Winter, come quick!

I did it! I finished my first infinity scarf!

Recently, my good friend Kellory taught me how to crochet, and I've been a crocheting fiend ever since! I've had my hopes on getting an infinity scarf for this up coming winter, but have honestly been way too cheap to buy one for $30+... so instead, I made one for a little less than $20!

If I had to do it over, which I think I will, I'm going to use a lighter yarn (I chose a very thick yarn for this scarf, thinking it would make it warmer. All it really did was make it stiff), and I'll make it a skein longer (I used 5 on this one, I think). 

Gahhh! I can't wait for winter to get here!

I am a tree cricket.

"Chase after truth like all hell and you'll free yourself,

even though you never touch its coat-tails."

I was raised in a Christian home. Though 'Christian' ideals and theologies have not been my cup of tea lately, I do have to say, I'm very blessed to have had parents who instructed me, yet never force fed me. If only by example, I have always been taught to think for myself and to come to conclusions based on conviction rather than the convenience of cookie-cutter beliefs.

As a result, my spiritual journey has been somewhat of a rollercoaster, as I'm sure isn't an uncommon story for most. In junior high, I wasn't super enthusiastic about God or religion. In high school, I might have been a little too enthusiastic, pushing my beliefs on others without consideration for the individual. Now, in my college years... well, it's hard to discern what my faith looks like now. The best description I have might consists of the words 'distracted,' 'unsatisfied,' 'confused,' 'lethargic,' and 'constricting.'

When I was about 5 years old, I used to collect cicada sheddings. Gross, I know, but for some reason I was fascinated by these transparent, empty, bug-shaped cases. I remember having my sisters hoist me up into that big maple tree in our back yard, toy treasure chest in hand, so I could gather what was left of my noisey little summer friends.

I like to think I've got something in common with the cicada. Forming into something a bit too big for my skin, my body is stretching and twisting into something new. Something similar, but new. I believe that growing up in a Christian-based atmosphere (church every Sunday, Christian high school, Christian college, etc.) has somewhat desensitized me to the concept of depth. (I'm sure this can happen in any religion). My entire life I've heard 'saved by grace,' or 'born again,' 'faith,' 'Messiah,' 'heaven,' 'hell,' 'redemption,' 'Jesus.' Honestly speaking, most of these things have begun to loose all meaning to me. Like repeating the same word over and over again until all you have is a mumbled mesh of nonsense syllables. And these concepts have become so flawed and tight and twisted in my mind, so unlike what they once were, that I've found the most natural (yet difficult) approach is to slowly shed each dead cell and start fresh. Like the cicada.

I am a fool if I believe that I will ever hear or hold an unbiased interpretation of the Truth on this side of life. But I am content simply to seek It. And regardless of my distaste for all this 'evangelical' bullshit, I cannot help but be compelled by this Man named Jesus. I cannot help but be drawn to Him. Even if I never understand quite so much as the scholar claims to understand, it is enough for me, for now, to question, to observe, to seek Truth, in whatever form it presents Itself.

Where else can I go? 

C.S. Lewis can only be read in a British accent.

"People often think of Christian morality as a kind of bargain in which God says, 'If you keep a lot of rules I'll reward you, and if you don't I'll do the other thing.' I would much rather say that every time you make a choice you are turning the central part of you, the part of you that chooses, into something a little different from what is was before. And taking your life as a whole, with all your innumerable choices, all your life long you are slowly turning this central thing either into a heavenly creature or into a hellish creature: either into a creature that is in harmony with God, and with other creatures, and with itself, or else into one that is in a state of war and hatred with God, and with its fellow creatures, and with itself. To be the one kind of creature is heaven: that is, it is joy and peace and knowledge and power. To be the other means madness, horror, idiocy, rage, impotence, and eternal loneliness. Each of us at each moment is progressing to the one state or the other."

-C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity

Dinner for Two

Last night I had Noffy over for a home-cooked "gourmet" meal, just the two of us! This summer has been fairly rough, so I figured this will put a pretty little coffee stain (in the good sense) on our memory of Summer '11. 

A few weeks ago, I left this invitation on his bed for when he got back from a work trip to Nashville.

Just a side note, I'm blessed to have a day job where I can hand-make a card while working. 

I set up my room as a private dining room. I love the lighting in there that time of day (sunset). It's just so... happy! :) This picture doesn't do it complete justice.

Waterfall scented candles and a few dried flowers for decoration :)

I made a strawberry/spinach salad to start, complete with carrots, cucumbers, and a home-made dressing of olive oil, white wine vinegar, sugar, honey, and sesame seeds! It was dee-lish!

I was sooo nervous to make salmon. Being from the coast, I've had my share of fish, but I've never prepared it myself. But it turned out WONDERFUL! (Just saying). Fresh salmon, marinated in teriyaki sauce, with sauteed zucchini and scallions, sprinkled with toasted sesame seeds, and served with boiled asparagus and brown rice!

And, of course, we had to get dolled up for the occasion.

The honored guest of the evening after finishing a fully satisfying meal ;)

To avoid Noffy's... uh... "reaction" to dairy product, we finished off the evening with vanilla almond milk ice cream, topped with a honey drizzle!

My Momma would be proud! ;)

And a P.S., thanks Liz & Josh (my good friends and landlords) for letting us invade the house for the evening. You rock ;)

Humbug

"The Spirit of God unearths the spirit of self-vindication; He makes us sensitive to things we never thought of before."

-Oswald Chambers

All's well that ends well.

I'll start this conversation off in a fashion that I'm sure You've heard a billion times before from so many others: I know we haven't really spoken much lately, but...

And then I'll tell You how I've been feeling, as if You didn't know: I can't seem to shake this emotional chaos, this down trodden, disappointing, heartbreaking emptiness.

I'll touch on my confusion: I'm never sure how to talk with You. But, honestly I suppose I wouldn't really wouldn't want to converse with anyone else. Not tonight anyway. But then again, maybe I'm just talking to myself. I mean, even if You are there, which I believe You are, I could still just be verbalizing my thoughts as a sort of unintentional therapy, not really consider You much at all. Just talking to release, not caring who it's toward.

I'll tell You things You've already known: I can't collect myself, my life. I had it all running smoothly, positively, gracefully, never once claiming it was on my own strength, but it was running smoothly, just the same. And at some point, I don't know when, it all starts tumbling down, down, down, down; emotionally, mentally. Whatever. And I'm on hard, cold concrete, under a pile of... stuff (though I'll really be thinking "shit"), wondering where You are, where my poise and motivation have gone, knowing how simple it is to just get up off my butt (but I'll really be thinking "ass") and seize the moment, but still feeling so held down by something only as difficult as I allow it to be; myself.

Then I'll connect with You through my dreams: You know that dream I always have? The one where I'm trying to move or speak or act, but I'm frozen and can do nothing? Completely frozen, like there's a force in every direction around me, pressing itself upon every physical fiber of my being. My thoughts are moving, moving, moving, but I'm stuck. Still. Immobile. I can do nothing. Nothing. 

As I'm speaking, my thoughts will loosen up and I'll then come to a conclusion about the situation: I need to get up, don't I? I need to start moving forward. Life has been nothing but good to me... YOU have been good to me. Why would I ever act as though I'm trapped? This cluttered mess I see before me, I can clean it. Broken promises, I can still fulfill them. Friendships I've neglected, I can mend them. Phone calls I've avoided, I can make them. Projects that need to be started, continued, finished, I can get up off my lazy ass (this time I'll really say it, because I'm feeling comfortable) and do them.

I'll draw a conclusion about You: You've made my hands and feet; my mouth, and eyes, and spirit. You've created me to keep walking, breathing, moving, working.

I'll draw a conclusion about myself: And I'm the only one stopping myself from moving.

I'll become thankful: You've made me to move, move, move if I want to. 

And I'll fall asleep etching the thought in my mind: I want to feel free. So I'm going to move.

And I'll wake up tomorrow, feeling...

Goodnight.

Forget about it.

"Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense."

- Emerson

This is what I needed to hear.

Ignite.

"What moves those of genius, what inspires their work is not new ideas, but their obsession with the idea that what has already been said is still not enough."

I've read lately on the unoriginality of most competent and popular artists. Not in a negative sense, but with the concept that humanity has been at it for thousands of years, billions of people per generation; how might we expect there to be anything new under the sun? One phrase in particular had caught my eye:

"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."

Part of me is relieved by this thought that those who seem so far ahead of me in art, thought, and originality are, in fact, really just presenting their own interpretation of the combination of influences in their life that had inspired them to create. Artistic thievery. Genius ;)

But on the other hand, I do not want to be a photo copy of others, while masking myself under originality. I want to offer something new. If not for others, than at least for myself so that I can lay my head on my pillow each night and know that my journey is special, different, original.

See, there is this fire in me. Silly, I know, but it's there, and I feel it right in the center of my being. It's small now, not much brighter or more heated than a candle, but it's biding it's time, just waiting to ignite. And I know that I know that I KNOW, it's going to blow even me away.

And I ache for the moment when I will step back in complete amazement and whisper, "This is what I was made for."

An ongoing thought...

It all proves difficult to conclude. I rearview past chapters of my life, and I'm convinced that my spirit well is drying up. Once, I had travelled through tides of creativity and conviction, vision and purpose, on what I thought was a progressive journey. Yet every stage is a simple remnant of the last, and now, at the age of nearly twenty-three, I find myself almost completely regressed. Or worse, maybe I've just been standing still. I cannot decide which is more terrifying.

Uncertainty is alway reliable. Ironic and cliche, yes, yet true. I cannot tell you my perspectives on God, because my conclusions concerning Him are hard to come by. And I certainly do no know what I believe about myself. What inkling I may have of the truth of my own existence is merely this damned inability to produce life. This fruitlessness; this drab, colorless dress, too large and awkward for my body, with crooked stitching and a wrinkled collar. Loveless, selfish, broken, obstinate, ignorant, etc. Dissatisfied and dissatisfying. And so, I leave myself with a suffocating unwillingness to dismiss the imperfections I display. There is no release. There is no relief.

I know this: I need to breathe in icy cold. I need to drain this puss from my thoughts, this muck and blood and poison, and fill my soul with fresh, cool summer rain.

Please, let it rain.