Things I Love About Life

Today I had one of those mornings where when I rolled over to face the day it was already 11. Normally I hate sleeping in, but for some reason it didn’t faze me today. I lay there for a few minutes thinking about all the things that I love.

1. The fact that I own four really amazing pillows.

2. My copy of Wuthering Heights. It’s in 3 pieces, because I’ve read it so many times that it falls open to all my favorite places, which is nice for mornings like today when I only have enough time to read the best parts.

3. Coffee...that should be a no-brainer. I almost thought about leaving it off the list it was so obvious.

4. All the people in my life.

5. My earplugs. They have become essential for me now that I live in a dorm.

6. Cheeseburgers.

7. Lists...I have so many sticky notes and legal pads floating around with lists ranging from what I need to do in order to be ready for next week to all the books I want to buy.

8. Verses in the Bible about sleep. For some reason those have become my new addiction.

9. Brown sugar. It’s mellower than regular sugar.

Another Post Written in Front of a Piano

Once again my mind has decided that it is not interested in comprehending music. So instead I’m listening to Mad World/The Great Escape/Cellists playing Smooth Criminal/Ingrid Michaelson with my feet propped up on the piano lid. And rather than sit here aimlessly staring at the wall I decided to do something moderately productive.

I have so many thoughts right now...I just don’t know how to express them! I’ve been having one of those months where everything around me and about me has changed all at once. My life is in flux right now and I don’t really know how to respond to it. I pity all the people who have to live/work/have classes with me right now; I’m kind of losing it a little more every day!

On the flip side of that, I see GOD so much more clearly than I ever have! At the end of the day, when there’s finally time for introspection, I see all the ways that the LORD poured out His grace on my weakness and my flaws. It’s difficult not to dwell on all of the things that I feel like I’m failing at, but once I look past those, I can’t focus on anything but GOD’s glory. I love grace so much. It makes everything better...kind of like coffee!

So I’m done talking about all that stuff, but my mind is not quite back from its vacation yet, so I want to talk about something that I’ve been thinking about for a really long time: the word ‘so’. I love this word. I love the phrase, ‘so anyways’. If you search through my blog posts, you’ll probably find that I’ve used ‘so’ or ‘so anyways’ 7 million times. I think I like that word/phrase because it makes such a great segue. If you’re in a conversation and you want to change the subject, just casually slip ‘so’ in there. If you’re talking to someone and the conversation is starting to end but you don’t want it to, just throw in a ‘so’.

So anyways, my mind is back now (finally!). So I’m going to practice some more.

Ten Things I Wish I'd Known a Year Ago

Lately I’ve been thinking about how different my life was a year ago. I had just finished high school in December, and I was beginning to adjust to the idea that in the near future I would be moving out of my parents’ house and going to college. I had just chopped all my hair off and I had decided that I was never going to grow it out again. I was preparing for one of my last performances on the piano, and I couldn’t wait to get it over with. I was also starting my first college class (college algebra...yuck). If I could go back to that time, there are a few things I would tell myself:

1. Long hair looks better than short under a baseball cap.

2. Don’t quit piano. One day you will have a job playing the piano and you will be sorry that you put your music away and stopped playing because then you will have to re-learn everything, which will suck.

3. When you disobey GOD, He curses you with insomnia.

4. The cure for insomnia is an extra pot of coffee and concealer.

5. It’s okay to miss class every now and then. Most professors won’t even notice.

6. Spend time with your brother. Someday you won’t be able to see him all the time and you’ll really miss him.

7. Sleep in when you get the chance.

8. It’s not worth going running every day. You’ll get lazy in six months and give up anyways.

9. Read all those books in that stack by your bed, because in the future when you go home, you will look at them with guilt because you won’t have time to read them.

10.    NOTHING IS GOING TO TURN OUT HOW YOU EXPECT IT TO. In fact, just learn to expect things to turn out exactly oppositely how you think they will turn out.

If a picture is worth 1,000 words, then this post is worth 3,361 words.

So I have ten million pictures and random things hung up next to my bed, and I decided to blog about some of them. Especially because most of them are of my family (who I have been missing a lot lately!).

So this picture is my parents’ engagement photo. The first time I saw this picture, I was kind of scandalized. (My mother is wearing red heels and a mini skirt after all.) But now I kind of like it. It’s funny because my mum was just a few years older than me when this picture was taken. Which makes me feel a little weird. Funny story about this picture: this is what my dad sent to my grandma to tell her that he was getting married. She had never met my mum, so this was her first impression of her. That went over well...

This is a picture of my dad. It's his official military photo or whatever you want to call it. This is what I would carry around when he would go on TDY (work trips) when I was little (which is why the side has been shredded into oblivion). I actually don't know if he knows that I still have this picture. Anyways, this picture is one of my favorites.(PS I didn't mean to be in the picture of this picture, but I couldn't see the screen and get the whole thing in it, so woops!)

This picture is of my baby brother and my dog. We took this picture right after we got Puppy (yes my dog's name is Puppy), and we were still getting used to him getting in our faces when he wanted attention, which is what is happening to Josh in this picture. I love that dog but he is stupid. Anyways, I miss my brother a lot. He's growing up and I feel like I'm missing it. Yesterday my mum called to tell me that he's growing a mustache. He's eleven. I think that is way too young for facial hair. I miss that boy so much!

So thanks for taking that little trip down memory lane with me. It was fun.

Confession: I wrote this when I was supposed to be practicing the piano.

Right now I’m sitting in front of a piano. I’m obviously not playing it even though that’s what I’m supposed to be doing. I have been practicing for two hours, and five minutes ago my mind decided that it was tired of reading music. I tried to force it to pay attention, but that made it even more rebellious and I found myself banging out the same note over and over, while staring at the wall. There are these little holes in the walls of the practice rooms here, and if you stare at them long enough they look really trippy.

So anyways...I’ve been thinking lately about the things that I waste my time worrying about. One of my favorite C.S. Lewis quotes is about how we spend so much of our lives doing things we shouldn’t be and don’t even like doing. For me, one of those things is worrying, especially right before I fall asleep. I don’t know why exactly (most likely it’s the perfectionist in me), but for some reason every night before I fall asleep I plan out the next day. This leads to a lot of worry on my part, particularly when the next day holds a lot of unknown things. Lately however, I’ve been trying to dwell on thoughts of the LORD instead of thoughts of the future. Whenever I read the Psalms I look for verses about GOD providing sleep and I write them on sticky notes and put them next to my bed. My favorite is “I lay down and slept; I woke again, for the Lord sustained me”. I also really like, “For the LORD gives His beloved sleep”.

The LORD is my sustenance. Sitting around worrying about all the things I feel like I need to get done or all the circumstances I feel like I can’t control has no effect on anything but my mental health (and let’s face it, that needs all the help it can get). GOD knows the future, and He’s in control (I’m really glad about that too, because I would hate to think that everything is random...that would drive me insane.).

And so, I think my mind has had enough of its fill of thoughts and words, and just maybe it will let me actually get through a song now. I would cross my fingers, but that’s kind of hard to do when you play the piano.

Chill

Today was a Jennifer Knapp kind of day. It wasn’t bad or anything, I just needed to put in my headphones and hear her crooning about martyrs and thieves and faithfulness and ghosts as I walked across campus. I really like her music. She herself makes me feel a little weird, because her personal life isn’t exactly admirable, but her lyrics just make me feel chill. Which is a good (and rare) feeling for me.

This semester is a lot busier for me than last fall was...which is good in that it’s making me grow up and be responsible, but not so good in that my alone time is slowly dwindling down to those few moments when I walk to class with my headphones plastered into my ears. For some reason, this inhibits my ability to function properly. So anyways, Jennifer Knapp is a good cure for this. Or at least she was today. Or at least...her voice was.

Thoughts From the Laundry Room

Okay...so I have a sticky-note full of stuff I’m supposed to be doing right now...but right now my mind is not letting me get anything done. Normally this isn’t a problem, but I think I might be developing ADD, because my focuser seems to be broken lately. So instead of doing the research for my fine art’s project, or practicing the piano, or reading The Odyssey, or cleaning my room, I’m sitting on the laundry room floor writing a blog post.

Granted, you have to guard your laundry here. Once, I left my laundry in the dryer, thinking that no one would bother it and that it would be left to dry in peace, but when I checked on it an hour later, I discovered that someone had thrown their ratty old skivvies and socks in with my clothes and they hadn’t even bothered to turn the dryer back on, so neither of our clothes even got dry! So now when I do laundry here, I sit in front of the machines, because there is no way I’m letting someone do that again.

So anyways...it’s been a long week. Not a bad week, just long. For those of my readers who don’t know yet, I got a job! I am an accompanist in the music department here on campus. It’s a good thing in that I get to play the piano again (which I missed a lot!), but stressful in that the perfectionist in me has been obsessively practicing and worrying and annoying people all week.

And here at the end of the week...I just need some words instead of notes. So I find myself here on the laundry room floor. And guess what, I’ve decided to chill out and not worry about homework or work or class for approximately an hour and a half! This is more difficult for me than it should be. (Honestly, I’m cheating a little bit, because I’m listening to the songs I’m supposed to be learning on YouTube.) So this post doesn’t really have a point. It just exists to take my mind off of all the stuff I feel like I need to be doing, so sorry if you were expecting something profound or amazing.  

A Post That Ends On a Down Note

So lately I’ve been thinking about love. Partially because Valentine’s Day is four days away, and mostly because loving others isn’t exactly my strongpoint...okay so that might be an understatement.

The problem is, even though love is mentioned hundreds of time in the Bible, and even though I can pull out my Greek/Hebrew dictionary and quote away all of the different words used to define or describe love, I still don’t really know or understand what it is. Being an English major, it’s so easy for me to see words on a page and just see words. Words. Words. Words. I’m really good at analyzing content and evaluating the literary value and appreciating the author’s prose and all that jazz...but when it comes down to application...where it really counts...I’m not so good at that.

Which brings me to 1 Corinthians 13...the love chapter...I bet you had no clue I was going there. (PS I don’t know why I’m using so many ellipses tonight, I’m just in a trailing off with my thoughts sort of mood I guess...) Honestly, I’ve always seen this chapter as being a drag. Maybe it’s because it’s referenced so much. So anyways, I was rethinking the love chapter tonight, and I realized, “It’s not a drag!” Great realization huh?

I had always glossed over this chapter and seen it as one of those fluffy little chapters in the Bible that are meant to make us feel good about ourselves (I’ve been realizing lately though that there isn’t really even one of those chapters.). But this chapter is not fluffy or nice or even about feeling good. It’s about the worthlessness of our lives without love. And not the kind of love that is about nice feelings and being happy. Our lives are worthless without the kind of love that is about being patient and kind to everyone, the kind of love that is about being content and humble, the kind of love that doesn’t resent or get irritated with others, the kind of love that seeks truth above all else, the kind of love that trusts and hopes and endures. I don’t have that...with anyone. Well I mean...I get to receive it from GOD...but I don’t really give it to anyone.

Usually I try not to end my posts on a down note...but tonight...sorry...

When life takes away your chocolate milk, drink coffee instead.

Today I got out of bed starving. I was literally awoken by the sound of my stomach wailing for food, which is not a pleasant sensation. So I trudged to the cafeteria for a bowl of coco-roos. I LOVE COCO-ROOS. (For two reasons: 1. The coco part. 2. My dad calls me Roo...as in the kangaroo from Winnie the Pooh...so when I eat them, I think of him.) So anyways, I was seriously looking forward to this bowl of cereal. When I got to the cafeteria, I headed straight for the coffee percolator (I have a routine) and filled up my coffee cup, then I poured as much cereal into my bowl as would possibly fit. Then I walked over to the chocolate milk dispenser thing (I have a problem with white milk from the cafeteria...it gives me a weird feeling), and then I looked up and I saw a sign. It said, “Temporarily Out Of Service”. I’m pretty sure the cafeteria people think I can’t read because I stood there for a while and tried to figure out the situation (Granted I had not had my coffee or my coco-roos, so I still wasn’t fully awake.). I didn’t even know what to do, so I took my chocolate-milk-less bowl and my cup of coffee to a table and sat there and stared at my forlorn, dry, little coco-roos. Then I picked up my cup of coffee and dumped it on them. They were really good that way.

My Addiction

Lately I’ve been thinking about coffee...lately as in for the past five minutes. I spent this past weekend at my parents’ house, and it got me thinking about the way that we communicate: coffee. When something is wrong, my mum puts on a pot of coffee. When we have something to celebrate, we make more coffee. When I just need to sit and chat about something, I hear the words, “Let me just go start a pot of coffee”. When my dad wants me to get out of bed, he brings me a perfectly percolated cup of coffee. Almost every holiday memory I have involves coffee. Every time I’ve come home from a funeral my mum has shoved a cup of coffee into my hands. Every time I had something big to celebrate my dad and I went out for coffee.

When I moved out of my parents’ house I was shocked that the people I lived with didn’t consume coffee in the ravenous way my parents and I did. My mum had sent me off with nice little packages of my favorite brands and flavors of coffee and pretty little mugs that reminded me of home. I thought that was how everyone’s family worked. Oh contraire mon ami...

Sometimes I think about quitting coffee. It’s an expensive habit to maintain when done right. It’s also kind of inconvenient...especially when you run out of coffee and then remember the next morning when your head is blindly screaming at you to feed your addiction or face the consequences. But at the same times, when I wake up to my coffee in the morning, I know that my dad is waking up to the same smell. When I pour my first cup of the day at seven in the morning, I know that my mum has already finished her first pot. This makes me feel good. I don’t think I’ll ever quit...hopefully GOD will let us have coffee in Heaven.

Bricks and other fun things...

I am snowed in right now. The Great Snowmagedon of 2011 hit pretty hard here. And I don’t just mean that classes are canceled, I mean that I went out for dinner yesterday and that was it. Today it’s doubtful whether I’ll even do that (Thank goodness for pop tarts and reese’s peanut butter cups!). So anyways, this snowed in business has left me with a lot of free time to think, which isn’t something that I usually have a whole lot of.

 Here are some of my thoughts:

1. The internet is a black hole that sucks away your life.

2. When scrubbed with bleach, my shower turns a different color...the color of clean.

3. I will have to buy more coffee when I can finally get to the store without an adventurous trek through snow and ice. I thought that what I had would last me for at least two months longer, but apparently being snowed in increases your caffeine consumption. Who knew?

4. I am a hypocrite.

5. It’s a good thing that I brought all those movies and books back from my parents’ house.

6. The Office is a really funny show, especially when you watch it with a bunch of people.

7. Snow is really wet when it melts all over your rug.

Okay, so a lot of you are probably wondering about number four. It was kind of thrown in there. By GOD. The rest of those thoughts are probably my original work, but number four isn’t something that I would think of myself on my own. This kind of goes back to my whole need for self-perfection. (If you’re new here, I’ve talked about my need for perfection before; you can catch up here, here, and here.) I really like to think of myself as being something amazing...but I’m not. I’m really, really flawed...and that’s a brick that GOD’s been throwing in my face these past couple of days. And it’s one big brick.

A lot of my close friends have told me that I did not leave them with a good first impression. They thought I was snobby and full of myself. We’ve always been able to laugh it off and act like it was just a thing of the past that didn’t matter anymore. But the first impressions I leave on people now are not a thing of the past. They’re happening every day with more new people than I can count. Sadly, these new people usually only get the chance to see that first impression. They see me in passing, but I don’t reach out to them. I didn’t realize this until one such person set me down yesterday and told me how she was feeling about my treatment of her. Ouch. (Thankfully that conversation ended with us watching hilarious YouTube videos together.)

It never occurred to me that I was hurting anyone. I blamed my inability to reach out to strangers on shyness and my personality. I said that if someone wanted to be friends with me, then they could put forward the effort toward getting to know me themselves; I was not going to put myself out there by any means. But that attitude was so flawed. It was not my personality that was stopping me from showing kindness, it was my pride. It was not shyness hindering me; it was my insecurities and my fear of vulnerability.

Ironically enough, my bad attitudes about people led me to a lot of hypocrisy. I would talk about loving others, but I never really seemed to put that into practice. Instead of meeting people and sharing Christ with them as I was called to do, I would hide from them and keep Jesus to myself. I talked a lot, but my walk wasn’t really happening (Refer to Christian cliché # 409: You can talk the talk and walk the walk, but your walk talks louder than your talk talks.).

Anyways, I want to change all this. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life trapped in hypocrisy and selfishness.  Thank GOD for grace and forgiveness as I start this journey towards kindness and reachingoutedness. To borrow an Anne of Green Gables quote, “Tomorrow is always fresh, with no mistakes in it yet”. Thank goodness for that.