Long Purple Bike

IA Summit in New Orleans!

2012-01-21T21:23:00.002-05:00

Today was my last day at Chick-fil-A. Boy am I glad to be done there. I was doing way too much between Chick Fil A, Converse, and classes, and it was taking a toll on my health and the quality of my education. I am paying good money for this MLIS. I want to squeeze every drop of learning from it I can. Now I can focus those eight hours a week on career development, and being better prepared for class.

This week, I have been preparing to go to IA Summit. I am really excited about this - someone at InfoCamp told me about it - it's the event where User Experience and Information Architecture professionals gather. Information Architecture is basically the structuring of information on the web so it makes sense and people can find what they're looking for. You could think of Information Architects as "web librarians." User Experience is about looking at your website (or any product, service, or place) through the eyes of the person using it - What are they trying to do? What do they notice? How does this come across to them? Then you can design or refine your thing so that it really serves the end user, and gives them a positive total experience. If you're curious, you can check out my Prezi, or visit the Information Architecture Institute, Usability Professionals Association, or Interaction Designers Association.

So I registered and got the early bird rates, researched transportation and lodging (I love Megabus - round trip to Mobile for $4!!) made a budget, applied for funding, and started beefing up my professional presence online. I have the beginnings of a professional portfolio I made for class last semester. Check out my portfolio! (and let me know what you think...)

Oh and I'm also just excited because it's going to be in New Orleans. I've never been there before! I'm gonna get there a day early and do a little sightseeing. And I will definitely be blogging about it. I love writing about my travels! Just for fun, I dug up my old college blogs about Spring Break '08 in Athens, GA. You can read them here and here.

Re-living some of the fun of InfoCampSC. Here are some pix.

Prayers for Matthew

2012-01-10T01:47:00.003-05:00

I finished reading Praying for Your Future Husband. It was excellent. Like Pam said, it is definitely geared toward teen girls but certainly of value to unmarried sisters of any age, even if they have someone in mind at the time.

A long time ago, I made a silly little pact with God. I wanted to pray for my future husband, whoever he really was, but I didn't know how. I could only pray in vague generalities. Then my affections locked onto a particular brother. Rather than exhausting my mental capacities in fighting it, as my stoic tendencies and the church culture seemed to dictate, I decided, instead, to pray for him.
If my thoughts were to turn to him every hour, at least I could turn those thoughts into prayers. The pact I made with God was that every prayer I prayed for him, could also be applied to whoever my future husband really was, assuming it wasn't him. I figured prayer could only help, even better if it helped two people at once. And learning the habit of intercessory prayer was certainly more beneficial than idle fantasizing. I don't know how God felt about that pact, but it was what it was.

Fast forward seven years. Now there is a brother who stands a good chance of being my future husband. Instead of imagining all the things he may be going through or that the Lord may need to do in his life, I can ask him, I can see for myself. Now, no longer are my prayers a young girl's attempt to make something useful out of a bunch of frustrating and potentially wasted feelings, but rather the earnest seeking of the very best of God's will for another human being whose life may end up inextricably intertwined with my own. I feel it is my duty to pray for Matthew. It is also my delight. And I don't even feel the need to make a pact like I did before - instead I'm just taking a step of faith that he is the one, and recognizing God's goodness in any agape love I have for him, regardless. The funny thing is, as God has given me a heart to pray for him, He is enlarging my heart to intercede for others as well.

Matthew and I spend New Year's together. I met his family, his friends, and his spiritual companions and mentors. We talked a lot, we did other things as well, like visit the High museum of art, drink Korean tea, and dance in the firelight. But the best part was the heartfelt fellowship and the prayer. It is amazing how our hearts beat with the same purpose, the same vision. Even though we came to it from such wildly different directions. Matthew, raised a Methodist, saved at the moment of his baptism, serving as a lay pastor, the heat and pressure of a missional life under attack by a secular college culture charting a rapid course of Christian growth. Me, anti-denominational, anti-clergy/laity, Christian since the age of 5, filled with the Spirit, sheltered and nurtured in a thickly Christian community, seeking a life of monastic purity and rigid discipline whilst God showed me freedom and richness of experience over and over.

When I first saw the vision of the glorious church life, the life of shepherding the saints, the life of hospitality and true communion in Christ, the life of a family dedicated, one hundred percent, to existing by God's grace and power as a light in this dark, dark world, I could not have imagined fulfilling it in the kind of setting God may be calling us into. (I hesitate to spell it out here, for one because it is still so tentative, and two because I yet fear it will be misinterpreted and judged by many dear to me.) But the point is, we are given to following the Lord, wherever He may lead. If there is any thing God has taught me it's that I can't limit Him, neither can I know exactly what He intends until He's done it. All I can do is pray, and walk in faith, one step at a time.

I wanted to write about my New Year's resolution (to observe the Sabbath truly and meaningfully). I also wanted to narrate the highlights of the last month (Christmas with family - this year including my sister and hers). I had planned photo slideshows (of my CSA veggie creations for one). I wanted to mention how God answered my prayers about serving the saints by sending an invitation to help lead a Bible study, out of the blue. I wanted to introduce what I will be expecting for school this term (Info organization and online marketing) and new developments at work (I'm guaranteed at Converse at least through June). I suppose now I've at least given those things a nod. But the one image that I can't get out of my mind, what I feel compelled to record, above all the others, is how I spent the turning of the new year - in my beloved's arms. They say how you spend New Year's day is a forecast of how you will spend your year. I say they are superstitious. But I also hope, in this case, that they're right.

Prayers:

For patience to endure the years that may pass before we can act upon the love begun between us
For clarity in all our dealings with one another
For wisdom in Matthew choosing a seminary and discerning God's will for his path this fall
For diligence in me remaining faithful to my studies
For commitment in our relationships and responsibilities to those around us
For healing from wounds opened by ones held dear and by circumstances
For openness to God's penetrating, perfecting work in our hearts
For contentment in the exact situations in which God has placed us - and eyes to see the work cut out for us where we are
For God's perfect will, not His second best, unhindered by our impatience, assumptions of who we should be, or presumptions of what we should do
For continued faith in the absolute, unfathomable goodness of God - especially when some facets of our lives don't bear immediate witness to it
For the real influence of Godly counselors to point us to God, the path, and the truth
For the daily presence of the Holy Spirit to comfort and guide us
For a steady contact with the living Word of God.

I have to stop. It is so late. But God is good. Love is good too.

Do Hard Stuff

2011-12-16T16:01:00.002-05:00

After discovering the Modesty Survey (fascinating!) through a random blog I found after reading Pam's review on "Praying for Your Future Husband," an internet jaunt landed me on this excellent blog post written by a 17-year-old in 2006 about success and failure as perceived through the eyes of a child, versus the eyes of a teen. Imagine your reaction if a four-year-old told you, "I'm just not a toilet person." Now imagine, or remember, your reaction when a teen or adult says "I'm just not a math person," or "I'm just not a people person."

How much are we letting our limitations define us? I could go off on this, but I need to go cook dinner. Lunch was a turnip. And a very good turnip it was.
I need rest.
Go read "My First Shower Nearly Killed Me."

Thanksgiving photos!

2011-12-13T21:44:00.003-05:00

Thanksgiving 2011 , a set on Flickr.

Yes, it is almost Christmas. But now I am out of school I can do fun things like make photo galleries. I am using Flickr's Blogger share feature. We'll see how it looks.

Why not make a night of it?

2011-12-08T05:16:00.001-05:00

Ever been so exhausted you can't sleep? Such is the unfortunate state I find myself in, now at 5am, the day after I finished my final project for class. Bad news is, work at 9am. Good news is, NO MORE SCHOOL FOR A MONTH! Hooray!

I have utilized this bout of sleepnessness to make a few improvements to the blog. Notice the new pages at top. Also, I am trying to increase the readability of the text - darkened some colors. Let me know if it's still hard to read.

I wanted to show you my final project for graduate school. After 36 hours of labor on the presentation alone (the project itself totaled far more) I am justifiably proud. Enjoy!

Converse Web Experience Survey on Prezi

All this work on the Converse website has made me realize how my blog is kind of stuck in the mid-00's and it was never very reader-centric. In an attempt to modernize, I will be incorporating more interactivity, like this Prezi, a music player, and Flickr slideshows. Who knows, now that I have a webcam I might start vlogging! I also want to add content which will hopefully be useful to you, starting with Scripture Songs and Teen Songwriters, which can be found above.

Lunch break at Converse

2011-11-30T13:31:00.001-05:00

Ten minutes to spare, munching on my Fresh Market sushi.

Matthew came this weekend. Matthew, that's his name. My gentleman. Charming, passionate, godly Matthew. Of the many indelible memories we made together, the peak was probably dancing on a rooftop in Greenville. It was sunset, he put on Frank Sinatra, donned a fedora and swept me off my feet. Top that, gentlemen. :-P

I had always sort of skipped the romance part of my considerations of a man. In my mind it was kind of like, God points out the one and then I say OK, now we have to work through X,Y, and Z and then we can get married and the real stuff starts. I take coupleness very seriously. Its goal is to fulfill God's purpose and also provide an image of what God wants His relationship with His church to be. I focused on the first part of that more, the team aspect, laboring together for the gospel and to bring the Lord back.

But honestly, the Bible is just as much about romance as it is about God's will. You can't split them because God's heart is utterly romantic. I knew that - have felt Jesus wooing me, romancing me all these years, but I guess I never thought about an earthly man's right - prerogative - to do the same thing. In his deep love, his satisfaction in me, his delight in my every happiness, Matthew is teaching me about Jesus. It takes a lot to allow yourself to be loved, at least for me it does. But as I see Matthew's joy in my simply receiving his affections, I see Jesus' delight when the heart turns to him, and a reflection of the glory as the veil is taken away (2 Cor. 3:16).

I know first love is not necessarily last love, and that there is no sureness until the day of unbreakable vows, but still, this is a beautiful thing that God has made, and I will thank Him and delight in it.

Matthew and I at Falls Park

Twitter!

2011-11-05T16:42:00.000-04:00

I finally caved and joined. The thing about twitter is that if you don't have anything to say, you don't have to tweet. You can just follow people. Some people actually have interesting things to say. So it's pretty much a professional tool for me to stay in touch with information fields. Maybe I will tweet interesting links. So here's me on twitter: @Lydia_Anthony

In other news, my dad and I got our old broken washer and dryer out of the house today. We're getting working ones this week. Now we just have to get a stove, microwave, oven, and central heating and we'll be like normal middle class Americans!

Love and Respect and...Courting...

2011-10-30T15:32:00.003-04:00

First of all, awesome blog that my mom turned me on to. She and my dad went to this marriage seminar based on the book, Love and Respect, and they seemed to have really had a good time. Turns out the folks that do the seminar have a daughter who writes a blog for us young single folks...it's actually not only thoughtful, relevant and Biblically sound, but it has this unexpected streak of ridiculousness that keeps me laughing. The blog is called Love and Respect Now.

So yeah, relationships have been on my mind for the past...several months. Well, six weddings in one year, a girl's bound to at least give it a thought...;-)
I've written blogs about it that have either stayed in draft, been trashed, or posted and then removed. This is perhaps the only thing that I'm really super shy and awkward about. But I feel like the time has come to open up on my blog, at least a little bit.

I didn't date, at all, through high school and college, and only just became open to the idea this past year. I read Joshua Harris's "I Kissed Dating Goodbye." I was perfectly happy giving my singleness to God. That was what was expected while I was in the Training, as well. To this day I am content with the choices I made. But of course, you come to new phases of your life. So, maybe in January 2011, I set my facebook status to "single." Before that it was...nothing. Nun, I guess. :-) That was a small outward indicator of a decision within me, the result of much prayer and meditation, a conclusion that I was ready to...be courted. (Yes, I am hopelessly old fashioned.) Without getting into detail about what all transpired over 2011, at this point, it tickles me pink to say that I am indeed being courted, by an utterly charming and wonderful young brother whose passion for Christ reminds me of the book of Acts and whose winning way makes me feel like the star of a fairytale. :-) No, don't be alarmed, it is only in the early stages, and only God knows what will become of it. But after months of fear, nervousness and awkwardness, (half growing up a church kid does create its own odd baggage) I have tied my hat on tight (read: brain), placed my trust in God, and am just allowing myself to enjoy the ride.

I don't know how much I will divulge on my blog as of yet. It took considerable courage just to write this much. So pardon me if I err on the side of discretion.

In other news, I sideswiped a truck on Thursday. Knocked out my headlight. That was annoying.

Oh, and another wedding in November will bring the year's total to 7. This one is two old acquaintances from Summer School of Truth and conferences - an unexpected but adorable match. Actually, this sister also had to leave the Training because of health reasons - this with a few other stories have got me wondering, is medical leave one of God's clever match-up strategies? Time will tell. >.< But anyway, I am looking forward to my second church life wedding.

A meditation on Psalm 6

2011-10-07T23:56:00.003-04:00

Props to my best friend Pam, who is participating in a challenge to blog about a single topic for 31 days. She chose the Psalms, and is inviting her readers to link up with their own Psalm meditation. So here is mine.

Psalm 6 (NIV)

¹ LORD, do not rebuke me in your anger
   or discipline me in your wrath.
² Have mercy on me, LORD, for I am faint;
   heal me, LORD, for my bones are in agony.

³ My soul is in deep anguish.
   How long, LORD, how long?
⁴ Turn, LORD, and deliver me;
   save me because of your unfailing love.
⁵ Among the dead no one proclaims your name.
   Who praises you from the grave?
⁶ I am worn out from my groaning.
   All night long I flood my bed with weeping
   and drench my couch with tears.
⁷ My eyes grow weak with sorrow;
   they fail because of all my foes.
⁸ Away from me, all you who do evil,
   for the LORD has heard my weeping.
⁹ The LORD has heard my cry for mercy;
   the LORD accepts my prayer.
¹⁰ All my enemies will be overwhelmed with shame and anguish;
   they will turn back and suddenly be put to shame.

Meditation:

Who said meditations had to have words?

A fairytale wedding in pictures

2011-10-06T22:45:00.004-04:00

My brother's wedding was so much more amazing than I could have imagined. He has a wonderful wife and awesome supportive friends that helped them pull off their dream wedding. Without further ado, a photographic narrative. (For a soundtrack to the story, I recommend Beats Antique.)

The lovely bride, Ivy. To think,
this veil was only for the bachelorette party!

Aaron, Ivy and company trampolining.

Aunt Mary Beth gets a feather!

Ivy gets henna.

Creating prayer flags

Finished prayer flags!

Rehearsal dinner

My niece Shakti (in pink)

My sister Esther has such a beautiful family.

My aunt Dede made it from El Paso. 2 aunts together
at once. that's Anthony history!

Me pre-revelry

Cutest little washstand!

Esther's mother-in-law Karen with husband David

The Wedding Tree

Shakti the Flower Girl

the Happy Groom

Mr. Ivey gives the bride away.

Guests stand in rapt attention as bubbles fill the sunset sky.

Mike, AKA Smiley, officiates.

A present for the happy couple.

Cake!

Cake cutting time!

That's Ivy saying "you better not smash that in my face!"

With her wonderful earmuffs, Nova could sleep
through even the loudest DJs. Esther is Supermom!

The Festivities

Yes, my mother dances.

Dance floor!

Baby dances too.

Me mid-revelry

Me post-revelry

My tent (courtesy of Esther and Brandan)

The bridal bower (that they never actually
slept in because they never actually slept!)

How can she party all night and still look this good?

The view from my brother's couch

My brother-in-law Brandan rocks the synth
at the Pecan Street Festival.

His twin, Alan on bass. Not pictured is the foggy daze
through which I viewed the entire day after the wedding.

My aunt DeDe. Not pictured is the scooter with which
I giddily traversed Whole Foods after injuring my leg.

I love my family!

I hope you have enjoyed this evening's presentation. In other news, I am enjoying fresh raw string beans from my very first delivery from SHAREcroppers CSA. Mmm!

AiR Jam

2011-08-20T14:57:00.004-04:00

Thursday, I went to Hub-Bub's AiR art talk/open studio. Got there a little late so I missed the beginning of writer-in-residence Eric's talk, but the last bit of it was good, as were the other talks. I really wanted to spend some time in the gallery getting acquainted with their work first, but the open studio was a rare opportunity to see their workspaces so I followed the crowd up the stairs. Eric, the writer, was my first stop. He apologized for not having much to show because he wasn't a visual artist but he did have his MFA thesis lying out for perusal so I read a few poems while community members and ex-AiRs stopped in to chat. Someone brought him some basil seeds for his mini herb garden - apparently he'd made a few remarks about it in his talk before I got there. He also had a guitar, base, and ukelele out that he welcomed his visitors to play.

The Writer in his Natural Habitat

Mark was the AiR that I met Sunday at the drum circle. He toured as a musician before he got into art in a big way. He mentioned he was making a series of non-athletic games during his talk, so I was kind of excited to play. I saw the Pang-Pung table hanging on the wall when I first walked in, studied it briefly as an artwork, then moved on. Then when I asked Mark about the games, he said if I would help him get the Pang-Pung table, we could play. As we took the big heavy hourglass-shaped piece of wood off the wall, I noticed it was a fully functional playing table with a divider marked by nails and yarn. We set it up and the next thing I knew there were a bunch of kids playing Pang-Pung.

Girls' Team.

At play.

Camille's apartment was comparatively calm. She has a really awesome hammock. She designs rescue devices for a variety of situations. She also likes to draw her prayers, spending hours, as she put it, in her hammock making tiny neurotic drawings. I like her prayer drawings. Also chatted with a new-to-the-area artist, Lee, about theology and some ancient dude that was almost Gnostic but not quite.

Steve was busy with guests, so I decided to go back downstairs for some food and to finally take a closer look at their art. The AiRs made some of the snacks. They were quite delicious. Stuffed mushrooms with garlic and a brie-wasabi-pea-Siracha cracker. I got to spend some time particularly with Mark's work. His MFA thesis, I guess, culminated in a series of artworks and a book entitled FLF. I had been trying to piece together some of the narrative of his work from my brief glimpses and what I had seen in his studio, and he told me the whole story was in the book. It centered around a protagonist named Kevinator and a rather frightful cloud of dogs in a post-apocalyptic scenario. The story was told with pictures and a phonetic dialect called Rungish. He also had an honor system store which I had been meaning to get something from. I spent some time shopping around and picked out a few things.

Two items from the Goatmother Industrial Voyage Corps Gifts Honor System Store.

This is an example of Rungish. See if you can decipher it.

I titled this poster the Sheep Cloud.

I can't decide whether I want to put it up in my room or relish the fact that it fits inside such a tiny box.

My favorite purchase by far was the face plant, a collaboration between Mark and Eric. It included a block print, an original poem, and the block the print came from. No two are alike.

Face plant box.

Face plant print. Sorry he's upside down.

Face plant poem.

Face plant block, poem, and socks.

I love my face plant so much, I gave him my favorite pair of socks. I'm sure if he had feet he would really appreciate them.

Steve's thing has been Adventure Art. It was really interesting in his talk, he described this thing called a pseudo-event, which is basically an event completely staged and only put on for the sake of its documentation. Like a ribbon-cutting ceremony. More and more of life is becoming staged so that it can be presented in some mediated form, like photos and facebook. So anyway in his art he has these adventures, where he does something mildly interesting, like float in a couch down a river, and presents them in such a way (writing press releases, etc) to turn them into as big a deal as can possibly be made out of them. So he ends up being King of the River and having scores of people and a news crew turn up to watch him. Then he presents it through various media including video, installation, photography and writing. I was really fascinated and kind of thought of this blog, the way I turn events that may be just ordinary life to some people, into adventures by calling them that, photographing them, and writing them down. He inspired me to do even more with it. When I came back upstairs and talked to him we had a nice little conversation about it.

I flitted back and forth between the apartments, chatting more with the artists. Camille offered me a beer. That gesture of hospitality suggested that my presence was not entirely off-putting, so I was encouraged to stick around. An ex-AiR conducted a group personality assessment with some sheets of paper and chalk. Another ex-AiR, Patrick Whitfill, whom I've seen around a fair bit since he left the program and joined the local writing community, pulled out Eric's guitar and started playing it. I was offered more drinks and enjoyed the presence and conversation of interesting people.

I had wanted nothing more than to jam with Patrick and Eric and Mark since I had seen the collections of instruments in the two AiRs' rooms. Mark has a variety of guitars, a banjo, a harmonica, a funny little keyboard, and a drumset. My wish was granted. Steve pulled out his $1 flute he got at some gift shop and we all migrated to Mark's apartment where we rocked out for a good two hours.

Patrick on acoustic and Steve on flute.

Lee improvises at the mic.

Eric on bass.

I think this was Camille's sister.

Mark on drums.

Patrick bled all over Mark's guitar. It was epic.

Eventually everybody but Steve and me went out for a smoke break. We jammed on flute and harmonica and then talked about life, insomnia, music and art for a while and finally noticed they had been gone a really long time. We set out to find them and discovered Eric and Mark packing up for the night, so we parted company. It was a great evening. I want to do it again soon.

Settling in for the fall

2011-08-16T19:45:00.001-04:00

I am starting back to work at Converse tomorrow! I am so excited. Beth, Converse's director of communications, emailed me shortly after she found out that Kathryn, Converse's web content manager, would be moving on to teach at a technical college in Greenwood. I'm glad for Kathryn because teaching is what she really wants to do, and I'm glad for me because I love working at Converse, especially that job. I'm going to be a part-time interim content manager while they conduct a search, but you never know what might happen... :)

So I will be juggling two jobs and two classes this fall. I expect I will have my hands full. I've really enjoyed my little breather after summer school and am ready to tackle new classes on Thursday. I am taking Practicum in Organizing and Managing Web Resources (which meshes perfectly with being a web content manager!) and Principles of Assessment for LIS Professionals. I have been excited about the first class since I took Intro in the beginning of the summer. The same professor will be teaching it and I feel like I learn a lot from her. I really deliberated on whether to take the second class or not. It is a special topics class, which means this will be the only time it's offered while I'm in school. It will definitely be useful in my chosen field, since colleges are always doing some kind of assessment. In fact, I'm a little afraid with this class under my belt, the college I end up working at will rope me into being a part of all their assessment committees. It was fun and exciting as an undergrad, but now it just strikes me as a lot of additional work. Well, assessment is a powerful tool for improving your professional practice and your institution so... I think it will be good for me. And I ended up not having a choice. I had to take two classes to get loans.

I feel like I am really starting to settle back into life in Spartanburg. I know, it's been almost a year, but pretty much the first half of it I spent missing where I had been, and trying to go back, or at least get out of here. There were times when I felt pretty sorry for myself, since I really felt like I had given up everything to pursue the Lord. A great job, a great life, school/career opportunities all lined up and ready to go...I ended up not only sacrificing that but losing my health as well, ending up, seemingly, right back where I started, only worse off. But that's not really what was happening. God was taking me through growing experiences. Showing me more of who I am, what the church is, what's going on with the saints in the recovery and how I fit with all that, and just how big of a world I live in. Some of what I learned I liked, and some I didn't, but I'm glad to have learned it. I no longer feel that longing for the Training that I felt for months. I wanted so badly to be back there this term, but now it's pre-training week, and even hearing all the chatter on facebook about who's going back, and who's starting out, I can honestly say that I'm just happy for my friends who will be there. God's made it pretty clear it's not where I'm supposed to be right now, and He's reminding me of the rich awesome wonderful life that he's given me here.

So I'm connecting with friends old and new in the area, and remembering what it means to be a responsible family member. I'm cleaning, scything the lawn with my dad, and cooking with my mom. I talked my family into buying a half share at the local CSA. I'm enjoying community in Spartanburg. I went to Hub-Bub for the first time in...nearly two years, I guess. Enjoyed a delightful drum circle and met one of the Artists-in-Residence. I'll be back to take a closer look at his work, along with that of the other AiRs, on Thursday at the Art Walk. I will have to find yet another rhythm with a new job and a new school load, but I am confident that I can do all things in Christ who strengthens me, and, perhaps for the first time since I left, I'm looking forward to a future in Spartanburg that's bright with promise.

A snippet of the drum circle. Lots of fun!

Camping Scrapbook

2011-08-12T18:21:00.003-04:00

Finished the scrapbook today, after working on it feverishly all week. I learned a lot in the process. Pam has provided an excellent record of our adventures here, here, and here. Let me know what you think of my first digital scrapbook!

Click on the pictures to zoom in on Flickr. I feel like there should be like a back cover or something. Oh well.

Thanks to Summertime Designs for the kit, and Tom Kolter for the font.

Camping and more weddings

2011-08-08T09:34:00.000-04:00

So my best friend Pamela and I decided to plan a camping trip to celebrate finishing my first summer in graduate school. It ended up also being a celebration of her being healed from a medical condition, so it was doubly exciting. She's going to blog all about it in the next couple of days, so I won't say much except that it was awesome, we had plenty of unexpected adventures, and we made lots of good memories. I'm really getting into this digital scrapbooking thing, so I decided to memorialize the trip with a scrapbook. I'll post it here when I'm done. So far I've finished two pages. It's kind of addictive.

I've also been at two more weddings since I last blogged (bringing my total to five this year).One was an old friend from back in my homeschool days, Mikia. We haven't really kept in touch well so I was honored to be invited. It was a cute outdoor wedding with a beach theme. The second was a friend from freshman year of college, Shilo. She transferred sophomore year, but we were pretty close back in the day. She asked Pam and me to be bridesmaids, which I was really nervous about, since it was the day we left our campsite, but it was a huge honor. So after two days of getting wet and dirty and mucking about, we woke up early, packed up our gear, showered and got all fancy to be bridesmaids. It was a whirlwind, getting there barely in the nick of time, being handed a bouquet and told to lead the way out the door to the alter. Then a bunch of pictures outside on a hot muggy day and the reception. It was really sweet when we did the Converse tradition of circling the bride and singing the Alma Mater.

I am so excited to be finished with two classes! I've got about two weeks before the fall semester starts, and I plan to enjoy every bit of it. Though I really do need to figure out what I'll be taking this fall.

Here's the bride and her bridesmaids:

New Blog Layout!

2011-08-01T21:24:00.003-04:00

I am learning about html and web design in my graduate class and got inspired. :) I found this awesome digiscrapping blog (yay new word!) while working on one of my assignments and the Moments kit appealed to me. I found this cool font at DAfont.com and after several hours of labor, much tweaking and risky code manipulation, I am proud to present Long Purple Bike's new look. By the way, if you need free hi-res image hosting, Picture Push seems to be a pretty good choice.

Please tell me what you think of the new look!

Edit: Added "Why Long Purple Bike" page, went through and tagged all my posts from the beginning, and added a cute little tag cloud. Hopefully that will help you to discover and peruse more writings of interest. Remember, I LOVE comments! >.<

Three weddings, a graduate course and 3200 miles later...

2011-07-12T18:34:00.001-04:00

I am back from a surprise road trip to Texas. My cousin Martin passed away and my dad and I drove down to his funeral. We also got to catch up with my uncles Doc and Roy and my aunt Dede, and see my sister's baby Nova and my brother's new house. It was a long, grueling drive but the time with family was worth it.

The weddings were all great. They each had such a unique flavor that reflected the couples' personalities. The first was formal and elegant.

The second was charmingly rustic.

The third was funky and atmospheric.

I'm actually going to another wedding this month, and then my brother's wedding in September. 2011 is definitely my year of weddings. In other news, I finished my first course in graduate school. It was really intense. That's why you haven't heard from me in a month. My second course is slightly less intense but still time consuming. I forgot how much hard work it is to be in school. Here is my family, from my trip to Texas:

My uncle Doc. It was his son that passed away.

My aunt DeDe.

My uncle Roy.

My nieces, Nova and Shakti.

Ed Anthony and Offspring.

Weddings

2011-05-13T23:43:00.003-04:00

I am attending three weddings this spring. The first is tomorrow, two young people whom I met at Providence. Then there are the Vangsnes boys, whom I have known for several years now through bible study, who found themselves lovely Christian girls in Athens, GA and will be marrying within a week of one another. I really do enjoy weddings, especially when the couples are as dedicated to grounding their marriage in their faith as these folks are. The "three-strand chord" of Christian marital love is just so beautiful. I'm looking forward to them all.

I suppose you are wondering about the anime convention. It was, all in all, underimpressive. A small gathering in the student center of UNC Charlotte. But the cosplay was fun. And roaming around Ikea for two hours in costume was just as fun. So was enjoying cinnamon buns and milk while watching Haruhi Suzumiya back at Heather's house. Quite a lovely day, really. And, in case you were curious, here is my "completed" costume:

Chick-Fil-A and a Djembe

2011-04-17T23:17:00.001-04:00

I got a job! Part-time at Chick-fil-A. Of all the fast food restaurants I feel like this is the best place to work. The people are so friendly and really care to do a good job and make the customers happy. Plus, at the one I work at, they are nearly all Christian so the atmosphere is really positive. It's a bit stressful at times but I enjoy the work. I've also got an interview for an assistant position at a college library this week, that would be awsome because it's right in line with my chosen career path. (wow that phrase still feels funny...I actually have a career path...) Oh, and something really cool happened on my way home from work. My car wouldn't start - kind of normal with my car now, I just have to give it a little time and try again later - so I decided to go to Marshall's. In the back of the store, I found a djembe. A hand-carved djembe from Ghana, with a real skin head and beautiful designs on it. It was on clearance for $25!!! That's like, 90% off! I snatched it immediately. I have been wanting a djembe for years. So yeah, that was like a little gift from God my Father, reminding me He loves me.

Today we did our Easter celebration at Providence. I was in the handbell choir and the regular choir. It was a lot of fun practicing and putting it on. We did the Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's Messiah.

Next Saturday Heather and Bryant and I are going to an anime convention. I'm not like a hardcore anime fan, but I do appreciate a fair amount of anime and manga, and it's closeby and cheap. Plus Heather and I have been waiting for an excuse to dress up in costumes. It's kind of random, since they're steampunk costumes, but you can pretty much get away with anything at an anime convention. Here's a sneak preview of my costume:

Home and abroad, and home again

2011-03-06T22:44:00.001-05:00

Since I last wrote, I've been to New York, New Jersey, Washington DC, and Georgia. I visited my good friend Sarah Bracey Johnson at her seminary in Yonkers, and experienced the places and people who populated the New Jersey landscape of my BFF Pam's childhood. I've applied to a handful of jobs, sold a few gallons of carrot juice and soymilk, and started planting camilia cuttings to sell. I applied to begin graduate classes in the summer. I walked the Cottonwood trail, bartered a haircut for fudge, and watched a baby feel spring air on his skin and grass under his feet for the first time.

And I wrestled with God. At first, the unexpected turn of my life over these last few months was a new adventure, sovereignly prepared and sweetly paved. Like a young child, it seemed my every trifling obedience brought instant rewards. Or at least, for some inexplicable reason God was smiling on me. But lately, I've felt as if I'm only beginning to realize I got sent into a pit of waist-high mud and the whole time I thought I was running I only moved two feet and have since ceased to move entirely. Lazy, listless, spiritually drained, cranky. Escaping an ever-gloomier reality through the desperate consumption of books, movies, and music. My prayer life thinning to a tenuous thread, my Bible reading a sludgy trickle.

When I found out about the college-age conference in Athens, I was so hopeful, so eager. Most of us church kids look at these kinds of conferences as a spiritual "fix." It's not about some emotional high, it's about getting a concentrated dose of God. Hopefully jumpstarting our spiritual lives, reminding us how good He is and how to get Him. Turning a downward-facing life back towards the Prize to which God in Christ Jesus called us upward. I didn't really deserve to go to the college conference; I couldn't pay my own way. I'm not even a student, just vaguely college-aged. But I felt like I needed it so badly, was in such a pitiful condition, I didn't blink my eyes at accepting "charity" to get there. There was a kind of desperate hope, that something would change, I would see something more clearly. Mostly, I knew I would gain more of God and that always improves things.

I did gain God. And something changed. And I saw something more clearly than I did before, though God had already been giving me a fuzzy image. It's been hard coming to terms with the possibility that God might want me to stick in Spartanburg for the long term. I want nothing more than to be back in the Training, pursuing Him with my whole being. But see that's the thing, what I really want isn't what God wants, it's a particular means of reaching God. I could be a fox determined to climb the fence to reach the chickens because that's the best way I can see, refusing to listen to the chickens themselves telling me there's another way in.

Even before this conference I was starting to get the sense that going back to the training without God's clear leading would be an act of spiritual cowardice, showing a lack of trust in God's provision. My father doesn't feel the time is right to go back and I take his authority as from the Lord.
But even as I was sharing this glimmer of light with a few sisters at the conference, I was getting a taste of the life I've been missing. Fellowship, prayer, truth. A simpler church life, an easier way to be absolute for God. Clear choices. How I wish God would allow me such a black and white existence! Go to the meeting, or hang out in the world. Spend time with the saints, or indulge my own individualistic desires. It's human to seek the tangible, the quantitative. To measure spiritual progress with a checklist - how many meetings attended, how many people visited, how much time spent in prayer, how many chapters of the Bible read. But my life in Spartanburg has never been that clear-cut. Maybe, I was thinking midway through the conference, the Lord would desire me to move for the sake of the churchlife. Friends of mine are migrating - uprooting and moving somewhere they've never even seen, with the sole purpose of establishing a healthy church there. That's their whole focus for living. What a sense of purpose. Even my parents, when they were my age, moved across state and country so they could live the church life. So admirable. What could be wrong with me taking the same action?

A friend even dropped the hint - have you thought at all about moving? So I did, I really thought about it. I considered the steps to take, I even came home and started looking for jobs outside of Spartanburg. But he also urged me to pray about it. So I finally did. I asked God if it was His will for me to move. I told him I'd be willing. I thought, maybe the only reason I'm still in Spartanburg is because of the security of it, the practical simplicity of life under my parents' roof, on my parents' nickel. It makes a lot of logical, secular sense, but was I following reason at the expense of trust in God? I gave that to the Lord. I also gave Him my desire to escape, to find a "normal" churchlife. My hunger for radical action. My dad said that some people confuse "absoluteness for God" with spiritual laziness - doing all the things people expect you to do if you're serious about God. Following a formula. It drives me crazy because I don't know who of my friends outside of Spartanburg could understand how this anti-formula, as it were, sticking in this crazy barren looking Spartanburg life, could actually be an act of obedience. I really don't see it myself. It's a lot easier for me to understand leaving friends and family behind as Abraham did, to journey to the unknown on God's bidding. But as I prayed it became more and more clear that it was just me begging for the greenlight to escape. I remembered brother Lee's words to my dad: "make sure you're clear with the Lord before making your move." and eventually just asked for God's peace, provision and guidance if it really is His will for me to stay right where I am. The fact of the matter is, He hasn't given me the green light to leave this place. In fact, the more it makes spiritual sense to leave the more He seems to be telling me to stay.

So there it is. A roller coaster taking me in one big circle. I'm glad my friend told me to pray about it. Exploring my options with an open heart before the Lord, allowing Him to solidify His choice. Maybe this suspension in the mud is really just God holding me in His hand, waiting for me to stop struggling and just believe Him. I still have my work cut out for me. His will is for me to give myself to Him each day, be willing to lavish time on Him, listen to Him. His will is also for to follow the small steps He's shown me: to clean the house, to write and sing in a balanced way, to contact the saints, to help my parents, to faithfully seek employment (maybe casting my net a little further from home this time, just in case). Not particularly spiritual or admirable. But that is obedience. He's giving me just enough strength to do what I see to do. Not more so I can accomplish some great work, make some bold move. But enough. He's promised me that much.

My mom at the beach

2011-02-03T19:07:00.001-05:00

I'm blogging from my nook at JAVAJOE'S in Hilton Head, SC. Our week of vacation is almost up. I've come to realize it's been much more of a vacation for Mom than for Dad and I. For us, the main difference was a change of location.It's been fun, for sure. An excuse to be even lazier than normal, languid walks on the beach, a day exploring the history of Savannah on a Spanish moss-strewn trolley tour. But for Mom, it's so much more. It's meant a whole week of freedom. A chance to decide exactly what she wants to do and when, and then actually do it, guilt free. I didn't realize how special and rare it is for her until I actually saw her, smiling the kind of smile I haven't seen in a really long time, a huge grin that stretches all the way across her face. A really genuine smile, not the mona lisa smirk she puts on for pictures. In fact I only recall ever seeing this smile on my sister, Esther. So it really surprised me to see it on Mom. she's never this kind of happy.

I take freedom for granted. It's been a fairly normal condition for most of my life. But even before she started working full-time, mom has considered her time to belong to her family, not to her. Every moment she gets to herself she feels like she's stolen, and is plagued with guilt about it. It's the same whenever she spends money - she feels like she has to justify every dollar. I can't imagine feeling like that all the time. No wonder she gets so frustrated with dad and me and the way we spend our days. But sometimes I feel like her sacrificial attitude is causing more suffering than necessary. She's so stressed all the time that seeing her relaxed is somewhat of a shock. She doesn't have to justify the way she spends her time any more than we do, but she always does. When I brought up the idea of her having her own private space in the house, like a little reading nook/study, she acted like it was impossible. "Moms don't get their own space," she said. Certainly not with that attitude. But as much as that frustrated me, I can't help but wonder if I'll feel the same way when I'm a mom. Is this just part of the deal that comes with motherhood? The older I get the more I notice all the thankless stuff moms do. Certainly makes you think twice before signing on. I can tell myself I'll be "smart" about it, not get into this guilt cycle, cut myself some slack, but odds are l'll be exactly the same.
Anyways, I'm going to enjoy Mom's big, guilt-free grins while they last. I hope she's having a really stellar vacation. She deserves it more than any of us.

2011, the Idiot, and the Elusive Necessity of Yellow

2011-01-07T01:35:00.002-05:00

So far, the New Year has proven a whirlwind of social activity. In fact, this week has kind of felt like a roller coaster ride between one visit and the next. Lots and lots of fun, but... A friend of mine said it seemed like her best years often began with little to inspire confidence. So judging by the past seven days, here's hoping for a year of discipline, balance, and perspective. It's going to be exhausting just to recount the events of the week, but the mean streak in me wants to wear you out with it too. Starting with the Cheeks' house for New Year's Eve with Wii, movies, music and dancing - of course a very late night ending in a sleepover and completely wrecking the whole next day. (We were all pretty much lost causes on Saturday...but then that is sort of a normal condition for New Year's Day, isn't it?) Then Sunday evening at Grace's house for a conversation that ended up lasting past 1am, then on Monday to the movies (Secretariat!) with the Bennetts, followed by late-night stargazing on the Cowpens Battlefield, catching the Quadrantid meteor shower on a particularly beautiful, crystal clear night.

On Monday I found out about two great job opportunities but was also introduced to Prince Muishkin, one of the most captivating fictional men I have ever encountered. I met him in my NOOKcolor, in a set of 50 classics for two dollars, in the book entitled The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. This is after learning about him in that book I mentioned in the previous blog post, deciding immediately that he would be my introduction to the great Russian author.

For the last few months I have known that January would be the beginning of my re-entry into so-called "real life." I have been healing, pressure free, for a while now, and pursuing my passions with gusto, but I knew that at some point I would need to begin, in earnest, to look for work. The kind that gives you reliable money. (It seems the penniless invalid artist persona has an expiration date.) Fortunately, two bones were thrown my way, on the very first Monday of the year. If I had been a good girl, or perhaps hadn't recently been spending so much time having fun with friends, or hadn't just this week reduced my medicine dose by half, certainly if I had not encountered Prince Muishkin, I might have jumped on it and been able to get those applications in by the end of Monday, Tuesday at the latest. But I am not a particularly good or industrious girl, and I have been spoiled rotten of late, so I have managed to drag the applications out all week whilst running around having a jolly time. At least I got one done today. If I can wrap the other one up by the end of tomorrow I won't beat myself up too badly.

But on to Tuesday. I had been staying up far later and spending more time out than I have since...before the Training, really. Plus I had just tapped into a novel more engrossing than any I have read since...again before the Training. Waking up befuddled, but with the earnest intention to spend a serious day's labor trying to procure employment, I was offered a proposition by my father: go with him to take Mom to work, and then take our Nooks to Barnes and Noble to sample their "select in-store offerings." I had a pretty strong suspicion that making that choice would put my job applications in the back seat, but I chose to, nonetheless. With guilty delight I read the Idiot all the way in the car. When we got to Barnes and Noble, I passively watched two or three hours slide away while devouring books, magazines, essays, and a free smoothie. I did run into an old college acquaintance and had a lovely chat and fellowship. He's on break from seminary. Never would have expected it of him. Weird wonderful world.

Having managed to fritter away the morning, I came home with a somewhat weakened resolve to continue work on the applications (I really despise filling out those things. In fact there is little in life that I find more unpleasant than job-hunting.) Perhaps half an hour into that, I get phone calls confirming an arrangement made to spend time with Pam, my best friend somewhat neglected of late. That led into an argument with my dad over transportation at the end of which I felt emotionally ruined, for the day. My last sprig of industriousness fled, I decided obstinately to curl up and escape it all with the book that had been haunting me, blessing me, wooing me for two days. I went up to my room, opened my Nook, and didn't come out for air all afternoon. After a brief dinner with my parents and pathetic token effort toward the job applications, I returned to Prince Muishkin and spent the evening with him, not seeing, hearing, or caring for anything in the world but to follow him and his Christlike love and sufferings all the way to his quiet, sad fate. Finishing the novel in the wee hours of the morning, I was exhausted, transported, and vaguely registering the fact that I'd managed to escape the job hunt for an entire day, and that consequently I would really need to "buckle down" in the morning.

Wednesday morning I did manage, somewhat, to "buckle down," but being rather sleep-deprived, overstimulated, and distracted (my dad's the worst help - constantly reminding me to "focus" while simultaneously accompanying me down every philosophical, theological, and fantastical tangent that pops into my head), the best I had in me to put toward the job applications was rather less than one could hope for. But dutifully I plugged at it until Pam's mother and sister came to whisk me away to their house for an afternoon and evening of Bollywood dance videos, Wii Fit, Kinect Dance Central, Rock Band, guitar lessons and improvisational adventures. Giddy and physically drained, I came home with the knowledge that if I didn't finish at least one of the applications the next day I was going to get kicked and would fully deserve it.

I am pleased to report that one application is in, complete with glowing cover letter and resume printed on Kinko's best. In addition to that mighty feat, today's activities have included picking up a score of library books, visiting the Hub City bookshop for the first time, catching up with Patrick Whitfill and Betsy Teter there, seeing my friend's boyfriend at the coffee shop next door and making the delightful discovery at the back of the shop that not only has Liz Blanchard realized her dream of a bake shop, but she and her husband Andrew have had their first child, a six-month-old girl named Simone.

Taking a most intriguing SC arts/music/culture magazine from the book shop to Venus Pie for lunch, I found out that Daniel Machado, with whom I had the pleasure of a brief conversation as fellow performers at Converse's Earth Day Concert back in '08, has, with his new band The Restoration, produced a noteworthy concept album called Constance. Its southern-gothic storytelling and history-laden accompanying compendium (resonance with the Decemberists here) appeal to me so greatly I am afraid I will be unable to resist, broke as I am. Going to give it a few days to see if I can really afford two week's worth of carrot juice earnings on a CD and book.

That's not even the end of it. I come home to find I missed Bryant dropping off some borrowed books by a mere 20 minutes. I make Suzanne's carrot juice, learn to make soy milk from Dad, and then Suzanne is over and we are watching a movie, eating marshmallows and a dinner of spinach and avocado smoothie. Not half an hour into the movie, we hear a knock on the door and find, to our utter surprise, Jidong Xiao and his six-year-old son Caleb, acquaintances from the church in Simpsonville. We have a lovely time with the Xiaos, playing and drawing with the son, talking Scriptures with the father, but don't finish our movie.

Now everyone's gone and I've just eaten into the early morning hours once again, this time on the computer. I figured I might as well make a full week of it. Maybe after I get that other application in, after Bible Study and after the Dixon's breakfast visit on Saturday, I will be able to calm down and begin to restore some measure of routine and balance into my life. I'm missing it sorely right now. The doctors since California have been beseeching me to engage in "structured activity." (It's the Yellow I crave. Too much Red, not enough Yellow - all play and no work makes Jane sore, tired, and poor.) Before the holidays, I was beginning, in my own odd way, to structure my life. It seems I am having to start all over again in 2011. Oh well. I guess that's what new years are for.

A drop of Red

2010-12-31T01:52:00.001-05:00

Perhaps someday I will explain to you about the Colors. But it's unlikely, truth to tell. I've spent snippets and hours explaining to friends and family my off-handed comments like "That's your red coming out" or "I need more yellow in my day" or "Sherlock Holmes and Moriarti are both green, like me, like my dad, like my brother." I've seen the Colors in Proverb 10, intricately woven through the movie Mary Poppins, in the isles of Home Depot, and, in fact, everywhere I look. God designed it, it's all there, He knew what He was doing. And it is so beautiful. But it's just too much to explain. For me anyway.

Leonardo Da Vinci wrote in his journal of his grand ambition to reveal the ultimate symmetry of Being - Man as microcosm of Earth as microcosm of Universe as microcosm of God. To prove it through science and mathematics. But I can't honestly say he accomplished that. What he did accomplish was a life, as a man that God made, a life like no other. What matters now about Da Vinci was not what he explained or even what he did but who he was. And I realize that that is exactly what matters about the man Jesus Christ, and what matters about every one of us human beings, His beloved people.

The fact that fleeting glimpses of DaVinci's vision can be apprehended through the various records and products of his life (the same could be said about Jesus I suppose) comfort me as I come to grips with a most difficult word and its truer expression. I'm hesitant even to write the word for fear of the accusations and incredulity that inevitably follow any individual's associating themselves with it. Perhaps I won't write the word. In fact I think that's the way it's supposed to work.

Why am I writing tonight? It started with a book. Well, more probably, it started with a forgotten dose of medicine - the normalizing potion that has kept me tethered to the world most humans spend their entire lives traversing. The world I left, for a time, a time of utter abandonment to Unknown, Unthought, Not Yet, im/Possible, and, in the most ultimate sense, to God. I've never been very tightly tied to this particular world but I'm coming to terms with it at last. It is necessary, after all, since it is where so many people live. As my love for God grows with it grows the love for those people - the bulk of humanity - thus the necessity of staying connected to them by means of the solid contact of feet on earth. Not to mention God's apparent desire to keep me alive. To please Him I must learn to traverse this particular world with measured confident steps - thus insuring my own physical, emotional, mental, financial and every other measure of well being, as much as it is under my own control. But it seems my loving Master has allowed me still to leap, here and there, to skip, to bound, to dance. In my dreams I still soar. And that is enough.

It is such a leap, a small one, just a drop of Red, that moves me now. Even as my new dose of medicine begins to anchor me back to the ground. I have to share something with you. I'm not quite sure what it will entail until I've written it. But it involves this book that I've been reading, a book that seems to change my life anew with each chapter. It's called "The Classics We've Read, the Difference They've Made". I wish I could buy it for every believer who, in being given the gift (*cough*) of the image of the Creator, struggles under the tumult of the two great forces in their life: the Faith, and Art. To say I can't recommend it highly enough would be a pathetic understatement. In reading these Christian writers' accounts of the writers whom God used to shape their paths, their unique callings, I can almost feel the hands of the great Physician gently rejoining the rent halves of my soul into a new and stronger whole.

I realize only a very few people will have any idea what I'm talking about. I can live with that. It's sort of characterized my life thus far and I fear it will only get worse. But the reason I can live with it now, as opposed to before, is because as I realize it is my life that is my art, not my words, whether or not people "get what I'm saying" shrinks to near insignificance.

I want to share with you a quote about a monk and a poet. I wasn't familiar with him but apparently he's well enough known: Thomas Merton. Now I will have to read his stuff. (Thanks to this book I have at least 10 other writers whose work presses upon me to be read. Good thing I got a NOOKcolor for Christmas.) Anyway, Thomas Merton thought he was giving up the writer's life to pursue a life of contemplation. His experience, and in fact the experiences of so many of this book, have helped me understand my own thoughts, feelings, and actions, especially of the past two years, and even offered insight into what God seems to be doing with me of late.

But before I share more about Thomas Merton, I have to recall to you something I wrote over a year ago, after summer camp, Austin, and my short-term visit to the Full-Time Training. Here is the post. I was talking about two vastly different places: Austin's Sunday Circus - a wild and weird land of color, costume, characters, uninhibition - and Anaheim's Full-Time Training: a sanctified, simplified school of the pursuit of God, structured to the max. The striking point was how utterly comfortable I felt in both worlds. That observation was a small arrow pointing toward what would become a vast dichotomy in my life, which, with the aid of Prednizone and overseen by God's providence, would help earn me a nine day stay at the hospital.

What God did, ripping me so violently from the Full-Time Training, and what He is going on to do now, feels so parallel to what happened to Thomas Merton that I had to stop reading right there and speak the passage aloud to my dad. I still haven't even finished the essay. It's that profound. To preface, Merton has renounced the way of the writer to enter the monastery. Then he gets a visit from an old college friend who somehow wrings from him a manuscript of poetry that he goes and gets published. He comes back to Merton begging for more. In Merton's own words:

I did not argue about it. But in my own heart I did not think it was God's will. and Dom Vital, my confessor, did not think so either. Then one day - the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, 1945 - I went to Father Abbot for direction, and without my ever thinking of the subject or mentioning it, he suddenly said to me. "I want you to go on writing poems."

Now, the essay's author, John Leax, continues:

To adequately comprehend the force of this direction, which struck Merton almost like a blow, one must understand that he was then committed to what the early church called the via negativa or the Way of Rejection. This way, in Charles Williams' words, "consists in the renunciation of all images except the final one of God Himself...The order to continue writing poems meant to Merton the postponement of his deepest desire, which he described as "the voiding and emptying of the soul, cleansing it of all images, all likenesses that it may be clean and pure to receive the obscure light of God's own Presence.

This is why I chose the Training. Why I had to go. Again I would refer you to that post from August, 2009, where after I describe the course of the summer I articulate my longing for the purity, the focus, of the Training, a place wherein to satisfy my deepest craving: God Himself, distilled, unmixed. It was not an ascetic experience or in any way self-flagellating, however I can testify - with no hard feelings mind you - that it is a place of deprivation of soul. Art, literature, movies, secular music, self-expression and more: gone. Removed. In the absence of that city haze, the true Light shines all the brighter. The being opens all the wider and receives all the more of the divine content. That was what I expected, that's what I was experiencing, and all was well, or so I thought.

Then what can account for what happened? On the one hand it was, and forever will remain, a mystery, yet this book, in an earlier essay, again helps account for my experience in the aftermath. This gem is found in Stephen Lawhead's discussion of the art of J.R.R. Tolkien:

There is a paradox of sorts at work here. How to explain it? Perhaps it is like a painter who sets out to paint a portrait of God. "After all," says he, "what could be more inspiring and winning than God's beautific image? It will move entire nations to worship and adoration. What more godly purpose for my work could I ask?" So he begins to paint with great religious fervor and zeal. But he doesn't get very far before he discovers that since no-one alive has ever seen the face of the Almighty there are no suitable references - no photographs, no sketches, no graven images of any kind. How then does he paint a subject that refuses to do a studio sitting? That is the question: How does one illustrate the invisible? It cannot be done. At least, it cannot be done explicitly. But an artist can achieve a satisfactory, even extraordinary result with an implicit approach. That is, he does not paint God directly. Instead, the artist paints the Creator's reflected glory - paints the objects God has touched, the visible trail of His passing, the footprints He leaves behind.

How does this help me? It tells me that as an artist (for that is what I am, not the whole of me - for no such word can sum up the whole of a creature as awesome as a human being - but largely), I depict the glory of God. Staring deeply into His eyes, metaphorically, has its merits, as does the study of His great letter to man, especially in its original languages, and the teachings of the Church to help grasp His dimensions - all of this can fit into the artist's comprehending of her subject matter. But when it comes to the rendering, what does she need? Tools, materials - paint and paintbrush, or guitar and mic, or computer keyboard, whatever the case may be - and the most surprising part: reference imagery. Where do I see God? Everywhere. Now, anyway. The very things - the material stuff and artifice of man that I used to shove impatiently aside, or run away from, to try to catch a glimpse of His face, now offer up clues into His being, dusky mirrors reflecting Him like tiny, imperfect windows into His soul.

A wise brother once advised a roomful of young people to put on our "Jesus glasses" and learn to see every positive thing in the universe as a shadow of the Reality which is Christ. He was basing his speaking out of Colossians chapter 2. I feel so privileged to have been in that room. The first part of that seeing involves seeing, really seeing, the objects themselves. Not impatiently swatting them away as distractions. Appreciating their beauty, their merit. Then going on to appreciate, through them, the vastly superior beauty, merit, of their Architect (or meta-Architect in many cases). God can and has spoken to me through the radio, through the TV, through colors and shapes and plays of light and shadow, through music and dance. I'm not talking about some creepy voice or secret code or image imprinted on the wall. I'm talking about the God-given power of the human imagination to connect the dots. The soul, joined with spirit, nourished by Word, strengthened by prayer and steadied by fellowship, and open to experience every beautiful thing, seeing and somehow conveying God in ways the world has perhaps never before encountered. This is the turn I see my life taking. This is a purpose which I fully embrace, in its season.

What I am beginning to see is beautiful beyond words. I'm so relieved that words are not necessary. God has not called me to reveal it all or to do some mighty work. He's simply calling me to live, so I will live, live in awe of the most glorious, genius Artist that was and is and ever will be. The fruit of such a life remains to be seen. Perhaps it won't be seen until long past the life's end. And I have little clue what shape the fruit will take. But it doesn't matter to me. I am happy, I am free. I am basking in the glory of my King. I am abiding in the Vine, and where there is abiding, there is fruit bearing. Oh blessed life.

Life Post-Hospital

2010-11-27T16:02:00.003-05:00

I hardly know what to say, except that God's workings are profound and inexplicable. One day I was in the Full-Time Training, enjoying the changes, challenges, and mercies of my second term, then there was a blur of sleepless nights, days running into each other, feeling and acting stranger and stranger and leaning more and more on my Savior. Then I was in the hospital for nine days, then I was sent home to my family in Spartanburg to "rest and recover." The full story includes a bronchitis medication, a reaction, a string of doctors each with their own opinion and impact on my life, and many, many adventures....but it is all much too close to write about, and, largely, even to talk about. I was a person who wanted to explain and describe everything. For the first time I find myself a woman with secrets, learning not to tell.

So here I am in Spartanburg, resting. It has been difficult to accept what I am doing here, and even more difficult learning to live it day to day. It's exceedingly hard to admit that all appearances of a sturdy, healthy, promising young woman to the contrary, I am actually a bird with a broken wing that must be bound, caged, and nourished by hand.

But it is, more than anything, a blessed time. I had relinquished my belongings, my own room, my clothes, my music, my cat, my family, my friends, the privilege of spending Thanksgiving with those I love, and Christmas....and suddenly everything is given back to me. Words like plan and work are carefully guarded from me, allowed in small doses as I'm deemed able to bear them. In the absence of such worries, I am free to offer small labors of love, pursue what is good and healthy for body, soul and spirit, and chase every dream.

Money and independence, I find as they gently ebb and flow around me in tiny quantities, are not nearly as valuable as time, which is the gift now given to me in abundance.

My Benefactor is an endless source of surprises. He rocks out with me on the guitar, listens to Eliot Smith with me, reads with me about quiet lives in midcentury England and cross-cultural encounters in the Ivory Coast, and every so often whispers His mind - "that's enough for tonight" or "How about this, now." To learn grace is to learn that I have a Father and a Love who are already pleased with me. Instead of trying to figure out what to do to bring Him joy, I learn to simply share my joy, my thoughts, my life with Him, listening with rapt attention for that voice I have grown so much to love. And then, when I hear it, each earthly pleasure that has so delighted me fades to the dustiest gray, and I am happier still.

On being a Christian

2010-07-17T16:59:00.006-04:00

May 1, 2010

Hello world. I am a Christian. Do you know what this means? You may think you do. You may say, a Christian is a person who follows the teachings of the man Jesus, whom they call Christ. Or you might say, a Christian is a person who has been "born again" - redeemed by the blood of the Son of God, Jesus, who died on a cross for our sins and was resurrected. I would not say you were wrong, if you were to say that, but neither would I say you had nailed it. See, being a Christian is fundamentally about Christ making His home in a person's heart (Eph 3:17). This happens by loving the Lord (John 14:23). When we love Jesus and spend time in His presence, He and the Father take up residence within us - They move in, get comfortable, make a nest, so to speak.

The purpose of being a Christian actually lines up with the purpose of the universe. You may have, at some time in your life, asked yourself "why?" Why all this motion and commotion and matter and transactions and noise? It is actually a very simple reason. God wanted a home. To quote a small weevil who, according to my dad, sings a famous song, "Everybody needs a hooome..." Even God. But what kind of home is fit for an all-powerful, omnipresent, omniscient divine Being? The answer may be surprising. It is your spirit. And mine, and everybody's, who will agree to it. God is Spirit (John 4:24), and he created man in His image and likeness(Genesis 1:26). Thus, man has a spirit (Zechariah 12:1). In fact (and this may also be a surprising fact), all of those galaxies out there, the solar system, etc., were created for the earth, and the earth was created for man. This is because man was created for God. Specifically, man's spirit was created to contain God. Thus, the spirit of man actually ranks with the heavens and the earth, maybe even outranks them.

But we're actually not done here. Yes, I am a Christian, I have God in my spirit, and yay, God gets a home. But Pamela also has God in her spirit, and Bob, and Jane, and many other people. These are like many abodes (John 14:2) which, in one sense, is fine, but in another sense, God wants A home. Not millions of them. We are all finite people, and He is an infinite God. Sure, being Spirit, He could kind of split Himself into that many pieces and abide separately in all of us, but that just doesn't sound very comfortable, does it? I wouldn't want to live like that. This is where the church comes in. You may also have heard of this thing called the church. Maybe your first thought is a building with a steeple and pretty stained glass windows. Or, perhaps, you'd say the Church is an organization which is headed up by the pope, or, depending on who you ask, the archbishop of Canterbury, or the presbytery, or some other hierarchy. You may even say that the church is not a building or an organization at all, but rather a collection of God's redeemed people, drawn from every nation, tribe and tongue. This last one hits closer to home, but it is still lacking. See, the church is the corporate home of God. The word corporate here does not have anything to do with a corporation. It is meant in two senses. One is in the sense of plurality - that is, made of many people. The other is in the sense of the word corporeal, that is, pertaining to a body. What body is this? It is the Body of Christ (Romans 8:10, 1 Cor. 12:12). Christ Jesus is the embodiment of God, and the church is the embodiment of Christ. Now, just like with your house, you would not want your body in millions of pieces, would you? You wouldn't even want it in a couple hundred pieces (how many denominations are out there today?) So, with God, he wants one Body, one House, in one piece.

You might now want to know how this can be accomplished. You can't exactly melt a bunch of human beings into one big glob. Besides the physical, practical conundrum this presents (sounds kind of messy), human beings are notoriously individualistic. We are highly opinionated and value our freedom above all else. Fortunately for us, we have a very wise God who is quite determined to get His (one) home. Thus, beyond our physical parts, and the opinions, emotions and psychology, we have another part, that part that contains God - the spirit (1 Thess. 5:23, 2 Tim 4:22). The spirit has a wonderful quality. When imbued with the Spirit of God, it has the ability to be entirely one with other human spirits. Thus, this ragtag collection of people called Christians can actually become truly one Body, one Home. As they are built together, fitted together, they grow into a holy temple, a dwelling place of God, in the Lord, in spirit (Ephesians 2:21-22). I particularly love this passage of Ephesians because it points to a practical reality of the church. All the building (the Christians throughout space and time) grows into a holy temple, and "you also" (in this particular case, the Ephesian Christians, but in principle any little group of us thrust together in the constraints of space and time) are being built together into a dwelling place of God, in spirit. So here in Anaheim, where I find myself, I am being built together with the saints around me, and as that happens, we're all growing into God's holy temple. This is God's hope, His joy. It's actually our joy, too. I'm pretty happy knowing that I'm participating in the meaning of the universe. I am God's home.

That's about all. Maybe, if you were wondering about the meaning of the universe, you know now. Maybe you might even want to join in and decide to become a Christian. Maybe if you were a Christian already, you know something you didn't know before. Regardless, you now at least know that I am a Christian, what exactly that means, and that I'm pretty happy about it.

Where in the world is Lydia?

2010-03-15T20:43:00.002-04:00

I am in my fourth week at the Full-Time Training. I’m afraid you’ll have to get used to not hearing from me very often - I only get a chance to be online once a week. I am so very busy here! But I am enjoying it very much.
Pictures are worth more than words so…

Grace Gardens, where I live

Me in uniform (Hey, remember the Amish – if they can do it, I can too!)

House breakfast (There are twelve of us!)

My room ( I have two great roommates!)

One of the more beautiful spots in Grace Gardens. It is truly like paradise here.

Hub City Co-op Ownership Meeting

2010-01-27T21:40:00.005-05:00

Tonight was the first ownership meeting of the Hub-City Co-op, and as a proud member of the vanguard of co-op owners, I can hardly wait to tell you all about it. But before I launch into the details of the meeting, I'll offer a brief background on co-ops in general, and this one in particular. For those of you that haven't been following along in the Spark, or my earlier blog posts about it. Food co-ops can take many different forms. One of the more well-known involves members fronting the costs for local farmers in exchange for regular shares of the harvest. Another is more of a "shopping collective" where members send a representative to buy produce from difficult-to-access local sources and then divvy it out to the rest of the group. The Hub City Co-op will operate with a grocery store model. First of all, anyone can shop there, and buy whatever they want. Hours will reflect those of a normal grocery store. The products will be locally-produced and regional foods and dry goods, with an emphasis on ethical production.

Stop right there. This is huge for Spartanburg. The closest co-operative grocery store is in Hendersonville. Greenville doesn't even have one. The only option for buying local right now is either the farmer's market (if you can wake up that early on a Saturday morning and the farmer whose goods you want happens to show up) or networking individually with the hundreds of often-isolated local producers. Most of us who want to shop locally and ethically just aren't able to overcome that kind of hassle. The co-op grocery store will put fresh, healthy, local food right in our hands for the buying. Not to mention the kind of community hub that a co-op grocery becomes. It will have a cafe and a giant community bulletin, a whole wall. It will partner with local chefs and all sorts of community groups to offer free classes and all kinds of other programming. It will unite fragmented sectors of Spartanburg in ways we couldn't even dream up.

Then there's the matter of ownership. The co-op is a community-owned for-profit business. It has an executive task force but they answer to the body of owners. It is $150 for a lifetime share. Or $25 a year, or, if you're really strapped for cash they will work with you to trade "sweat equity" for ownership. What does that get you? Special discounts and sales. A share in the profits when they start coming in (it will take a few years). But mostly, the rights, responsibility, and pride of a full-fledged owner. This could mean a lot or a little. We have voting rights, but some owners may abstain from voting. We are not obligated to volunteer, but the whole thing rests on our commitment to spreading the word and pooling our talents, resources, and labor to make it happen. It's our passion and energy, our baby. You may be asking, what happens if the whole effort falls through? There's always that chance. The money was taken in good faith that the co-op is actually going to happen, and if not, for whatever reason, the ownership fee will be reimbursed. But you know what, even if I never see my $150 again, it's worth it. The dream is so big, the adventure so exciting, the potential payoff so great, it's worth every penny.

I don't know if I've quite gotten my glowing vision into your head yet, but I want to move on to the actual meeting. You can read more on the website.

The Barrett room at the library was pretty much full. There were somewhere between 30 and 40 owners present and a handful of non-owners. Highlights of the agenda include a financial status review, owner count (113 owners as of the beginning of the meeting), discussion of an upcoming fundraiser, and discussion and vote on a new possible location.

The new possible location was by far the most exciting news to report. You know where Kimbrell's Furniture Store used to be, next to Monsoon, right across from Morgan Square? That's the one. I thought that the empty space in the Hub-Bub building was a great spot (though the rent was ridiculous) but this spot beats that one all over the place. First of all, it's RIGHT DOWNTOWN. You can't get any more downtown than Morgan Square. Think of the visibility, the foot traffic. Secondly, the Hub-Bub building was pretty much an empty shell. They were going to have to upfit it with plumbing, electricity, lighting, everything. The estimated upfitting costs were $300,000. That's right, a third of a million dollars just to get the space usable and that's not even talking about inventory, rent, utilities, etc. The Kimbrell building, on the other hand, had been fully operational as a furniture store. A large part of the upfitting would be cosmetic. They had estimated upfitting to be around $75,000, but then admitted that the estimate was probably on the underside. So let's, for the heck of it, double the upfitting cost and say $150,000 (that's being overly generous) Still half the cost of renovating the Hub-Bub building.

Next, there's the matter of square footage. The Hub-Bub space had 6,000. Big enough, sure. The Kimbrell building has up to 28,000 sq. feet of available space, and the Co-op wouldn't have to take it all. That's the main floor, a full basement, and an upper "mezzanine" that would be used for administrative offices. The details of the lease offer are confidential, but let me just say that the offer is, as the phrase went in the meeting, "aggressively competitive." The owner was there, too. Wesley Hammond. I like him. Unlike most of the other downtown property owners, who apparently would rather let their storefronts sit there and rot than open them up to anyone with less than ten thousand dollars to wave in their face, he has been letting community groups use the space while it is in between tenants - for example, Hub-Bub's Bring Your Own Art sale this past December. Actually, that's how he got hooked up with the Co-op. They had a booth during the event and he approached them with his wife saying something like "Would you be interested in this space?" See, if he hadn't been putting the building to good use, this beautiful connection never would have happened. Assuming this story has a happy ending, I hope the rest of downtown's property owners are taking notes.

We voted on moving forward with the new space. You would think, from my description at least, that this would be a no-brainer. But there was a lot of debate. It centered, mostly, around three concerns. One was parking. During the lunch and dinner rush, it can be pretty tough to find a spot on Main Street. There are a few spaces on the Broad Street entrance. And people were concerned about having to walk any further than that, for example to the city parking lot on Broad Street, or the parking garage on the other side of Morgan Square. In answer, one owner who had lived in an urban area testified to the feasibility of walking a little ways to the grocery store, especially if armed with one of those collapsible shopping buggies that could be sold at the store itself. Others described the loading dock in the back and how volunteers, perhaps even fundraising groups from schools, could offer assistance with groceries, similar to traditional grocers like Publix.

Most of those who were hesitant about the new space just wanted to see more numbers, more facts. Especially about the true cost of upfitting, since that figure seemed a little weak. That is perfectly reasonable of them. But nobody is committing just yet. A lot of owners have to sign on, a lot of funds have to be raised in the next ninety day period, before the lease can be signed. In the meantime, Ashley, the founder, is crunching the numbers and hashing out the business plan and will be doing her best to provide all the information she can.

Another concern, or perhaps alternative, brought up, was the concept of "starting small." We all love going in with a bang, but often it is more sustainable to start up a business in a small location with lower overhead, and growing steadily from there. I am all for this and think many an endeavor in Spartanburg has suffered "blow-out" by launching on too grand a scale.

But in all honesty, the Kimbrell building is being offered for the same price as many smaller buildings in less-desirable locations. Ashley has been doing the research for months, trying to find the perfect spot, and could continue to search for years before picking. A man in the back row made this point very clearly. But since we all want to see it actually get off the ground, it behooves us to move forward with the best thing we've got going, and focus our hard work and energy on getting owners, educating the community, and actually bringing the store to fruition.

There were two votes; the first in favor of sticking with the Hub-Bub building (no takers) the second, for moving forward with the Kimbrell building. It seemed that most of the good handful who abstained from voting would have liked to see a third vote - in favor of continuing research on locations, including the Kimbrell building, before moving forward with any one. But their point was clearly made, even if they didn't get to raise their hand. And the majority of voters agreed that the Kimbrell building was too good an opportunity, with too little to lose. We will re-evaluate down the road if we have to, but in the meantime, we're acting with the image of the Kimbrell building in our minds.

The deal got even sweeter when we got to the discussion of the fundraiser. First, the W's in a nutshell:

What: "Spring for Your Community:" Live music, art auction, used book drive, silent auction, ownership drive.
Who: Hub City Co-op in partnership with the Spartanburg Charter School.
When: Saturday, March 27, from 12 to 8pm
Where: 127 W Main, St., Spartanburg (i.e., the Kimbrell Furniture Building)

Wesley Hammond has been gracious enough to allow us to use the building for fundraising/marketing purposes. Even before making any official commitments. He wants the Co-op to happen as much as we do, and furthermore, he wants it to happen in his space. Is he awesome or what?

To conclude, the Co-op's new timeline is in two phases. The first is 90 days of marketing, fundraising, and serious ownership drives. Pending our target figures are reached, the next phase is moving into the space, upfitting it, stocking, hiring, etc, getting it ready for the grand opening in August. If the target figures are not reached, we will go from there and figure out the next move, but there are at least 113 of us who are prepared to teach Spartanburg the meaning of perserverance.

The meeting came to a close with some discussion about pulling the March 27th event together, and stressing the need to get the word out to everybody and their dog. I'm leaving in three weeks, but I'm trying my darndest to spread the word as best I can 'til then.

1:42am

2010-01-21T01:41:00.001-05:00

I've been sleeping 8 hours and now it's time for dinner (breakfast?). This week has been strange. My whole family is sick but me, and being determined not to get sick has meant the same thing it always does for me: sleeping as much as possible, taking lots of Vitamin C and E. But coming home at 5:30, going straight to bed and staying dead asleep til 1:30? That's strange even for me. The plan was to sleep for an hour or two, then wake up for dinner and to spend a little time with my family. They feel like they never get to see me any more and I feel guilty for sleeping through prime family time. I remember hearing my mother come home from work at about 6:30, but I didn't even open my eyes. She shouldn't have gone back to work so soon, the doctor told her she had bronchitis on Monday. But she had a homeschool class coming in and so she forced herself. I hope it doesn't turn into pnuemonia. I'll have to say hi to her when she wakes up.

I'm eating Cuban leftovers, and Cajun crab dip and crackers. If and when I do get back to sleep, I'm probably going to regret that choice.

Since last week life has been a blur of work, darkness, and sleep. I stayed home all weekend and cleaned and slept and did laundry and sewed. I didn't even do Augustine tutoring because it was Martin Luther King day. Well I did go out for Cuban food with my Converse little sister Carrie on Tuesday night - that was a wonderful, colorful two-hour respite from...I don't know what this is. Maybe it's seasonal affective disorder. Maybe it's real life, hitting me at last. But no, I think it's just that if I wasn't sleeping so much, I would already be sick. And I'm trying to conserve every bit of strength and health for the weekend - Pam and I are going to Atlanta on Saturday and staying through Sunday.

Strange dreams. Among them, I was hanging out at Converse's new senior apartment housing (circa 2011) where there was some cutting-technology and a kick-butt party. As I began to consume a little more alcohol than I ought, I made the connection in my mind between the consumption of alcohol and a really good party. The reason, I thought, that I had never drunk much at Converse before is because the parties/dances were all pretty lame and I didn't feel like it. Nothing to do with the fact that I am morally opposed to drunkeness or that I was underage and most of the time they wouldn't have served it to me if I'd tried. Good thing I was out of school now or I might have turned into a party animal.

Then it was morning and I was flipping through this huge stash of art I had produced in school that had magically appeared in file cabinets under the kitchen counter. Then I was on a message board for knitters and crocheters where people were offering free yarn and I was going through all the messages feeling the yarn (yeah that's right) and then I unraveled one girl's ball and thought, I shouldn't do that, what if all the people on this message board did that, then we would have a big mess! Because you can totally reach into a message board on the computer and mess with people's yarn.

Oh and then there were some completed projects, one of which was actually very inspiring. It was like macrame'd fringe, made in two tones of yarn that came together in a herringbone and tapered into points. Kind of reminded me of ferns, the way the two halves always catch the light differently and look like two different colors. There were sage green and brown ones, turquoise and brown ones, and heather purple and grey ones. One of the project's admirers had commented saying "There's a girl underground that will always love you" a direct reference to the Noah and the Whale song that at that moment happened to be playing through my mind. Now that was odd. I started to feel like something was fishy and awoke shortly afterward.
I've got to stop eating this crab dip. I can feel it burn all the way down. I think I'm going to go put away laundry, pay a bill, and then go back to sleep. I've got 7 more hours before I have to be anywhere.

Escapism / Athens

2010-01-12T20:06:00.001-05:00

Some nights you're just driven to write. I should be doing everything else. Reading the Economy of God - 32 days left and counting. Putting in that extra hour for the Converse job - considering I came in late today and left early, with a 45-minute "I CAN'T STAND IT ANYMORE" break in between. Paying the final payment on my one and only credit card that is due tomorrow, doing laundry so I can go to work without looking like a blind person raided a gypsy's closet.

But I'm writing instead, just like yesterday I was asleep at 8:00pm and after work today I went to the library and lost myself in "the Big Girl's Guide to Knitting." Something transpired in the last few days which has made me feel more like an adult than just about anything that's ever happened in my life - strangely. I can't talk about it but the weight of it has affected my willpower - and pushes me to write.

It was not the weekend, though, the weekend was good. Pam and I - that is, Pam my best friend, whom I never mention enough in my blog considering how many memories we've made together and whom I am about to miss dearly - have been having what we've come to call "Sunday Adventures." I should have been writing them all, I've just been so blasted busy. Well, I suppose I can give a little summary now, since I've made up my mind not to do anything useful this evening.

We decided to make the best of my last few weekends in Spartanburg by going to church together. We used to go "church hopping" in college. No, not like searching for a church and never being satisfied, never settling down. We both are more or less comfortable in our own church traditions. We simply did it because we love the Body of Christ and were trying to get a glimpse of it in all its beautiful (and sometimes ugly) diversity - its hour-late ex-addicts, its white-robed feminist priests, its sincere Bible lovers. We went to a lot of different types of churches in Spartanburg and learned a lot of things.

But anyway, that's background. Our Sunday adventures are more about introducing Pam to my world - the churches in the Recovery, spread across the southeast. We started with the church in Charlotte - tailing a college blending conference and arriving for its climactic overflow meeting. She loved it. I could hear her saying hallelujah every time we said amen. We went to Simpsonville, and, well it was Simpsonville. She enjoyed it. We tried to go back to Simpsonville and got lost and ended up at Fountain Inn First Baptist - where the saints were friendly and sincere - it was Thanksgiving and we popped up to give our thanks when the invitation was given. We woke up late and had to stay in Spartanburg, so we visited her church, St Matthews Episcopal, where at the Sunday School our frank discussion of the Bible was appreciated by some while leaving others clearly out of their depth. We caught the last half hour of another Spartanburg church that seemed to be more interested in the victory of Christ than the Victor Himself.

And then it was the Christmas holiday, and then we were back to the blending trips. Columbia was next. I know when Pam is spiritually comfortable - she starts to close her eyes and rock in her seat and not care whether her prayers are audible or inaudible. The saints there were, in her words, "kooky" - but just as endearing to her as they've long been to me. She even followed them to an Asian restaurant - a sure sign of her love of their company - she hates Asian food.

That leads us to this weekend. The past week was my first full-time at Converse. I know that a 40 hour workweek is completely normal and I am certainly blessed to have it - however I am not used to it yet. I probably won't be before I leave for the Training and have to get used to something entirely new. Anyway, I was busy, and hadn't made the preparations as I ought, but we'd decided to go to Athens for the weekend. The Lord works everything out, though. I decided on a whim to invite Pam to Simpsonville for the Wednesday night prayer meeting. There we found out my dear friend Anna L, who was on break from the training, was planning to serve in Athens and voila! Instant traveling companions.

I can't believe it had never occurred to me how famously Anna and Pam would get along. Two separate, very different aspects of my life - deep-rooted memories, deep-rooted friendships - thrust together and somehow it clicked. Like really clicked. Anna and Pam and I are, for lack of a better word, like-minded. I mean spiritually. It all goes back to the Body. We love the Body, and refuse to put it in a box, just as we refuse to put God in a box. But anyway, we picked Anna up, and immediately started fellowshipping, and fellowshipping some more and reading the Bible on the way to Athens, and all of the sudden I started to notice us coming into Atlanta, and we found ourselves 40 miles past our exit. Praise God! We turned around. He knew we needed the fellowship time. Anna bought us ice cream at McDonald's.

When we finally got to Athens, a good 5 hours when it should have taken us 2, we got lost directly in front of Sisters' House 2. I mean literally in front of it. We asked an old man walking if he knew where 110 Vista was, he didn't, we drove on not knowing it was literally the house behind where he was standing. We got to Sisters House 1 and greeted the sisters there. Pam and I brought our things inside - it was where we were staying, while Anna was staying at 2. That road in Athens is literally Acts in action. The part where it talks about living and meeting house-to-house. I mean, there are, I think someone said, over 50 saints living within a block or two, and you're always running into them - praying, praising, inviting each other for dinner, maybe Frisbee, maybe some board games.

We (Pam, Anna, Elizabeth Davis our host, and I) went to the Tello's house for a home meeting. We ended up being the only sisters, besides Gail and Katie Tello that is, the rest were college brothers. Pam got to experience male-female interactions in the churchlife firsthand - and base her less-than-positive opinions on cold, hard evidence. Most of the saints in the Recovery are practically Amish in their views on separation of the sexes. Hey, it's kept me out of trouble. The brothers were bashful, awkward, and somehow, according to Pam, oddly intriguing. It's that whole mystique thing. But anyway, all too young for her. Us, really. Dang we're old. Anyway, we played Wii with Katie's adorable son Daniel, and greatly enjoyed the fellowship, food, singing, and prayer. It's always a delight to see young brothers unashamedly adoring God.

After the meeting, we went to Hallie's house for game night. Well, we were expecting game night. What we found were a handful of college sisters drinking boiled ginger and trying to save an experiment involving cinnamon and potato bread - the feat ultimately being accomplished by a mixture of milk and chocolate. Chocolate makes everything better. The children of the house were asleep (and some of the grown-ups as well) so we realized if we wanted to actually play any games - especially boisterous ones like Taboo - we needed to relocate. After a half hour or so of debate and cinnamon-ball-eating, we ended up at Sisters' House 1 - the temporary home of Pam and myself. We played Taboo to hilarious effect, and taught half the crowd to play Spoons. Only this was a delicious chocolate variation whose "consolation prize" considerably lessened the the sting of losing. At half past midnight, we arrived at the decision that prolonging game night was not worth the cost of being zombies during the morning meeting, and the other sisters left Pam and me to get some rest.

To our surprise, the Lord's Day meeting was at the UGA student center, not, as I had expected, at the brand new Student Station recently built by the UGA Christian Students club with a little help from the church in Athens. The reason, come to find out, is because the upper rooms had not been completed so there was not yet any place for the children. The meeting was wonderful. Pam and Anna and I enjoyed it immensely. I was particularly pleased by the way one of the elders explained what we were about to do with the prophesying, why, and how. Good info for Pam, I thought. We gathered they probably did this kind of explaining every week because of the high possibility of new student walk-ins. We broke into groups (new, for a Sunday meeting) and read outlines and pray-read verses. I was touched by Ephesians 3:16-19 so when we came back together I read it to the saints. I was actually intending to do some kind of exposition, but I gave it to the Lord and He just wanted me to read and sit down. But it was cool. He knows...everything! Isn't it awesome?

Pam would have gotten more out of the meeting if she'd been a little more awake. She is very slow to gain coherence in the morning - we should have woken up earlier. but she still liked it a lot. One sister, in particular, shared something so simple, but so...perspective-altering. She said something like "If you think you have a problem, whether it's a situation or a problem with another person, it's really just a problem in your relationship with the Lord. Take care of your relationship, and you've taken care of the problem." Wow.

We had some lovely fellowship after the meeting, got to talk with some rarely-seen friends. Had a nice little conversation with Paul Tashman, cool getting to know him a little bit. There's something about him and Ashley (his wife of 1 year) that I just think is so cool. They're just cool people you want to hang around. I can't explain it.

There was going to be a wedding reception at the Station, and Pam and I had already discussed going, but basically decided against it since we didn't know the folks. Justin and Phoebe. But I really wanted to see the Station so I was a little sad. But God works everything out. We roped Anna into going with us to Five Guys - the best burger joint...ever. I actually have an odd memory associated with that particular Five Guys in downtown Athens. It was after the first (or second?) college training and groups were going out to eat. I was walking around Athens barefoot because my high heels were killing me, and I remember standing on a short wall outside of Five Guys looking in, waiting for the people I was with to decide it was too crowded to eat there.

This time, however, it was not crowded, and I didn't have to wait on some huge group to make up its collective mind. I introduced Pam and Anna to the exquisiteness of their burgers and fries, really if Plato had known about burgers and fries he surely would have declared that they had achieved the height, the true Form, of the art. Anyway, enough about the food. Except that, wow, they put fresh jalapenos in my cheeseburger. That was a kick. We had more excellent fellowship over an excellent meal. We were supposed to drop Anna off at the Station a little early for the reception so she could help set up. She was there in Athens to serve after all. That nicely tied with my desire to see this famous Station - I had been hearing about its awesomeness as a student hang out / fellowship / Foosball / feed&read spot for some time. Anyway, it was 2:00 before we knew it, and I stopped at the restroom while they started for the car - leaving my Cherry Coke / Barq's on the table. When I got out, I saw a guy wiping the table and I was just starting to say "oh no" in a sad voice when he looked at me and said "That's her" to another worker, who promptly produced my drink from behind the counter. Now that's service.

Pam and I ended up going into the reception anyway. We couldn't resist checking the place out, and we wanted to say goodbye to the sisters. It was not what I expected. The first thing we noticed was the beautiful landscaping, and the waterfall on the small cliff facing the front door. Inside it was kind of classy, it reminded me of the lodge at camp with its quasi-chandeliers and its rock chimney. Perfect for a wedding reception. Especially with the ice in the fountain - flowing over the rock like a gorgeous natural ice sculpture. Lots of saints there, lots of food (sushi! But I was actually too full to eat a piece, can you imagine?) and we said our thank yous and goodbyes.

Then Pam and I were free to indulge in a classic Lydia/Pam adventure. This time it was an awesome vintage clothing store with a colorful, talkative owner who wants to commission some fingerless mitts from me (hey, maybe that's a way to earn a little cash as a trainee...) and a homeless man for whom Pam bought some coffee and a brownie, and with whom we chatted and prayed. Athens, interestingly enough, has old parking meters converted for donations for the homeless, with a request not to pay panhandlers. But it didn't mention coffee.

I really like Athens. Pam could see why. She liked it too. And we loved the saints. It was very good. And now my story is told. I think I will to bed now. And avoid all those grown-up tasks that are beginning to pile up, at least for one more night.

A Writer

2009-11-14T17:55:00.002-05:00

I just watched the movie "The Soloist." A profound and beautiful movie about a writer who meets a street musician - a homeless Juliard dropout who loves music more than life itself. This writer records his story, and then becomes a part of it by trying to "help" him - finding out that playing God can be a lot more complicated than one first imagines.

It got me thinking about being a writer. We can wield such power, or we can just fill up empty air with empty words. I want to write things worth writing. I want to really dig into something and tell a story that needs to be told. The rest of the time writing feels like a waste. But I tell myself it's practice, or keeping sharp, or something like that. I've started journaling more as I blog less, largely because while the act of writing may be very important, that doesn't necessarily mean what was written is worth reading.

Some Mondays aren't so bad, or, work like a grown-up, play like a grown-up

2009-11-04T20:53:00.001-05:00

Someone told me that the real meaning of the 21st century is that the people with the least to say have more ways to say it than ever. Those people are called bloggers.

I got a job at Converse. It's been about four weeks. For the first time since graduating (actually, ever), I am working full-time. On the one hand, it's so nice to feel like a real adult that's pulling her own weight, but on the other hand, I was finally starting to be domestic - cleaning the house regularly, cooking grocery shopping, etc, and now that whole carefully perfected routine has flown out the window.

I don't understand how modern people can keep a clean house, cook most nights, and work full time. Like my sister. She even runs several miles almost every day. Maybe it comes with practice. This whole adulthood thing is still very new to me.

I guess you'd like to hear about my new job. I am writing/compiling content for Converse's web site re-launch, slated for mid-january. It's perfect because the job ends a little before I leave for the training. I enjoy the work, too. Mostly gathering information from various campus folks and the current website, some assigning/editing pieces, but a fair amount of writing new content as well. I particularly enjoyed writing the section about Converse's traditions, like the way all the seniors wear panther ears (or horns), tails, and Chuck Taylors to opening convocation.

I even have my own office, since the assistant director of communications just left and they haven't filled his position yet. I'm getting paid like a real professional too. Yes, I feel very much like a grown-up.

This extra income source has made me feel slightly less guilty than I normally would about going out a little more with friends. On Monday, I went with my old roommate and good friend Anna and her best friend Sarah to Ichiban for sushi. It was half price, but we managed to generate a hefty bill nonetheless. I still can't believe we ate 10 rolls. That's about 50-60 pieces. That's like 20 pieces of sushi per person. We got beers too - the first drink I've gotten to order since turning 21. It was a Sapporo, which is a light Japanese beer. I liked it. But I couldn't finish it so Sarah and Anna helped.

Then we got some ice cream from Brewsters (hard to believe, I know, after eating all that sushi) and went to Anna's to watch the new movie she gave me for my birthday. Mirrormask is a very strange British film with a story by Neil Gaiman and produced by Jim Henson. But we liked it immensely. It made sense to package it with the Labyrinth and the Dark Crystal - many strange creatures and shifty, mind-blowing visual scenes that turn inside out and do other crazy things. But since it was made in 2006 and used CGI rather than puppetry and animation, it was perhaps even more visually stunning, if lacking some of the earthy richness achieved by the elaborate physical designs of the other two. But it had a distinctly unique flavor - I'm guessing because the director was also the art director and co-wrote the story. It was his baby, I imagine.

The score was odd - for such spectacular visuals one would expect something sweeping and orchestral, or perhaps kind of rock-anthem. But this music was distinctly urban, with tinges of electronica and hip-hop.

Anyway, it is a good movie for fans of Tim Burton or Jim Henson. Highly imaginitive, with an epic fantasy story line, and just creepy enought to be cool.

It's nearing 9:30 - bed is calling me. (I know, isn't that repulsively early? But sadly normal thanks to my two jobs, tutoring, and the daylight savings switch.) It's cold too. I'm ready to curl up under my nice warm blankets, and watch my cat leap up, wait for me to lift the blanket for her, and circle under the blanket a few times before settling down with her head barely poking out from under the covers.

Party

2009-10-29T00:10:00.002-04:00

It was a jazz themed party with champagne and lots of food and jazz records and dancing. Definitely my best birthday party ever.
The blurry photos came from my camera and the nice ones came from my aunt Mary Beth.
I am writing this post from Windows Live Writer, after editing the photos, tagging them, uploading them on Facebook, all through Windows Photo Gallery. Loving Windows 7.

I got a New Laptop

2009-10-24T01:29:00.001-04:00

I am posting this from the BloggerBuddy Gadget - it's a 2-postage-stamp size app on the edge of my beautiful 15inch screen. Yay! Maybe the fact that I have my own computor again, combined with the fact that I can post a blog with a single mouse click, will encourage me to write more and shorter blogs. Won't that be nice?

More about my computer:

Windows 7

Card reader

DVD writer

250GB hard drive

$350

I'm loving it so far. Windows 7 is a pretty steep learning curve though, considering I'm going from XP. Favorite new features so far include Snap, gadgets, themes (a slow slide show for my wall paper! So fun! ) and Google Toolbar.

Jump lists seems promising but I'll have to wait and prove its usefulness.

Hmm...now I'm off to explore the super new Paint - always been my favorite MS program. I wonder how much it's like Paint.NET...

By the way, I turned 21 on Thursday and had an amazing party.
I don't think I can post pictures from this gadget but maybe later I will show you my blurry camera phone pix.

Woohoo! Wow it's half past one I probably should turn this thing off and get some sleep.

Are you alive?

2009-10-01T10:35:00.001-04:00

I asked a strange question to an unsuspecting friend yesterday. I saw her on facebook - this is someone I don't know very well, just see her at conferences since we were in junior high - and I IMed her asking if she was alive. "At the moment, yes." she replied, with a :).

I don't really know why I asked that. Perhaps because if someone asked me that, I would say, 'yes, finally.' Maybe a better question would have been, 'are you really living?'

The past 30 days, for me, have danced along Time's continuum like steps in a minuet - graceful, cadenced, neither too slow nor two fast. They've been spent working in the library, cooking, cleaning, organizing, making memories with friends and spending quality time with family and the Lord. I've read three graphic novels and a great biography, and am now engrossed in a lovely children's novel. I've sold some handmade jewelry and am now working on a custom piece. Of course the profits were promptly invested in new supplies...Michael's is a dangerous place!

I've been making the prayer meetings in Simpsonville on Wednesday nights (except for last night - my keys were missing!). When a child of God sincerely asks for the Lord to bless those gathered in His name, His answer is real - palpable. I encourage folks to not just pray at their meetings/church services, but to pray for them. In the car, even arriving early to ask the Spirit to move...He really honors that.

A few weeks past, while many saints were in the blending conference in Jacksonville, I visited the church in Columbia, where the remnant was gathered around a dining room table, praising God with raw, unaided voices and partaking of the communion that somehow tasted sweeter than ever. It was worth driving two hours, getting lost, missing the beginning...it was more than made up for by the sweet fellowship, the meal afterward...this is the church life. Then I spent the rest of the day with a friend who recently moved to Columbia from Spartanburg, a friend whose main contact with Christianity has been judgement and restriction... she feels free, rooming with a quasi-Pagan who "accepts her just as she is" - she feels like she can create her life into whatever she wants it to be, now she has to figure out what that is. I am glad she feels free. But what will she choose? Christian though she may be, will she ever tap into the meaning of her life that is, already? Will she ever see how much she is loved and valued by her maker and be willing to accept His vision for her within His plan? Or will she grasp her life firmly and make of it what she thinks she wants, which may be much smaller than what could be...? I pray for her.

Bible study has been especially enjoyable, as the various members of rise up to supply every need. Kathy, our normal teacher, is still out, handling a lot with her sons...I never wrote about that, did I? Well, you'd be best off getting the full story here: (Caring Bridge for the Vangsnes boys) but basically, they were out in Montana, serving God as summer missionaries, when they had a terrible car wreck that left one with several broken bones and one in a coma.
Dan, whose leg and back are healing up surprisingly well, has recently come back home from the Montana hospital. Jeremy, who flew home much sooner, has come out of the coma into what is called a "semi-concious vegetative state." He can sometimes control movements and exhibit signs that he's comprehending what's being said to him, which is a long way from the braindead pronouncement the doctors initially gave him. If you pray, they could certainly use your prayers, although the prayers of the saints around the world have been so potent already...I wish I had time to tell you all the stories of miracles, large and small, that surround this family, but you'd be better off reading them for yourself at their site.

Anyway, Bible study has been a little different with various saints rising up to teach, and me finally putting my musical gifts to consistent use for their benefit. But it's so good. I always leave feeling like 'This is it. This is the church. This is...where it's at.' Something is happening with that rag-tag little band of Christians that go to different places on Sunday mornings. The Lord is doing something, He's been working on it for six years or so but it's now starting to...bubble up a little bit, like a simmering pot. We all feel it, although we couldn't tell you exactly what it is - it's something new.

Hmm. Sometimes you just start writing without an idea of what you mean to say. I guess life is like that, my life anyway. But I like it that way. God is writing this story and He knows exactly what He means by it. If I knew the ending, or even the next chapter, I might just cramp His style.

A time for every purpose

2009-08-31T19:24:00.001-04:00

Hello. It's been a very, very long time. Camp came and camp ended. I drove from Missouri to Austin, Texas. I drove to Columbia, South Carolina. I drove to Atlanta, Georgia and flew to Anaheim, California. And now I am sitting at home again, at last.

So many wonderful people, wonderful stories. Although I haven't (and probably won't, unless someone asks or I write a memoir) typed any of it up, I kept up my little silver Mound Ridge journal pretty well. The internet broke about halfway through camp so I couldn't have blogged even if I'd felt like it. (After a week with those kids, just getting laundry done is an accomplishment.) It's kind of nice because I've never been that devoted to hand writing in a paper journal. I could write a lot more personal stuff, and God stuff, that would bore you or make you squirm. Don't feel you missed out too much.

It's weird coming back to this blog. I really don't know what to say. I guess I'll say that I'm a very changed person after this summer. God taught me many lessons, particularly about humility. I was used to seeing my life as my big picture, with God and other people fitting into it. I'm learning to see my life in terms of God's big picture, with others in there and myself as a tiny piece of it.

I read a book called Monk Habits for Everyday People. It's a Protestant's guide to applying the wisdom of St. Benedict's Rule to modern life. It was recommended to me by pastor Christian Boyd whom I think Pam mentioned in my previous post. It was just the book I needed to read in that place and time, thinking about discipline and purpose, what it means to be in community, submitting your own will and desires not just to God but for the people around you.

Then I went straight to the source and read the Rule itself. It's a quirky thing, full of archaisms, absurdities, humor and deep wisdom. It's hard to explain how these two books intersected with my story weaving its way across far-flung locales. In Austin, after enjoying the Barton Springs Sunday Circus and all the oddities therein, I'd read about monks who never laugh or engage in "idle talk" and somehow identify with both worlds. I took the Rule to the Full Time Training in Anaheim, one of the strictest but also most spiritually living Bible schools in the nation. Although most people there would not see their life in terms of monasticism, I do. The parallels were truly striking.

I guess brother Benedict has given a particular color cast to my whole summer, added a certain brilliancy that's hard to explain. Those two books, combined with repeated themes of experience and fellowship with the Giver and Purposer, brought me to a perspective that cut out a lot of the fluff and revealed the true sheen and worth of the essences of life.

In six months, I will be enrolled in the Full Time Training. This is what God has been preparing me for. This is the true desire of my heart and something I will be willing to strive toward harder than I have pursued graduate school. (Not that I won't be a librarian - that's still the plan. It's just on hold for two more years. I'll still be done with grad school before I'm 25.) On the other side of the country, my contact with parents, friends and family will be reduced to weekly phone calls. I will not see any of them for stretches of five months. My entire life will be structured around one thing - God. Not just learning about Him or doing some kind of obesience rituals supposed to make Him happy, but gaining Him. Breathing and eating and drinking Him. Getting Him into my being in in a way that transforms me not only into His image, but into His very life and nature. Not just because I want to be a better person but because I want to be a part of the reason for the universe, to bring joy to the heart of the Creator, to fully inhabit my place in His. . . His . . . I can't even think of a word big enough to describe it, big enough to capture the feeling I feel of His utter vastness and the smallness of my heart within Him.

With that goal in view, how am I to approach the next six months? What is truly important? God, family, friends. Living in a way that glorifies Him, benefits them, and draws us all closer together. I've been thinking and doing far too much. I need to truly live. It will require some painful sacrifices and I hope those reading my blog will understand. The things I have been a part of in Spartanburg have been good and wonderful things and I continue to fully support everyone involved in them. I believe it is all a part of God's plan. But I have to step out now. I realize many of those things had become reasons to neglect the people God put into my life to cherish and the more personal responsibilities I must now learn to bear as an adult. I hope that over the next few months, I will get to develop deeper relationships with all of you as human beings, whoever you are, and maybe even that we could spend time together, not doing, doing doing, but just being.

"He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end." (Ecclesiastes 3:11)

"Live from Kansas City!"

2009-07-04T20:43:00.002-04:00

I'm not actually in Kansas City. I am at Mound Ridge Camp near Saint James, MO. I've had one (very busy) week at camp but I don't have time to write about it right now.
However, my friend Pamela drove up with me on her way to Kansas City, and she wrote a very detailed note about the trip on her Facebook. She has given me permission to repost it here for your reading pleasure:

Lydia and I left Spartanburg Thursday morning at 8:45 and I got to my aunt and uncle's house probably around five or six yesterday (Saturday). First, a brief synopsis of the journey:

Thursday: Having eaten breakfast at Lydia's house, we only made one rest stop before briefly having lunch in a Taco Bell about half an hour past Knoxville. We'd completely avoided traffic and delays and were probably a good two hours ahead of schedule when we got to Nashville and missed our exit. We saw it, but we just couldn't get over fast enough. So we had to do a secondary way, that led us to the same place but through bumper to bumper traffic. Which wouldn't have been so bad except it was on a road where many other highways seem to be constantly merging and everyone (especially giant 18 wheelers) kept changing lanes for no apparent reason. We felt we'd almost been creamed like three times, but God protected us.The car did something weird at one point, and we pulled over. Lydia checked the oil, and that wasn't it. So we just decided to use either the AC or the stereo and not both and that seemed to solve it.Even so, we were still way ahead of schedule when we got near Lydia's aunt's house in
Kentucky. So much so that we decided to randomly stop at a garage sale we saw.

We got to her aunt's house at 4:30 Central time. Her aunt wasn't expected to be home, but she had told Lydia where she hid a key. We were there for about half an hour until I realized something... I didn't have my wallet!The last time I had remembered seeing it was at the Taco Bell, as I'd not used it at the garage sale. I figured it was either at the Taco Bell, the side of the highway where we stopped to check the car, or the garage sale. Since the Taco Bell was the only place I could hope to call, we hoped it was that. We tried several methods to get the number, but finally we found the reciept. It didn't have the area code on it, but we were able to obtain it and called and, Praise Jesus! it was there! You can't get on a plane without ID anymore and I'm supposed to be flying home. They agreed to use some of the money in it to pay for postage and are mailing it to my aunt and uncle's house.After that crisis was resolved, her
aunt was home and we ended up going out to dinner. It was good, and then afterwards we sang together, then went to bed.

Friday: We woke up and had breakfast, and hit the road by 8:45, again. At 2:30 Central we still hadn't eaten and were near O Fallon, IL. Lydia met a pastor when she was in MO last time who lives there. He and she and I have been having a 3way email conversation about God and the Body of Christ and community. So we called him up, just in case he was free, and he was! So we had a two hour lunch at the "St Louis Bread Company" which is really Paneras.

Just after we left him, we made our biggest error. First, I read the map wrong. Then we turned around and Lydia was saying how she should have listened to her gut and not my navigation. So then we get on the right road and I fold up the map and say confidently that we'll just stay on this for a while... and not five minutes later she says "aren't we supposed to turn here?" and before I can answer turns off. But of course, that means we were off the road AGAIN. So we decided that God had that happen so we were both humbled. :) We'd missed the bypass, and had to drive through the heart of St Louis, which took a while but now we have really nice pictures of the arch.We were finally in MO and it was pretty much smooth sailing. We got to the town right outside of Lydia's camp and we'd not eaten dinner since we'd had such a light lunch. I asked if we should stop but she just wanted to go there. So we did. It is very hot. :) Otherwise, it was pleasant and the people were wacky but nice. It was the last night of one camp session and so the other counselors were busy so Lydia and I and her guitar, Sancho, went singing to the Lord. Later, we played with the campers, and then had a very late dinner and went to bed.

Saturday: We woke up and had breakfast with the campers. Then Lydia helped clean up and I went and packed up and sang unto the Lord. Then Lydia and I went and sang in the chapel in the woods and played with Rex, the camp dog. But it was too hot for much singing and then it was really time to go. A fellow counselor decided to tag along. We were meeting my aunt and uncle half way, in Columbia, MO. We took 68 to 63 and 63 was supposed to take us all the way to Columbia, through Jefferson city. Apparently in Jefferson City you have to take three exits to stay on the same road? Not knowing this we continued on the same stretch of pavement, only apparently it was now 50! We realized this half an hour out of Jefferson City and had to turn around and therefore took an extra hour to meet up with my poor, patient relatives. My phone died just before we met with them. But meet with them we did, and they invited Lydia and whoever she wants to bring to come visit whenever.

(this is Lydia again) I hope I do get to Kansas City before I leave Missouri, however it's not happening this weekend as camp staff has made plans together. Tonight, we are watching the fireworks in Steelville. Tommorow, we are seeing St. Louis. I'm hoping I'll have some down time before the next camp starts Wednesday to relate to you some of the adventures of my first week as a counselor.
Happy Independence Day!

Interim

2009-06-16T22:03:00.002-04:00

I'm back home, once again immersed in the constant commotion of my Sparkle City life. The two weeks since that lazy afternoon on the Meramac River might as well have been two years. That Sunday evening, my fellow counselor Bleke arrived from Missouri, then all sorts of staff began trickling in. As the week progressed, evenings at Mound Ridge evolved from scavenged dinners, scary movies and late-night stargazing to full-blown camp cooking, staff training videos and "Teambuilding." As regards the camp music program, I had to quickly adapt the fruit of two weeks of thoughtful, solitary perfectionism to the abilities and interests of real, non-musician folks who would have to carry on in my absence.

I think my favorite evening of that last, somewhat frenetic week was the night we began making music in earnest. The three senior counselors, plus a gaggle of 14 and 15 year old counselors-in-training, gathered around the campfire, each with a drum or a tambourine or some other delightful noisemaker. A vital precursor to the actual noisemaking, necessary for bolstering energy and lowering inhibitions, was of course, the obligatory round of s'mores. I began with some of the simpler tunes, easy enough to echo around a mouthful of marshmallow. Once the roasting sticks were all retired and we had a good few songs under our belt, we picked up our instruments and sang my favorite arrangement of the Lord's Prayer - learned from the Psalters. It's a catching Middle Eastern melody with a driving rhythm, each repetition whirling faster into the next until it spins into an ecstatic chorus of "Amens" and wild drumming. My "test campers" loved it. A few of the CIT's even started to dance.

This being the natural climax of our evening, we thereafter began packing up and heading to the cabins. I was inside the dining hall when I heard a man's irritated voice, asking the CITs for the person in charge. He came inside and asked me where there was an adult he could speak with. I told him that would be me, unless he cared to go up to the top of the hill to speak with Christy and Don. He proceeded to explain that having paid to camp at Mound Ridge to escape the intense stresses of his life, he did not take kindly to people beating "50 gallon barrels" when he was trying to enjoy a peaceful evening. I was aware that he and his wife had been camping down in the field (a good quarter mile walk from our fire circle) but I had no idea they were still there, or that a person in that field would be able to hear me playing the djembe way up here. He threatened to pack up and leave, and I apologized profusely and said it wouldn't happen again. He left in as big a huff as he had entered.

When I told Don the story, he laughed. "He thinks that was loud? What's he going to do with the 50 people who will be in the lodge right above him tomorrow night?" Don informed me that quiet hours didn't start until 11:00 anyway, and that the man had been informed of this. The incident had occurred at 10:30. I felt a little better after talking with him, but we didn't have another drum circle after that. The guy and his wife apparently did leave. None of us were terribly sad to see them go. Least of all the CITs, who'd gotten a bit of a fright.

It's storming out here and Dad says I should turn off the computer and go in. So I guess you won't get to hear about life back in Spartanburg. Ah well, it's pretty much the same old. My gig with the Windjammers (a 20's/New Orleans style jazz band) is this Sunday at 7:00 at USC Upstate, if you're curious. That's after Friday and Saturday trying to get my $50 worth of the Music Camp, without enjoying it too much. I have an 11am rehearsal.

Also, you really ought to look into Renaissance Street Navigation. It's a team scavenger hunt-type challenge thing that will be going on the 4th of July. I have to miss it but you bet I'd be there if I could. There's a $400 reward plus you get to go adventuring all around Spartanburg and learn about its history.

I swear, my camera must've sprouted feet. I keep seeing it in odd places and then it vanishes when I try to find it to upload pix. I'll try to get to it before I launch on my road trip Thursday. If not, you'll be hearing from me in Missouri next.

Farewell 'til then!

Mound Ridge Week 2

2009-05-24T14:36:00.001-04:00

Monday
I've stopped keeping track of the number of days I've been at camp. I guess it's been a week seeing as it's Monday and I got here on a Monday. I am becoming more aware of God's presence. That is easier when a) you are surrounded by His astoundingly beautiful creation, b) you are given time to think and c) the things to distract you from Him are limited.

I got a box from Mom and Dad. It had my camera card reader, my harmonica, my penny whistle, shampoo, and a box of granola bars, along with the music I'll need to learn to be ready to sing with the WindJammers Jazz Band when I get back in June. After dinner I took the music to the rec hall. There's an old out of tune piano there. It was fun banging out those old 20's tunes on it.

Tuesday
To the tune of "I Got A Dollar"

I got a sammich, I got a sammich. I got a sammich, yes I do.

Well actually it's a chicken wrap from Sonic. It was supposed to be a taco. Last night Don said he would bring me some Jack-in-the-Box tacos. Awesome. That's one of my very favoritest of foods. But this morning, all I see in the fridge is a bag from Sonic with something small wrapped in foil. Don explains that when he got to Jack-in-the-Box and ordered 2 dozen tacos (Christy and Don really love them too) the scuzzy-looking server said "They're in the freezer and we can't defrost them."
"Well," said Don, "Can't you just throw them in the fryer like you always do?"
"I donno, let me ask Al. Hey Al!"
Al comes in, looking just as scuzzy and unpersonable as the server, and says "What do you want?" It's become a scene, with customers in the line behind Don witnessing the whole thing.
"Never mind, I'll just figure it out, somewhere else."
He turned to the server.
"You should have just told me you were out of tacos."

Don offers this word of advice out of his 20 years in restaurant management. "If the service is unfriendly and the manager does not appear well-groomed or well-organized, don't eat there."

At this point, the journal entries are replaced by to-do lists and hastily scratched notes. It's just as I suspected. I have been a lot busier this week and consequently have had less time to write about it. But I'll summarize.

Most of the week I spent doing music stuff. Christy has put me in charge of music for the camp, which is a really exciting opportunity. Finally I can put my talents and experience with music in full service to God. So much of the week I was flipping through song books and playing various instruments, learning new tunes and trying to remember old ones. I'll be leading singing and accompanying on the guitar and sometimes the piano. It's a real challenge getting together all these songs, organizing them and working them into the daily schedules, mixing camp favorites with new material, and trying to make it all relevant to the daily Bible lessons, but I'm learning so much from it. I'm especially excited about arranging with a great assortment of instruments. Christy is truly a woman after my own heart. She has been collecting for the camp an awesome assortment of rhythm instruments, with tambourines, a djembe, and all the fun things that people like to bang, shake or click. She also has a dulcimer that I am making sure will make it into the worship times.

One of the greatest challenges but also a really exciting thing has been reconciling my passion for music with my commitment to stay centered on God. I don't come from a musically elaborate church tradition. Acoustic guitars and maybe a piano are about all you see on a Sunday morning. I have a lot of fun with music but often it has been at odds with, or at best a distraction from, my relationship with God. My prayer for this time is that more than just having a lot of fun with music at camp, I, the counselors and the children would be able to truly praise Him with the guitar and the djembe, the dulcimer and the tambourine. Reading Psalm 150 helped me claim the truth that this is possible:

Praise the LORD.

Praise God in his sanctuary;

praise him in his mighty heavens.
Praise him for his acts of power;

praise him for his surpassing greatness.
Praise him with the sounding of the trumpet,

praise him with the harp and lyre,
praise him with tambourine and dancing,

praise him with the strings and flute,
praise him with the clash of cymbals,

praise him with resounding cymbals.
Let everything that has breath praise the LORD.

Praise the LORD.

(Psalm 150, NIV)

On Wednesday, I went with Christy to the Presbytery of Missouri Stated Meeting. That's where representatives from all the churches in the state come together to fellowship, take care of church business, and listen to speakers talk about matters relevant to the church. We were there representing Mound Ridge, which is a Presbyterian camp and retreat center. We had a table and were passing out goodies and information.

I learned a lot. I don't really know much about the Presbyterian church, or traditional denominations for that matter. My favorite part was talking with a pastor named Christian Boyd. Christy knew that we would have a lot to talk about so she went to great pains to ensure we met. We spent lunch talking about all sorts of things pertaining to the Church, Christian community and radical brotherly love, rediscovering the deeply rooted practices of our faith, how denominations may be beginning to break down of their own accord (Awesome!) and him being a Benedictine oblate (that's kind of like a monk outside a monastery). He has a blog and his church website is really cool. I spent a long time yesterday link hopping from there, and found this awesome online Christian classics library, and this radical Christian emagazine thing.

Last night, Don's brother, sister and brother-in-law came to spend Memorial Day weekend. We ate dinner together and had a great sing-along. Don's brother-in-law Larry brought his guitar, and I had my penny whistle and harmonica. It was a blast and we stayed up til past midnight (Which is pretty late, for me, here).

I'm about to go kayaking on the Meramac with Don and Bob and Larry, so I need to get going. Until next time!

Mound Ridge Camp Week 1

2009-05-17T15:28:00.001-04:00

Hello from Missouri! It's been an interesting week. Since the only computor access I have is at the Welcome Center (with dial-up internet), I have been journaling the old-fashioned way.

I'm typing up my "field notes" (as my anthropology professor friend would call them) for you. The thing about journaling is, the less going on, the more time you have to write about it, and conversely, the more interesting things happen, the less time you have to record them. I'm sure future entries will be nowhere near as detailed, but might as well take advantage while it lasts.

Pictures will have to wait until next week; my card reader is in the mail on its way over.
Without further ado, I present the first installment of:

The Mound Ridge Journal

May 11, 2009 (Day 1)
I'm still very definitely sick. The decision was made to fly today anyway, despite flu-like symptoms which utterly destroyed my weekend, because the nice American Airlines people would not exchange my ticket for less than a $300 extra charge. It's amazing how much strength one can muster when one has no choice.

The flight from Charlotte to St. Louis was uneventful, marked only by a singularly personable flight attendant. I found Jenny (a seasoned summer counselor sent to pick me up) at the baggage claim, on the phone and leaning intently over her sudoku book. She was easy enough to distinguish by her Mound Ridge T-shirt.

The two-hour ride back to Mound Ridge was pleasant enough, but long. We had to go a little out of our way to get some 5 gallon jugs of something for redoing the pool. Don, the grounds/maintenance man, had requested them before 2:00, at which time the concrete truck came. That didn't happen, but he didn't seem to mind. "Hey," he called out from his golf cart as we pulled up to the Welcome Center, "Are you the sick girl?" Yes, I was, and still am. Luckily, Christy, the director, has been incredibly understanding. She said they weren't going to expect anything of me for the next two or three days and told me to get a lot of rest and heal up right.

Mound Ridge isn't quite what I expected. (Is anything ever?) Turning off at a rustic wooden sign reading 'Mound Ridge Camp and Retreat Center,' onefinds oneself ona long, narrow gravel road in the woods, passing signs that say '5 miles, God's Children at Play.' After the colorful totem pole you come to the welcome center / office / gift store, housed in what looks like a doublewide mobile home. A small house with a dog tied out, and some random out buildings that are a little junked up complete the picture. To be honest, the initial impression is more like the trailered homestead of an eccentric, woodsy, multi-generational family than a summer camp. I have to cut them some slack though, this is the off season and they are doing several maintenance projects like the pool revamp. I'm sure it will be tidied up before the campers come.

The staff, as far as I've met of them, are incredibly warm, friendly, and accomodating. The office assistant, Heather, brings her baby Jaspar to work. He is the sweetest thing, dark, with a frequent long-face expression that gives him an old-for-his-years look. chisty introduced me briefly, asked me what I needed, and had Jenny drive me to my cabin straightaway for a much-needed nap.

I saw the bulk of the buildings on the way down. Again, not what I was expecting. They are all small and nestled close together in the steep folds of a beautiful wooded hill. Jenny warned me we'd be on a hill, but still, somehow in my mind it was all flatter and spread out a bit more. But I like it. It all sort of feels like a quaint, rustic, miniature village on a hill, sort of like those Halmark porcelain winter scenes. My cabin is rustic indeed. It's down a steep little hill with mossy stone stairs anda narrow concrete channel in fron that feels like it may become a canal given a good rain. Jenny said it has been flooding lately. (not the cabin, the camp.) I'm staying in the right half, with three cots, and Jenny's on the left. I'm thankful for that; I admit I'd feel a little lonely and frightened here at the bottom of this hill by myself, and sick to boot.

The cleaning ladies were still working on it when we got here, an unforseen obstacle to my nap that I had to muster some patience to wait out. After bringing me a lovely assortment of clear sodas and herbal teas, Christy left me to wait in the Mace cabin porch, a few feet up from my cabin, Kickapoo. Mace is nice, in that quaint miniature way one would expect in this little village. I expect it is one of the older dwellings, at least half a century. According to a faded, peeling collage on the porch, it was renovated in 1997. But the fact of it appearing torn up and mildewed in the 'after' photos while clean and tidy in the 'before' shots, I can only attribute to some prank.

I am being distracted by the pointed bellowing of a group of cows. I was warned of this eerie noise back at the Welcome Center. They called them the Mad Cows and explained that they moo like that because their calves are being taken away from them. I'd be mad too.

When I finally got to take my nap, I had a lovely dream. I was running races with a young boy, a Mound Ridge camper. Over and over again we ran, with no pain or weariness. I was bounding, floating along the ground in great effortless strides only possible in the dream world. Mound ridge was grander, too, populated by stately stone buildings and an elegant water fountain, like a college campus. As we neared the end of our final run, I saw my friend Grace ahead of me, running, then slowing to a stop looking spent. "No, Grace!" I called out jokingly, "I need to see energy and speed, don't show me that!" So she got back up and jogged beside me chattering, obviously unaware I was in the middle of a race. I was sprinting furiously at this the final stretch, rounding the water fountain. Had it not been a dream I would surely have tripped and broken something. I flew at the middle step ofthe main building, arriving just half a second after the young boy. He grinned at me in triumph and I grinned back, mentioning I took the long route aound the water fountain. That didn't mean anything to him of course, but it was impossible to be upset with the endorphins still coursing strong.

As I rose into conciousness, sweating, I was quite sure I could hear a faint snoring in the cot next to me, but when I opened my eyes there was no one. A large black ant was exploring the bedspread next to my face. I brushed her off and listened carefully. I could still hear the snoring sound ever-so-faintly. Now, as I finish up in the darkening cabin, it's been replaced by the sound of birds, crickets, frogs croaking, and the mad cows of course. Every once in a while a plane flies overhead, a faint reminder of the civilization I've left entirely behind.

May 12, 2009
Ants
to the tune of "Raindrops"

Ants keep a'crawlin' on my bed
and very soon they could be fallin' on my head
- ants are not for me - oh -
(can) you get these ants out of my room, stop their crawlin'
sometime real soon?

(Day 2)
More ants. Slept all day. Went nowhere besides cabin and dining hall. Made earrings for Mom. Saw a tick crawling on my bed. Still coughing hard. Think I broke the coffee maker. Sick of being sick.

May 13, 2009 (Day 3)
Morning: Drank Tulsi Rose tea on the porch, hung out with the black cat Holly and her grey kitten.
Getting better. Spent a little time in the office getting to know the camp Bible lessons and brainstorming curriculum with Jenny. After dinner, we watched "Forces of Nature" in the conference room. We lined chairs up to make "couches" and spread our blankets and pillows over them.

The camp is really beautiful at night. That's when I noticed all the stone work - paths, waterways and walls everywhere, with big geodes that rise up and sparkle. And the way the moss grows all over it.

May 14, 2009 (Day 4)
Today Jenny and I spent most of the day working on programming. Deciding which games and crafts the camp is going to do when, etc. We did it all day long until we both had brain fatigue. We took some chill time in the cabins before creatively masterminding a meal of macaroni, taquitos, sliced avocados, salsa and cheese dip.
Rex is the camp dog. He is obsessed with playing fetch. He will keep bringing a stick back to you all day long. Today I accidentally threw it on the3 roof. Poor dog, he looked everywhere. I caught him looking at me out of the corner of his eye like 'Oh no, I can't let her kn0w I can't find it!'

May 15, 2009
I looked at a map today. Missouri is so much closer to Texas than South Carolina. When I road trip out here in July, I really don't want to drive all the way to SC, then turn around and drive for 3 days down to Texas with Mom and Dad to visit my siblings.

I'd really just like to drive down to Texas from Missouri, then fly Mom and Dad over and let them drive back with me to SC. Its a lot less time driving and more time with family. I'll have to research 1-way plane tickets from SC to Austin.

May 16, 2009 (Day 6)
Hallie came in last night. She is kitchen help i.e. dishwasher and a junior in high school. We (Hallie, Jenny and I) hung out and watched movies in the conference hall - which is a small stone building that serves as the staff lounge. We got caught in a rainstorm and had to wait it out - 10:30 and then we raced back in the rain and Jenn accidentally stepped on a frog.

Tonight we (Jenny, Hallie, Christy + baby grandaughter Marissa, and I) went to Ruby's, which is a really wonderful ice cream parlor. I had a coconut almond hot fudge sundae with a waffle cone on top. Then the three of us watched two more movies. Wehad a great time being really silly - talking in funny voices and copying each other.

Hallie is quiet at first - well really she's always quiet - but she is much fun. She squirts Jenny and her mom Sue (Sue is the weekend cook) with the water sprayer. Jenny encourages her. She bought her a massive water gun that Hallie doesn't hesitate to use against her. She even made herself a T-shirt with a big bullseye on the back. I wonder if today, after several surprise drenchings, she's starting to regret that.

May 18, 2009 (Today)
Besides a sore throat and that awful lingering cough, I'm feeling pretty much back to normal.
Christy took Hallie and me to Steelville Presbyterian Church. It was very nice. The people were friendly. A man with the Gideons (the people who put all those Bibles in hotels, prisons, barracks and such) gave a talk. I was happy to give $5 for a hotel Bible; I have been grateful to find one while traveling on more than one occasion. There was a small reception for the high school graduates, with some delicious red velvet / cherry cupcakes, and then it was back to Mound Ridge. I'm here all alone now; Christy and Don are visiting Don's sister who just had a stroke. It's peaceful here. I'm going to ride around on the golf cart and explore all the corners of the camp I haven't yet seen.

Until next week!

Mound Ridge

2009-04-30T14:35:00.001-04:00

It's official. I will be a counselor at Mound Ridge Camp this summer. It's a small, Presbyterian, outdoorsy camp in Missouri. I'm quite excited about it. Not only does it seem to be a spiritual place but because it is so small I will have the opportunity to exercise many of my gifts, teaching crafts, leading songs, etc. It's a beautiful, remote area in the Ozarks. There are rivers to be forded, trails to be trekked, trees to be climbed, mountains to be boarded down...I know it's going to be an experience to remember.

I will try to maintain a weekly chronicle of my time there and will have access to email and phone. But my contact with civilization will be somewhat limited. I'll have to get used to dial-up internet again.

I leave for set-up and orientation on May 11 or 12. That's the week after next. I'll be back the second week of June to work for SMC's summer semester, go to the Music Camp, and sing with the WindJammers for Ice Cream Sunday on Father's Day. Then I'll be driving back over with all my gear for the camp stretch and won't set foot in SC again for two whole months. What an adventure!

This may or may not be my last post 'til then. I will be accepting your best wishes in the comment box below.

PS. Look for the latest issue of Root starting Monday!

Global Warming vs. Hellfire

2009-04-18T18:23:00.001-04:00

I don't really believe in "global warming," actually. The whole apocalyptic ice-caps-melting-which-will-cause-the-end-of-the-world thing. Mostly, this is due to the science curriculum I had in high school which convincingly enough at the time argued that the environmental changes being touted as proof didn't actually exceed normal fluctuations over the history of Earth. I haven't really looked into the science of it since then, who knows, things may have changed. I'm only mildly unpersuaded. I haven't seen An Inconvenient Truth yet, after all.

But here's why it doesn't really matter to me, and why, in fact, I'm actually pretty happy that the danger of global warming is becoming a matter of pressing international attention. Whether or not humanity is specifically destined for a Day After Tomorrow-like climate meltdown, or more of a Wall-E fate of Earth's natural resources being used up and spit out 'til there's nothing left to take, I am convinced that humanity's treatment of our planet over the past few generations is both unsustainable and morally wrong, and that we all need to change our behavior.

What global warming crusaders have done is created a crisis. They have alarmed the public by presenting a graphic, tangible doomsday toward which we appear to be careening at full speed. Without that, all my or anyone else's moral exhortations and vague doomy warnings could do little to get the majority of lazy, selfish humanity, to take notice, get off their butt, and begin to treat the earth the way we should have from the beginning. I've concluded that to be persuaded to do anything, humans in general need a message that is simple, urgent, and personally relevant. I can almost imagine a collection of activists and scientists gathered in some back room saying "if they need an apocalypse, we'll give 'em an apocalypse!" Hey, if we can judge by 2008/2009's rise in environmental concern in media, movies, business, politics, and the small but significant changes everyday Americans are starting to make, it seems to be working. I am almost disgusted at my pragmatism on this.

This attitude has been developing in my head for about a year now, but today, I was startled by the sudden illumination of an unexpected link to an issue that is much closer to me. That is, the subject of Christian evangelism. I am compelled to explore this connection, to "write through" the implications of this, here on this blog. How far do the similarities run? What makes the issues different?

Like many of my generation, I've had no sympathy and little respect for the so-called "hellfire and brimstone" preachers. I'm speaking of anyone who tries to convert people to Christianity out of the fear of Hell. People are driven to serve what they see as a God of punishment and hate because the alternative is far worse. At worst, this leads to an utterly false impression of God and at best, a wholly inadequate understanding of the reason we exist and why God created the universe in the first place. There is certainly no peace and happiness in such servitude.

You could call mine a theology of love. I don't trust myself to lay it out comprehensively (I'm no theologian), but I'll try to explain quickly, so you can see why I get so frustrated with the fire and brimstone types. It starts with why God made Everything. It's very simple. He was lonely. He created Man, and our astoundingly beautiful habitat, so that He could enjoy us and we could enjoy Him. God and Man - friends and lovers. As the Presbyterian Catechism so aptly puts it:

"What is the chief end of Man?"
"To glorify God and enjoy Him forever."

Why did God make Adam first, instead of making male and female right from the start? So he could set him there, with access to every good and beautiful thing he could conceive of, and say, "It is not good for Man to be alone" and then create the solution. It's a picture of God's own heart's desire: a companion, a counterpart, a wife.

Fast forward a few millennia. We Christians have to remember this original intention as we get entangled in the whole sin/salvation drama. Getting freed from the bondage of sin and death, from the threat of Hell if you will, is not the end of the story. People aren't saved just so they can walk around saying "yay, I'm saved, I'm not going to Hell." That's the beginning, the doorway into God's beautiful intention for us. Jesus didn't just die to cleanse us of our sins, he died to become "a life giving Spirit" (1 Corinthians 15:45) - allowing God and Man to be intimately joined in a way that was not before possible. Our end is better than righteousness - it is divine and holy bliss inseparably united with the one true God!

I'm not a preacher. My personal philosophy of evangelism boils down to "walking the walk." I've never "presented the gospel" to anyone, not in the way the evangelists talk about. Maybe I have been too quiet. I don't know. Most of what I've grown up hearing about is those who say too much and do too little. However, it would be stupid of me to claim to know what's the best way to share the gospel in every case. I really can't even cross out the fire and brimstone method. After all, look what Paul said:

"But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice." Philippians 1:18

And the guys he was talking about didn't even have good intentions. Maybe even as bad as those who turn Christianity into some sort of pyramid scheme: "be converted so you can convert others!"

Anyway, I didn't really start blogging to lay out my thoughts on global warming or on evangelism. This is the tricky part. What was that link between them that just flashed at me like a minnow in a creek?

I guess it's like this. Global warming alarmists have presented humanity's sustainable living predicament in terms of a "change or eminent punishment is certain" proposition. Fire and brimstone preachers reduce salvation to an "accept God or hellfire is your certain end" proposition. You can throw the Christian "apocalypticists" (?) in there too. (You know, "Repent for Doomsday will arrive in September, 2012!") They all have that simplicity, urgency, and personal relevance that I've already admitted is a surefire way to get people to act. That was the initial similarity that startled me.

I've been so harsh on the brimstoners for neglecting the bigger picture, and yet sort of complacently condone the people who spread what I deem a falsehood because it has resulted in positive action. Does that mean I believe the end justify the means, even if there's untruth involved? Does that mean I should rejoice when the gospel is spread even mixed with deceit or gimmicks to make it more attractive or compelling? Think of everything that could stem out of that. "Follow God and He will bless you with MONEEEY!" "Become a Christian today, and you'll receive this shiny new toaster!" How appalling! (And yet I can't get Paul's words out of my mind...)

On the other hand, the realization gave me a little more insight into, not sympathy with but perhaps understanding of, those religious leaders and movements who focus on the dark things (Right now I'm reminded of all those graphic Renaissance frescoes I saw in Europe, of tortured souls in Hell). They wanted to break through to complacent congregations. Maybe describing the rewards of life and eternity with God didn't/wouldn't have had much effect. It's frustratingly true that people, when presented with a marvelously good thing, often say "oh that's nice" and get back on with their lives. In this light, especially if you measure your success by the number of butts in pews, I can begin to see how you might be tempted to try scaring them into Heaven by showing them Hell.

Only God can judge.

Here's a key difference though. As far as good environmental stewardship goes, that's a behavioral change. We measure success in terms of action and its consequences. Get the oil companies to change their disposal policy, resulting in less toxic spills. Get people to cut down on packaging and paper use, resulting in smaller landfills. So perhaps one motivation is just as good as another. I don't really care whether Joe turns his lights off when he leaves the room because he fears his children will see the apocalypse, he believes it's his responsibility as a steward of the Earth, or he just wants to save a few bucks on his electric bill. The light got turned off, right?

Christianity isn't behavioral like that. God doesn't want our actions, He wants our hearts. Of course true love manifests itself in action, but God has no use for a bunch of servants who do what He asks but don't feel anything for Him but fear. He already created servants in the angels, He's looking for something much more in us. Companion, remember? Counterpart.

One more thing about love. It goes hand-in-hand with truth. If you love somebody because of all these endearing characteristics, and then you find out that all those things were lies, did you really love that person? You only thought you did. You may be able to love them once you know the truth, but I don't believe real and perfect love can exist except in the face of the truth. (It follows: God is the only person who can love us really and fully, because He is the only person who can know us completely.) In turn, I don't think God could be happy with people loving Him with false notions of who He is. He doesn't want "Christians" at the expense of compromising or hiding His identity. It must sadden Him to see people following Him in ignorance and for the wrong reasons - I'm sure He'd rather they could see and love His true Self.

As far as global warming goes, if I were convinced it were a lie it might be different. I'm not really sure, and I believe the scientists and activists believe what they're saying at any rate. Good. No moral dilemma there.

I wonder if my attitude about these things will change. It likely will; at the very least be tweaked. It will be sort of fun to go back and read this and disagree with myself, and then tell my old self how I learned better.

Money Well Spent

2009-04-15T20:22:00.001-04:00

I have $8 and eight days till payday. But today I had a miniature revelation that caused me to see my money in a new light.

The Cafe on Morgan Square is closed. I'm sad for Spartanburg more than for me, since I didn't go there a whole lot, but it was somewhat of a piece of local history.

Walking back to my car from a fruitless money-collecting trip to the Beehive, I was debating with myself whether to dig something up for lunch at home, or get something on the way. The sensible thing was to save my money, but as I was walking past Monsoon Noodle House, I suddenly had this flash of horror at the thought of it closing down too. For all I know, Monsoon is doing just fine, and I hear that the Cafe closed for health just as much as monetary reasons. But still, the thought shook me enough to change my course and walk through those big glass doors.

Schooled as I have been in the principles of thrift, I always look for ways for my work, time, or money to do double duty. Same research to write two different stories, vacuum while waiting for the laundry, etc. Usually, both those ends somehow serve me. But why not include in my considerations, how to get more bang not just for myself but for others? This is the principle behind the new social entrepreneurship movement as well as an impulse many nonprofits are beginning to capitalize on.

I have precious few extra dollars each month. As long as I still have a choice where and how to spend it, doesn't it make sense to put it where it will do the most good? Will Taco Bell notice and appreciate my last four dollars, or will Gaston, the owner of A Caribbean Sweetness, who remembers who I am and what I like and who always has some entertaining story of Cuba to share? When I can afford to buy a CD, do I reward Wal-Mart for their unethical treatment of employees and havoc wrought on local culture, or do I get it from Earshot, one of the few and by far the coolest indy record stores left in the area? (Why did I have to pick up that copy of How Wal-Mart is Destroying America? I'm afraid I already know what my New Year's Resolution is for 2010.)

We the consumers aren't the only ones suffering right now. I realized today that we have a responsibility not to turn our backs on our favorite businesses just when they may need us most.

Reasons I love Asheville:

2009-04-09T10:44:00.003-04:00

The Architecture.

The Art.

The Street Musicians.

The Fashion.

The Square.

The Lizard.

The Flora.

Summer Camp

2009-04-07T16:06:00.000-04:00

A few bright spots appeared in my employment doldrums recently.

Yesterday, I was called to substitute teach for the first time. I registered as a sub a few months back but haven't really made the calls necessary to solicit work, because honestly, I was scared witless. I can count the number of days I've spent at a public school on one hand. But for whatever reason, Houston Elementary noticed my name on the very bottom of the list, and it happened to be one of the two days I'm not at SMC. Scared or not, I was not about to turn them down. It was kindergarten. Not so bad, especially as my friend Grace has been doing a lot of kindergarten subbing lately and always has good things to say about it.

I put up my bravest, most self-assured front when I got to the school the school, and I think I did a pretty good job of it. When I got to the classroom, though, I started to panic a little. "Where's the teacher's desk?" I asked the secretary. She unocked a tiny office in which the desk was tucked out of the way. "Oh. Well, where does she teach from?" "Oh, she has rotating centers." Ok, centers, like Montessori or something. I think I can handle that, as long as I have some kind of lesson plan.

"Lesson plan? Oh dear, I don't see it..." She shuffles around the room. I start to break a sweat. "She must have left it with Brenda." Turns out, Brenda was the teacher's assistant. A most wonderful, competent, knowing, take-charge teacher's assistant. She was what saved my bacon. I got through the day with a small measure of grace, basically just asking Brenda and doing whatever she told me to do. The kids, though a little naughty, were adorable and kept hugging me and saying "I love you Ms. Anthony!" At the end of the day Brenda thanked me, said I was wonderful and that she wants me back. Oh, blessings from Heaven! It could have been such a nightmare!

Today, my boss told me I am on the top of the list for summer hours. Things are looking bright for next year too. I took a look at SMC's summer calendar and confronted the stretches of time the library won't be open. Two weeks in May. Not too bad, if I can just squeeze all my bills into that first paycheck, I'll call it an unpaid vacation. Enough leftover for gas, and I might could pack a few sandwiches and go on an adventure.

Then there are the entire months of July and August. What will I do in the middle of the summer? Who hires people in the summer? I don't know where the idea came from but suddenly it was there in front of me, plain as day. Summer Camp!

It's perfect.

It's only for the summer months, lots of fresh air, quality kid time, and room and board all paid for! Sure, it's not a lot of money, the living conditions can be rough, and you have little down time. But it's such an adventure!

I've been wanting to travel and do something entirely on my own. Isn't this what people my age do? I could go to Alaska! Oregon! Practically anywhere! Plus, I'm way qualified with plenty of kid experience and handy skills to teach. Music, macrame, knitting, you name it.

I spent a couple of hours today surfing campstaff.com and campchannel.com. The only hitch is convincing them that I'm worth hiring after the first session is over, since most sessions start in June. But surely, of the hundreds out there, someone will think I have enough to offer even starting late. I feel like it's actually attainable, worth the effort of filling out dozens of applications.

So now I'm feeling really good. The stress and desperation that surrounds most of my job hunting effort is nowhere in sight. I feel like I can breathe a little easier. I feel like it's where I belong.

Of course I can't breathe too easy until I actually land a summer camp job. I'm rolling up my sleeves.

Postscript. I finished the Root article. Whew. And the Sonny's job fell through, for the two of you who might have been curious.

an⋅o⋅mie

2009-04-02T11:25:00.000-04:00

–noun Sociology.
a state or condition of individuals or society characterized by a breakdown or absence of social norms and values, as in the case of uprooted people.

Gmail Autopilot

2009-04-01T15:22:00.000-04:00

What I see as I'm signing onto my email this morning:

April Fools.

Thanks, Google.

(if the colors are funny it's because the only computor in my household that still sort of reliably functions has a dead video card. or something like that.)

If you've been wondering where I've been these past few weeks, so have I. I finished the presentation on the Amish, it went really well. Now I'm trying to pick up the pieces of my life that started scattering with the cieling/power/roof incidents and have continued to fall apart as I got more and more enmired with the Amish presentation. I had no idea how much work and time goes into those things. And I have finish this article for Root that is way, way late. I really ought to get back to that.

Shopping with Jesus

2009-03-09T09:49:00.001-04:00

I want to tell you a story about how wonderful my Lord is.

Yersterday, I went to Barnes and Noble to buy some music with a gift card I've had forever. I've been learning lately how God wants to be invited into every corner of my life. Anywhere He's not welcome, I don't need to be. I was a little trepidatious about applying this in the arena of music, but I decided to do an experiment. I invited the Lord to shop for music with me. That is, I asked Him to help me choose and told Him that I wouldn't buy what He was against me having. I was a little afraid, thinking, well maybe He won't let me buy anything, or point out some kind of "spiritual music," but, whatever, we'll just see what happens.

This decision occurred after I had collected a large stack of CDs to take to that reader thing that lets you scan it and preview the tracks. So I sat down and began. Some of the music I didn't like, some of the music I kind of liked but the Lord was like "no." Then I came to a CD of an older band I like but don't have a lot of music by. All of the sudden the Lord was like "Yes!" This was the one. I was completely taken aback. I was not expecting Him to have a positive preference, I just expected Him to limit me. I double checked, but His voice was clear. When God speaks to you, you just know. I can't explain it.

So I bought it, and a cd of one of my favorite bands of which I'd had a pirate copy for years. I could tell the Lord wasn't thrilled about me buying that one but I knew the band deserved to be paid for all the times I'd listened to them and I'm trying to become a law-abiding music citizen.

I'm still so surprised at that choice the Lord made for me. It's by no means a spiritual band, and I really...like them. It's a really fun album. But of course just because I bought this CD with the Lord's blessing doesn't mean it's automatically His will for me to listen to it whenever I want, or that they're somehow a band sanctioned by God and He wants everyone to listen to them. Of course not. I could speculate all day about why this CD, but that's a waste of time. Either I will eventually see some sort of divine reason for it, or I won't. All I know and care about right now is that I came to the Lord in vulnerability, with something I really care about, and He honored me and gave me something I really am happy with. He is just the sweetest person ever!

My power is out.

2009-03-03T16:40:00.001-05:00

I'm blogging from work. It's been an interesting (and cold!) two days. Cole has graciously allowed me to reschedule the presentation. It is difficult to create a Powerpoint with no power.

The power goes out so often at my house that we've developed a routine. Light the candles, bring out the camping stoves, switch the fridge to gas. Boil a big pot of beans and keep hot water handy for cocoa and tea.

It's cold and we have no water because our well uses an electric pump, but yesterday was pleasant. I spent the morning visiting with elderly neighbors and the afternoon looking after some neglected small maintenance projects. My coat has all its buttons again. And my hair things, jewelry, and dresser have not been this organized since...ever. I was even able to get a little crafty with pimiento jars. I covered the lids with fabric and ribbons and they now hold hair ties and safety pins. I knew there was a reason my family has been saving all those glass jars. The jalapeno jar is especially shapely. Too bad it smells all spicy.

I'm so glad I was able to get out of the driveway and to work today. But I think I'm running a fever. Been feeling out of sorts all day, headachy and sniffly. I hope it goes away. Being sick with no power/heat/water is not a pleasant prospect.

a string of unconnected news bytes

2009-03-01T18:08:00.001-05:00

Yeah. It's March and it's snowing. I'm working on my presentation on the Amish for Cole's Anthropology class Thursday. And my ceiling caved in. Well about a quarter of it anyway. And I really think I'm going to be in grad school this time next year. I need money to take the GRE. Next week I am going to Atlanta for a conference, the week after that my band is playing at Shamrocks on the Square. Friday night I swing danced to an amazing band, Cristabel and the Jons, in the Cleveland Alumnae House at Converse. Wednesday I had a picnic on the hood of my car, under a beautiful tree on Kennedy Street.

I would upload pictures, but this is really just a brief update because I need to get back to the Amish presentation. It feels like being in college again. (Only this time, I am the guest lecturer!)

Oh yes three bands I recently discovered and love:

The Welcome Wagon
Anathallo
Noah and the Whale

still alive

2009-02-11T21:47:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I wore spring green velveteen pants. I just really wanted to type that. Spring Green Velveteen. It's really the only reason I'm blogging.

(Hey, inspiration doesn't strike that often. I take it when it comes.)

Ironically, it matched my chilled avocado soup. I didn't take a picture of either, but the soup looked about like this:

Cilantro and all. Except we didn't have such pretty matching cups to drink it out of at Soup Night.

Anything else to say? Oh, I didn't get my dream job. Ah well. God has other plans, obviously. I'm excited to know what they are, but I feel more and more like they will involve school for library science. I just have this vision of me as a reference librarian at a small liberal arts college and I like it. Actually, I can't shake it.

With today's paycheck, I must make the difficult decision: sign up for the GRE, finally, or have my car checked. It's got an oil leak. Man, having a car is so expensive.

For those of you who have been biting your nails in anticipation (steve), I am working on the second installment of the AiR story. Promise I am.

This week Grace and I were talking about how I keep myself so ridiculously busy all the time. Really, for only getting paid for 17 hours a week, you'd think I'd be less stressed out. And devote a hair more attention to the job search. I don't know, I care about the band, and the jam, and the stuff with the college kids, and the Augustine Project, and the Spark, but I'm getting so restless. Just kind of wish I could shirk everything and be a completely irresponsible kid. For the long term. 'Cause right now, whenever I goof off its with this looming air of "there's something else you should be doing" all the time. And no matter what I've accomplished during the day, it never feels like enough. Maybe that's me creating stress for myself again. Or maybe I should be feeling that way. Maybe I have my priorities all wrong and it's time for me to grow up and streamline my life. I know it's not fair to my family not pull my fair share of the weight around here.

All I really want to do is go back to being 10 again. Sheesh.

I did clean the house though. Hasn't been this clean in months. And I cooked some delicious peanut butter cookies and biscuits and chicken pot pie from scratch. In addition to the soup.

I need sleep.

Words just don't do it

2009-01-25T22:44:00.003-05:00

Writing down every meaningful moment from the past two weeks became an impossible task, so I've decided not to try.

Tuesday, January 13

Mr. Haller and Scout

Soup Tuesday at Sarah Witt's.

Come to HUB-BUB this Tuesday (the 28th) at 8:00 to have as much fun as George is here.

Hookah and a cookbook. (Joey Geier, Sarah)

Friday, January 16

After the College Town interview, I unwound and celebrated with a little banjo pickin'.

Amanda and Cole Cheek at the SMC Faculty/Staff Winter Banquet

Tuesday, January 20

Wednesday, January 21

Birthday girl Grace Suggs, husband Jacob, and Georgie

Thursday, January 22

When a planned activity is canceled, an unplanned adventure generally results.

Nathaniel Coburn and Lindy Bunch. We ate sushi and talked big. Marvelous thinkers, those.

Friday, January 23

Screen was not working.

Source of the problem (notice the pinched spot on the pink wire).

Fixed!

Saturday, January 24

Allyn Steele's house.

Finally got to meet the man after hearing about him for a year.

Lindy Bunch.

Dinner.

Hat.

Sunday, January 25

Chapman Cultural Center.

I was on the front row. It was a defining musical experience.

Saturday

2009-01-19T12:38:00.001-05:00

I am pleased to report I have my car back. It had been stuck at the Showroom since Saturday night. Why, you ask? You will learn in good time, but I must begin with Saturday morning.

The Augustine Project's SC chapter gets together once a month to discuss tutoring strategies and the progress of our students. I've been tutoring a sweet little girl over at E. P. Todd since November. Her name is Charli and she is the brightest, most cooperative pupil a tutor could ask for. Anyway, Saturday was "lunch bunch," as we call it, so I drove out to Traveler's Rest (where all the other SC tutors live). It ended up just being me and the director, Maxine Bennett.

Maxine is one of my favorite people. She is astute, compassionate, and driven. She works at the Camperdown Academy for dyslexic children, and is dyslexic herself. Anyway, we had a great time at Panera and she gave me lots of ideas for working with Charli. She also entertained me with fascinating details about how the English language gets its quirks. You know how it's the words we use the most often that seem to defy the spelling and conjugation rules? These actually tend to be the oldest words in our language, and have shifted over the years as speakers come up with easier ways to say them. (English speakers have always been a lazy bunch.) The way she explains it to students, she said, is by holding up her favorite Birkenstock so they can see the soles. "See here where the pattern is worn off?" she asks. "These old words are just like that. They got used so much the patterns wore off."

So interesting. Makes me want to study linguistics.

Home from that, I spent the afternoon cleaning and messing with my new banjo and then headed to the Nu-Way lounge for the Sparkle City Bloggers meet-up. That's always fun. (well, always as in the two I've made it to...) I met Chris of Flying Oskar, as well as Daniel of the Plastic Breech and Jim O'Donnell. And Steve's wife Erin, with whom I share a passion for knitting. Ironically, we were both sporting a pair of gray fingerless mitts. What's more, we both had knit the same pattern from the Winter 2002 Family Circle Easy Knitting. Dude.

Over fried green beans (delicious!) and beer (water for me), we discussed Spartanburg's strengths, failings, history and potential. As well as knitting, the "QVC for porn," music in the 90's, and sundry other topics.

Then I invited them all to the HUB-BUB's showing of the Petty Crimes Unit, a short film featuring all-local talent. Here's the trailer. We had a blast. A full house, free popcorn, pre- and post- show cop trivia, and a creative, hilarious film. Written and directed by Brad Tinsley, it was utterly silly and the ultimate spoof of all the 1970's cop shows. The lines were delivered to deadpan perfection by Tinsley, who played a mustachioed crime buster / rookie trainer, and Benny Lee Smith as the sensitive, determined unit captain. Jose Franco, also producer, completed the team in an unforgettable silent role. I was quite impressed by the script, the acting, filming, the use of music, and by the poster I got for free:

This little pic hardly does it justice. That thing's going on my wall.

About halfway through the video I noticed my camera was missing. Enough cause for alarm in its own right, it was especially worrisome since my car key, my only car key that actually unlocks the door, was hooked onto it. I conducted an unsuccessful search during the movie, trying to keep a low profile. I went out to the car to see if it was locked in there, but couildn't really see by the dim light. So after the movie I made an announcement (embarrassing!) and borrowed a flashlight. Sure enough, the camera was locked in there. Fast forward 45 minutes, a bent coat hanger, and some very helpful but ultimately unsuccessful friends (Thanks for trying, Blanchard!) The cops used to be willing to come out and use a jimmy stick for you, but apparently now it's too much of a "liability." Thanks guys. I'm sure glad I wasn't alone at night in some shady neighborhood. I didn't have enough money to call a locksmith, so eventually I convinced my dad to come pick me up. I decided the best course of action would be to go to the Toyota dealership and have them make me a new key from the VIN number. So that's what I did, yesterday.

It's actually kind of nice to have your favorite things taken away from you for a while. It makes you appreciate them that much more. (I'm certainly appreciating my laptop as I type this with numb fingers in the sunroom, snow looming in the windows...)

I can't wait to find out whether I got the College Town position. The interview was Friday and I think it went very well. Hopefully I'll hear back this week. If I don't get it, I'll surely want to know who did so I can hook them up with the student leaders I've been working with. One student group I'm particularly excited about have organized a monthly meeting known, presently, as the Spartanburg Student Convergence. The next one is this Saturday at Wofford. (Olin Theater, 2:00, in case you're interested.) From what I gather, it is an open forum for any and all college students interested in local matters and/or enacting change in Spartanburg. Curious non-students are welcome as well.

Oh, I'll be covering the college scene for the Spark, probably starting next week. Have any ideas for a column name? Have a scoop? I guess the convergence makes a good starter story.

Why I Can't Sit Still and Listen or Stand Back and Watch

2009-01-14T22:33:00.002-05:00

I guess I failed to mention my new year's resolution. I will not buy myself new clothing for the entire year of 2009. This is because I have ENOUGH clothing, because I don't need to use shopping as a source of entertainment, and because I'm sick of the consumerist values I have allowed to sink so deeply into my character.

I've heard of people garbing themselves entirely with the castoffs of others. I really like that idea. After 2009 we'll see how plausible that is for me.

Also, I realized something about myself. The hardest thing in the world for me to be is passive. Today I went to the HUB-BUB AIR invitational exhibit opening. My favorite pieces were the memento boxes artists create at the end of their residency at Elsewhere, an artists' collaborative with an emphasis on creative play. Why were these my favorite? I'd like to say because they were aesthetically striking and I felt like I connected to the soul of each artist and felt I was experiencing part of their Elsewhere journey through the objects, and that wouldn't be untrue. But the real reason they were my favorites is childishly simple. I could PLAY with them. Not only was I actually allowed to touch them, I was encouraged to pick them up, open them, rifle through and examine the contents. The tactile dimension and the explorative process were immensely satisfying. I have gotten in trouble at art shows and high-end stores countless times for TOUCHING the goods (heaven forbid!). It's a part of who I am, to experience something fully I must touch it.

But it's not just touching. I can't just watch, I yearn to participate in whatever I'm looking at. That's why I've always hated watching sports, ever since I was a little kid. Even if I would be the slowest kid out there, never catch the ball, and keel over exhausted after the first play, I'd rather be in on the action. Not to be is almost...torture.

This is true to a lesser degree with music. While I love attending classical concerts and listening to records, with most live popular performances, I can't sit or stand still. I at least sway a little in my chair, I'm even happier if I can get up and dance. But I'm the happiest yet when I can have even the tiniest part in making the music, whether that's clapping along or jamming along. Like when I went to Sonny's for open mic, I couldn't keep my hands off of Kerry's djembe. Here are these songwriters up on stage strutting their stuff, and here's me at the corner table drumming quietly (sometimes not so quietly) along. When I didn't have the djembe, as much as I wanted to pay attention, I was easily distracted and quickly bored. And this is why I love the Jam so gosh-darn much. To get right to it, it's not like I'm really doing it for the community. I'm doing it for ME. Because it's so darn FUN.

Yes, I wouldn't be surprised if it relates to ADD. (which runs in my family.) But it also relates to the way I was raised. I was homeschooled. Try sitting silent in the back of the class when the class consists of you, your mom, your textbook and your couch. I also grew up attending unusually participatory church meetings. Everybody says amen to the prayers, anybody can pray aloud at just about any time. Anybody can stand up and speak God's word instead of having to listen to some preacher lecture them all the time. Even the music gets chosen by whoever calls out a hymn number, and is played by whoever brought their guitar that week.

I guess I'm just spoiled. Yeah, that about sums it up.

Livin' Life in 2009

2009-01-11T18:02:00.001-05:00

Hey guess what! Spartanburg college students (and recent grads) now have a literary/art 'zine! It's called the Salt Shaker. Now I have to dig up some poetry.

Mmm...so much life. More than I have time to blog about. Oh, but I do have photos:

Last Thursday I took a walk with one of my best friends at Converse, Sarah Bracey. We always find ourselves gravitating toward the graveyard. Its peace matches the usual contemplative nature of our discussions.

This house struck us as a foreboding place. Few windows in the front and a general air of neglect. I imagined dark things happening there. It was an especially odd juxtaposition with these houses across the street:

Hard to believe they are part of the same neighborhood.

Sarah (left) treated me to dinner at Gee Dining Hall. It was good to be back. I caught up with a lot of friends including Liz (right).

Saturday morning I spent with one of my longtime best friends Bethany and her husband John.

We watched a great documentary Lucas Patterson lent me, called Ordinary Radicals, while Bethany and I crocheted and knit. That blasted mitt still isn't finished.

My friend Daylan (2nd from R) is a children's librarian at the HQ library. She invited mom and me to her open house party where we got to tour her sweet little townhouse. And try on a few hats.

Today I interviewed Ellie at HUB-BUB for an article I'm writing for the Spark. I took a few photos too.

Jonas is going to kill me for posting this. Haha.

Studio space. The sign reads "I think having land and not ruining it is the most beautiful art anybody could ever want to own." -Andy Warhol.

The Jam went very well yesterday. We are at the HUB-BUB for the winter. PJ brought his electric guitar and Adam, Maneesh brought his djembe, Allison brought her flute and guitar, and Lucas Patterson showed up and tapped on the bodhran. I rocked out on dad's string bass on "Fever", jammed along to some Dave Matthews covers with the pear shaker, and played recorder on "Wipeout." One of my favorite things about the Jam is being able to pick up completely random instruments I don't play and not caring if I sound terrible. The funny thing is, usually it turns out alright.

I'm so excited about the February Jam. Bryant's bringing his new uke and I'll have my new hand-me-down banjo. Thanks Bryant!

I go back to work tommorow. Oh that dream job I mentioned, it's for College Town Coordinator. I have an interview Friday. I am so excited and very nervous. If you pray, please pray for me Friday!

Atlanta and "Cottonwoof"

2009-01-05T22:55:00.001-05:00

I left my camera at home! *whines* And my knitting bag, so that blasted right mitt remains unfinished. But the trip was absolutely wonderful.

Before I tell you about that, a recent piece of marriage advice from my father.

"When you're talking to him [as in, a potential husband], find out if he likes food. If he loves food, he will like sex. And I think you will like sex so you'll want someone who likes food."

Yeah. Awkward turtle. Now I've passed the awkwardness off on you, muahaha.

Oh and then today, he told me he didn't think I was going to last more than three or four years. This is the guy who said maybe he'll allow me to date when I turn 45. Suddenly he's decided that I'll be married before I'm 24.

And now, back to the regularly scheduled program.

There are times when you are just compelled to do something, even when you can't explain exactly why, and then you do it and God reveals it was part of a plan more wonderful than anything you could have come up with. This was one of those times. To begin with, I got there for the last three open messages of the video training, which meant I got some really solid scriptural teaching, fellowship about the Lord's move around the world, and more excuses to see all my friends, including a bunch from Athens who came over for the training. Then, there was this brother that doesn't even meet with the Church in Atlanta that I had met earlier at a conference, who just happened to be there visiting his friend, so we got to fellowship and I gave him a study Bible. Actually, that was a pretty funny story.

So I was like "what are you reading in the Word lately?" And he was like "1 Peter, it's awesome."

"Cool! Have you gotten into the footnotes any? Like in the Recovery Version?" [this great study Bible]

"No, I don't have that translation"

"Well hey do you want one? It's free!"

"Sure!"

So I dragged him over to the bookstore and asked the brother at the cash register for one of the cards you fill out to get one and he was like "I'm sorry, we ran out of those...but I think i have some in my car if you'll hold on for 10 minutes"

Jeopardy theme music. I needed some air (I really don't do big crowds and the hall was packed.) so I went and played balance beam on the curb for what approximated 8 minutes. Hadn't done that in a while. Such a simple childish pleasure.

Went back in and the bookstore was overrun with saints buying stuff. "Hey," I said to the brother at the cash register, "It looks like you really have your hands full. If you want, I'll take your keys and get it so you can stay here."

"Tell you what. Go get that brother over there [another older brother selling morning revivals in the lobby] to come over here"

So I got him, but he couldn't leave the table because people were buying things and the money box was there, so I was like "Here, I'll man the table for you while you go over there."

So there I am, selling morning revival books in the Church in Atlanta, I didn't even know how much they cost at first, and to top it off, he took the money box with him so I was just collecting the money in my hand. And I didn't have any change. And I was thinking "this dude better not leave before I get him that darn bible card!"

10 minutes later the brother returns with the cards at last. He gave me a few and said I was free to go. I handed him the 20 something dollars I made. Thank goodness, the young brother was still over there so I walked up to him, handed him the bible card, waved awkwardly and left. Looking back I'm thinking I should have at least introduced myself to his friend.

That whole encounter was one of those weird, "is that really what you want me to do God?" type things. Actually I had several of those in Atlanta. The great thing is, I was reading about something kinda like that in Acts, it was one of the passages mentioned in the meeting.

In the beginning of Acts 13, a handful of prophets and teachers in Antioch were "ministering to the Lord and fasting." The Holy Spirit spoke to them and said "Set apart for me Barnabus and Saul" so they prayed and fasted some more, laid their hands on them, and sent them off. "Then," says verse 4, "having been sent by the Holy Spirit, they went to Selucia and sailed to Cyprus."

First of all, this was a really new church. A church in a Gentile city, probably the only one at that time, since only in chapter 11 had Peter and the saints in Jerusalem figured out that God had given "repentance unto life" to the Gentiles too. Plus, who is this Saul dude? At that time, he was pretty much the new kid on the block, one of Barnabus's friends. Not exactly the place or the people today's church leaders might pick to launch a mission. And yet, this was the beginning of Paul's great ministry to the Gentiles. You could even say I, along with all the American Christians' salvation could be traced back to that moment.

And it all came out of a handful of saints in some little remote church praying, ministering to the Lord, fasting, listening to His speaking, and doing what He said. They had no idea how richly He would bless their faithfulness. Heavens, it doesn't even sound like they knew where they were sending Paul and Barnabus, the way verse 4 is arranged. (Notice how the "being sent by the Holy Spirit" part comes first - the where is secondary.)

Wow. I'm thinking a little prayer and fasting is in order.

Anyway, a few more memories I will treasure from my visit with the saints in Atlanta:

Goofing off in the GSU music building with Michelle and Alana

Trying to find to Javaology, then Java Monkey, then finally going to Java Lords and drinking fair trade chai with Michelle and Alana

Enjoying great rock music from across the street, seeing the band through the open front door

Goofing off on webcam with Alana and Glori

Spending time with the sisters and getting a delicious meal at Moe's for under 4 dollars

Playing Catch Phrase and cooking angel hair with garlic alfredo sauce for 6 sisters at ten o'clock Saturday night

Cleaning bathrooms with dear sister Debbie

Making up riddles, playing Snaps and the Line Game with the sisters at Emily's birthday party

A handful of much smaller but perhaps more meaningful moments that I can't write about here.

The fun hasn't really stopped yet. I spent pretty much all of today hanging with Spartanburg friends. First Dad and I went to see our dear friends Bill and Michelle and daughter Tifaney. Bill's battling cancer, again, but he is just so fun to be around and he has a servant's heart to which I've never seen the match. Then Grace, Bryant, Georgie and I went to the Cottonwood trail. Two of my best friends, an adorable dog, gorgeous weather and the squish and smell of fresh mud under my shoes. How could life get any better?

(photo credits to Bryant)

Old School Paper Delivery

2009-01-01T17:08:00.001-05:00

Happy New Year.
Yesterday, Dad and I successfully delivered Root to a handful of locations, by bike. Pick up a copy while dining at the following fine establishments:

Yanni's
the Honeybee Cafe
Panera
Starbucks
Sun King
Captain Tony's
Mexico Lindo
Four Seasons

Or you can just read it online.

As promised, I have pictures chronicling the journey.

Me pumping air.

Dad.

This is what we were looking at for about half an hour going down East Main.

Bike Portrait With Flag. Note the trash bag. I felt compelled to do a little tidying along Webber Road.

Me back at the house. I now have two sets of wheels.

It's cold out here in the sunroom. My laptop is experiencing the bane of all laptops - the dreaded power plug malfunction - so I am on Dad's desktop. Luckily I have a mitt to keep me warm:

My right hand is jealous. The right mitt's been giving me grief but I'm gonna finish it off tonight.

Now that my camera is back you may expect a lot more photos. Next up: pix from Atlanta.

A request

2009-01-01T17:04:00.001-05:00

With eyes wide open to the mercies of God, I beg you, my brothers, as an act of intelligent worship, to give him your bodies, a living sacrifice, holy, well pleasing to God. This is your reasonable service. Don't be fashioned according to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and well pleasing and perfect.

For I say, through the grace given to me, to each one of you: Don't cherish exaggerated ideas of yourself or your importance, but try to have a sane estimate of your capabilities by the light of the faith that God has given to you all. For just as you have many members in one physical body and those members differ in their functions, so we, though many in number, compose one body in Christ and are all members of one another.

Through the grace of God we have different gifts. If our gift is preaching or prophecy, let us do it in proportion to our faith - to the limit of our vision. If it is serving others let us concentrate on our service; if it is teaching let us give all we have to our teaching; and if our gift be the stimulating of the faith of others let us set ourselves to it. Let the man who is called to give, give freely, in simplicity; let the man who wields authority work diligently; and let the man who feels sympathy for his fellows in distress help them cheerfully.

Let us have no imitation Christian love. Let us genuinely hate evil and cling to what is good.

Let us have real warm affection for one another as between brothers, and a willingness to let the other man have the credit.

Let us not allow slackness to spoil our work and let us keep the fires of the spirit burning, as we do our work for God.

Base your happiness on your hope in Christ. When trials come endure them patiently; steadfastly maintain the habit of prayer.

Give freely to fellow-Christians in want, never grudging a meal or a bed to those who need them.

And as for those who try to make your life a misery, bless them. Don't curse, bless.

Share the happiness of those who are happy, the sorrow of those who are sad.

Live in harmony with each other. Don't become snobbish, setting your mind on the high things, but take a real interest in ordinary people. Don't become set in your own opinions.

Don't pay back a bad turn by a bad turn, to anyone. See that your public behavior is above criticism.

As far as your responsibility goes, live at peace with everyone.

Never take vengeance into your own hands, my dear friends: stand back and let God punish if he will. For it is written: 'Vengeance is mine. I will repay'.

These are God's words: 'If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him a drink; for in doing this you will heap coals of fire on his head'. Don't allow yourself to be overpowered with evil. Take the offensive - overpower evil by good!

Romans 12. A mashup of the Philips Paraphrase with the Recovery Version, with a little NKJ thrown in for good measure.

Thinking, living simply

2008-12-30T21:59:00.001-05:00

Christmas is over, the new year is about to begin. I was reading about the New Monastics yesterday, in particular the organization known as the Simple Way, and found something interesting.

"Action must be accompanied by reflection, and reflection by action."

Not only is it true, it is something that has been on my mind lately. I have enjoyed this December period of reflection and am beginning to recognize the great cycle of rest, reflection, and planning which leads one back to action. Rest and reflection seem particularly necessary to the work of an artist or visionary of any type. When one is deeply entrenched in the thoughts and actions of the work at hand, the struggles of the day, it is extremely difficult to "think big," or draw those abstract connections necessary for substantial innovation.

It's always nice to go away for a while, get some of that "mountaintop" perspective on your life. That's what generally happens when I go to Kentucky with my family to visit my aunt. Every year we spend Christmas together, and every year not only do I get to know my family better, but myself as well.

This time, the realization that came as a shock is that lately, I have been behaving of a citizen of Spartanburg. No offense to Spartanburg, but I only have one citizenship and that kingdom is not of this world. I haven't exactly learned to balance my life in this world with my role in the Body of Christ, but lately, the balance has been heartily skewed in favor of the former. This is me acknowledging the problem as a first step toward correcting it.

I'm so glad to be going to Atlanta this weekend. It's hard to explain the sort of perspective one gets when completely immersed in the local expression of the Body of Christ, but it's beautiful, and it's real. And the beauty of it all is, the closer one is with the Spirit of God, the more perfectly all other facets of one's life are handled, including one's responsibility to one's neighbors, country and planet. Jesus is panacea. Of course I'm not talking about knowing, talking, or preaching about Him, I'm talking about the Person Himself, and actually being one with Him. It's not like He's not here with me in Spartanburg, of course He is. But the link sometimes feels...tenuous. And we need to be shored up occasionally.

I've been experimenting with cooking a little more lately. Today I made pasta with a mushroom-garlic-shrimp cream sauce. There's a certain appeal to my sense of adventure in the challenge of creating a delicious meal from whatever is at hand. Dad has this great cookbook called More-with-Less. It's not just a collection of recipes, it's a presentation of an entire perspective on cooking. Mennonites wrote it. Something tells me that the New Monastics would get a kick out of it too. It basically holds to the premise that we Americans expect, and give ourselves, too much. Too many choices, quantities larger than we need, overcomplicated, exotic ingredients replacing what grows in our back yard. And of course, convenience foods, regarding which I am the queen of sinners. This book teaches how to apply your mind and creativity to create meals that are healthier, kinder to the environment, cheaper, and tastier all at the same time. I highly recommend it.

One piece of wisdom I took out of the book today is that a beautifully prepared meal can be a gift, showing your love to family and guests. More than that, there's this powerful idea of connectedness, an idea that cooking can be not only a manifestation of love, but even spirituality. I'm not sure if I'm making myself clear, but I'm sure Brother Lawrence would know exactly what I'm talking about. Approach everthing with prayer and attentiveness, that's one thing that God has been trying to tell me lately. And it's so foreign to the modern American way of life. Sometimes I just want to back out of life entirely and spend a few years learning how to live properly.

Which kind of reminds me of a friend's blog I read today. (or doesn't really, but I have to segue somehow) Tim and Hannah were true mentors to me before they moved to Austin. Lately I've been following their blogs and it's almost as good as soaking up the Diller goodness firsthand. Well Tim wrote an excellent post about bicycling as therapy. I'm ashamed to admit that I haven't as much as looked at my poor Bike E since gaining a car in October. But Tim's very accurate description of the reflection, pleasure and feeling of connectedness that goes with riding a bike made me want to dig it out and give it some love. I've got a few reams of Root to deliver as well as a few other errands so I've decided to make an outing of it tomorrow. I've got my camera back now (HALLELUJAH! It shows up after a whole year missing!) so I'll take a few pictures. Then you'll finally get to see where my blog's funny name comes from.

Oh yes. We watched Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed today. I had some misgivings about it, but I was actually pretty impressed overall. (not that it didn't have its shortcomings.) I would encourage anyone with an open mind, who supposes that the scientific community is an open-minded place, to watch it. One interesting thing I learned (really it was only incidental in the movie but I found it fascinating nonetheless) is that the founder of Planned Parenthood (I forgot her name) was a leader in the Eugenics movement of the early 20th century. Doesn't surprise me, really.

Hmm. I should go to sleep now since I'll be rising early for my adventure tommorow!

Skate, art, and a job

2008-12-13T19:48:00.004-05:00

Hey, it's a Greer-based arts zine:
http://www.therevenantculture.com/
(haven't really looked at it just noticed the ad on facebook...)

Today as I was driving home, I noticed several cars parked in the big empty lot next to the abandoned gas station next to my house. I looked closer and saw a bunch of kids on skateboards. A sign read "Sk8 Contest Today!" I've never really had much to do with skateboarding, but it was interesting and rare enough that I had to stop in for a closer look. Turns out, it was a fund raiser / party for the soon-to-be started skate park coming to Union Street. That's cool. Especially because, from what I understand, local skate kids had a big part in designing the park and making it happen. I'm not much of a sports spectator but it was fun watching all those skaters all the way from tiny six-year-olds to high school and maybe a few beyond.

Caroll Foster, a photographer I've seen a bit around Hub-Bub, was the MC today and has been one of the players. I'm pretty sure Will Barnet, the mayor's son, has been involved too. Caroll said it's taken 5 years to get it all together and get the approval, funds and support, but they've pretty much gotten all the money now and will be starting early next year. Here's the website with more info.

Way to go, guys! Can't wait to see the skate park in full swing!

Oh yes, I also wanted to mention, they've created my dream job. My application's in and I'm waiting for a call. Woohoo! Now I have to get all professional and stuff for the interview.

Chicago, Drinks and Clothing

2008-12-05T14:50:00.001-05:00

Can't believe it's been nearly a month since I was here. Just been busy.

Read about this chica in Fiber Arts at work today. And this one. Way cool. And how about this fashion label. Slow fashion...what a concept! I feel new years resolutions brewing...

I went to Chicago. In a van. With my friends. lol. Normally I would want to spend an entire afternoon chronicling the epic journey, but unfortunately, the storytelling impulse has been exhausted on friends and parents. Didn't get to the blog soon enough.

It was marvelous, and I suppose to make up for not saying much I will repost a few photos from friends' facebooks. Maybe I will ask their permission first. In the meantime, I will share the facebook note I wrote:

A Collection of Tasty Drinks

So I decided I would begin a list of unusual non-alchoholic beverages to inspire the palate and quench the thirst of the adventurous teetotaler (or designated driver). Feel free to add to this list.

Boba / Bubble Tea
A pan-Asian treat. Frequently fruit- or coffee-flavored, often smoothie-like but whose distinguishing characteristic are the tapioca balls ("bubbles") which add a unique chewing experience. I recently had an avocado-flavored boba - it was actually quite tasty.

Horchata
A Latin American rice milk drink. Generally enjoyed iced with cinnamon and vanilla.

Mango Lassi
A thick, rich Indian yogurt drink. Pale orange in color, It's got a great taste and texture and is perfect for cooling your tongue after some spicy papadomes and chutney.

Chicha Morada
A brilliant purple Peruvian drink made from purple corn. Very sweet, tastes a little fruity, a little like bubble gum and cinnamon.

Thai Tea
A sweet, smoky, milky beverage from (you guessed it) Thailand. Opaque amber in color, very rich and usually enjoyed iced.

Grass Jelly Drink
One of many unusual sweet herb-flavored Asian beverages. Contains dark-green jelly cubes. Tastes...herby.

Basil Seed Drink
Another Asian herbal oddity, real basil seeds in their little jelly sacs are suspended throughout. If you can get past their striking resemblance to frog eggs, it is actually, a pleasant, refreshing beverage.

The last three can be purchased canned or bottled at your local Asian grocery. Horchata can be purchased in powder or bottle form at just about any grocery with a hispanic foods section. For bubble tea, chicha morada, and mango lassi, your best bet is to visit a restaurant of the appropriate ethnicity.Will post more as I find them. Please respond with your favorites. I'm particularly curious about any savory drinks out there.

Ooh that reminds me:

Avocado Soup
A chilled pureed soup with many variations. My dad and I make it from avocados, chicken broth, soy milk, garlic and green peppercorns. Frothy and delicious. I drink it from a mug so it counts.

Role Models

2008-11-06T21:54:00.002-05:00

I'm not surprised at the election outcome. Nor am I terribly upset. Whatever his faults, the President-elect has already become an inspiration to millions upon millions of people, both here and abroad. I believe in the power of the people's belief in Obama. I also believe this power could prove beneficial or very destructive, depending on the true character of the one who wields it. I guess we'll be finding out.

But it got me thinking. Last Thursday, I attended the Hub-Bub Green Screen, where we watched two short films, one called "Gimme Green" about America's obsession with fertilized, pesticided (?) irrigated lawns, and the other called the Story of Stuff, which you can watch for yourself by clicking here. Do it. I mean right now. It's only maybe 20 minutes long. No seriously, stop reading this and click the link.

It's really incredible how consumerism has been the one value that unites America. I guess I'd missed it at the time, but the fact that President Bush, after 9/11, when he could have issued any number of inspirational missives, told us to SHOP? I mean really?!! What we consume has become our cultural identity, how we define our worth and happiness. When you stand back and think about it, isn't it pathetic?

The discussion afterward, as always, was fascinating. I just love these events because people of thought and action in the community are coming together to learn and think and share on matters important to me. Tammy Stokes, whom I've been keeping up with on Seeding Spartanburg, led the discussion. It was nice to finally put a face to the name.

I was still thinking about the elections, and the mixture of it all gave me an idea. Americans are very suggestible. I mean, they've been trained, from an early age, to buy up all the stuff the media has been selling them. Like it or not, if the TV/news/magazines say jump, 90 percent of America jumps. This includes the people they are supposed to look up to. Certain individuals are tagged as heroes, and society believes it, and they look up to these people and try to imitate them.

Now it's already been perfectly clear that the media is obsessed with Mr. Obama. He was a celebrity even before he was elected (Actually...given the above observation, a causative relationship doesn't seem far-fetched...) Anyway, as president, I can already imagine how every minute detail of his and his family's life will be televised and photographed, every uttered word captured, printed, and revered. And I know this happens to a certain degree with every president but this is like, the Kennedys multiplied by Oprah.

This could be very good for America if President Obama and his family can be pursuaded to be positive role models. What if they went into the White house and started eliminating wasteful spending right on the household level? I mean, applying sustainable living and energy conservation concepts. I can see the headlines now: "WHITE HOUSE GOES GREEN" and if O magazine wrote an article about Michelle Obama doing it, then all of the sudden it would be raised to national consciousness like never before and you'd have all these housewives wanting to go green because Michelle Obama said it was our duty to our country to reduce waste and make what we have go farther (thus helping to reduce national debt etc.)

There are so many ways to conserve energy that are just really simple and easy and make a huge difference. And it all makes sense once you take the time to listen to someone explain it. And obviously a lot of people would listen to Obama if he cared to explain (or at least endorse) it. And of course actions speak louder than words.

I feel like I'm not making my point very well but all I mean out of this is that I think we all should write letters to President Obama stressing the importance of him advocating sustainable choices and responsible spending beginning on the family level, and modeling it in his own family.This works on both the macro and micro level, and it will take both. If people could begin to realize it is their duty to their country and to their planet, and also serves them both short and long term...they'd realize the way they have been living is stupid and change. We just need a strong enough catalyst.

Earlier I said I didn't think Obama would go for this kind of advocacy. But maybe I was wrong. Besides, that's too fatalistic an attitude, after hearing Chris's point about our responsibility to act upon the solutions we want. So I intend to write a letter to the Obamas. Who's with me? Hey, maybe they'll listen.

I have a headache.

2008-11-04T12:23:00.001-05:00

I stayed up too late last night researching Chuck Baldwin and Ralph Nader. Now I am babysitting the library while everyone else votes. It's very quiet in here.

One last thought for anyone who hasn't voted yet: Please pray first.

recycled political spew

2008-10-26T18:15:00.002-04:00

Mmm...I'm starting to like this thinking about politics thing. My brain has needed the exercise since I got out of school. Here are my thoughts in response to Chris's recent blog on political power. Please forgive the elevated speech. It just seems to be the language of my brain on politics, I didn't mean to sound pretentious...

(please read the original blog before you read my answer)

As usual you've clearly articulated some very good thoughts here, Chris. I love the quote from Thoreau. And of course Gandhi's is one of my all time favorites.

chAng, I have to agree with Chris as far as the political power we hold. Voting and jury duty? What about lobbying? How do you think the barons of the oil industry and all the other corporations we love to hate have gotten their interests so deeply engraved in legislature?

And what about the countless, tireless social reformers who spoke up and marched and entreated and wrote letters and boycotted - and those who continue in their tradition today? Chris I'll add to your list of victories one we'd all rather forget - what about the Prohibition?

Voting is only the beginning - the infant's first step - to enacting change. With this in mind, I have to hand it to your precious Obama - he comes a hair closer - with his campaign - to inspiring people to direct, grassroots action than any presidential candidate I've known. If only I could believe that, once in the white house, he won't simply put his feet up, turn to all the grassroots leaders who have fought so hard for him and say "Thanks for the hard work guys...I'll take it from here."

I was surprised by the conclusion you drew from your "approach to voting," which isn't fundamentally different from mine. Issues change, after all - I want someone who will confront whatever issue is at hand from the perspective I am most fundamentally aligned with - this is the person I can trust. However, you threw me for a loop when you said this is an argument against third-party voting - I had seen it in support of a non-bipartisan system! After all, what is one supposed to do when the two dominant, prepackaged standpoints are closer to each other than they are to mine? (Therein lies the difference between us, Chris...)

And laying aside all the issues the Dems and Reps are virtually ignoring, how are any other viewpoints to be heard at all, much less represented in government, when most everyone in power was handpicked as the truest shade of red or blue? What progress can be made in debate between two parties for whom all issues are settled, who have already made up their minds? Sure, they'll listen to those with whom they agree...to those whose concerns they've allowed onto the table.

After reading your post and thinking it over, I am only more deeply convinced to vote third-party. (Regardless of whether another candidate more accurately reflects my views). If the biggest problem with the third-party vote is what we all three agree it is - not enough people believe the system can change - then it is even more imperative that I use my vote as more than a vote - as a voice for change.

Political scientists are already beginning to notice the shift - more Americans are claiming themselves as independents and straight-ticket voting is decreasing. As the aggregate of third-party votes rises, Americans, in typical fashion, will realize that "other people are doing it, I guess I can too." It will compound on itself and more and more people will begin to consider non-bipartisan politics as viable and possible. I'm not sure what other actions, legislations and paradigm shifts will have to take place, but I am compelled to, if nothing else, take that first baby step.

Hmm...now do I continue my research on third-party presidential candidates, go work on my Halloween costume, or watch Heroes? Decisions decisions.

It's muh birfday!

2008-10-22T12:49:00.001-04:00

I'm 20 years old today. How about that.

I'm writing this while manning the front desk at the library so I'll have to be brief. Tommorow I'm leaving for Kentucky...my wonderfully awesome Aunt Mary Beth is giving me her old car - a '96 camry with a CD player and a sunroof - and all I have to do is go pick it up!

So I guess I'm getting Freedom for my 20th birthday. I'd say that makes the Top 10 list of best gifts ever.

Makes me want to go on a road trip. One without my dad offering me peanuts & jerky every 5 minutes and my mom feigning a heart attack every time I hit the brakes. Maybe one with company of my own choosing and a soundtrack we create and a destination unknown until we get there...

Two Evils

2008-10-07T23:39:00.001-04:00

Nah, I don't actually think either Obama or McCain are evil but I don't like 'em neither. It's so late and I'm exhausted but I have to record my observations and conclusions of the debate or I will hate myself tomorrow.

I've been really riding the fence this whole election season. I refuse to have anything to do with the major parties and in fact utterly despise the bi-partisan system. My mother is a Democrat-turned-Republican and my father is something like a radically constitutional alt-energist conservative with Libertarian leanings. They have instilled in me an understanding that one of the fundamental ideas America was founded on is that government is a necessary evil and therefore should have a smaller rather than a larger role in the lives of citizens. Another is that all the power within a country and, following, its responsibility, stems from and ultimately lies with us, the citizens. Not the state.

Tonight, after watching and listening to both candidates, I still am really borderline. Both candidates managed at times to utterly impress me, and at other times completely disappoint me. However I did arrive at two new conclusions. 1. I really can't stand McCain - his "stage presence" is horrible and he's a pompous braggart. 2. I'd feel safer with McCain leading the country than Obama.

This is why: Obama, for all his smooth speech, intelligence and even sincerity, is Democratic to the very core. He has many, many grand ideas, for increasing volunteer opportunities, bailing out various people groups in need, and extending financial help to struggling countries, etc. etc. And yet, he claims he's going to reduce our net spending. As many projects tonight he suggested funding, he did not elaborate on one solid idea for where to cut. Except, of course, cutting taxes for "95% of working Americans." Oh wait, that's less money to spend on these government projects, not more. Don't get me wrong, I don't like the government siphoning money off of my honest labor any more than the next person, but where does he expect the money for all these great dreams to come from? Are we supposed to just print it up and get bit in the butt by inflation?

McCain brought up Obama's vote for a 3-million dollar projector for a Chicago planetarium. My Democratic friends, with whom I was watching the debate (at Hub-Bub), considered that an irrelevant attack. But it brought to light Obama's fundamental belief about the government's role in society. To him, it was the federal government's responsibility to write legislation to give one projector to one planetarium. As much as I'm sure that planetarium really needed that projector and it benefited a bunch of people, I do not believe that a law should have been written about it, or that it was the Fed's responsibility to think about it in the first place.

McCain acknowledged that we will need to make sacrifices to get through this economic crisis. He indicated broad measures to cut back on federal spending "across the board." Obama attacked this, saying McCain wanted to use a "hatchet" while he would use a "scalpel" to only cut spending where it wouldn't hurt "everyday people." It appears his plan for getting us out of this economic hole is to generously fund new projects while tiptoeing around shaving money off of certain projects he doesn't like.

As much as I hated the way McCain kept plugging himself as a reformer (thank heavens he managed to completely avoid the term "maverick" this time) and harping on his "record," he made a solid point when he stressed his willingness to step across party lines and even challenge those whom he respected the most when he felt they were wrong. While I admit, it was just what America needed to hear in order to vote for a Republican after Bush, I believe he means it. Obama made no effort to challenge the claim that he has never challenged Democratic orthodoxy. Independent thinkers (an ever-increasing percentage of Americans) need to know that a president is willing to take off his red- or blue- tinted glasses if there's a chance they are hindering his ability to make the best choice.

On the flipside, I believe Obama truly understands cooperative leadership and the importance of building on one anothers' strengths. I am not sure how much Mr. Maverick will trust and rely on the experience and expertise of those around him. Or inspire the average citizen for that matter. One thing Barack certainly has is the ability to inspire and coordinate grassroots leaders and ordinary people, to tap the strengths of the citizens to effect change in their immediate surroundings. If only he would use that power to advocate a radical rethinking of the "American lifestyle"; sustainability on the family front, environmentally-aware consumer & transportation choices, healthy financial habits, physical wellness...but after tonight, I just don't think such advocacy would make it onto his priority list. It's not Democratic enough.

Like I said before, I'm still not deeply committed. I may choose to wield my vote against the tyranny of bi-partisan politics. But it's looking more and more like I won't be voting for Obama. Even though something in my gut tells me he's going to win. He is charismatic, sharp, a visionary perhaps. As the figurehead of our country, I think he could inspire a lot of people towards doing whatever they could to change the world for the better. But as its leader, I believe his choices would only benefit the short term, leaving us deeper in debt than ever. Like a few other "great" presidents that come to mind, Obama, praised by future generations as a "hero", would create and then step untainted from a huge mess that his unfortunate successors would spend entire terms trying to clean up.

Healing Species, Columbia and the International Festival

2008-09-28T21:12:00.001-04:00

Gonna keep it short. 3:00 Saturday morning I rolled in from a two-day trip to Orangeburg, SC for the Healing Species training. I am so excited to bring this program to Spartanburg. In a nutshell, it is compassion education...assisted by a rescue dog, instructors go into elementary and middle schools to teach that being hurt is not ok, that every one of us has the power within to change the world, and that giving respect and love brings happiness and true success.

Pamela and I were in a panic the night before the trip since our transportation plans had fallen through. But at the last minute, our very kind, gracious and trusting friend Bill lent us his Lincoln Town Car. That single act has changed the course of our lives. (ack Heroes is rubbing off on me...) The Healing Species is instilling values that, if soaked into the consciousness of a generation, would radically reshape the future of mankind.

I will cover this in more detail in a lovely piece I'm writing that you will hopefully soon be reading in a local publication.

On Friday night we decided to take a detour in Columbia...thought we'd have a bit of an adventure and got a bit more than we bargained for. It started out well, wandering aimlessly through the city, stumbling across large historic buildings and memorial parks we knew nothing about...but then we got hungry. There's a nice little "bites and sights" guide and I got it into my head I wanted to try a tapas bar. As we wandered past a Marriott, I had a nice chat with the doorman, who suggested "blue." as a good pick for a "college budget." 90 minutes of trying to find parking, trying to find the tapas bar, and we finally follow the blue lights, discover they offer free valet parking, and that they are for 21 and up. I was mad. Then we drive around for another hour or so and finally settle on a McDonalds.

I was so exhausted by the end of it all. It was my intention to sleep late into the afternoon, but my dad had other plans and woke me at 11 for brunch. Mom and I then went to the International Fair, which was fantastic as always...it gets bigger and better every year. Ate some great food and bought a few choice international treasures. My favorite booth belonged to Nisha Dias...gorgeous Indian jewelry, clothing, and "paper-free paper" gifts. She did henna on several of my friends too. I love Indian adornments.

I got home a little after 5:00, crashed, and didn't wake up again till this morning. Thing is, I'm still exhausted. Think I'm going to bed now.

sick and tired

2008-09-21T18:35:00.002-04:00

Last night I kept waking up, in half-dreams imagining I had a great mechanical mask on my face, something like a Borg appliance. It's this dratted cold and it's been getting worse every day since Thursday.

Thursday morning I awoke hardly able to swallow. Surmising I was sick and realizing this would account for the past few days' sneezing and coughing, I treated it to my usual remedy: vitamin C and E and a whole lot of sleep. I woke up again at 12:45 and realized I had to deal with the guy whose truck I dented the night before. Other than that, I don't recall accomplishing anything. Oh well, I told myself, today will be my Saturday. That night, against my better judgment, I went out with my friend Bryant to catch Peelander Z at Ground Zero.

Peelander Red's beautiful dreadlocks are gone! oh mourn the day.

"My Heart will Go On"

Peelander Yellow with Bryant (to whom photo credits belong)

Sure it was a lot of fun, and I didn't scream nearly as much as last time, but there's no way dancing around in a smoke-filled bar to music so loud the hair on my neck vibrated can be what a sick body needs.

On Friday I got up at 11, but the fog was thicker and I really can't recall doing much of anything except sometime late in the afternoon going out into the woods with my Bible, God Calling and a lawn chair, and being captivated by the brilliance of the sunlight shafting across leaves and rotting wood. Two colors were highlighted in various shades, creating a palette any designer would be wont to snatch. There was a rich, chestnutty light brown in the foamy, flaky fallen pines, a variant of which glowed like fire on twigs where the sun caught. And then there were the greens - the glow-in-the-dark, plush greens of moss and lichen, and a more vibrant version in the leaves overhead. I couldn't keep the song of praise and wonder from pouring out my mouth. God is an artist.

Yesterday, Bryant and I went to PJ Teague's house to jam again. We did some Beatles stuff, Who Loves the Sun by Velvet Underground, (which, apparently, is also a favorite Tally Hall likes to cover...who knew?) and Fly Me To the Moon. He gave us homemade eggrolls too - they were delicious. Despite my constant sneezing and out-of-its-prime voice, we had a really good time. In fact, we had such a good time that we lost track of time and Bryant had to drop me straight off at babysitting so I'd be there in time. There, armed with a generous supply of antibacterial hand soap, the magic "five minute warning," and a toaster oven, I survived the evening.

Today, the fog was so thick I could hardly stand up without feeling dizzy and weak. I slept so much I'm ashamed of myself. I'm glad it wasn't tonight I had to babysit 'cuz I am definitely not equal to that task. I did manage to cut Dad's hair and I made it through Bards practice, but now I think my evening has ended. I'm going to lay down again. (Funny, blogging takes effort but it's all I've wanted to do all day.)

2008-09-17T23:39:00.000-04:00

2 days ago, I caught my first wafty whiff of autumn. Today it came to me in full. What is it about that whiff that always brings with it thoughts of pumpkins, new clothes, candles in sparkling amber sconces, family photos, Renaissance outings and other joyful things? Is it a scent, the temperature, barometric pressure, wind speed, humidity...? I donno, but that whiff always makes my head heavy with a deluge of memories and my heart light at the prospect of more in kind.

I got hit today. By a truck. It was my fault, he was in my blind spot and I pulled in front of him. His bumper sustained a nasty dent while I just had a few paint flecks knocked off. It was minor but it shook me up. There goes my "safe driver" insurance discount.

Tonight I discovered Asthmatic Kitty Radio. AK is like my favorite record label of all time so this is big news. If you're new to AK, make sure to check out Half-Handed Cloud, in addition to the ever-popular Sufjan Stevens. I don't want to go to bed because that means taking the earphones off.

2008-09-16T23:41:00.001-04:00

Last night, I told the Lord that I was His servant, that I would do His bidding. Today, I waited for His bidding. Half and hour ago, He bid me wash the dishes. So I washed the dished.

In other news, Craig's photos of the jam are up. I am so excited, they are marvelous pictures. Here's my favorite:

There are more on his wonderful photoblog, and many more on his Zenfolio! Thanks Craig!

Hub-Bubbly Mood

2008-09-14T20:27:00.001-04:00

Woo! I had so much fun swing dancing at the Hub-Bub last night. (Jonas Criscoe is a born dancer. Wow.) Two fabulous bands. Christabel and Sarah were even kind enough to stop by the jam beforehand - I got to chat with them - they're pretty cool folks.

The jam was amazing. They just seem to be getting better and better. Bryan Teague (aka chAng) came and brought a slew of friends - Allison (jazz flute, way cool!) Maneesh on the drums, and Donny with a case full of harmonicas. Davin came, whom I know from swing dancing. A guy named Frank found us from CraigsList...an amazing banjo player, taught us a few sweet tunes. Craig from 4pPhotoblog came and brought his family. I'm looking forward to seeing his pictures.

I get to go swing dancing again on Wednesday! (Info)

Lost in the Trees is playing Friday. (info) I probably won't make it 'cuz I've got Bible study, but they're definitely worth seeing. Check out this funky little video I found:

Oh and the AIRS are going to be hanging out at the Seay House for a week. I've never been there, so I'll probably check it out either Saturday or Sunday. (info) Two more fun things coming up: Spark 'n Boil on Tuesday and the Soapbox Open Mic next Wednesday. That'll be interesting, it's gonna be at the Nu-Way just like they had it back before Hub-Bub had a building.

No, Hub-Bub did not pay me to post this blog, I swear!

Art Mart and the Philharmonic

2008-09-06T23:32:00.002-04:00

Today was a good day. I've been working on that song of my friend's and I think I've got a decent tune. In the afternoon I stopped by Creative Tastes/the Hub-Bub Art Mart. Sarah and Ellie are too cool. They sold tutus and moustache-on-a-stick's (moustaches-on-sticks?)

This Tuesday they are starting an "adult playtime" called Spark n' Boil. (more info here. ignore the "21" it's actually for 18 and up.) Sounds like a barrel of monkeys. I'm so there.

It was blasted hot so after helping set up for a bit Bryant and I fled to Taco Bell for a Frutista Freeze (those things are so good) and then to PJ's house to jam. He's got this music room full of instruments - we rocked out, it was awesome. He even put a new spin on one of my old songs and made it sound pretty good. And I found out that Rock Band, unlike most video games, is not a complete waste of time. Bryant plays drums on there all the time and now he kicks butt on the real thing.

By the time we left it was considerably cooler outside so I went back to the Art Mart. There was some really fine work there. I felt bad about not buying anything (can't wait to get my own place to fill up with art) but placated myself with the thought of spreading the news about some really cool local artists and artisans.
Here's a sampling.

All Aboutcha - Jewelry by sister team Kristen and Trina - I know these ladies! Speaking of whom...Swing Dancing at the Hub-Bub September 17th! Woot woot! Be there.

Pottery by Kate - Beautiful rustic pottery designs at reasonable prices.

White Wolf - Hand-hammered silver and copper jewlry in Native American tradition.

McRose Designs - "Jewelry with an Artisan Spirit"

I'm really annoyed. I misplaced the cards of my top pick two artists (and they had to be the coolest cards too - one was a tiny print and the other was a recycled retail tag) but I will let you know when I find them.

...Actually, I found one of them on Google:

the Green Wardrobe - I just love the aesthetic of this artist. She had these great "upcycled" journals made from old hardbound books and various bits of stuff- including comics, feathers and Happy Meal bags. Very cool.

Oh and I was also reminded of a cool upcoming event: "A Taste of Africa" - it's going to be at the Memorial Auditorium on the 20th. It's sponsored by the Cross Cultural Institute. I've really got to check that place out some time.

Then to top off the evening, Lucas Patterson (editor of Root) gave me free tickets to the season opening concert of the Spartanburg Philharmonic so I took my dad. It was at Twitchell Auditorium at Converse so it was like a mini-reunion with a lot of Converse buddies. I even played usher while one of my music major friends took a pit stop. The music was of course spectacular. Violinist Lara St. John was the special guest and boy did she know how to put on a show. After intermission, they played this piece written by a guy who was sick with unrequited love and so he wrote this symphony about a crazy pipe-dream where he killed his beloved out of frustration and was sent to hell. Just by listening I would have never guessed - except for the final movement ("the Witches Sabbath") it sounded like your typical Romantic-era symphony. At least to me.

Yep, so it's been a pretty good day. I've got to wake up for church in 7 hours. Darn it.

A Realization and Lots of Photographs

2008-09-05T13:51:00.001-04:00

I figured out why I can't write good lyrics. While writing about Missy Higgins for the Spark, (yes Steve, another plug. I now know it's going to pop straight into your inbox...so much for name-dropping behind your back...) I read a lot of interviews talking about the process of songwriting. There was also a 14-yr-old girl in there somewhere who said something about the reason she writes songs is because she just can't express how she feels any other way. I've never had any trouble stating my feelings in prose, so perhaps I'll never be able to muster that emotional thrust necessary to write a song. Maybe I'm destined to become Hugh Grant in Music & Lyrics.

Today I met with a friend who has a few lyrics that need tunes. We'll see how the theory pans out.

I found the photos from my graduation weekend. It was so hard to choose just a few...every time I look at these my heart just floods with joy and I had to share it with someone.

Ecstatic at the airport, the night before graduation. This was the first time my dad had met baby Shakti.

At the reception after graduation. That's my sister next to me, and Aunt Mary Beth hiding coyly behind the flowers :) She's usually behind the camera.

It was the first and last chance I'd get to enjoy the Converse campus with my whole family.

Back at home. Mom never passes up a chance to display her storytelling skillz.

Aaron and me jamming on the piano.

It's a family thing.

Mom is a first-class kazooist.

Shakti gets in on the action.

My father really took to the whole grandpa thing.

Mom prefers to be known as "J-Ma."

At Five Spices for a last meal before their trip home. If you've never had lunch at Five Spices, you've got to try it - such the best.

Little heartbreaker.