Almost A New Year

Well, another year has passed. Almost.

Looking back on the year, I see so many changes.  Relationships come and gone, pets as well.  There are so many people I have met this year, and so many that I haven't heard from in a long time.  I miss them.  I miss friends.  I miss Arkansas.  I miss Ginger and Oscar and so much more.

But life brings its changes.  I have been changing and growing a lot.  This is the first time in a long time when I have been able to feel close to God again.  I am glad to be growing in my relationship and knowledge of him.  His comfort is great in this lonely stage in life.

This year has brought a new member to my family.  My sister got married, and they are so happily in love. I am glad to see all my sisters happily married.  They inspire me not to give up on love, and to have faith that it is real.  So I haven't given up on fairy tales yet.  Just waiting for them to find me.  I think I would like a Jacob and Rachel kind of love.  Without the extra wives and slaves.  But just the way he loved her so much that he pursued her whole heartedly, willing to work 14 years for her.  Or a Hosea kind of love, after he bought her back.  Hosea is by far my favorite book I have read.  I will have to blog about why later.  But it is very deep in my heart.

This Christmas also brought a new dog.  My dog, Ginger, passed away this summer.  Along with my 4 year old fish Oscar.  Those were both really devastating.  But I was finally able to get another puppy.  Her name is Bella Donna.  She is sometimes more like destructo-puppy, but I love her still.  I just hope I can raise her well.

As the year ends, I am praying for an even better year to come.  I am that cool person who has nothing to do on New Years, so I am sitting home alone blogging.  And getting my legs chewed off by my mutant dog.  I am praying that this next year bring health to my family and opportunities for new friendships and a social life.  Maybe good job stuff, too.  That would be nice.

What have we done to this beautiful world?

We as a human collective always seem to be in a constant battle to destroy the beautiful things God has created. We take and take without giving back to nature.  And then we try to stay naive about all that goes on, or we try to cover up the blame, so that we wont have to act responsively to what we are convicted of.

I am noticing this in my own life, too.  It is so easy to be ignorant because there is no knowledge of things that need to be changed.  I tend to focus on my own selfish life rather than focus on God's creation.  But, God put man on earth to rule and domain his creation, and in the context of that command, the only ruler and domineer to model after was God.  And he rules with love and compassion and grace.  We tend to model our behavior after dictators and Hitler and evil people.  Look at the dolphin slaughter, or the way we cut down too many forest and our waste we throw back on the land and waters and animals.  But, we try to justify it by saying that it is economical or practical or all part of building up our society.  It's just that we aren't being good stewards with what God commanded us to take care of when we see no conviction in our actions, or try to make changes in the world.

We still eat the meat from the slaughterhouses that don't allow chickens to ever see sunlight, and pump the animals so full of chemicals because they have been raised in their own crap.  We justify it by saying that that is the only way to feed a lot of people, or we stay naive about it, or we just say that caring is for the hippies.

We also support the food industries that tae buses to Mexico, bring back people to work illegally, and then hire the police to deport the workers after a time as criminals so that the company won't have to give them a raise.  But the people bringing the buses are never looked at, only the people doing the work.  And we support this because we still buy their food because it is cheap and easy.

We support so much waste in the world, so much cruelty in the world, just because we want things easy.  How dumb is that?  Just because it is easy doesn't mean it is right.  And nowhere in the Bible does God say he came to make our lives easy.  Yes, it says he gives us rest and his burden is light and his yolk is easy, but that does not mean that we are to live easy lives.  It just means he gives us inner peace and strength.  We are called to be lazy turds.

But we are lazy turds.  I am realizing how much I don't do because it would disrupt the normal way of my lazy life, or because people will think weird of me for acting out of conviction.

I used to get teased a lot for my environmental thoughts.  But God made this beautiful creation which we are so easily destroying with our waste and our slaughter and our lack of responsible action.  We are selfish stewards.

I am not saying we should all be vegetarians and never eat anything we haven't grown ourselves, but I am saying that maybe we should research what we support when we buy our produce and products and materials, etc.  Because even if you are naive that you might be supporting something sinful when you buy something from a sinful company, you are still responsible.  I am still responsible.

So now, I am going to try to be less lazy with life and to act responsibly once more.  There is so much beauty in the world, and I don't want to support it being destroyed.

Inspiration from a teabag

I am a tea drinker.  I love all kinds of hot teas and herbal teas.  Lately I have been drinking the Yogi brand tea, which has these wonderful little thoughts for inspiration on the tag of the tea bag.  Tonights tea stated, 

"We are here to love each other, serve each other, and uplift each other."

Tea has never been so honest!  And it got me thinking about the idea of love.  

Today love seems so temporary and disposable.  I am just as bad as others at forgetting the meaning of love.  We say I love this and I love that and I love you and I love pizza....  We have turned love into this temporary feeling or this temporary thought, when actually, love isn't temporary at all.  Real love isn't at least.

Our model for love isn't supposed to be from this world, but the One who is love and created love.  The Bible says that God is love, and it also says that love never fails, never falters or stumbles.  It doesn't just go away some day when the lovey-dovey feeling is gone.  That is because love isn't the emotion we think it is, but love is an act to be proven.  It isn't based on our words, but our acts.  The love we feel for one anyone is supposed to be an act of service and encouragement and patience and kindness to each other.  

When God said He loved us, it wasn't only through words, but His acts.  He came down and lowered Himself to be one of us, to die for us and redeem us from our own sins.  He didn't have to do that, but He proved His love for us.  And that love never fails.

I have been through many friendships and relationships where love was just this temporary statement.  It was an "I will love you forever" with a side note of "but I might change my mind."  And all the times love was promised to me but abandoned, it made me doubt that love was real at all.  I still struggle with this, and I can only pray that God will help me along the way.  But now I am understanding that love isn't this feeling we state out loud, but it's something that compels us to act in certain ways that prove our love.  Just as Christ loved us and served and uplifted us, so should we to each other because of this love.

And this is what a simple pot of tea reminded me of.  

Massacre

Sadly, 10 of my fish dies today from overheating.  Apparently the heater in the tank shorted out and heated the water to 97 degrees, which turned out to be very fatal to some of my fish.  Amazingly all the mollies and platies made it, though.  But I am sad for those lost.  It was pretty depressing to find a lot of dead fish, though.

On another note, I don't know what I am doing with my life.  I don't even feel like me anymore.  I just feel like a vegetable.  I miss excitement and adventure and being with friends and so much more.  Unfortunately I am too broke to go see my friends or even really pay for gas to leave the house.  I barely drive so that I can save the gas in my tank for when I really need it.  But I'm working on fixing that.  Hoping to find a job soon, and then maybe I will be able to afford some adventure, or maybe even move away to where there are people my age to find adventure with.

I miss Arkansas. It was a beautiful place.

Oh crap

I was feeling a bit down today so I decided to cheer myself up, and this is what came from it.

I read too much sometimes.

Sometimes I wish life could be like in books.  I wish I could feel like a character in a story sometimes.  I used to think that it could, but I don't know anymore.  I hope someday.

Peace

I have been struggling with peace for the past couple of weeks.  I had been focusing so much on things that don't really matter, and had lost my focus on serving and loving God.  Sometimes I get caught up in the here and now, worrying about whatever situation I am in or hating where I am at in life, and I lose focus on the reason God has put me in the places I am at and what He might be trying to teach me through those situations.  And then I get restless because I see all these things ahead of me and what I want and where I want to be in life, and I forget that none of that stuff really matters.  In the whole scheme of life, it won't matter where I lived, if I had much money or not, if I got married or not, or even how long I was alive.  All that matters is if I have loved God and done my best to serve Him and tell others about Him.  It's amazing how quickly I can lose focus.  But I was reminded today that no matter what, God loves me and cares for me.  It doesn't matter where I live, how much money I have or don't have, it doesn't matter what I have done, or who I used to be, or if anyone thinks I'm pretty or not, or even if I care to love Him back.  He loves me, no matter what.  And that is awesome, and inspiring. So I am going to try to focus on things that do matter.  Because God first loved me, I want to love others.  And in the end, people are who matter, not all the material crap that the world tell me I need to have.  And realizing this today gave me a ton of peace.  God loves me.  He has a plan for my life.  And it doesn't matter what I have or don't have, because He's got me.  And this is the realization that I want to live in.  So I am thankful for the peace I have been given.  It feels truly amazing.

Feeling like a failure at life.

It's a wonder that God loves me.  I am grateful for it, but I will never comprehend it.  I am filthy and foolish and can never be who I should be.  I fall into my own sinful mind so much and even when I am trying my hardest I am just a lowly cockroach hoping to be taken out of its miserable, gross existence.  These are my contemplations tonight.  Thank you, God, for your grace and love you have given to us small creatures.  I am sorry I fail so much.

Crazy Person in the Woods

I have this awesome dream of running away to the woods.  It's this weird idea of leaving every ounce of reality and living completely in my imagination.  Running away from adulthood, responsibilities, realities, etc. and just living in a story in my mind.  I would love it.

I would build a house, deep in the woods of an enchanted forest. It would start small, but eventually would become a castle.  I could talk to the animals, have a small garden, fight dragons and ride unicorns.  It would be magical.

I don't know why I have these deep longings to be away from reality.  Ever since childhood I have lived more in my dreams than in the real world.  It's a place full of adventure and beauty and love; a place where anything is possible and people are good and knights really save you and every girl is pretty and there is no such thing as murder or rape or abuse.  The more I grow up, the more I am expected to be an adult, and think like an adult, and to give up those unrealistic dreams and to stop living in my fantasies.  But life gets so dull without the imagination.  A simple stroll in the park can become something so much more.  The trees can be whispering songs that we had forgotten, the stars are actually dancers in the sky, the wind may be carrying a distant traveler, the path may be leading someone beautiful and unexpected.  Or a long drive is an adventure rather than a dread, spurred by the beat of the music and the anticipation of where the road may lead.

And music is the door to opening this new world.  When I hear the piano or the sounds of strings or the simple rhythms of a song, I am taken away.  The scenery changes and the characters come out to play.  It's like the music being to paint a whole new picture in the air.  I could spend hours just blankly staring at a wall, listening to music and just watching the images in the notes.  I am transported.

Sometimes I think if only others could see what I see, then they would understand. Nothing is simple, nothing is just what it seems, but some people just don't understand.  It's the curse of the artist's mind, I guess.  But I am grateful.  I see beauty where others might not, and then I can try to share that beauty with others.  I miss painting, though.  Sometimes I am overtaken by my imagination that it's like I forget which is real.  Sometimes I fear I will become one of those crazy people that are unrespondent to the world around them because they really are living completely in their mind.  I wish I could just take the people I love and mix them in with the worlds in my head.  But then again, if I only lived in a dream, that wouldn't really be living at all.

Shoot for the Moon

I had this dream the other night where during the whole storyline, my dad and I were planning on going to the moon.  I only remember a few details, so here is what I can remember.

The whole dream took place in my house.  There was something about my friend coming over so I was trying to clean the house and such.  But in all my efforts, my mom would say there is no point in trying because my dad and I were going to go to the moon.  Then my sister and her husband came over.  They have been married for a month now, and they were dropping by to visit.  While they were with us, they decided that they should move in.  Of course, since they are newly weds, they would need more living space, so I was told I would have to always stay upstairs in my room unless invited downstairs or going outside.  I was a bit upset about this because the piano was downstairs.  But then, they would keep reminding me that it didn't matter because my dad and I were going to go to the moon.  Somewhere in there my friend came over and we also talked about my plans to go to the moon.  That's all I can remember.

I also had a dream a few days ago while trying to have a lucid dream.  I went to bed telling myself that I would do it, and that I would control my dream, but that didn't work.  Instead I dreamt that dinosaurs and raccoons were having a war with one another.  There was lots of bloody rabies-filled battles scenes.  I wasn't even a character in my own dream.  I guess my mind decided to make me watch scenes to protect itself from the possibility of a lucid dream.  Lame.  But here is a dinosaur I drew last night.  I think I will draw more with him fighting some raccoons.

Bittersweet Dream

This might be a little more melancholy than my normal posts, but to stay true to the purpose of this blog, I am going to write out my dream from last night.

First, it must begin with some history.  I had this friend in high school, who meant the world to me.  He walked me to my classes every day, talked to me and listened to me about the deepest feelings I was having.  He lifted me up when I was feeling down and I tried to do the same for him.  He was such a caring and outgoing guy, very popular and loved by just about everyone.  One night, though, he got a gun and took his life.  That same night I was having a dream about him that we were saving each other from the  government because they were raising us like cattle to be eaten. He was saving me the night he killed himself. After that night, I would have dreams of him for months.  And still, years later, I sometime will have another dream.  I love them now, though, because it gives me back time that I can't ever have with my friend.

So here is my dream from last night:

It starts with a room.  I am at something that seems like a high school reunion, and we are all chatting and catching up with each other's lives.  As I go through and talk to my friends of the past, I see him.  He is standing there with Hunter Pryor and I am so thrilled to see them both because they meant so much to me in high school.  But as I walk towards him, I remember that he died long ago.  I am confused as to how he is here, but when he sees me he runs up and gives me the biggest hug I have ever gotten.  But, because I know he is really dead, I start crying in his arms.  He tries to console me and tell me that he is alive and holding me and he isn't dead, which is when I realize this must be a dream. I also had a strange feeling like Hunter had died also in reality, but I am hoping that isn't the case. We catch up with him and talk and laugh, and it was beautiful.  But I knew it was a dream.

Then, the dream switched to us three and 4 other girls going into our school building.  I guess we were supposed to continue the reunion there.  It was dark outside and very quiet.  When we entered the front door, a lady greeted us and said, "Come on inside, but hide quickly.  There is a shooter running around in here and we are on lockdown."  No lights are on in the building minus the safety lights that would come in in blackouts.  We run and try to find places to hide, there is blood on the ground from others that had been shot, and every now and then a dead body.  

We had all split up, and now I am in what looks to be an abandoned choir room and a laundry room and a storage room all in one.  I am with my friend, Bethany (from college, not high school) and we are trying to find a place to hide.  The door to the room does not shut, but there is a storage area in the back of the room with a lot of debris and saloon type doors separating it from the rest of the room.  We try to get back there as quietly as possible, all the while feeling like the shooter is about to come upon our door.  The saloon doors aren't shutting all the way and we are now trapped.  Just as I think we are doomed and that the shooter is getting closer and closer, my friend runs in and jumps into the debris and shuts the doors and figures out how to lock them.  He came and made us safe, and he hugged me and told me it would be alright.  But I kept trying to tell him that I knew this was a dream, because he died a long time ago.  

Then the dream switches once again.  I am now at one of my three older sister's houses with her two year old, Zoe.  My friend is with me and it is another one of my sister's wedding days.  We are all getting ready to go, but then my sister tells me I have to stay behind and babysit Zoe, and that I must miss the wedding.  I am highly upset, but I have no choice.  So I am watching Zoe, and for some reason she is being horrible to me.  We are having to drive somewhere, and she just would not behave herself.  I must have been driving us back to the apartment, because when I parked, that's where we were, But Zoe kept saying how she hated me and wanted to kill me and would not mind me, and I am just having to hold her arms and drag her back to the apartment.  She seems more like a five year old than a two year old.  I tell her that my sister is going to spank her when she gets home, but Zoe just says that my sister would take her side and would give in and not spank her at all.  I knew this to be false, but I was still frustrated.  When I get in the apartment, my friend is there.  Zoe runs up to him and her whole attitude has changed. She is now the adorable and lovable two year old again, and he just holds her up and plays with her.  He had come to help me.  Then, he takes us to see the very end of my sister's wedding/reception, which happened to be in the ugly old fellowship hall of our church.  And there was something about Walmart thrown in there.  But we got to see the end, and Zoe went back to her mom and my friend hugged me again.  At that point, I woke up.

Outside my window.

I peeked outside and here is what I saw.

My rabies forcefield is still going strong.  Watch out bad guys.

Rabies Threat

Just about every night before I go to bed I hear thumping next to my bathroom window.  There is a family of raccoons that seems to gather in the nook where the roof meets the wall to the upstairs there.  They are like my own little rabies forcefield against bad intruders.  Makes me happy.  Although, it also makes me feel kind of watched when I'm going to use the restroom.  Beggars can't be choosers, I guess.

The Brave Little...Toothbrush?

I finally began my quest to destroy the evil trash gnomes' plot of taking over my living space.  It took a while to uncover, but I have found the floor once again.

In this cleaning frenzy, I noticed I have an abundance of toothbrushes.  Last year, the dentist told me that when the blue on the toothbrush has faded, that it is an indicator that you need to replace it.  This kind of wrecked my idea that you can brush your teeth with the same toothbrush you had when you were a kid.  And then I started realizing how many germs have probably mated like rabbits and are now living in the toothbrush.  Naturally, my reaction was to go and buy another toothbrush, and then another, and another.  I found 5 toothbrushes in my toothbrush holder, and two more in the cabinet.  Some of them had long since faded in their glorious, new blue, and others had only lightly been used.

As I tried to pull myself to throwing the old ones out, a strange sadness came over me as if I was going to throw out an old friend.  This feeling is to be blamed on a particular incident in my childhood.

It all started with The Brave Little Toaster...

Whoever decided it was a good idea to tell a story to little kids about how inanimate objects have feelings of rejection when their owner gets rid of them is a definite way to produce hoarders.  I remember watching it one day as a kid, and then going to my room and crying because I felt I had let down all my belongings.  Ever since then, I would equally play with all my toys, and I would go through my closet and let each one of my pairs of shoes and clothing know that they were thought of that day.  As I started to grow, it became an emotional experience when my mom would give away clothes that didn't fit anymore, or when she felt I had outgrown a particular toy.  I would often take them out of the give away stack and sneak them back into my room.

My sister tried to help me along the way with my hoarding problem.  I'll admit that I was never as bad as some of the people you see on TV, I like things to be open and clean, but I had a big problem of getting extremely sad and losing sleep on lost or given away items.  I really felt that everything in the world had emotions like I do.  It also makes it tough when cockroaches enter the picture.  I normally feel really guilty if I kill them.  But anyways, she would kind of help me say good-bye to objects, or help me to know when I really needed to get rid of things.  I remember I saved every single paper )homework, drawings, notes, etc.) from kindergarten to high school, and then one day she came in and went through it all with me.  She put logic and reason into the equation of why I didn't need to save it all, so it helped.

My sister is gone and married now, so I am left alone with the decisions of what to keep and what to throw out.  Unfortunately everything is swayed by this childhood knowledge of life being like the Brave Little Toaster.  I have learned to view the trashcan and give away piles as a kind of burial ground or nursing home, instead.  I pretend that the objects have died or really old, so I either let them be buried, or send them away to a nursing home so they can be better taken care of and loved by even more people.

And this is where we come back to the toothbrushes.  Of the 5 I had in the holder, 3 of them have been buried now.  They were good toothbrushes, faithful to the very last bit of plaque.  Even though they made my gums bleed sometimes, or my lack of really using them to their full potential, they will always be in our hearts.  RIP toothbrushes.  I will miss you.

My overactive brain is going to kill me...

If you steal a baby, aliens will chase you....

Here is a dream I had...


It started off where i was an orphan with my 3 older sisters, and we were in the crummy orphanage.  The lady in charge of us had us all sitting on blankets and pillows on the floor to watch a movie on a big movie projector.  While sitting on the floor, I found this cool gun hidden in between the wall and the pillows.

Curious, I aimed the gun at the wall, and pulled the trigger.  The gun acted as a projector and shot symbols out onto the wall.  I thought it was cool, so I put in it my backpack.

Then, the lady came in and said that the area was going to flood and we had to get out of there, because a big storm was coming. So me and my sisters got in a car and headed to my church.  We figured we would be safe there because it is uphill and my dad is a pastor.  (apparently we are no longer orphans)

On the way there we saw this little baby, so we stopped the car and I picked it up to save it from the flood.  But the flood was coming too soon, and I realized we wouldn't have time to outrun it with the baby.  I found a fat piece of PVC pipe sticking out of the ground and put the baby in it, because apparently in my dream, that would save the baby.  Then we continued to drive to our church.

At this time, our church's new sanctuary was being built, so it looked like a lot of wood and sheet rock inside. When I went into the sanctuary and this lady was holding a hawaiian party with buffets and music and such.

 I guess she was trying to bring some fun into the big storm outside.  I walked around inside for a while, but my dad wasn't in there.  Someone told me that he was in the fellowship hall, so I went there to ask for his help. When I finally found him, though, a CIA looking guy was talking to my dad and I knew they were looking for me.  They wanted the gun I had stolen, and something about the hidden baby.

Terrified, I ran for the youth building, and grabbed my sister. We jumped in the bushes to hide from the CIA guy, and I told her we were going to have to escape, because I stole a gun and now they are looking for me.

Then my dream switches to my sister and I on this spaceship, running from the CIA guy and this alien who were on separate ships following us.

It goes through this whole scene of us flying around in the clouds.  The alien's ship was must faster than ours, and he was gaining speed.  We knew he would soon catch us, so we hid in the clouds.  As he came closer, we acted like innocent bystanders and whistled a tune.  The alien stopped and asked if we had seen two little girls pass by, so we pointed the wrong direction.

We lost the CIA guy in the clouds, but the alien realized he had been fooled.  He flew after us once more as he gained speed.  Seconds felt like hours as we waited for him to catch us.  Everything was in slow motion.

At the last moment, I turned around and ripped off his wings!

We barely escaped with our lives, and the gun was safe again. The alien went back to his planet and his boss told him he was a failure.

And then I woke up...

Trash gnomes

I have decided that my room has been infested with trash gnomes.  They are sneaky little guys, who wait until you are asleep or not paying attention, and then pounce into your dresser and trashcan and throw all of the contents into the middle of the room.  

There is no amount of cleaning or poisons that can get rid of these guys.  The only hope is to try to clean so fast that they can't catch up in their efforts to make it dirty again.  Or never sleep, but that never works.