Success in Life

Someday, I will be able to tell how successful I have been. I will reach a state of ultimate happiness and satisfaction. Okay, maybe not, but it's nice to dream.

All houses have door knobs, because all houses have doors. My house will have beautiful door knobs. Hand painted, or made of glass. It is by this that I will be able to measure my success in life. 

I would love to have my own piano, and I don't think any house is complete without them. When I have my own piano, in tune, in the perfect corner of my house where it can resound beautifully, then I will know that I have been successful.

I want clocks. Many analogue clocks on many walls and many shelves that tick and tock and look perfectly beautiful and maybe some that chime. I love clocks. I have a Clocks board on Pinterest. I need the clocks to know my worth.

I also want things like a hot tub, a big yard with a vegetable and/or flower garden, a mattress to sleep on, and enough food to feed my family, but all I need to feel like I've done a good job in life is pretty door knobs, a nice piano, and lots of clocks. This is my version of the white-picket-fence-with-a-dog-and-2.5-kids Great American Dream.

Just thought I would let all of you know that for no good reason at all. Maybe I just like to see myself write like some people like to hear themselves talk.


God bless.

How to Ask Questions

I have heard people say, and I totally agree with this theory, that one of the best things you can do to build relationships is to ask questions.

I'm not exactly a master of this but I am usually trying to get better. I think the key is to ask good questions and listen to their answers. Quiz people relentlessly, because they probably love talking about themselves.

Here is what I have so far. Some examples.

The Deep Questions:
1. How's your soul?
2. What has your relationship with God (if any) been like lately?
3. Why? (after anything and everything someone says) Why do you think that? Why did you say that? Why do you follow that religion? etc.
4. What is your favorite part of _________? (your family, your life, your boyfriend/girlfriend, your religion, your religious book, your religious group, your home, your day, nature, eating a cookie)

Odd-ball Questions (inspired by Phil):
1. How does your t-shirt reflect your world-view? What do your shoes say about you?
2. What was an interesting article you remember reading in the newspaper once?
3. If you could live in the mountains or by the beach, how many pets would you like to own?
4. If you were a vegetable, what would you be and why?

Offensive Questions:
1. Do you believe in Jesus? Why or why not?
2. Do you believe in our president? Why or why not?
3. Aren't you going to pick that up? Are you really going to waste that?

Annoying Personal Questions:
1. What are your parents like? How are you similar to or different from them?
2. What are you looking for in a spouse or boyfriend/girlfriend?
3. Do you like kids? How many do you want?
4. What weird bathroom habits do you have?
5. What do/did you do that always annoyed your siblings?
6. What was the cutest thing you did as a baby?

Would You Rather Questions:
1. Would you rather be a carpet or a tile floor?
2. Would you rather walk on your hands on a carpet or a tile floor?
3. Would you rather eat your grandma's homemade cookies or your mom's?
4. Would you rather eat a beetle or drink gasoline?

Riddles:
1. What gets wetter the more it dries?
2. What goes around the world but stays in one corner?
3. A woman gave birth to two sons who were born on the same hour of the same day of the same year but were not twins. How is this possible?

Try asking questions next time you talk to someone. That's all the advice I have for today, folks.


God bless.

Ghazal

I was required for my creative writing class this past semester to write a poem in "ghazal" (pronounced "guzzle") form. It is a strict form originating from Arab culture. You will be able to tell what some of the requirements were just from reading it, but I should probably tell you that virtually all ghazals are about unrequited love. So naturally I wrote about an crush I had an high school, on a guy two years older than me, strikingly handsome, and totally not interested. His name is the title of the poem, which I am not including in this post. Enjoy!

He kills bamboo and breaks the holy song

Eyes alone, the silence sings the song

The dying butterflies of his red lashes

Blink and past me see the ancient song

Eyes of bamboo green and growth decay

His perfect voice croaks out his lonely song

But I, the master of th’impossible

Whisper sleepy tears and sob the song

His heart of gold is locked in iron ribs

The trumpets blare their icy loving song

Living Fragrance of this time now gone

Recalls and Bitter crawls to bring the song.

God bless.

The Happiness Project

The idea came to me from Pinterest: get a huge stack of notecards, write the date at the top of each one of them. And over the years, every day, write the year on the date-card and one short sentence or thing you did. What you will have in the end is hopefully a beautiful collection of memories.

I was going to do it. I had a goal: go to Walmart, buy four 100-packs of notecards, and spend an hour writing the date at the top of each one. Then on January 1st, I would begin my journey. It would be like a New Year's Resolution thingy. That would last many years. If it worked.

But today, my uncle and aunt got me a little notebook called The Happiness Project. It's a "five-year record and one-sentence journal." It's basically a little book with the format I just described with the notecards. It's based on a best-selling book by Gretchen Rubin who apparently invented and did the project in order to find happiness through her memories.

Now, I don't intend to find more happiness, as I feel I already have quite enough, thank you. But any of my close friends or family members will be able to tell you that my memory is horrible. I would like to remember better what I have done, and even if this project doesn't help, I'm sure I will still look back and say, "I didn't know I did that! How interesting!" I think future years will be more rewarding than this first year when I have nothing to look back on when I write each day, but it will still be fun. I'm not exactly sure why I want to do it so badly, but I'm very excited about this little book.

The book instructs me to write one sentence a day, basically to "capture the essence" of my day. Well today I started it and wrote four fragmented sentences. Maybe I will get better at narrowing my thoughts to one sentence. Maybe it doesn't matter. I wanted to start on January 1st but I couldn't wait. Here's what I have written for December 25th:

2012* Wonderful Christmas. Got several puzzles and a TON of books. How am I going to read them all?? Found out I can't go to ________ tomorrow for the concert. :(

So that's the beginning of a personal journey/adventure for me. If anything regarding it gets more interesting, I may let you know, but it may just wait until 5 years are up and I need to let you know how it went. So stay updated! Haha.


God bless & Merry Christmas.

Goodbye, FA12 semester!

This semester, the fall of my junior year at the uni, is probably going to be my most missed semester. Despite the stress of exams this week, I am actually sad to bid it goodbye. Therefore, this post is a tribute to this semester.

I have loved all my classes this semester. Except one, but we're going to ignore that one.

I loved taking creative writing with one of the best writers and professors my school has to offer. I learned a lot about writing poetry and short stories, both fictional and nonfictional. We had nonjudgmental class discussions about one another's work and we all learned from each other, although the class was full of already very talented writers. I loved growing so much in something that I love to do.

I loved my biological psychology class. Now, I'm not a very biology-smart person, but this is the one professor that you can't go wrong with. He made all the subject matter interesting and strengthened my love for psychology. He's a compelling man with a great sense of humor.

I loved my ASL 1 class. ASL (American Sign Language) is a beautiful, as well as very useful, language. I loved talking to people without them having to hear my voice. I loved moving my body to express my thoughts. And I absolutely loved my professor. He taught very well, was so patient with everyone, and took a genuine interest in all his students. He also was very funny.

I took band again, and loved it again, but we had a new old conductor teach us, and I really look up to him. He is a very thoughtful, caring, and wise man.

This is not an exhaustive list of my classes this semester, but it is the highlights.

It was a huge blessing to take so many classes in things I was interested in, and all with the most amazing professors my university has to offer.


There were other things that made this semester amazing. I got a great, enjoyable, well-paying job as a mother's helper type person for a beautiful family in my town. I made some amazing new friends through Cru. I became a discipler (meaning I mentor someone just a little bit younger than me). I have an awesome roommate that I've known for a very long time (okay, my whole life...) but have gotten to re-connect with very well and who [still] is one of my best friends. I got a great boyfriend whom I treasure, and who treasures me. (We don't go to the same school, but I'm counting it into my "semester" because it falls into the time frame of these last four months.)

I also grew and expanded a lot as a person. I came more out of my shell than perhaps I ever have. A lot of my newer friends might actually call me outgoing! I stepped way out of my comfort zone for applying for mission trips this spring and summer. I'm pumped. And... I took a leap of faith by changing my major. I am no longer a music major, only a music minor. I am still a psychology major, and I also added a creative writing minor. Scary, but I already feel rewarded by the switch, even this late in my college career. I mentioned these things in my Trusting God post too, in case you're looking for more reading material.


I'm sure you all didn't need to know all this about my life. But I needed it recorded, and I wanted other people to know about the joy and the many, many blessings that God has given me these last few months of his life. I know that he is good.


God bless.

News

Guys.


I am going to Jamaica.


Really.


On a mission trip this spring.

Updates to follow. Or I may just keep my mouth shut until I get back. Mwahaha!

God bless.

Trusting God

I was in my room studying for what I knew would be a difficult exam a couple weeks ago. The class is Audio Electronics, and, while it comes quite easily and naturally to some of the other students in my class, I struggle more in that class than any other class since Music Lit. This would be the second test of the semester in this class, and I was very grumpy about having to study for it and take it in the morning.

Less than a week prior, I had scheduled for classes for spring semester. For those of you that don't know, I'm a double major in Psychology and B.A. Music. My schedule was full of music classes, and a few psychology classes that seemed almost "on the side." Music has always forced itself onto the front burner of my college career because that department is so intense at my school, even though my particular major is considered a "light load." But my biggest passion is, and has been since I began my higher education, psychology. I was frustrated before I even began that I couldn't focus on it more because the music was so all-consuming. I thought it would get better, but it didn't.

In high school, I loved music. I joined everything I could involving music, and I was good. I wasn't the best by any means, but I was good. But when I got to college, I came to a tragic realization: I wasn't praising God in my music. I was just doing it for fun, for me. I never even intended to make a career out of it. I was a music major for the sheer pleasure of playing music, yet I got no pleasure in it anymore, no deeper fulfillment, and gave no glory to God.

I thought this was a problem with my heart, so I prayed about it this year, because as 1 Corinthians 10:31 says, "So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God." I got a little better at it, but not much. I still didn't ever want to practice or even care about the music classes I was in. But maybe the issue wasn't in my heart, but in what I was doing. Maybe I wasn't supposed to be in music at all.

All these thoughts came to me as I was studying for this audio electronics exam. I thought, I can't do this anymore. I need to be done. It's way past time for a switch. After all, I was already through two and a half years of school.

After talking to several close, Godly friends, as well as a couple professors, and my mom, I knew I needed to at least look into actually dropping my major.

I found out it would cost me $14,000 in scholarship money per year.


Meanwhile, I was trying to figure out where God wanted me to go. I was feeling called to attend a Christian conference over Christmas break, which costs a little less than $200, to go to an abroad spring break mission trip, about $1700, and a summer-long mission trip on the other side of the country, about $1850. Although I knew I would be relying on mostly fundraising for these things, I still had some anxiety over it. I felt called to go, but held back by the funds.

I told a few people about this, and they said that I should trust God and he will provide the money. Hmmm, I just wasn't sure about that. I have gotten good at trusting God with more abstract things, like relationships, my "future," his "plan for my life," even things like talking to people that I didn't initially want to reach out to. But trust him with something as concrete as money? I have never had to do that before and didn't know if he would do it, at least for me. Of course I have seen it happen in the Bible, and even in the lives of people I know, but I have always have everything I need and I was used to just having it without needing to ask for it. I have never had to trust. I have tried to be grateful for the things I have, but trusting God to provide those things is different.

But he gave me a well-paying job a month or so ago, which was something I had asked him for, and he provided it. In the past he has provided something as concrete as a roommate when I needed one. I knew what I needed to do, and that was to trust God to somehow, some way, provide the money that I needed to do what I thought he was calling me to do. I decided to apply for the mission trips, register for the conference, and, gulp, drop my major.

"For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power..." 2 Timothy 1:7

Lo and behold, a few days after I made this decision, Mom called me with the amazing news that, although I would lose my music scholarships, I would also get back the academic scholarships that I lost at the very beginning of my college (since they were replaced by music scholarships), resulting in a loss of only about $500 a semester. In addition, not being a music major also meant I won't have to take any more lessons, which cost almost $500 per semester in addition to my regular tuition. It comes out almost even, an awful lot better than a loss of $14,000 a year.

It was the concrete relief I needed. Two days later I got all the papers signed to drop my music major and changed my spring semester schedule. I even had enough room in the time I have left in school to add a second minor, so I picked up a creative writing, which I'm pretty excited about.

As for everything else (my trips), I know that God will provide the money through fundraising or other means and that I shouldn't be afraid to pursue those dreams and answer that calling.

It's really nice to finally be pursuing something that I'm good at, that I love, and that I think will bring glory to my God. I plan to live a life worthy of the calling I have received (Ephesians 4:1).


God bless.

Red

This is a poem I wrote called "Red". Don't freak out, it's not about me or anyone, I know; I was just following a prompt for my creative writing class. But I hope it makes you think at least a little bit about the hardness of the world and how our society reacts to pain.

I wrote a couple much better (and happier) poems for that class that I would love to share with you, but I am going to have to wait to do so.

I think the door to poetry has been reopened for me, and I'm excited to try to get back into it. Expect more on this blog from now on, and hold me accountable if I don't supply you with at least monthly poetry.

Without further ado,


Red

I felt the tiny bump

Of the chipmunk under the tire

Of my pickup truck,
And I laughed.
Seeing thousands

Of tears
From my broken-hearted mother
Hardened mine.
For even in her womb,
Her sobs angered me
When her compassion
drew her to a bloody chipmunk
facing death on a sidewalk.
Bloody indeed!
The cracks drink it in and the sidewalk cries out in terror
And my mother answered its call
Tending to the worthless body before her
Her mountain crumbled but I am a volcano.
And I grew up
Hating tears,
Hating animals
And tenderness.

God bless.

Skirts vs. Pants

I am a woman who loves a purdy skirt. Let me tell you why I love skirts but usually wear pants.

Pros of skirts/ cons of pants:
1. Skirts are pretty and make me feel likewise.
2. Skirts are comfortable unlike pants (except sweatpants).
3. Skirts are feminine.

Cons of skirts/ pros of pants:
1. Pants are warm
2. You can climb and run and sit in awkward positions in pants.
3. Pants are more socially acceptable as casual daily attire.
4. Pants more frequently have pockets than skirts.
5. Pants (blue jeans, specifically) match more things than skirts do.
6. You can't wear whatever shoes you want in a skirt. But you can wear crapshoes in pants.


In my opinion, the pros of skirts outweigh the pros of pants, but I must admit that pants are more practical. Thus, I wear pants more frequently.

In closing, I urge you to please click this link:
http://www.googlefight.com/index.php?lang=en_GB&word1=skirts&word2=pants


God bless.

Definitions

We are creatures of definition and we allow/seek many things to define us.

You already know this, I'm sure. But would you like to hear me talk about it? Good. Here I go.

Appearances define us. Our clothes and makeup tell others our opinions of ourselves. Our hair is a good indicator of our personal hygiene. Our weight boasts our greatest struggles or our greatest accomplishments. Our posture proclaims our mood.

Music defines us. Oh you listen to country? Does that mean you grew up on a farm? Oh you listen to rap? You thug. Oh you listen to rock? What a conformist. Oh you listen to jazz? You really think you're that cool? Oh you listen to _______? You must be _________.

Home defines us. Do you live in a city, suburb, or the country? Is your house big or small or nonexistent? How do you decorate? Is your place a mess or is it tidy? Is your lawn mowed? Is your dorm door open or closed? Why is that poster/painting there? Is home full of pets? Is it full of plants? Is it full of people? Are you alone? Do you ever have visitors? What do you keep in your fridge? How furnished is it? What are the colors?

Gender defines us. I can't [wear that/say that/eat that/read that/go to that place] because I'm a girl.
I can't [wear that/say that/eat that/read that/go to that place] because I'm a guy.

Sexual orientation defines us. That guy is so flamboyant, he must be gay. Why is that girl wearing clothes like that? Is she a lesbian? That guy is definitely straight; look at how he ogles those ladies. That girl is such a slut, I think she likes guys a little too much. "I am sexually confused and don't want to be made fun of..."

Wealth defines us. Anywhere from the vast populations of poverty-stricken countries to the few billionaires. How much money do you make? How much did that cost for you?

Actions define us. My college major is ______. My job is ______. My hobbies are ______. Over the summer I will be doing ______. In my spare time I ______. One time I _____.

Our creations define us. What you build, make, sew, paint, bake, grow, or concoct is a product of your imagination. Our internal being is reflected and expressed in these external, tactile items.

Religion defines us. As an elementary student I clearly remember being asked on the playground, "Are you Catholic or Christian?" (Whatever that means.) But what about the girl that wears the hijab or the guy who wears the Wiccan pentacle around his neck? Who do we pray to?

Childhood defines us. Were your parents loving and caring providers or were they abusive and neglectful? How did the kids at school treat you? Did you have exciting fun experiences or were you bored in front of a TV screen? Was there a traumatic experience that haunts you to this day? Did you love something? Did someone die? Did you have siblings? Did you get yelled at for bad grades or did the teacher tell all the other kids that they should follow your example? Did you laugh?

Names define us. What do people call you? What do those names mean? How do they reflect your character?

Friends define us. How they act, how they dress, how they talk, how they influence us. From getting high to sitting in a pew, we follow their lead.

What we love defines us.

~

Many of us, I'm sure, would say that these "definitions" are a bad thing. And for the most part, they are. The extent the world leads us to take them to is definitely bad. We take them way too seriously. However, at the same time, we need them. We need to be defined, because if we had nothing with which to define us, everyone would be in a heck of an identity crisis.

We need to be our own person, definitely. We need to express ourselves and we need our quirks and uniquenesses and our stories. We need those to be us. We are allowed to change ourselves and make decisions about who we are.

But we also are creations. We also are ourselves products and expressions of creativity. So how can we let that define us?

Psalm 139:13-16 says:
For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful,
I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed body;
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.

Allow yourself to be the person you were born to be and allow yourself to be changed for the good.

Be you.

In closing, I would like to share some things that came up in the comments on my recent facebook status. I asked, "For a blog post: What are things that 'define' us?"

Garrett P. said, "'Its not who I am underneath, but what I do, that defines me.' -Batman from the Batman Begins"

Amy B. said, "Depends on who's doing the defining. God defines me as His child, and a saint (righteous). Sometimes perhaps a very childish saint. I define myself according to my mission: I am a witness for the Savior. I have to be careful not to let my self-definition devolve into my WORK, which is infinitely inferior to my mission. The world defines me by what they see; some see a teacher, some a healer, some a dog lover, and some a really obnoxious, prideful stinker. And we are all correct. In the end, only one will matter. I'm counting on my Father's mercy and justice."

and, of course, Amber B. said, "aliens. aliens define us. manta rays are also a big factor, as well as clowns. clowns define a lot of people. just sayin." She later added, "the history channel defines us...horoscopes...fossilized remains of wooly mammoths...watermelon...."

Be you.

God bless.

Bad Relationship Advice

Someone once told me, "You'll know you've found the one when it doesn't feel like work."

I smiled and nodded at the time to appease this person so that their advice would seem appreciated (as I was not in a place with this person that I felt comfortable arguing). But I took it with a grain of salt.

On the contrary, any worthwhile relationship is work.

For example, your relationship with your friends requires time, a listening ear, making an effort to show you care, driving around, paying for something you don't really want to pay for. Work! Worth it? Absolutely, but it is work nonetheless.

What about your children? Even as someone with none of her own, I understand at least a fraction of the gravity of work it takes to raise a child. How much sacrifice could that possibly take? Thousands of dollars, missed sleep, feeding them, clothing them, teaching them how to take care of themselves, actually teaching them pretty much everything they need to know, driving them around, drying their tears, cleaning more poopy bottoms than you ever wanted or could imagine. Sacrifice. Work. And hopefully well, well worth it.

Your relationship with God requires work. As any Christian  will probably tell you, it's not all sunshine and rainbows and a perpetual spiritual high. It's persecution and conviction and humbling and striving and work. Worth it? Yes, every second. Amen and halleluiah.

Why would a romantic relationship be any different?

Should a romantic relationship always be skipping hand-in-hand through a field of lollipops? Should it always be hugs and smiles? Should there always be agreement and never any argument or conflict whatsoever? Should it just be a happy trip from dating to the glorious walk down the aisle to perfect kids in a perfect house into the peaceful happily ever after? Is that realistic? Well, maybe it would be nice, but no.

It's not going to be easy. It's not always going to be fun. It's going to be work, and it's going to piss you off and make you want to cry and curl into a ball and stress you out and frustrate you. But if the relationship is worth it, you keep working. You keep pushing. You keep investing time. You keep loving. You work on intimacy. You work on friendship. You work on encouragement. And yes, it will actually feel like hard work sometimes. But, like the paycheck you get from your job at the end of the month, sometimes the work is well worth it.


God bless.

The Hang Drum

The hang is a drum reminiscent (in my opinion) of steel drums, but not as bright-sounding. It sounds very soothing and can be accompanied by a variety of exotic (usually percussive) instruments. 

(photo from Wikipedia)

And I love it.

You can learn all kinds of fun facts about the hang from Wikipedia. But that's not why I'm here right now. I am here simply to tell you about my newfound joy. Because you probably care enough about me to hear all about it. Right? Right.

I was introduced to hang music back in the winter by my good friend, Alex, and thought it was great but promptly forgot about it.

However, a week or two ago, I rediscovered it (reintroduced it to myself) and have been listening to this gorgeous and relaxing "stoner music"a lot since then--mostly by completely abusing YouTube.

Funny thing, I was listening to it and thought Alex would like it, totally forgetting where I had heard of it, and posted a video on his facebook wall, only to be embarrassed when he told me he was the one that introduced me to it. Bad friend award for me. The end.

Anyway, I thought I had a lot more to say on this topic, but I guess I don't.

I feel like I have weird musical interests. Because I'm a music major, people think it's appropriate to ask what kind of music I like/listen to. I hate this question. My favorite band will always and forever be Relient K, but I also like bluegrass, and apparently now hang music. I'm not even sure of what genre that falls under. Oh, and I guess I like Johnny Cash. And Adele. And Queen. And organ music. And that one horribly depressing but awesome-sounding song that my sister introduced me to.

So yeah. Please don't ask what kind of music I like. I won't know what to tell you. But I love music, and now I love the hang, and that's all I have to say.


God bless.

Restlessness

Every now and then, but not frequently, I want to run away.

It's not that I'm dissatisfied with my life... well, not really anyway.

It's just that I'm bored. I've never had a ridiculously traumatic experience or am living a terrible life. I just sort of feel like I'm living a boring, predictable life. And I should find great comfort in that. In fact, I usually do. Things could be so much worse for me. But sometimes, that is, once in a blue moon, it's not enough and I hunger for more.

Right now is one of those moments.

Several people at church asked me tonight what I had going this week that I was excited for, or looking forward to, or that I could use prayer for-- and I had no real answer to give them. On the chalkboard section of the wall in the bathroom (at said church), someone had written, "What are you waiting for?" I didn't know. I was waiting for nothing. So I wrote, "Something to happen." I wasn't trying to be melodramatic; I was trying to be honest.

So I came home and I have been sitting in my room staring into space for 20 minutes while Amy does Bible homework, and thinking about what the heck my problem is.

I still can't say what that problem is, but the ingenious solution I came up with was running away.

So goodbye everyone, I'm going to Brazil or India or possibly the deepest, most remote part of Africa, and I am going to learn another culture and become someone different instead of merely the person I have learned to be. I am going to take God with me (of course, because I take him everywhere with me, he is my beloved constant companion), and we are going to experience something other than Ohio where I drive a car and eat food that is given to me on a plastic plate with silverware and napkins. I am going to see an incredible animal and hear and play new music and dance boldly with all my might around a fire at night under starlight and eat my meal sitting on the ground with no shoes on. I want to communicate with someone through laughter alone, someone whose language I do not know (yet).

Also I am going someplace warm because I am grumpy that winter is impending here.

I will miss everyone terribly and I will write you all letters and hope to receive a reply but I do not know when I will see you again... here, there, or in the air, I guess.


...What does God want of/for me?? Why do I feel this restlessness?


God bless.

Superhero

If I could be a superhero, I know exactly what I'd want my power to be.


Reading minds.

It's true. I legitimately love getting into people's heads and figuring them out, figuring out what's going on up there.

Maybe that's why I'm a psychology major.

This isn't some weird sick pleasure. I like knowing because I care about you people. I just like understanding the human psyche and how it affects what we do. And, in turn, maybe I can help. Maybe. Hopefully.

I just feel like being able to read minds automatically instead of always trying to dig deeper would be so much more convenient. It would save the trouble of actually spending time and getting to know a person...sheesh! What a drag! (facetious)

So it will come as no surprise to you when we had Superhero Tuesday for dinner at camp, that I became Synapse, the evil villain who can read minds. I wish I had pictures to show you, as I'm sure I was a sight to behold. I put my hair up in crazy ponytails, tied a brightly-colored scarf around my neck as a cape, put on crazy, bold makeup, and carried a slinky around, holding it an arch and moving the ends up and down obsessively while I stared at people.

But Synapse was not the only Superhero (or super villain, in that case) I became this summer.

The next time Superhero Tuesday came around, I was PopTab Princess, clad in my many pop tab belts wrapped around my various limbs, and fighting crime by expelling pop tabs out of my hands/fingers.

The last week of camp, a last-minute revelation transformed me into Captain Hygiene. A shower cap on the top of my head, a towel as my cape, a loufa around my wrist, a toothbrush and Q-tips stuck into my ponytail of dreads, and carrying a tube of toothpaste, which I would dramatically "squirt" into people's unclean, unbrushed mouths. I was valiant indeed.

I don't remember that many other people's superhero entities, but I remember Caroline's dressing up in pajamas and saving the world from homesickness, and Sarah's dressing and walking all backwards, saving the world from logic.

Now.
Here's my question for you.

If you have ever dressed up as a superhero, what/who was it?
-or-
If you were to dress up as a superhero, what/who would it be?
-or-
What would your ideal superpower be?

Go.


God bless.

Cristina's Biography

I know a girl named Cristina.

She has dark brown hair and glasses.

She used to wear a boot on her leg, but now she does not. She had to wear it because she ran too much and her bone got sick.

She has a brother and another brother and a sister.

She likes math but not art.

One time she went to Jamaica to tell people about Jesus.

She is my friend. Also my neighbor in my hallway.

I love my friend Cristina.

That is all.

God bless.

How to Make Pop Top Belts

For those of you who don't know, I have a past time of making belts.... out of pop tabs/tops. You know. These guys:

The belts are pretty awesome, if I do say so myself. If you want, I will try and be one of those super crafty bloggers who generously share all their creations with the rest of the world. At least I will for this one post. Don't expect me to be doing madness like this all the time. I am far too uncreative for that.

Without further ado, okay. (By the way, don't be discouraged by how much I write. I am going to be very thorough, but this is actually pretty easy to do.)

You want to find some sort of cord or ribbon with which to weave the pop tabs together. Something as thin as embroidery floss will not work. Find something durable, but if you go with pretty ribbon, don't choose anything wider than a quarter of an inch. Measure out four yards (or about four meters) of your cord. This will be a good length for anyone with a relatively normal waist size. I wear pant size 5-ish, and if I make a belt for a waist my size, I still have plenty of cord leftover if I wanted to make the belt longer. If you are ridiculously skinny or are making the belt for a small-ish child, you can probably get away with cutting the cord off at three yards, but if you need to make the cord be longer, say five or six yards, that's fine. It's always better to guess high and then be able to cut cord off at the end than to get to the end of your belt and realize it's too short and have to start over with longer cord.

Once you have your cord, fold it in half and tie a loop in the middle.

[Optional step]: Oftentimes, I like to add a liquid called Fray Check to the tips of my cord or ribbon. This hardens it like a shoelace after drying for about half an hour, and keeps the cord from fraying as you work. Just follow the directions for it on the bottle. You can find it in craft stores, and probably stores like Walmart too.

Now you need to gather your pop tabs. Start with about a hundred (You may only need 70 or 80 if you are super skinny), but start there and get more later if you need it.

Get your first tab and hold it under the knot where you made your loop.

Take the ends of your long cord and put one end through one hole of the pop tab, and the other through the other hole. Make sure the knot is still on top when you're done, and the shiny side of the tab is facing you.

Now flip your pop tab over. Now the knot is on bottom and the "rough" side of the pop tab is facing you. Move your cord out of the way so you can see it better.

Grab a second pop tab and line it up with the one you just did. Make sure the "bottom" hole lines up with the bottom hole of your first one, and the "top" whole lines up with the top of the first one. Your second pop tab should have the shiny side facing you. That's what makes the belt reversible.

Now you have a top cord and a bottom cord. Put the top cord through both top holes and the bottom cord through both bottom holes. Now when you let go, both pop tabs should stay on there.

Flip your belt over again. Repeat what you just did, except this time, put the bottom cord through both top holes, and the top cord through both bottom holes. This will make an X, and is also what makes the belt reversible.

Repeat over and over, with one side having "lines" (top cord through top holes, bottom cord through bottom holes), and the other side having "X's" (bottom cord through top holes, top cord through bottom holes.

Once your belt is long enough, tie the two cords together at the end of the last pop tab to keep the belt from loosening.

I'm sure you can figure out creative ways to tie your belt (and yes, it will hold your pants up!), but usually I just string the two cords through the loop, then tie the cords. You can figure out what works for you.

Something to note when you are trying to decide how long to make your belt is the fact that the length from the tip of the loop to the very last pop top will always be the tightest you can get it. You can always take pop tabs off later when you courageously lose fifty pounds, but if your trousers are too big and your belt is longer than your waist, the job won't get done. That's why you want a little bit of cord hanging off, so you can make it as tight or loose as you like. So yay! You have a belt!

History:
I started making belts when I was in 8th grade after I saw them at a craft show. I made them for all my friends for Christmas that year, and didn't stop. I have been making them for the last seven years. I give them as gifts, sell them for $5, or donate them (so the organization/whatever can sell them and make money.) I made one special belt last summer out of all colored tabs, and it is my pride and joy (you can see it on the right in the photo). Sometimes I teach my campers at camp how to make them (it's amazing how many ways they find to mess it up). Making belts haven't had any profound impact on my life, but it's something "unique" that I like to share.

God bless.

Dreadiversary

Wrote this only a few days afterward, but didn't have the cord to hook up my camera to get the photos on there. Sorry for the delay, but please enjoy!

My one-year anniversary of getting dreadlocks was August 28th. I celebrated by going to my second day of classes of my fifth semester of college. I went to creative writing, biopsychology, and American Sign Language. I ran three miles, sat by the fountains on campus sipping a caramel frappuccino and later ate ice cream with Cru where I introduced myself and talked to a ton of freshmen. Oh, and I took photos of my dreadlicious hair (my beloved roommate, Amy, helped me with the back of the head ones):

Out of my 65 total dreadlocks, I now have several dreads with names. If you remember when you see me (if, indeed, you have ever or ever will meet me), ask me to introduce you to Lumpy, SquigglyPants, Elaine, Greta, Graft, Fatty, Levi, or Horatio.

While eating my delicious ice cream that evening, I met a cool freshman named Garrett, who was curious about my dreads. He asked me if I got them just for the style or if I was doing it to promote some sort of lifestyle. ("Like vegetarianism?" I suggested jokingly. I'm not a vegetarian.) I know I've written something like this in my blog before, but this is how I answered him (roughly, and in fewer words):

"Well, at first I got dreads because I loved the style; I thought they looked so cool. But after having them awhile, I realized they did a lot more for who I was. I became more "approachable" to people. Instead of just being this cute little middle-class white girl, I was suddenly less bland and had an instant conversation starter. It no longer appeared that I have the perfect life or have nothing interesting to say. It helps a lot of people relate to me better. I get to talk to more people despite my shy nature, which in turn opens up more opportunities to share Christ. So that's not why I got them, but that's why I'm keeping them for a while."

And, in case you were wondering, I still wash and tend to them regularly, so they are, for the most part, clean.

If you are reading about my dreads for the first time and are curious about how they are made or how I adjusted to them, feel free to read these other posts:
http://musiclaughtersilence.blogspot.com/2011/09/dreadlocks.html
http://musiclaughtersilence.blogspot.com/2011/12/stereotypes-are-bad-dreadlocks-and.html
or just ask me about them! If you couldn't tell, I'd love to chat about them or anything else on your mind :)

God bless.

Loving God

Loving God sounds easy. After all, God is God, and that's pretty awesome. He did cool stuff and he made cool stuff and he sent his son to die and whatnot, so what's not to love?

I have been finding recently that my love for God has been, well, sucky. (Pardon my french.) I'll wake up in the morning and instantly be wrapped up in my own little selfish world, with thoughts like, "What can I do to make myself happy today?" and "How does this affect me?" and "Maybe I should read my Bible today. Maybe."

And then time passes and I start to think, "I need to get my act together. I need to read my Bible and pray and go to more Christian stuff. Because I am just not loving God enough."

The ultimate goal is to love God more. But even if I try my darnedest,
I fail.
Epically.

1) I can't love God on my own accord, because the only true love comes from God anyway. My love for God has to come from God.
2) I am dumb. At least compared to our Creator. I can't even fathom the magnitude of his love and what he's done for me. So how can I love him for what he's done when I don't even know because I'm merely human with a merely human intellect? There's no way I can begin to wrap my mind around why I should love him. How can I truly "get" it?

I read an article today, and a fine one too, about how we shouldn't let the Bible get "boring" for us. And it went into great detail with all kinds of metaphors and everything about how incredibly mind-boggling Jesus' love for us is and how the story of the Gospel is too remarkable to ever get tired of. And then it ended as if he just proved to all the readers why should be totally in love with God, no excuses.

Well. Maybe some of the other people who read that article had a stunning revelation and it really did change their perspective on how significant Christ's sacrifice is. But I'm a dumb human. I'm blind to the reality of it. "Oh, yeah, another reminder that Jesus died for me. Sweet, yep, okay." Why do we get bored of its daily newness? Because we're human, and humans are sinners, and sinners, well, don't care about Christ's love for them.

That being said, do we have an excuse for brushing off the significance of the Gospel or the magnitude of Christ's love? Uh, no. Our efforts are mostly, but not entirely, in vain. We should always be striving to love God more and to see his glory and goodness in our daily lives. And no, we'll never "get it" fully, but maybe, just maybe, we'll get it a little more tomorrow than we did today, with the help of his wisdom. And although we will never, ever love him as much as he loves us, maybe, just maybe, with the help of his love, we will love him a little more tomorrow than we did today.


God bless.

Ice Cream

Thank you, Aunt Amy, who had the idea for this post, and who is, in fact, a builder of ice creams.


Is there ever a wrong time for ice cream?
No.

Can one ever be too full for ice cream?
No.

Can it ever be too wintery/cold for ice cream?
No.

Is ice cream unhealthy?
No. Not for the soul.


Needless to say, ice cream is my favorite dessert food. I would say it's my favorite food ever, but pizza and mac & cheese bring tough competition. Despite this, I have no favorite ice cream flavor, but some well-loved ones include mint chocolate chip, chocolate chip cookie dough, moose tracks, cake batter, mocha chip from Graeters, straight up chocolate, straight up vanilla, and many others.

Toppings are never a must, but they may be desired in the case of plain ice cream (like vanilla). Never nuts. Ever. As a topping or in my ice cream. But peanut butter is occasionally acceptable (for example, the little Reeses-like cups in moose tracks) Also, a sugar cone is preferred to a cake cone, but a bowl is always just as well too. I've had a waffle cone like once in my life, and although it was tasty, it sweated ice cream which was not very convenient or clean.

Ice cream is suitable for any event or social situation, always. It can be just as classy as it can be fun and playful. And if you dump it on your apple pie, or into a mug of hot chocolate, you're doing life right.

Ice cream, in short, is a gift from God. They call it soul food for a reason. While it may be cold to the tongue, it brings warmth to the heart and a smile to the face.

I guess all I can say now is...

I SCREAM YOU SCREAM WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM


God bless.

Singing

Summer camp means singing, of course.

I sang all summer long. I started out by shouting at the top of my lungs, and cracking my voice every now and then. The higher register went completely untouched, as I was going for volume, not tone. It wasn't, shall we say, "pretty."

As the summer went on, though, I noticed a change. By the end of the summer I had found vocal strength that I haven't had since I was in high school (when I was in 2 choirs and taking voice lessons). Now, I was making music all the time. I was either playing recorder, or whistling (I am a fine whistler), or singing. Walking from here to there, I sang songs to myself, even ones that I haven't heard in ages. I sang with confidence, strength, and volume. Even in my higher register. It was amazing to me, that all I needed to do to get that voice back was to sing more. I didn't need lessons, or a choir, for me to feel confident in my singing. I think it actually sounded decent. And definitely more adult-like than it did at the beginning of the summer.

Now that camp is over and I'm sitting at home all day, my amateur singing has come to a sudden and almost complete stop. It seems out-of-place here.

Whatever shall I do? School is starting soon and I doubt I'll be singing as I walk from here to there. People would roll their eyes at me and scoff, "music majors!" I am going to lose my fine singing voice yet again. Although, perhaps next summer I shall gain it back.

Or maybe I could spend a few hours in a practice room and finally learn to really, truly yodel...


God bless.

A Fear of Heights

*This blog post inspired by my good friend/roommate Amy's recent skydiving experience.

I wouldn't exactly say that I have the fear of heights. I can be up in a tall building, or even an airplane, and feel no fear whatsoever. Heck, I sleep on the top bunk of the bed for most of the year.

But I have a thing with ladders, and I have a thing with jumping.

It's hard to define both of them, because not everything about these things scares me.

When it comes to ladders, I am not afraid of ladders themselves. I can look at them, I can be around them. What I am afraid of is climbing them. Sometimes. I think the best way to explain it would be a feeling of insecurity, which means not all ladders scare me, because not all ladders are insecure. But most are.

A ladder that you have to take out, unfold, set up yourself, etc. = bad. How can a lightweight, foldy thing possibly bear my weight? Sometimes at the summer camp I work at, I actually have to climb them, and I always get short of breath and insist that someone hold down the other side and keep it steady. If it is leaning against a wall, that's still not good enough. Someone has to hold onto it from underneath. Believe it or not, even smallish step-ladders make me a bit nervous. Actually, just moveable ladders in general. They're terrifying. I'll climb them, but I'll probably die if I do.

A ladder that is built into a wall or some other sturdy structure = no problem. It's not an issue with myself. I mean, of course I trust my own strength (have you seen my guns?), and if I feel I can trust whatever the ladder is built into, then I'm good. For example, I climbed up the built-in ladder at the end of my bunk bed in my dorm room all the time, because I trusted the bed not to topple over and crush me. But a hook ladder you attach to a bunk bed and can move around--no. That thing is not firmly attached to anything and will probably kill me. Furthermore, the ladder on Turtle Island (the tree loft at my camp) is totally fine with me. It's a big wooden structure that I put my trust in. I even let go of the rungs with both my hands in order to close the door (difficult and sometimes painful to do, but actually not scary).


Now for jumping. I am scared of jumping off of high things usually. The zip line at the climbing wall at camp... no. Well, okay, the zip line itself is fine, even fun, but initially jumping off the platform is basically impossible for me. I actually can't bring myself to do it. The two times I've used the zip line, I had the person at the top push me off.

When I was little, I took swimming lessons, and to pass the course I had to jump off the diving board. Just once. I stood at the end of that board freaking out for who knows how long (seconds? hours? months?) and when it became clear that I couldn't jump off, a lifeguard snuck up behind me and pushed me off so I could pass the class.

I have jumped off a few diving boards in my day, but not many. I haven't done it in years, nor have I even jumped off the side of a pool in years. (Part of that now has to do with not wanting to immerse my dreads in water, but that's a conversation for another day.)

I'll jump off of a short wall if I think it's short enough that I won't break my ankle. But I won't jump off a swing. And I don't suppose I would ever, ever, ever, jump out of a plane.

Oh, and I also hate roller coasters. I don't feel like psychoanalyzing myself anymore, so I don't know exactly why, or if that has to do with my "fear". But they're terrifying nevertheless.


Why do I climb the rock wall if I'm scared of jumping off the zip line at the top? Why do I climb ladders even when I really don't want to? Because God did not give me a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and self-discipline (2 Timothy 1:7). I climb that ladder because of the spirit of love that causes me to want to serve. I climb that rock wall and jump off the zip line because I want to remind myself that God is in control.
And I jump off the diving board because... never mind, I don't. Ha.

God bless.

The Color Run

I wrote this a couple weeks ago but haven't edited until now. Sorry for the wait!


For those of you that haven't heard, The Color Run is a 5K race where you where mostly white clothing and every kilometer(ish) people throw powdered paint on you. Each kilometer is a a different color, so by the time you're done, you're a nice little rainbowperson. I went twice: once today, once a week ago.

I signed up for one with my mom, who is also a runner, way back in the spring sometime. Then I found out that the camp staff I work with wanted to do it too, so they signed up for one in a town that was a bit closer to camp. That one was a week before the one I was supposed to go to with my mom. I thought about doing both, since I wanted to run with my friends too, but it was fairly expensive and I didn't want to just pay that. So I signed up with my friend Alex to volunteer for the first one.

Alex and I got up at 5 a.m. last Saturday morning to get to town in time to volunteer. We ended up getting a bit lost because of construction on the highway, but finally got there, so they sent us to work at  the yellow color zone. Our job was basically to squirt yellow paint at the runners.

It was pretty hectic, and the whole time was like living in a yellow haze, but it was really fun. By the end, we were all out of yellow powder, so we started scooping it up from the piles on the ground and using that, but eventually there wasn't really any substantial amount left on the ground, either.

People were so crazy. They wanted paint all over them and would come up and tell you where they wanted you to squirt it (on their backs, on their face, in their hair, in their cleavage...). When we were low on paint, they rolled around on the ground to get it on them. Their were thousands of them, and most of them weren't even running, but walking.

When it was finally over, Alex and I had to laugh at each other because of how yellow we were. We were pretty much head-to-toe the color of dandelions. It was caked on our skin and we could scrape it off of our faces. Our snot was a freaky orange-ish yellow color. When we took off our shoes, we could pour yellow powder out of them. We washed our clothes that afternoon, and my socks remained a deep yellow color (although, the rest came out pretty well).

It was a good time though, and we got a lot of good laughs. Afterward, Alex and I went out to lunch and ice cream before going back to camp, and since my school was in that town, I gave him a quick tour.

In the shower, the yellow was all underneath my clothes. It looked like urine was pouring down my legs when the paint got wet and started to run. I washed everything, my hair, face, and body, at least two times, and still had yellow spots when I looked in the mirror afterward.

❧

Then this morning I saw a whole different side of this crazy event. Mom and I got up at 4:15 a.m. (as if the week before hadn't been early enough!) and left within about 20 minutes. I slept in the car a bit, but I was still pretty tired. We went with my friend Aimee and her mother, Lisa and younger brother, Pete. We ended up on the wrong side of town so we showed up to the race pretty late, but we stood in an impossibly long line, got our packets, and off we went.

We stood in line for half an hour after the race started before we actually went, because there were just so many people there. But then we were off, and it was awesome. There were a few times I got a little winded and wanted to walk, but with Mom and Aimee running with me (Lisa and Pete mostly walked, I think), I was able to keep pushing. Also, every time we got paint thrown on us, it gave me another rush of adrenaline to keep going.

The paint stations seemed a little anticlimactic, since I didn't get all that messy, but it was still fun. The 5K itself was somewhat hilly, but the weather was really great if not a little humid toward the end. There was nice scenery pretty much the whole way, since it was through a park and over a river on some bridges. Since most of the people were walking, we had to dodge traffic a lot, but the three of us stayed together. 

At the very end, we waited for Lisa and Pete, then they had a "color throw" where we all threw color packets we had got at the beginning into the air and onto each other. That way, if you didn't get super colorful during the race, you were sure to get pretty painted now.

We hung out for a little bit, then left. We saw a bagpipe player on our way out, and it was so beautiful :) We went out to eat for lunch, which was fun(ny) because we still were pretty colorful in the restaurant. Then we went home and showered.

There are ways to preserve colored clothing, but the only thing Mom and I preserved was our previously white headbands. Although the rest of the color washed off our clothes and bodies, we will always have a little bit of color with us.

God bless.

Poison Ivy

Before I get started, I want to apologize for completely skipping the month of June on my blog. Until now, I have succeeded in filling my four posts a month quota, but this time I have failed and I'm sorry. I am now taking suggestions on how I can make it up to you people.

Once upon a time, I started working at a Christian summer camp. This is actually my third wonderful summer working at this particular camp. We typically have two weeks of staff training before any kids arrive, and on our last day of staff training this year, our job was to clean camp so it was ready when kids and their parents arrived two days later. After a lot of the buildings were cleaned, a bunch of us were sent out to pull weeds by the front sign at the entrance, which is supposed to have nice little flowers and shrubbery around it, but was now covered with weeds and -dare I say- poison ivy.

At first we just avoided the poison ivy and focused on less threatening plants. But then someone came out bringing us "gloves" (plastic kitchen gloves) for the poison ivy, and towels for the prickly weeds that we also were unable to pull up by hand. I put on the plastic kitchen gloves and went about my work of tearing the dreaded poison ivy from its home and tossing it to the ground, trying not to touch it with any part of my body except my gloved hands. I had never had poison ivy before and didn't know if I was allergic to it, but thought it would be best to stay on the safe side and not touch it anyway, since for those sorts of things I am usually in the majority and it's been said that about 90% of the population is rather allergic to urushiol oil, which is what's in poison ivy, poison oak, and poison sumac. (http://poisonivy.aesir.com/view/fastfacts.html) So I figured I was probably allergic, and that the only reason I'd never gotten it was because I lacked the exposure (I  have always kept a safe distance away from it, ever since I knew what it looked like.)

Needless to say, a couple "bug bites" showed up on my arm. One had a black streak on it which I thought was really weird, and I told a couple people "this is weird, I have this little black thing on my arm," but didn't do anything about it. Except scratch it, naturally. Because it itched.

Fast forward about 5 days, and I was complaining to my team coordinator and friend, KJ, that the weird thing on my arm was spreading and was starting to look infected. I was convinced that it was not poison ivy, because I didn't know that poison ivy could spread, and I didn't know what it looked like (the rash, not the plant). The part with the black streak truly did look infected, and KJ agreed. she gave me some sort of cream and some band aids. When the kids asked me the next day why I had band aids all over my arms, I told them I had infections on my arms. I also had some stuff showing up on my right knee, but it was mostly on the underside of both of my forearms.

I woke up in the mornings that week truly bothered by the itching; the first thing I would do when I woke up was sit up in bed scratching vigorously at my arms and knee. Genius, right?

When we got back to camp, the nurse had already left for the week, and since I was working the weekend, I just had to deal with it until Sunday. The nurse that came in on Sunday looked at me and said, "That's poison ivy." "It is? Awesome..." She told me to go the doctor's and get a prescription for prednisone and a bunch of other stuff that I can't remember, and also recommended I get over-the-counter hydrocortisone cream. Whatever that was. I called  my mom, who was already aware of the situation, and she said a doctor would be unnecessary, and that hydrocortisone cream would do the trick, which she sent up to camp with dad, who was spending the week there. Dad looked at it, said "Yep, that's a bad case of poison ivy, but we wouldn't send you to the doctor unless it was on your face or in your lungs or something." Which I felt was reasonable.

For a week after that, I slathered hydrocortisone cream all over my itchiness at least 3 times a day. It helped the itching, but the rash was still spreading, still getting worse. It was completely covering my knee, traveling up and down my legs, were on the undersides of both my knees, and spreading up my left arm. Ironically, my right arm, where it originated, had slowed spreading and pretty soon stopped, and the infection went away. It also started itching less in that area.

Sarah, my sister, who also is working at camp this year, and I, got home late that Friday night. Saturday morning, Mom looked at my poison ivy, which I'd had for over 2 weeks at this point. She called her dad, who had known of a tried-and-true over-the-counter solution called Zanfel. But he also must have suggested I go to urgent care, because that's where mom took me. Apparently 2 weeks and still spreading was not good.

But when we got there, I wasn't alone. There was a girl there with poison ivy absolutely covering her face and neck. Since I have none in those areas, I almost felt unworthy to be there, especially seeing how miserable she was... She looked at me and I looked at her and neither of us said a word. But I looked away first.

Because there had been a big windstorm/thunderstorm the night before, urgent care had no electricity, but was still up and running. I went in, they checked out my problem, asked my a few questions about it, and decided I not only needed steroid pills (Prednisone, which the camp nurse had recommended to me a week before), but also a steroid shot in my butt. Woohoo. We also got the "ridiculously expensive" Zanfel. (I put that in quotations not because it isn't true, but because I am quoting my mom and her dad.)

I have been diligently taking the horrible-tasting steroid pills, have used Zanfel in the shower twice now, and my poison ivy is finally drying up. I stopped my use of the hydrocortisone cream because after doing a bit of research, I found that the cream moisturized areas that should be drying up in order to heal, and therefore sometimes did more harm than good in the long run. I was pretty close to trying an epsom salt bath, which my friend Janina recommended, but didn't get the opportunity, and at this point probably don't need anymore anyway.

And last night, I finally slept through the night without waking up every few hours with the unquenchable urge to scratch. It was glorious.

Moral of the story: it is just as important to know what poison ivy the rash looks like as it is to know what poison ivy the plant looks like.

God bless.

A book review- The Hiding Place

The Hiding Place is an autobiography written in 1971. Its author, Corrie ten Boom, was born in 1892 and raised in Holland. In her lifetime, of course was the second World War, which left a profound impact on her life. As a Christian full of love, she opened her home to persecuted Jews as well as managed an underground network helping other Jews find homes and food.

Eventually her work was discovered and she was sent to prison and solitary confinement. Later she was sent to Ravensbruck, a women's concentration camp in Germany, with her sister. There they saw horror upon horror, but they brought into this dark place the light of Christ by holding a "worship service" every evening and sharing the gospel with others. Eventually Betsie died, and Corrie was released shortly after. For the rest of her life, she traveled the world speaking, and opened a home to provide healing to people deeply affected by the war.

This story is quite moving, almost life-changing. I just finished it for the second time today and would recommend it to anyone and everyone. Corrie is an excellent writer and her story is incredible.

And that's all I have to say about that.


God bless.

Mom

Happy Mother's Day to all! But especially, happy Mother's Day to my mom!

She's been with me since day one, through thick and thin, and I couldn't be more grateful, nor could I have asked for a better mom. She basically rocks.

This is a fun little picture I made of her, using words that describe her. The picture I used of her to create this was, in fact, from the "Mother's Day picture" we took last year--a tradition Mom likes to do where a picture is taken of her and her children, that is, I guess, the source of her motherhood. I thought the fact that this is last year's picture made this one pretty cool. 

Some of the words repeat, and some of the words might be too small to read (although if you click on the picture, you should be able to see a bigger version), so here is a list of the words used in this picture:

Mother
loving
sweet
teacher
Godly
inspiring
beautiful
Paula
wife
mom
cook
awesome
wonderful
thoughtful
caring
joyful
Christian
patient
kind
good
faithful
gentle
example
passionate
joggler
smart
creative
generous
funny
goofy
fun
hospitable
friend
grateful
committed
PTL
dedicated
smiley
prayerwarrior
musical
family

I love you, Mom! Thanks for everything!

The original photos:

God bless

Life Goals

I have recently solidified a few of my life goals. It's a big deal, because I am not a very goal-oriented person. I just go along. But now I'm planning!

1) I am going to go to Jamaica. If a vacation doesn't work out, I will just live there forever.

2) I am going to graduate with a bachelor's degree in psychology and then I will go be a counselor for Mercy Ministries and help young women get out of rough lives and discover the truth and love and, most importantly, hope, of Christ.

3) I am going to marry a man who loves me. And I have to love him too. And we're going to have children. And we're all going to be happy together. Even though I'm utterly single right now, I feel that this stage in my life is coming soon. After all, by the time my mom was my age, she was already engaged to Dad.

There's a bunch of other things I would like to do, but if they never happen in this life, I will still be okay. If these things don't ever happen either, I guess I will still be okay. Sort of. Of course, God probably has all kinds of craziness in mind for me, so whatever. I guess that's the plan that I'm going with, which isn't really a plan on my part at all. WOO LET'S GO DO LIFE.


God bless.

Score

Today is my 20th birthday. I celebrated by joining (or rather, requesting to join) www.20sb.net. That is, 20 something bloggers. A place for bloggers in their 20s to get together and read each other's blogs and talk and whatever. I'm not sure yet but it looks really cool and I've been looking forward to joining since I was nineteen.

I did other things to celebrate. For example, I attempted to run 3 miles under beautiful cloudless blue skies and otherwise pretty much perfect conditions. However, I was struggling, because I ran yesterday, and I literally never run two days in a row. I'm trying to start running every day, and this was my first attempt at not skipping a day. It was beautiful out, so I didn't really even mind that I had to stop and walk a few times to catch my breath. Also, there was a cute guy mowing the lawn and I got to pass him twice. And he smiled at me both times.

I also made myself cream of wheat for breakfast, ate leftovers from last night's delicious dinner with my Aunt Amy for lunch, talked to Gavin on the phone for a bit (he always knows how to make me laugh), and checked facebook where I had practically a zillion notifications. That was stressful, but not really in a bad way. Also, Mom came home briefly and I got to talk to her and watch her put the icing on my homemade chocolate cake. It was lovely.

Since I just finished the book of Philippians yesterday, I wasn't sure where to go next with my devotionals I try to do. So I was like, I'll read a Psalm! Because you can't really go wrong with a Psalm. The first couple I flipped to didn't look good (or, "applicable," I should say), then I thought, hey, since it's my 20th birthday, I'll read Psalm 20. Or maybe God put that idea in my head, because it was absolutely perfect. It's short, so I'll share it with you.


Psalm 20 (NIV)

May the Lord answer you when you are in distress;

may the name of the God of Jacob protect you.
May he send you help from the sanctuary
and grant you support from Zion.
May he remember all your sacrifices
and accept your burnt offerings.
May he give you the desire of your heart
and make all your plans succeed.
May we shout for joy over your victory
and lift up our banners in the name of our God.

May the Lord grant all your requests.

Now this I know:
The Lord gives victory to his anointed.
He answers him from his heavenly sanctuary
with the victorious power of his right hand.
Some trust in chariots and some in horses,
but we trust in the name of the Lord our God.
They are brought to their knees and fall,
but we rise up and stand firm.
Lord, give victory to the king!
Answer us when we call!

In the afternoon, I went to my elementary school where my mom works, and helped do a couple odd jobs for her there. One of the kids in her class wrote on a piece of notebook paper, "Happy birthday Mary Ann." It was a sweet gesture, even if she did spell my name a little wrong.

I looked forward to getting the mail all morning. There was sure to be something for me. I haven't told you all about Chris [yet], but I've been corresponding with him via snail mail and he had told me he would send me a drawing for my birthday. Last night I had a dream that I got five letters from him, which would probably be hard for him to live up to, but I think I was just excited. Unfortunately, I haven't gotten that from him yet (sometimes the USPS is kind of slow, sometimes they are surprisingly quick). Neither did I get my letter from Marcus who said I would be getting one from him "VERY soon." But I did get a nice card from my Virginia-dwelling aunt and uncle, with an iTunes card inside. As I write this, I am listening to music I bought with it; have you ever listened to Goldmine Pickers? They sound like their name, so check them out if you're interested. I'm quickly falling in love with them. "Far from Shore" is playing now and the solos are incredible.

For dinner, we had twice-baked potatoes and steak (at my request), and after Sarah's BFF, Marie, got here, we had the cake and I opened presents. I put a dorky "party" hat on and blew out the candles. You know the whole spiel. I got some cool presents from Mom & Dad and Sarah, but all Sam got me was a card that it must have taken him all of 20 seconds to make. He loves me a lot.

And now I'm sitting here. When I took my hair down my headache went away. Hopefully my 21st birthday next year is a bit more thrilling, but I'm not complaining about today. It was a good day, and I thank God for being with me through it. And the blue sky. was beautiful. So there you go. You just witnessed the first full day of my third decade of life.

God bless.

P.S. I spent the rest of my evening reading The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom, which I recommend. In case you were wondering.
P.P.S. Also in case you were wondering, the reason the title of this post is "Score" is because score is another word for twenty. Yep.

Beloved Camper

A post I wrote last August but never published because I never finished it:


Camp is officially over (but I am one of the lucky few who is working an extra week). It's been a good summer. Unfortunately I am out of the practice of writing.

Last summer I met a camper who found a special place in my heart. He'd never heard of Jesus before but I told him what I could; he and I were (not technically) alone for a long time and we had a long conversation. He asked me if he could pray and I said yes so that little 7-year-old bent his head and folded his hands and prayed a silent prayer, and I prayed too. He had so many questions. He was so curious. I did my best to help him and answer his surprisingly deep, thoughtful inquisitions. He was so thirsty for Jesus, he kept wanting more. When I hugged him good-bye at the end of the week, I never thought I would see him again, but knew I would never forget him.

Well, I did see him again. This past week. Seeing him was just as amazing as last year. He had more questions. There was so much basic stuff about God and christianity that he just didn't know. And yet he asked complex questions, such as "Who is, no, what IS God?" Well, an 8-year-old won't understand what a superior, divine spirit is, so I tried to explain how he was the most good, powerful, perfect person of all and how he made everything in the world. This boy also asked a lot of questions about the difference between God and Jesus. I guess I can see how that would be a little confusing for someone so young. He was pretty uneducated, but he's probably one of the smartest campers I've ever had. He said he wished he had a Bible. I told him I would do my best to get him one. On the last day I told him I had one for him and that he could have it at the end and he kept asking for it all day. It was awesome how excited he was. As soon as I handed it to him, he opened it up and started looking through it.

He said a few times he doesn't get to see his dad. He sounded like he missed him. Children, I don't think they can fully take in events all the time, he told me his dad threw a bottle then he had to go to jail. His dad was not allowed to see him and he went to jail "a lot" and used to beat up his girlfriend but doesn't do it anymore. Those were pretty much his words. I'm sure there's more to the story than that, but through the eyes of a child, that's how it was.

He was a good kid. Real nice. Not always super social with the other campers; he didn't really fit in real well.


...and that's all I wrote.


God bless.

God Hears You (Minimalism Project)

For my advanced theory class, we had to compose a piece using the styles of minimalism, post-minimalism, or serialism. I chose minimalism.

To listen to my piece, click this link and download it. If it sounds like crap/static, it's not because the file's messed up. It's just because that's what it sounds like.
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B1EW_PU9B5GBU2hEX3RpVXp6WFE

And then I wrote a paper about it.


“God Hears You” has a lot of meaning behind the noise. It functions as a tape loop, but it goes in reverse of the typical tape loops of Terry Riley. That is to say, rather than starting with one track and adding more until everything is more or less a drone or vibration, this piece starts out sounding like a drone, then voices drop out one by one until all that’s left is a single voice.

The loop is Amber [last name] saying “You know what, like, God hears you,” in the context of a mostly one-sided conversation where I started recording and instructed her to tell me about some of her experiences or encounters with God. She took it from there. There are 29 tracks of equal volume going at once at the beginning of the piece, and they drop out one by one until only one voice is left, repeating the phrase.

I wanted this piece to be symbolic of the confusion and clouded view of the world and of God from a person who does not understand God or the relationship they can have with him. Everything is a blur and God is not easily heard or understand. As the voices or tracks drop out, a clearer voice slowly emerges from the woodwork, and the person begins to understand. The end of the piece symbolizes a conversion moment, when the message God is trying to convey to the person becomes clear with no obstructions, and their eyes are opened. They get it, and they want that relationship with the Lord.

When I was listening to the recording of Amber’s entire “speech,” I toyed with several phrases I wanted to use for this piece, including, “It’s in John,” “He must become greater,” “God made me,” “breath of God in me,” “encounter God,” “second chance,” “right to the heart,” “He cares,” and “give hope (to these people).” I chose the phrase I did based not only on the meaning but on the inflection of her voice: on the way I thought it would sound when it was repeated over and over. Amber didn’t appreciate that she had said “like” in the phrase once she heard the piece in its completion, but I thought her verbal tic as well as the “you know what” adds to the “conversational” feel of the phrase. She wasn’t just reading a script. In fact, I thought the phrase “you know what” emphasized even more the idea that she was trying to convey that God hears us and wants to know us.

Although not all minimalist pieces appeal to me in sound (and neither does this one, particularly), it has special meaning for me. A friend of mine recently came to Christ, describing her experience as her eyes finally being opened, so I have been thinking about that analogy a lot lately, and have applied it to my piece. Although this was probably the easiest composition project to put together, I put much more thought into the meaning itself than I have for any other piece I have written for theory.

God bless.

18,216

Eighteen thousand, two hundred sixteen. That's how many times my blog has been viewed. That's... incredible. I just wanted to give a big

to every single person who has ever read my blog.

They changed the layout of blogger (for the writer, not the reader) recently, so it was only a few days ago that I found out this number was so high. Until then, I didn't think my tally had even been above 300. The number for my "profile" views was the number I thought were my actual blog views.

At first when I saw this gargantuan number (spelled gargantuan right on the first try!), I thought it had to be a glitch. Something had to be messed up. But no. It's true. I'm amazed, even overwhelmed. I feel a little famous almost. People I've heard of before are reading things I've written. How cool is that? It puts on the pressure for me to write well, but maybe I've already made a difference in a few lives.

Basically, I'm honored. Thank you.

So, because I love you all so much and because I'm extremely grateful to you, I'm going to share some more pictures of Snoopy with you that I found on the internet. By the way, fact about me: I love Snoopy and the Peanuts gang. And Charles Schulz. So enjoy.

God bless.