Monday, April 24, 2006

festivities

Hey, hey! Three lovely ladies at the Gospel Choir concert!


L to R: Sarah, me, and Laura.

What a full week! Actually, it’s just been a full half-week. But more than enough has been going on…

Wednesday night was Honors Convocation—kind of like an honors graduation—and I sat up on the stage with the other honors graduates. Pretty cool, except we were staring into spotlights, so I think I had a squinty half-smile on my face the whole time. Oops. But we gave our graduation robes a trial run, and both the presenting professor and the student speaker had good things to say. It really felt like the Beginning of the End: all these final ceremonies, farewell dinners, and celebrations.

After the ceremony, we had time to talk with professors and other students, and I enjoyed that even more than the ceremony. Mom came with me, so I got to introduce her to our English department chair—Professor Vanden Bosch, my wonderful grammar professor—and to Professor Engbers, who worked on my honors thesis and has been my advisor for every step of these four years. She’s heard their names before, so I had fun introducing them to each other.

Then, Thursday morning, Festival of Faith and Writing began! How do I even sum up those three days? So much happened, it’s impossible to describe it all. Here are my highlights, then:

1. A Reading by Thomas Lynch: I actually studied and read Thomas Lynch’s essays in Craft of Writing last fall. He was wonderful reading out loud! Not all authors read their work well (have you heard T.S. Eliot reading his own poetry??), but Thomas Lynch was a delight to listen to. He got the entire audience laughing hard. And the reading reminded me of how much I enjoy reading and writing (and listening to!) personal essays.

2. Two small group sessions, one with Patricia Raybon, one with Alice McDermott: This was a great way to start Thursday and Friday. A few honors students had the chance to meet with these authors (after reading their books) and to talk about their work and their messages. It was really interesting, and a rare chance. So helpful for me as a beginning writer!

3. Interview with Lauren Winner: Turns out that Lauren Winner is a blast to listen to. I loved her insights about church and reading and introverts—yes! She talked about being an introvert, and I so identified with what she was saying! And she was so darn funny about it. I picked up Mudhouse Sabbath, and I’m hoping to dig into it this summer.

4. Salman Rushdie’s keynote speech: I was absolutely blown away by Salman Rushdie. I’ve only read Haroun and the Sea of Stories, but I was wishing I had read even more of him when he began to speak. I was impressed by his intelligence and his ability as a speaker, even though I disagreed—strongly—with some of his points. At the same time, he got me thinking about other issues as well—stirred up a lot of thoughts.

5. ...augh, and I thought these were going to be brief! Oops. Anyway, I was surprised by how much I enjoyed a presentation on the “Spirited Traveler,” a session that dealt with “Journeys, the Soul, and Sacred Places.” Amazing. I went just to see what it would be like, but I took notes like crazy. The two presenters (Tim Bascom and Daniel Taylor) had so many relevant things to say—made me want to travel! With pen in hand!

6. The perfect ending to the Festival was the final keynote speaker, Walter Wangerin Jr. I was familiar with him as a writer, but I had no idea that he was such a powerful speaker. He talked about how Christian writers can be “voices in the wilderness” with what they write and say and who they touch. It was unexpectedly moving, and my friends and I had tears in our eyes when he announced a blessing over us at the end.

I promise you that the above is shorter than it could have been!

My mom went home on Sunday—we had a great time seeing each other at various sessions and comparing notes from the ones that we attended separately. Sunday afternoon I went with Sarah and Laura—my freshman-year suitemates, and stunning Calvin alums—to the Gospel Choir concert and then out for a lonnnng and luxurious dinner afterwards. We had so much catching up to do!

Whew! So now I’m exhausted, but there are papers to write…—jl

Posted by Jenn Langefeld on 04/24 at 08:07 PM
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