Quarter Life Crisis

I'm in Quito, Ecuador. The one in South America.

It's only been six days since I returned to the país de mi alma. I don't think I can describe the completely strange feeling of walking into "my" house and not knowing where "my" bedroom was. It's odd, because as much as I love this new house, it still feels like we're staying in somebody else's home. I'm hoping that will change, that by the end of my time here, I'll actually be able to find my way to the laundry room. 

Flew in Thursday night. Thanked God for getting me to Quito without having to spend the night in Guayaquil (I would have hated that). Cried as soon as I saw my parents while riding the escalator out of the hallway at the airport. Jumped on my brother and sister while they were trying to sleep. Stayed up late just to revel in the newness of the new house.

Friday and Saturday: Alliance choir concert. Felt jittery at the notion of seeing people I hadn't seen in a year. Thankfully avoided too many awkward moments with said people. Laughed with my best friend one night, then flirted with my brother's underage friends the next. "Illegal" flirting is probably the best kind.

Sunday, went to the church that has been a part of my family for about 50 years. Reconnected with my youth pastor from Dana Point and finally met his wife. Felt jittery about that, too, until I realized that who I am, and who I was back then, is not made up of one person. Was filled with memories I kept to myself and feelings I hadn't thought of in a long time. Scored an age of 41 on the Wii fitness test.

Saw best friend number two on Monday afternoon. Visited my high school as a non-high school student and felt weird about it. Was almost not recognized as an alumni by the school nurse. Hung around the big soccer field and waited for first best friend to come on campus. Was 1/3 of 3/4 of a bear hug of a best friend reunion. Played Prince of Persia, Fable 2, and Halo 3 on the Xbox 360. I really missed that thing. 

Tuesday, wore pajamas, did nothing. Made sugar cookies and worked on Christmas presents. Quizzed my sister on her Science test (mitosis is the first and most important stage of cell division) and partook in a dinner party with people I didn't know so well. Am now sitting in my dad's office chair, trying to get sleepy enough to go to bed. 

Once the little bro and sis get out of school, I'll be more productive. I promise.

Please

I just want to know you're ok.

You've told me before, told me that I'm the one who reminds you to be good. I took it very seriously when you told me that. I took it even more seriously than when you told me you were praying for me. 

That's why I'm trying to remind you again. But you're not helping to make that happen.

I need you to write me. I need you to acknowledge that I am trying to get in touch with you again. I need you to remember our friendship and what it did to both of us. 

We're not children anymore, you even more so than myself (you're the one of legal drinking age) and it terrifies me that you have this reason to screw things up and forget who you are deep inside yourself, beneath all of those layers of swearing and "cool" and fakeness (I truly believe that you are who you were with me, that this person you show to everyone else isn't the real you). 

I feel responsible for you. I just want to know you're ok.

His good, pleasing, and perfect will

 

We talked about God's will in my Romans and Galatians class today, about how God's will isn't "footsteps in the snow" that we need to somehow need to find and follow, but a corridor with boundaries and lots of flexibility in terms of what exactly God wants us to do. This is ironic because I fell asleep last night while I was debating over this issue in my head, and I came to the same conclusion my professor presented to us today.

All of this brings me back to something my high school Apologetics teacher, Mr. Roedding said: "As long as you are striving to do God's will, you will not make a wrong decision." God doesn't have a set system of choices and options for us to make; He offers us free will. He gives us the space to make our own decisions, because just like a loving father, God trusts us to make good ones.

In our class today, we also talked about a verse I memorized years ago, probably for AWANA: "then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, His good, pleasing, and perfect will." My professor argued that it isn't God's will that is "good, pleasing, and perfect"; God's will involves all that is "good, pleasing, and perfect". God is all about good decisions and He provides us with the resources we need to make those good decisions.

So what it comes down to is this: as long as we are striving to do what is "good, pleasing, and perfect", we will be doing exactly what God wants us to do, and so we will not be able to be "out of God's will". And this can be applied to jobs or picking the right college. It can even be used in deciding who to marry. (Yes, there is more than just one person that you are able to marry. God doesn't set us loose in a maze, blindfolded, and tell us to somehow find the person whose fingerprints match our own. He gives us some leeway in this case.)

God created us with the ability to make good decisions, and we should exercise this ability, rather than allow ourselves to be paralyzed by the fear of doing something that God does not approve of. 

How sweet it is

Easeful – relaxed.

Exquisite – great beauty and delicacy.
Is not she an exquisite creature? p. 70.

Maul – 1. to wound by scratching or tearing.
2. to handle or treat savagely or roughly.
He mauled the edges of the paper with his reddened and blackened hands.

Flicker – 1. to shine or burn unsteadily or intermittently.
2. (of a feeling), to be briefly perceptible.
3. to make small, quick movements.

Spectral – of or like a spectra.
Spectrum: ‘image, apparition’ a band of colors produced by separation of the components of light by their different degrees of refraction, e.g. in a rainbow.

Dusk – the darker stages of twilight.
The fire light flickered on the wall and beyond the window a spectral dusk was gathering on the river.



This is what I'm doing for "work" now. I say "work" because it's not really. It's fun for an over-obsessive, perfectionist, wordprocessing freak like me.


I like words.

The Piercing

I’m looking at pictures of you, and
I don’t recognize the person I see.

I don’t recognize that smile, or that
hairstyle, or your sweatshirt, or the
way you do your make-up. When
did you become a stranger to me?

I’m confused by how it happened,
but I know it had to happen. We
aren’t kids anymore, and maybe
that’s all we had in common: just
a background, a story, and stories
can’t last forever. They have to have
some kind of ending. Is this ours?
Is this it? Are we no longer destined
to be friends for life?

Are you ready to let me go?

Maybe you already have.

From a while ago, but I'm feeling it now

save it for later

What happens when we grow up? What happens
when our beginnings have finally turned into the
middle, and we're no longer able to see down
that finnicky old tunnel that most people call life
and that sometimes involves sea lions and youth
pastors and sunsets that can never be erased from
the corners of your mind...? Some people fall, and
some people forget, and some people get lost in
the gigantic San Diego Zoos of life and are never
quite returned again. But when you look at what the
purpose is, at what should be pushing us forward
into this new "epoch" of our life, maybe they were
lost for a good cause. Because remembering them
is almost as good as really being with them.

Right?

Just a thought

Someday, I would like to live on Languid Lane.

Mirrors and Books

'"It's not that easy. They just like somebody that can give them a purpose."

"A purpose?"

"Right. You know? Girls like guys to be a challenge. It gives them some mold to fit in how they act. Like a mom. What would a mom do if she couldn't fuss over you and make you clean your room? And what would you do without her fussing and making you do it? Everyone needs a mom. And a mom knows this. And it gives her a sense of purpose. You get it?"

"Yeah," I said even though I didn't. But I got it enough to say "Yeah" and not be lying, though.

"The thing is some girls think they can actually change guys. And what's funny is that if they actually did change them, they'd get bored. They'd have no challenge left. You just have to give girls some time to think of a new way of doing things, that's all. Some of them will figure it out here. Some later. Some never. I wouldn't worry about it."'

'I never once thought that it would mean Sam might start liking me. All I cared about was the fact that Sam really got hurt. And I guess I realized at that moment that I really did love her. Because there was nothing to gain, and that didn't matter.'

'"Charlie, don't you get it? I can't feel that. It's sweet and everything, but it's like you're not even there sometimes. It's great that you can listen and be a shoulder to someone, but what about when someone doesn't need a shoulder? What if they need the arms or something like that? You can't just sit there and put everybody's lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love. You just can't. You have to do things."

"Like what?" I asked. My mouth was dry.

"I don't know. Like take their hands when the slow song comes up for a change. Or be the one who asks someone for a date. Or tell people what you need. Or what you want."'

Quotes all taken from The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, my current favorite book.

growing in Grace

So I was thinking...


My vocab is so huge cause I read so much.

My imagination is so crazy cause I think so much.

My eyes are so wide cause I look so much.


My heart is so full cause I love so much.

Yep, it doesn't help anything to just "feel bad". But it does move the heart to action. And that's where feelings and sympathy and empathy and all that good stuff comes in.

We'll never know the difference between right and wrong, happy and sad, fixable and leaveable if we can't feel those differences. 

Feeling bad is where it all starts. Don't make it seem like it's the wrong thing to do.

Proverbs 15:1

A gentle answer turns away wrath, but harsh words stir up anger.

Do you realize??

I come from a place 

that intoxicates it's visitors with sweet-smelling flowers and

towering mountains, a place that stays fresh in your mind

until you can't hold back from returning, just onemoretime, 

to catch a glimpse of that overpowering joie de vivre. You see,

my home is a home

that will never let go of your soul, even though you think you've

moved on, the eyes that at first welcomed you and made you 

the highest priority (then later forgot) will always live in a picture

at the foreground of your thoughts. No one ever understands

what makes this body

so intoxicating, so inviting, so INTERESTING, because to the

untrained eye, what makes it so special is exactly what makes

it ordinary. Ordinary and plain and simple and underwhelming,

while at the same time, unforgettable. If you won't forget, then

neither will I.

I lay all of my birdies

I was getting ready in the Hastings' guest bathroom this morning when it finally hit me again; on a plaque hanging from a bathroom wall was written this verse:

"Trust in the LORD with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight."

So often I forget that worrying is the sin of not giving all your cares to God. He expects us to trust that He rules over our futures. When we try to take our troubles upon ourselves, we usually learn the hard way that we have nothing to do with how things turn out.

I don't want to keep relearning this again and again. I want it to forever be pressed on my heart. But I don't think that's how humans work. We live circular lives, always coming back to the lessons we thought we had memorized by heart. That's also how God set up our lives: we weren't created to learn something once and remember it forever.


I cast all my cares upon You
I lay all of my birdies down at Your feet
And anytime I don't know what to do
I just cast all my cares upon You

Under our bare feet in this brand new colony

Well, I fell in love again... with The Postal Service:

I'll be the waterwings that save you if you start drowning

In an open tab when your judgement's on the brink

I'll be the phonograph that plays your favorite

Albums back as you're lying there drifting off to sleep...

I'll be the platform shoes and undo what heredity's done to you...

You won't have to strain to look into my eyes

I'll be your winter coat buttoned and zipped straight to the throat

With the collar up so you won't catch a cold

Lovely. Strange. Beautiful. And lovely.

Get Naked

Nothing will come between me and my Naked Juice.

Californians Must Be Crazy

A few hours ago, I was sitting in my car, patiently counting down the minutes to the end of my lunch break. That's when a drop of water hit my windshield. Another one followed. Then another, and another, and suddenly it was drizzling. The only thoughts running through my head at this point had to do with dreading the idea of moving all my stuff from one house to another in the rain, which is what I have to do today, come 5 o'clock. I also inexplicably had a craving for blueberries and ice cream, a craving that California rain almost always brings out in me.

My lunch break ended, and I briskly walked through the rain into the office where I work. This is where the pandemonium began.


Minutes after I approached my bosses' desk:

My boss (L), after tilting her head to one side and hearing the sounds of rain drops on the windows and roof: Is it raining?

Me: Yeah, it was kind of drizzling-

L: It's RAINING?!?!?

Woman who works next door (M): It IS! It IS raining!! Come look, come look!!

After this command, five of the women who work in the office huddled in front of a nearby window, where they proceeded to exclaim in high pitched voices over the (ridiculously small) amount of rain drops falling from the sky.

And then the unimaginable happened:

L: IS THAT HAIL?!?!?!?

M: No, it couldn't be hailing!!!!

L: It IS!! Look at the GRASS!! It's HAIL!!!

And then they all ran outside - outside - to watch it rain. And they weren't the only ones standing outside. Most of the people who work in this building were also standing outside. Watching. The. Rain.

Later, we had another episode where L realized that other boss, C's car window was rolled down, so L had to race around the office in search of an umbrella - M burst out with a chorus of "Under my umbrella, ella, ella" here - so C could run outside and close her windows.

Since then, the lights have flickered a couple of times and have completely gone out twice. It's also turned into a full-on thunderstorm, with loud noises and even lightning!

The most annoying thing about this rain is that two days ago, the temperature was in the hundreds. And I thought rainy season in Ecuador was bipolar.






I'm just praying that rain will never make me as psychotic as it makes most people who live here.

So let's make it rock

Well I'm sitting in an empty dorm room, surrounded by the scent of Clorox. That's what us college students use to clean our desks at the end of the year when it's covered in layers of dust and eye sleepies.

The end of the year. Really? Already?

It's amazing how quickly something that you've looked forward to for so long can pass. During my last year of high school, I couldn't wait for May 13th so that I could finally graduate and start my life in the real world.

And then you realize that what makes life real is how much you put into it.

I took Philosophy this semester, and we studied all sorts of ontological and rational and empiricistical stuff. We talked about Plato's cave example and what happens when you die and if there really is a God.

But none of that really matters. All philosophical theories are just ideas that men have had over the past hundred (thousands, even) of years. It's just speculation. It never comes to any conclusions, which actually drove me crazy during the process of learning about it, but thinking about it now, it's not so bad. It feels like a metaphor for life; we all live without conclusions, without finishing our thoughts or determining exactly who we are.

Life is about what you make of it. If you don't put that effort into making your life exciting, interesting, adventurous, and in the end, liveable, it won't be any of those things. It will be boring. It will be dull. It will be monotonous, beating to the rhythm of a drum that lost its prime long ago.

Life's what you make it.

It happens

Only during finals week can 12:00 midnight feel more like 12:00 noon.

I took a lovely walk over to Crestview a few hours ago for a study party (more like a "complain about this horrible horrible week" party) and it was ridiculously hot outside, due to this crazy thing called summer. I'm still completely not used to actually seeing seasons change. This spring has been the first spring I've experienced in a very very long time.

So anyway, on my way back from my study party, I walked by Trinity tables. There were dozens of people out there and even some guy playing a very pretty tune on his guitar. I was impressed. Also freaked out by the fact that it was midnight and I was hours away from sleep.

And then these words floated into my head: "I am such a college student."

God's Love Letter to You

I found this in my mailbox this morning. I don't know who put it in there or where it came from, but it definitely put a smile on my face as I was walking back to my dormroom and I couldn't stop thinking about it all day. I think that's the sign of a great love letter.

God's Love Letter to You

I made her... she is different. She's Unique. With love I formed her in her mother's womb. I fashioned her with great joy. I remember, with pleasure, the day I created her.

I love her smile.
I love her ways.
I love to hear her laugh!
And the silly things she says and does.
She brings me great pleasure.
This is how I made her...

I made her pretty and not beautiful, because I knew her heart, and I knew she would be vain... I wanted her to search out her heart, and to learn that it would be Me in her that would make her beautiful... and it would be Me in her that would draw friends to her.

I made her in such a way that she would need Me. I made her a little more lonesome than she would like to be... only because i need for her to learn to depend on Me... I know her heart, I know if I had not made her like this she would go her own chosen way and forget Me... her creator.

I have given her many good and happy things... because I love her.

Because I love her, I have seen her broken heart, and the tears that she has cried alone. I have cried with her, and had a broken heart too.

Many times she has stumbled and fallen alone only because she would not hold My hand. So many lessons she's learned the hard way because she would not listen to My voice.

So many times I have sat back and sadly watched her go her merry way alone. Only to watch her return to My arms, sad and broken.

And now she is Mine again. I made her. Then bought her. Because I love her.

I have to reshape her and remold her... to renew her to what I had planned for her to be. It has not been easy for her or for me.

I want her to be conformed to My image. This high goal I have set for her.

Because I love her.

Colonel T. M. Everett

I have a new fish languishing in pink fishy-paradise on the top shelf of my desk right now. His name is Colonel Theodore Michael Everett, and he kind of loves his new home. Sometimes he swims across his bowl and I can't stop looking at him because his tail-fin is so lovely. I think he knows how beautiful he is because I've caught him a couple of times looking up at the reflective surface of the water like he's checking himself out. I would have a fish like that. I would.

A house

Tonight, I'm in Colorado Springs.

It's funny how many memories can be connected with just one house. My grandparents have owned this particular home for as long as I can remember and probably even before that; countless Christmases and various summer vacations have been spent here, miniature golfing at the Putt-Putt course down the road, cracking nuts in the living room, and of course, getting as much of the family together as possible for that essential family portrait, many of which hang in positions of importance in this house.

The last time I was here, I was spending only a night before a long road trip back to Dana Point, California. I was preoccupied with thoughts of "major" social events I was missing, a church choir program and several all-important date nights in particular. (In fact, I was so consumed by those thoughts that I even forgot to notice the brand-new shelving unit in the living room.)

A house can measure your growth just like those enormous rulers your parents used to draw on the back of your bedroom door. Every time you enter a house, all the feelings you felt the last time you were there welcome you at the entrance, and for a slight moment, you're exactly the same person you were two years ago.

whimsical, thankyou

The search for the end of the perfect rainbow was on.
Gena was once again caught up in wonder. Her heart felt as light as the after-rain sky above and every shadow, storm, and cloud that had previously been holding her captive had cleared. These were the effects of the fascination that took control of her senses every time a long rain finally ended. But unlike other gloomy showers, this one had put a flawless, perfect rainbow in the sky above her small town of Chestnut, California and Gena was intent on finding the end.
It wasn’t that she expected to find a pot of gold or even a leprechaun. In fact, Gena had actually developed a fear of the little green Irishmen during her fourth grade year when her best friend, Mara had dressed up as a leprechaun for Halloween; Gena was sure that the costume wasn’t meant to instill a fear of all things Irish in small, impressionable children, but unfortunately that’s what had happened. Since then, Gena had always secretly questioned the exact intentions of leprechauns.
No, it definitely wasn’t a leprechaun that Gena wanted to find at the end of this rainbow.
An old pink bicycle was accompanying her on her quest. Together, they traveled up Potter’s Grove Street and down an unnamed side street, where Gena said out loud to herself (altogether a very charming and annoying habit), “I wonder why this street doesn’t have a name” and continued down the redwood-lined road. Her eyes were stuck on the brilliant rainbow as all other thoughts were pushed out of her preoccupied mind.
It was an obsession, really; Gena felt she couldn’t focus on anything else until she reached the end of that all-consuming rainbow and witnessed for herself the magic she was convinced was waiting, just waiting for someone curious enough to snatch it. And she had to be that curious someone. Her desire to reach the magic flowed out of her heart and into her fingertips. All over, her body tingled with the anticipation of discovering something new and a silent, joyous song began to hum its way down, down to her toes.
Looking ahead, Gena could see where the rainbow dipped into a tightly huddled grove of trees halfway up Pistachio Mountain. The only problem was that she had run straight into a roadblock: Mr. Duskin, the owner of the sliver of the mountain where the rainbow-glowing grove of trees resided, happened to be the most overbearing, overprotective, overparanoid man Gena knew. He was always complaining to the town mayor, Gena’s grandfather that yet another group of “teeny boppers” had trampled the neon-red “WARNING” signs that littered Mr. Duskin’s property fence from one side to the other.
As she had been throughout her life, Gena was completely aware of the trouble she was getting herself into as she pushed her slight body through the one hole in the fence that hadn’t yet been secured with twelve planks of wood. “At least I have a good reason for trespassing,” she said out loud to herself, again in that offhanded manner of hers. Any anxiety she might have had about intruding on Mr. Duskin’s property was dissipated by the thought of reaching that perfect rainbow and Gena began to run up the side of the mountain, so consumed by the thought of finally reaching the magic that wonder and enthrallment took control of her footsteps and propelled her towards the as-yet unseen trunk of the rainbow.