closeness

These days I often say, "God, come near to me."  It has become both a comfort and a challenge:  a certainty that God is there, and a willful suppression of my inner chaos.  Sometimes it is when I'm falling asleep at night; sometimes when I'm walking across campus; sometimes when I close my eyes and listen.
And God always comes.

some more thoughts about music...

...so you can skip this if you're tired of them.

My junior recital is in a week.  (December 2!  7:30!  Martin Chapel!  You should come!)  So today when I was practicing I decided to play through everything straight, the way it will be next week, without stopping to fix mistakes, so I can tell what I want to work on between now and then.  And it wasn't perfect, but it was exactly what I hoped for.  Because after I was done I knew I got it.
Music isn't about perfection, it's about passion and joy and expression.  I can't expect every note to be in tune and clear and the way I want it, but today I knew the right feelings were there.  And that made me completely happy, because what more could I ask for?  I just want to give the music what it deserves, and I just want to make people feel something, and I just want to lose myself in the emotion of it.

In String Pedagogy on Tuesday, Joan told us horror stories about people who play for professional orchestras, and let me tell you, if I had ever been thinking seriously about auditioning for one, I'm not planning on it anymore.  I don't want to be part of anything where people can lose their job for one mistake or slash each other's tires from the pressure of it.  To me, professional orchestras like that have lost the essence of what music means to me.
Anyway, the moral of the story is, I'm learning to find pure, simple joy in my music.  After years of striving for perfection, it's nice.

colors

Last night I sat in the front seat of a car reading a wonderful book about love and beauty, and when I looked up, I saw that the entire sky was consumed in a glorious sunset.  The horizon from the far left to the far right was awash in brilliant color, as if God had drawn his fingers across the sky from the south to the north.  And in the center, right in front of my spellbound eyes, was the brightest, hugest, most incredible blending of orange and pink fading into purple and gray and blue.  It shone through our car windows and into my heart like the culmination of everything, and in that moment, it seemed to me that there was nothing more I could possibly want.

enriching the earth

The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry has become my occasional breakfast companion, and I love this one especially.  Make sure you read all the way to the end.

To enrich the earth I have sowed clover and grass

to grow and die.  I have plowed in the seeds

of winter grains and of various legumes,

their growth to be plowed in to enrich the earth.

I have stirred into the ground the offal

and the decay of the growth of past seasons

and so mended the earth and made its yield increase.

All this serves the dark.  I am slowly falling

into the fund of things.  And yet to serve the earth,

not knowing what I serve, gives a wideness

and a delight to the air, and my days

do not wholly pass.  It is the mind's service,

for when the will fails so do the hands

and one lives at the expense of life.

After death, willing or not, the body serves,

entering the earth.  And so what was heaviest

and most mute is at last raised up into song.

our stories matter

Last night was the coffeehouse for Take Back the Night week, the time when everyone is invited to share stories, poems, and songs from their experiences with sexual violence.  As always, these stories brought both pain and healing to those of us who heard them.

I heard a girl tell the story of a family member raping her thirteen-year-old sister, and all I could think was what if that had been my sister.  I cried until my eyes were sore at hearing all the stories of abuse (so many, many stories) and felt bewildered at my own reaction.  A small part of me was asking, what right do I have to cry?

I don't have a story, but I feel like I do.  A wise friend of mine said, "We are the stories we've heard."  I feel like a victim because I know far too many people who have experienced sexual abuse, and because I have carried their stories with me, and because I feel other people's pain when they share their words like this.  Another friend told me that secondhand trauma is real and justified, and maybe that's me.

But I know that I'm glad I feel these things -- I don't ever want to cease to empathize with another's pain, because that is when we cease to embrace our shared humanity.  We are human together, and we walk with each other through darkness and light.

No-buy November

Who wants to do this with me?  :)

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=269469573077264&ref=ts

top 10 books

I am and always have been a lover of books, and as a way of embracing this part of myself, I have written a list of my very favorites.

1.  To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
      I read this first in seventh grade and again in eighth, and then came back to it my junior year of high school and loved it beyond words.  It's one of those books that speaks to you in different ways at different times in your life, and although I could mostly comprehend the story as an eleven-year-old, it is much more meaningful to me now.
2.  The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
     The stories of the women of a missionary family in the Congo, growing and changing together and apart.  Barbara Kingsolver is one of my favorite authors all-around, and this book is one of her best.  One of the things I like most about it is that each chapter alternates between the perspectives of a mother and her four daughters, and each one has a unique voice.
3.  I Am The Messenger (Markus Zusak)
     I first read this in tenth grade for an extra-credit book club.  I started it one afternoon intending to read the first quarter, our assigned reading for the week, and read the entire thing straight through.  It's that kind of book, and every time I re-read it I never fail to be amazed at its clarity, humility, and truth.  The very idea behind it inspires me to be a better person.  
4.  The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
     It's about a girl who, after living with an abusive father following the death of her mother, runs away and finds healing in the home of three sisters who raise bees.  Because it is set in the South during the Civil Rights Movement, she also learns about inequality and love without boundaries.  The story may be simple, but it resonates with a kind of gloriousness and truth that many good books lack.  The essence of what it communicates can be found in every human soul.
5.  Blue Like Jazz (Donald Miller)
     This is a collection of humble, inspiring stories about life and following Jesus.  Like many books on this list, it is simple and deeply profound.  If I can live my life with anything that approaches this kind of honesty and grace, I will have touched many people's lives.
6.  Chronicles of Narnia (C.S. Lewis)

     This is obviously more than one book, but I'm listing them as one entity because they are all so wonderful.  They are an extraordinary blend of imagination and depth of meaning.
7.  The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
     I first read this when I was probably in middle school, after my mom told me she loved it.  My response after reading it was something along the lines of, "I don't get it.  What's the point?"  Then I read it again this summer and it made me cry.  It is so simple, really a children's book, but once you get older it echoes in you like childhood and eternity together.
8.  The Elegance of the Hedgehog (Muriel Barbery)
     The writing in this book is simply exquisite.  The story is good, but it's actually irrelevant sometimes; what's more important is allowing yourself to sink into its words.
9.  The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
     This is another exquisitely written story about redemption and finding our common humanity.  It's difficult to read at times, but the issues it presents are real and relevant.  The difficult moments are woven together with beauty, and the ending is timidly hopeful.

I'm aware that my list of 10 favorite books only has 9 on it.  That's because although I can think of many other amazing books, none of them quite fit in at the level of these.  Also, I know that there are hundreds of wonderful books out there that are still waiting for me to read them.  As always, I would love to hear your suggestions.  :)

some words I like

1. Take my life and let it be
   Consecrated, Lord, to Thee.
   Take my moments and my days,
   Let them flow in endless praise.
2. Take my hands and let them move
   At the impulse of Thy love.
   Take my feet and let them be
   Swift and beautiful for Thee.
3. Take my voice and let me sing,
   Always, only for my King.
   Take my lips and let them be
   Filled with messages from Thee.
4. Take my will and make it Thine,
   It shall be no longer mine.
   Take my heart, it is Thine own,
   It shall be Thy royal throne.

fall thoughts

I am feeling tentatively secure.  And no, that's not an oxymoron.

I'm learning to admit the fears and insecurities that sometimes try to follow me through life.  I'm learning that everyone else suffers from them too, and to admit to them is not weakness but strength.  I am teaching my inner self to say, without even a shadow of a doubt, I am rightfully loved.
So when I find myself fallen and shaky and unsure of the next step in life, I am trying to find the courage to say out loud that everything is not okay.  Because I've noticed that there are people in my life who seem to care an awful lot about me, and blessings like that should not be distrusted with the fear that these people want me to be perfect.
Instead, I've started telling the truth and I'm going to keep on telling it.  I am happy, but not always; I am loved, but sometimes I forget; I am content with myself the way I am, but sometimes I let myself down.  And all this is okay, because every soul on earth struggles with feeling hopelessly inadequate at one time or another.  The worst thing we can do with this feeling is keep it inside, which is what I used to do, and it doesn't make you feel any better.  Henri Nouwen said that what is most personal is most universal, and I'm going to start living that way.

three things I love quite a lot

This blog:
http://jmuwomensstudentcaucus.wordpress.com/
I discovered it one day when looking up information about a speaker who was coming to JMU to speak about the impact of pornography.  It's basically a feminist blog run by a bunch of spunky, impassioned JMU students, and I love it.

This song:

Biber's Passacaglia for solo violin.  I wrote about it freshman year when I was researching Bach, but I didn't actually listen to it until String Pedagogy class on Tuesday.  It makes me want to frolic off into the sunset and play violin for the rest of my life.

And this book:

I've only read six pages and I can already tell it's the wisest, most beautiful writing I've read in a while.  hopefully it will inspire me to write more about it once I finish it.

So, tell me.  What is it that you love right now?

the beauty of autumn days

The past two days have been beautiful and simple and also deeply inspiring.  Yesterday was a perfect sunny crisp day of hiking to Tiger Rocks and reliving memories of camp.  We read the Bible at the top of the mountain and talked about missions and our callings, and the wind swirled vigorously above us through the treetops.  We watched hawks glide serenely and powerfully below us, and I thought, God is alive.

And today I ate pancakes with apple-butter faces at the relief sale and watched my breath fog in the newly-October air, and reveled in the glory of food and people and handmade things and fall.  Then we drove to a church and dressed in our best clothes and sat in the front row for the wedding of April and Scott -- two people who make each other whole.  They wrote their vows with words and stories that made tears spill from my eyes, in wonder at the beauty of love and everything else.  Then they sat together on a piano bench and played a duet, mostly improvised, of lyrical and touching melodies that made my heart open wide.  In that moment their whole world was centered in each other, and the rest of us were breathless to witness it.

equality?

I wrote this for the Weather Vane this week because I care about it.  You should read it and think about it and then do something about it.

I am a woman.  And I am objectified.

This week I and several other EMU students attended a presentation at JMU about pornography and its impact on modern-day American culture, entitled “Pornography’s Perfect Storm of Inequality:  Patriarchy, White Supremacy, and Capitalism.”  The speaker was Dr. Robert Jensen, a visiting professor from the University of Texas at Austin.  Dr. Jensen’s arguments encompassed the growth of the porn industry, the reasons for its success, and its incredible capacity to dehumanize and objectify human beings.

Dr. Jensen challenged the audience with the truth.  He spoke to us about life in the “post-Playboy world,” and the need to form a life of integrity and meaning in a culture where sex is marketed and sold like any other commodity.  However, sex itself is not the problem; the problem is that we regularly “buy, sell, and rent objectified women’s bodies for sexual pleasure.”

“Pornography is not just sex on film,” said Dr. Jensen.  “It’s sex presented in the context of domination and subordination...and the sex in pornography is made sexy by that domination and subordination.”

This attitude of domination and subordination does not extend only to women who are directly involved in the production of porn.  The prevalence of pornography is large enough that its assumptions, stereotypes, and attitudes extend throughout our entire society.  Because of this, it is not just a few who are impacted.  We are all influenced by the effects of pornography, whether directly or indirectly.

Pornography has normalized an appalling level of violence and disrespect against women in the context of sexuality.  The voices who dare to speak out against pornography risk being written off as too uptight, judgmental, or sexually repressed.  The voices of women and children suffering from the sex trade industry are drowned out by the voices of profit and sexual liberation.  But in the words of Dr. Jensen, we must “recognize what we’ve done in the name of liberation.”

I am blessed with a privileged life and the freedom to make my own choices.  However, I cannot feel liberated or even fully respected when other women are suffering.  When I see any instance of objectification and degradation toward other women, the impact of this objectification extends to me.  I am not yet so distant from my fellow human beings that I do not feel any part of their suffering.  We must stand in solidarity with our sisters and mothers and daughters – even the ones we have never met.

In my mind, I have a vision of a world where everyone is equal and free.  I want to see people who are not afraid to stand up against sexism in the media, against objectification of women, and against valuing us for our bodies alone.  The issues of pornography and sexual violence are often still viewed as uncomfortable or forbidden topics, but I believe the longer we stay silent, the more we condone the oppression of ourselves and our fellow human beings.  

I challenge you, myself, and our broader community as a whole to speak up.  We must not allow fear or complacency to silence us any longer.

five

five phrases i aspire to live by, from my recent thoughts, reading, and life experiences

1.  become a storyteller.

2.  love wastefully.

3.  live life with your arms wide open.

4.  burst bubbles, yours and the world's, with the truth.

5.  ask your questions.

imperfection

Tonight is my first orchestra rehearsal as concertmaster.  It's also my first time playing first violin in college -- until now I've been principal second.  By now I know my own tendency to hold myself to perfectionism, especially when it comes to my music, and this type of situation is the worst.  Whether or not it's true, situations like this make it easy for me to convince myself that everyone else expects me to be perfect, too.
So I'm trying out a new philosophy called "confident mistakes".  Here's the truth:  I'm not perfect, and neither are you, and neither is anyone else.  So let's be imperfect together.

life in community

"Forgiveness is the name of love practiced among people who love poorly. The hard truth is that all people love poorly. We need to forgive and be forgiven every day, every hour increasingly. That is the great work of love among the fellowship of the weak that is the human family."
-Henri Nouwen

If everybody believed this, think of what life would be like.  If everybody lived this, think of what the church would be like.
This year, I am creating more of my own life than I ever have before.  Living in an apartment opens up so many more questions about community, food, balancing time, and how to navigate the little choices that make up our days.  I believe there are many things that are essential to a healthy community, and one of them is a personal awareness that "I am not perfect, and neither is anybody else".  There are many, many times when I love poorly, but there is something so beautiful and blessed about this fellowship of the weak.

I've been feeling increasingly convicted to spend my life living in intentional community.  I need other people to help me struggle with life decisions and conscious living.  It would be far too easy to close myself into a comfortable bubble of this-is-my-life-and-this-is-how-i-do-things.  So this year, I am beginning to share my life and choices with seven other people who also care deeply for the entirety of God's creation and about following in Jesus's footsteps.

I'm reading The Irresistible Revolution for the second time, and it is hard to live with.  It is good and encouraging and inspiring, but it leaves me with a growing sense that if I were to truly follow the call of the gospel, my life would look nothing like this.  It would look a whole lot more like giving up material possessions, living among the less privileged, and finding Jesus in the eyes of those who are "different" from me.

As I told one of my roommates recently, most days I don't know what to do or how to make my life everything it should be, but I'm committed to figuring it out.  And every time I am struck by my complete and utter inconsistency, I am reminded of God's immeasurable faithfulness.  He is everything I am not.

humanity

"Ubuntu speaks of the very essence of being human.  We say, 'Hey, so-and-so has ubuntu.'  Then you are generous, you are hospitable, you are friendly and caring and compassionate.  You share what you have.  It is to say, 'My humanity is caught up, is inextricably bound up, in yours.'  We belong in a bundle of life.  We say, 'A person is a person through other persons.'
...
A person with ubuntu is open and available to others, affirming of others, does not feel threatened that others are able and good, for he or she has a proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that he or she belongs in a greater whole and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed, or treated as if they were less than who they are."
-Desmond Tutu

my loves

I emailed my English advisor yesterday to tell him I'm changing my major (to liberal arts with an English concentration, for those of you who didn't know), and he responded by saying, "Though I hate to see you go as an English major, I completely understand your reasoning here.  It makes sense, particularly since your "first love" seems to be music."

    Which caused me to make a face sort of like this:

Because, obviously (to me), music isn't my first love, nor is it my primary love, and certainly not my only love.  It made me ask myself, then -- what is my "first love"?

I don't think I can confine myself by choosing one thing (which, now that I think about it, is a pretty good example of why I'm changing my major to liberal arts).  I love so many things I can't even list them all, and I'm always finding new things to love.  That's why I've spent several hours recently researching (and falling in love with) the art of growing bonsai trees.  :)
My deepest, truest love stems from pursuing a genuine, Christ-like, loving, community-centered way of living. I know that's about as broad a category as it could possibly be, and I like it that way.  That means that there's enough room for my whole life to fit in that category.  And that, ultimately, is my goal.

here's to porches

These days I am struck by my readiness to throw myself into community.  I spent a summer learning exactly what that means and exactly how important it is to me, and I am beyond excited that this year will (hopefully) involve embracing a similar kind of community.  In imagining the apartment and intentional community I'll be living in, I can see so many possibilities for grace, depth, and being Christ to each other.  I can't wait to experience the simplicity of living together:  cooking and eating together, sharing joys and burdens, walking together in mutual accountability and love.

It's not just this kind of community that I want, though.  Today I told someone that I'm turning myself into a porch-sitter.  It might sound more or less negligible, but I think there's something profound in simply moving yourself out to your front porch.  Not only does it allow you to be closer to nature and creation, it makes you physically visible and also more emotionally present to your neighbors (both literal and figurative).  It opens up opportunities to interact with those who pass by around you.  And perhaps most of all, it forces you to expand beyond your comfort bubble of your house.  I always say the one thing I want to avoid most in life is complacency, and letting myself remain comfortably within my own four walls seems overly complacent.

Maybe it's overanalyzing to claim that the act of sitting on your porch encompasses all these things, but I need a metaphor for the things I'm striving for.  So here's to becoming a society of porch-sitters:  people who venture beyond what is merely comfortable and strive for openness, acceptance, and risk-taking vulnerability.

love, courage, wisdom

Love without courage and wisdom is sentimentality, as with the ordinary church member.  Courage without love and wisdom is foolhardiness, as with the ordinary soldier.  Wisdom without love and courage is cowardice, as with the ordinary intellectual.  But the one who has love, courage, and wisdom moves the world.


~Ammon Hennacy

joy of the redeemed

Isaiah 35

The desert and the parched land will be glad;   
  the wilderness will rejoice and blossom.
Like the crocus, it will burst into bloom;
   it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy.
The glory of Lebanon will be given to it,
   the splendor of Carmel and Sharon;
they will see the glory of the LORD,
   the splendor of our God.
Strengthen the feeble hands,
   steady the knees that give way;
say to those with fearful hearts,
   “Be strong, do not fear;
your God will come,
   he will come with vengeance;
with divine retribution
   he will come to save you.”


Then will the eyes of the blind be opened
   and the ears of the deaf unstopped. 
Then will the lame leap like a deer,
   and the mute tongue shout for joy.
Water will gush forth in the wilderness
   and streams in the desert.
The burning sand will become a pool,
   the thirsty ground bubbling springs.
In the haunts where jackals once lay,
   grass and reeds and papyrus will grow.


And a highway will be there;
   it will be called the Way of Holiness;
   it will be for those who walk on that Way.
The unclean will not journey on it;
   wicked fools will not go about on it.
No lion will be there,
   nor any ravenous beast;
   they will not be found there.
But only the redeemed will walk there,
  and those the LORD has rescued will return.
They will enter Zion with singing;
   everlasting joy will crown their heads.
Gladness and joy will overtake them,
   and sorrow and sighing will flee away.

night revelations

Sometimes the world seems so much more manageable in the daylight.  Then at night my thoughts come undone and I can't remember which way is up.  This happened to me on Thursday night, when I realized I only have one more week at camp.  Which is one more week at the place that makes me happier than anywhere else in the world.  I know I will be happy after that too, but right now being in the real world sounds so awful to me.  So my thoughts kept spinning in circles in the middle of the night, forcing me to ask myself a lot of questions.

Like these:  Why am I happier here than in the "real world"?

What is it about life at camp that completes me?

How can I make it overlap more with my life at school?

And what do I do if it doesn't?

I don't have a lot of answers, but I do have a few revelations.  Like this one:

Life at camp is simple.  It's not easy; it's full of challenges, but it's simple.  All you have to do is love God, love the kids, and love the other staff.  And really, that's what I want to do in life:  love God and love the people around me, to the fullest extent I can. 

Here's another one:

I don't know exactly how the different parts of my life fit together, but I'm becoming oddly comforted by the phrase "It is what it is".  And I know that everything will be okay.  I believe in myself enough to follow what feels right to me, and being at camp teaches me a lot about what feels right.

reteaching beauty

The bud

stands for all things,

even for those things that don't flower,

for everything that flowers, from within, of self-blessing;

though sometimes it is necessary

to reteach a thing its loveliness,

to put a hand on its brow

of the flower

and retell it in words and in touch

it is lovely

until it flowers again from within, of self-blessing;

as Saint Francis

put his hand on the creased forehead

of the sow, and told her in words and in touch

blessings of earth on the sow, and the sow

began remembering all down her thick length,

from the earthen snout all the way

through the fodder and slops to the spiritual curl of the tail,

from the hard spininess spiked out from the spine

down through the great broken heart

to the sheer blue milken dreaminess spurting and shuddering

from the fourteen teats into the fourteen mouths sucking and blowing beneath them:

the long, perfect loveliness of sow.

-Galway Kinnell

honesty and animal products

I realized this week that I am becoming the kind of vegetarian that I used to look upon scornfully.  By this, I mean that I have eaten pizza with bacon on it and lasagna with meat in it just in this week alone.  Contrary to what you might think, this is not to say that I'm forgetting or ignoring or giving up on my beliefs.  It just means that I'm becoming more relaxed about things.  I've come to understand very deeply the reasons why I choose not to eat meat, and with that understanding comes the acceptance that there will be times when it is okay to make exceptions.  I think in life it's best to be adamantly sure about some things and easygoing about others -- otherwise you just end up with a bunch of halfway ideas.

Anne Lamott is amazing, and you know why?  It's because she writes so honestly and freely about her own struggles and shortcomings.  Unlike the other 99 percent of the human race, she doesn't pretend to have it all together.  And she's not like those people who acknowledge that we have problems but don't really like to go into detail, either.  Most of her writing revolves around the times when she has to work hard to be okay, and she tells her stories with humor and also with reverence for what is beautiful and true.
This is one of my favorite parts from Grace (eventually), which I finished this week, and it kind of sums up the way I feel about working with kids.

Children can connect you to the child inside you, who can still play and be silly and helpless and capable of wonder.  This child does not have to be yours, of course.  It can be a niece or nephew, or the child of a friend.  But living with a child makes the opportunity for this more likely.  Having a child, loving a child deeply in a daily way, forces you to connect with your mortality, forces you to dig into places within that you have rarely had to confront before, unless you have taken care of a dying parent or friend.  What I found way down deep by caring for my father during his illness and then by having a child is a kind of eternity, a capacity for -- and reserves of -- love and sacrifice that blew my mind.  But I also found the stuff inside me that is pretty miserable.  I was brought face-to-face with a fun-house mirror of all the grasping, cowardly, manipulative, greedy parts of me, too.  
I remember staring at my son endlessly when he was an infant, stunned by his very existence, wondering where on earth he had come from.  Now when I watch him sleep, I know that he somehow came from life, only I cannot put it into words any better than that.

dependence

I've never had to enter a week of camp with questionable health before.  This week, by the time the kids came, I wasn't as sick as I was last week, but I still had a bad cough/cold...which I expected to get better quickly.  Except then it didn't.  And at night, I couldn't sleep because of coughing so much, which didn't do a whole lot to help my energy levels.  So I was concerned, because I wanted so much to do everything I could for my kids, and yet I knew for sure that my own strength was quickly fading.
Every morning, when I woke up feeling like I hadn't slept at all, after spending hours of the night coughing, I couldn't do anything but ask God to be my strength.  Psalm 55:22 says, "Cast your burden on the Lord, and he will sustain you; he will never allow the righteous to be shaken."  And this week taught me that this is true.  How else is it possible that I had more than enough energy to keep up with a cabin of seven- and eight-year-olds?

I also came to realize the way being around kids at camp energizes me.  Some would say it's exhausting to be responsible for a group of children (and spend most of your time surrounded by many more) for a week, and in a way, it is.  But I also know that their excitement and joy for life becomes my own.  Being surrounded by them, by their playfulness and hilarity and all-encompassing love, is more of a blessing than anyone who hasn't experienced it can understand.

So, all in all, I am thankful for the chance to believe in a strength that is greater -- and I'm ready for whatever challenge comes next.

a beginning

I decided a while ago that this summer I want to write something at the end of each week at camp, so that I have some real way of reflecting on what I've learned and treasured and experienced that week.  It's hard because there's so much.  So instead of trying to describe everything that happened during the past nine days of staff orientation at Highland, I think they can be summed up in these ways.

God is in our laughter.  I can't describe all the things that happened and the ways we made each other laugh this week.  But I know that the level of craziness, humor, and laughter at camp is something I haven't found anywhere else.  We truly love each other and love being together.

God is in the rain.  At the beginning of the week, it rained copious amounts every single day.  Everything was cool and wet and muddy, and even though I tend to love the sunshine, it was nice, in a way.  The earth lives on water, you know.

God is in the stars.  One night we had Fireside around the baby pool, dangling our feet and singing songs to the skies.  There's a kind of peace that comes over the world at Highland that can't be matched by a world with cars and lights and climate control and chaos.  Another time all the female staff walked back from the fire circle after dark and lay in a circle on the soccer field, watching the stars brighten and fade above us.

God is in our voices.  I love music.  Most people know that.  But even more than rehearsed music, I love the moments when it just happens and it is so beautiful.  We hiked to Tiger Rocks on Tuesday, which takes about three hours to get there.  And after eating lunch at the top, we spontaneously burst into our own rendition of "In The Jungle".  If you don't know, it's the song from The Lion King, with lots of harmony parts and creativity.  And that moment was so life-giving for me because of the way we all fit together without even trying.  It was symbolic of the way I feel about the staff this year:  cohesive, well-blended, exuberant, and loving.  I often wish my life was a musical, and that moment made me feel like it was.

And God is in the kids.  May we be prepared to accept them with outstretched arms this coming week.  May we be given enough grace, strength, and energy to give them everything they need.  And may God shine in us.

wedding sights

I think my favorite thing about weddings is the way everybody cares so much, and I could tell this just by looking around.  I loved looking at the bride in her glorious, lace-covered beauty, but even more than that, I liked the way the air felt different when she was there.  I liked watching everyone else and seeing their eyes get soft when they looked at her.  And I liked the bridesmaids' mother-hen manner as they flitted around her, fixing her train and protecting her from even the slightest harm on her happiest day.  I loved seeing that everyone there was the same as their usual selves but also more, in a culmination of joy and beauty.  That was the best part -- that all the energy and love was focused on that day, right then.

I like this because I am just so very susceptible to hovering, and because of that, sometimes I don't adjust well to in-between-ness.  But instead of hovering I want to embrace here and now, always.  For this time is what I have been given, no matter how much I always seem to look toward the next thing instead of being in the present.  How blessed I am to have things to look toward... but still, for now, I will try to teach my timid feet to land.

validation

I feel like I'm losing my words.  Either that or summertime signifies a decrease in things that make me think deeply.  Actually, that's probably it.
Still, I have this need to express my current life in words, thereby validating it in some way.  So here's a random collaboration of thoughts, for better or for worse.

1)  There is so much wisdom to be learned from our elders.  At least my elders.  This week I helped my grandma clean her house, which mostly included talking to her, hearing her stories, thoughts, and life experiences.  I haven't even begun to imagine some of the things she's experienced, and I felt so blessed to hear her speak of them.
2)  I think I might try writing a poem every day for some undetermined stretch of time.  I love reading poetry, and I want to practice writing it too.
3)  People are great.  Did you know that?  This morning I decided that if my life were an experiment, the one conclusion I would feel qualified to make is this:  People are great.
4)  I am surprisingly (to myself) adamant in my dislike of Wal-Mart.  I've long been opposed to a corporation that ruthlessly exploits workers, vendors, and customers, but I recently read the book "How Wal-Mart is Destroying America (And the World):  And What You Can Do About It".  And since then, whenever I hear about people shopping at Wal-Mart, I just think, do they KNOW?  I mean, are they AWARE what they are supporting??
If you're curious, read that book.
5)  Yesterday Melody and I realized that we read different books of the Bible for our accountability group.  We're supposed to pick one together each week when we meet and then read that book, separately, throughout the week.  But this week we realized she read Romans and I read Hebrews, which is seemingly unexplainable and also hilarious.
6)  I'm going to a wedding tomorrow for two people I love a lot.  I think weddings have to be my favorite large social events -- they're just so happy!
7)  I'm taking a French language CLEP test in two weeks.  It's actually nice to re-induct myself into the language of my high school years... plus I get to read Charlie Brown in French.  I mean, really-- is there any better way to study?
8)  I am so inexpressibly excited to work at camp again this summer.  It is such a blessing...to devote yourself to serving and loving more than you ever thought you could.  I know it's going to be challenging too, and I can't wait to see the ways God is working in all of our lives and what I learn from it.
9)  I've missed 11:11 a lot recently.  I'm not taking it as a sign.
10)  I'm finding myself simply thankful.  God is here, in my life, and I know such beautiful people.  And how lucky am I to get to experience both of those things at the same time?  Everyone should be so blessed.

So, although I would like to believe that my life is not quantifiable, there it is in list form.

"Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is the way; walk in it."  -Isaiah 30:21

believing

Because even though I feel as if I am drowning in rain these days, I still believe in sunshine and blue sky and days that exude happiness.

i thank You God for most this amazing day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything wich is natural which is infinite which is yes (i who have died am alive again today, and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth day of life and love and wings:and of the gay great happening illimitably earth) how should tasting touching hearing seeing breathing any-lifted from the no of all nothing-human merely being doubt unimaginable You? (now the ears of my ears awake and now the eyes of my eyes are opened) ~i thank You God by e.e. cummings

my aspirations

Poetry like this wraps its words so lovingly around truth, leaving me in wonder at its effortless capturing of everything I strive for.

To Begin With, the Sweet Grass

(excerpts)

2.

Eat bread and understand comfort.
Drink water and understand delight.
Visit the garden where the scarlet trumpets
    are opening their bodies for the hummingbirds
who are drinking the sweetness, who are
    thrillingly gluttonous.

For one thing leads to another.
Soon you will notice how stones shine underfoot.
Eventually tides will be the only calendar you believe in.
And someone’s face, whom you love, will be as a star
both intimate and ultimate,
and you will be both heart-shaken and respectful.
And you will hear the air itself, like a beloved, whisper:
oh, let me, for a while longer, enter the two
beautiful bodies of your lungs.

3.

The witchery of living
is my whole conversation
with you, my darlings.
All I can tell you is what I know.

Look, and look again.
This world is not just a little thrill for the eyes.

It’s more than bones.
It’s more than the delicate wrist with its personal pulse.
It’s more than the beating of a single heart.
It’s praising.
It’s giving until the giving feels like receiving.
You have a life–just imagine that!
You have this day, and maybe another, and maybe
    still another.

6.

Let me ask you this.
Do you also think that beauty exists for some
    fabulous reason?

And, if you have not been enchanted by this adventure–
your life–
what would do for you?

7.

What I loved in the beginning, I think, was mostly myself.
Never mind that I had to, since somebody had to.
That was many years ago.
Since then I have gone out from my confinements,
    though with difficulty.
I mean the ones that thought to rule my heart.
I cast them out; I put them on the mush pile.
They will be nourishment somehow (everything is nourishment
    somehow or another).

And I have become the child of the clouds, and of hope.
I have become the friend of the enemy, whoever that is.
I have become older and, cherishing what I have learned,
I have become younger.

And what do I risk to tell you this, which is all I know?
Love yourself. Then forget it. Then, love the world.

~Mary Oliver

summer reading list

So I just made a reading list for this summer.  I have a gigantic ongoing reading list, but these are a few I picked for the next few weeks/months:

1)  The Chronicles of Narnia -- classics.  I've been wanting to re-read them for a long time, and if you haven't read them yet, you really should.
2)  The Lacuna (Barbara Kingsolver) -- I love Barbara Kingsolver more than words can adequately express, and I haven't read this one yet.  Thus, it is on my list.
3)  The Sound and the Fury (William Faulkner) -- I'm reading this as part of a group of English majors who started a reading blog to talk about books this summer.
4)  Water for Elephants (Sara Gruen) -- This is just a random one that people keep telling me I should read.  I've been putting it off for a while, but I did that with the Kite Runner too, and look how fantastic that one turned out to be.
5)  The Brothers K (David James Duncan) -- again, it's been highly recommended and has been on my monster book list for a while.
6)  To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee) -- my favorite book in the whole world.  


any book suggestions are always welcomed.  :)

a picture of Jesus

Where was your love today?

Mine was in the eyes of a small toddler who stared, enraptured, at Taylor as he played guitar outside.  It was in the astonishing blending of nine male voices, singing about love and God and being blessed.  My love was in the gaping eyes and wobbly head of Melody's six-week-old niece, opening her newborn self to the world.  It was wrapped up in the warm sunshine, in the exuberant blue sky and white clouds.

tell me -- where was your love today?

poem for holy week

will I lay my cloak before you,
when they arrest you on olive mountain,
or pull it tighter around me,
fading into the ranks of the deserters;

will I shout
‘Blessed is the one who comes
in the name of the Lord!’
when they parade you
before the authorities,
or will I tell any one – and every one – around me
I never met you in my life;

will I lay my palm branches at your feet,
as they march you to Calvary,
or use them to put more stripes
on your bloody back;

will I run behind you
when they carry you to the tomb,
or turn away
as the ashes of my hopes
are rubbed into the
wounds in my heart?

-anonymous

my church's good friday service was called "Tenebrae...a service of shadows".  I liked that title because it distinguished shadows from darkness.  Life is full of not only light and darkness, but dimness and shadows and all kinds of illumination -- and the shadows remind us that there must be light somewhere.

new directions

It's like Glee, only it's my life.
I always say I want to dedicate my life to God and use all my actions and gifts to serve him.  So when there was something I could do that seemed like it was all about doing that...it just seemed right.  It was another way I could make my life about my faith and share it with other people too.  I was so confident that I could continue leading my peers in ministry, learning about myself and God along the way.
And I really wanted that.

But I've learned by now that my way doesn't mean "best way", especially when it's a choice between my way and God's way.  I've been stopped on a path I've chosen before, and it will surely happen again.  It's not that I can't adjust to something new; it's just that I hate the feeling of the ground shaking beneath me, when at first it seemed steady.

It's hard not to treat this as a failure, especially when it's something I care so much about.  So now is the part when I try to stifle my inner cries of not good enough and not wanted and hope for something different.  I don't know how to silence the fear of missing my calling.  You can talk about trust and laying down burdens all you want, but in the end you can still have doubt about your choices.
So for now, I guess I'll go to bed.  Tomorrow is another day.

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.
Ralph Waldo Emerson


God, it's in your hands.

spring break memories [3]

This is the last of our readings, the very end to our Chambers concert.


I called through the door,
   "The followers are gathering in the street.  Come out!"


   "Leave me alone.  I'm sick."


   "I don't care if you're dead!
   Jesus is here, and he wants to resurrect somebody!"

   -Rumi 


may we all see the glory of God today.  Jesus is alive, and he is here...and for me, at least, that puts everything else in perspective.

life in pictures

Walking outside in the bright sunshine with bare feet made me feel like this:

Watching a movie about the violence, aggression, and domination at the center of our culture's male image made me feel like this:

(Accidentally starting to type "violin" instead of "violence" made me smile.)

Celebrating a long, short, hard, beautiful year made me feel like this:

There will always be things that frustrate me; things that bless me; things that allow me to breathe deeply and rest; things that make me disappointed to call myself human.

This is a prayer that I've loved since my first semester of college -- and I think right now I'm finally living it. Maybe I haven't this whole year, maybe not this whole semester, but this week at least I have felt this way, and for now that's enough.

May today there be peace within.
May you trust God that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.
May you use those gifts you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content knowing you are a child of God.
Let this presence settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise, and love. It is there for each and every one of you.
     -Mother Teresa

justifying

It feels strange and incredible to be in this moment, which is in a way the culmination of my college musical experience thus far.  But I have come to realize that the hard work is done.  How deserving this music is of the dozens, maybe even hundreds of hours I have given it.  I have never before dedicated the time and discipline of diving deeper and deeper into a single piece of music, until I know every note forward and backward and through, and my fingers and my very bones know what every line and melody feels like.  I'm trying very hard to forget the people who will be listening:  tonight is about me and this music.  My greatest goal for this concert is to let the joy of music and God and life flow through my fingers, celebrating the life I have given to this instrument.

admitting

Watching the movie Codes of Gender last night made me want to punch consumer culture in the face.  It was more than the usual rant about gender representations in advertising, but it gave me the usual feelings:  anger at the blatant objectification and devaluing of women, disappointment in the women everywhere who allow this to happen, and the blindness of all who look on these images and see what is "normal".  And more than anything, a growing awareness of my complete inability to change it.

Sometimes I am energized by baby steps toward change for the better (like Mike vandalizing the cafeteria advertisements of a Jersey Shore-themed dance party by ripping off all the pictures of bikini-clad girls), but I'm tired of little change.  I just want a world where people have the rights they deserve.  Is that so much to hope and dream and pray for?

Here's a crazy new idea:  this world might be too big for me.

conservativism

I have these two friends who I respect a lot who happen to be conservative.  And there's this super-conservative church in Washington that they really like, and my friend posted one of their sermons online.  So I listened to it (while I was writing a research paper for music history, incidentally).
I was expecting to start listening to it, become annoyed and/or infuriated, and stop.  But I was surprised to realize that it actually made a lot of sense.

Okay, so there were a few moments that made me cringe, like the part about the man being the head of the household and the woman being a passive helper.  ("It's a man knowing what he's doing and inviting a woman to participate.")  But the point is that despite the patriarchal emphasis, a lot of it sounded good to me.  Because the truth is that I still believe in marriage that lasts forever.  I believe that loving someone deeply is not about happiness, it's about holiness, and happiness will follow.

This idea of my views meeting with conservative views has been confronting me a lot lately.  I'm not becoming a Republican or anything -- I'm still a long way from that.  But I've been challenged to accept people with different (conservative) beliefs, and even more than that, I've been realizing that we may not be as different as I used to think.  I've also been realizing the importance of the middle ground.  I really believe you can find common ground with anybody if you try, and yet it's so hard for us to do that with people who we understand to be "different" from us.

On the Mars Hill website, it says this:
WELCOME
it's all about Jesus, it's only about Jesus, it's always about Jesus

I mean, I can't really argue with that, right?  In a sense, the rest is just details.
It's not that nothing else matters.  Lots of other things are really important; but I think that if together you have a foundation on something like this, the other things should never keep you from getting along.

So, hey.  Maybe we should start looking at the people who seem completely, radically different from us and find ways to relate to them and to love them.  I think that would make the world a better place.

spring break memories [2]

Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that a spring was breaking
out in my heart.
I said: Along which secret aqueduct,
oh water, are you coming to me,
water of a new life
that I have never drunk?

Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that I had a beehive
here inside my heart.
And the golden bees
were making white combs
and sweet honey
from my old failures.

Last night as I was sleeping,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that a fiery sun was giving
light inside my heart.
It was fiery because I felt
warmth as from a hearth,
and sun because it gave light
and brought tears to my eyes.

Last night as I slept,
I dreamt—marvelous error!—
that it was God I had
here inside my heart.


Antonio Machado,
Last Night As I Was Sleeping


isn't this what you always wanted your life to be?

spring break memories

This is one of the readings that we included in our Chambers concert.  It was instantly beautiful to me. Read it and let the words sink into your soul.


Days pass and the years vanish, 
and we walk sightless among the miracles. 
Lord, fill our eyes with seeing and our minds with knowing. 
Let there be moments when your Presence, 
like lightning, 
illuminates the darkness in which we walk. 
Help us to see, wherever we gaze, 
that the bush burns unconsumed. 
And we, clay touched by God, 
will reach out for holiness and exclaim in wonder, 
“How filled with awe is this place,
 and we did not know it.”


Mishkan Tefilah, 
Jewish Sabbath Prayer Book

wholeness

A while ago, I recognized my own need for attainability.  Sometimes, I realized, the world got too big for me, and then I just had to take baby steps.  I think maybe this isn't a bad philosophy.  I will always, always be wrestling with the bigger questions, but they so easily become overwhelming.  In those times, I need to know how to be okay with the small things.
This weekend, I realized that I'm scared by the prospect of Real Life.  This is such a college-student cliche, I know, but I'm into being honest with myself.  It's not even the thought of what-will-I-do, it's how-will-I-do-it and what-do-I-want.  I think this was brought on by the overwhelming number of people who asked me what I want to do after college.  (Spending the weekend at an inter-generational food conference, this came up way too many times around the lunch table.)  I was tempted to start answering simply, "I want to follow Jesus."

The car ride home challenged me just as much as, if not more than, the actual conference.  Hearing people's stories about sustainable agriculture this weekend was amazing and inspiring, but talking to Larisa and Katie in the car on the way back, I was struck again by the huge, all-encompassing nature of this issue.  It isn't just about food and farming, it's about the economy, energy use, oil consumption, stewardship, climate change, and the brokenness of the system.  It blows my mind.
It doesn't even matter what the global solution is at this point, because we're so far from it.  But that doesn't mean we should do anything, does it?  That doesn't mean it's not worth it to fight a problem, just because you know you aren't going to solve it in your lifetime.
In a way, it's not even about progress or solution.  It's about my complete incapability to be okay with doing nothing in the face of injustice, and I pray to God that I never lose that.

i don't write poetry

i am fragmented;
a parceled offering held to a mirror
and found wanting.
drowning in this murky mess
of ingratitude
self destruction
lack
there is nothing so powerful
as the need
to be free.

I Am
your strength,
your blessed redemption.
day by day
I will feed your soul.
You
Will
Never
Be
Enough
but-
I Am.

let's just all be happy

A little part of me hates Valentine's Day.

Not because I hate love, of course.  I love telling people I love them.  I also love chocolate and flowers and cupcakes and decorating things (like my friend's boyfriend's car).  And I love dressing up and being happy.

But I do hate things that are exclusive.  I hate the name "singles awareness day", even though I have never felt that way on this day, and it doesn't apply to me now.  I wish everyone was happy, no matter what their circumstances are.  And most of all, I wish there wasn't such stigma attached to Valentine's Day.  Like if you're single you don't have feel lonely, and if you're not, you don't have to do anything special.  My own Valentine's Day celebration involved spending an entire day helping a youth group make a Valentine's Day banquet for a fundraiser, decorating and carrying plates and washing dishes, taking a break for dinner with the one who made it all worth it, and ending the day exhausted but happy.  And tonight I'm having dinner with a bunch of amazing girls.

So I guess I'm asking all of us to embrace this day because it's a day.  Because God gave us another chance for the millionth time, and that's pretty great.  I'm saying, let's not worry about romantic love or lack of it.  Let's spend time with people we love and tell them we love them.

Also, read this.  It's awesome and probably made my day.

http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/20899.htm?sms_ss=facebook&at_xt=4d594a9372e6af90,0

the joy of today

One of my favorite things in the world is watching people do the things that they are the most passionate about.  You can see on their faces how much they love it.  I have seen this twice today, both in the eyes of someone playing piano - one who played Chopin gloriously, with all the power and joy it was meant to contain, and one who played and sang her soul's delights, turning eyes in a packed coffeehouse, and whose music never fails to amaze me with its truth.  And although these two were very different, they made me feel the same way.  Like this is enough reason to live.  This, the privilege of observing a person's deep gladness.

clear sight

Sometimes I am thankful for the chance to see things oh so clearly.  When my friends at lunch were unconvinced that I could find symbolism in anything in the world (say, a glass of orange juice), they handed it over so I could prove it.  And I could.  Never before had I actually looked so closely at a half-full glass of orange juice, but like everything else in life, it has its complexities.
So I explained how that glass of juice was like people, surprising even myself maybe a little, and I was comforted with the reminder of potential.  I can look at anything I want and find it meaningful, even beautiful.  This is why I have the soul of an artist, if not the skill of one.

Earlier this morning I was asked to answer the question, "How will you bring the spirit of God onto this campus?"  And I said I will keep trying not to put people into boxes, and now I know why.  Because if there is depth of meaning in orange juice, it would be unthinkable for me to claim to understand everything about a person, especially one I barely know.  I can look deeper.  As much as I can help it, I will not judge on the outside.  I want to look and truly see.

this is God on earth

this is a list of 100 things that make me happy.  it is wonderful and inspiring.

1. watching the sun set
2. metaphors and symbolism
3. defrosting the freezer
4. singing four-part harmony
5. the taste of fruit that is fresh and in season
6. the smell of books
7. seeing a rainbow
8. my campers (and learning to love them unconditionally)
9. all the colors of blue
10. hands that are mine to hold
11. a dinner table surrounded by my laughing, happy family
12. rain dances
13. being uninhibited
14. poetry that strikes a chord in me
15. a day of sunshine and blue, blue sky
16. listening to a child laugh
17. writing with depth and honesty
18. finishing a good book
19. a chord perfectly in tune
20. a rainy day with a blanket, a book, and a cup of tea
21. lazy, quiet summer lunches
22. songs that don’t resolve
23. mud squishing between my bare toes
24. armchairs I can melt into
25. following my own thoughts
26. art
27. changing seasons
28. a bowl of granola with milk from the farmers’ market
29. autumn leaves that turn every color of the sunset and crunch under my feet
30. hugs
31. inexplicable joy
32. summer’s first glass of mint tea
33. shaping words to match feelings
34. finding beauty in pain
35. sharing an awkward moment
36. wearing dryer-warm sweat pants on a cold winter night
37. being called a hippie
38. finishing a project and knowing that I Made This.
39. wordless understanding
40. daffodils that wave in the breeze
41. finding meaning in something that doesn’t make sense
42. 11:11
43. affirmation just when I need it
44. finding something after I’ve given up looking
45. alternative means of transportation
46. signs of peace
47. honesty
48. moments when someone else understands me better than I understand myself
49. the Wailin’ Jennys
50. feeling beautiful
51. a successful performance
52. curiosity
53. wishing on dandelion seeds
54. my bare feet on cool grass or warm pavement
55. the ocean
56. the excitement of Christmas
57. clouds
58. when worlds intersect
59. wearing hats
60. playfully fighting over olives at Thanksgiving
61. snowflakes on my tongue
62. a fire in a fireplace
63. homemade jam
64. snuggling
65. choosing the illogical option because it feels right
66. notes from people I love
67. being ridiculous
68. collages
69. irony
70. getting letters in the mail
71. wondering
72. realizing that I am small and God is big
73. braided hair and inner beauty
74. being with people I love
75. blowing bubbles
76. cute animals
77. a bright full moon
78. allowing myself to be surprised
79. enthusiasm for the littlest things
80. sunflowers
81. feeling exuberant
82. singing camp songs (and doing the motions)
83. unexpected blessings
84. random, hilarious conversations
85. bright colors
86. overcoming
87. random escapades of college students, ridiculousness, late nights, and laughter
88. kisses on my cheek
89. pictures of love
90. cereal
91. music that is full of life and spirit
92. hammocks
93. the farmers’ market and local food
94. handmade jewelry
95. postsecrets
96. accomplishing goals
97. deciding something important
98. natural rhythms of life
99. laughing till you cry
100. the people who are my everyday blessings