Ending here, Beginning There

After 5 years of blogging here, the time has come to end this site and begin anew over here. My new blog will be integrated into my main portfolio site, which at the moment is still underway.

As always, blank canvases, blank slates and fresh starts fill me with terror and hope.

Don’t forget to grab the new feed or toss blog.elnellis.com in your reader, or however you follow along and stay in touch. See you there.

Loading...

Hide notes

Checking Back In on Last Year's Resolutions

Last year I resolved to do two things: read more poetry and try to digest the entire Tom Waits discography. I did neither fully, but at the same time, don't think I failed at either entirely.

I went almost all year without reading poetry and in this last month, have read two books of poetry cover to cover- and I strongly recommend them both:

Billy Collins - Questions About Angels
Wendell Berry - A Timbered Choir

While I didn't "digest" [it might have been a bit ambitious, what was I thinking] all of Tom Waits, I certainly listened to a lot of Tom Waits. And at the end of the year, I will say that I am more convinced I need both good poetry and the music of Mr. Waits in my life.

Family Update

Interview and Q&A at Art Show

happy anniversary to us! [8 yrs!]

[www] el nellis [dot] com

you may not have noticed, but elnellis.com has been quietly under construction. i'm excited to have the gifted help and lovely friendship of two brilliant men: joshua (standing) has re-shot all my art work and jonathan (sitting) is building the site. combined, these efforts will give it the feel of a professional portfolio and make it a more user-friendly space to move forward as an artist. i'm so excited! i'll let you know when it's up and running.

[][][]

in celebration of sylas

he's awesome. and today he's 4. happy birthday son!

how grad-school made me stupid

i will say it and say it again, that i believe in the power of stories. that narrative is important. that fiction can be more truthful than non fiction. but sadly, i havn't read a novel in years. since i finished grad school a month ago, i've started and cast aside 3 novels. i just can't stick with a good long book any more.
my first thought was that i might blame the last 10 years i've spent in higher education. i've been trained (and become highly skilled) at plowing through texts, at writing book reviews on books i didn't have time to read, at getting to what the author is saying without noting their every word. the act of reading a story requires something different of the reader- to submit to the text and be guided by the intentional sequence of events- quite literally, to undergo it. i have become impatient and somewhat utilitarian with books.
another thought came after reading an interview in the sun magazine with the fella who wrote the provocative atlantic article "is google making us stupid?" last summer. he believes that the "distracted nature of web surfing, is reducing our capacity for deep contemplation and reflection." he realized that after years of "online information gathering, he had trouble reading a book..." hmmm, says i. sounds like me. one of the things he notes in the interview is that online activity exercises the part of the brain that is the realm of decision making- an activity which is mentally exhausting in comparison to the mental energy used in reading a book or in contemplation.
so this is my lament. my brain has been re-wired by grad-school and the world wide web. the process of Re-Re-wiring must begin as soon as this internet connection is no longer available!

need a miracle

by frank stockton. word.

new face: ezra árbol

IT'S A[nother] BOY!!!

proud to announce Ezra Arbol Nellis!
he was born at 11:29 pm on 5/3
after 2.5 hrs of labor.
7lbs and 14oz, 20 in long.
our hearts are full and everyone is healthy.
couldn't ask for more.

graduation speech

I graduated with my MDiv yesterday from Mars Hill Graduate School. It was a full and rich day, spent with friends and family, culminating in a huge party, a veritable feast. I had the honor of being nominated by my peers and faculty to speak on behalf of my class. This is what I said...

"Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything."

My son Sylas is nearly four and has no inhibitions in regards to the questions in him. They arise from his depths and spurt out onto the canvas of the world, voracious in their flow, begging only for an authentic response of any kind. I expect that as he journeys towards adolescence, the questions will move deeper into his body and he will become less free to speak them as self-awareness and cynicism set in. The world that awaits him is one that deems the inquiry less than its answer, the one who inquires less than the one who answers. The curious soul begs: "Where is it safe to ask all the questions I have? Is it ok to not be ok with the answers I have been given? Is there room for me in this process of discovery?"

It was the questions that brought Ruth and I to Seattle, 5 years ago, to this little graduate school tucked away in a nearly un-marked business complex in Bothell (The first question was- "where is it?"). They were questions about God, church, identity and community. We sought answers, for I had been told that the process of maturation was oriented towards the end of questions and the having of answers. Standing here, upon graduation, I can say that I know something more of God and have caught glimpses of who I am to be in creation. But it is not in that I have answers that I feel ready to graduate, but in that I now know the value of a good question, am learning how to ask better questions and have begun to learn how to live with unanswered questions.

The first month of my first semester, we became pregnant with our first child. We now celebrate the birth of our third. My MDiv studies have had the gift of being augmented by the intertexts of 3 children. If there is anything that children invite one to, it is the particularities of life- into the living of everything. And the point is to live everything. Will we hear the invitation to risk (which is ultimately the invitation into creativity)? How will we live into the questions when the making of mistakes has been so stigmatized that we are terrified of being wrong?

It is when this fear of being wrong has moved so deeply into my body that I become paralyzed by pride and settle for answers and ways of being in relationship that leave my heart out of the conversation. Mars Hill Graduate School has been a space where I have learned to step back into the sort of dialogue where I can hear and be heard, where together, we can experience the fullness of life and transformation. Here, I have learned alongside my peers and professors how to creatively risk in inquiry and to play with those questions whose answers I am not yet able to live.

One thing I have learned about the nature of questions- When I parent and I am lazy or disengaged, I offer answers that abruptly end my son's voracious stream of questions to relieve myself of this seeming burden. When I am present to his questions, I am learning to offer answers that increase his curiosity for the world, leading to deeper and more playful questions. As a theologian and an artist I have become hungry for the answers that expand my curiosity for the Other, that lead me to the articulation of more meaningful questions and a more consistent presence to dialogue. These, I am convinced, increase my capacity to worship God and participate in his Kingdom.

I am grateful for my brilliant peers and patient professors who have invited me to learn in this way. So, to us, the graduates: May the creative Spirit of God continue to lead us into the questions we are uniquely called to ask and struggle with in this life. May we never be so proud that we become resistant to transformation. May we hold all answers loosely until we are able to actually live them- and in doing so, might we bless the world.

L'Chaim.

[photo by Joshua Longbrake]

Status: Due Date Re-Calculated... Still Waiting

DUE DATE is TODAY (STILL WAITING)....

expectation [april 20]

feliz navidad!

Inviting YOU!

summer [sweet] update

the beginning stages of

photo by joshua