Christmas?

Out of curiosity, why are we so ungrateful at Christmas time?

um...

Some times I wonder who are my friends, and who are merely passing through and hang out with me and have fun with me simply because I'm there when they are. Why do I have to do some of the pursuing in the friendships? Okay, most of it in these types of friendships. Hello college friends, Goodbye college friends.

In other news, I seem to have lost my conscience. If you find him, please let him know that I miss him.

The Roads Most Traveled

The roads we travel may take us all down the same path, or they may take us down different paths. I'm okay with that. The hard part, the rewarding part, is the travel, and what you do with who you meet on the way.

I have a friend who is graduating on Sunday. He's not entirely certain where he's going in life after this. He's okay with this. He knows that God's going to take care of him. He's also certain that all he needs to do is trust God and go after what God gives him.

I have another friend who is moving up in this world. He's going to become a SEAL. It's a huge deal, and he's worried that he's not going to make it that far. He's leaving family, home, friends, all to do this. He'd already left home and family and friends to join the Navy, but now he's moving further away. He knows that this is where God wants him. God's given him all the open doors to move ahead with this. God's given him the passion to rise above the rest and become a SEAL. He's worried, but he's going ahead because this is where God wants him.

I am not at a crossroads. I am not doing anything special with my life right now, and I'm not going anywhere special, except home for the holidays in about 4 days. And yet, for some reason, the traveled path, the one that's been traveled, the one that I sometimes feel like I'm traveling alone can be the hardest. The only thing hard about a crossroad is coming to them and making the decision about which way to go. The hard thing about plodding along is the plodding. You can easily lose sight of where you are going. If the landscape is not changing, you're liable to think that you aren't going anywhere. This is very dangerous, because if you aren't going anywhere, you might as well sit down and rest. If you're in a battle, resting is the worst thing to do.

Each of us has a personal battle. Joshua, in the old testament had not only a personal battle to fight, but a public one, and he had to lead a bunch of people too. As he was getting ready to do this, and quaking in his boots, God spoke through Moses to Joshua and to the people of Israel. In Deuteronomy 31: 1-8, God speaks amazing wisdom and grace.

Then Moses went out and spoke these words to all Israel: "I am now a hundred and twenty years old and I am no longer able to lead you. The LORD has said to me, 'You shall not cross the Jordan.' The LORD your God himself will cross over ahead of you. He will destroy these nations before you, and you will take possession of their land. Joshua also will cross over ahead of you, as the LORD said. And the LORD will do to them what he did to Sihon and Og, the kings of the Amorites, whom he destroyed along with their land. The LORD will deliver them to you, and you must do to them all that I have commanded you. Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you."

Then Moses summoned Joshua and said to him in the presence of all Israel, "Be strong and courageous, for you must go with this people into the land that the LORD swore to their forefathers to give them, and you must divide it among them as their inheritance. The LORD himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged."

Do not be discouraged.

Being lonely is a powerful feeling. It can overwhelm you like a tidal wave of negative feelings. It can push you down, knock the breath out of you, it can even make you feel dead inside. Just when it seems like you might be getting a breath of fresh air, it pulls you back under.

Being lonely is hard to overcome. It's time when this happens that I have to look to my savior, and trust that he knows why, for this brief space of time, Adam is in the garden alone.

Something for the dance...I mean road...

Fiddle lessons are in the works. So are naps, rest stops and Thanksgiving breaks. A Gaelic Storm blew through here last night and left some toe tapping behind. Also ear bugs. They seem to thrive off the rumpus that is left in this Gaelic Storm's wake. Speaking of "wake", it's not like you can sleep when it blows through. It drones, rather like a bagpipe. One would have thought there was an entire brigade out there. I'm about to bow out, but I'd like to leave you with something that will resonate with your ear drums. And probably your toes.

loop-dee-doop-dee...

So, very recently, I've discovered that I'm not fully here. It started Monday night. I was tired, and feeling a little loopy. I'm so tired, I'm not dreaming vividly anymore. Tuesday was worse. I was really loopy yesterday. At times it alternated between happy loopy and wanting-to-cry loopy. There were also times where I appeared to be not-loopy at all! I'm still not all here today. I need a nap. Desperately. I'm probably going to get one around three this afternoon. Yay.

whirling, twirling, down we go!

Well, happy November. With November comes Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving break, lots of tests, lots of other things, and everything in general is spiraling around my ears, taunting me and making fun of the fact that I feel like and am behind on my homework. Thank God for professors who are understanding and allow you to have different due dates. Extensions are life savers. Now, before you say, "You've been procrastinating!!" I get to say, "Not true! I was sick for about two and a half weeks!" And yes, I did just anticipate what you were going to say and slap down your accusation. Go me.

Now, little ol' me is going to go. I've got work to do! (She said in a very super-hero-esque way.)

ttfn! ta-ta for now!

Weather and possible seasonal affect disorder...heh

It's amazing how the weather and a good night's sleep can affect ones mood. (By "ones" I mean "my" of course.) And yet even though my mood is crazy, and up and down, God's goodness is not affected. God cannot be affected by my mood, by the weather, by classes or anything. The only thing it can be influenced by is the day. God's goodness and mercy are NEW every day. They're not old. They never get old!

This week has been a strange one. I was tired going into it, and recently, I've been realizing that I really wish I could be in a relationship, though I am also realizing that it's not important, because God has ordained when and whether it even happens. Let me tell it this way:

When I get tired I dream very vividly. This semester has been very tiring. I've been getting about seven and a half hours of sleep a night, if that. The only time I get more is on the weekends, and normally it's not much more... I've been sleeping poorly because for some reason, my shoulders and back become very tense in the middle of the night, so while I go to sleep relaxed, I wake up tense and because of that stuffy. This is the reason I normally don't get more then 9 hours of sleep on the weekends, unless I have a headache. Needless to say, I dream very very vividly when I am tired, exhausted. Most of the time I'll remember for about 30 seconds after I wake up, but very occasionally, I'll remember them later, throughout most of the day. The thing is, lately, I've been remembering only the dreams that seem to affect me the most. My consciousness seems to think, Oh, this one will really rattle her, let's remember this one. And because I have recently been wishing that there was a someone who could come along side me and support me and be there for me and love me, someone I could do the same for, well, every time I have a dream that falls into that category, it seems that I remember it.

About the end of last week, I had two dreams, about two days apart. I had one dream in which a young man who is constantly in my life, who plays banjo in my RUF praise team, starred. In this dream I dreamed (what else would I do in a dream, really?) that he was very concerned about the fact that I'd hopped a ride with a friend on his motorcycle, minus a helmet, and didn't I know that I could die? The fact that the dream young man was concerned about my dream self caused a realization between our dream selves that we really liked each other. Naturally, when I woke up I was all in a dither because of this dream. It's a dream, yes, but I've been told by various people through out my life that dreams are great ways to interpret emotion. I decided I needed to not do that with this dream. It's not smart. Then about two days later, I had another dream, this time about another young man who I know less well, and whom I contra-dance with. I know I don't have feelings for this second young man. Dreams are silly, and one should not base feelings off dream feelings.

Then comes this week. I was feeling particularly gloomy, Monday afternoon and evening and felt a bit like I could cry the later half of the day. I didn't feel pretty. Monday night I didn't get great sleep; Tuesday morning was brutal. I actually got out of bed to check and make sure that I couldn't skip my first class that day. I was dreary Tuesday as well. Again, not very pretty. I was tired, and out of sorts, and when I'm tired and out of sorts, I just want a hug, or someone to care for me, someone to take me by the shoulders and shake me a little and say, "GO TO BED. YOU NEED SLEEP." and then to assure me that they'll take care of me, no matter what my mood. What I'm trying to say is that when I'm tired and gloomy, my relationship gap becomes painfully obvious to me, and I can't see two feet in front of me.

I had praise team practice tuesday night, and during a rather lively discussion with one of the members, Josh, about good music, we both discovered that we liked the same band, Shane & Shane. He was asking me what music I have from them and was appalled to find out that I didn't have any, because I don't have money to buy any... Anyway, praise team continued, and I left disgruntled, because I was going to have to walk, first to the music building, and then home, in the dark. I grumbled through both walks because nobody had thought to offer me a ride. By the time I got home, I had completely lost sight of God and any goodness He might have.

When I had walked in the door, and set my stuff down, I looked first to my desk, and there was a letter there from my grandma. In it was 50 much needed dollars. She said she was praying I wouldn't lose my smile. I was shocked. Next, after finding food, I opened my computer and then my email. I found in my email to itunes gifts from Josh. They were both Shane & Shane songs. The first one was "You Said", talking about how if we ask, God will pour out his love and blessings on us. The second "This is the day the Lord has made". Both were songs with messages I needed to hear. God pointed me back to Himself, in the matter of about 5 minutes. He is amazing. He showed me, very simply that He could fill me both physically (the money) and spiritually (the songs). I love and (try to) worship an amazing God. Amazing.

crazy hecticness = awesomeness

Life has settled down into a nice, hectic routine. I like hectic routines. They give me something interesting to do. I enjoy running frantically from one spot to the next. This is much more calming then, say, having two jobs during the summer and trying desperately to keep them from over lapping, and then ending up with days filled with _____. What was that you say? oh. I meant to put nothing there. And nothing is there. heh.

As it is, I'm running like a chicken with my head cut off. Also, good news, my classes are fantastic!

Even better news is that God is gracious. I have realized again, and with some fantastic finality, that I really am not worried about who God has in store for me. It's amazing. When I was younger, I used to think it would be great to get married and have kids, and the idea of writing letters to my husband while I was younger and waiting for him seemed so romantic, but the problem of all this was that my letters were directed towards anyone that I had a large crush on at the moment. I feel like, if I wanted to, I could sit down and write a letter to my future husband without imagining a current crush reading it. I've realized that my feelings towards a crush now do not get in the way. That's huge. And it's amazing. I'm sure you remember how worried I was that things would change and that I would lose sight of who my betrothed is, but God has been amazing and helped me keep in sight that anyone, anyone, he brings into my life will merely be my help-meet on the long road to God's throne room.

I am so looking forward to anything that God throws in my lap, because I know that ultimately, He's the one who's going to be taking care of it for me.

Oh, and I just lost the game.

~H

bad joke 2:

Answer:

Moby Pickle.

Heh...

A really bad joke:

What lives in the ocean and is really big, green and weighs 4000 lbs?


answer coming tomorrow (feel free to take a guess... heh)

First Day of Classes!

Classes started up today. I've had two already, and am looking at two more, at least. This isn't the final schedule either! It's good to be back in Boone, and even though I'm outside, it's overcast, so it makes it easier to see the computer screen.

Right at this moment, I'm sitting on Sanford Mall watching two different frisbee things happening. One is a large group with a lot of guys, maybe one girl, and the other is David and a girl named Hailey that I just met and Sammi. Sammi and David are RUFers and I think Hailey has potential to be. I'm watching and trying not to get hit with the hacky-sack that is being bopped around by two guys. They're fairly good. It is wet, but that's ok. I'm sitting on a notebook. The clouds look like they could either break up, or start raining. We'll see which happens.

My next class is astronomy, so, for the first time in my life, I get to really study the stars. The book looks like a bunch of rubbish, but that's ok, I guess, because I know the real way the universe started. I just hope that there isn't too much math. I don't care for math. Eh. It will be my first time in the CAP building, which is the Chemistry/Astronomy/Physics building. It'll be interesting. I just hope I can find the right room number.

I'm very excited about the fact that I got into the low strings class that I needed. It's an answered prayer. I just hope this next one works out. It's a class that happens every other fall, so I could technically take it next fall, but I really don't want to miss it this fall if it does happen this fall. It's a whole big screwed up mess. w00t!

Pray that I get a job. I need one.

Jack Sparrow Foolish

Note to self:

Blowing on cabinet doors does not shut them. Nor does puffing on a sail in a sail boat move the boat. It just makes you look a lot like Cap'n Jack Sparrow trying to put out a fire.


Looking silly is never a very good thing, but feeling silly, feeling foolish never helps one's countenance. I'm feeling a little bit foolish. I suppose though, that comes from being tired and human. My last post, you know, the one about being nervous? I'm still nervous. But, I keep forgetting that I don't have to do it all on my own. I get most nervous when I think I have to do everything on my own. When I think I have to face each day by myself, I get very very nervous. Everything I do is like blowing on a cabinet door to get it to shut. Thank God that I don't have to blow a cabinet door shut. Thank God that I don't have to blow myself along in a sailboat with just the weakness of my breath. Thank God that He is my strength, that He is the one who scatters the wind on the earth, the one who creates the storm and calms it all at the same time.

I forget to pray that He would calm the storm in my heart, in my stomach. I'm so weak, weary, and utterly vulnerable. I have to believe that He's doing this for a reason, but I so hate being human, especially when it means that I can't take care of the problem myself. One would think that I normally style myself as a god, if suddenly feeling weak and vulnerable, helpless, makes me this uncomfortable.

God, please help me. Give me the strength to worship you with everything I have. I'm so human. But you made me this way, and you made me this way for a reason. Please help me to glorify you with my weaknesses. I love you in my tiny selfish way, I love you because you loved me first, and I don't know how to love you any other way, but please, please, let me radiate, shine, glow with your radiance, with your Glory. I want to be like Moses. I don't know what I'm doing, but I want to be like Moses. Please.

2 Corinthians 4:7-12 "But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. ⁸We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; ⁹persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. ¹⁰We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. ¹¹For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. ¹²So then, death is at work in us, but life is at work in you."*

May God use me to shine His light on the darkened mountains around me.

Th-th-that's all folks!
~H

*Thank you, Patrick, for the verses that helped me pull myself together.

nervous? yes.

I am unusually nervous about heading back to school. God is gracious. He has taught me so much this summer, and I'm so eager to continue learning whatever He has to teach me, but it's so hard sometimes to actually do what I know I should do, what He wants me to do. I'm almost afraid that I'll not be the person I'm supposed to be. I don't want to be afraid of being as close to being 100% me. If I'm worshiping God with everything I have, then I will be close to being 100% me. I'm nervous. Pray that God will show me His grace and mercy as I struggle through worshiping Him with everything that I try to do.

Eating Out

I've decided I don't like going out to eat by myself, even dressed in ratty work clothes. I keep getting stared at by MEN. And it's uncomfortable. I keep wanting to tell them, "um.. it's RUDE to stare. You're NOT being a gentleman! STOP staring!!" and then throw something in their face. Stupid men.

~H

Love, and Amazingness

What is love? I've come to understand this more and more since my revolutionary discovery in march. I used to think that love was explained well in romance books, in the stories I read. The hero and heroine, in love, the hero doing acts of kindness for the heroine. Maybe the two of them would argue and mock each other through out most of the book, but then the hero does something that changes the way the heroine looks at him... or maybe they just realize that they've been meant for each other all this time.

I read a lot on FictionPress, and a while back, I read a story where this girl went through this really tough time and the guy who she fell in love with had helped her through her tough time. What really got me was the epilogue at the end of the story when it was the same girl about 3 years later dating another guy. The author had put in her note at the end of the story, "I know most of you are probably stunned and a little bit upset about the fact that she didn't stay with So & So, but it just isn't realistic! They were in high school! High school relationships don't last!"

This concept got me thinking. If we head into a relationship with anything don't we want it to last? We like a level of consistency in our lives. We expect friendships to last, and when they drift apart, some times it hurts. We expect our relationship with our car to last as long as the life of the car, and we expect that to be a very long life. We expect our pets to be around for ever. We also expect that these relationships and the love, or like, based around them isn't going to change, except for the better. Why else do we always smile and nod happily when we hear of a husband and wife who've been married for going on 40 years and were high school sweethearts before that?

God, as the author of love is infinite, unchanging and goes on "forever and ever and ever" (to quote DC*B). I feel like dancing and skipping and singing at the top of my lungs; shrieking because of this next amazing thing. Because God is the author of love, real love, true love does go on forever! It's not something that begins and then ends in the span of a week, month or even a year! If you are loving someone with God's love, the love God gave you for them then it's going to keep going! OH MY GOSH! IT'S AMAZING!! This is why we want to be able to have a relationship that lasts! To have a relationship that lasts, we must first have a lasting relationship with the who makes relationships.

As a side note, this is why gay relationships are wrong. The only type of right relationship is the one that God created. He specifically created a female for Adam, not another male. He made it so that females and males would work together to build a family and life better then two males. Besides, if he'd made two males, there would be no other humans. (yes, I know the falacy of this statement... God can do anything...)

As another side note, the thing we feel for each other in high school can turn into love, but most likely it is affection. Real and true love will most likely show itself over several years time. Too, real love is a steady thing, willing to sacrifice its own happiness for the happiness of the people/person it loves. Affection or emotions are a genuine thing that often lead to love, but affection or emotion by itself is a dangerous and often painful thing.

God is absolutely amazing.

On a completely different topic, I've been talking with my mentor, and my mother, and a couple of friends and have the feeling that God has been using at least these last two years of instruction (and for however long He feels like) as an instruction period before something amazing happens. God's going to do something amazing, and I can just feel it. Thank the Lord for his amazing mercies which are new each and every single morning.

That's all for now folks!
~H

Wherefore Worship?

There is, I think, something built into every human being (and maybe every creature, plant, animal, bug, inanimate object) on this earth. That is the desire to worship something. Dictionary.com says on their list of what "worship" means,

7. To feel an adoring reverence or regard for (any person or thing)

It also comes up with the synonyms: honor, venerate, revere, adore, glorify, idolize, adulate. This is rather telling. Worship is something that is not only done towards a deity, and by the pious, but is also done by the common man, the punk with piercings all over his body, the geek with his calculator in hand, the overworked mom with food on her front, the high school girl in the bathroom making her self throw up.

You know that question: If you were stuck on an island indefinitely, what would you bring with you? (In other words, would could you not do without.) If you're a Christian in a Christian circle when this answer comes up, you're automatically going to give the church answer of "my bible," or, "my book of prayers," or something equally as church-y ("my Hymnal!"). The question is the same when you substitute it with "who would you bring with you" instead of "what". (On a slight side note, there's always the saying about a couple, "He/she worships the ground he/she walks on!")

If you have anything that you, at one point, realize that you couldn't do with out, you are, to some degree, worshiping it. If you have adoring feelings for it that place it above all other things, you are worshiping it. Gosh... that doesn't leave room for much that I'm not worshiping. Maybe I'm being a little extreme here. I think though, to look at one extreme a person needs to look at the opposite extreme. Either your worship everything, or you worship one thing. What you worship will affect your life, the way you live, the way you talk, the way you act.

Have you ever watched a really good movie, read a really good book, or heard a really good song? What happens if you see the movie more then once, read the book over and over again, or hear the song a billion times? I know what happens for me. I start quoting funny lines from the movie, dreaming about characters from the books, or quoting points the author made in the books to make points of my own, or I'll be singing the chorus of the song for weeks, frustrated that I have the "stupid song running around and around in my head again!!" Whatever I'm "in to" becomes a part of me.

Psalm 115 (I love this psalm) says:

⁴ Their idols are silver and gold,
the work of human hands.
⁵They have mouths, but do not speak;
eyes, but do not see.
⁶They have ears, but do not hear;
noses, but do not smell.
⁷They have hands, but do not feel;
feet, but do not walk;
and they do not make a sound in their throat.
⁸ Those who make them become like them;
so do all who trust in them.*

The Bible states that those who worship things, those who make idols out of things will slowly become like them! That's huge. I look at eternity and I realize, do I really want to be like that book, or that person, or that tv show for all of eternity? What do the things I worship on this earth actually do for me? Do they make me a better person? Do they help me find happiness? I'll be happy with them for a little while, but not for all eternity. Twilight, or a CD of songs, or my favorite mascara is looking pretty dull against the backdrop of eternity. So, I need something to match up to this colorful and inexhaustible backdrop.

Right now, there is only one thing I can think of that matches that backdrop and outstretches, outshines and out-colors it. That one thing is God. God is so colorful it hurts. He is so eternal it's exhaustive. He is so personal it's almost too personal. My God created the Heavens and the earth, He created me. He created the things I love. If He created me, that means he also created that desire that I have to worship something. He also realized that I would not find the ultimate satisfaction to that desire here on earth. I was made for something more. I was made to worship Him with all I have. C. S. Lewis once said, "If we discover a desire within us that nothing in this world can satisfy, we should begin to wonder if perhaps we were created for another world." I think he's very, very right.

I told you in my last post that I thought God might be teaching me about worship. What I have realized recently is that the worship we have here is a taste of heaven. We practice worshiping God here because that's all we'll be doing in heaven. We practice singing songs of praise to God so we can be ready to sing out in our best voices in heaven! What's amazing is that we can worship God through making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (to quote Matt Gurney), or by putting our socks, or flipflops on in the morning. I'm never fully going to stop learning about worship, just like I'm never fully going to stop learning about relationships, God's sovereignty, or anything else that God reveals to me about Himself! The worship that I'm learning here on earth is just practice so that I can worship God with all my might when I finally get to heaven.

With everything I do in live, I want to worship God. I want my whole life to be a "living sacrifice," testifying to the amazing power of my Lord. He created me, and he created the ground I walk on. Like I've said elsewhere, I want to worship the God whose ground I walk on.

That's all for tonight folks! (I really need to get to bed...)
~H

*ESV translation, (It's so good, I suggest reading the whole psalm!)

lessons learned, part etc.

Many times I feel like God is trying to teach me something. For the past two years now, I felt like God has taught me in blocks. They normally go in chunks of school years and summers. It's strange, really, but exciting.

My first year at college was all about me learning that God is really bigger then anything I can throw at Him. I had to find a new church, a new "family", a new campus ministry, new friends, and while all that seemed overwhelming, God took care of every single one of those details, and He did them in perfect timing. I can look back on that school year and say that I grew in God through what I learned that year.

That first summer home was spent on communication with my family, with my parents, and through re-learning how to communicate with my parents, God taught me how important the unit called "family" was. Without my family, without my parents and all the support I've gotten through this unit, I wouldn't have gotten where I am today. Thank God for His gracious support through my family.

My second year at college was all about relationships. It's as if God said, "You figured out that I can handle anything, so why don't you hand me your relationships?" About half way through the fall semester, I broke my finger, and couldn't play violin, or anything except very feeble piano, for about 6 or 7 weeks. During this time, I had an identity crisis, because I'd always (for at least 10 years) been "the violinist", and now I couldn't play. I even got to the point where I was asking the question, "If I died tonight, would anyone, besides my family, miss me past the first week?" And then I realized, through talking with my RUF leader that if I was putting that much of my identity into my violin, that was that much identity not being placed in God. I needed to find my identity in Him, and Him only, because He is the one who gave me my talent for musical instruments to begin with!

Also, that year, I had a slight panic attack because I liked a guy and knew he wasn't going to like me back, and as per Hana, I couldn't figure out what to do about it, when it was kinda like, "let's sit back and enjoy the ride, see where it goes, and while we're at it, maybe we'll pursue God in the meantime." God was gracious an honored my feeble attempts to pursue Him, and one night in March, knocked on the door of my heart and was like, "You don't need a knight in shining armor! Duh! I'm your knight! I've been here since the beginning, just waiting to sweep you off your feet! I rescued you from a dragon." It was amazing, because that night, I was able to say for the first time in my life that I was happy being single, and it wasn't because I didn't have a crush, but it was because God, Jesus, was/is my bridegroom.

I can already tell that this summer, God is teaching me about worship. What it means to truly worship Him with everything that I do, whether in word or in deed. As further proof of this, the theme of my Christian string camp this summer is "worship through the ages" and what it means to worship God with everything that you do. It's so exciting! I can't wait until God gets to the punchline!

Over and out
~H

Flash Back

My word. I'm feeling old.

Friday (or Saturday if we're feeling lazy) is cleaning day. We do our respective jobs or switch off and do a different job, and normally I like to crank up some sort of working music. That's why I was in my brother's bedroom today looking at his CDs. My music had gotten boring and he normally has really rockin' music. I know, I know.

What I didn't know was that I was about to be shocked. Two from the bottom of his rack, sat a neon green on black CD. On the label was the title of the band and then the name of the CD: The Promise. I had to straighten up quickly and shout out the door, "William! You have my Plus One CD?!" I, personally, had thought that my Plus One CDs had gotten lost in the clutter of moving to this house.

Let me explain. There were five guys in this little band. It was epic. They got "New Artist of the Year" award in...are you ready for this?...2001. That's eight. EIGHT. 8. years ago. Wow. Now, if you're doing your math correctly, and you're about my age (21) you'll remember that during that time there were two bands on the "secular" music stage, N'Sync and Backstreet boys. (FLASHBACK!!!) Remember how they were so popular? Well, Christian music, which was all I listened to back then (give me a break, my parents were my music muses, and they listened to christian and classical... I was 13!), Christian music decided to copy the secular industry's boy band idea and pull together five guys for a "Christian boy band". They called the band "Plus One", as you can see by the cover on your left. Christian girls were quickly obsessed with them. Oh. Em. Gee! *cough*

Anyway.

As things would have it, I fell in love, and joined the fangirl-dom. My bestfriend Katie Beth did too. We knew all the names. Actually, from left to right on that album cover (and this is without looking them up) that's Nathan, Gabe, Jeremy, Jason, and Nate. I loved Nate...And Jason. And Katie Beth and I laughed at Gabe's hair. Enough said. We were obsessed. I had dreams about Plus One showing up and singing just for me. I memorized every single word on both their albums. (yes both their albums. They had a christmas album, but those rarely count, 'cause everyone has those.) I mourned when they broke up...or in other words, two of them left to go where God called. And now, about once a year, probably longer then that I am reintroduced to them.

As I write, I'm listening to "The Promise". It's very dated music, but I actually still like it. Sorta. Part of me can't believe I was that obsessed with them, but let's just say that my favorite concert of all time was the concert that my dad took me and Katie Beth and Grace and one of her friends to go see. The main act was Plus One. Of course.

Here's to all of you out there who have been "reintroduced" to Plus One through reading this, or finding a dusty CD somewhere in a box in your attic, or in my case, in your brother's CD rack. It's ok to let the fangirl-dom die. They are, after all, probably married and have kids now.

I'm chaotic...

Derrick: do you like big band music?

Me: depends on what it is

Derrick: Glen Miller, Percy Faith Orchestra
wait PFO isn't big band

Me: not WHO... WHAT.

Derrick: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJE-onnw2gM
videos speak louder with pictures and words

Me: ok, I'll try watching that AFTER Esther

Derrick: you'll either immediately recognize it or you're officially from Mars

Me: yeah, I definitely recognize this. I've danced to this
it's a ton of fun to swing too
*to

Derrick: yeah, it reminds me of rose red

Me: huh?

Derrick: a stephen king movie

Me: oh
why?

Derrick: the movie centers around an autistic girl and that's the only song she ever listens to, it makes her happy

Me: well, it would make ME happy

Derrick: you're already happy enough
it would overstimulate you into disaster

Me: not all the time, but generally yes
I AM a disaster

Derrik: *catastrophe
sorry, typo

Me: I'm a catastrophe too!

Derrick: You can't be all forms of chaos!!!

Me: I can SO be!

Derrick: That's it! I'm sending FEMA after you
they're a-comin'
I'm listening to music from the 50's for seniors to workout to

Me: NOOO!!!! NO FEMA!!!
they're government related!
I'd rather have my community step in.

Derrick: this is an obama-nation
your government is your community

Me: O.O
I'm um...going now...

Derrick: they finally get there? Yeesh, FEMA's late for everything

Me: no, I'm NOT going with FEMA
I doubt they have the white coats to handle me

Derrick: ..........
good point

How did I get here?

I know I said in my last post that family is such a strange concept, but right now, I'd like to go out on a limb and say that life is a strange concept too.

Everyone seems to have these pre-conceived notions of what life is supposed to be like. Young girls are constantly watching their mommies and thinking, "I'm gonna be just like my mommy when I grow up." For me it was, "I'm going to become a mommy. I'm going to have a passel full of kids. I'm going to have a husband who can be a daddy to my kids." As I grew up, I would look at the girls around me and compare them and where they were in their life to me and where I was in my life "plan." There were other girls, one of them my at-the-time-best-friend, who met guys they really liked and who really liked them back. They would come to me, "Oh Hana! You'll never believe!" I'd sit there and be happy for them, but I'd want the same thing. Like I've said on here before, I was in love with the idea of being in love. Well, maybe I've said that, but it's pretty certain that I've given that impression.

If you had told me when I was 16 that at 21 I would still never have been kissed, would not have a steady boyfriend, would not be engaged, and would have only dated on guy for three months, and had been the one to break it off, I would have laughed at you and then thrown myself at the nearest guy to prove you wrong.

I look at my life and I think that if God had put me in a family that public schooled, I would have been seriously rebelious. I might have even given away my virginity, if not pregnant within the first couple of years at college. It is because God was gracious enough to stick me in a family where my parents are so integral in my life that I am who I am today. Granted, I'm still nasty and ugly inside, but thank God for his graciousness, His mercy.

I never ever expected to go into music education at school, but here I am. I'm moving into my third year of music education at ASU and I'm loving it! It's not everything I'm looking for, but it'll give me a good background on what I need to know to get a small studio going. I never would have thought that I would learn guitar on getting to college ("I'm never going to play something with frets!"). I never thought I would enjoy my crazy family the way I do. I never thought that I would enjoy the frantic hecticness of coordinating two jobs during the summer. I never thought I'd have two jobs during the summer. I never in my life thought I'd be content with being single, and yet, somehow, God has brought me to that very point. Thank God.

However, it is now late, and as I said in the previous paragraph, I have two jobs. I have to coordinate them, and that is going to take someone who is awake and on her feet. I am not really that. I need sleep, so I'll sign off. Just thinking about this, the fact that life hasn't quite turned out like I thought it would, but I'm so glad it didn't. This way has been much better. I'm glad I'm not the author of my own story.

Sleep well to all! and to all a Good Night!

~H

Welcome to the nuthouse!

Family is such a strange concept. Have you ever thought about it? You're born, and do you figure life out on your own? No. Instead God plops you down in this place where people not only care for you, by changing your diaper and teaching you about how to feed yourself and walk, but they also love you, no matter who you are, or how ugly you are, inside or out! These people are sometimes blood related, but other times they're not. No matter what, we'll normally drop everything to protect these people, because we know that no matter how ugly we are towards them, no matter how many times we stab them in the back, they'll still put themselves in harms way to protect us.

Sometimes you hate your family, other times you can't believe that you've had the good fortune to be related to them. Sometimes when you're with your friends, your family totally embarrasses you, but other times you can't believe that you ever thought you were embarrassed by them. I mean, duh, they're exactly like you are!

Thank God for family. Yeah, my family (according to a small plaque in a souvenir shop on the beach) is a lot like fudge: a ton of sweet with lots of nuts. :-D I'm the biggest nut of them all, and I can't wait to head for home.

Two days!

Craziness here I come!

song...aaahh!!!

I <3 Jon Schmidt.

The End.

The Formative Years

Lots of psychologists say that the formative years of a child's life is from ages 4 (or so) to about 12 (making a guess here). This is when they start making discoveries about themselves. This is where they discover who they are. This is when the decisions that are going to affect the rest of their life happen (most of the time... I'd like to argue that most of that actually happens in high school and college).

For some reason I think psychologists are wrong. Very wrong. I've seen my Grandpa become sweeter with age, instead of becoming an "old fart" like many people do when they get older. I have changed dramatically since I was 12, and the people who I know best have too. For example, when I was young I had a bad habit of stealing candy from my dad's tin, or reading after mom and dad turned the lights out and specifically told me to go to bed, or lying to them directly. I had heard that a child's nature/character/"who they are" is determined by the time they were 12, and as a 12-year-old, I'd lie in bed thinking, "Please God, don't let this be who I'm supposed to be. The psychologists missed one very important thing. This, I think is the fact that we are all born with one fatal disease. We are all born sinners! We are "who we are" from the moment we enter this world with the sin nature. It is only after we accept Christ that we begin to change. I'm no psychologist, but I have this theory that for Christians, our most "formative years" are the years we spend from when we first accept Christ as our savior, to when we die and have our eyes opened to everything we've ever been missing.

So, to get to my point after a very long opening. There are several years that I believe are some of my most formative. The first of them begins on January 23 of 2006. In January of '06 I was 17, and enduring high school. It had seemed like fun back when I was 14, but now all it was was work and class (online) and the occasional IM jaunt with my best friend, Katie Beth. On the 23rd, however, a person stepped into my life which changed it quite a bit. David Gardner showed up on my blog claiming that the apostle peter had told him that stalking my blog wasn't the right thing to do any more. I was kinda weirded out, but I thought it would be interesting to get to know this dude. Dave later introduced me to his brothers, Daniel and Ben Gardner. All three of them had grown up in Brazil because their parents (God bless them) were/are missionaries to the people of Brazil.

Almost exactly one month later, I joined the forum that Daniel had created, "MK Forums" which stood for "missionary kids Forums", of course. Right behind me came Katie Beth, and she persuaded several of her friends to join as well. Because I was homeschooled, and about 70% of the kids on that forum were as well, I actually felt like I fit in. I made friends right and left, never mind that I'd never met them, that they were "internet buddies". My parents complained that I was always on my computer. I felt like that was the only place I had friends, which didn't help issues. However, in this "virtual world" I grew. I knew that they were all Christians, and would tolerate my growing love for Christ, they would actually help me. There was a serious forum and the (more predominate) silly forum. My expertise for puns developed through a thread that grew out of proportion (thanks Ben!). Daniel introduced me to the world of photo-editing and short videos, and David was generally my goofy buddy. With all three boys, and the various friends I made in MK Forums, I had mostly silly talks, but also out of these friendships came deeper, more serious talks. It was "formative". I learned about myself, about others, and more importantly about God.

The second stage of my "formative" years was coming to college. Coming to college was the hardest and yet, most freeing thing I've ever done in my life. It was a step in the direction of finding out who I was/am in Christ and whether or not my faith was real. When I set foot on App's campus, I was pretty certain it was real. I wanted to be known as the "God-follower". I was naive. That was good. Find a church was the hardest thing I've ever done. It taught me that God is great, and that He'd given me a passion for showing people who He is through song, through worship. I also learned that first year that family really is important. I didn't quite realized what I was taking for granted until I didn't have it close to hand. This year I've learned all about how God is soverign. How He's the one who rescued me from a dragon. :-) Yeah, college is going to continue to be formative.

And I can't wait.

~H

Weekends

There is something about a Sunday night. It's rather dubious because you are about to plunge back into the hectic craziness of the week, and yet, sometimes, if the weekend's been nice, it doesn't feel like it's really over.

On Saturday mornings I sleep in till about 9 or 10ish. There was the time when I was getting only 6 hours of sleep a night, and then Jill and I would sleep till 11 most mornings.

Normally on a Sunday morning I will read PostSecret (after going to church, so I guess it's more like noonish that I read it). I enjoy reading these simply because every sunday I can connect with a couple of them and every sunday I read a couple that I can't believe someone feels embarrassed about.

On another note, I'm in love.

With a Dodge Caliber.

Go look it up.

Wow.

May God bless your week as you plunge headlong into the mire.

To worship a God...

There's something strange about the word, "crush." Many guys will shy away from a girl who has a "crush" on them, or will even turn away (it seems like it) if a girl says that she has a crush on someone. If one girl tells another girl that she has a crush on someone, the second girl will automatically squeal in a very high-pitched annoying tone that some how all of us manage to do at some point in our lives, and then automatically demand to know everything. Pushy girl. The girl with a crush, if she is 12, will think it's amazing and that she couldn't possibly fall "in love" with anyone else, ever. If the girl is 16 or 17, she will feel silly for having a crush (possibly), and feel like she's in middle school again, discovering the fact that boys really don't have cooties.

As long as I can remember, I've always been told, by my parents, to guard my heart, so that when the right guy comes along, I can give him my whole heart. When I turned 12, I had my first recorded crush. I was certain that he was the one! Since I'd been a little girl, I'd read stories of princesses and their handsome knights in shining armor who worship the ground they walk on. Somewhere in my future there was going to be a fantastic wedding, I would be the one wearing white, and at the end He would be standing there, ready to pull me into His arms, to love me for who I was. Surprisingly enough, the person I had the crush on at age 12 is Him. Every young man who was remotely good looking, or had a good disposition and manners, or even possibly liked me, was considered. I pined, I dreamed, my imagination sometimes pushing me to tears. Why didn't any of them like me?

I was 18 when a young man who had entered my life several years earlier, declared that he really liked me. Unsurprisingly enough, I really liked him back. He was cute, he was funny, that crooked smile of his charming birds out of trees, my heart from its chest, and he, at the time believed in the same God I did, and was willing to ask my dad if he could date me. He had put off telling me that he liked me and wanted to date me for a long time because he knew about my parents dislike with the word "dating" and how they would rather I "courted." Then he did something that no one else ever had: he went to my daddy and asked him for permission to date me. My parents were reluctant, and it took them a whole month to get back to him, but in the end, because of many persuasive arguments that started and ended with, "Because, I just want to date him. Do I need a reason?", they gave in and told him that we could date. It was on my 19th birthday that my daddy called him up and let him know.

I was on cloud nine for three months, during which we went on dates, held hands, went to homeschool prom, but never kissed. I told him I was saving that for the man who married me. He respected that. Towards the beginning of the third month, he called me (we had a long distance relationship) and told me that he'd realized that I was more emotionally involved then he was. He said he didn't want to break up with me because he still liked me, but that he didn't want to break my heart, because he realized that I'd given it to him. He was right. He tried to hand it back on a silver platter, the way I'd handed it to him. At the end of the third month, something wasn't right. He was distant. I knew something was wrong, but he wouldn't say anything. I had to ask him if he still liked me. When he said no, I broke up with him, and told him we could go back to being friends.

My parents were worried about me. My best friend, who had steadfastly warned me against dating him, was relieved. I was glad I hadn't had my heart broken, and proud of the fact that I'd not shed a tear over any of it. I told my mom that I didn't regret any of it, because it was a huge learning experience. I told her the truth.

At the same time, I was left with thoughts running through my head. They were the same thoughts I'd had before I had a boyfriend, but now they were intensified. "Why did he tell me he loved me one month and then not mean it the next? Is something wrong with me? Why doesn't he like me anymore? What's wrong with me?" It took my conscience probing deep, asking some questions that he didn't realize hurt, to make me realize that I was feeling these things.

I swore off boys.

The end.

Ok, not really, but I did for a while decide that the only safe place for me was a nunnery...or rather a home with the nuns. (I can't think of the word right now.) Then I stumbled across a saying, on, of all things, a facebook bumpersticker: A girl's heart should be so lost in God, that a man must seek Him to find her. That completely changed how I looked at relationships.

While I had been told all my life that Prince Charming would come (dude, Cinderella's had come hadn't he?), I had also been told that God should be the center of my life, and that he would write my love story. That's what Eric and Leslie Ludy had said! I had read the books that they had written, and come to the conclusion that if I pursued God, that if I tried to bury my heart in God's, romance would come blooming into my life, instantaneously, like those funny little sponge animals that you could buy in plastic capsuls and then drop them into a cup of water and they'd expand instantly. I was convinced that if I just found the cup of water, my romance would blossom instantly.

I'd missed the mark again. I was still focused on the word "romance." I was ready to drop everything if a guy that loved God came waltzing into my life and declared his love for me. It wasn't until last semester, a mere 3 or 4 months ago, that I realized I had a "crush" on a guy again. I hadn't had a "crush," really, since that disastrous three month relationship. I'd been denying the crush for a while, I'd been fighting, because I had told God that all I really wanted was to know Him better. I wanted to bury myself in God. In todays terms, I wanted God as my boyfriend, as my husband, my lover. Even though, I'd been doing this to subconciously to find romance, God had been faithful, and honored my feeble attempts to draw closer to Him. He wrapped me in arms as large as...well, as He is, and drawn me towards him. When, in about November, I finally admited that I liked this guy, I struggled with it for about a week because I didn't want a crush. It was a hinderence in my trying to bury myself in God. I wanted romance to hit me over the head. Then, at the end of the week, I realized that I didn't have to struggle with my "crush." I could ignore it and continue to pursue God, because, God was the creator of the "crush."

I decided to sit back and go along for the ride.

What a ride it's been. I've sat back and watched as the "crush" on this guy is put on the back burner and God has put Himself front and center in my life. Every time I approach a guy, I approach him now, with prayer, asking God to lead our relationship. It has done wonders to me and my relationship with my champion, my knight in shining armor, my savior who died for me, saving me from the jaws of the dragon.

One last thing before I sign off. In answer to the questions I asked myself before I had a boyfriend and afterwards. "Why don't they like me?" My answer is, "Who cares? If they had shown me that they actually liked me and done something about it, I wouldn't have even considered God. I would have shoved Him on the back burner and forgotten about Him. Instead, God, in His sovereignty, knew exactly what I'd need to pull me towards Him, and gave me the yearning for romance, but made sure that there was no romance in sight. Instead, He stood there, waiting patiently for me, holding in His hands a white dress that is more beautiful then anything that I could ever imagine, dressed as a groom, waiting for me, His bride. Why He would choose me, me who would easily chase after something that doesn't fulfill is beyond me, but He has. It doesn't matter whether or not the guy next to me, or the guy who I am/was "crushing" on likes me. All that matters is that He adores me. He does."

I don't want a man who worships the ground I walk on. I want to worship the God whose ground I walk on.

As I end this post, Phil Wickam is singing in the background,

For You I sing, I dance,
Rejoice in this devine Romance,
Lift my heart and my hands,
To show my love, to show my love.

Wonderful things about life

One of the funniest things about snow is when it freezes.

I know, I know, you're saying, "but snow is already frozen!"

What I mean is when snow melts, runs all day, and then refreezes at night, on black top, creating black ice.

It's hazardous to the health, your tailbone and anything that might hit the ground when you realize it's there.

It's hilarious when there are four girls in front of you who discover the black ice first. There they are walking along nice and quiet like, and then suddenly they're slipping everywhere and shrieking and grabbing onto each other.

Makes one want to laugh and take to the snow that hasn't melted and refrozen. That's exactly what I did. Go me.

Mondays

Mondays. They hurt. Like HECK they hurt! But then, when does a day not go by when something doesn't hurt in some respect. It's like the weight of my world is hurled at me all on one day. w00t! Yay for six classes and a lab on Mondays. 

Besides this I've discovered that friends are a blessing. Normally on Mondays I go to classes at 9, 10, and 11, and at 12 I hurry on over to the student union to eat lunch with my friends from RUF. Today, I didn't have time. I had to hurry on over to the closer cafeteria, Trivette, and eat there, by myself. The whole time, I thought about my friends and wondered what was going on there without me, and if they were saying, "It's monday, I wonder why Hana hasn't shown up." I'm pretty certain they did say any such thing, but I missed them nevertheless. 

Yes, I know I'm attached. 

No, I don't care.

Ok, so maybe I do, but do I care about what's right?

Anyway, in celebration of mondays, I post a monday story that I created a while ago when I was obsessed with de ja vu-like dreams. :)

Everyone says that Mondays are horrible. They have a right to, I guess, but what is this right? Why do people despise the beginning of a week so terribly? What has Monday done to you? Not many people know the answer to this, other then the fact that they have to get up and go to work. Or they have to do some other nasty thing on a Monday.

For Josh Bennet, Mondays were especially trying. He never could get the hang of Mondays, the same way Arthur Dent could not get the hang of Thursdays.

This particular Monday morning was something to behold. After accidentally sleeping in and through his alarm clock's warnings, Josh found him self being dragged out of bed. He wasn't entirely sure just who was dragging him from his bed, but he didn't like it.

His sleep had been wonderful and he'd been having the nicest dream, though the fact that he'd been dreaming about pink bunny slippers and green people with gills, will leave some people wondering at his sanity.

As he grasped at his bed sheets, his mind grasped at something else. It was an important day. Or something of that nature. At least he thought it was an important day, but the way he had been dreaming left him wondering if he was correct.

As what-ever-it-was dragged him out of bed, his brain grasped at every possible reason for this rude awakening and when it flitted past the fact that he vaguely remembered his alarm clock ringing he let go of the sheets he was holding so tightly onto suddenly and promptly found himself on the floor, eyes wide open and his hair, which was long and rather curly, flying wildly about his head.

"Crap!" he said suddenly and without much brilliance as he stared up into the face of his older brother.

"Come on, lazy lump!" his brother snarled. "It's way past due for you to get up!"

"What time is it?" Josh asked, afraid of the answer.

"Almost eight o'clock."

"Crap!!" Josh said with even more urgency as his brain scrambled to figure out why eight o'clock was so dreadfully important. When it lighted upon an appointment at eight thirty with his new boss, his body took control and he scrambled to his feet. "I gotta get ready!" he said, flying about his room, grabbing miscellaneous socks, a shirt, a pair of pants and several other articles of clothing before he raced out of his room to the bathroom down the hall, his brother looking on very amusedly.

Ten minutes later he sat in his car, slamming his fist on the dashboard. It wouldn't start. Some genius had left the car door open a crack and the lights had drained the battery.

His hair, still a wild mess, Josh pulled out his cell phone and slowly dialed the number his boss had given him.

"Hello?" sounded his boss's voice on the other end.

"Hi, Adam, it's Josh."

"Oh hey, Josh, what's up?"

"I won't be able to make it to the appointment today. I slept right through my alarm...either that, or it never went off, and then when I got out to my car just now, it won't start. My brother woke me up before he left for work, so I have no one to jump start the car because all the neighbors are gone too."

"Oh, well, you realize that your keeping your job depended on this meeting."

"Yes, sir, I understand that sir, but there's really nothing I can do."

"Well, I'm sorry for you Josh, you looked like you'd fill this role really well. I'll possibly see you later."

"Ok." Josh heaved a sigh as the other end of the line hung up.

There went his job. He'd have to remember to murder the genius who used his car last and left the door open. Oh wait... After realizing the implications of that, he quickly abandoned them. Maybe he could just maim his alarm clock instead.

That sounded like a better idea.

As he climbed the stairs to his empty apartment again, his feet dragging, whatever it was that was biting him in the rear today, dumped another truck load on his head. Or his feet, as it turns out.

He tripped.

Yes, dear reader, he fell up the stairs.

Because he wasn't expecting this and his mind was elsewhere, his hands came out at the last minute. Despite this, his forehead hit the hard metal edge of the step and his fingers screamed as they suddenly found themselves recipients of a rather large weight.

As Josh scrambled up, holding his head, he continued on his way to his room, only to realize that his shins hurt too. Curses. This Monday was not happening the way he wanted it to, but then when did Mondays or any days of the week ever listen to him?

When he finally got to his apartment, he dug about for his keys and inserted them in the door, the neighbor's dog setting up a din. Drat the dog. He set his keys down upon the entrance table and shrugged out of his coat, only to find that he'd had something smeared on his hand, and because of that, on his coat.

He looked up to see that his forehead was bleeding--quite freely.

Twenty minutes later found him slumped on the sofa, bandaged forehead, ice on his shins, watching some stupid TV program. He'd tried to make soup, some of the stuff in a cup that you simply warm up, but had managed to heat it so much that when he went to sip it, he burnt his tongue.

He'd changed out of his appointment clothes for something better suited to moping around the house and that's where twenty minutes later found him. That's also when his doorbell rang.

He rose stiffly and shuffled his way to his door. He peered out the peephole before deciding that the disfigured figure outside his hole was probably his girlfriend. He could use some cheering up. He opened the door and grinned widely down at her.

"Hi Jade!"

"Josh..." she trailed off, oblivious to his bandaged forehead.

"Come in won't you?" he said gesturing behind him.

"I can't." She said, sounding desperate. "I have to tell you something Josh. I have to end our relationship. It's not going anywhere. I've had enough."

Comprehension came slowly to our thick witted friend as Jade desperately raced through her speech. She didn't love him anymore. Heck, she hadn't felt anything for him for quite a while, but had been desperately hoping that she was wrong. But now she had decided that she really didn't feel anything, so it was time to break things off.

"You're...you're breaking up...with me?" Josh asked her breaking into her long winded speech.

"Yes, Josh, who else?" she asked, looking everywhere but at him.

Josh leaned heavily on the door frame. He never could get the hang of Mondays.

"So...I guess I'll see you around..." Jade trailed off again and then without looking at him, turned and walked towards the elevator.

"You...you might want to take the stairs," Josh called after her. "The elevator takes the longest time." He took a step into the hall as a bright idea struck him. "Please tell me this is an "any-day-but-April-fools-day" joke!" He called as she pushed the button for the elevator.

Jade looked at him and then up at the light that indicated the elevator was there that wasn't on and then at the stairwell. Without answering him, she headed for the stairwell and out of his life.

Lovely.

Josh headed back into his apartment and back to his seat on the couch. He couldn't pay attention to the TV any longer. He needed sleep. Maybe he could wake up and it would all be a bad dream. Vaguely thoughts of green people with gills flitted through his head. He shuddered and then wondered at his sanity.

With the frailty of a man twice or three times Josh's age, he heaved himself out of his couch and headed for his bedroom. Sleep. Yes. Sleep. That would make things all better.

The next thing Josh knew, he found him self being dragged out of bed. He wasn't entirely sure just who was dragging him from his bed, but he didn't like it. And the vicious cycle starts all over again...

Mondays are like this, he thought sleepily to himself just as his brain registered the fact that he'd been dreaming of sleeping through his alarm clock and probably had.

The end

 

x or o?

Oh the irony of finding the words "You huggable you" in a chocolate kiss today.

Amazing Insecurites

It's kinda odd how life works. I think God was confirming that it was okay to be content with my insecurities. Sunday morning, after I wrote that last blog, my pastor talked basically about loving people.

I was all concerned about what people thought of me, and as a girl, I'm concerned, worried about how guys view me. People have said that, in order to be lovable, you need to love. Pastor Berry said something similar, yet more profound on Sunday. His basic point was that my ability to truly love, depends on how dependent I am on God. If I combine both ideas, in order to be lovable, I need to love, and in order to love, I need to be completely dependent on God. I need to constantly remember how Jesus loved me, and that God provides for my every need. If I try to love people, I'm only human. I will fail to love people unless I love with the love that God gives me. God's love is infinite, and as I am filled up with His love, I am filled up to love others. As God pours into me, I can pour into others.

My insecurities are amazingly helpful in this too. The reason is because when I realize that I'm not right, when I'm not perfect, I can realize that He is right and perfect, and that He is the one that I am representing. The fact that God chooses to use broken, insecure people to show His glory among the world, the sinner reaching out to the sinner, saying, "I might be insecure about myself, I might not like myself very much, I might think I'm not great, but God, He's--He's, like, WOW. He's powerful and mighty and He loves me, even if I don't love myself, and He thinks I'm great because His son died for me! DIED for ME! Me who decided before I was born that He wasn't worth my time. Me who killed him through my sin. He died for ME. God's amazing."

Thank God for His mercy and grace, because I don't have much or any of it.

Shocking Revelation

It's probably a good thing that so few people read this, because today I had an amazing revelation. If you're sure you want to read on, please do so, but for those who aren't sure where their hearts lie, it might be a good thing to go back to wherever you came from and not bother your heads about it any more. Now for the revelation.

The truth is, I discovered today, almost for the first time, that I am incredibly insecure.

I'm not so insecure when I look at the way I interact with people on a day to day basis, but when it comes especially to guys, I'm highly insecure. I look at the guys around me and think, they can't possibly look at me that way.

Part of me though, after today, and all the glorious weather (it's amazing what a sunny day can do to a person) and hanging out with friends is ok with this. It doesn't bother me terribly, this realization that I'm really insecure, but it doesn't make me happy either. Sure, I wish guys would be good at telling a girl they like that she's pretty. Sure I wish I had a guy who looked at me like that. Will I ever? Probably not. I can, however, do my best to make others feel special and loved. I guess that's what friends are for.

In like a Lion...

With January, blew in the new year, a cold front of massive proportions, new classes, some new faces, some old faces gone, a new president, and a partially new out look on life.

As I sit here, it snows outside. It's been snowing, bit by little bit, since yesterday afternoon, at least. It is alternately very snowy, or almost not at all snowy. I love it. Thank you cold front. There is something about the cold that simply makes me want to dance. It's cold, it's wild, it brings newness, in the form of an all-covering blanket of white, with it sometimes, and here in the mountains, it brings even colder wind gusts. As odd as that last thing seems, I do love it. I love the wind here. It is wild. It doesn't give you any pretense that you could possibly control it.

Have you entered the storehouses of the
snow,
or have you seen the storehouses of
the hail,
which I have reserved for the time of
trouble,
for the day of battle and war?
What is the way to the place where the
light is distributed,
or where the east wind is scattered
upon the earth?

Job 38: 22-24

It makes me feel small. It's an uncomfortable feeling, and yet one with amazing freedom.

It's like a match being lit,
or the sinking of a ship,
letting go gives you better grip.

David Crowder, Foreverandever

My new classes are something else all together. As I live through each semester, each semester becomes harder, more challenging and yet more satisfying as I complete them. It is satisfying to realize that I'm starting to understand Music Theory finally. My professor mentioned in one of the first days of class that a male mosquito's wings hum at about the pitch of a very high D. A female mosquito's wings will hover at a perfect 5th below that. A perfect 5th is the most perfect interval in music, the vibrations of the notes themselves, locking into place, so, if you know what you're listening for, you can tell instantly what it sounds like. The female mosquito and the male mosquito will not mate until they find another mosquito, one whose wings hum in a perfect 5th to theirs, their perfect mate. I've been struggling to understand music theory for three, going on four semesters now, and mosquitoes have it built into them by the God of the Universe.

With every new semester comes new faces. There are new residents on my hall, new people in my classes, new faces at RUF, babies just born, or pregnancies just discovered. Life buzzes all around.

A friend of mine died last year. Another friend of mine is now in Alaska. Yet another friend is no longer on campus, because she's off doing student teaching.

For the first time in the history of the United States we are about to have a black president. It's "history in the making" they say. I say, while this president is looked on as the salvation of the people, the one who is going to restore the economy, people are getting their hopes up for nothing. Change doesn't come in four years. It can start but it doesn't finish. Oh, and ever presidential election is "history in the making." Get a life people.

And everything up above, is my partially new outlook on life. The world might be going crazy, it might be getting better, but anything that is happening is happening for a reason. Who's to worry about what we can't control. Like David Crowder said above, maybe we just have to let go to get a better grasp on things.

Four-year-old on the loose

One picture I wish to keep in my mind with me always is the picture of Lily Ava's grubby little four-year-old (today!) hands looking for flowers for Mommy. It was positively precious.

Because today was Lily Ava's birthday, I some how ended up with Lily Ava in the back seat of my car as I drove to the nearest craft store, looking, not only for a little something for Lily Ava, but for a gift for Mary Asta, because I won't be here for her birthday.

Upon getting there, the fake flowers were the first thing both of us saw. I love fake flowers, and if I could, I'd probably have lots of vases of them everywhere during the winter. Lily Ava seemed to have the same thoughts, though of a particular flower, or bunch of flowers.

She immediately trundled up to them and declared, patting them, "I want for Mommy."

Just a little bit touched, I said, "Well, we'll see. Maybe when we come back this way."

She understood.

We skipped (literally) through the rest of the store, looking for things. We ran to the bathroom, because for once, the older sister needed to go, and not the younger one. We trotted back to the kids craft section and sang "We're following the leader" from Disney's Peter Pan.

Lily Ava version: "We'ewe following da leadew, da leadew, da leadew..."

There were many exclamations of, "I wan' buy dis for Asta. (Mary Asta)" and simply, "I wan' dis." She went gung-ho with my idea of a paint-by-number kit that had three paint-by-numbers in it. She would have gone gung-ho if I'd suggested getting Mary Asta a set of Transformer Legos (if they make those).

On our way back to the front of the store, I told her to go find the flowers. She found them, pretty much on her own, and buzzed right through every type of flower, until she'd found the ones she saw when we first came in. She wanted just those, none other.

When I asked her which colors she wanted, she grabbed a handful of the pale blue blossoms, not even thinking that they might be in bunches. I had to help. After seeing the bunches, she was a bit more careful. I held the pale blue, and then a darker blue, and then a pink, and then a mauve color as she reached for bunch after bunch, determined to find the best for Mommy. I finally had to limit it to four different types. Then I pointed out that she had two blue types, and did she want to find a different color, a color other then blue. For a four-year-old, she was sharp. She pulled the pale blue out of my hands and put it back, before reaching for a pale peach bunch. She was certain that she wanted all of those flowers for Mommy.

We went to the cash register. She carried the flowers. She proudly stuck them on the counter and grasped the counter staring at the flowers and the woman checking us out as if to make sure that it was all done properly.

After all was said and done, she carried the flowers (in her own baggy that the lady gave her) out to the car, into the car, on the way home, out of the car, and then finally into the house, where she proudly presented them to Mom.

"We bot dees." She proclaimed, holding them out to Mom, while standing on a bench so she could see Mom's face better.

"How pretty!" My mother exclaimed. "For your birthday?"

"No." Lily Ava was emphatic. "Der for you."

Eventually Mom understood. They now sit proudly in a vase in our downstairs guest bathroom, making it just a little friendlier down there.

Oh to have the determination and simple love of a four-year-old.