Through the Cemetery

Today was a tough day for a number of reasons.  The Bruins lost last night so I didn’t sleep well; Thomas and I wanted to watch at least the first set of the French Open this morning but Roger Federer made it a lot longer than it should have been; I found it difficult to leave the hotel after enjoying the wedding so much yesterday; the last day I had ridden more than 30 miles in a day was Wednesday so my legs were a little stiff; and probably a lot of other reasons because I want you all to feel bad for me, eh.  For whatever reason, too, my stomach started acting up part-way through the ride and made it difficult to keep pace.  Oh, and about twelve of the 58 miles from Canton to Jackson, MI were dirt roads that weren’t well-kept, meaning I had to keep switching bikes.  All of that made me very thankful that Thomas wanted to get exercise today so he rode quite a few miles today. 

One thing that did make me happy was that we left with the third set of jerseys for my trip.  I left D.C. with Wesley Theological Seminary jerseys and personal jerseys to soothe my ego.  Now I have Polaris Project jerseys with the phone number for the National Human Trafficking Hotline on the back to advertise that most useful of resources for all of us to stay informed and to report possible trafficking cases.  I continue to hope that all of you will go to the Polaris Project website at polarisproject.org and perhaps even call the hotline to get information on how serious and widespread slavery is in our world and our country today, and to find out ways to spot cases of trafficking.

At one point today I heard this over the radio, “Ok, now take a right into the cemetery.”  Because I had been cracking jokes all day, and knowing Thomas, I figured he was joking.  Plus, why in the world would I want to ride through a cemetery?  I just thought it was a joke.  But alas, it was no joke.  So I turned into the cemetery and tried to be somewhat solemn by pedaling slowly, but nothing I could do made me feel appropriately respectful.  Thankfully, the road didn’t last very long and I came out on the other side within a few minutes.  Still, the experience was not a pleasant one.

My mother has tried very hard to try and calm down my controversial comments, arguing that this is not the time nor the place to make people angry.  Perhaps she’s right.  In my opinion, though, people can’t sit back and say, “Oh John, what you’re doing is so great!  You should be so proud,” and then maybe donate some money, and then be done.  Our lives must be changed and, the way I see it, we all need to become radically justice-oriented.  You may disagree with the things I say but I intend, through your anger with me if necessary, to plant a seed in your mind that will be sown in the near future.  I’m writing this paragraph not to be stubborn, per se, but because I truly believe that to make the choice to be committed is difficult, and I truly believe that putting myself out there for all to see and to invite you to struggle with me is the only way that any of us will make that choice.  And being committed is certainly absolutely necessary. As Gary Haugen writes, “Let there be no mistake, evil and injustice thrive on moral ambiguity, equivocation, confusion and the failure to commit… we must know that injustice is strong, forceful, committed.  In every case it will prevail against the uncertain, the unsure and the uncommitted.”  I don’t care what you believe, I don’t care if I offend you even or say something that you think is ridiculous, I just want you to come to terms with how serious this is and how urgently we all need to commit.  We must all ride through the cemetery, unpleasantly and slowly, but it is through the cemetery that we will get to where we’re going.

With all that said, riding through the cemetery for me means changing the way I write a little bit and listening to my mother for once.  So, instead of spouting out what I believe, I’ll share with you some real stories from former slaves, as taken from the new sex trafficking magazine, Bitter Sweet.  Keep in mind, all these stories are from the UNITED STATES, from within our country, generally from people born American as well.  Human trafficking/slavery is not exclusive to third-world, Asian, or African countries.  Human trafficking is equally prevalent, IF NOT MORE, in the U.S. as it is in China, in Romania or Spain as it is in Somalia.  Massachusetts just had to pass a law on human trafficking (and thank God for that!  More on that later).  Ok, without further ado:

“I’m not sure if I was 5 or 6 when my mother started selling me to men.  Usually, she sold me for a small amount of drugs.  When I was 13 years old, I ran away and met a man 20 years my senior, who told me he would take care of me.  However, it wasn’t long before he made me work on the street.  I had to bring a quota of $800 every night.”- Beth, 17 years old; Courtney’s House

“I remember being 10 years old and my mother putting makeup on me and telling me she loved me, then opening her bedroom door where a man sat there waiting for me.  My mother then put me in the room and closed the door.  She told me it wouldn’t take long.”-Kelly, 17 years old; Courtney’s House

“In 2009, I met a man twice my age who pretended to be my boyfriend.  This ‘boyfriend’ soon revealed he was a pimp.  He put my picture on Craigslist, and I was sold for sex by the hour at truck stops and cheap motels [like the Lamplighter Motel that we stayed at the other night]—10 hours with 10 different men every night.  This became my life.

Men answered the Craigslist advertisements and paid to rape me.  The $30,000 he pocketed each month was facilitated by Craigslist 300 times [Craigslist is projected to make $36 million from selling sex ads; Rebecca Project].  I personally know over 20 girls who were trafficked through Craigslist.  Like me, they were taken from city to city, each time sold on a different Craigslist site—Philadelphia, Dallas, Milwaukee, Washington, D.C.  My phone would ring, and soon men would line up in the parking lot.”-AK, 18 years old; Fair Fund

Wedding Day

The wedding of Joel Leslie Walther and Megan Jo Crumm was quite beautiful and I am honored to have been a part of it.  I couldn't be happier than watching two great friends that I love covenant to live with and to love one another for as long as they shall live.  And it was certainly good to see a number of people that I may not have much of a chance to see anymore now that they have graduated from seminary.

It was a hot and long day, though, so I will make this post short to make time for a good night's rest.  While reveling in the beauty of the wedding, I thought about how beautiful it would be if we all covenant to God to love everyone.  We cry and laugh when two people love each other and display that love to all the world.  So why not cry and laugh when we covenant to love 27 million people?  That, I think, would be unimaginably beautiful and joyful.  And maybe then those 27 million slaves would be able to experience the joy of their own wedding.  Often slaves are so broken and so distrusting that they cannot or choose not to feel love.  Let's make wedding days applicable to all people, eh?

On that note, I hope that the Stanley Cup Finals will be as beautiful as the wedding today.  Let's go Bruins because, unfortunately, you do have a lot of control over my emotional and spiritual state.  I don't want to be depressed at the end of this bike trip.  Would it be improper of me to ask for y'all to pray for a Bruins win...?

Power of One

Falling asleep last night I thought of something I wanted to write this morning before the wedding as a sort of follow-up to yesterday's post.  I can't be totally sure this is what I thought of, but it's close at least and that will satisfy me enough to not rack my brain the entire day to try and remember.

I wear a One bracelet for a number of reasons.  First, One is a great organization (check out One.org for more information, right after checking out polarisproject.org) that fights poverty and HIV/AIDS across the globe.  For me, though, One stands for more than just the organization--it stands for the incredible power of one.  I truly believe that if we want the world to be a better place it is up to each and every individual to be transformed to the attitude of love.  But the transformation of one individual most certainly extends far beyond that one individual.

Please do not ever underestimate the power of one, the power of your self.  You do in fact have the power to do great things.  If you need any proof of that, look at what I have organized and what I have done and am doing (at this point, not only have I gotten the word out to hundreds of people and made many of those hundreds passionate about modern slavery, but check out the donations page and see that I've raised over $2,400.00 for Polaris Project).  In that very comment, though, you can see how the power of one can impact others.  By my taking on this project, many others have caught on and are becoming serious about following political initiatives to fight slavery and doing their part to join the fight.

And the power of one does not mean that every individual works alone.  It takes one person to start a chain of individuals' joining the cause.  Polaris Project was founded by a wedded couple not too many years ago.  Just two people.  Then like wildfire the work they do caught on with others, including me.  I was inspired by the work of Polaris Project a couple of years ago and now here I am.  What I am doing has inspired many friends and family, and now Thomas is with me insistent that we make sure we get up to 27 million revolutions.

There's really no reason to be overwhelmed or scared to join the fight.  Do what you can, trust in your power, and know that others will see the good that you do and the passion that you carry into life with you, and eventually a team will build around you that extends far beyond your own reach, and then together we all who started as one will take down injustice.

Response to Comment

One of the comments to "Biking Upwind" is a question of how I can say that nothing this country or any other has done has made the world a better place.  Were not ending the Nazi regime and freeing African-American slaves acts that made the world a better place? 

Well, yes, if we want to think of it that way.  I certainly wouldn't say that we were wrong to do those things (although, if I were to be extra controversial, I would go ahead and say that using force to stop the Nazis was wrong... but stopping them was not).  Nor would I say that those things were negative or harmful to the world.  Those acts are certainly examples of the type of love that I encourage us all to embody.  And I'd definitely lift those things up as models for our children to follow and learn from.

At the same time, though, history is very clear about one thing: "It's all been done before," as the Barenaked Ladies would say.  Something is inherently wrong with human nature.  Now, I believe that humans are created divine (heresy, I know) and so we are inherently good.  But history teaches us something very different.  Something is wrong, and thus I make a distinction between the human creation and human nature.  The human creation is good; but when humans come together, for whatever reason, human nature is inherently negative.  It requires some serious inward reflection, transformation, and conversion to remove us from our human nature back to our created purpose.  Outward actions, no matter how good, cannot change the soul of the individual. 

I don't know if I'm making any sense, but what I mean is that each individual must make the tough choice to love others.  It's probably the most difficult, and most necessary, life choice that any individual can make, but only the individual can make it.  No matter what governments do, millions and billions of people could still choose to be selfish and harmful.  And if governments do start restricting us to live certain ways, then it won't be much of a government any more, would it?  There's a reason why 1984 and other similar books are so terrifying to us.  George Orwell wrote a distopia, not a utopia.

Governments do nothing to change the evil within us.  If governments do restrict us and make it impossible to do certain "wrong" things, we'd still have evil within us unless we individually make the choice to be loving.  As long as we don't make that choice the world will continue making the same mistakes and will be no better than before.  People might do good things that have temporary effect, and we might be progressing in certain ways, but still inside every hero is a thief, a robber, a criminal (as Project 86 would say) if we don't make different individual choices.  In the end, that is the truth, and with it no government can ever make the world a better place, in my view.  Only individuals, only real conversions, can make the world a better place. 

In the end, you either agree or disagree with me.  I hold many controversial views about government, community, faith, and the like that are considered heretical in church circles.  I don't intend for any of those to become a running argument, but I figured I'd give in for one last response.  But please, let us all realize that ideological differences are not necessary to focus on when it comes to loving the 27 million slaves in the world that desperately need that love.

Funeral Day

A short bike ride later and we are in Canton, Michigan, just outside of Ann Arbor.  The weather was great for riding today so I'm a little disappointed I didn't get to ride any farther, but then again a short day was needed.  I'm here for the wedding of two of my great friends, Joel and Megan, and I am so glad to be among friends that make me smile just knowing that they are around.  Plus, it's the best possible break I can imagine at the moment.  Much needed, too, since Thomas and I definitely need a day away from each other so that we can forget what annoys us and remember why we love each other.

Because I had an under 20-mile day today, I rode pretty quickly.  I didn't ride quite as fast as I could have, though, because I saw a funeral procession pass by and I had to slow down.  Whenever I see a funeral procession I always try to stop what I'm doing and say a little prayer for the soul of the deceased and for the family and friends.  So I slowed down a bit to pray, but then I slowed down a lot when I realized how emotional a funeral really is.  One beloved person passed away and now many mourn.  Facing the death of one person is so difficult.  You've always known life with that person and now they're gone... I'm still not sure I've actually confronted the death of my grandmother a few years ago because it's too painful, and I'm sure that many people in that funeral procession today will feel the same way.

It's a somewhat known fact that people are more offended hearing about one or two deaths rather than thousands.  One or two deaths is personal whereas thousands upon thousands becomes a number, a fact, nothing more.  We've probably all experienced that phenomenon and yet I'm betting that for most of us it's still strange to acknowledge.  Of course, there's a psychological reason: our mind and heart don't necessarily think that we are capable of dealing with the pain of one death thousands and thousands of times.  I don't think it's necessary, then, to push ourselves to deal with that much pain.  Serving and loving the world does not need to mean suffering, especially not more than we can bear.  But I do think that we need to think of the 27 million slaves in the world not as a number, as a fact, but in the same way that we think of the deceased at a funeral: as one beloved person.

Take one person at a time.  Think about how awful it is for one person to be enslaved.  Imagine that one person and how sad you would be if one person died in slavery from mental, spiritual, and physical torture and negligence.  Imagine the sadness of the funeral procession for that one slave.  Then, find ways to prevent that funeral procession.  You don't need to take on more pain or more suffering to do right.

Source Code

Thomas and I have not yet posted a review of the bike shops that have been oh so helpful to us yet because we have not had proper Internet access to do so.  I’m sure y’all can wait on that, though.  We promise (to ourselves as well, because we need to do some maintenance on the bikes that we’ve yet to do) to make the next couple of rest stops much more productive.  I promised Polaris Project some mid-ride updates as well.

Today Thomas and I did some more bowling and watched a movie to enjoy our rest day.  We’ll spend the night locked up in our room again to avoid the night club scene, though last night didn’t seem too bad.  Our Massachusetts readers probably will not believe that we each only paid $1.00 to watch a matinee film (if it weren’t a matinee, the price only would have been $1.50).  Unbelievable to us Mass. Natives.  There was no way we’d pass up that opportunity to watch a movie that seemed really good, the newest blockbuster with my favorite, Jake Gyllenhaal.  Source Code is the name of it.

I won’t give away the film, or at least I’ll try not to.  At one point in the film, Gyllenhaal’s character asks someone on the train with him why he’s always so irritable, and he replies that the world is a crappy place.  Then Gyllenhaal bets Mr. Irritable a lot of money that Mr. Irritable couldn’t make the entire train laugh.  Mr. Irritable takes the bet and proceeds to put on a little comedy show and everyone in the train starts gathering around to watch and listen.  It’s a beautiful scene in the middle of an intense film, because as you’re freaking out about what’s going to happen and everyone in the train is acting like normal people—getting angry about being late, not wanting to talk to anyone because there’s too much on their mind, et cetera—and suddenly the train community becomes a real community. 

Art is art, I know.  Not every day can you give someone money to put on a comedy show in the middle of a train, I know.  But the point remains the same: little actions that we take can make the world a much better place than we ordinarily think it is.  When we think that there are 27 million slaves in the world we can easily be overwhelmed and let ourselves be depressed about how awful the world is.  But one little act at a time we can be the change we want to see in the world.  That’s what Source Code has taught us today: little actions, little changes in attitudes and behaviors, can really and seriously affect the world for the better.

With Your Powers Combined

With your powers combined, I am Captain Planet!  To annoy Thomas, I was singing that song into my radio this morning.  But it’s a good theme for today anyway.

After the dreadful heat and humidity and wind yesterday, I told Thomas that it would be nice if he could ride up through Toledo for me this morning and I’d take the last 50 miles.  But Thomas wanting to get as much exercise as possible decided he wanted to ride an extra twenty miles and do about half the ride.  So he rode 30 miles at a very quick pace.  Then I took over and did the last 30 miles at a really quick pace.  With our powers combined, we absolutely dominated today.  We left after ten in the morning and arrived in Lincoln Park, Michigan, a little over sixty miles from Perrysburg, Ohio, just after two in the afternoon.  Considering that one of the roads we were on was a dirt road with giant potholes all over the place, and we sometimes had to stop for passing trains, we were really flying and we both feel great now.  By the way, Lincoln Park is right next to Detroit.

So, the place we’re staying at is really ironic or coincidental, I’m not sure which.  As we were coming down the final road, Thomas said, “supposedly the place we’re staying at is on this road.”  I replied by saying, “Umm, are you sure?”  Because we were on a residential road and the building at the end of the road clearly was a sketchy place.  When we reached the end of the road, we both stopped and gave each other a look.  Lo and behold, the place we are staying for the next two nights is indeed that sketchy building. 

What was really hilarious was when Thomas double-checked my reservations and asked with a shocked tone, “Is that the Lamplighter Motel???”  I read the sign and said yes.  Then he said, “John, do you know what lamplighter stands for?”  Not knowing anything about anything, I shook my head no, and Thomas slapped his hand against his forehead and looked at me as if I’m an idiot.  “John, lamplighter is for strip clubs and such.” 

Well, apparently lamplighter is also a slang term for a really tall bike.  Unfortunately that’s not the lamplighter being referred to.  Thomas was right.  Thomas's girlfriend has done some research for us and we’ve discovered that “Lamplighter” is a historic nightclub in Vancouver.  I should have figured it out, though, because there’s a bar right in front of the motel called, “Bada Bing,” with a naked woman on the logo.  I had no clue what I was getting us into when I booked this place. 

I guess that we now have a up-close and personal view of the world of prostitution and slavery.  Based on our surveillance of the place so far, Thomas has already supposed that this is the type of place where pimps come and I’ve guessed that it’s the type of place where husbands come for a day or two to have uninhibited fun away from the family.  The problem is (although our parents might think it’s a good thing), we are too afraid to go outside except to eat.  We don’t want to experience anything here.  The vibe of the entire place is negative.  I can’t stop laughing because I think scary situations like this are hilarious, and I think it’s hilarious that of all places we are staying at a Lamplighter Motel with a strip joint on its property. 

I, for one, never knew places like this existed, but now we can maybe leave here on Friday morning with better insights into the world that we are fighting against.