Prom

Some of you may know that tonight is the night of my high school's prom. (I am a freshman in college so you would think that this event wouldn't affect me much, but it does.)

Some of you may also know that my ex-boyfriend is still in high school. He is going to prom. With a girl.

And I'm upset.

Even though, if I love him like I say I do, I will be like, "Whatever makes you happy, dude." Or, that's what most people would say.

What I really want is what's best for him. Because I do love him. A lot. This chick might make him happy, even though he insists they're just going as friends (I'm not so sure), but I don't care. If she's what's best for him, then good. So be it. They can run off and get married. That's what I want. But if it's not what's best for him, screw his happiness. I don't care how "happy" he is if it's bad for him.

To take it a step further, I also put what's best for him above my happiness. I know that sounds crazy. But I love him. And when you're in love you do crazy things.
That's why I'm not talking to him. He needs his space and time, but I miss him so much and I miss my best friend and I am dying to get back in contact with him. It's awful. But he needs this and that's what's more important.

It's a time of restoration, I guess.

I hope he learns whatever he needs to learn tonight, whether he has a marvelous time or an awful time, as long as he learns what  God wants him to learn.

I'm still a little jealous of this chick though.

Maybe I am more selfish than I claim to be. Actually, I know I am. Even after all that, I still wish I was the one he was taking to prom tonight.

I need to get out of this town.

Thanks for letting me vent, guys. I haven't had the perfect love story, I know that for sure, but if any of you need someone to vent to, or even some advice, I want to be here for you. Relationships are hard. Feel free to email me at bennettmk@earthlink.net. For those of you that don't know me, just because I'm on the internet doesn't mean I'm not accessible. I can still love you. I still want the chance to care about you.

God bless.

How to Count to Ten (In ten easy steps!)

This morning in the theory exam we learned how to count to ten(10). I am now going to share my knowledge with you, because counting to ten is something everyone should learn how to do.

Although I am going to teach you how to count to ten(10) in english, if you look at just the number and not the word next to it, you can learn to count to ten in many languages.

Ready? Let's go!







1. One







2. Two







3. Three







4. Four







5. Five







6. Six







7. Seven







8. Eight







9. Nine







10. Ten







You did it! Great job!
That'll be ten dollars, please.





Sorry about this post, guys. God bless.

Easter 2011

Happy Easter Everyone! Today's facebook statuses went like this:

"Jesus, he be livin' todaysies. Hoorah!"

"My brother got sexy cologne for Easter. My hormones are so confused."

"Socializing is so exhausting."

"Listening to the rain. Blowing bubbles in it. Laughing when they come back to hit me in the face. Watching them dance among the raindrops. Marveling at their beauty. Feeling them brush against my skin without popping. Learning how to live."

Fact about me: I make it my job to compose good facebook statuses. Sometimes I do a better job than others.

So yeah, who wants to hear some fun stories about Maryann's Easter? 

Almost as huge as Jesus being raised from the dead, is the fact that Lent is over. What a relief!

So I woke up and it was morning and I was like eww morning. Yay Easter, but still, ew morning. I slept in for approximately 15 minutes, and then I got up. I took a shower. I got ready. I drove myself to church. I had church. I sang the alto line to all the hymns. I know Mom likes when I do that. I like when I do that too. It is better for my musicality. It is practice. It also fits my range better.

Then we had breakfast.

I flirted with Scott, because, as Sarah and I say, we always flirt with Scott. Then I asked Jason if he would do me a favor. He tried to hide his reluctance when he said sure. He wanted to be eating his pancake, not doing me favors. I asked if he would give me a hug and he immediately complied. I accidentally got the top arms and he got the bottom arms even though he is significantly taller than me, but it meant he could pick me up, and he did, and I giggled a lot and bent my knees back. It was great fun. Hugs like that are awesome. All hugs are awesome, really.

Then more stuff happened, including the status about my brothers cologne.

So I love when guys smell good. A guy with a good smell, like cologne or some many deodorant is really, dare I say it, hot. Or at least, it helps an awful lot. It's a big turn-on for me. My biggest turn-off is not B.O., but my biggest turn-on is probably sexy smell.

And my brother got some of it for Easter. And sprayed it on himself. So while my instincts were wondering who this sexy man was, the rest of me was panicking that my almost-eleven-year-old brother smelled this way.

Then my whole mom's side of the family, minus Aunt Chris and (Uncle) Erik, plus Anne Marie's (my aunt) parents, came to my house.

It was many people. Let me count how many...

Twenty people including my family. No pets, thank the Lord, but many of them were children. Our small house was overwhelmingly crowded. It was exhausting.

I was not jealous at all, but rather, annoyed, that my brother was the center of attention on several occasions. I recently found out that his almost-eleven-year-old brain has an IQ of 124. First he showed the family how quickly he can solve a Rubik's cube (about 2 minutes, 20 seconds, I think). I taught him how to solve a Rubik's cube. That really got the family going. Then he and Mother played a piano duet upside-down and backwards which I taught them (albeit, Amy taught me). While I absolutely do not wish to be the center of attention at family gatherings, or ever, I was annoyed that Sam was getting so much praise. And I could see my other cousins, who didn't understand, becoming jealous.

Enough about that!

I have two of my cousins I wish to discuss.

I have seven cousins total. Only one of them is a girl, Caroline. Neither of the cousins I am about to discuss is her. They are both boys.

The first one is Arthur. He is eleven. He is approximately nine months older than my brother and about two feet taller than him. He hit puberty like a wall. He has braces, his voice can jump between two octaves in one sentence, and like I said, he is suddenly very tall. He is a fraction of an inch shorter than me. He has pimples scattered among his adorable freckles. It cracks me up. This is what I told him as we were eating dinner: "Arthur, you are the first person ever, in my whole life, that I have held in my arms as a baby and I've now seen grow taller than me. No one else have I ever seen go through that much life." Or something to that affect. His mom, my Aunt Kate, tilted her head and said, "I never thought about it that way!" After a few pensive moments, my Aunt Kate looked over at big-for-his-age, three-year-old Alec, my next topic of discussion, and said, "I wonder how old he will be before he is taller than us!" "Six or seven..." I said.

Alec is adorable. Positively adorable. Since he was an infant, he really got my motherly instincts going. I remember a few years ago when we were having a photo shoot for the whole family for my grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary, I was holding him in my arms, and he fell asleep. His hand was trustfully resting on my breast; I just loved him so much, I was his protector, and secretly wished I was his mother, not Anne Marie. Temporarily, I was. He has huge brown eyes and he's just a tiny ball of energy, at least now he is. This is his personality: Sarah saw him standing outside on the back patio yelling, "OUTSIDE! OUTISDE!" over and over just because he was either a) very excited to be outside, or b) he liked to hear himself yell and that was the word that made the most sense to yell. At some other point, he was yelling "KRABBY PATTY!" over and over because he was watching Spongebob with his cousins. Today, after he threw a juggling ball at me that hit me in the shoulder, and I talked to him for a little bit, I got to carry him up stairs. He was pretty heavy. But the highlight of my interaction with him today went like this. I was sitting eating at the picnic table outside. I saw Alec. He was walking toward me holding a caprisun in his mouth, drinking. I started making goofy faces at him. He decided to make goofy faces back. He stuck his tongue way out and all the juice that was in his mouth spilled out. I immediately started cracking up and everyone turned to look at me to see what my problem was. The end.

~~~

It is now Monday. I'm sorry about everything I just wrote, since I wrote it late last night, and was too tired to be allowed to write, but I decided not to edit any of it and just publish it anyway. Deal with it.

I think I talked about everything I wanted to talk about, minus blowing bubbles in the rain after everyone in my family left. But it's not really a story. I blew bubbles in the rain. The end. Now you know.

I have a lot of school work to do today, exam week is next week and this week will probably be the most hectic one of my life, ever. So I don't really have time to be blogging, at least right now.

Well, I hope you all enjoy the rest of your week. Glad tidings to you all!

God bless.

How to Play the Bassoon

I was going to write a serious, thoughtful post, but came up with this instead:

Some of you may know that I play the bassoon. Some of you may not know that I play the bassoon. I play the bassoon. Now you know.
Here is a picture of me playing my bassoon:

At the end of this post, you will be able to play bassoon too, or your money back, guaranteed. Ready? Let's go!


1. What is a bassoon?
The bassoon is a large, magical, double-reeded musical instrument made out of wood and metal. It looks like this:

Clearly it is wonderful. But because of its many keys, it can be difficult to learn. But don't let that discourage you! I am not a talented human being, yet I learned how to play one when I was twelve years old. (I am currently almost 19. You do the math to find out how long I have been playing. It is not a very difficult problem.)

2. Music for the bassoon

The bassoon plays low notes, which means it reads the bass clef. To learn how to read music, find another blog that will teach you how. If you can already read music, but are not familiar with the bass clef, just know that the top line is the A below middle C and go from there.

The bassoon can also play high notes due to its range of about 3 1/2 octaves. Daunting, I know, but you don't have to learn all those notes at once.

Although the bassoon plays mostly classical music, it can also play other kinds of music. I'm not exactly sure what those kinds may be, but I know that one of them is ragtime, because I once played ragtime on my bassoon. Please explore this field of genres for bassoon, for I have not.

3. Emotional Preparation

Playing the bassoon can be emotionally draining. Some people may mock you. They will say you play a "farting bedpost" or worse. Be strong. It will be okay. Someday they will find out that you play the bassoon like a boss and they play the trumpet or violin like a sad person. You are not better than them. But you play a better instrument.

You may also become frustrated by the difficulty of playing the bassoon. Chin up! Perseverance is key. When you cry, just find a friend who will pat you on the back and say things like "there, there" to you. Then you will know that everything will be fine. It's just that simple!

4. The reed

Reeds share about half the importance of the bassoon itself. This is a picture of one close-up:

Take care of your reed. Nurture it. Fight the urge to destroy it, and you will prosper.

5. Holding the bassoon

First you have to pick up the bassoon.

I don't know where this picture is from, but I found it on Google and I can tell you that, although it may seem correct, it is indeed not the correct way to hold a bassoon:

Here is the actual correct way to hold a bassoon. Be like this cool man.

As you can see, it is best to sit in a chair when you are playing the bassoon. Once you have mastered holding a bassoon, you are ready to play.

6. When you feel as though you are fully prepared to play the bassoon, this is what you should do. Put the reed, which is attached to the bassoon, into your mouth. Blow air into it with your lungs. Wiggle your fingers at the same time.

Congratulations! Now you can play the bassoon. Here is your prize:

Vow of Silence

As a few of you may know, I had been seriously considering taking a vow of silence this week, starting today and ending on Easter. I hereby announce that I have decided NOT to go through with this and I will state my reasons why.


I am not afraid of doing this. That is not my reason for deciding not to take a vow of silence. I do not care what people would think. I do not care that it might be awkward at times. I do not care that people would think that I am weird. If you know me, you already know that I am weird, so it doesn't matter.


The two biggest reasons are that 1) It would be a huge inconvenience, especially with everything that's going on this week. 2) I can accomplish the same thing I would have accomplished by not speaking without actually vowing to not speak.




For those of you who still have no idea what I'm talking about, here's the scoop: a week or two ago, I was reading my Bible and whatever I read made me stop and think about actions speaking louder than words. 


How can we best accomplish letting our actions speak louder than our words? By not allowing ourselves to communicate with words at all. 


If we cannot speak, I have no choice but to communicate with you using only my actions. (This does not include sign language.) If I want to let someone know I care about them and love them, rather than telling them, I should just hug them or pat them on the back. If they are upset, I should cry with them and hold their hand rather than just saying "There, there. Everything will be just fine." I can smile and laugh with friends without trying to make myself the center of attention. I can listen to people. Talking very much can be selfish. For example, if my friend has a problem that they need to talk about, or if they need to vent, but all I want to do is tell them all about that funny thing that happened on my way to class earlier today, I'm not being very caring at all. In fact, I'm being pretty selfish. Listening rather than talking makes a world of a difference.


However, the more I thought about the reality of what vowing not to speak would be like, the more I realized that, while it may be beneficial at times, it would really just be obnoxious, a big hassle, quite inconvenient, and totally unnecessary.  It would even be rude, when a "thanks" or "sorry" or "hi" is expected of me. 


However, this is not going to stop me from trying to make some changes. I think God put this on my mind for a reason, to make me aware of my words verses my actions. I know I can do a better job of showing people how much I care rather than just saying it. I also know that, although many of you probably already view me as a quiet, soft-spoken individual, I talk way more than I need to. I really do. I should listen a lot more. I should ask more questions and allow plenty of room for answers. I shouldn't demand constant conversation. If I'm with someone, and both of us just wants to listen, and neither of us says anything, so be it. We will listen to the birds and the wind or the music or the people around us or the silence. We do not need to add to the noise. Let us be content with our ears and not our mouths.


Radical change is not a bad thing. I wish it would have made more sense to do this. Maybe someday, when it is more practical, I will. I don't know if that day will ever come, but maybe. Maybe when I can get someone to do it with me, then it will make more sense to people who might just blow me off as a freak (I don't mind that, but it won't benefit them at all if that's what's going through their minds.)


So, in the words of Lilly Moscovitz from The Princess Diaries, "Shut up and listen."


And always let your actions speak louder than your words.


God bless.

Alternatives

Hey folks, I know it's been a while, but I've been super busy and journaling more instead. I've had a lot on my mind, but it's not really stuff I can share with the world, sorry. However, if I could ask those of you who follow Jesus to pray for my friend, I would really appreciate it. God will know who you mean, even if you don't. Thanks :)


I've been thinking a lot about alternative lifestyles. I've talked about it with a few people, and I think it'd be really cool.

The first one that I heard about that got me thinking about how I don't necessarily have to follow the normal American lifestyle that is expected of me is sharing a home. I'm not talking about me and all my other single girl friends renting an apartment and living together. I'm talking about my family, once I have one of my own, and a whole other family, sharing a house. When I heard of two christian families living together, it blew my mind. Everyone expects me to marry a man, have a few children and maybe a pet or two, and get a nice little house in a suburb and live happily ever after. But why can't we find a whole other couple, one that we're really good friends with, and live with them too? Raise all our kids in the same home, under the same roof, share pets, share meals, share furniture, share finances, everything, maybe even cars. Wouldn't that be great? Of course it would require a lot of trust on the parents' parts, you know, me trusting my husband that we're living with another woman, and him trusting me that we're living with another man. But if the trust and the faithfulness was there, the community and the deep friendships that would come from it and become deeply rooted in our home would probably be absolutely amazing.

Another thing that me and my prayer buddy, Sarah, were talking about, is intentional poverty. Living with poor people on purpose. Being poor on purpose. What if you make a lot of money? Well, I guess you could just give so much away to charities that all you have left for yourself is simply enough to get by. Or just have a low-paying job on purpose. Talk about rejecting the American Dream! I love it. It sounds so crazy, but think how much you would get out of it! It would change your life. You would see things through totally new lenses. Americans all think that we need stuff to be happy, but living a life like that forces you to form a community that can support each other, rather than just "thriving" in your own little bubble. I'm sure it would be worth it. It would definitely put things into perspective.

Or, what if I traveled to another country? Learned to live in a totally different culture?

Or adopted and raised children but never married?

Or took a vow of silence and let my actions speak rather than my words?


Readers, what are your thoughts? What sorts of alternative lifestyles can you think of, no matter how "crazy" they sound?

God bless.





Update: Everyone should watch the movie/read the book Into the Wild. I have only seen the movie, but this is the kind of radical lifestyle deviation I am talking about.

Rufus and Lardhead

Due to the more serious nature of my last few posts, I have decided to lighten the mood a little. The following stories were composed by me and several other people during a long car ride, in which each person says one word at a time as we go around the circle. I wrote them down in my notebook as they were being told, which I am copying directly from now. (I have corrected all the spelling errors.)

I apologize for the many things that don't make sense in these short stories. I also would like to warn you ahead of time that you should probably not read these if you have a queasy stomach. It gets worse as you go, believe it or not.


Behold:

The Tragedy of the Bulimic Toad
Once there was a toad named Rufus. Rufus had 17 and a half hamburgers. He ran to the grocery and bought some buns. Rufus was sick and tired of eating hamburgers and decided to barf up them all. Puking his guts out was a trend that he liked to participate in. Throwing up beans was Rufus's past time for most of his life. When he was crying he passed out. Dying with his disease was often smelly. His death was obvious to people but he didn't live. Instead Rufus died. Squished by a truck full of watermelons.

The Ugly Little Smells of Lardhead
Lardhead was quite a fat princess. She really desired fat cows and hated all skinny crickets. One day fate handed her a magic cricket that was so skinny that fat clouds came home. He melted away when Lardhead sat on him. She regretted ever eating smelly eggs and she smelled awful. Frequently the princess drooled all over lap. Nasty little droplets of saliva sloshed all down her leg rolls. Jiminy Cricket showed up drunk and stoned which was normal however appalling he appeared. Lardhead sat cross-legged on Jiminy Cricket and squeezed out his intestines along the back of his butt. Which smelled distasteful but delicious. Children might understand someday why he smelled so wretched yet he appeared normal.



You're welcome.

...God bless.

Amazing Grace

Amazing grace! How sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now and found, Was blind but now I see.

'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, And grace my fears relieved;
How precious did that grace appear The hour I first believed

Through many dangers, toils, and snares I have already come
'Twas grace that brought me safe thus far, And grace will lead me home.

When we've been there ten thousand years, Bright shining as the sun
We've no less days to sing God's praise Than when we first begun.

My God has promised good to me, Whose word my hope secures;
God will my shield and portion be As long as life endures.

I don't think this traditional old hymn gets the credit it deserves. I've heard many people, even strong christians, say they don't like the hymn because it's overused and they're tired of it, or they plain just don't like it. I think the reason it's used so much, though, is because of its beautiful and profound meaning that should be taken into account every time it is uttered.

It was written by a man named John Newton who led a sinful life as a sailor in the slave trade. Yet he, at some point, found Jesus and quit the slave trade to study theology. Apparently he was a pretty good poet, too, if he could write something like this. Have those of you who are christians really thought about or understood how truly amazing and remarkable your grace is? "Amazing grace" is practically an understatement. It's pretty darn amazing.
Because I don't have a clear conversion moment (I apparently asked Jesus to "come into my heart" when I was two years old and my faith has taken some interesting turns, for both the good and the bad, since then), the second line of the second verse, "How precious did that grace appear the hour I first believed" is, to some extent, lost on me. I almost wish I had experienced a moment in my life (that I can remember) when I was unsaved one minute and saved the next. When I took the step to ask Jesus to be my personal Lord and Savior. That would have been a truly remarkable experience. However, I'm also pretty grateful that I've had the Holy Spirit dwelling in me since my baptism at a month and a half old, and been a born-again christian since the budding age of two, before I can even remember. Perhaps I've always had an older mind than my body.

And yet, does that make the grace given to me any less amazing? Absolutely not. Sometimes I imagine my life without Jesus. I've been thinking about it a lot as of late, actually. When I imagine my life without my Savior, I feel like there would be a huge, empty void inside of me. So much of my Jesus fills me up and brings me light. I can imagine myself still going to school but pouring all my life into my music until I go practically crazy, and not studying psychology like I am now, and probably not going to Capital University. I would be incredibly lonely and falling into a depression every time I felt insufficient in my music or anything else.
I can also picture myself not in college at all. I don't know if I'd be living at home or somehow struggling by on my own. But God pushed me to come be at this place and I don't know if I would have tried hard at all if not for him.
I can also picture myself in a losing battle with anorexia. Surprised? I've struggled with this before, for a brief time at the beginning of high school. I kept track of everything I ate because I thought I was fat (I wasn't) and sometimes lied to get out of eating dinner. I would beat myself up at the end of a day if, when I was writing down what I'd eaten, I thought I'd eaten too much. I was hungry a lot and I welcomed that hunger. I felt better when my stomach rumbled. I was terrified that it would turn into actual anorexia, which I knew was wrong. I knew what I was doing was wrong, but I couldn't help it, and it was God who pulled me out of that when I prayed for healing. It was God who kept me from losing my body. I've eaten pretty normally ever since then. But if not for God...
I can also picture myself with a child of my own. Unwed? Oh yes. It's pretty likely. Giving into fleshly passions is a weakness of mine and it is Jesus who guides me out of situations that could be tempting for me. If not for Jesus, I probably would have given into those passions and found myself in a real pickle and eventually a big belly. And I would have gotten all upset that some idiot "broke my heart".
Other than that, who knows where I'd be? I don't know if I'd be religious at all, if I'd attend church because I thought that I should because I was expected to but stop going completely once I got to college. I don't know if I'd be atheist or agnostic or I'd be lured into some other religion or cult, or if I wouldn't think much about my soul or God at all. If it'd be something I'd just ignore. The one thing I know for sure, though, is that if not for Jesus, I would be empty inside. I would have little or nothing to live for. Maybe I'd have killed myself by now. Depression is bad enough when I have a Savior carrying me along the way. I can't imagine how hard it would be if I was walking that path alone. I'd have a void. I would be stumbling through the darkness, hopeless...

This is why grace is so amazing.

Because of grace, I'm going to Heaven. I have hope. I have joy. I have peace. I have love.

Heaven is something I've been thinking about a lot lately. I've been thinking about how wonderful it must be. Every person I've met lately who I know is a christian, I've thought, "I get to see them in Heaven. I'll get to be with them forever. If I never see them again in this life, I will see them forever in the next one." Because of Heaven, my hope is for every non-christian I know to find salvation, because I really, really want to spend eternity in paradise with them, too. I also am super excited to see people that I love again who have died, and to meet people that died before I was around, all the way from King David to Martin Luther to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to Mother Teresa to Jesus' apostles to martyrs in cultures distant from my own, to the founding fathers of my beloved nation. All these people I'll meet someday and many, many more, and I really, truly can't wait. I'm so excited!

Not to mention eternity with Jesus, the love of my life, the light in my world, the hope of my future, the truth amidst the lies, the King that I worship, my best friend that holds my hand, the one that saved my life because he loved me despite my many failings. Yeah, him. In his presence forever. I will see him face to face. If that's not the most amazing thing I've ever heard, I don't know what is. I certainly have grace to thank, but even more than that, I have love to thank.

Going back to the song "Amazing Grace," I have really been focusing in on the fourth verse this past weekend. The verse is preluded by "grace will lead me home" in the third. As you may have caught onto, "home" in this context is Heaven. I can't wait to go home. The fourth verse, I'll remind you, goes like this: "When we've been there [Heaven] ten thousand years, Bright shining as the sun, We've no less days to sing God's praise, than when we first begun." It kind of blows my mind, the fact that Heaven is forever. Forever is just...pretty much impossible to imagine, period. This whole line kind of blows my mind, actually. Too bad I can't really describe how it makes me feel. If it doesn't blow your mind too, well, I'm sorry. I'm really, really sorry...

For those of you who are believers, just remember that Heaven is coming soon enough. Live your life to please our Jesus and you will be rewarded in Heaven, and whenever you're in danger or a sticky situation or going through a rough time, just remember that it's temporary and soon you'll be in paradise and never have to worry about anything ever again.

For those of you who are nonbelievers, I hope you want what I have: amazing grace.

God bless you all.