A Month of Facts about Dru: Day Twenty-seven

I live in the spaces between my stacks of books.

Lately, I've been working on trying to clean them up a bit. I have a lot of stuff that is just lying around that needs to be organized and placed neatly somewhere. Lack of bookcases is definitely hurting me. I only have three bookcases right now, and my tallest one got messed up. I remember the day when the bottom shelf collapsed. That was a very sad moment.

Now I just have stacks and stacks and a few boxes of books. Comics, trade paperbacks, novels, even some textbooks left from college that I never managed to sell back. I've been purging some stuff but mostly putting all the stuff I want to keep in a box. I don't like putting books in boxes. Books belong on a shelf so that anyone can pull them off and read them at a moment's notice. Books are meant to be read.

One thing I came across while sorting through my stuff was a box of ministry stuff left over from my college days. I found a bunch of notes and handouts from Campus Crusade and Epic sermons. I don't know why I've always been such a pack rat. I don't wanna be sentimental, but maybe it just comes naturally. I even always skim over stuff one last time before I throw it away.

I even found my outlines and notes from a bunch of the Bible studies that I was leading back then, too. I gave them a cursory glance but ended up keeping them. I don't know why. Maybe one day, in the future, I will recycle them. (I mean recycle the messages, not the paper.) I think it is funny to look at the things that I had planned for my Bible study group. I wonder how it would feel to be an impartial third party observer of the 2004-2005 Dru leading his Bible study. I think of all the ridiculous things I must have crapped out my mouth and it makes me laugh. And cringe, just a bit.

In that box of ministry stuff, I also found various cards and notes of encouragement. Reading them again was a trip down memory lane. Sometimes it surprised me how well people seemed to know me, or at least my character.

It is also a weird feeling to read stuff where people write encouraging and nice things to me. I don't think I take compliments well. I guess I always feel obligated to think of a compliment in response, although in retrospect, I suppose a simple "Thank you" would suffice. I don't think I am too cynical of a person. I think I just prefer to bottle up my emotions. It's uncomfortable, at times, to be speechless because I prefer to disarm people with a sarcastic remark, but there are some situations when sarcasm is uncalled for. (Sidenote: sarcasm is the lowest form of wit.)

There's this one scene in a superhero story that greatly resonates with me.

It's the epilogue from this one comic, Kingdom Come. Superman and Batman are old men who basically just survived an apocalypse together despite the fact that they were part of different factions (although they were not exactly foes). So after things have settled down a bit, they have lunch together at a busy restaurant. They (well, mostly Superman) kinda reminisce about how their ideologies are different but the goals for which they strive are the same. At the end, Superman calls Batman a "moral man" and someone he can count on, and goes on to say: "You're right about me. Trust is the center of my world. I don't know if that makes me an expert on it... but I know I trust you. Despite our differences over the years... I always have."

At that point, old Batman has no words. There's a neat panel where he stares at Superman with an expression of speechlessness while Superman wears a satisfied and honest smile. No words. Then they both stand up in the middle of the restaurant and hug each other. No words.

I sometimes feel like old man Batman. When someone offers me a nice piece of sincere encouragement, I often have no words. Maybe next time I will just give a manly hug.