Where The Sidewalk Ends

I love the mountains, while The Lady longs for the ocean. She was raised around Jews and Italians, me around Kansas farmers. I hate hot weather, she hates cold weather, and we both hate being stuck in traffic. We're both frugal conservatives who can't stand corruption and government waste . Our children are black (closer to brown, actually) and we love diversity.

Therefore, we chose to live in the western suburbs of Chicago, so that we could both be equally miserable.

For many people, buying a home involves a long search process. We looked at precisely 1 house and signed a contract within two weeks. About two months later, back in India, we awoke to the news that we were the owners of a 105-year-old home in Wheaton.

It was a counterintuitive choice. What could be more stereotypical than evangelical Christians moving to Wheaton? (My best friend's wife mockingly asked us if, "God told you to move to Wheaton," which is funny because I don't think God told them to move to the northern suburbs of Cincinnati). Four years before, The Lady had considered moving to Istanbul to help plant a church; we now owned a home in a community with somewhere close to a hundred churches. But refugees were increasingly settling in the area, we were familiar with the home and the sellers as The Lady had been their nanny, the location was amazing, and it made sense financially (given that we could rent out most of the house while traveling). We were married there and it was the only place that felt like home: a concept more foreign to us than cows wandering city streets, but for which we longed more than hamburger.

Upon finally settling into our home over a year later, our next door neighbor Bill asked The Lady, "Do you know why the sidewalk ends at your house?" We had never noticed that it did. Bill, who once served as the Chief Detective of our county and has lived in the neighborhood for decades, carries an air of gravitas born of a life marked by struggle and consistent perseverance. Any African-American man his age has seen more prejudice than most of us can imagine, but he rose above it all and carries not a tinge of bitterness. It's good that we have a black President, but I want my children to look up to Bill.

He went to on explain that our neighborhood was once the only place where non-whites could live in Wheaton. The city saw no point in putting in sidewalks - who would want to walk there? Besides, the neglected drainage system tended to flood the streets.

I confess to being shocked. Probably I am naive. But Wheaton was founded by abolitionists, and Wheaton College produced Illinois' first black college graduate. Apparently, at some point the radical faith of its founders was subsumed by standard suburban attitudes. Perhaps the fire simply dimmed, or perhaps the city's leaders ended up rejecting the social implications of the gospel during the fundamentalist-modernist battles of the 1920s. Regardless, it was not until after the Civil Rights Act of 1968 that the color line ringing our neighborhood was abolished. That line ran right past our property.

I also confess to being proud. We were not yet a multiracial family, but I was glad to know that our home was on inside of this nicer suburban version of a ghetto. It was like buying a share in someone else's rich history. And we felt more comfortable surrounded by those who had always been outsiders, than those who grew up with country club memberships. It also seemed fitting that we were on the border of two worlds, which in some way or another is how we've lived most of our lives as believers.

A year and a half later, as we prepared to adopt our African-American son, we realized it was truly providential that our home was across from the only African-American church in a community that is 84% white.

Sometimes The Lady dreams of buying a second home on Long Island where she was raised. But aside from practical considerations, such as the fact that we can't even afford to put a new lamp in our dining room, and that a pet penguin would be easier to maintain, it's not clear how much time we could even spend there and it's far from the mountains.

Sometimes I wonder if it would be smarter to move to Houston, where as a chemical engineer I could get 10 high-paying job offers within a week, and we could buy a Texas-sized brick house in a diverse neighborhood. We wouldn't even have to pay state income taxes. But The Lady would suffer traumatic culture shock, and apart from her resistance there is more to the good life than money.

If we ever left, I would miss the city of Chicago. I would miss our church even more, which has embraced us and changed us and through which we have encountered God. I would miss the friends who have witnessed our journey and stood by us in our darkest days. I would miss our home, packed full as a U-Haul with memories. But perhaps most of all, I would miss a small square of dirt in our backyard.

It was there, in a barren patch that had once been a garden, that we figuratively buried the 4 children we lost in the womb. If you acknowledge the biological fact that life begins at conception, then the appropriate way to deal with such loss is to hold a funeral. It was a short ceremony with no one else present, but on that day our open wound began to heal and our own insignificant patch of this planet became sacred.

One of our favorite songs is "My Father's Gun" by Elton John, featured on the Elizabethtown soundtrack. It's a strange choice because neither we nor our fathers own guns. And it's almost hilarious to hear a New Yorker singing along with lines such as, "It wouldn't do to bury him / Where any Yankee stands." (Same for a Kansan - we fought for the Union, thank you very much). But it resonates with something deep in our souls: that we have a legacy to carry, and that there is a place where we belong and thus other places - whatever their virtues - simply aren't home.

For us, that's here in Wheaton... where the sidewalk ends.

The 11 Worst Movies I Have Seen

We all have that experience of getting up from the couch, or walking out of the theater, and thinking, "I will never get back the 2 hours of my life I just wasted!" But perhaps we can bring some good out of the cinematic sins that others have visited upon us. Or perhaps I'm trying to atone for having spent $15 to see The Green Lantern.

Note that these are movies that I have seen. (Thankfully, I managed to avoid Left Behind). Also, I will not attempt to explain why I saw some of these movies - except to say that college students have been known to do stupid things.

11. Bad Boys 2 was actually enjoyable at the time. But by the time it ended, I simply felt tired, and upon leaving the theater I realized that I had killed more brain cells than if I had spent the afternoon downing vodka. It was producer Jerry Bruckheimer who first proved, with Top Gun, that a movie didn't need to have a plot to be successful. Supposedly, the original script for Bad Boys 1 was so bad that he and director Michael Bay actually rewrote it. If only I could get my hands on that original script - now that would be interesting.

10. The American President. Political movies rarely work as good drama, simply because it is so difficult to avoid pushing an agenda. Director Rob Reiner didn't even attempt ambiguity or complexity. He made a thinly veiled infomercial for the Democratic Party, particularly then-President Bill Clinton, and against the Republican Party and then-nominee Bob Dole. Dialogue and situations were lifted straight out of the previous few years of political headlines, including the 1996 election and the Monica Lewinksy scandal. Like Facing the Giants (see below) for diehard Democrats.

9. Jarhead. Although well-acted and -directed, this Gulf War movie / Full Metal Jacket-remake fails to tell a compelling story or offer any redeeming elements. Part diatribe against the Marine Corps, part tragedy of a lost and confused young man, it is long on pathos but short on substance. Nothing about any of the characters, except perhaps the Sargeant played by Jamie Foxx, gives us any reason to love or hate them - only to pity them.

8. Scary Movie 1 & 2 are combined not only because I watched the back-to-back, but because they are utterly indistinguishable. (Don't believe me? Hook up two DVD players to a television and switch back and forth randomly. You'll never notice any discontinuity!) Like a desperate comedian losing his audience, both movies continually resort to sexual perversion in an attempt at actual humor. Parodies only truly succeed when they use the material of the original as a springboard to mock larger trends, and in this regard both movies fall flat and remain (thankfully) utterly forgettable.

7. Nothing But Trouble. I am told that this movie was intended to be a comedy. Unfortunately, without a laugh track it was difficult to distinguish those events meant to be funny, from those that merely appeared to be snapshots of the most bizarrely bad day ever.

6. Sex and the City 2. For the first 90 minutes, I found myself checking my watch, looking around the theater, thinking about technical problems at work, and wondering what we should do with the landscaping in our backyard. I could not find a reason to care about anything happening to any of the people on screen. I have never seen a movie whose subject matter was so utterly banal. The movie works only as an uintentional comedy, in that the central conflicts facing each of the four women are - if given any thought - actually hilarious. A sex addict complains she is losing her libido? The worst conflict in a marriage is whether to go out and party every night or watch TV every night?  etc. etc. blah, blah, blah. The one redeeming element? A surprisingly accurate portrayal of Middle Eastern culture.

5. The Joneses begins with a truly intriguing premise: a "family" of actors who move into a very upscale neighborhood and entice everyone to buy various products through a combination of suggestion and envy. There was great potential here for an insightful look at materialism and the way we are influenced - by envy or the desire for social status - to buy things we don't need. Unfortunately, the plot quickly becomes bogged down by the conflicts within the "family," then veers into utter tragedy before suddenly ending on a romantic note. The actions of one of the main characters, a neighbor who spends recklessly to keep up with the Joneses and then defaults on his jumbo mortgage, are incomprehensible - it is difficult to believe that someone that affluent would have so little clue about his own finances. Rarely funny, occasionally insightful, but thoroughly depressing.

4. Scream. Senseless violence, no plot, and only amusing to the degree that it pokes fun at horror-movie conventions. That is, unless your idea of comedy is watching somebody get pinched to death in a garage door.

3. Swimming Pool. This movie should have been rated "X." And the plot (if you could call it that) made absolutely no sense. Reviewers praised it's "Hitchcockian sense" and the director claimed it "mixed fantasy and reality on the same plane." More accurately, it mixed gratuitous sexual content with a failed aspiration to be about something.

2. Jeepers Creepers. Not even scary, just pointless and disgusting. It featured bad acting, senseless gore, and a "plot" (using term loosely) in which evil wins for no particular reason.

1. Facing the Giants. Terrible acting, preachy dialogue, and ridiculous plots could all be forgiven when the movie was made by a Baptist church in the 9th poorest metro area of America. The real problem - and, unfortunately, the reason the film was so popular with many Christians - is that it contains, by far, the worst theology I have ever seen or heard. One reviewer called it "pornography for evangelical Christians." The gospel according to this movie: walk into a field and put your hands in the air... and God will give you a new truck, a winning football season, and cure your infertility! Truly an embarrassment to the church. And, quite possibly, the worst movie ever made since the invention of motion pictures - surpassing even Plan 9 From Outer Space.


Wow, I feel better now. Perhaps one of these days I'll write about good movies. Until then, consult Christianity Today's list of the Most Redeeming Films of 2012 - especially if you have seen any of the above monstrosities.

Making Sense of the Senseless

I pray for change. The demonstrations in New Delhi call to mind the orange revolution in the Ukraine, and the protests we witnessed in Mumbai after the 11/29 attacks, more than the so-called Arab Spring. The death of 4 children in the infamous Birmingham church bombing help to galavanize American opinion behind the civil rights movement. Perhaps this atrocity will help to bring about genuine protection for women in a society that views them as unwanted or expendable. 

I want to believe that at some point as she lay clinging to life, she cried out to the only deity in the entire pantheon of the East or the West who actually gives a damn about suffering and victimized human beings. And thus she is now with Jesus, drinking in unending beauty and awaiting the resurrection of a newly-whole body.

And I pray for her fiancé. There is no mental health program, counseling technique, or pharmaceutical that can heal such horrific memories. But if Jesus can turn an instrument of torture into a ornament of beauty, he can bring redemption out of even the worst violation.

Losing the Races

With the 113th Congress now in session, and Barack Obama preparing to take the oath of office a second time, the post-election analysis and explanation of the Republican Party's 2012 setbacks continue. The conventional wisdom is that the GOP is too conservative on social issues - such as abortion, marriage, and the rights of religious institutions - to win broadly. This is a gross misrepresentation of the data.

Remember all those speeches Mitt Romney gave about the sanctity of life, the sanctity of marriage, and the importance of religious freedom? Neither do I.

Mitt Romney did better than any recent Republican candidate among affluent white moderates. He actually won a majority of the white vote in both California and New York! (FYI, neither state is known for their social conservatism). He lost because he lost Asians and Hispanics, who gave in 2004 gave George W. Bush an estimated 43% and 44% of their votes, respectively. Similarly, Romney lost my home county of DuPage (IL) - traditionally a Republican stronghold - because, according to the 2010 census, it is now only 69% white. He would have had to win 70% of the white vote to carry the county. 

On the other hand, as is apparent from the actual number of votes cast by different groups, Romney lost Ohio entirely because working-class whites simply didn't vote: they don't like Obama, but after being saturated in anti-Bain advertising they didn't trust Romney either.

As for the Senate... Everybody knew Todd Akin was pro-life, and yet he was still expected to win handily over Claire McCaskill - until his infamous "legitimate rape" comment. Richard Mourdock's comments were actually far more nuanced, but coming in the wake of Akin's mega-gaffe they sounded too similar. Lost in all the furor was the fact that Democrat Joe Donelly, who defeated Mourdock in the Indiana Senate race, is also pro-life. Similarly, Scott Brown lost the Senate seat in Massachusetts to Elizabeth Warren despite being pro-choice. Losing Ilinois Rep. Joe Walsh had only recently become pro-life, is one of the most loud-mouthed and least likable people in politics, and was running in a redrawn district against a war hero in a wheelchair.

As famed political scientist Larry Sabato noted, the 2012 election most resembled 2004. In terms of education, gender, age, and income, all the trends were unchanged from 8 years before; only the actual numbers were slightly shifted toward the Democrats. The one big change: Republicans total loss of minorities.

Does anyone really believe that embracing abortion and same-sex marriage will win over Latinos and Asians? And for every female voter such positions woo from the Democrats, they will turn off at least two women who already vote Republican. Despite the supposed "war on women," Romney won the votes of 56% of married women - it's single women whom he lost, and they are probably a lost cause for the GOP anyway.

The bottom line is that the GOP lost because they ran a candidate (backed by an immigration-hostile platform) who utterly failed to appeal to anyone other than non-Hispanic Whites (and possibly Cubans). From his privileged childhood, to his education, to his religion, career, and present home, Mitt Romney has spent his entire life around those who are white and mostly upper-class. He was clearly uncomfortable in any other setting. Bush, despite his privileged background, was at home with ordinary Americans. He surrounded himself with advisers such as Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice, and assembled what is still the most ethnically-diverse cabinet in history. With the exception of his infamous binders, no one could imagine a Romney cabinet filled with anything other than white men.

Republicans: stop listening to the advice of those who won't support you anyway, and look at the data. Stand for life and marriage - and for the dignity of all Americans, including the unborn, the unemployed, immigrants (regardless of how they got here), minorities and those trapped in dysfunctional neighborhoods. In Illinois, forget Lake Forest - you need someone who can win in Aurora. Let the Democrats have the rich white liberals. Win non-white social conservatives - particularly Hispanics - and you win the future. Ignore them, and your party fades into history.