BeLoved

What I've Been Missing

2010-09-02T01:07:00.000-04:00

I had no idea how much I was being encouraged by my daily blog readings until I stopped reading them.

I have felt like I've been hitting a brick wall over and over again for the past few weeks. I have made some pretty big changes in my life and the changed has proven to be a struggle in that I have fallen out of a daily routine. I no longer get up, go to work and then completely ignore my work for the first 30 minutes (well, let's be honest, most of the day...) while I read specific blogs that give me so much encouragement. I am not a coffee drinker, but these blogs were the equivalent to my morning cup of coffee and I had no idea... None of these people know that I read their blogs on a daily basis, but they are my own community and without them my life is not the same.

So even though I am pretty sure none of these people will ever see this, I still want to say thank you...

(In)Courage

In The Name of Love

Jasmine Star

Sarah Markley

Jon Acuff

Chatting at the Sky

Donald MIller

Anne Jackson

Holley Gerth

the Journey

experiencing the real thing

2010-04-03T22:35:00.000-04:00

For many, including myself, this very weekend is considered a time to mourn the death of Jesus Christ and celebrate his resurrection three days later. New dresses and shirts and ties are purchased. Family and friends gather for good food and time spent together. Eggs are hidden and little children pepper the yard to find the little treasures hidden inside.

But these three days. Do we really even have the ability to begin to fathom the depth of pain and heights of joy the close family and followers of Christ experienced all those years ago? I cannot answer that. I cannot even begin to fathom the pain I would feel in my heart to loose someone some close to me in such a way. My church does a passion play this time of year. My brother plays Jesus. Now, the followers of Christ didn't have the hindsight to see what the death on the cross would actually mean to the world. They only saw it as a confusing loss. But being able to see the act portrayed now and know what it means, if you really think about it, is heartbreaking. Especially if that person playing Jesus is your brother. Your own flesh and blood. Watching him carry a cross down an aisle and 'die' on a cross.

I know it doesn't compare. I know it can only represent a small inkling of what it was actually like. But when you experience that inkling of pain, of seeing someone so close to you being treated like that. Being hung on a cross, even though he didn't deserve it. Even putting the experience into words is hard. But it breaks your heart. I can't imagine experiencing the real thing.

A few other blogs I have found inspiring this weekend:

Loss & Resurrection and The Comma.

Stepping Out

2010-03-24T11:04:00.001-04:00

Sometimes I sit here in my desk at work and have an overwhelming urge to just leave. To just step out into this BIG world God made and not ever come back.

I just want to do MORE. And right now, I don't know what the more is. But I know myself. And I know that I am capable of more. I know that I am capable of doing things that I see others doing.

I find it curious the little things I remember my parents telling me as I was growing up. I probably shouldn't find them curious so much as realize that God wanted me to know and remember those things. I remember once my dad telling me that when I wanted something bad enough I could find a way to make it happen. And I know this sounds like a pretty general piece of advice. But I'm pretty confident he wasn't giving me another piece of advice. I'm pretty sure he was talking about ME. I'm pretty sure he was telling me that when I know there is something that I want, I am capable of figuring out and bring to fruition whatever it is I want. ...I know I put a lot of "I's" in there but I want to emphasize the point that it was personal.

So for right now I am waiting. And praying. I cannot tell you how many times I forget that all we need to do is ask and God will hear us. So instead of just sitting around and wondering what MORE is out there, I am just going to ask God what MORE is out there and trust that he is going to show me.

confessions

2010-03-16T21:05:00.000-04:00

I have recently discovered a couple blogs that I love and the authors happen to be sisters: jasmine star and bianca juarez. They recently posted some confessions and I thought maybe I might throw out a few:

while at a youth camp for my church, i slapped my brother in the face so hard he had to tuck his head between his legs so he wouldn't cry. i cannot even begin to put into words how bad that still makes me feel.
i spent my 21st birthday laying in bed in my dorm room while at the university of memphis. i hated being there and all my friends were at home. those were the hardest two years of my entire life.
i skipped a lot of class my senior year of high school. although they weren't really the important classes. so hopefully that makes it better.
i feel i did not live up to my potential in school at all. high school or college. and i wish i knew then what i know about myself now. it would completely change what i studied in college.
sometimes i feel like my job makes me numb to emotions i should be feeling. there's a song that says, "i'd rather hurt than feel nothing at all." and i think i understand that.
you could argue i buy too many clothes. and i might agree with you on some days. but i know it is a fact i buy too many books. if you compare the amount of money i have spent on clothes with the amount i have spent on books, there is no contest. books will win.
i need God in a way i have never needed him before. the past two years of my life have really had some backlash i didn't even realize until i actually had time to slow down and look at my life.

hope you enjoyed these and maybe you learned something new about me.

Loves of My Life

2010-02-25T11:46:00.000-05:00

"...to be in a relationship with God is to be loved purely and furiously. And a person who thinks himself unlovable cannot be in a relationship with God because he can't accept who God is; a Being that is love. We learn that we are lovable or unlovable from other people...That is why God tells us so many times to love each other."

"I never liked jazz music because jazz music doesn't resolve. But I was outside the Bagdad Theater in Portland one night when I saw a man playing the saxophone. I stood there for fifteen minutes, and he never opened his eyes.

After that I liked jazz music.

Sometimes you have to watch somebody love something before you can love it yourself. It is as if they are showing you the way.

I used to not like God because God didn't resolve. But that was before any of this happened."

"No, life cannot be understood flat on a page. It has to be lived; a person has to get out of his head, has to fall in love, has to memorize poems, has to jump off bridges into rivers, has to stand in an empty desert and whisper sonnets under his breath... We get one story, you and I, and one story alone. God has established the elements, the setting and the climax and resolution. It would be a crime not to venture out, wouldn't it?"

"It is always the simple things that change our lives. And these things never happen when you are looking for them to happen. Life will reveal answers at the pace life wishes to do so. You feel like running, but life is on a stroll. This is how God does things"

"There is something beautiful about a billion stars held steady by a God who knows what He is doing. (They hang there, the stars, like notes on a page of music, free-form verse, silent mysteries swirling in the blue like jazz.) And as I lay there, it occurred to me that God is up there somewhere. Of course, I had always known He was, but this time I felt it, I realized it, the way a person realizes they are hungry or thirsty. The knowledge of God seeped out of my brain and into my heart. I imagined Him looking down on this earth, half angry because His beloved mankind had cheated on Him, had committed adultery, and yet hopelessly in love with her, drunk with love for her."

~All quotes from various works of Donald Miller

Happy V-Day ...A day late

2010-02-15T09:49:00.000-05:00

I want to say thank you to my sweet husband who got me such a great Valentine's gift! We went to Green Life one night and across the parking lot is an art gallery and I've always loved theses pictures:

I got this one and one that says "Live" -

I told Michael I wanted to be able to make my own but the only letter I have been able to find is a "T" made out of a telephone pole. And those aren't so unique.

Half of My Heart

2010-02-11T13:09:00.001-05:00

I cannot think of a better way to have spent the night:

Heartbreak Warfare
Crossroads
No Such Thing

Vultures
Bigger Than My Body

Perfectly Lonely
Assassin

3x5
Comfortable

Waiting on the World to Change
Slow Dancing in a Burning Room

Half of My Heart

Why Georgia

Gravity

Who Says

Say

Happiness x10

2010-02-10T13:43:00.000-05:00

My sweet friend, Emily, tagged me in her blog to share 10 things that make me happy:

1. PHOTOGRAPHY. I could probably spend my day online finding photographers' websites and looking at picture after picture. I am also trying to learn a little more about this art so hopefully one day soon I can show off some stuff.

2. Being WARM. Climbing into bed on a cold night and curling up under the covers. Getting out of the pool on a summer day and feeling the sun warm up your skin. Walking out of the freezing cold and letting the heat of a warm building hit your face.

3. Getting to the LAST 100 pages of a book. I know I am close to the end and the excitement of seeing how the story is going to come together is too much for me to put the book down. So if I get to the last 100 pages, I'm probably going to finish no matter how late I have to stay up.

4. The SMELL of summer. Not the way too sticky, hot summer. The kind we had last year where the temperature didn't get over 100 and you just want to be outside all the time.

5. A new pair of JEANS that fit perfectly. I don't usually try on clothes in the store so when I get them home (or in the mail) and they fit, I might wear them for a few days straight.

6. CHEESE BISCUITS from Red Lobster. I am pretty sure I could go to Red Lobster and have a meal entirely of these biscuits and be in heaven.

7. My sweet dog, BELLA, hopping up and down like a kangaroo when I come home from work. She does this every day. Even though I usually go home for lunch so its only a couple of hours since she saw me last. I also love to watch her little nub of a tail wag back and forth as fast as a little nub can.

8. Being able to drive with the WINDOWS down. And turning up my radio really loud. Sometimes it just feels good.

9. STARS. I love to look up in the sky and see millions of them just twinkling their lives away. This either stems from or is the cause of the fact that I also love things that sparkle. If it were not so tacky to have a house filled with sparkly things, I might do it.

10. All the RED and PINK at Valentine's Day. Its really the only time of year when its okay for these colors to be together in such large quantities. Seeing them out there just makes me happy.

Have you ever...

2010-01-31T17:58:00.000-05:00

read a book and it took you forever to finish? I am sure the answer is yes. That's how it was with this last book I read. I could just not get into this book. I wanted to finish it because I didn't want to leave it unfinished. But ugh. I did not really enjoy it. Maybe in another time or place... I actually considered for a brief second, with about 20 pages left, putting the book down. I just knew it was going anywhere. Not only that I knew how it ended before I finished it due to the fact the author wrote from about 5 different perspectives and one of those started from the end and went to the beginning. I just kept holding out hope that, in the end, the author was going to throw me a bone. She was going to throw some surprise in the end and it was going to have been worth the read. Fail. This did not happen.

This isn't to say someone out there won't love this book. I just didn't. And as a result of me taking a week to read this book, I didn't read as many books as I would have liked to this month.

I also didn't get a chance to work on my photography class assignment this weekend. In the excitement of leaving work early on Friday I completely forgot the handout/assignment that was sitting on my desk at work. But my last class meets on Saturday this week instead of Thursday, so maybe I'll get the opportunity to make up for it in the extra days.

Sweet, Sweet Summer

2010-01-28T15:00:00.000-05:00

It has been TWO long years since I have been able to enjoy summer. It has been two years since I got to play during summer. This year I am free and praying for a sweet summer.

It makes me so happy (literally smiling to myself) to think that I do not have to spend two nights of every single week in school. I do not have to to spend the rest of the week nights reading and/or studying. I get to be free. I do not have to worry about mid-terms and feel sad that the only good night of Riverbend (yes, I do still go to Riverbend) happens to be on the same night as one of those mid-terms. I do not have to plan going out and having fun around school nights. I get to be free.

When I started working full time I was a little bummed that no matter what I did or how late I stayed out at night, I had to get up and go to work the next morning. But at least you still get those summer nights... Having devoted two years of my life to school took those nights away from me. And now I get them back. I don't have to plan my vacations around school nights or worry about missing a class. I just get to go have fun. And I do not think I can put into words how happy this makes me.

So, here's wishing to a sweet summer full of fun and friends and NO SCHOOL!!

20/20

2010-01-20T09:31:00.000-05:00

So I spent an hour at the eye doctor yesterday. I don't think I have ever looked forward to a doctor's appointment so much. I had been wearing my glasses for almost two weeks and I was really struggling. I can see fine with my glasses - but I hate wearing them. Unfortunately I am pretty near sighted. My doctor did some little math formula yesterday and I learned that without any type of corrective lenses, I can see a whole 22 cm into the distance before things start to go fuzzy. And let me tell you, when that is the case and you are wearing glasses, forget about glancing down or out of the corner of your eyes. Because you can't. You just see blur. And taking a shower... that is fun. I can't wear my glasses in the shower because the fog up (yes, I've tried) so that just means I'm stuck just seeing blur. It is not fun attempting to shave your legs this way. Glasses also tend to minimize things. So, even when I wear those, I am seeing things slightly smaller than they actually are. Which you might not notice so much, except when you do things like read or look at the computer. I get less of a headache holding a book right up to my face than I do when I read wearing my glasses. Overall, I find it much, much, much more enjoyable to wear contacts.

But even contacts, when worn correctly can be a pain. You are supposed to take them out every night or every other night or something like that. I don't do that. I enjoy living in my false sense of reality that I have 20/20 vision. At least until I get something in my eye or some small little tiny piece of dust on my contact that hurts like you would not believe. Most of the time I just make myself suffer through it. Again, I find this easier than giving up the ability to see.

In hopes of making my life a little better, I am considering having LASIK done. I don't mean in the next month or anything. But maybe in the next year or so. I actually talked to my eye doctor about it for a while yesterday and the more I think about it, the more I want to do it. So, maybe, hopefully in the next year or so I can be glasses/contacts free!

Starting all over

2010-01-12T10:50:00.000-05:00

So it is the start of a brand new year... at least it was 12 days ago. I wouldn't say that I made any 'resolutions' but there are some things I want to work at - spending money would be on the top of the list. Unfortunately I don't mean spending more of it. I need to stop shopping online for clothes and I need to stop buying 1 or 2 new books every time I go to Target or Books A Million. Well, maybe just Target because I'm pretty sure the point of Books A Million is to buy books. I also need to work on my organizational skills. When you live in a small house built in the 1930's you are not afforded a lot of storage space. Therefore I need to be more organized. I love the location of our house. And if I could afford a $300k house, I would have no trouble finding a larger house with lots of space in the same area. Unfortunately, that is not the case. And we are not really looking to move in the near future. So I am stuck with the task of becoming more organized in a small house.

After 2 looonnng years of Law School I am not going back. And this makes me so happy! I do not regret making the decision to go. I thought it was what I wanted to do and I tried it. And I hated it. So now I know and I don't have to wonder for the rest of my life if I should have done it. This leaves me with more time at home, more sleep and a much better outlook on my Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Tuesdays and Wednesdays will now consist of Biggest Loser, NCIS and Criminal Minds.

I was supposed to start a photography class last Thursday, but due to all the inclement weather, it was moved back a week. So this Thursday I will start to learn a little about the art of digital photography. I think for now it will be a little hobby. But if I am able to actually pick this up and become good at it... well, I'll just see where it takes me for now.

Now that I have time to read for fun (which, in protest for hating the last half of school last year, I did anyway) I want to read a lot more than I do now. I was poking around on a website one day and saw where someone had set a goal of reading 100 books in a year. And I thought to myself, that is something I can do. So I am going to attempt this. The key word is attempt because I have come to realize that to accomplish this I have to read 2 books a week. I think its possible. I read fast. But if I make it to the end of the year and haven't done this, well, hopefully I will have put a dent in it. We shall see...

The Help

2009-11-30T11:10:00.000-05:00

Last week was Thanksgiving and I had a pretty busy week. Monday & Tuesday I had to work. Tuesday night my family went out to dinner for my parents' 50th birthdays. I took the day off Wednesday to make a Turkey for a family my sunday school class decided to help out for the Thanksgiving Holiday. Thursday was Thanksgiving. And I spent Friday, Saturday & Sunday taking care of Michael, who got a cold, putting up the Christmas tree and finishing laundry.

I guess since I had a lot going on I couldn't really get settled enough to start a new book. I was lucky enough to have some time at the beginning of the week to finish The Help. This book was recommended to me and at first I wasn't sure if I was going to like it. I didn't really pay much attention to what the book was about but thought I'd give it a shot. And I am so glad I did. It took me a few pages to get into the book, but once I did, I could not put it down. I was completely drawn into this story of black maids in the 1960's and the white women that employed them. I've seen plenty of movies and heard about racial segregation in the 1960's, but I've never considered

it from this point of view. I can only hope that if I had lived in this time, I would have been brave enough to stand up for what is right. I did not want this book to end. But it did and as I read the last few pages I could not help but notice the tears rolling down my cheeks.

I finally picked up another book to read last night: Last Kiss. Its been on my shelf for a while and I need to get some off to make room for new ones I seem to accumulate pretty quickly.

The Blind Side

2009-11-17T13:22:00.000-05:00

I did not grow up watching a lot of football and therefore did not find a great deal of interest in it. As I got older, the interest I did take in it was mostly just because I noticed everyone else around me taking interest. I can vividly remember sitting in sixth grade science, the teacher being a Tennessee football fan, reviewing by way of a game set up to be a lot like the way a football game works: each team had four chances to get the answer right before having to forfeit their turn. And I could just not wrap my head around what a 'down' was. Even after several people in the class, the teacher included, tried to explain it.

Football for me was just something that would allow, every once in a while, a bunch of people to get together and hang out. Even in high school Friday night football was just to go and hang out. I paid attention mostly my junior year when we made it to the state championship, but it was hard not to get caught up in that excitement. I don't think I really started to really pay attention to football until sometime in college and it was an off and on thing.

After I started dating my husband my concept of football really changed. College was really all I watched. And it was really just Tennessee football. Pro football became something I loved to watch because my husband plays fantasy football. I think if I had to choose between college and pro, I'd choose pro.

If you don't like football, this book might be a tough read. It is a great story about a black kid from one of the poorest parts of the country who finds his way into the home of rich, white family and how it changes his life. It will tug at your heart strings. What makes this book interesting (and probably pretty boring to some people) is that it seems to take two entirely different pathways: the first being history and evolution of pro football, the second Michael Oher's (pronounced 'oar') life and shows how, against all odds, they happen to converge into one.

If you can muddle through the history side of it, the story of Michael Oher's life is truly worth reading about. And if muddling through the boring stuff doesn't sound appealing, then definitely check out the movie: The Blind Side.

Picture Perfect

2009-11-14T01:34:00.000-05:00

I started reading this book about two weeks ago. It usually doesn't take me this long to read a book, but I had some school things, like finals, to finish up. I love reading this author. She writes on hard subjects but her stories are so captivating, I always get drawn in.

PIcture Perfect is about a woman who finds her the love of her life in the middle of Africa. She is there for work and happens to have the right expertise to consult on a movie set. There she meets her future husband, the star of the movie, and begins her life living out a fairy tale most would be envious of. But things are not as they seem and soon her fairy tale turns nightmarish.

On to finish my next book, The Blind Side. The movie comes out this Friday and I am looking forward to seeing it!

Two Sides

2009-10-31T20:00:00.000-04:00

One of my latest reads (along with a few of my friends) was 19 Minutes by Jodi Picoult. Overall, I am a fan of this author. She writes on some hard subjects & I absolutely love reading books that make you think, that make you experience real emotion instead of the surface emotion.

19 MInutes is about a boy who, after years of being picked on, walks into his high school & starts shooting. Not long after I started the book I read online that the mother of one of the shooters at Columbine was going to be writing an article in Oprah's magazine talking about her point of view. I kept meaning to get it when I would be out at WalMart or Target and just never did.

I finally picked it up this week and sat down to read the article. Its maybe 4 pages, as opposed to the 455 pages in the book, & I know I shouldn't be surprised, but I ended up being just that has the amount of similarities in the long book & the short article.

You always, always go straight to feeling for the victim & the victim's family. And how can you not?Suffering a tragedy like Columbine... as much as you felt that to your core as every other high school student in America, how much more did it hurt to be there? But how many of us consider the flip side? How many wonder how devastated the family of the shooter feels? Probably not very many. I can't imagine losing someone that way. To love someone so much & not see how much they hurt inside. To wake up one day to find that you have no explanation for the actions of someone you love & on top of that the whole world is looking at you like you did something wrong.

There are two sides to every story.

Books on Ipod

2009-10-24T15:38:00.000-04:00

I have been listening to some audiobooks on my ipod recently - I listened to The Shack on my way to North Carolina a few weeks ago. It took almost the whole trip there and back, but I finished it. I have started to listen to Mercy by Jody Picoult - its 17 hours long. Its going to take me a while to get through this one.

I love the idea of listening to a book - I love to read so I discovered this week that while I did the dishes and laundry I could just listen away. The only draw back is that you have to listen to the same voice for however many hours and on top of that, the narrator is using different inflections for different characters. So listening to a male narrator do a female voice or a female do a male voice can be a turn off. Which leads me to wonder if I would be capable of doing a better job. Which leads me to this memory...

The summer before my senior year of college my family and I went on vacation. We went with some family friends. We were going to a quiet little island off the gulf coast of Florida. A week of sun and sand. The catch was we would not be staying in a hotel or condo or house. We were basically going to be camping on this island for a week - as in take your own food, no hot water unless you boiled it and cold showers in a shower stall on the side of a bath house. I know most everyone will be thinking that this is NOT AT ALL what you call a vacation. But I will say that I like to camp. And going to this island sounded like an adventure.

Well.... let me tell you it was not the kind of adventure I would sign up for again. It was hot. There were mosquitos everywhere. We would go through a whole can of bug spray a day. The beach was not a beautiful sandy beach - but more of the broke up shell kind. And it stormed BADLY almost every night.

Maybe its because when you have a bad experience the good parts stand out even more, but one of my favorite memories has come from that trip. I took a few books to read that week and I'm not sure if it was during one of the bad storms or just a moment when no one had anything better to do, but at some point I picked up a book and started to read it out loud to everyone. And for whatever reason, everyone decided to listen. So throughout the week everyone would gather around and listen as I read more and more of the story until I finished. I didn't use different voices for the different characters. I don't even think I changed the tone of my voice depending on the situation. I just read. And people listened.

I have not found a narrator of a book that has reminded me of that moment. The book I read was The Five People You Meet in Heaven and it was a great book. I highly recommend it if you haven't read it yet.

Feels Like Home

2009-10-07T22:15:00.000-04:00

I think it would be amazing to be able to travel around the world. I can think of several handfuls of places I would like to go. Often I will see a picture of or hear someone describe a place and find myself wanting to go. Maybe even with just a small bag and a camera to capture incredible moments. I am about to go on a trip to see my sister in North Carolina and one of the things I am looking forward to (other than actually getting to see my sister) is the drive through the mountains. I am praying the leaves have already started to change into brilliant shades of reds, yellows and oranges. I'm not much of a photographer, and I'm hoping to change that soon, but I plan on having a camera ready in case I do get to catch some of those beautiful colors.

But as I am going through my head all the things I need to remember: tickets to a speaker we are going to see, what clothes I need to pack and some things I need to take to my sister so she will have warmer clothes for the coming months, I can't help but feel a little sad. This has been a busy week and I have not gotten to spend that much time with my husband. And now I am leaving for 3 days. I can't help but get that feeling that creeps up after I have been gone for just a little too long: longing for home.

Because while there is a huge world at my fingertips, I know there is a beauty in being home. Especially when most everyone you know and love is there. And while there is a huge part of me that wants to embark on adventures, I believe there is just as big a part that enjoys finding the beauty that is all around me. The things we see everyday and sometimes miss. And finding those things over and over again, for what feels like the first time can feel like home.

2009-10-04T21:08:00.000-04:00

We often ask God to show up. We pray prayers of rescue. Perhaps God would ask us to be that rescue, to be His body, to move for things that matter. He is not invisible when we come alive. I might be simple but more and more, I believe God works in love, speaks in love, is revealed in our love. I have seen that this week and honestly, it has been simple: Take a broken girl, treat her like a famous princess, give her the best seats in the house. Buy her coffee and cigarettes for the coming down, books and bathroom things for the days ahead. Tell her something true when all she's known are lies. Tell her God loves her. Tell her about forgiveness, the possibility of freedom, tell her she was made to dance in white dresses. All these things are true. We are only asked to love, to offer hope to the many hopeless. We don't get to choose all the endings, but we are asked to play the rescuers. We won't solve all mysteries and our hearts will certainly break in such a vulnerable life, but it is the best way. We were made to be lovers bold in broken places, pouring ourselves out again and again until we're called home.

....This is not something I wrote but read somewhere. And it absolutely floored me. It was part of a story about saving a girl from all the wrong things and showing her the right ones. I found in reading that story that I wanted the courage to step out into this world and make a difference in it. Not in a huge way where everyone might know who I was, but in a way that would change people one life at a time. I hope that my life is on a journey to becoming a person such as that.