The Fall of the Númenoreans - STC hazing

In Sindarin - the elvish language

I’ lanta en’ Númenoreans

e’ i’ minya yen

en’ Eru noa

i’ lanta ve’ Adam

i’ Dúnedain

en’ edhel ar’ apanonar

auta ed’ cair lakilea a’ Númenor

ron ndor

nan’ ‘ksh lambe

en’ Valar nosse

glak i’ corm en’ i’ aran

ar’ a’ apanonar i’ alkar gurth

quern gorga, coi ten’oio quern irm

Aman, tur

nuquern i’ Valar

aran auta nan’ il i’ n’nir

Ilúvatar yel

Arda sii’ laara’

sii’ morgil

ar’ Númenor tumba luin

Rakt rast

no’ Middle-Earth

i’ voronda hyarya coi

Sauron usin

nan’ wanwa quenat

ten’oio thang Elendil chil

nan’ sal’ hary

e’ i’ corm en’ n’nir

a’ man quessir ar’ apanonar kwar

Tanya lanta

karn mori sii’

Yassen winya yen rakt winya estela

In English

The Fall of the Númenoreans

In the Second Age

Of Eru’s design

Came a fall likened to Adam

The Dúnedain

Of Elf and Men

Sailed victorious to Númenor

Their island

But a wicked tongue

Of Valar descent

Poisoned the heart of the king

And to Men the glory of life restricted

Became fear; undying of envy

Aman, the goal

And for the Valar’s defeat

The king set sail, save the hearts of the Few

But Ilúvatar beseeched

Arda once a plain

Became globe

And Númenor deep blue

Washed ashore

Upon Middle-Earth

The loyal, Faithful spared

Sauron escaped

Though lost Maiar form

Forever opposing Elendil’s heir

But still remains

In the hearts of some

To which Elves and Men take note

That though a fall

Can darken for now

With a new age arrives new hope

Conflict

            No great story is without conflict. We know this and have even come to expect it in the movies we see and books we read; but it is not the conflict itself that draws us back each time. It’s what the conflict produces. When conflict arises, it may scare or upset us at first but by the end we know the reason the story was worth telling.

In the beginning of our relationship, it seemed that all my wife and I ever did was work out issues. A hurtful word here, a misinterpreted situation there and a smorgasbord of insecurities made for some pretty good practice in our problem-solving skills. What was interesting though was that instead of all of these driving us apart, we just became closer and closer. At one point, we both caught on to this phenomenon and began to secretly rejoice whenever conflict arose because we knew that by the end of it we’d reach another level of intimacy we hadn’t experienced before.

None of us can change the fact that conflict either does or will exist in our relationships at times. We can however change the way we see it when it does come. If we believe that conflict is a threat, then our energies will be spent in avoiding or denying its existence; both of which produce anxiety, not peace. But if we realize that conflict is an invitation to intimacy, though it may scare or upset us at first, we can find out why our own      story is worth telling.