A Matter of Solitaire

Have you ever won a game of solitaire on the computer, and then sat there, staring at the computer screen as the cards jumped, flew, and bounded off screen? I think everytime I see that, I think I've done something amazing, something so few have ever done before. I get that, look at me feeling, the one where you want people to know, you've done well at something. Isn't that ridiculous? I think it is... For the first time, ever, I haven't gotten that feeling. I watched the cards bounding, flying, jumping off the screen, and I didn't feel, anything, except maybe a bit numb. My eyes blurred, the numbers of the cards were unreadable, and my mind was somewhere else.

I used to be teased, still am actually, for passing time by playing solitaire. I used to play it all the time on my computer while trying to come up with something to write... trying to figure out how to put my thoughts onto paper... it always helped clear my head. Maybe this time it cleared it a little too much, because I didn't think anything. I didn't mind the teasing though, still don't, I like that that's what I do, and I think I just might like the fact that I didn't get a "look at me feeling" for the first time ever, maybe it will continue to be that way, maybe not... But it did give me something to write about.

I think the game of solitaire is properly named though, because it is a solitary activity. You can play it by yourself, or take turns, watch others, but it's still one person, one single, solitary soul. It's that person's decisions, guesses, mistakes, correct actions, that determine the outcome of the game. It's one mind, maybe two hands, that play... and whatever that person uses to see.

Seeing is an interesting thing though, because sometimes things aren't what they at first appear. A card can easily be misplaced, a game can easily be lost, and a heart can easily be crushed, when people cannot see. I don't know how I started a post about solitaire and ended it with love, but there you have it. Love isn't a game. It isn't something to be played with, it is a part of life. There are many parts of love, there's the friendship, the brothership, the loveship, the undescribableship; all of which are different forms of love, and, because of which, are parts of life.

Life is so fragile, and so fleeting, I think if we aren't faced with a life or death scenario, where it all comes down to one action, one wrong move, and a life is ended, if we aren't faced with that, we never truly see just how fleetingly fragile life here can be. Is, actually. Well, now I've turned philosophical, so I think I'll turn in for the night.

A Tragic Matter

How are people able to smile after tragedy? The Jews in the concentration camps, the one's who lived through it all, how were they able to enjoy life again? To not be haunted by terrible memories, would that ever happen?

Do you have to find an old barn, filled with old books, read old stories, to escape an old past? A place in which you can curl up in a corner, escape from the world for a while, in order to escape from your own nightmares? I wouldn't mind that... I wouldn't mind that at all...

To watch other people, knowing that their lives will never be the same again, because their eyes have seen tragedy and their hearts have felt it, it's hard, it's so hard.

I want to curl up in a corner, to read a different life, to live a different story, just to get away from mine.. and the saddest part is, there isn't anything to get away from. Yes, it's hard sometimes, and yes, it's not perfect, but it's life.

Is life not beautiful, even though it's hard... is that why people can smile again?... even if it's not right away, eventually they can, because eventually they see life as beautiful again. Because it never really stopped being beautiful, it was just another side of the beauty, that you can't see, not right away, and sometimes not ever, but it is, it's beautiful, because God created it. Life. It may not always be a happy word, but it is one of hope, i dare say, "life" is a word of hope.

A Matter of Troubled Times

This year has been a year of first times for me. Some good, some not. The most recent first time for me was my little brother was admitted to the hospital this past Monday. Two brain aneurisms. That's not exactly something you see every day in your family. One of the aneurisms is 4 cm. long. It's nothing light, it's pretty major, both my older brother and I were called home. Family and friends have flown and driven in from all over the United States and elsewhere. And that is good, but it's hard, it shows just how serious this all is.

I feel dissociated from it all, like I can't really fully be here, if I am I'm not sure I'd be able to handle it. My body just feels like it's floating somewhat. I want to run, but I want to stay as close to my brother as possible. I want to be comforted by friends and at the same time want to be completely by myself, with maybe just my Bible for comfort. There's so many different emotions, so much to sift through, it's hard, overwhelming. How will we get through?

I lift my eyes up, up to the mountains, where does my help come from? My help comes from You, Maker of Heaven, Creator of the earth. Oh how I need You Lord, You are my only Hope, You are my only Prayer. So I will wait for You to come and rescue me, to come and give me Life.

"Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; His understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint."

- Isaiah 40:28-31

Truth heals. Don't you think so? The truth of what is, what was, and what will be, it's healing for the soul and a comfort beyond words. The Lord's peace, what greater thing is there on this earth other than His Love? What greatness, what awesomeness, what power!

"Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

-Philippians 4:4-7

If you wouldn't mind being in prayer for my brother I would deeply appreciate it, the link to his blog and updates on him is on this page, called "Praying Him Through." Praise Him, and God bless.

A Perfect Feeling

Have you ever gotten that feeling, the one where you are driving down the street and you look around, and suddenly you feel like you are living in a book. The trees are on either side of you, the leaves are changing colors, and for that little bit of time it seems everything is perfect. The kind of perfection one reads about in novels. It's a feeling of quaintness. One of elegant simplicity.

It's almost like stepping into Stars Hollow, or some other town written to make people want to live there. You almost feel like you need to have a script infront of you, and a bunch of guys carrying around big cameras and microphones... ok, so I don't know too much about the movie making industry, oh well...

Anyways, I got that feeling today, that feeling that everything is perfect... that if I looked really fast to my left I would see Huck or Tom heading to the river or white-washing fences... Everywhere you look people just seem happy.

The only sad thing that happens is the next feeling... Kind of like a Sunday afternoon feeling. You've had a great, wonderful day, and then you realize that the next day you'll have to go back to school or work, and it almost ruins the rest of the day for you... Almost, but not quite.

A Matter of Snow

Do you smell that? Mmm... Snow. The first snow of the season, any day now. What an amazing time of year. Oh, snow! There is just something so beautiful about snow... something magical and fantastical about it. Great things happen when it snows. And snow, one of the truly best things about it, is that it transforms the entire countryside. Something once brown and drab now becomes white and beautiful.

There's something almost poetic about snow. And not only that, but it gives one a great excuse to wear amazing clothes, coats, scarves, hats, gloves, and generally you can get away with wearing little to no makeup! Which is a definite plus...

Oh, the best is to wake up, Christmas morning, and the first thing you see is a perfect snow. Not that there is ever a non-perfect snow... but the type of snow I'm talking about is the type that as soon as you see it you want to run out the doors and join it, even if it is six in the morning.

Oh and the crispness of the air, it's so refreshing. Taking a walk through snow, oh is there anything better? Especially if it's late at night, maybe even with a full moon. The moon is so bright in the middle of the mountains, and when it's full, the light reflects off of the snow, and the world is brightened a little bit more. And walking on nights like these, lightens the heart a little bit too, which is always a plus.

And then there are the winter sports, which only come with the snow, downhill skiing, ice-skating, sledding, tubing, snow-mobiling, and of course, the great snowball fights. Oh the times that snow brings.

The first snow of the season, it brings the hope of all the wonderful times yet to come, there's nothing bad that comes with the first snow. And that is a beautiful, wonderful thing.

A Matter of Loss

Have you ever lost your best friend? The person who was the closest to you, who you could call at anytime of the day, to share whatever, even if it was just to laugh about something stupid you did... You can't share that with anyone else because they wouldn't really understand just how funny it was, or how it relates to past experiences... you would have to sit the new person down, explain everything, and then share the experience, and by the time you do the experience is no longer funny. Losing a friend, that is something I would never wish on any person.

It's so hard. It hurts. Especially if the friendship is irrepairable... Something happened, that can't be taken back, and that neither side can fix. Forgiveness has been given and accepted, but the friendship is gone, everything. But it's hard, because now you have no one to laugh at yourself with, or so it seems. Maybe I made the mistake of making my best friend a guy, for some reason we just could always get along. We could say the hardest things to each other, and even if we hung up the phone or walked away, the next day we would come back together, pick up the phone again, whichever, and talk it all out.

It was one of those friendships, the really rare kinds, that you don't find too often. And when you do you want to hold on for dear life. Because you feel like, through all of the chaos this world is throwing at you, some other person out there feels the same way you do, and whatsmore, can help bring a little sanity into the mix. You feel like you finally have some common ground with someone else, and it's refreshing. Almost like you can breathe a bit easier now, knowing that you're not completely alone... whether it's in your thoughts, feelings, beliefs, trials, struggles, pain, burdens, any of it, or all of it, you are no longer alone.

Aren't those instant, fast friendships incredible? They just brighten up the day, even if it's a thunder storm, and the sun appears to be millions of miles away, somehow you still feel warm inside, and it's not a romantic love, but that friendship love, that brotherly love, that thing which you have been craving... it's finally yours. We all crave romantic love too, but brotherly love is something I feel like we truly can't live without. Romance is hard to live without, but it's doable, whereas if we didn't have brotherly love, I feel like we would be a much more depressed and lonely people here on this earth. We have God's amazing, unconditional love, and I think that's why He created brotherly love, He knew we'd need it... not as much as His, but still a little. Maybe.

And I guess that's kind of encouraging, knowing that we can never lose the love that we truly need to survive, God's Love. But it doesn't make losing a brotherly love of a friend any easier. I miss my friend. I miss being able to call him at two in the morning just to laugh about a funny dream or thought I just had. Just to be able to wake him up and wish him a "happy birthday," even if he is irritable and grumpy that I woke him before noon. It's being able to cry to him, knowing that he doesn't judge my tears or the choices that caused them. It's him being able to cry to me. It's knowing each other so well that we can finish each other's thoughts and sentences, and we can answer each other's questions before they are even asked. It's going out to get donuts at three in the morning just to have an excuse to walk in the peace that comes before the dawning of the day. It's sneaking out of cabins to lay in a field in the middle of the mountains just to look at stars, and make a few wishes. It's knowing that he knows everything about me, the good, the bad, the pain, the joy, he knows it all, and whatsmore he's been through a lot of it with me... has helped me get through a lot of it as well.

He knows my fears and my dreams. He's seen me as I've grown, and I've seen him. Maybe this is starting to sound like some epic romantic love story, but it's not like that... at least not for me. He's just been the best friend I've really ever had. He's always known when something was wrong with me, has called, just to make sure that I was ok, and if I needed to talk and vent for four hours, he was more than happy to just sit and listen.

But this is all how he used to be... We didn't talk or see each other for over two years... met up with each other again this past summer, I've mentioned him before I think actually. The problem is that neither one of us acted like we had spent time a part, we just pretended almost like no time had passed... so everything that had happened in those two years we just overlooked, when really we shouldn't have. We should've taken some time to delve into each other's lives again.. or to just get to re-know each other. But we didn't...

The loss of a brotherly love, I must admit to be tragic. Why else would I cry? It's a pain to the heart, you will hurt in places you didn't even know you had. You'll wonder why you can't get out of bed in the morning and then it hits you anew, you're precious friend, who saw you through so much, is gone. And the worst part is, you immediately want to turn to someone, someone who can listen to you, who you can cry to, who knows every part of you, and you immediately think of going to that friend... And then fresh pain hits you anew, and tears you didn't know you had will show themselves. Generally they are silent, all of it is silent. The world doesn't see the pain of losing a brotherly love, but oh how the world would feel it if every brotherly love was gone!

A Matter of Stepping Out and Away

Stepping outside today was a bit like stepping outside of myself. I didn't stay for long, it was just a short trip, but it enabled me to see things differently, maybe even through "rose colored glasses." I smiled at the people that I passed, and they smiled back at me, but I didn't know them and they didn't know me. I didn't try to blend in, but instead wore my green sneakers and my bright orange coat. I didn't care who saw me, because I had stepped out of myself for a bit, ready to view the world a little differently.

It's freeing, in a sense, to be able to walk the isles of a grocery store and not know or even recognize a single person. I looked around, and realized I could create a completely different identity from that which was mine and these people would never know the difference. I could be whoever I wanted to be, they didn't know me, my past, my failures, my accomplishments, or the things in life that had brought me pain or joy. They didn't know any part of me, and therefore I could just be someone completely new... to both them and me.

Maybe that isn't a right way to look at it, but it sure was nice, for an hour or so, to not have to be me. Not that I don't want to be me, I trust that God's plan in my life, whatever it is that He is doing in all of this, will be good and ultimately glorifying to Him. And I want that.

It was just nice to take a step away. I didn't take a step back, or forward, but I stepped away. For one hour I was able to just take a break from it all. And that was amazingly refreshing. To look at life through the eyes of someone who wasn't hesitant to fully live it, to see things, like the different shades of yellow pushing aside the greens in the leaves. The cold air conquering the heat, and the shouts of children to each other across the streets as they went home after a long day of school. To see the world as innocently as it had once been to me, to desire to live fully once more. It is a beautiful thing. And sometimes we have to step away from it all, look through a different pair of eyes, to see what it is that's right infront of us, that's good. When so many bad things are facing you head on it's hard to look around them. But if you step off to the side, you can easily see that these things won't last.

Eventually there will come a time when the pain and trials, fears and struggles, will all just be done, they will have faded into nothingness. Life will be worth living again, and even more than that, there will be this unbridled desire within you to live it to the fullest!

I for one, cannot wait.

An Unrecognizable Matter

Have you ever looked in the mirror and wondered who the person was looking back at you? Sometimes if you turn your head away and then back really quickly you think you glimpse yourself, but all too soon that glimpse is gone and you are left with someone staring back at you who you don't recognize at all. And you're not even sure why you can't recognize yourself, but you can't. You stand there staring at yourself, wondering what it is about your reflection that makes it unrecognizable.

Is it something in your eyes, something maybe hidden by the tears that fill them? Or is it the way you tilt your chin, holding your face at an angle that hides it as much as possible from the world? Maybe it's something that can't even be seen by the naked eye, either way that something is there, changing your very appearance.

You jump when you run into someone you know and they know exactly who you are. Somehow it feels like if you can't even recognize yourself, then no one else should be able to either. You start to question how well you know yourself if everyone can recognize you, except for you. Is everything you're going through really that invisible to the world? Do you really not look any different from your normal regular self? And isn't that how it's supposed to be? Yet somehow it doesn't seem fair or right? You feel like to some extent someone should know that something isn't right in your life... And maybe they do know, but they just don't show it, maybe they too are going through something, and they too are wondering the exact same thing as you are... How does this person know who I am, because I don't even recognize myself.

An Uncertainty of Desire

Have you ever had a plan? Not necessarily a plan for a day, but a longterm, semester type of plan, or maybe even a plan for a year? You set a goal, something you will have achieved by the end of the year, and you don't expect it not to happen. It's a plan. It's set in stone, it's imminent. And it's good. Generally the plans we make for ourselves our good, right?

So what do you do when that plan can no longer happen? When something comes out of the blue and broadsides you? Something you didn't expect, didn't plan for, and it's too big to just overlook, or sweep under the rug? What do you do? When the plan for the semester, for the year, is forced to change? What do you do when you look at where you are in life, at what has just happened to you that's so huge that now life has to change in some way, somehow, and you don't really know what that's going to look like? Do you get overwhelmed, over-anxious, to the point where you can't do anything? You're stuck. And it's not that you want to be stuck, you want to move, to do something, to live life, but you don't know how. How do you change that? Do you just wake up one morning and an idea hits you as you get out of bed? Suddenly you know how to dress, you know what you want to go after, to pursuse, to desire, and you're finally able to follow through. Is that what happens? Or does it have to be more forced? Is it something you have to force yourself to do? Do you have to wake up every morning, the end nowhere in sight, and make a temporary plan for your life, for the semester, the month, the day even, just so long as there's something, some sense of some accomplishment?

Or is it a balance of the two? After weeks of forcing yourself to get up, do laundry when needed, grocery shop, make food, etc... then will there eventually be the day when you wake up and you just know? When you finally have a desire to do a specific something, instead of just desiring? When you know what the day holds? When you know where to work, when you desire to be there? Does that time ever come? Forced or not, does it ever come? Is there any light at the end of the tunnel? Is there ever a time when you don't have to question anything at all, when you can live the life that is set before you and no longer ask any of the "what if's?" or "whys?" that you have been asking every day for so long... does that time ever come?

Is there something to look forward to? Or will there always be this feeling that there's something better, something to be desired, but that that something can never quite be grasped?

I want to be the best possible version of myself. And I know that means immitating Christ, and living every day to glorify Him. But what does that look like? I feel like I can study it every day for a lifetime and still not have the answer to that question. When life hands you lemons, you're supposed to make lemonade. But what if the events in life are just too sour, nothing good can really be made out of them, except for now you know to not use those lemons, to not go about harvesting lemons in the future like you did those. Does that make any sense? I guess what I'm trying to say is that, sometimes there are events in life, which just hit too hard. Which knock you down flat on your face, they knock the breath right out of you, and leave you bruised and crippled, broken on the side of the road. You feel like you're dying.. and it's not necessarily that you want to die, it's just that's what you expect the end of life to look like... So how do you keep living, when you feel like you're dying? When you want to get out of your house everyday, but you still want to be by yourself, because you're not strong enough yet to defend yourself once again from the world. It's too hard, too frightening, to step outside your front door... and yet you want to...

I used to have a place where I could go when life threw me a hard event. I love being able to have time to myself. Time in which no other person can even be seen, much less heard. Here, where I am now, I can't have that unless I'm in my bedroom... and I think all of us know that if we stay locked in a small room for too long, depression is imminent. But see, I used to have a place, a whole mountain actually, to escape to. The mountain has healing powers for the heart. I would go there broken and bruised, I would cry my heart out to the Lord while sitting on His mountain, and I would let Him, through His creation, mend my brokeness. He would put the pieces of my heart back together, gently, tenderly, slowly, and then the healing process would begin. And by the time I got back to my house, I wouldn't mind so much being around large groups of people, I had had precious time to myself, time in which I the depression and pain life had tried to strangle me with, had been lifted from me. My heart was lighter, and it was being healed.

It's so much easier to step outside when you can still hide away even while out of doors. It's so much harder in a big city. Escape isn't so easily found. And yes there are bike trails, and places to go hiking, or boating here, but all of those places people will be seen and heard, and getting to those places isn't easy on top of that. So that method of healing, at least for now, while I'm here, isn't too realistic.

I was once told that the best things in life were often the hardest things in life, but that just meant that they were worth fighting and suffering for. I hope that means that through this suffering and pain which my heart is having to go through right now, a best thing is about to happen. I hope. But I do not know. Uncertainty is a blessing, and a curse. It's something we love in some situations, but it's mostly something we cringe at. When someone tells you that they can't really say whether or not something did or didn't happen, it's crushing and discouraging to say the least. You want a 'yes' or a 'no' not a 'maybe.' We didn't even like 'maybes' when we were kids, if your mother told you 'maybe' it just meant she didn't feel like saying 'no' and arguing with you about it right then... and we all knew that.

It's harder still when we get 'maybes' in life, as adults. Will this get better? "Maybe." Will there be a good period, a time of blessing and happiness, and just enjoyment now that there has been this awful time? "Maybe." So does that mean it will get even worse? "Maybe." There's never a definite. "Yes, you will have an amazing time of prosperity now in your life." or "No, it's going to be very hard for quite some time yet to come, and it may never be as good as you want it to be."

So do you we still make plans for ourselves, and for life, even after we've been knocked out cold. Do we still get up in the morning and plan. And if we do, do we plan for life to be good, for that day, that week, that month, that semester, that year, to be good? Or do we hesitate? Do we instead make plans of uncertainty, planning on something else to happen, to knock us down once more? Or do we go back to the outlook of life we once had, and plan on life to be good, to always be good? Or do we not plan at all?

Do we add a "maybe" to the plan, and make it so it could go one way or the other, plan on uncertainty, pain, trials and tribulation, but at the same time hope that they will not occur? Or do we plan to have hope? Do we plan to live life, no matter what? And then do we strive to figure out what that looks like exactly? And then, how do we figure out what that looks, while at the same time living it?

And then of course there's the matter of dreaming dreams for yourself once more... Of not being fearful to say, one day, hopefully even soon, I want to be doing this... I believe this would give me a sense of accomplishment... This is what I desire to do, and even more than that, I'm not afraid to do it. Wouldn't that be an amazing blessing in and of itself? To finally be able to dream once more? I hope that time comes. The time in which I again find myself desiring and dreaming for my future. I hope that time comes soon. Because I desire to desire. I desire to dream. I desire to have dreams for myself. And I desire to not live other peoples' dreams for me, but to let God give me dreams for life, for Him to help me dream, because if I'm dreaming His dreams for me, then they'll happen, won't they?

A Matter of a Raindrop's Life

As I sit here on my couch in my little house, watching the rain pouring down from the skies outside of my windows, I am reminded that life never stands still. We are never given a time of just complete nothingness. Something is always happening, life never breaks until it ends. The rain picks up speed, bringing down the leaves hanging loose among the trees. It thunders the ground, you can hear it in every part of the house. It picks up such immense speed, but only for a couple minutes. It returns to a more normal pace, the rain falls into a pattern, it doesn't stay falling at one speed for too long a time... soon it changes once more.

Have you ever thought of just one single raindrop. It gets released from the cloud, and rockets down to the earth. Never losing speed, but going faster and faster and faster, traveling to the ground as though it's life depends on it, when in actuality, the life seems to end with it's final drop to earth. It seems to end, but does it? When it finishes it's fall, when it comes in contact with the earth, it does burst, but is that the end? Or does it mix with the other waters, and satisfy the thirst of the earth? Forever alive? And then, when the water evaporates into the air, traveling back to the heavenly clouds, does it all begin again? Does the life of a raindrop ever end? It's a cycle; sometimes slow, sometimes fast, but never completely stopping. There's always movement. There's always life.

To be a raindrop. To know the aggravating waiting, when life itself seems to have ended because it's moving so slowly. Impatience begins to take root, and aggravation becomes the controlling feeling from day to day. And then, the clouds open, the rain released, life picks up immense speed. Unbelievable speed. For a moment, just a moment, the wondering if life has actually ended presents itself, but soon it fades, the raindrop sees the earth, looks around, sees the world, and knows it's living the peak of it's life. The most exhilarating times of a raindrop's existence is when it is able to fall to earth, that is what it considers to be living. And then it must work, and water the ground, then travel back to the clouds and wait. Wait once more until the time comes, until it has the strength and power to fly back to earth.

Is the life of a raindrop something to covet? Is it something to envy, to desire? To have those breaks in life, when life is at it's highest peak? When exhilaration is the dominant feeling? And life is fully lived? After work and waiting, the knowing that something fun, exciting, and borderline terrifying is right around the corner? That would be a blessed thing. To know that eventually a break will come. A new day will dawn, and with it the cloud will release you, and life will be exhilarating. On that day you will want to get up, and therefore each day you rise hoping that it will be that day. A day where you find yourself living, instead of wishing life would stop because it seems so incredibly pointless.

That would indeed be something, to know the life of a raindrop.

A Changing of Circumstance

Have you ever wondered what life would be like if you had been born in a different place? If you had grown up somewhere completely different from the city in which you actually did? Do you ever wonder then what the person you are today would look like? Do you ever question whether you would have the same values, standards, beliefs, dreams, and loves you do now if you hadn’t of had the same experiences you did then? People can change, they generally choose not too because it’s too hard, but they can… if they really want to that is. Generally people change due to circumstances. The circumstances cause a person to grow, to deal with life, and the ways in which we deal with whatever events life hands to us, causes us to change into the people we are today. But is it possible for a person to use circumstances to change in the ways that they want to? Instead of letting the circumstances change you?

The above picture is a picture of the house I lived in for the longest period of time, for five years. I've lived in 12 different houses. But this one I actually helped make liveable. We had to re-chink the outer walls, we installed in-floor heating, and poured/stained the concrete. We installed heaters, appliances, and made the basement into a TV room, guest room, bath, office, and laundry room. I grew up on the Continental Divide in Colorado... I lived there for almost eight years of my life. And when someone asks me where I'm from, the only place that remotely ever felt like home is this cabin.

I was born in Houston. I wonder if I had stayed there, if my family and I had never moved to Colorado, if I would be a different person. Would I be a better person? Or would I be worse? Or just the same... I bet I wouldn't be so naive. I bet my view of the world wouldn't be so innocent. Living in a very conservative family, being raised at a Christian Mountain Adventures Camp, created a very safe, sheltered world for me. But I doubt I would have ever found myself in the situation I found myself in on October 4th. I doubt I would have been that naive... My view of the world, had I grown up in Houston, would be a lot less innocent, but a lot more realistic.

Do circumstances change people? Can people change circumstances? Or can we make the change be a change for the better?

Questioning what Matters

Have you ever found yourself in need to just step outside of yourself for a while? To take a drive just to see where you'll end up? To listen to classical music, just to be able to create the words on your own? To dance a dance no one has danced before? To compose your own song?

Have you ever tried to count the stars in a night, or stopped recently just to find a familiar constellation?

Have you ever wished a wish at exactly eleven hours and eleven minutes just to see what would happen? Have you ever dreamed a dream just to see where it would take you?

Have you ever walked along the beach late at night, accompanied only by the sound of the waves crashing along the shore?

Have you ever given time to your thoughts, or has it always been something too intimidating to really do?

Have you ever not been able to cry for a long time, and then the littlest thing happens and you can't stop the flood of tears? It's like they just needed one more tiny thing to happen before they could let loose...

Have you ever truly stopped to smell a rose? Or to look at something growing in the oddest of places? Like a flower pushing itself up through the cracks in the concrete?

There are some pretty incredible things in this world, if only we took the time to truly enjoy them...

A Matter of Friendship

Today I encountered something; something that may appear trivial to some, but maybe not so much so to others. It was along the lines of friendship. I never realized just how much I was missing while growing up in a small town, a town where every child went to the public school, but I was still only one of two in my grade. I didn’t know the meaning of friendship from people my own age. I lived in a place and time where I found friends among the young adults, in their twenties, and in their children, in pre-k and younger. My closest confidante was my younger brother, and probably still is to this day… well him and my best friend. I’ve known this friend for about six years now, and it’s weird to think that it’s been that long. We met in my town, (the one that’s in the middle of nowhere); his family was there on vacation. We saw each other again the summer after, five years ago, and actually exchanged contact information that time… and that was the beginning of a friendship, one of the few I have been an actual part of. I have retained a friendship with two of my closest childhood friends from my few short years spent in a big city, Houston to be exact, which is where I was born. But those two friendships are hard to maintain, when I see them it’s like we haven’t ever been a part, conversation flows easily, and our hearts are shared, bonds that were starting to grow weak strengthen, but they are hard friendships, ones that time and distance have taken their toll on. I pray one day those two friends and I will be able to live in the same city once more, and grow our friendships once more.

Recently, however, on a brighter note, my friend, best guy friend I guess you could say, and I are now living in the same city. What started out as a summer friendship, what faded into almost complete nothingness over the past two years of us not seeing or really talking to each other, has now moved into an even deeper friendship. One that could possibly be called a true friendship… See I think in this day in age, in America at least, we use words so frivolously. We have no idea what the actual meaning of the word is when we say it, it’s just something to say, and since it takes too much effort to actually learn the words to convey what it is we want to convey, we stick to what we know and hear. Broadening our minds is something foreign to most of Americans in the young generations. Yes, we go to college, and yes we listen to speakers, our elders, or the crazy smart home-schooled student sitting two rows in front; but we don’t go out of our way, generally, to find that word that would enable us to say what it is we actually want to say. How truly sad it is.
We generally use the word ‘friend’ to describe someone whom we know the name of, say ‘hi’ to when we see them, and maybe we’re even friends on facebook, myspace, or some other world wide web socializing community... maybe. The word that probably should be used to describe them is ‘acquaintance.’

I try to use words as they should be used, but I’m not the best at it. I have, for example, used the word ‘friend’ to describe people from my past with whom I grew up, but in actuality I didn’t even get along with. But recently I have discovered that there is a difference between an acquaintance and a friend, and that the words should be used as they were first intended.

Not only have I had the opportunity to grow and develop a deep, true friendship with my now good guy friend (I don’t like to use the term best friend, I know I did earlier, but I just think it singles too much out, like it’s being too specific, you give one person a title of ‘best’ and then what do you do with your other three friends with whom you get along with just as well?), but I have also had the opportunity to watch new beginnings of friendships come into being. It’s an even more exciting feeling than when I was a child and I started a new friendship with someone. See, my town was so small, and most people didn’t stay for too long. You’d make a friend in school one year, and by the next semester they’d be gone, sometimes even before… no exaggeration here, I promise. So now, to be able to stand in a city, surrounded by people who, yes they could move at any given moment, but for the time being looks like they’ll at least be around long enough to begin a friendship that can weather distance and time with the best of ‘em… well, it’s exciting stuff to say the least.

I don’t really know what the point of writing this was. Save that it was a matter of my heart, and I felt compelled to share.

A Matter of Rain

Raindrops threw themselves against the window panes. Trying in vain to destroy something which in reality they had no chance of destroying. And their futile attempts were only perceived by one pair of the deepest blue eyes ever seen by any rain. These blue eyes belonged to a little brunette girl, not much older than six. The rain was a constant in her life, something dependable, unchanging, predictable, and therefore comforting.

Annette sat in her window seat that morning, basking in the rain's familiarity. She loved the rain, mostly when it came right before the rising of the sun. But she especially loved it when the storm was harsh. It's voice would thunder across the plains, and echo back to her from the distant mountains. It's heart would flash, and she would be captivated by it. Her heart raced with the rain, her soul cried with the storm, and her eyes captured the breaking of the dawn, which would inevitably clear the storm until another time. Annette would then sigh, turn from the window, and set about beginning her day.

But whenever it would start to rain in the afternoon, she would slip out from underneath the negligent handmaiden's care, kick off her shoes, and race into the storm. There, among the woods, she would dance; in and out of the storm she danced. She'd laugh at the rain, and skip around the trees that grew to be miles high, and there she would sing. She'd pour her heart out in song while the rain made music build up all around her. And the heart of the storm would thunder on.

A Gray Matter

Have you ever found yourself in a place in which the line between right and wrong, once so black and white, has now become quite gray? What do you do when that happens? Work on a smile? Sing a sad song just to turn the day around? Get so confused that the thing first questioned is now best left ignored. Just don’t touch it, and you won’t have to deal with it? But what happens when it keeps coming up? You try to stuff something, but it just won’t stuff. It’s like trying to stuff a really large blanket into a clutch purse. No matter how hard you try to push, success will not be yours. Giving up is the only choice. But then there’s still the blanket. It’s huge; the quilt smothers you under its weight. And what do you do? Eventually confrontation is the end result. You have to confront and conquer, decide which side is right and which is wrong, and then act accordingly.

I believe I’ve mentioned before that I grew up somewhere between the middle of nowhere and goodbye… and my view of the world was very small. Right and wrong was very black and white always, it was never gray. I could discern what I needed to do and then I would do it… well not always, but I never questioned if what I was doing was right or wrong, I knew it was one of the two. Now I’m not so certain.

I have been out from under my parents’ tutelage for a couple years now, living on my own, in a house, and constantly questioning now what is and what isn’t right. Mainly with friends, really… I mean where is the line with guys exactly, how far is too far when the two of you are just friends? And then how far is too far outside of that? How exactly are you supposed to treat each person individually, since obviously each person will be treated differently depending on who they are…It is a constant question. Life is a maze… and love is a riddle.

Verses of the Heart

May I stand and ask permission to be a kind of benediction to a love we know is bigger than ourselves? Oh the spirit and your witness is bearing light upon our weakness , giving weight to what we cannot see alone, oh we come with what we are, oh we come with what we’ve done. We are a beginning. In faith we look to comfort, she is laying her old hands, on our souls as we discover we are waking more to hope. Your committed celebration is part of our salvation. Holding onto what we know we cannot hold alone. ‘Cause we are not that strong, sometimes afraid of what we’ve done. And we are not that strong, we are just a beginning. Pray for the bravery to act upon the kindness of forgiveness and the mystery of clarity sometimes. Mercy is grateful to go under all our failures. Thanks be to Christ for severity that has kissed us on the cheek.

We are not that strong, most times afraid of what we’ve done, and yet we are a beginning. I think we’re coming to a standstill. I think you’re magic with your strong will, but this is love and not justice. He’s hurting everything he touches, he cannot carry what he clutches; he needs a mother and a child. How about some love and charity, the sense that you are family? Well I’d like to help but you’re on fire. How about some peace and honesty, some hard core sense of clarity? How about respect and dignity, some kind of hope and yes more clarity? … Well you are a careful mystery, not someone’s sweet commodity. You are a precious one on fire.

And when darkness covers you in the valley, I’ll pray that the Kingdom comes soon. When daylight is a distant memory in that valley, I’ll pray for you that Jesus comes soon. Try not to be afraid for long if you can help it while you’re deep in that valley, don’t worry, I’ll send you a picture of my childish face. And like a flower you can burst forth smiling even in the valley, but I’ll still pray that Jesus comes soon. When it feels like you have nothing left to offer but your sorrow, oh remember where there is grace there is no shame. And as it happens light has nowhere else to happen but the valley, and maybe something’s trying, oh yes maybe something’s really trying, to break through!

And life’s come out from the inside, and we’re all caught up in a brand new smile. Now love’s come out from the inside, carefully, willingly; you are alive, so much more alive. And love is breathing like a child come out, life’s suspended in the gravity of care. Never ending does the child come out. And hope’s come out from the inside… now we’re all caught up trying to hide the fact that you are alive, you are more alive than you try to be. Growing down into the Kingdom, child, cover our most desperate cries with ease, please! Love is breathing like a tree on fire, violently consuming tender lives. Love is breathing.

Rains, rain, give a little bit of your love to me. I’ll give a little bit of my love to you. There’s so much that we need to share so send a smile and show you care. I’ll give a little bit of my life for you, so give a little bit of your time to me. Do you see the man with the lonely eyes? Go take his hand and you’ll be surprised... Give a little bit of your love to me, and I’ll give a little bit of my life for you. Now’s the time that we need to share, so find yourself, we’re on our way back home. Give a little bit of your love to me and I will give a little bit of my love to you.

Sun went down that’s when she started seeing things. Midnight souls with top hats, coats, and diamond rings; undertakers, suitors, staring like they knew her, she was not impressed. She opened up the window where she met the wind. Time and time again she is her closest friend. Coming and going, the wind, it brushed her forehead, she was not afraid. In the desert of the heart, let the healing waters start; in the doubting place of dark that she is holding. Walking on the sidewalk after time unkempt, she is trying to remember what somebody said. And her arms long forward, to where she is already in him. This is the day, but there is also the night.

I got caught up in my own light. I didn’t notice all the stoplights. Getting caught up in my own rhymes... I think I killed a man. I was on my way, but should I stop or should I stay? I didn’t know him anyways, but should I see if he’s ok? I got caught up in my own sight. I didn’t notice all the search lights. Getting caught up in my own sighs… Oh I think I could lose myself… I got caught up in my own lies.

She looks over her shoulder with a half specific glare as if it were the past. And the reception of intentions of a once familiar path, a promise, broken in half. So, she let go. And in the pages of her memos are picturesque clichés she once called providence. They were fragments of Picassos with running lines undone that wrecked her confidence. Is there any sense why she let go? It was what she thought was right, through all the gloom and might living in between. It was like she said, “a chance to learn instead of staying in the lines,” and never knowing why, she stumbles through the door. Were the angels fighting demons in the corner of her room? Or was it heaven’s stance? That she would catch a glimpse of love in safety more than life, a fate-less circumstance. So, she let go. Now the reasoning is theory, living out a grand crusade of greater magnitude. And the consequence of failure is a possibility, but will it break the truth? She won’t know, not until she lets go.

We’re taking off our clothes to sing. We’ll be wearing our own skin. We’ll be taking off a whole lot more, just so we can sing. Because hope is coming out tonight, knocking at the door. You’ve got to let that stranger in, looking at your soul. A pealing and a shedding mind, it’s changing what we’re worth. Blessed are the meek somehow, they’re taking in the earth. And all this talk of love and peace, and wanting something true, well peace will cut the ropes sometimes that are holding onto me and you. No sentimental bags of gold to occupy the hurt. It’s knowing what the demons saw when falling to the earth. I’m stretching out across the land. I’m trying my best to understand. While fear is barking like a dog, I’m holding out my hands, yes I’m still holding out my hands; standing in the cold, and looking at your soul.

I’d like to sleep for one more hour or two, an hour or two… You look like my dad when he slept really hard, through everything. Now everything’s gone, and, like Christmas, we are home. This all feels so familiar. Are we really getting older? Home... I wish I could remember. That little hill seemed like a mountain then, we were shorter then. We wondered just how it was going to be, when here we are. And it’s not too bad; it’s quite good in fact. We are home. You are like poetry and feathers. The way you button up your sweater… The one you chose for colder weather. I wish I could remember everything good. I’d like to sleep for another hour or two…

A Matter of the Heart

When I write it isn’t something that I make up and start to write as I go, well it kind of is, but that’s not it, not really. It’s worlds that I see, things actually unfolding around me, I put myself in a different place and time and this is how it looks to me. I don’t know if that is abnormal or what, I definitely see it as strange a little, if only because no one else has ever explained it that way.

What is my purpose supposed to be? If I write I am completely absorbed within my writing, and it scares me, if I distance myself from my writing and yet still try to write, it’s not good at all. The quality of the writing drops immensely, I’m not able to do what I really want to do, I’m not able to portray thoughts the way that I really want to be able to portray them. I want people to see it how I see it, and yet I don’t think that’s possible…

Why can’t I just write a story and have the whole thing unfold on paper, are my dreams all that I have? Will that be the fullest these stories ever get told?

What am I supposed to do with this? Am I supposed to do anything? Am I not supposed to do anything? What?! I can’t keep doing this, I need something substantial to hold onto, to seek after, to pursue… but wait I already have that, and that is Christ. I just need to remember that…

Questions of the Heart

I don’t know how true this is for every person. But I do know it’s true for some, and it’s especially true for me. I’ll begin by asking a rhetorical question of sorts: Do you constantly dream of having a life that makes sense, in other words a life in which you have a job you love, no regrets about your life's choices, (or at least just a handful and no more), and then finally someone who you know loves you more than life itself?

Have you ever looked out of your window and seen a Kodak moment in real life- a gorgeous girl tossing back her head and laughing at something that a look-a-like prince charming just said to her? Ever wish you were in that scenario? I do, all the time. There’s the subway- looking across and seeing an older couple helping each other off at their stop and holding on to each other as they find their way to their destination. Ever wonder if that could be you? In other words, are you a romantic or a realist? Do you romanticize everything, or are you realistic about life and the moments it gives you? Maybe a little bit of both?
Have you ever wanted to be different, but found it harder to change than you originally thought? It's like going on a diet, but not being able to stay on it for more than a few weeks because it's just so different, in an uncomfortable sort of way... Perserverance takes on a whole new meaning when you try to push through something that's long, drawn out, and just keeps getting harder. It's easy when it's just for a little while, but when it turns into a never ending process it gets discouraging, and before you know it you're waking up one morning and realizing you've gone back to the way it all was before you tried changing.
Or did you wake up one morning and realized that your former character, the one that was a dare-devil, loved the truth, and skipped instead of walking (just because it was more fun), was now gone, that somehow that part of yourself had died, and instead now you resemble one full of fear, preferred to walk as slowly as possible, and was more pessimistic than you ever thought possible for a person to be?

Honest Conversation

Have you ever been too afraid to be honest, specifically with your parents, because you're afraid that even though it's the right thing to do, there's more consequences immediately, whereas if you just put it off you won't have to deal with it right away? However, that also means that the consequences will probably be more long-term than if you had just been completely honest in the first place... I've tried both, with the same type of issue, and let me just say I was pretty amazed at my mom's response the second time when I was just upfront and honest with her immediately. Granted, she was dissapointed, but she handled herself so completely differently. She wanted to know what she could do for me, what I needed, whereas the first time, well let's just say I was supposed to be home for the weekend and I ended up just staying twelve hours. There is something to be said for honest conversation, it's definitely better, a lot harder just because it's uncomfortable and its admitting that you aren't perfect, that you've screwed up, but like they say, admitting it is the first step... it really does get easier after that... well, at least I'm hoping!

Of the Heart

There are certain things in life which I believe should never be overlooked.

Simple things, yet they have the deepest meaning…

Something so small as watching a childhood movie like “A Little Princess” can just make me glow inside and out!

I just love simplicity.

I also love tradition, elegance, and timeless with a dash of the countryside thrown into the mix.

I love the smell of rain in Lake City.

I love the reflection of the sunset on the beach in Seaside.

I love the view from the cockpit in a plane.

And I love to watch the bustle of the city, but I live for the calm of the country.

There is just something so magnificent about this world. I wish I could see all of it, and really get to know it- life is short!

The Bible study lesson today was on Deuteronomy 8, and remembering that the Lord my God is the reason I can boast, to only boast in him, to not be prideful of anything, and to remember that nothing I have is a result of my works but rather everything, including myself, is the work of the Lord and a gift from Him.

The whole idea of building up treasure in heaven I have never actually grasped, I guess I sort of dismissed it as something that I would never be able to attain anyways, “so why even try,” sort of thing… But I believe the Lord has used these teachings to get my attention and to have me realize that I must strive to be like Christ- I must pursue the impossible, and while I will never be able to attain it, through pursuing Christ in every aspect I will be obeying God, and through obedience I will store up treasures in heaven… My thoughts are so scattered right now, probably in part because it’s well past midnight and my brain went to bed hours ago! (Leaving me behind, what nerve!)