Creative Writing—Week One Vignettes

I'm finally writing again, and it only took a class to force me to do it. So for the next couple days if I remember, I'll be posting some of the vignettes or poems I've written for my creative writing class at Dallas Seminary. Here are three of the five writings from the first week of class.


Writing No. 2

Being in love is red and green. Two ends of the same color wheel, perfectly complimenting one another. Sweet and sour. Love is kind of like taking care of your teeth. Sometimes it can be a real pain in the gums; sometimes there’s a little blood shed as the floss forces its way into those hard-to-reach places as you learn to live unselfishly with another human being. Sometimes love burns a little not unlike rinsing; but when you get done, you’re left with a peppermint-fresh taste and a little bit brighter soul.

Writing No. 3

She’s not my cat. Supposedly. I don’t even like cats, to be honest; they make me sneeze. Still, somehow I got suckered into living with a dumb, fat cat. Only Whitney Williams could do this to me. She’s dangerous … like fire. I may be 23, but I’m still a boy and boys like fire. Fire is beautiful. Fire is intriguing. Fire is dangerous. That woman, she’s like fire: beautiful, intriguing and dangerous. I think she’s out to kill me, why else would she trick me into having a cat? She makes me smile by smiling and cry by crying. She’s the only person in this world for whom I would willingly scoop cat litter.

Writing No. 4

Any word, when you say it enough times, loses its meaning. Write, write, write, write, write. It works on a piece of paper too. Write. See? Now it’s just a bunch of squiggles, curves and lines. And a dot, but I think that’s actually called a tittle. Write, write, write. Now that the word looks meaningless, it reminds me of a road in Hawaii going to a little town called Hana. That road is full twists and turns, not unlike the process of writing—both of which we do hoping to catch a glimpse of something beautiful.

- Caleb Williams

Digital nomads

If someone were to challenge me to sum up my generation in one word I think it would be "nomad." Webster's defines 'nomad' as "a member of a people who have no fixed residence but move from place to place usually seasonally and within a well-defined territory." While the word carries certain connotations of bedouin and gypsy lifestyles it actually is a very elegant description of 21st century America.

We roam, not across deserts and countryside, but across information and relationships. This thought really struck me the other day as I was at the grocery store buying avocados to make guacamole to accompany a healthy plate of tilapia tacos. I was in the store squeezing the awkward green fruit, trying to find two that met my guacamole needs when something caught my eye. In the corner, next to the bell peppers--which, of course are really peppers--and the habaneros was a young woman, older than me but younger than 30, wearing headphones in one ear and a bluetooth headset in the other ear.

I have to admit, the first thought that came to my mind was: Why didn't I think of that? The second though was somewhat sobering. We live in a world where we can be completely caught up in our little spheres of influence, unwilling to move or to be moved by anything outside. We can get so segregated from the world around us that the very limited contact we have with people outside our bubbles can be blocked out by our favorite songs, making human contact obsolete.

I was thinking about this as I finished my shopping and paid for my goodies and while I did I noticed something. Not one person in the grocery store will make eye contact with anyone else. Butchers, sales associates, customers and cashiers alike are all caught up in their own little worlds, staring at their shoes when theirs happens to overlap with someone else's.

I can't help but place some of the blame on technology. Many people will argue that technology is neutral; it's neither good nor bad in and of itself, it just depends on how it's used. I will admit being a strict adherent to this theory until this year when I have had the good fortunes to hear people like Shane Hipps and John Dyer talk about technology.

I don't really want to get into the implications of technology theory right now, but it seems like we've become digital nomads without a home. The only place we're really home is inside our little bubbles. I'm no different, I just feel like I'm finally waking up from mine.

-Caleb Williams

To tell a story

I miss writing. I mean really writing. Writing with a purpose, writing with a story to tell. I guess there just aren't that many stories in my life right now. None that anyone will want to read anyway.

Lately I have been sitting behind my computer screen for what seems like 12 hours a day. The keyboard attached to the bottom of by silver-colored MacBook Pro feels like a part of me now. The LCD screen is like a window to the world that is passing by while I tirelessly toil away, trying to become something I never thought I would be. I have been playing with multimedia for a long time now and until relatively recently I have seen much of it as only a hobby. Now I'm beginning to think that I might actually be on to something with it.

My problem is that I have no area that I can really call my own. My specialty used to be writing, but only because that was all I ever did. Lately I have been playing with graphic and Web design and development. I love it, but I still love writing.

I've noticed a correlation between the two fields though: Both require a story, both are message begging to be told. Whether that is the relationship between sound and light, client and employee or man and city hall, they are all stories that need to be told.

That's my story now. I'm learning to tell stories in a whole new way; a whole new language.

-Caleb Williams

Ever had one of those days?

Have you ever had one of those days where nothing you do seems to turn out right? Yeah you have.

Just remember, at least you can roll over.



-Caleb Williams

What just happened?

I feel like three weeks just flew past me. It's been a crazy month with reading week, Thanksgiving and computer-related incidents to keep my busy.

Let me just say the concept of a reading week is awesome. A week where you can catch up on anything you have fallen behind on or get ahead for. I wrote almost 50 pages worth of material over that week and let me tell you, I glad it's over. Of course, I was three-quarters done with my final paper and my computer decides to stop working.

Kind of.

Apparently my computer was made with a faulty video card that blew, rendering everything I have on my computer inaccessible. Luckily, I had a backup disk but I was missing a couple pages of material for one paper that I finally finished today--it's due tomorrow.

I've been enjoying the drama of the close of the college football season, although I wish Nebraska DT Ndamukong Suh would have blocked Saxet's field goal and cemented the Heisman. I can dream. As it is, I think Suh deserves the award, but he probably will come in second.

It has been an interesting week here in Dallas. The pastor of The Village Church, where Whitney and I have been attending, was diagnosed with a brain tumor last week. Thank God the doctors removed it, but he is still recovering and if my Christian View of Art professor is to be believed--and I trust him here especially--Matt [Chandler] will have a splitting head ache for a week or two.

The semester is finally drawing to a close and I'm not too sure what to do with myself. As of Friday, I am effectively done with all but one of my classes. All that's left is to turn in term papers and take one final exam. The only class I have remaining is an Introduction to Theology class that has really challenged me intellectually. It's not that the material is itself difficult, but the form of reasoning is a change. The class right now is really focused on helping us change the way we think and reason, particularly within a secular world.

I am really glad I lucked into taking this class with the professor I did, the man is a genius. Right now, we're discussing philosophy of science and the merits of scientific thinking versus religious thinking. I've always been a little intimidated about discussions involving faith and science--fascinated, but intimidated--but now I feel I have a sound way of reasoning with most people.

In closing, I'll leave you with a quick note about a trip Whitney and I took to Hobby Lobby. We were looking for some stockings and a nativity scene when we came across this little diddy:




Talk about taking Christ out of Christmas. Maybe its really an advent scene?

-Caleb Williams

Links in the meantime

Not a good couple of days. I have no motivation. I don't even want to be motivated really, but that's on me and it's something I have to man up to and face. Instead of elaborating on the last couple of days, here are some links to check out:

• A contributor to The Burnside Writers' Collective take a look at the growing prosperity gospel, comparing it--rightly in my opinion--to voodoo.
• Jon Stewart takes a look at recent election coverage ... yes, there were elections Tuesday.
• Joanna Brooks from "The Religion Dispatches" examines the complicated past between the Mormon church and blacks.
• Recent controversy surrounding Florida linebacker Brandon Spikes has led the player willingly to sit out the entire Vanderbilt game, ESPN's Chris low reports. Spikes was previously benched for half of the Vandy game by coach Urban Meyer after an eye gouging incident in the team's win over rival Georgia last week.
• WIRED magazine's Matthew Shechmeister wrote an amusing article about the death of Geocities.
• A friend of mine showed this video in class today, saying he imagines it to be a foretaste of Christ's return, the nations dancing together.

That's all for now. I'll write something when my finger stops hurting.

Little men inside the refrigerator

I used to think there were little men inside the refrigerator
whose only job it was to turn the light on and off as needed.
They would work day and night through the cold
so that I could see the milk sitting next to the butter.

They were shy little people, never ones to talk
they would stick to themselves and their friends the milk and the butter.
I thought that if I opened the door quick enough I would finally see them.
I never did.

I thought maybe they knew the guys who made the cereal and cookies
and that they would all get together during holidays and eat our leftovers.
The leftovers never disappeared while no one was looking,
however, my father would occasionally claim they did.

I imagine them sitting there next to the milk and the butter
in their fuzzy eskimo coats, their fingers kept warm by tiny little gloves,
sipping at an already opened juice box talking about the cans of diet soda
and planning their next disappearing act.

You can imagine my disappointment when I finally realized they didn’t exist--
that the light turns off and on like normal lights do.
And while playing with the refrigerator switch was fun for awhile,
the milk and the butter soon became lonely

there were no little refrigerator people to keep them company.
There were only little people on highways, in cubicles,
talking on the phone, eating in chinese restaurants, watching television,
laughing, playing, praying, loving and drinking coffee.

-Caleb Williams

On motivation and whatever

Rain.

Rain.

Rain.

Rain.

It's killing my desire to be productive. I'm the kind of person who likes to fall asleep listening to the splattering of rain on the window, so rain makes me want to avoid work. It's not so much that I want to go to sleep, far from it actually. I just don't want to work.

I began writing a paper the other day, a textbook review on St. John of Damascus' "Three Treatises on the Divine Images," but about a paragraph into the paper, I realized I don't know Turabian Style. They're making me use footnotes. That's a complete waste of space.

I read 100 pages of "Inerrancy" edited by Norman L. Geisler yesterday. Today, I've read about 30 so far. The book is a collection of essays, around 450 pages or so, on the topic of, gasp, biblical inerrancy. I was floating through the book really well until the 5th essay, where the author lost me about half of the way through. I got his main point, don't get me wrong, but about a third of the essay was gibberish. Not that it was drivel, I'm just not well-read enough to understand the complexities of the point the author was trying to make.



Don't wear house shoes in the rain, you'll just end up disappointed. And soggy.

My mind is scattered right now, that's why I'm writing. In case anyone was wondering.

We're having roast for dinner tonight and I have to say, I think a more effective means of "harsh interrogation" than water boarding would be forcing a hungry person to smell a roast cooking.

Two-hours and 22 minutes to go, make a wish.

-Caleb Williams

Fried Oreos and fall in Dallas

Rain, rain ... has finally gone away, for a day or two at least. The weather here is brilliant, I sat outside on campus for an hour today and read 50 pages out of a textbook and I feel good.

In case you can't tell, it is officially fall here in Dallas--day four to be exact--and I couldn't be happier. Don't get me wrong, I love summer, but there's only so much heat you can take before you boil away. I do have to say, I miss fall in Oklahoma, hopefully Dallas is far enough north to enjoy the season.

In Houston there is no fall, only seven or so days of moderate weather in December, then "cold" (not the good, bundle yourself in a jacket and scarf cold). There is no months-long gradation of green to auburn, you just wake up and things are a bizarre combination of grey and brown. Here's hoping fall in Dallas is closer to fall in Oklahoma.

In fall, a real, honest-to-goodness fall, coffee becomes even more a blessing. I am currently doing a study on the effects of coffee on the body at 5:40 in the morning, analysis so far: It helps considerably. And if the smell of coffee isn't enough to convince you of God's existence, it's effects should be.

Another gift of God: Deep-fried Oreos.



Don't knock it until you've tried it. The things are yet another wonderful concoction from the brilliant--and arterially clogged--people at the Texas State Fair. These same people proudly brought you deep-fried butter. Don't worry, I respect my body too much to even approach that counter.



That's all for now, time to read, then on to Intro to Theology at 1 p.m.

-Caleb Williams

The Ontological Argument

"[God is] that than which nothing greater can be conceived."
-Anslem of Canterbury (c. 1033-1109)

Interesting little argument. If God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived, God must logically exist if He can be conceived.

Not convinced?

If God doesn't exist that means the mind can conceive of something greater than God (for fun, we'll call it Zeus). Logically, the only quality Zeus contains that God doesn't is the attribute of existence. It stands to reason, therefore, that God exists.

-Caleb Williams

Last-second heroics

Still reading a lot. Finished John Damascene's "Three Treatises on the Divine Images" which is essentially an iconodule argument. Personally I'm not sure where to take that one still, even after reflection on it. Started a book called "Christian Theology" by Alister E. McGrath, one chapter in and I'm enjoying it.

A lot is going on. Whitney worked nearly 70 hours last week and I am still without a job and wondering about the wisdom behind getting one. There's a job opening on campus for a sound technician that's only 1- or so hours per week that I'm perfectly suited for, except for a 10 minute block at the beginning and end of the shift (classes). Anyway, Whitney is wonderful and I wouldn't be able to do any of this without her; wouldn't want to even if I could.

I'm learning a lot these day, more than I ever have before. I'm learning in school, learning to be a husband, learning to be responsible with money and health. Learning to balance a large number of responsibilities and just trying not to "drop the ball."

Not to be mean, I just don't want to end up like this kid, jump to 1:25 to see what I mean:



-Caleb Williams

1,500 and counting...

I'm worse at updating this than I thought I would be. Nevertheless, I will take a few minutes to write while I'm waiting for my mac-n-cheese to cook. I've been doing a lot of reading recently, in the last couple weeks, I've accumulated well over 1,500 pages of reading and I am still going. Here's a brief taste of my life these days:

• "Methodical Bible Study" by Robert A. Traina. A very-helpful Bible study guide that really shows how to break down the Scriptures. This book, along with Howard Hendricks' lectures have increased my confidence in my ability to read the Bible tenfold.

• "Spiritual Leadership" by J. Oswald Sanders. A nice little book about, well, spiritual leadership and growth.

• "Letters to a Diminished Church" by Dorothy Sanders. Sanders is a student of the Lewis-Tolkien school of thinking and writing. A contemporary of both, Sanders writes mostly to early-to-mid twentieth century England. A lot of what she has to say is relevant to us today, but her audience is Church of England. Therefore, some of the doctrinal statements don't flow with modern protestant Christianity.

• "The Grace Awakening" by Charles Swindoll. Grace, plain and simple. All the joys and pitfalls of living a life filled with grace.

• "Love Your God With All Your Mind" by J.P. Moreleand. A condemning view of American Christianity's lack of knowledge of the faith. A good read, I would recommend it and agree with a majority of what Moreland has to say, but not quite all of it.

• "Inclusive Yet Discerning" by Frank Burch Brown. A thought-provoking analysis of varying views of appropriate worship styles to reach the people.

• "Basic Issues in Aesthetics" by Marcia Muelder Eaton. This book had and has me so twisted on the definition of "art." 150 pages later and I have more questions than I started with.

• "Inside Out" by Larry Crabb. Spirtual growth from the inside out, this takes a look at a look at some of the slightly uncomfortable aspects of spiritual growth.

• "Three Treatises on the Divine Images" by St. John of Damascus. John Damascene's three letters to the Byzantine emperor after his banning of the use of icons in worship. I'm not sure what to think of this one yet.

All this is justification of my inability to post. Luckily, I enrolled in a speed reading course that has so far increased my reading speed from around 137 wpm to (at last count) approximately 400 wpm. So, that has been a huge blessing for me. Anyway, write soon.

-Caleb Williams

The n00b kids on the block

The London Telegraphy published an article today about the effects social and new media are having on society. The article focuses on how social media Web sites such as Twitter are changing our language. The gist of the story is that the Collins English Dictionary has added over 250 words to the official lexicon, many of which have been established by the online culture.

Internet memes such as "meh" and "noob" (or is it n00b?) are now a part of the English vernacular (I use this word to point out the irony of words like "noob," but that's another post). It seems with every passing day we become more and more addicted to the virtual world that has exploded in the last 10 plus years. This reminds me of two things: The fact that we still need face-to-face interaction and the potential for ministry utilizing media.

This presents a sort of paradox though, how does one go about using multimedia to create a more personal environment and encouraging community? Media by nature is meant for the masses, to make mass communication easier. Media is corporate. Faith is not. Community is not. This is evidenced itself by Twitter and Facebook, both of which are largely leading to a society that is by and large narcissistic. Twitter points to this perfectly, it is a place where people have come to believe that trivial exploits such as picking up the dry cleaning are worthy of exclaiming to the world. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with social media, there's nothing wrong with Twitter. The problem is the attitudes and ideas of the people using it.

I've struggled with the close of this post, but it all boils down to one question: Where is the room for God and the Church in all this? I don't have an answer now, but I feel very sure there is one and I'm determined to find it.

-Caleb Williams

Front foot leads the back one...

What a week already. I had my first seminary class Tuesday and after only two days, Dallas Theological is already living up to its promise of first-week "syllabus shock."

This is somewhat of a weird feeling for me, I'm in school, I'm going to classes, I'm doing homework and reading more than I have since Damon Akins' History of the American Frontiers class at OU. Only now instead of having one class demanding 1,000 pages of reading (literally), I have six. It's weird though because it doesn't quite feel like work yet. I know there will soon come a time when my tune will change, but I know that I'm learning to love God more.

This semester I'm taking an Introduction to Theology course, the professor tells us that we will learn to love God with our minds--an idea which excites me to no end. I'm ready to leave behind the ignorance of my former faith and embrace Jesus with my mind as well as my heart. I'm reminded of an image from one of Donald Miller's books in which Miller recounts a dream of his. In this dream, he is walking along a road toward God. God used to be distant but had now drawn so close that Miller could see the lines on His face. What I'm doing now is walking down that road, waiting for the day that I see God that way.

This is going to be a challenging two years but I know, Lord willing, I'll make it through. I've got a wonderful support system to help me, a beautiful wife, good friends, an awesome family that I know will always be there for me. This is the beginning of my journey and as such, I've felt a need to re-imagine what I want to do with this space. This blog is going to be about my life in the tension of school, learning to love God, love my wife, love my family and learning to fulfill my purpose on this spinning chunk of rock that we call our home for now.

-Caleb Williams

A new beginning...

School starts--again--in a little under two weeks. I've been going to school my whole life it seems, first because they made me (how dare they), then because I knew I needed to. Then I went to get ahead in life through college (look where that's gotten me, I'm 22, a college grad and unemployed). Now, I'm going to school to serve God.

That to say it's funny how our motivations change over time. Continuing school was one of the last things on my mind two years ago, then I felt the calling again. I'm seeking an M.A. in media and communication from Dallas Theological Seminary, hoping to use my skills in various media to promote the Gospel and promote Church unity.

How? I'm not entirely sure yet.

-Caleb Williams

And a year later...

I thought today as I was reading PostSecret that I would like to start blogging again. I know no one will read this but it feels good to write; to let my thoughts pour out into this little text box.

I've been looking for a job lately. Something, anything to contribute to this budding family Whitney and I have begun. I know something good is on its way but it's hard not to get discouraged, especially when you never get a call back and attempts to check in on an application are met with a cold shoulder.

I know I'm not alone in this, though. My wonderful wife is working her tail off to support us as we begin our lives together and I love and appreciate her more than I could ever let her know. She keeps me sane and is a constant encouragement to me.

I begin seminary next month. I ordered my first semester's text books yesterday and it looked like some heavy reading but I'm very much looking forward to it. For anyone who doesn't know, I'm seeking a M.A. in media and communication, an area that I am very passionate about. I have a few concerns but I'll get to those in a later post.

Until next year,

-Caleb Williams

Stop-n-go

I'm sitting in Oklahoma now, bored and I figured it would be fun to sit here and tap out a few lines about my thoughts. So far this semester I have been working for The Oklahoma Daily, the school newspaper here at OU and I have found myself busier than I care to admit.

I've let a lot of things slip away from me lately, things that are important to me that I just haven't quite been able to find time for. I actually "quit" working at The Daily for the semester a week ago today but I am still writing one more story for this week about what its like to be a pizza delivery boy in the bustling metropolis of Norman, Okla. Hard hitting stuff, I know, but it should be fun. I am planning on doing a ride along with him for an hour or so, just enough to ask my questions and watch him work to write out 15 to 20 inches and send it in to my editors.

Funny thing is that on the same day I "quit," I applied to be editor in chief for the summer edition of the same paper, a job that is tentatively mine, unless someone more qualified (and let's face it, who isn't) comes along. This summer will be interesting, if you can, come on up and visit for awhile.

-Caleb Williams

Oh, to be a Gypsy!

Now that I have finally succeeded in killing off any sort of hapless reader base I may have once had, it is time for another post.

Sometimes I wish I could have been a gypsy. I don't mean I want to be Romanian--although I would like to live in Europe for a while--I mean I want to be a gypsy in the popular conception of the term. Care-free and able to do as I please with only a small group of friends beside me. I don't want to have to worry about things, I realize that this is a sign of immaturity but my immaturity is something I need to own up to and move beyond.

I've been grappling with my future lately and quite frankly it scares me. I worry about money. I worry about finding a job. Contrary to what I know you think all the time, there isn't that huge of a demand for journalists these days. There are blindingly few high paying jobs in journalism. But I want to write news, opinion, fact, fiction, I like to write and that's what I think God has for me.

I've been less introspective over the last few months. Less, I don't know, 'artsy.' I hate the word "artsy" because it implies snobbish or rebellious and those kinds of things. I'm headed toward the mainstream and I don't have any idea when this began to happen to me. It kind of makes me mad to be honest. I guess everything gets swept away by the tides of conformity eventually and why should I be an exception?

I feel like Natalie Portman's character in Garden State, sometimes I just want to do something bizarre to break to monotony of time.

I talk a big game but I'm glad I'm not a gypsy.

-Caleb Williams

Jordan Green is a Genius

If you haven't been reading the Burnside Writer's Collective you are wrong! Read this: http://www.burnsidewriterscollective.com/general/2007/07/the_emergent_churchal_qaeda_co.php

Do it now!

-Caleb Williams

Kenyan Farmers’ Fate Caught Up in U.S. Aid Rules

By CELIA W. DUGGER

LOKWII, Kenya — As the United States Congress debates an omnibus farm bill, it is considering a small change that advocates say could make a big difference to the world’s hungriest people: allowing the federal government to buy some food in Africa to feed the famished, rather than shipping it all overseas from America.

The Bush administration, with odd-bedfellows support from liberal Democrats, has called for allowing the purchase of some food in poor countries to quicken responses to emergencies. But even so, its proposal would not have prevented the paradoxical deepening of hunger here during a long-term project to combat hunger in the harsh, arid reaches of northwestern Kenya.

Families participating in an American-financed irrigation project from 2002 to 2006 were promised payment in corn for clearing the land and digging canals. The Kenyan government objected to the importation of American corn because the country was awash in a bumper harvest that had caused corn prices to plunge.

The result: American officials, prohibited by law from buying the corn locally, could not deliver it. As the impoverished families waited in vain for sustenance from the American heartland, malnutrition among the youngest children worsened and five people died of hunger-related causes.

Ikai Moru, 19, still recalls the hunger that gnawed at her and her mother as they chopped down thorny acacia trees on their tiny plot, hoping one day to reap a bountiful harvest from the parched earth. She watched her mother grow thinner and paler, and finally sicken and die.

“My mother was a very hard worker,” Ms. Moru offered in a brief epitaph.

Through sheer grit, the 2,000 families finished the irrigation system last year and are successfully farming. But long-term projects to help Africa’s rural poor feed themselves are chronically underfinanced, charities say.

Across Africa, the United States is more likely to give people a fish — caught in America — that feeds them for a day than to teach them to fish for themselves. Since last year, for example, the United States has donated $136 million worth of American food to feed the hungry in Kenya, but spent $36 million on agricultural projects to help Kenyan farmers grow and earn more.

And even that small budget for long-term projects in Kenya is expected to dwindle. The United States Agency for International Development, known as Usaid, in seeking to concentrate scarce resources, has dropped Kenya from the list of countries eligible for undertakings like the irrigation project here.

Such efforts are dwarfed by the epic scale of the need. Viewed from a prop plane buzzing like a mosquito overhead, the irrigated land here shimmers as a tiny oasis in a vast, dun-colored landscape.

With the guidance of the Christian charity World Vision, which implemented the project, the families hacked an irrigation system from the barren landscape with machetes, hoes and shovels, clearing 1,000 acres and digging 99 miles of canals along the Kerio River.

Ms. Moru will soon be feeding her four younger brothers and sisters with an abundance of sorghum and corn harvested from their half-acre farm, fulfilling her mother’s dream.

The success is noteworthy, but the families’ sacrifices also illustrate the risks of an American food aid system that is designed to benefit domestic agribusiness and shipping interests and enmeshed in an intricate framework of farm subsidies.

Members of Congress who favor the current system say the support of influential commercial groups is needed to sustain political support for food aid. They warn that ill-timed purchases of food in Africa in times of scarcity could send food prices higher, harming poor consumers.

But critics in Congress contend that the United States could feed far more people more quickly if it could buy surplus food in Africa. It might also help boost the incomes of African farmers, by providing a market for their crops, they say.

The Bush administration is now trying to change the law so that up to $300 million of food can be bought in poor countries during emergencies.

The Senate Agriculture Committee chairman, Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, where growers and landowners got $1.58 billion in corn subsidies in 2005, is advocating a $25 million pilot program to test buying food in poor countries for both emergency and long-term aid.

Even that modest proposal is meeting stiff resistance from farm state legislators. The House Agriculture Committee’s version of the farm bill includes no such pilot. The committee chairman, Collin C. Peterson, Democrat of Minnesota, said of his members,` “They’re still of the mode that this should be American products we’re using our tax dollars to provide them.”

Mr. Peterson’s district got $367 million in corn subsidies in 2005, according to government data analyzed by the Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit research organization.

Even without the American corn that was supposed to keep them going, the families here were determined to grasp their once-in-a-lifetime chance at fertile plots of farmland. Ms. Moru, 14 years old when construction began, recalled how she and her widowed mother had taken on the acacia trees together. They lopped off branches barbed with thorns, burned the trunks and uprooted the stumps.

“It was the heaviest work we had ever done, but we had no choice,” Ms. Moru said. “It was the only way to get land to plow.”

Their success was all the more extraordinary given this desiccated region’s history as a graveyard for well-intended foreign aid efforts to help the Turkana tribe, mostly nomadic herders, escape punishing cycles of drought, hunger and death.

The participants themselves credit a man who gave them fortitude when they faltered: Daniel Mwebi, a Kenyan engineer who managed the project here for World Vision.

From 1992 to 2004, he lived for much of each year in this remote place, far from his wife and children. He said he had been determined to avoid the mistakes of earlier aid projects that relied on heavy earth-moving equipment and diesel-run pumps that required costly fuel, expertise and maintenance.

So he designed a very basic system and trained the Turkana in the masonry, carpentry and welding skills they needed to keep it running. The earthen irrigation systems — built in two United States-financed projects — are powered only by gravity and the sweat of the local people.

What Mr. Mwebi could not have anticipated, however, was how the workings of the American food aid system would deeply complicate that plan, which Usaid financed for $4 million over five years.

When it came to tiding the families over with American corn, the Kenyan government objected, said Simon Nyabwengi, then World Vision’s Nairobi-based manager of the Turkana project. “They offered a very reasonable option,” he said. “They said we appreciate the project, it’s a good project, but we don’t want you to bring in maize.”

William Hammink, who heads the office of Food for Peace at Usaid, confirmed that the corn was never delivered because the United States was prohibited from buying it in Kenya or paying duties on imports.

“We kept waiting,” said Aemun Imong, a 32-year-old mother of four. “They told us, ‘Food is coming, food is coming.’ But we saw it wasn’t coming.”

The lack of food was particularly dire for children under age 5. World Vision surveys documented that the proportion of them stunted by malnutrition rose to about a third in 2004, from about a fifth when construction began in 2002.

The five people who died were Ms. Moru’s mother, another woman and three children, according to Mr. Lokolonyoi, who said he reported the deaths to district authorities.

Mr. Hammink of Usaid said he did not know what caused the worsening of malnutrition, though he said that provision of corn to the families would most likely have lessened it.

The United Nations World Food Program, with contributions from other nations, was able to obtain 75 percent more corn to feed Africa’s hungry from 2001 to 2005 by purchasing it in Kenya, Zambia and Uganda, rather than shipping it from the United States, Michigan State researchers found.

As the building stretched over years, a portion of the promised beans and vegetable oil from the United States was delivered in 2004, Mr. Mwebi said. Some corn bought in Kenya with private money also came. But it was too late to avert the hunger of the early years.

By 2005, the families each had a half-acre of cleared land to farm. They grew enough food to donate almost 14,000 pounds for the needy still around them, said Hosea Lotir, who heads the local water users’ association.

As they settled down to farm instead of wandering with their animals, the number of children in the Lokwii primary school more than doubled, to 857 — and would have doubled again if it had not closed its admissions, school officials said.

The families here continue to nurture their verdant green spots of progress. Nearby villages are clamoring for irrigation projects of their own, but American officials say they do not expect to have the money to finance them.

As the sun neared its zenith one recent morning, the main canal in Morulem — the site of the first irrigation project — was a cauldron of flailing hoes and shovels. Women glistening with sweat gouged out tons of silt to clear a clogged channel.

On a later shift, it was the men’s turn, and women squatting on the banks hectored them. Don’t just shovel at the sides of the canal, they yelled, dig out the middle of it. That’s the hard part!

“I know what I’m doing,” Julius Edukon barked back. “I don’t need your advice.”

Arupe Eoto, a withered old woman, sought to mollify him with praise and a nod to the tribe’s sternest taskmaster. “You really seem to know what you’re doing,” she told him. “The hunger has taught you well.”

-New York Times, July 30, 2007

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/31/world/africa/31food.html?ei=5088&en=bdc2058b2d1a8814&ex=1343534400&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&pagewanted=print