Tag: Gollum

Gold iPhone 5s = The One Ring

iphone5s-gallery5-2013

I was looking at my gold iPhone 5s–which I tend to do–appreciating the gold ring around the newly designed home button. So sleek. So beautiful. So much like…

J.R.R. Tolkien’s One Ring from The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

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Never before has an iPhone’s home button looked like the Ring from Middle Earth. This thought led me to remember Gollum’s appearance while in the presence of the Ring: He holds it in the palm of his hand. He touches it. He caresses it. The Ring knows more about him than Gollum realizes. It knows what it’s doing to Gollum. Of course, we all remember what Gollum calls it.

I was doing the same thing. I’d touch the home button Ring. It knows my finger print and turns on without a pass code. I gaze into it. It learns about me. It knows my name.  It collects my information, my location, my voice, the voices of my loved ones… It’s more powerful than I know.

It came to me by UPS. My one. My own. My… Precious!

So I’ve thought of some reasons why my gold iPhone 5s is like The One Ring to Rule Them All:

1. As shown and stated already, it literally has a gold ring on it.

2. As stated already, it knows my voice and collects my information.

3. Like Gollum, I put it in safe places where no one (i.e. my children) can find it when I’m not using it. I put a gold(ish) case on it.

4. When I am using it, I tend to ignore everything around me (not good). I get lost in it. It can be very dangerous indeed to use while driving.

5. In a waiting room, when I’m peering into my Ring–er, iPhone–I become invisible to others and unattached from the spontaneous conversation that could occur.

6. It alerts others of my presence by ringing, vibrating, sending my location to map apps to determine traffic on the road, etc. (Someone it the trilogy is also alerted when a certain Baggins puts the Ring on…)

7. I become panicky and bemused if I’ve misplaced it momentarily. When I find it, I grasp it in thankfulness that it hasn’t left me.

8. In many ways, it has become an extension of me.

9.  I sort of stoop downward when looking at it–kind of like Gollum.

10. I spend too much time on it.

11. It’s slowly invading more and more aspects of my life. For example, I use an app with my students’ names to call on them equally in class instead of using sticks or playing cards or notecards with their names.

12. It’s powerful… and these devices seem to be getting more and more powerful.

13. It’s beautifully assembled by Foxconn, although it might as well me crafted in the fires of Mount Doom for all I know.

Thirteen seems to be a good number with which to end.

The phone’s full effect on me (and civilization): To be determined.

Gollum and pity

I encourage you to click on the following link and watch the 2:14 clip. If you’ve seen the first Lord of the Rings movie, you’re probably familiar with it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RemBy5yeW8g

Now that you’ve seen the video, I have to tell you why this small part made me love the film version of this story.

Pity is the reason none of the fellowship kill Gollum. They could have at any moment. I mean, Gandalf knew he was following them for three days. Later, when Frodo and Sam are traveling with Gollum during The Two Towers, there were plenty of chances they could of gotten rid of him. But they didn’t.

“He hates and loves the ring, as he hates and loves himself.”

After all, “it was pity that stayed Bilbo’s hand.” So Frodo shouldn’t have said Bilbo should have killed him when he had the chance. At least, not according to Gandalf.

“Many that live deserved death, and some that die deserve life.”

Yes, Gandalf is correct, and to try to explain why this is can drive a person mad.

So it’s established that things happen we have no control over. Later, Gandalf says,

“Do not be too eager to deal out death and judgement. Even the very wise cannot see all ends. My heart tells me that Gollum has some part to play yet, for good or evil, before this is over.”

Here, he tells Frodo to not be too quick to judge others. Even people who have done horrible things. It’s not our place to judge, so don’t do it.

“The pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of men.”

The above excerpt shows even more proof in a sovereign plan. It may be what some would call “weakness” that may save mankind. In brokenness, they may find salvation.

“I wish the ring had never come to me,” Frodo says. “I wish none of this happened.”

Gandalf replies, “So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to do is decide what to do with the time that is given to us. There are other forces at work in this world, Frodo, besides the will of evil. Bilbo was meant to find the ring, in which case you were also meant to have it. And that is an encouraging thought.”

Yes. Unfairness, death, and despair are all around us, but we didn’t choose this. And we definitely can’t choose when we should be alive to “strut and fret (our) hour upon the stage.” All we have to do is decide what to do with the time that is given to us. As Jesus says, worry about today, because tomorrow will have its own problems. God will take care of us.

Here’s more sovereign-tak from Gandalf: “Bilbo was meant to find the ring, in which case you were also meant to have it.”

Bilbo found the ring for a reason. This seemingly inconsequential happenstance would liberate Middle Earth and usher in a new era.

Likewise, we can’t even fathom why things happen. We can’t see anything clearly. “Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror,” Paul says. Truer words may never have been said.

So, to wrap this up (thank you for obliging my love for The Lord of the Rings), pity is a wonderful thing. I would go so far as to see it’s a scarce thing. Especially for those we don’t love. Especially for those who have done things to not earn it.

Also, pity can “rule the fate of men.” We’re told to be loving — and I would say empathetic — in the Bible for a reason. It may be a reason we can’t comprehend.

Lastly, everything happens for a reason. We can’t control everything. All we can do is try our best in the moment.

P.S. After this interlude, Gandalf remembers his way through the cave. “The air is less foul” through one of three tunnels. Sometimes, a small, honest conversation can change our trajectory through life.

And that is an encouraging thought. Isn’t it?