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A loud blast from the dinner horn sounded across the camp. Dobbins tossed the letter onto his bunk, stood up, and pulled back the flap of the tent door. He cocked his eyebrow and grinned, “Well, boys, what do you say? Wanna go get us some of that crap they call ‘food’ from the Dog House? My stomach is literally eating itself.”
“Yeah, I guess it’s about that time,” I drawled as I grabbed my jacket from where it was hanging at the end of my bunk and followed the rest of the men out of the tent.
“Watch out for that… hole,” laughed Dobbins as several guys sunk up to their ankles in mud. As he tugged his own foot free, Dobbins’ hand went to his pocket where the stockings were kept. As we stomped and scraped our boots on the steps at the mess hall, I glanced back and saw Dobbins pause at the edge of the porch, breathing hard. “You ok?” I asked, turning back to give him a hand.
He waved me off, “Naw, I’m good.” He grinned, grabbed the door handle, and, pulling it open, bowed with a flourish of his arm, “After you, my friend.” I chuckled and threw my arm over his shoulder.
As we entered the hall, I could feel the tense and uptight muscles in my shoulders and back instantly relax. Men were sitting close together around the long tables in the room and the air was filled with the sounds of joking, laughter, and camaraderie.
“Time to get us some grub!” Dobbins patted his belly and strutted over to the end of the line at the back of the building, picking up two trays and handing one to the guy behind him. He called out to one of the men serving the food, “Hey, Cal! You seriously don’t think I’m gonna waste my time in this line of yours? That slop isn’t even worth the wait!”
Cal gave Dobbins a give-me-a-break look and laughed, “Dob, you ask that question every day you come in here. Do you really think the answer’s gonna change?”
“You never know,” Dobbins grinned. “You could have a change of heart one of these days for a good ol’ friend who hasn’t had a decent meal in who knows how long.”
“Ain’t happenin’. You gotta wait your turn just like everyone else does”
“Grump. See if I ever do you a favor again.”
“You never do anyway.” Cal smirked as he plopped meat and potatoes on Dobbins’ tray.
Dobbins winked, “You’re catchin’ on pretty quick.” As our group sat down at one of the empty tables and started eating, the loudspeakers crackled to life, making some of us jump:
“All troops are now being put on immediate stand-by. I repeat; all troops are on immediate stand by. Await further orders. Over.”
At that, Dobbins slowly pulled the stockings out of his pocket and wrapped them around his neck and shoulders. All eyes were drawn to him. “No sweat, guys. We’ll make it.
-Written for Creative Writing on October 30, 2011
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A blood red sun shone through a thick veil of smoke over an ominously quiet town. Black ashes fluttered in the wind, like the snow of death. Traces of gasoline lingered on the light breeze blowing through the skeletal structure of what was once a house. Charred doors stood as if still attached to a non-existent wall and shards of glass littered the surrounding grass. Large crows with black, beady eyes pecked among the burnt remnants of what was once a kitchen. Blackened cupboards with their doors lopsidedly hanging, melted trash cans, and a shattered cookie jar yielded their contents to the persistent pecking. Metal bed frames stood out in stark contrast to the ghostly white remains of a bedroom wall that easily flaked at the slightest touch. A smoky mirror hung, cock-eyed, in what was once a bedroom. At its foot lay the broken pieces of picture frames, a young child’s smiling face peeking out between the remains of a hand-crafted frame that had managed to escape the hungry flames. Outside, on the scarred lawn covered in debris, there stood a sturdy sycamore tree. Several of its branches had been suddenly amputated and a large chunk had been gouged out of its trunk. Tucked in the nook of the roots at the base of the tree, a well-worn rag doll sat with a childlike, yet expectant look on its face. Her body was disproportionate from years of cuddling and the smile on her face, though nearly worn off from numerous kisses, was one that even tragedy could not erase.
– Written October 6, 2011 for Creative Writing
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Jessie Schwartz grew up in a non-Christian home, where she witnessed what drugs, and drinking did to people she loved. Unlike some of her friends, who grew up in the protective bubble of a Christian community, Schwartz wasn’t surprised by the influences and temptations she found on a secular college campus. But her friends had no way of knowing what they were up against.
Many young adults raised in the church are growing up isolated from the world around them. Their parents might think they are creating a safe space for their children’s faith to grow, but a new study reveals they might be setting them up for disillusionment and failure.
According to the findings of a research study recently released by the Barna Group, 59 percent of young adults disconnect from the church in their teen years. Many study participants told researchers they stopped attending church because it was not always open to discussing how to relate faith to real world issues.
Of those who listed the church’s isolation from the culture as a problem, almost one quarter complained that Christians were too quick to “demonize everything outside the church.” Twenty-two percent said the church ignored the problems of the real world, and 18 percent said “my church is too concerned that movies, music, and video games are harmful.”
David Sanford, a freshman at Edinboro University of Pennsylvania said churches too often refuse to step out of their comfort zone to test their faith against the modern world. “They seem to have their own safe bubble that they stay in,” he said.
Micah Reed, a sophomore at Edinboro, agreed that some churches don’t do enough for the younger generation. “People don’t seem to venture out,” he said. Churches aren’t always welcoming to outsiders, much less a place to discuss what’s going on in the world, he said.
Schwartz, who also is a sophomore at Edinboro, said churches and parents should do more to prepare their children for what they will encounter in the “real world,” instead of keeping them solely in a Christian community.
“The only way to rectify this is to get out of our holy huddle and start reaching out to the lost,” Schwartz said. Churches hold plenty of Bible studies and dinners for their members, but in reality, it’s just “a place where we can all get together and be friends,” Schwartz said.
Sanford also encouraged churches to spend more time reaching out to the communities around them.
“They should train the people that they are sending out in order to better equip them to take on the world,” he said.
The Barna Group’s study suggests that some church leaders ignore the concerns and issues of teens and those in their twenties because they think the church disconnect will end when young adults are older, said David Kinnaman, president of the research organization based in Ventura, Calif.
In his latest book, You Lost Me, Kinnaman says the concerns young Christians raise about church and culture could lead to revitalized ministry and deeper connections in families.
“In many churches, this means changing the metaphor from simply passing the baton to the next generation to a more functional, biblical picture of a body – that is, the entire community of faith, across the entire lifespan, working together to fulfill God’s purposes,” Kinnaman said.
This is the first in a series of six stories exploring the major themes of the Barna Group study about why young adults leave the church. Coming tomorrow: Just skimming the surface – Young Christians who want more of God say the church is too shallow.
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At 5 p.m. on Dec. 3, Colleen Reed, from Orangutan Outreach, will inform students at Edinboro University about the fact that orangutans are facing death, torture, abuse, capture and are being illegally sold as pets at an alarming rate.“People need to know,” said Katrina Spirko, the orchestrator of the event and a senior at Edinboro, majoring in elementary education and early childhood education, with a minor in environmental studies.
Spirko has always been interested in the great apes and became personally involved when she discovered Orangutan Outreach through her research.
According to their website, some of Orangutan Outreach’s main goals are to protect orangutans in their native habitat, to promote public awareness of conservation strategies, and to fund rescue efforts of orangutans.
Orangutan Outreach is based largely on volunteering and provides the opportunity for people to adopt orangutans and sponsor them as they go through the rehabilitation program, Spirko explained.
“With her fluffy hair, her big bright eyes and her Mona Lisa smile, Luna stole everyone’s hearts,” Richard Zimmerman, executive director of Orangutan Outreach, posted on their website.
But, last April, Zimmerman received a devastating phone call. Luna had gone missing.
“I remember the day I heard about it,” Spirko said. “I cried. I love her so much and even though I’ve never met her, I feel like she’s really special [to me].”
According to Zimmerman’s blog, police and army officials were involved with the search as well as a team from Jakarta Animal Aid Network (JAAN) and Center for Orangutan Prevention (COP), which are all based in Indonesia.
“[We’re] working tirelessly to find information about Luna,” Zimmerman said, as they made regular sweeps through local villages and sought out leads on local smugglers and wildlife traffickers.
Femke den Haas, founding director of JAAN, wrote, “It is simply not believable that a baby orangutan can just ‘disappear’ like that.”
But now, after months of searching and trying to figure out what had happened to her, a memorial has been posted on the Outreach’s website. According to Spirko, it seems like they’re losing hope of ever finding her again.
“She may very well have been captured by wildlife smugglers and sold,” said Zimmerman, “She may even have been smuggled out of Indonesia by now.”
In order to help raise awareness of what is happening to the great apes, Spirko and members of Students of Edinboro for Environmental Defense (SEED) are organizing a presentation.
“I hope the room is packed and that people will be willing to donate,” said Spirko. “I want people to know [Luna’s] story, because if she is dead, I don’t want her to have died in vain. For me personally… it’s a shout-out for Luna.”
More information on Orangutan Outreach can be found at their website, www.redapes.org.
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It was the day before Christmas Eve in New York City. Blaring car horns traveled through the alleyways and down the streets, while the sounds of Frank Sinatra’s “White Christmas” drifted out of store entrances, beckoning to the passing shoppers. White flakes danced on the wind as they swirled down from the thick, gray blanket of clouds. Children’s faces were turned up to the sky with their tongues hanging out in an attempt to catch the small, cold morsels, while parents and grandparents held tight to their coat sleeves so as not to lose them in the stampede of Christmas shoppers.
Amongst all the hustle and bustle of the city, a small, round man shook his head as he watched passers-by scurry from door to door as if they could keep the cold at bay by moving faster. Sitting in a little run-down shack, surrounded by racks of soon-to-be Christmas trees, Elias watched as young Islamic women made their way up the stone steps of the new Islamic Cultural Center across the street. Elias rolled his eyes, “America; the land of the free,” he muttered with a harsh laugh. “I guess that makes New York the city of diversity.”
Elias looked like your stereotypical Jew: a gartel was hanging from his waist, a kippah was perched on his head, and he was sporting a thick, curly beard. But, while he looked the part, Elias certainly didn’t act the part of a devout Jew. While other Jews didn’t observe the Christmas holiday, Elias could be found every Christmas season on his little portion of the sidewalk, surrounded by rows upon rows of trees.
Turning, he straightened his cloth belt and glanced around at the mixture of prospective buyers wandering among his blue spruce and white pine trees. Moms and dads stood in small groups while their kids ran helter skelter, pointing out various trees they thought would be the perfect size for their house. Elias heard their giggles and laughter ringing through the air as the wind whipped toward him. Pulling his coat closer around him, he burrowed his face down into his beard, trying to defrost his nose.
As he watched a small boy in an oversized blue winter coat, wearing a fluffy coonskin cap pulled down low over his ears, bouncing around like a jumping bean as he pointed out the perfect tree to his chuckling father, Elias thought. “This is the life I want for Tina and me.” Just then he caught the disapproving glance of the Jewish rabbi as he hurried past on his way to the synagogue to pray. Every year, during the Christmas holiday, Elias always felt like throwing his head back and screaming to the wind, “This is America; the land where anyone can be anything they want to be!” So what if his girlfriend, Tina, was a Christian and believed that Jesus was the Messiah? So what if the Jews and Muslims that surrounded his little Christmas tree stand didn’t agree with his beliefs?
Yet, Elias acknowledged the rabbi with a nod, all while grumbling under his breath, “Judgmental old coot.”
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The paranormal has always been one of Chad Calek’s interests.
“Instead of going to spring break, I was going to the Waverly Hills Sanatorium or the Villisca Axe Murder House. I was going to all these haunted places to investigate them,” he said.
More than 200 students, faculty and visitors gathered on Friday to hear Calek speak in the Frank G. Pogue Student Center’s Multipurpose Room. Calek spoke about his purported encouters with ghosts and showed footage he and his team recorded for the television show “Paranormal State.”
In “Good vs. Evil” – Calek’s first episode on the show – Chip Coffey, a psychic, and Ryan Buell, one of the directors, told Calek there was a demon in the basement and suggested he check it out.
While sitting on a chair in the middle of the basement, an ominous growl came out of the darkness.
Calek radioed upstairs and asked if anyone else had heard it. “Yeah, man, [we] heard it,” they replid.
The growl came again and Calek told the team upstairs, “There’s something down here, bro.”
“People ask me how I could just sit there and listen to the growling without moving.”
Calek laughed as he described the situation to the audience.
“Well, the truth is, the growling came from between me and the stairway out… If that thing had come from behind me, I would’ve been flying through that door like a pissed off Sasquatch!”
Calek has been investigating such phenomena since the age of 12, when his family was torn apart by paranormal attacks.
His parents and siblings had told him they had been experiencing things, but Calek had seen and felt nothing.
Calek said he would shout into the air to provoke the ghosts to show themselves when the family wasn’t there; he wanted to be a believer and not think that his family was crazy.
One night at 3 a.m., Calek woke up to his father reciting Scriptures.
According to Calek, when he looked into his parents’ room, he saw his mother’s hair was being pulled by something that wasn’t there.
She also had mild burn marks on her skin and was speaking in Latin, said Calek.
“It’s when you’re looking into the eyes of your mother, and it’s just not your mother and everything that’s going on is just shattering your entire belief system,” Calek said.
That was the moment that he decided to investigate the paranormal.
Throughout their time with “Paranormal State,” Calek and his team have encountered paranormal activity in Waverly Hills Sanatorium, Villisca Axe Murder House as well as churches.
“Our goal is to go out and challenge the biggest [and] most scary, horrifying places around, document that footage and show the people have the power,” said Calek.
This will be the last season on “Paranormal State” for the team. Calek and Buell have been working on a documentary film called “American Ghost Hunter,” which will be released June 2.
“It came out 10 times more intense than we had imagined,” said Calek. The film covers the paranormal activity his family experienced for more than two decades.
According to Calek, “the stuff we captured is the most compelling evidence we have for the paranormal.”
Calek and Buell realized people are going to have questions and will want answers once they see his film.
That’s when they decided to tour around the world with the film. They intend to give their audience a taste of their world.
Pittsburgh and Philadelphia will be two of their even locations this year.
The Student Philanthropy Council sponsored “Student Philanthropy Day: Trail of the Dead Tour 2011” and made it possible for Calek to come to campus.
Visit his website at: http://www.wolfmanproductions.com/chad_calek.html
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