Here's Looking At You

My beautiful friend, Emily sent me the above picture recently.  She said it reminder her of me.  It, naturally, appeared the exact day I needed a reminder.

As I have said before, and I shall say a million times before I die I'm sure, my best friend always told me to live life without regrets.  He was right; that's the only way to live.

The thing about this picture, this saying, is that it came, as I said, on exactly the day I needed it.  Amber has been trying to convince me that I need to recognize that the boy I am love with was brought into my life for a reason.  We were supposed to connect.  Clearly I got the wrong memo on how deeply we were supposed to connect, but clearly we were supposed to connect.  She kept saying I needed to remember to focus on the good and learn from the rest of it.  I shouldn't regret this relationship just because it feels like it's ending.  Maybe it was never meant to be a permanent thing, but good would come out of it.

Then Em sent me that.  God speaks.

He consistently amazes me.  Sometimes I ask the question so many times that I forget to listen.  And then I run face first into the answer.

For days now I have been trying to find some kind of purpose to the relationship I had with this boy, this man.... Today I realized something, he is what led me to actually start taking an interest in myself.  Sure, I still am not completely happy with myself (as anyone who has ever read anything I write might be able to tell).  Because I adored this man, I began taking some pride in myself.  I wanted to be my best because I felt that is what he deserved, and if I wanted to be loved by him, I wanted to be someone he could love.  Yeah, maybe that's a little screwy, but I think it has begun good things in me.

Because of my relationship with this man, I finally forced myself to ask God to help me figure out exactly what I should be looking for in my future spouse.  More importantly, maybe, I have been asking God to shape me into the woman He wants me to be so that I can be someone I am proud of and therefore someone my future spouse can be proud of as well: physically, emotionally, financially, spiritually.  It's been a major boost in my relationship with God.  I want God to be the center of my life.

Maybe this relationship didn't work out the way I had hoped, well, obviously it didn't, but it has done a lot of good in my life.  It has triggered major change and growth for me, and I am grateful.  Even if I never get to tell him, I hope he knows I am grateful for the friendship we had.  I hope I was something good in his life as well.

Find the good, and really, my loves, live life without the regret.

And lastly, here's looking at you, Sunshine...er, Kid...

But Sometimes It Hurts Instead

Favorite Things about this Very Moment (11:46 am CST):

• Starbucks Vanilla Doubleshot Energy
• "You've got this" texts from Kimmie (do you know how much I love you, Kim?  Honestly, I do.)
• The Wreckers singing me their perfect blend of sassy and heartbroken country
• Adele (Oh Adele, 21 IS my heart)
• Knowing it's not just me that feels super awkward about the engagement announcement from this week
• Sunshine outside
• Getting paid to hang out in Baskets and talk to the wonderful people that come into Conover and my shop
• Knowing I'll be getting paid twice this week.  Party & bonus
• The immense kindness & love from amazing people like Nikky, Kimmie, Amber, Regina, Hilary, Heather, & Jay
• Jordan Durham, an altogether hilarious experience
• Having next weekend's Refuge trip to look forward to

This week has been a lot of things, and I feel like me being sick was a strange sort of blessing.  It allowed me to be home when I found out the boy I have been in love with since I the night I met him wearing that ridiculous Han Solo costume that no one but me seemed to recognize was engaged.  But it is more than that, he's engaged to someone who makes me nervous down to my very soul.  It has been a rough week.

Even so, I feel like I am taking all of this better than any of us could have imagined.  This may, in part, be due to the fact that I've been living with the feeling like this day would come for the past...oh...4 or so months.  I really thought he'd propose at Christmas or New Year's.  I forgot about Valentine's Day.  How odd to forget it...hmmm...

I've gotten everything that reminds me of him packed away and out of site.  Mixes, pictures, the bracelet he made me, speed dial... He's hidden, but he's not forgotten.  It finally really started to hit yesterday while I was at work by myself typing.  I had been able to find a way to distract myself every moment until then, and suddenly I had to face that this was real. 

I am never going to get greeted by him smiling right after he's gotten up, never going to be the person he wants with him to run errands in the middle of the night, never going to lay next to him watching cartoons, never going to be the person that makes him light up when I walk into a room...it is apparently not in the cards.

Life alternates between dark and light a lot right now.  I realized I have avoided all things romantic even though I am a romantic through and through and usually I watch a lot of sappy movies at this time of year.  Instead I am reading The Hobbit (which is great, but no romance) and watching things like Sandlot, UHF, and Monsters Inc. This is probably really healthy for me, but one of these days I am thinking this will probably break too.

Mom says maybe I am realizing that this is better for me already, but I don't know if that's it.  Letting go of all of this is letting go of a lot of hope.  I want to do that, but I want to replace it with faith that something better is on the horizon and that God has got other plans.  Sometimes that's hard to comprehend, and, on top of this, I am worried about this decision in how it will truly change his life and the lives of his brother and his fiancee.  I feel guilty for thanking God that I at least won't have to see him at family functions for the rest of my life with this girl that breaks my heart.  He's not even the same guy that I was friends with anymore.  He changed for this girl, but not in good ways. 

Hear ye, hear ye, I shall bestow upon you words from my parents who are always wise in the ways of love and marriage:

"You shall only marry someone who brings out the very best in you, that you also bring out the best in."

He's not doing that.

He is not my heart.  He is not my light.  He is not my life.  I will move on.  I will be stronger.

I will sing "Someone Like You" to myself until I mean it entirely, not just the part of it that says for me it isn't over, but also the part that says I wish nothing but the best...

This I Remember

When I was a senior in high school I was in this amazing class that truly changed my life.  It was an English class.  We would read poetry or stories or novels and then write response papers for the next class.  Then the 7 of us would sit in a circle of desks with our teacher who was this incredibly crazy, but brilliant bald man by the name of John Vincent Young, and we'd discuss our ideas and thoughts and feelings about a certain piece.

But, though that did a great deal to improve my writing and my appreciation for the written word, this wasn't how the class changed my life.  No, what changed me was the giant boy with long curly hair that was so dark it was bordering on black who was a poet and a romantic to the truest extent.  His name was Jacob Zuniga.  And without ever really intending to, we became best friends.

It still amazes me.

Zuni was one of the most popular boys in our school.  Formerly a football player until a knee injury made further play impossible, he knew everyone and everyone loved him.  He was a born story teller and comic, and he could make anyone feel important.  His girlfriend once used a quote from "The Big Lebowski" to explain him, he like "that rug really pulled the room together."  Odd as that may seem, that's probably the best way to describe him that I have ever heard.

I miss him every day.

Today is September 11, 2011.  And I remember what happened 10 years ago.  I won't ever be able to forget it.  I was 15.  I was a sophomore in high school.  I was in first period algebra with Mr. Rolondo when the first plane struck.  We were watching coverage on the news when the 2nd plane struck.  I saw it happen.  Those images never go away.  I remember the questions and the crying, and I remember, very distinctly wondering if this meant we were going to war and what that would mean.  I remember wondering if the guys surrounding me would be going to war, and even worse, if my brothers, my best friends, and the boy I was sure I wanted to marry (I was 15, remember) would go to war too.

And we did go to war.  We're still at war.  Sometimes I wonder if this war is in competition with Vietnam to see who can be drug out longest without any kind of satisfying conclusion.  And many of my friends have gone to war.  A friend of mine just finally got out of the air force after being in for 6 years.  I hate this war.  I hate knowing about the things my friends have seen or gone through trying to protect the United States.  And I hate knowing that people are dying for this thing all the time.  Innocent people, good people, bad people, poor people, rich people, children and adults.  All kinds.  People are dying.  10 years of this.  Is this worth it?

All I know is that I remember.

But what I want to remember is the good.  What I try to remember is the way this amazing country pulled together.  How we donated blood and clothes and food and time and energy to help people rebuild.  How we searched the wreckage for survivors and cheered when they were found.  How we mourned together over the dead, those we knew and those we didn't.  How we supported the men and women who serve in the armed forces, even if we didn't believe in war.

We have gone through so much as a country in 10 years.  Hurricanes, tornadoes, wildfires, plane crashes, blizzards, landslides, and so many disasters, but if we learned anything from tragedy it is this: we will survive and we will take care of each other.  The love I see in this nation is overwhelming.  We are learning to take care of each other a little better all the time, and I find hope in that.

Beyond all of these memories, this day reminds me very much of all the people that I have lost in the past 10 years. A best friend, a girl who might as well have been my little sister, several classmates, 2 kids who were best friends with my youngest brothers, several great aunts, a boy who I had taught in youth group, and several very beloved elderly church members.

Zuni is what I remember and think of most.  I ran across something he wrote for me just a month and a half before he died.  My best friend was a genius, especially when it came to matters of the heart, and this particular letter was no less a gem.  I ran across it again this evening when going through some old papers, and it made me miss him so much my heart about burst.

So as a parting thought, something good to remember, something that my brilliant, amazing, wonderful best friend once said to me that I hope will do you as much good as it does me:

"In closing thoughts, love is blind.  We don't choose who we love, or who loves us back.  It's something we can't explain.  When you're away from your love, you start thinking about it.  You sit back and wonder what the hell it is that makes you work, that attracts you to them, and although you have a few ideas, it's nothing solid.  You've bunches of friends with the same qualities.  What makes them so special?  You sit and you wonder, but it's all in vain, for when they're back and in your arms, you know.  What, I'm not sure, but you know that this is right and that you were wrong for questioning it.  I guess that's true love, above all else: having faith.  Right now, I don't know what I'm doing.  I'm living for my weekend binge, for those few choice hours when I'm there and she's there and something as old as the sun but as new as our lives is there enslaving us.  I know that I die every time I see her because I know I have to say goodbye.  I know that I die every time I hug her, every time I kiss her, every time I look into her eyes and see myself.  I know that sometimes I don't remember what I've done during the day because all I've done is think about her.  I know that she's the last thing in my mind at night and the first when I rise.  She literally is the girl of my dreams; she visits every night.  I've sat on the sidelines and wondered why her, why this, and I should never have done that, for when I see her, when I talk to her on the phone or read her e-mails, I know.  I can feel it in my heart and in my mind, and I know this: this is real.

Have faith in yourself and your love.  Know that no matter what happens, you will be together again.  There is no end if it is real, no stop and start.  You'll become so entangled that you won't be singular anymore, won't be alone.  There will come a time when the roots of two trees will connect underground and form a vast village of matter, until there no longer are two trees, but one singular unit living via the other.  That's love, or at least, that's the best way I can describe it."

This I remember.

One Last Thing Tonight

"But let me talk for one more minute. I have a vested interest in this thing because I'd like to see you be happy. What you need to ask yourself is this: Are you a better person when you're with him? Are you kinder or smarter or happier? Do you think you do more good in the world? ...One man can be perfectly fine, but maybe he doesn't bring out what's good in you, in which case I'd suggest you best not stay with him. But if you find a man who makes you better, or if your're better on your own, then you need to listen to that."
-Jeanne Ray, Step-Ball-Change

I Will Worship While I'm Waiting

Tonight I am tired. It is late and I have work in the morning. I am wondering how long this will be, and hating myself for wondering.

I keep hearing the words echo back through my head from a song I heard in a movie once, "I will worship while I'm waiting..." I remember feeling a deep longing as the guy sang those words, and at that moment I knew exactly what he meant, and I knew that that was exactly what I wanted to be able to do. I want to worship while I'm waiting.

I was hoping to be able to post something incredibly hopeful and deliriously happy about how I would be heading back to ABC in the fall, as if there was ever any doubt, and that life was truly moving along perfectly. That's what I wanted to post. That I was silly to have ever wondered.

What's really silly is that I'm still surprised each and every time God changes my plans for something better.

Does this mean I am not heading back to ABC 3 weeks from today? No. It simply means that I don't have clear cut answers like I was hoping for. I asked God for a sign, and He gave me something unexpected. I told him that whatever the college told me they felt needed to happen, I would do that, and I would do what I could to accept it gracefully. Yeah...that didn't exactly work. The college did answer me, but not, so much, with an answer as with a new question.

I responded, and we'll see what is said further. At present, I am trying to come up with a new to-do list so that if I end up in an unexpected place, yet again, that I will actually use the time to my advantage and share my joy. I do not want to become the bitter, frustrated version of myself that I was the last time I came home from college.

A week or two ago, I posted a play list from a cd that I made my friend Jordan. It was a play list meant to inspire him. To lift him up a bit because I know that the last bit of July and usually on into August are rough for him. I am feeling this toll as well. I've been listening to that cd on repeat for the past several days.

It's hard to recover from the high points when you seem to drop so low after them, and tonight my mom reminded me of that. She walked in to tell me the good news that my grandmother (my beloved 91, nearly 92, year old grandmother) was back home and out of the hospital. She's doing just fine. And I, being the bit of a wreck I am, blurted out everything about the email and the payment plan and the contract and the requirements and the job I don't have down there and the money I would have to come up with and how upset I was and how confused I was and how much I felt like a failure as an adult all over again and how angry I was feeling because this seemed like a painful echo of the last time...

But my mom said no, this is not the same. The last time was not my fault even a little, and that this time just happened. That this is all happening right after I was so full of crazy hope and optimism because of FUEL and that it's after those highs that we tend to sink down to the lowest of the lows. It's life's way of rebalancing everything. She said it would be okay and that God has got it. She said she could always arrange my marriage to one of the Bliss boys or maybe even the one of whom I refuse to speak because he's always trying to marry everyone and it makes my right eye twitch just thinking about it (and Nikky, it wouldn't even be worth it once, not even a little). Mostly she said she was sure that this would work out somehow in the end. It always has before. God's got this.

And she's right. She's always right.

But it's still hard.

Jordan told me to punch the college registrar with a weasel into a wall. I said I wanted to punch one of the three. He improved it. He always does.

Kimmie sent me hugs and told me that she's praying.

I know Jay's praying.

And I know Nikky is too.

I just wish that sometimes I didn't have to make a Venn Diagram of my heart. That I didn't have to separate the pieces and realize that I was going to only get to keep one side and the middle bits for now. I don't like that my home is split into several places. It makes life strange at times, and I don't know what to do with it.

I do know this: if I stay, things will work out. I was offered an additional job. I will have a part time job at the pharmacy as often as they can find me work. I will continue to write for Tramp Imperial Travel, and I will work at Basket Beginnings as often as Linda finds use for me. I will make baby blankets for all the beautiful new little ones that are coming into my life and the lives of the people I love. I will send care packages to the people that I love down at ABC and several other places to because I refuse to be forgotten, ignored, or simply not missed (I WILL BE MISSED, DANG IT!). And I will buy myself an iPod so that I can text Amber and Sam and Jordan and Kimmie and Jack as often as I am capable of being near wi-fi. I will help with the youth group and go to Joel's band concerts. I will help Forrest adjust to his first year of college and try to spend more time with David and Kels. I will continue to get to know Amy, and I will spend time with Morgan and Chelsea whenever they are available. I will keep making Jay laugh until he cries because we are talking way too late at night and we've consumed way too much caffeine. I will learn to quilt/knit/whatever else I can manage. I will go to the play my mom will be in this September, and I will spend as much time with the little ones at church as I can. I will write long emails and spend a fortune on postage so that people will know that I love them enough to send them real mail (and the aforementioned emails). I will work hard. I will save money, and I will find a way to get my butt back down to the college to finish as soon as God allows (if not now, January? Please, God).

And I will continue to daydream about a boy with blond hair who plays drums (and guitar and piano and...) and wears t-shirts part of the time.

Mostly though, wherever I am. Here or in GA, I will do my best to be what I call others to be: full of joy and thanksgiving. I will find ways to serve others (big and small) and I will find the things God brings into my day each day to be thankful for (because I am blessed).

I will worship while I'm waiting.

ps. "Love from the center of who you are; don't fake it. Run for dear life from evil; hold on for dear life to good. Be good friends who love deeply; practice playing second fiddle. Don't burn out; keep yourselves fueled and aflame." - Romans 12:9-11 (MSG)

Amen.

Cure...Maybe, Cure.

“Authoritatively, and in a doctorly manner, Wayan ticked off on her fingers the six elements of her Fail-Proof Broken-Heart Curing Treatment: ‘Vitamin E, get much sleep, drink much water, travel to a place far away from the person you loved, meditate and teach your heart that this is destiny.’”
-Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love

I'm currently following the drink much water and travel to a place far away from the person you loved part. I need to get more sleep and try the Vitamin E. I haven't done much meditating, but quieting my mind down would be helpful. It's the last one that I'm struggling with the most. Destiny. Ugh.

On the other hand, I really want to be able to do this:

“Launch yourself into all the things you’ve been putting off for all the wrong reasons. Make room in your life for a puppy. Learn to navigate by the stars. Revive the lost art of conversation. Practice kissing. Bathe in the innocent bliss of daydreams. Do the things that make you the sort of person you really want to hang out with.”
-Bradley Trevor Greive, The Book for People Who Do Too Much

I mean, that's what I want to be. I want to be a kind person and fun. That would be nice. Someone even I would want to hang out with. I need some work. Seriously.

Being that this is the 4th of July, I am reminded of the fact that just a few years ago I was sitting around worrying about whether or not Jay would show up and disappointed when he didn't come, but thrilled to have met a new friend in Brandon Clark ( http://ginhouse.bandcamp.com/ ) who played his guitar on my porch and sang his beautiful, beautiful music and made life great. A year later I was worried because Jay WAS coming to the house and I was still working on just being myself around him, but he came and we had a great time and Brandon came back with our friend Jessica once again to play music late into the night. Every year since then...the 4th has been something of an anomaly and wonder.

Today will be no exception. I have long since stopped being infatuated with Jay, but he has become one of my best friends. Instead today I am in the process of trying to figure out life, yet again, but the sunshine, perfect weather, good food, wonderful music, and brilliant friends make any hint of darkness light up with the glow and power of every star in the night sky. God is an an amazing planner. I don't know what He's got up his sleeve for the future, but He keeps changing my plans and life just keeps getting better and better.

May your 4th be something full, glowing, magical, and beautiful like the fireworks and sparklers we'll be seeing tonight.

Love,

J

Favorite things of this very moment (3:51 pm CST):

• The smell of grills around the neighborhood getting warmed up and cooking 4th of July feasts


• Josh Garrels ( http://noisetrade.com/joshgarrels ) ...I've fallen in love with this angel man's voice and his beautiful music and lyrics that write the words of my heart...


• My camera


• Working on Nikky & Yan's wedding stuff


• Knowing I should get to see friends this evening during my families annual 4th of July cook out