The little moments in this anomaly of life. Touch, a review

There's been something on my mind for a while, something that would be considered almost a nonissue to some, yet could potentially seem life-and-death important to others. How life works.
As a child, I had a gift to understand words. It was how I was able to get straight-A's in spelling and understand what words meant. It's what enables me to understand what I read and what I type. It's how I learn about the world- through written word more than anything else, except hands-on. Yet as a kid, I hated numbers, I would find out eventually I have a form of dyslexia for numbers, called discalculae. No one in my family's familiar with that term, so no one could understand why I was great with words (in the 5th grade, my reading level was already in the college level) yet terrible with mathematics while my brother was the exact opposite. I felt that the public education system was always trying to force me to be like everyone else, something that's never ever worked.
With the opening of Touch, a young boy explains how the world works with the universal language of mathematics, focusing on patterns and how they're everywhere in life yet only a few people on the planet can see them. Then he reveals the exact amount of time he'd been alive, then throws the punch- "In all that time, I never spoke a single word." From there, this episode seems to be a sequence of little moments that, at first, seem disjointed while showing the realities of life, including social prejudice when it comes to autistic children ("Your kid should be locked up in a cage!" "What'd you say!?"). And yet, there's another plot going on, literally around the world dealing with a lost phone that, while the owner's trying to get back because of the photographs on it, other people are using it for their own solicit gains.
The boy, Jake, has a beautiful talent with numbers, seeing them in many numerous ways yet using them in specific ways. When his father starts seeing a start to the pattern, he starts to wonder what his son is seeing altogether.
The phone subplot could be a plot all on its own with how people are shown to have disconnected dreams and different backgrounds of life, yet are all connected in some way or another, whether in life or through an unseen connection in life.
Life may seem trivial to many. Like a cruel cosmic punishment for simply existing. Like it's trying to push you to your own extreme edge with loss, confusion, pain. These Jake's father is seen to suffer, yet he never loses hope, even when he's on the brink of losing hope with an agency. And an agent in said agency finds out Jake's talent when he reveals a number he couldn't have known but is familiar to her. Then, moments later (show-wise), that same number ends up in what seems like a chaotic mess, only for that chaotic mess to end in hope for someone else eventually. I once read recently a short story of a man talking to God about how bad his day's been and asks where God was. Post-complaints, God reveals what all He was doing for the man. Even in when it seems like tragedy, it doesn't mean there's nothing dealing with God in it.
And one of the hardest emotional scenes deals with a teenage boy in the Middle East being forced to wear a suicide bomber's vest. With that one man's phone as the battery for the vest. The boy gets a call to let him know the phone isn't his and he needs to give it back. The boy reveals that it isn't his fault, he's not a bad person he has a dream and almost believes it lost when he's given a chance to achieve it. The way it plays out, even though you can very well guess what's about to happen is tear-jerking anyway. The boy achieves his dreams, the woman who calls him has helped him, and everyone who's had a connection with the phone has had more than just connection by touching the phone, they just won't realize it.
Young Jake reminds me of the character Holden from Karen Kingsbury's book, Unlocked. People see him differently, don't understand him, even when he has a close connection to the world around him, just differently than we would expect. I've never been tested for it, though I have a few suspicions about having Aspberger's Syndrome, a high-end autism disorder, which explains how I miss certain social cues, get socially awkward, yet in my own little world, I see everything immensely different. How something is simple to most can be difficult for me to grasp and vice versa. Jake doesn't speak a single word in the episode, yet he helps immensely with connecting people in unseen ways through the use of what I once loathed with a passion, helping me understand (and remember) that mathematics isn't strictly formulas and basic structures with a couple symbols and whatnot, but something I can understand more easily- a pattern within life.
The creator of the show has gone from showing how evolution can make people have unique powers once only in comic books to how God is in life from looking into its bizarre complexities that we can NOT escape from, no matter how hard we try.

The little things that can happen

It seems there's little in little Alva, Oklahoma. A Wal-Mart that's just barely over half the size of a supercenter (which I've been hired as an overnight stocker), a small theater/video rental store, a pharmacy with soda fountain, and a youth center that opens 3-5:30 pm where kids can (gossip) play video games, go online, skateboard, play sports, and pig out with food that, like the soda fountain at Holder's, is like Ohio- no tax on it.
Yet it's at that last place, called the eXtreme Building, that something really amazing happened (in the scope of this small town, 5 miles square) this past Wednesday- a concert featuring radio-steady Christian prog-rock band Fireflight with a couple guest stars- Cory Lamb and Rapture Ruckus. I was asked by the youth pastor, Jeremy Little, to help out with the band set-up. As much as I love Fireflight's music (they're not my favorite, but nonetheless, I love their stuff [my faves are As I Lay Dying, Skillet, and Demon Hunter]), why would I pass up a priviliged opportunity? So I came by expecting to help out. That I did, and so much more. Warning, I didn't treat the members of each band like some rock gods, I did greet them, hung out, and asked stuff. Not like "Where do you get the inspiration for your songs?" or "Where do you get your instruments?" Rather, stuff like "I imagine you had a few normal jobs before being in a band, huh?" and, when I saw the logo of Rapture Ruckus (it looked like an old-school video game "sprite" character), "You play video games?" Turned out, yep, many of them do. When I was asked (by the guitarist for Cory Lamb, who was wearing the shirt) what my favorite video game was (yes, I'm a hardcore lifelong video gamer), I first asked if old-school or new-school. Old-school. "That one's easy- Super Mario Bros." And I agreed with his answer, "Can never go wrong with that one!" Spent an hour getting their equipment out of their trucks and setting up inside.
Got to meet Glen from Fireflight (the band member that day I met), and he figured out pretty quickly that I'm a huge Skillet fan while he was getting his guitar ready, while Dawn, it turns out, doesn't need to look any different than she does in the videos. As someone commented on their latest video (Stay Close), "Is it just me or does she get more and more beautiful in every video?" Impossibly, it turns out to be true, And just a little talk with her showed how passionately compassionate she is, and (believe it or not), how human and humane she is. Then, onto their new drummer, Adam. While he and a lady who goes with them on the road, Katy, were getting his drums ready, all three of us talked... and talked... and talked. If they ever got annoyed of my incessant blabbing, they showed no sign, they just went along with it, and with loads of great humor. Especially when another roadie got out a huge, all-wooden tambourine, sat in it, and started playing it. I asked Katy to hold my glasses, asked the guy to keep playing, then started to headbang with a Rock On gesture shooting out and bobbing up-and-down. At that, everyone who saw it cracked up.
Believe it or not, even roadies and bands have misadventures and funny stories while on the road. The guitarist with the Rapture Ruckus shirt? It turned out that at another venue, while opening a door, was afraid he'd be slammed under, so he asked for a little assistance this time. While Rapture Ruckus was getting all their stuff set up, knowing they're from New Zealand (you don't have to know that to know they're foreign, their accents make it obvious, but I almost thought their lead singer was from Ireland!), I decided to make jokes with my "professional" linguistic skills (spoke a touch of Japanese, Norwegian, and Russian, along with English) and it got everyone surprised and amused.
Cut to 5 hours later, start of concert. Rapture Ruckus was up first, it'd been four, maybe five years since the last concert I was at (Skillet's Comatose concert at the Veteran's House in Huntington, WV), so it took quite a bit of time for me to get myself loose enough to headbang and Rock On with my fist in the air (I still feel it in my neck and right elbow...). Nonetheless, I was immensely surprised at all the energy the dude has! And anyone who wonders why a Christian music artist keeps praising God, it's not entirely because it's "in the contract" as the cop-out goes. I did a little research on the band, and their singer, Brian, had suffered from drug abuse when, at 18, he was challenged by a good friend who's a Christian on where hise life was heading. At that, he went to a church, committed his life to God. So, why constantly praise God in the music? As a public celebration, an energetic acknowledgement that your life is no longer the same, and that you have no shame about it.
Yet, the biggest thing that happened to me wasn't all the intense energy that kept flowing out and everybody rocking it out, it happened about five songs into Fireflight's playing time. Saw a little girl that was anxious to get up front, so I shifted to the "side" (if you can call it that in an open area like a mosh pit) and let her go on. A few minutes after she thanked me twice (the first time I was headbanging and she didn't know I saw her), I had the feeling she wanted to get further up, so I tapped a guy ahead of me on his arm, then tapped the girl on her shoulder, gesturing to her to go on ahead, the guy got the hint and waved her to go ahead, then she started going crazy right up front (there was no security guards at the stage). So, even with all the immense intensity and that electrifying concert that sparked this tiny town, it was helping a little girl from Enid, Oklahoma to have a better time than she would have if I hadn't let her go ahead.
After the concert, I was stunned to find out my own mother had been headbanging, while my stepdad couldn't (stiff back from work), but we all had a great time afterward nonetheless. Even managed to get pictures of the lead signer of Rapture Ruckus (my mom is in the picture, she got a picture of me with him on her phone), as well as with Cory Lamb (never heard his music before then, turned out to be really good inspirational rock). Post-concert, even had a great time helping the bands get their stuff packed up to get ready to hit the road. Told them all, "Wherever you're going after this, have a great time there."
And Adam from Fireflight? He told me to finish up on my book. Though he doesn't read fiction, it was awesome to hear a member of a great band say that to me anyway.

The testimony of yours truly

Before I post anymore posts (and I have many in mind), I do believe it's more credible to know who the speaker is than to simply take the words of the speaker to heart (so many dangers can happen that way).
So, onward I go to explain who I am and how I came to believe what I believe.
I was born in in the county seat of Muskingum County, Ohio- Zanesville, a rather large place, but not quite big enough to be considered a major city (it doesn't have any major skyscrapers, just plenty of  landmass). I was born to two different kinds of people-the religiously devout and the spiritual skeptic-and had a lot of pain growing up, mainly through my father (who turned me off from swearing, so if you met me and I hate cussing, it's not solely from my beliefs, it was from my father). My mother tried raising my brother and me in church, though it felt more like a religious obligation than out of goodwill or out of the heart. In other words, my brother felt like we were being forced into church. Personally, I wanted a way to get away from the pain.
At 11 years old, I found that way through my mom's boyfriend (Mom and Dad divorced in the late 80's, when I was just a toddler) who told me about being a Christian and asked me if I had ever been "saved". Funny thing is, even at that age, when no one had told me about the process, I knew deep inside how it worked, I hadn't heard about the concept of sin, yet maybe the pain had something to do with my already knowing something about it. So, instead of getting saved in a church, like most of the world would expect, I was saved in my mom's boyfriend's apartment in New Philadelphia, Ohio. Saved...
Or so I thought.
There were other concepts I hadn't heard of or would know for a while that I needed to know about- including false faith (psychosomasis, you could say), religiousity, being Pharisaic, etc.
For a full ten years, things would seem to happen that, logically were impossible- including times and incidents where I just knew-knew-that I shouldn't have lived through. At least three of such an event happening, yet I did live anyway. And other bizarre events that should have been impossible if life were as boring and expendable as I've heard in public school (yep, I was raised in a battle for the mind between creationism and evolution) had left me to believe.
Even though I hadn't read the Bible as much as it felt required to read (you know, at least some daily), I did know bits and pieces and when certain people would challenge me about what the Bible said (okay, it was just one person who had a degree that called him "Reverend") about homosexuality, I told him, "You're the reverend, you tell me." Really, I was onyl familiar with the story of Sodom and Gomorrah and their widely-known acts of perversion, not solely homosexuality, but also gang rape, pedophilia, etc. Yet, from the things that I did read, I decided to take a hint from King Solomon and do a prayer I had never heard anyone else do at that point- pray for wisdom over riches.
And I would get it in college, through the help of a great friend, Gerhard Esterhuizen. The leader of Marshall University CRU, he explained the many finer points of Christianity without sounding like a know-it-all theologian, he brought the Truth of the Scripture to us in a down-to-earth style that was easy to comprehend without watering it down (like I'd seen so many televangelists do, which disgusted me), including one MAJOR thing I was guilty of-legalism. I'd judged people in my mind for the slightest of things, even if they did those things by accident.
I hated and judged gays.
I hated science.
I hated. This. That. These. Those.
I was the epitome of what people hate Christians for without ever realizing it.
That year in college, I gradually changed. Then, at 21, when I moved to live in Huntington, WV (ever since the first time I saw it back in my Upward Bound days in high school, I knew I wanted to live there irregardless of how), it happened.
I picked up a copy of Christian Apologetics author Lee Strobel's new book, The Case for the Real Jesus, without knowing he was a Christian, just knowing a vague thing about him yet not remembering if he was a Christian or not. The moment before I opened the flap to read it, I knew and felt something- my mind was opening.
When I say felt, I don't mean in a metaphorical way, I mean literal- feeling something like a temperature shift in a specific area of my brain.
The moment before I opened that book, I thought this thought:
There will be one of four things that will happen when I'm done reading: I will either be an atheist, an agnostic (again, I was one for half a week, most depressing time in my life, and I was chronically depressed as a teen), or a Jew (thinking of believing in God, but not Jesus), or be a stronger Christian.
I would find out later that I had only "thought" I was a Christian. I had finally learned of false faith, and it was when I read an article in my Apologetics Bible titled "How can I really know?" that it finally clicked what I should do- stop being a fake and become a real deal for people.
I already had edgy Christian shirts, a decent selection of Christian books, knew (some) Scripture, always praying before meals, etc. Thing was, I realized I was being religious, which was never prescribed by Jesus to do. I was going by the rules more than anything.
I knew that it was, by far, time to change. So, right after reading that article, while keeping something in my that Gerhard had said ("when I gave my heart to God and Jesus, I didn't pray, I didn't say amen, I simply confessed and accepted him in my heart") and remembered how much of a strong, faithful Christian he was, I didn't put the "madatory" amen at the end of what I thought- I simply mentally confessed and accepted, and did feel something else- that burden Christians talk about? It felt like my body had a few pounds lifted, something like a spiritual Slim-Fast, essentially put.
Since then, I've come to learn much, oh so very much. Especially that there is an area where all those degrading stereotypes about Christians are true- at least in certain churches and areas. In fact, I'm living in such an area- the "Belt Buckle" of the Bible Belt, Oklahoma. And it's been a test of my faith to see such a terrible thing that some churches simply do not know how to operate spiritually (at all) while others are down-to-earth, Scriptually sound (and never watering it down), and get ripped left and right by the world. One such church I've been to operates as a coffee shop in OKC, called Valley Brook Vineyard Community Church, or Joe's Addiction Coffee Shop.
So, if anyone tries to offend me about being a Christian and get shocked that I can offend back, I just say this, "The world's been trying to offend me all my life- it's my turn now."