night, I boarded an Amtrak train in Longview, joining my mother and younger brother, who had come up from Austin on the same train to accompany me. Their willingness to come along would turn out to be a great help.

Normally, I love trains. I love being able to see the countryside pass by, and I actually like the long overland trip much more than a shorter airplane ride. This journey north, however, tested my patience.

The trip from Longview to Chicago was mostly uneventful, but not entirely. Late Monday night, I awoke to the protestations of a drunken lecher two rows up, who was being put off the train for making a nuisance of himself. He charged the conductors with racism, to the amused exasperation of the black women sitting nearby. Then he promised darkly that he wouldn't leave the train unless he were carried off by paramedics (he was having a heart attack, he decided). Fortunately, the man meekly followed two Arkadelphia police officers off the train at the next stop. The rest of the trip was pleasant.

The second leg of the journey, however, was considerably less smooth. The train we boarded at Chicago was smaller and less comfortable, with narrow seats and out-of-order bathrooms. Furthermore, we were sitting directly behind an incredibly irksome passenger -- a large, loud, irrepressibly obscene man with a cell phone and a DVD player. He was traveling from Chicago to New York City, so we had to deal with him all the way to Syracuse. To make the experience more interesting, the passenger seated directly beside me also had a mobile phone; he chattered on it nonstop during the night.

Even after we arrived in Syracuse, the trip kept getting complicated. Shortly after detraining, I ended up in an emergency room to investigate some pain that had been getting worse and worse during the journey. The problem didn't turn out to be very serious (as far as the hospital could tell), and I felt much better the next morning, when I was scheduled for interviews at the university.

I think Syracuse is going to be a good city for me -- a nice size and atmosphere for my needs. When I was there, of course, the weather was beautiful; I was warned strongly not to get used to that. (I believe the annual average is 115 inches of snow, with nearly 200 inches in one recent year.) Whatever the climate is like, the people I met there were uniformly warm and accommodating, easily matching what I expect here in the genial South.

I probably shouldn't go into much detail about my meetings at this point, since I don't know the individuals involved very well yet. I will say, however, that I met with several faculty members and students in history, and that they all made me feel very welcome. The professors even shepherded me from office to office themselves, introducing me to each other. They answered my questions freely and, I may say, satisfactorily. When I went back to my hotel that day, I was pretty sure I had already come to a decision.

Unfortunately, the medication prescribed as a precaution by the ER doctor made me violently ill that afternoon; I stayed in the hotel moaning and vomiting rather than exploring the city. On Friday morning, I felt much better but still not well enough to walk about much, so we stayed in the hotel until it was time to catch our train back home.

In other words, after all that work, I got to spend just a few hours at the university, or indeed, seeing the city at all. But those hours were enough.

I have mailed the school my paperwork, declaring my intent to register and accepting my university fellowship. Starting this fall, then, I will spend the next few years at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University, studying in the department of history.

Now I have to figure out where I'm going to live when I get there. Oh, well. Minor details.

Next round

I'm off to visit Syracuse now. I'll be back in a few days.

He returns

I'm back! And now I must try to catch up on many different things around the apartment. The trip to Chicago was useful but very tiring. I got off the train just a couple of hours ago, so the world is still rocking back and forth; I shouldn't stay at the computer long.

If you've had any difficulty commenting here, I apologize. The blog technicians have been busy dealing with our spam problem. Things should be working properly now. You'll notice a slight difference in the commenting procedure, but I think it should be easy to figure out.

Today's tomorrow

I've heard back from two graduate schools so far. One, citing the universally high credentials of its 8,000 applicants, politely declined to admit me. The other, however, had already promised a very comfortable financial award. The details I have been given so far make the offer sound luxurious; my academic advisor assured me that I have his permission to spend the rest of this semester daydreaming.

Actually, I am trying to decide whether I want to spend this summer studying German or Latin. On the one hand, I plan to focus on modern intellectual history, so German makes a lot of sense. On the other, I am getting more and more interested in the premodern foundations of modern thought, so Latin could be more valuable. Also, there's something inherently cooler about dead languages.

Speaking of coolness, my graduate school picks are located in the northern regions of the country -- more specifically, near large lakes. I think this native Texan is finally going to get to deal with snow.

Unveiling

There is something apocalyptic about this campus in the nighttime.

We are located near a chemical plant and a heavy-machinery factory, so we get plenty of light pollution. On a cloudy night like this one, the southern horizon glows a dull red -- especially when the plant lights its flare.

We also hear strange, inhuman noises. We often hear a sound like a far-off giant's front door slamming. I suspect it comes from the factory. Closer at hand, young men drive through our neighborhood with their car stereos at full power, rattling windows. Sometimes these cars backfire ... but sometimes the sounds we hear come from weapons.

I rarely notice the eeriness of all this during the work week. On a Saturday night, however, a trip outside becomes an adventure. Every faceless human shape that passes, inspires a sense of loneliness. Every locked building suggests wasted potential.

Then I return home and start reading. Tonight, Locke and Rousseau.

Tomorrow, I will go to church. The front wall of the sanctuary at St. Mike's is all glass; the congregation gets a splendid view of deep green pine trees. The altar is covered in white cloth. We recite the creed and pray together, thanking Christ for the morning.

Advantages of tolerance

Reading from a collection of the Marquis de Condorcet's writings this morning, I came across a letter he addressed to his daughter. Condorcet wrote this in 1794 while hiding from the Terror. (He was on the run after publicly criticizing the Jacobin constitution.) The letter is full of fatherly advice, the advice Condorcet wanted to leave his child but doubted he would be able to impart in person. I especially like his admonition to be nice and "indulgent" whenever possible:

My child ...

If you want society to give you more pleasure and comfort than sorrow or bitterness, be indulgent and guard against egoism as a poison which ruins all its pleasures.

By indulgence, I do not mean the ability, born of indifference or thoughtlessness, to pardon everything simply because you do not feel or notice anything. I mean the indulgence based on justice, on reason, on an awareness of your own weaknesses, and on our happy inclination to pity men rather than condemn them.

This will enable you to find happiness in the many good but weak people who are not tiresome though they have no shining qualities, who can distract you even if they cannot occupy you, whom you can meet with pleasure but leave without pain, and who do not count when we view our lives as a whole, but who can pass the time and fill a few empty moments. ...

Because of your duties, your main interests and the things you feel strongly about, you may not always be able to associate only with people you have chosen to have around you. And then, situations which would have cost you nothing if you had been more reasonable and more just, and had made indulgence a way of life, will require painful, daily sacrifices. Instead of a slight constraint, they will become a true source of unhappiness.

It's a nicely practical argument, founded on self-interest as well as the concept of fairness. This is what you would hear if your father were an Enlightenment philosopher who wanted you to play nice. The essence of the advice: overlook irritations, be charitable to everyone, and be humble. I like that advice; it could already have saved me a lot of difficulty in my short life, had I followed it more often.

Yes, actually, I am

Watching the game, that is.

Go, Texas.

Happy new year

Down with 2005! To the health of 2006!

Happy holidays

Which is to say, merry Christmas and happy Hanukkah.

Explain me this

When my roommate pulled up the weather forecast this morning, this is what he saw:

Things are looking up

I celebrated the first day of Advent on Sunday.

My stomach can handle ordinary food again.

Dr. J moved back the due date on the Paper of Awe.

I have a workable thesis and outline for said PoA.

I made a good grade on the last Financial Management exam.

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs contradicted Donald Rumsfeld in public yesterday. (Via Chris Bray)

I saw frost on my lawn this morning.

I finally seem to have Firefox on my side again. I uninstalled it, deleted all the related folders, and reinstalled everything with version 1.5, which has just been released. So far, so good.

Perfect timing

The really annoying thing? After three days, my cold has completely thrown off my sense of taste.

Fizzlefox

So all of a sudden, Firefox hates me. I hadn't been doing anything different lately. I've uninstalled and reinstalled it to no avail. This is frustrating; I'm running regular Mozilla at the moment, but it isn't nearly as much fun.

Jimmy Rogers

I have been avoiding personal updates lately, but I think I should post this one.

My maternal grandfather died two weeks ago. Because of my responsibilities here, I decided that I was unable to attend the funeral -- a conclusion I regretted but tried not to think about too much.

My mom sent me a link I would like to post here. Granddaddy's death made the local section of the San Angelo Standard-Times: "Parks director dies: Rogers, water lily visionary passed away Friday." (You can get a username and password at BugMeNot.)

The 34-year parks superintendent, whose drive and vision led to the creation of the International Water Lily Collection and the expansion of the Concho River park system from 19th to Bell streets, died Friday after a decade-long battle with Alzheimer's disease. He was 83.

''He was the best parks director San Angelo ever had,'' said Kenneth Landon, curator of the internationally renowned Civic League Park water-lily collection, one of the last projects Rogers spearheaded before he retired in 1989.

I will miss him. To adapt Solzhenitsyn slightly:

We had all lived side by side with him and had never understood that he was the righteous one without whom, as the proverb says, no village can stand.

Nor any city.

Nor our whole land.

Mon semblable -- mon frère?

My cousin Jared, in calling me "most boring blogger in the blogosphere," has a point. This site is looking really sad.

There are several reasons for my lethargy. I would rather not elaborate on some of them here; others I can explain simply as "senioritis" (I will get my undergraduate degree in 181 days). Fundamentally, though, this blog has come to reflect my academic interests -- interests that only rarely coincide with my school work or routine life these days. I am simply not having fun here anymore; my ennui is reflected in this blog.

A thousand lost golf balls

A present from myself arrived in the mail today.

Fading light, converging paths

Snatch

Thanks to my mole on the library staff, who tipped me off to their presence on the book sale tables, I now own 22 issues of The Journal of American History from the 1990s. I paid $5.50.

In light of recent events

First-person pronouns

I am very tired of anthropocentric worship music. I refuse to sing another chorus that celebrates my own determination to love God.

I do not mean to condemn all self-awareness in our church music. Certainly, a believer's relationship with Christ should be personal and immediate. Divine grace provokes a response in us, and our love entails a commitment that goes beyond propositional assent.

Yet the primary purpose of worship is to fix our attention on God -- precisely because God is immutable and we are not. Our feelings are transient even when they are directed properly.

My complaint was inspired by today's campus chapel service, which consisted entirely of praise choruses. It was actually put together fairly well; even so, I had to abstain from some of the songs.

The light of day

I'm disappointed. The rain stopped completely by Saturday evening; Sunday arrived clear and hot, though with a breeze. I had hoped the weepy skies would last the weekend out.

In any case, the day flew by. I did accomplish a few things -- nine more ILL requests and a somewhat irate e-mail to a professor, for example. At day's close, my conclusion is that I need a vacation.

I don't have traditional senioritis. My focus on the core of my studies is sharper than ever. But I am finding that as this focus narrows, I am interpreting more and more aspects of quotidian life as purely annoying distractions.

Stormy weather and time travel

Rain has been pouring since I got up today. The wind is driving it at a steep angle, so people have trouble staying dry at all when they venture outside. My front yard has several low places -- one might say the entire yard is a ditch, actually -- so it is watery. Fortunately, the apartment itself is on higher ground.

The electricity went off a few times this morning, but it has been on for me this afternoon. Right now, I am copying more notes from my Tocqueville books and listening to popular music from World War II. I have a playlist with two and a half hours of vintage recordings.

Sitting at my desk, I face a small window. I have the blinds open so that I can watch the action outside. The storm does not seem threatening at all; there does not seem to be any thunder or lightning. Dry and cool indoors, I find the weather charming.

Time for tea.

Rain to come

In pure selfishness, I'm looking forward to the prospect of rain in East Texas this weekend. With Rita headed for the Texas coast, we should receive substantial precipitation here. It may make the night of the symphony interesting, of course. Saturday evening, we'll all be dressed to the nines -- tramping along from our cars to the performance hall and then back again. I will be entertained.

My selfish attitude appalls me, though, when I think of the people who are on the road right now, fleeing homes in Galveston and other vulnerable areas. Some of these evacuees will end up at LeTourneau. The administration is already asking us to volunteer any extra dorm space we have, and instructions have been issued for sheltering family members here. Students are also being asked to avoid travel this weekend.

None of this, though, is of much concern to me. My apartment is not likely to be needed for evacuees. The symphony is not likely to be canceled. The streets are not likely to be closed. I did not plan to leave town this weekend. If Rita does to us what Katrina did to us, the biggest annoyance to me will be a temporary lack of milk in the cafeteria. Gasoline prices will probably rise, but I do not have a car at the moment.

Oh, well. I have books to read and papers to write. Rain is welcome here; I am warm and safe.

Update: I should mention that I have some relatives living south of Houston, just a few miles from the Texas coastline. All but one, I'm told, have already reached safer areas; my uncle had to stay to look after a chemical plant.