Today, I am amazed.

Today, I am amazed. There are many days where I am amazed, but today I am particularly amazed because I have time to be amazed. It's Monday, which is my "day off" -- no class until 6pm. But today, as I was cruising Facebook, I noticed that  a dear friend of mine has launched into a new form of artistic expression -- stained glass. 

I've written about Mark before, but that post isn't about his art. Mark is not an artist by profession. He's actually an extreme scientist/genius by day. [That makes him sound kind of like a cartoon criminal mastermind. Which, you know, is kind of a cool idea.] But outside of his work (which I have to admit I don't even understand and should maybe ask about sometime) he creates some of the most beautiful images of dancers. His daughter, Emily, is an extreme dancer/genius (see what I did there?) and Mark always took photographs of her childhood dance career. What I love about Mark's work is that the dancers are just your average girls, not professional dancers, not unhealthfully thin, etc. They're people I've met in real life, and have seen dance in real life, and they're beautiful. 

It just amazes me, then, that Mark has discovered this incredible talent later in his life. [Sorry to point out that you're old, Mark.] I guess I sort of always wondered where, in their sciencey family, Emily got her artsy genes. Mark unknowingly, it seems, passed his artfulness on to Emily. But it took Emily's expression of that artfulness to get Mark's to come to life. Does that make sense? I just think it's too cool.

Anyway, here are some of Mark's dancers. 

"Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." [Matthew 6:21 and Albus Dumbledore]

For the past couple of Sundays I have been spending after-church fellowship time chatting with my favorite 10-year-old, Sophia, about Harry Potter. Sophia has seen the first four (I think?) Harry Potter films, and is just now old enough (according to her Mom) to start reading the books. As of last week, she's about halfway through book two, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

This, alone, causes me great joy.

When the books first came out in the US, I was 11. So was Harry. (My life is so perfect sometimes.) Since I read book one way back in 5th grade, I have had this deep, visceral connection to these stories. The final film hits theaters in July of this year. Every year since 1999 (yikes bikes) there has been a book on its way to my hands each summer or a film on its way to theaters each fall. This July marks the end of an era. My generation (I'd say those between 20 and 30 years old, these days) were the original target market, and are now the most intense superfans of the series.

It is heartwarming, then, to encounter Sophia, who is just now embarking on what has been the greatest literary joy of my life, and what I hopehopehopehopehope will be hers.

There is a specific point to this post, other than just general Harry Potter fandom. Last week, Sophia asked me what I thought the moral of Harry Potter was. I smiled, and started to answer, but she stopped me. She said, "I think the moral of Harry Potter is that, even when no one believes in you, you should believe in yourself." I congratulated her on getting that out of it, because that's exactly right. And she even continued, saying, "Also, it's that your friends and your family are the most important ever. And that good guys always win over bad guys." I agreed. I started to say something about loyalty and courage and she added, "Except I don't really know about Snape. He seems like maybe a good guy, maybe a bad guy."

I can hardly describe my elation. To be in the midst of the epic journey that is the life of Harry, Ron, and Hermione is a state to which I wish I could return. Certainly I reread the books with regularity and fall straight back into being fully engrossed in their world. But sometimes I wish I was still learning. Sometimes I wish I was still holding my breath until everyone made it out of a situation alive. Or didn't.

There are many things that make me anxious about future generations. But if there are even just a few more Sophias out there, I think it's going to be all right.

Today is the day.

This morning, President Barack Obama officially announced his plans to run for re-election. We are 582 days away from Election Day 2012. Time to get moving!

Sure, the Republican Party has yet to officially announce any of its candidates. We don't even know who's going to show up for the primary, let alone who the President will be running against. The way I see it, we've got a head start on campaigning.

Sure, the Tea Partiers are going to run the dirtiest of campaigns we've seen in a while. It's what they do. The way I see it, we've got a leg up on taking the high road.

Sure, some Democrats are disappointed in what President Obama has been able to accomplish in his first term so far. But do you really think that John McCain would have had any of our interests in mind? The way I see it, we're light years ahead of where we'd be if McCain and Palin were in the White House.

This campaign is going to be heavy. It's going to take a lot of work by a lot of people. But we worked hard to elect him in 2008, and we're going to work hard to elect him again in 2012.

It is my hope that you will do your part. It is my hope that you will not let your busy life, your apathy, your frustration, or your anger somehow manage to let the Republicans win. I know it seems early. But if you wait, it could be too late.

And if you don't want to hear my incessant election banter, you may need to take a hiatus from reading this blog and/or following me on Twitter, and you may even go so far as to hide me on Facebook. I'm not going to lie to you and say that nobody did that in 2008 and 2010, haha. But if you want to know what's up, and you want to BE what's up, stay tuned.

And please, get involved.