beam and reverse

hiatus

"For he will not much remember the days of his life because God keeps him occupied with joy in his heart" ~Ecclesiastes 5:20

i've felt this strongly before, and I kind of crave being there again. i've been way too reflective the past couple of days, to the point where it is hampering peace of mind...maybe some of that is just coming home. It's hard to carve out a "present" for myself here, since I'm surrounded with ancient memories. old journals, scrapbooks, the stuff in my room hasn't changed since senior year of high school but I've changed so much.

thanksgiving break is so weird. it's like stopping 2/3 of the way through a footrace...you had so much momentum even though you were really tired. now I'm not so tired, but I can't imagine finishing the last leg of the race...or starting the last leg of it.

for as tired as I've been this semester, it hasn't been because of work. I've been half-assing the last part of advanced photojournalism. I think I'm thinking too much...in the philosophical, circular way that sometimes gets me somewhere important but often keeps me in a state of paralysis. I really want to just be "doing" again...I want to be busy, enjoying my work, enjoying any semblance of routine. As it is, I've been all over the place. Other people have been all over the place, and I may be letting it affect me too much.

I guess it's okay. True, my identity is not wrapped up in how much I accomplish. "Fear God and keep his commands, for this is the whole duty of man." That's it...right there. And in all my thinking I've kinda forgotten this. Again, it's okay. Repent and believe.

repeat

I stumbled across this scrap of writing that I wrote around this time last year. I can't believe that this came out of my own mouth...I've been unable to conjure the truth on my own. I guess that's why I need the body of Christ...because I will never be able to preach it all to myself.

My soul has been aching for this...this break not so much from school but from my racing mind and swirling fears. I was going to write about the latter, but I've changed my mind and am going to let it go...I've beat the subject to death, I've psychoanalyzed and overanalyzed and overcried and overfelt everything...and...it's...fragmenting...scattering. Screw how I feel and how I think and what I feel and what I think, because I know full well that my emotions are fickle. a whisper...Courtney, all that matters is that YOU are the bride of Christ, and that He not only knows about all your crap but has DIED for it and FORGIVEN it and has promised to provide. It's not dependent on how confident I am with photography or how well I "reach out" to other people or how productive I've been or how little sleep I've gotten because I'm so busy "doing God's work." and if I don't pray or read the Bible for a day, God will not love me any less, because He sees me AS CHRIST! Christ is in me and I am in him, and He will meet me in my despair or my frustration or my intense doubts about my 'performance' in this walk of life.

Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. 3It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. Therefore, as it is written: "Let him who boasts boast in the Lord.

I thank God that it is not up to my strength. I thank God that He won't let any of these freaking idols that I am running after become my rock. I thank God for my troubles, even for my troubled mind...because it leads me back to Him. Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, Prone to leave the God I love...He is able.

Yeah, so basically I am dead tired. Tired of centering my life around work.

ugly cap and gown picture, random insights

it's sad that my most recent update is to copy and paste the html coding of an online quiz I took.

Your Dominant Thinking Style: Visioning

You are very insightful and tend to make decisions based on your insights. You focus on how things should be - even if you haven't worked out the details. An idealist, thinking of the future helps you guide your path. You tend to give others long-term direction and momentum.

What's Your Thinking Style?

I think this is pretty accurate...the visual part at least. I' not sure if I really give others "long-term direction and momentum." Then again, I am wrought with self-doubt.

at any rate, this semester has been crazy...not busy in terms of schoolwork, but a roller coaster in terms of new and old relationships and growth. God is taking me on a roller-coaster, and I've already thrown up a couple of times (metaphorically, folks). I feel like an Israelite right now...I've forsaken Him over and over and don't trust that He will provide, just as He already has. Job is a comfort right now...God is meeting me in my distress. He is wooing me from the jaws of distress to a spacious place free of restriction (Job 34?). I'm comforted that God knows me completely and loves me completely...He is the one romancing me, pursuing me because I am desirable to Him...even IN my sin, crap, and guilt. It's a beautiful picture, and it's reality!

I miss writing.

words can't

It's not that I've been uninspired all summer. I've just been doing other things.
(Like reacquainting myself with pop culture).
Thanks, Julianne.

I haven't been much in the mood for writing, reflecting, introspecting, etc. I've been doing all those things in the context of ordinary life, with new evanstonian RUFies, with housemates, and with Julie, of course.

So I'm not even going to try to reduce the summer into a blog-post. I don't like containing things that are real and large.

Which brings me to Mainsqueeze, on 9th street in downtown columbia (missouri). I feel like it was just a month ago that I was here...with the remainder of sophomore spring semester, early summer, st. louis, and chicago being just tiny hiatuses. In all of my "wisdom" I've learned this: when with anne's "bosom friends," it doesn't matter how much time has passed since your last visit. All that time is like a vague string of shadows, as in a dream, and being awake is the tangible reality. I can't really describe the feeling accurately. But I know that one of C.S. Lewis's Four Loves is involved.

update

it's what I need to do.

moving day

It's moving day, part one! I just packed all of my stuff for my st. louis/chicago pilgrimage. I can't move into the Evanston house until the 18th of June, so until then I will be frolicking with St. Louis friends in Forest Park and Chesterworld.

These three weeks in North Carolina have confirmed several things:

1) I need a job and responsibilities. Life is boring without work, and the work that I need is people-oriented. Boredom breeds when there is a lack of interesting people (or people in general) because creating 'fun" things to do only gets me so far.

2) I like being a part of community. And i miss fostering those relationships. I like this about RUF and dorm-life at UNC, and especially all the journalism trips. Half the fun of going to Peru and Chile and all of those photojournalism workshops was getting to know my classmates better, and in a new environment. Being around all sorts of people with different opinions and beliefs and personalities than my own challenges me to take a deeper look at the world (and myself) and helps me relate better, in the long-run.

3) the importance of "just doing" things. I've been sitting around too much, thinking about far-off possibilites...like classes, potential jobs, study-abroad options...and it causes too much self-doubt. When I'm not DOING photography I feel like I'm made a bad career decision. And then I waste a lot of time hypothesizing, worrying, running my thoughts in circles. I have enjoyed the hiatus from hard-core photojournalism work, and that is fine. It doesn't mean I'm not fit to do it as a job.

4) I don't ever want to move to Wake Forest for permanent residence. Suburbia scares me, especially when the home becomes the central part of life to the expense of other important aspects of community. It's not just suburbia...I guess this can happen anywhere, but it's especially apparent here, I guess. I'm excited to try out Chicago and see how I like living there.

my brain

Your Brain's Pattern

Your mind is a creative hotbed of artistic talent. You're always making pictures in your mind, especially when you're bored. You are easily inspired to think colorful, interesting thoughts. And although it may be hard to express these thoughts, it won't always be.

What Pattern Is Your Brain?

mirror lonely

I'd like to memorize more poetry. I'm pretty sure I will fail at this endeavor, as I have in so many other similar undertakings. I came across this William Carlos Williams poem that I quite liked. It has a lovely colour to it.

Danse Russe

If I when my wife is sleeping
and the baby and Kathleen
are sleeping
and the sun is a flame-white disc
in silken mists
above shining tres,--
if I in my north room
dance naked, grotesquely
before my mirror
waving my shirt round my head
and singing softly to myself
"I am lonely, lonely.
I was born to be lonely,
I am best so!"
If I admire my arms, my fac,e
my shoulders, flanks, buttocks
against the yellow drawn shades,--
Who shall say I am not
the happy genius of my household?

this is all a bunch of bullshit

Your Birthdate: April 6

You tend to be a the rock in relationships - people depend on you. Thoughtful and caring, you often put others needs first. You aren't content to help those you know... you want to give to the world. An idealist, you strive for positive change and dream about how much better things could be. Your strength: Your intuition Your weakness: You put yourself last Your power color: Rose Your power symbol: Cloud Your power month: June

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

finally

It's time.

I just ordered two lenses for my digital SLR. Granted, they are relatively cheap and won't last me very long professionally speaking, but they'll work just fine.

I've taken three weeks off from photography. It wasn't really planned, but I was so burned out after one of the most grueling semesters ever, photo-wise. Plus, I had to turn in all of the J-school's camera equipment (which is, usually, one of the saddest days of the year! thousands of dollars worth of beautiful equipment at my fingertips for (essentially) free. It's one of the wonderful things about Carolina's photojournalism program...there is so much money circulating that school!) Anyways, so come summer vacation, and I have no good equipment, one broken lens, and a really exhausted artistic spirit. That equals...a photo hiatus.

It was definitely a good thing for me...much needed. But right now I am looking at Women in Photojournalism best of show photographs...beautiful, inspiring art, and I am wanting so badly to just take pictures. To get back at it.

Photography is like poetry for me. I wish I could be a song-writer or the next William Carlos Williams, but I just don't have the gift for that. I want to immerse myself in a world of beauty and contrasts, in a world slowed down by the quick opening and closing of my camera's shutter.

goodbye, may. hello, june

Oh dear, it's nearly June. One month of my summer has nearly passed, and I don't have much to show for it. A nice tan-line, a vintage dress, and one 1000-piece puzzle. I have enjoyed the time to just read (I finished Harry Potter books 5 and 6, Life of Pi, and have picked at Mere Christianity, and various Christian lit). But my wandering spirit is screaming to go discover some new place and challenge myself socially.


This past year has been filled with such exciting adventures: hanging out with boarding school students in Chile, swimming with a river-shrimper in Peru, getting hit-on by a 72-year old Indian Chief in Cherokee, N.C. (ha!), ending my teenage years with a bang on a bus in Panama, when the clock struck midnight...sigh. I guess those were the cross-cultural adventures, although I'm forgetting all over the wonderful hidden secrets of UNC, of solidifying meaningful relationships with unsuspecting folks, of discovering rope-swing trees and magical places in the woods, of delving deeper into photojournalism and, concomitantly, the larger Chapel Hill/Triangle community. I suppose this is me in hindsight, romanticizing the past year's experiences. Oh, but I am so thankful for them!


Ben told me in one of our last talks of the semester that he hoped I had a boring year, for a change. (Based on current circumstances, I wonder if he is a prophet?) (I am kidding). I do see the merit of suddenly having no obligations...it's such a hard thing for me, since I sort of thrive on the External. But it's pushing me to pray more and working out my salvation in practical terms. I'm not doing too well at loving my family and keeping myself immersed in community, but that pushes me to rely on God's grace all the more. I guess I have all sorts of time to experience my own stench and waywardness...a state of sin and misery that can easily go unnoticed when I'm doing all sorts of things at school. (Not that doing things is bad...we're called to be part of community and to love others). I guess this is what Ben was thinking of when we had that discussion about my immediate future/decision-making.

Well, I will be very excited to start school in the fall...UNITAS is going to be really challenging but quite excitng, I hope. It will bring those international travles right to my living space. I didn't want to do it for awhile after I got accepted, but now I'm warming up drastically to the program. Yay for theme housing. Yay for diversity.

vanity

I'd like to get a nose ring. On my left-side. I still can't bring myself to do it...I can't think of a good enough reason, other than "it's cute" and "I'm bored with my pierced ears." I guess it's one of those things where you can't really come up with an "original" reason to jump on the bandwagon.

today's mood--->

I finished the 5th Harry Potter book today. I'm really excited about the new book and the new movie...ahhhh. It's one of those nice pleasures that you forget about while your studying "real" things at the University. But Harry Potter is wicked.

I guess that concludes this post. I don't have any profound thoughts of the day. It's just been a pleasant, lazy summer afternoon. Oh, and I made afternoon scones today. Tomorrow I think I might make a summer squash medley and ride my bike to the pool.

green cotton dress

I'm wearing a green cotton dress right now. I couldn't find a nightgown, but I really wanted to wear something freeing and flowy before I went to sleep. I'm in my room, as usual. It's been a nice cave of sorts the past three days...I read, sleep, nap, watch old movies, nap some more, etc. in here. I didn't leave it once yesterday except to run around the neighborhood and release pent-up energy/frustration.

Summer is frustrating. I feel like a high school student at home...my room is a shrine to my high school self with all it's pictures and dangling medals and high school english lit books. I want to be an adult, but for now I'm just an "adult" (not sans quotations yet): jobless, dependent on my family for money/food/shelter/loving. As far as the job situation goes...it's weird how God has changed my plans. I wasted so much of second semester not just applying for photojournalism internships at newspapers, but worrying about it! Then when that fell through and I no longer wanted to be a full-fledged, independent photojournalist for three months (the thought frightens me terribly), my back-up job with Ami fell through. And now...my high school self wants to find at a coffeeshop or as a nanny, but my professional, "adult"-like self is telling me to get a job doing photography. A real job. Hmm...I don't think it's bad to want to work at a clothing store or a restaurant. I'm having a huge mental/spiritual fight against what journalism professors spend all semester telling us: "You're not a worthy person if you get a "normal" job. You don't want to be working at McDonalds over the summer when you could be honing your skills and working at a newspaper. Internships! Internships!" Gah. I could have had a "worthy" job this summer, but I turned it down. And now I don't have any job, yet, and I am anxious.

Wow, it's crazy how much of my security I place in my work and expectations for the future...something that's not even real! I feel like a different person at home...without the photojournalism classes, photojournalism talk, intense projects, obligatory career nights, Daily Tar Heel assignments. I'm suddenly not engaged on all those future-oriented tasks...and it's good, even though it's hard. In a way, it''s strangely liberating. So liberating that I don't know what to do with myself. (This is not a good feeling, I must admit). I guess it's like...say you were in outerspace in a tiny, confined spaceship for a year. You would get uesd to the obvious boundaries and limitations. You would be comfortable up there, used to your routine. When you come back to earth, you suddenly have an entire world at your feet. You can swim in the vast ocean, you can run a marathon, you can go to the Great Wall of China. The freedom can be paralyzing...you don't know what to do first. The way you defined yourself in space (i.e. based on your surroundings) cannot be applied to Earth. Since you have a different externals, different limitations, you define yourself differently. It's almost like you have to start all over.

The transition from college campus to home can be like that, I guess. Don't get me wrong, I love my family, I love reading and relaxing, I love being outside. But I also love being on campus, involved in meaningful work, surrounded by friends and tons of interesting strangers...dying to get a glimpse into their lives. I have different boundaries there, and I make many decisions based on my aspirations with photojournalism. But those boundaries don't apply to home, and photojournalism is pretty much absent here. It's not a smooth transition.

Yes, so obviously I AM the same person. And I know that my identity is only found in Christ: me dwelling in Him, and Him in me. But how does this play out practically? Practically, I let work, friends, external environment, external boundaries define who I am. I don't like that. I know it's human...we all have our own idols. And it's a horrid thing. All I can do is repent and pray that God infiltrates all aspects of my life. I guess that's why it's a good thing that I'm not doing some intense photo-related thing this summer: because I have put so much of my trust and comfort in that, and it's not even real!

Hmm, I haven't completed my thoughts on the matter. And I haven't attained a level of peace yet, but that's fine.

I'm going to go finish Harry Potter 5 and listen to some Derek Webb. In my green cotton dress, in my cave, before I sleep.

These inward trials I employ
From self and pride to set thee free
And break thy schemes of earthly joy
That thou mayest seek thy all in me

looking forward to looking back

I have to write a religion paper on the purpose of reflection, but I'm not feeling that philosophical/academic right now. Besides, I'd rather reflect on real-world experiences than reflect upon reflection. It's a cool topic though. I just have to be in the right setting to think. (right setting=on this rainy saturday afternoon, either by the fireplace at the e. franklin st. caribou coffee, or davis library. I just can't work on anything in my dorm.


Dad came today and helped me move 2/3 of my stuff. I forgot how much I love being around him...we have more in common than I thought in high school. In a way, we've both gone through similar life-changing experiences within the past two years. He finally quit his computer-related job, a source of great unhappiness and frustration, and took on something that more suits his free spirit: truck-driving. He stopped doing what he thought he should be doing and did what he wanted to do...but it was a long process of finding that. College did the same thing to me...heck, I found an old college application essay to UNC with my "professional statement" on it and laughed for a long time. It was a sad laughter, since I was so trapped then...pursuing what I thought I should do (science, pre-med) instead of finding my true desires. I guess that's just a long process, though...I was so tied up in Westmonsterland and family legacies and what not that I wasn't able to explore my real interests. Pastor Byron expressed to me on Tuesday his awe over how much I've blossomed this past year, for lack of better terminology. I've discovered my artistic side here, something that I used to cultivate when I was eight years old and writing crazy short-stories. And then there's the relational realm...a brand new conception for me. And now...I can't imagine a life without photography. Or people. I feel like it's always been a part of me...and maybe it has. I was still a photographer in high school...I just didn't have the equipment. At any rate, I've been freed from my enslavement to academic perfectionism, in God's grace, in coming to Chapel Hill. And I can't really put a finger on when the transition started. It was so gradual...mostly ignited by Chile in June 2006.


Anyways, Dad and I are both free-spirits, I suppose. Prone to wandering and longing to break past the boundaries of scheduled monotony. We both like traveling...the highs that come from seeing new places and meeting new people and then the periods of solitary reflection before returning home. He admitted to me that North Carolina/Wake Forest doesn't feel like "home" for him. He said, "My home is on the road." That's exactly how I feel. Chapel Hill is, admittedly, becoming more of a home. But my real home is out there...out in the world...whether that be on the drive to St. Louis as I pass through the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains and sing Regina Spektor in my car, or on a chiva in Panama with my new friend Olmedo and an old gringo friend beside me, or in a new area: a Cherokee reservation in the Smokies, up north with my sister at an Ivy, out west. I really can't imagine settling down and still don't know if what it's what I really want. I want marriage, I want to learn how to love someone other than myself...but I don't want the suburban package that typically accompanies it. I guess I need to find another wanderer like myself.

Anyways, I'd love to go with Dad on one of his trips. I want him to get a trip out to the Grand Canyon, or Montanta, or Idaho. He said it's not likely unless he transfers to a new company, but oh man...how unforgettable that would be. Me and Dad on the road. Speaking of roads, I need to read On the Road. Carolyn said it's good...and I know it's one of Jules' obsessions. Thank goodness for summer...reading.

I'm sad that the semester/year is coming to a close. I've had so many positive experiences these past nine months...I've made so many unlikely new friends, learned important life-lessons, messed up a good number of times but have grown from it.

I like the rainy Saturday-afternoon mood. It's a good thinking/writing atmosphere. I like peeking out my window in the dorm and watching families take pictures at the Old Well. I think it's a visual that I'm going to miss from sophomore year.

Yelling out my window to RUFers as they convened there for a scavenger hunt in the fall, screaming in ecstasy with Carolyn the first day we moved in and saw our spectacular view, seeing the first snow over the Well in January and taking pictures from my lofted bed,

photographing Carolyn and her friends there in the closing weeks of school, with pink flowers in full bloom.

And just talking on the phone at midnight in that general area. Gah...yeah, I'm going to miss the Old Well "experience," since there's not a specific memory that sums it all up.

Well, I think I'll be on my way to Caribou to start this paper.

I'll leave you with a good refrain that's playing on my computer, and it's a pretty sound:

"Walking out in the freezing rain, I feel nothing because I've numbed the pain. I'm looking forward to looking back on this day." ~Over the Rhine

verano

I'm so good at procrastinating that I should win an award.

I'm at Weaver Street right now, taking advantage of free wifi, raspberries, and iced coffee. I've decided that when I get my own house I will grow raspberry bushes so that I can eat them whenever I want for free. They really are the best fruit, even though they aren't technically berries. (A raspberry is an aggregate fruit with lots of little drupelet things around a center).



The Brenner family used to grow blueberries in their front yard. I remember waking up one summer morning and picking the berries right off the bush for breakfast. Whenever I drive by their house (which is rare, since I'm never in St. Louis anymore), I glimpse out the window to see if the bush is still thriving.

I have a serious problem when it comes to making decisions. I let my mind wander way too much when I hear of exciting opportunities and start imagining what it would be like to do that or be there. For example...yesterday Andrew told me that there may be one spot left in the Fall 2007 Honors Abroad program to Cape Town, and I decided then and there that I wanted to do that. So i went on a wild goose-chase trying to find the right study abroad advisors. But alas, there is no such spot, and I cannot go to Africa in the Fall. Phooey. I wonder what would happen if I substituted daydreaming/trying desperately to leave UNC with prayer. Would I be more focused? Would I be less prone to fantasize about traveling the world? Food for thought...

At any rate, I think I do want to study abroad for a semester. But I don't want to go alone on an exchange program. I like UNC students. (Isn't it weird how God has been changing my heart with regards to that??? Last semester all I wanted to do was drop out of school and go live with my Peruvian lovers). There's a cool UNC program in Havana, Cuba that happens every spring. I think I might try doing that next spring. Cuba would be AMAZING. I'd get really tan and maybe I'd meet a lovely Latin America boy. :)

We all know how fond I am of foreign boys...

Anyways, I really need to post some more fotos. This is my attitude about the end of the year:






*************

I have so many random, unconnected thoughts right now that I have been steadily aquiring the past week. I've been hanging out with Mormons for a photostory. I think i'll write about that experience later.

Here was a mini-epiphany of mine from last night: You know you feel at home in a place when you have friends/acquaintances willing to smoke cloves with you on the quad at night. Friends who, at one random phone call or run through the UL to see if they are there, will drop what they are doing and spent 15 minutes outside, talking under the night sky. Sometimes I still get lonely and wish Julie or Emily were here...they would always be willing to do something of the sorts. But that loneliness has waned the past semester. Lots of people would be willing to do such a thing...you just have to ask instead of waiting to be asked.

I really like painting with light.

That's all for now. I really do need to start editing these intro texts for the Special Olympics website. Adieu.

desultory

I've been generally bored all week. Which is weird, because I've got lots of work to do. I guess I'm treating things like a check-list...just pushing to get stuff done so that summer can come sooner. It's made me very unmotivated...so I just lay in the grass. I think I had this problem last April. April really is the month of that bright eye's song.

Why do you lay in the grass?
Why do you lay there?
Don't you want to be found?

I hate Carroll Hall. I always forget to bring my music so I'm usually bored to tears working in the lab. It would be so much better if I brought Coldplay or the Shins or something soothing to assauge the tedium of working in the stupid, windowless labs.

My kleenex smell like cloves because they're in the same bag. I really like blowing my nose now.

I've also been very moody this week. Becca asked me if I wanted to taste her falafel on Monday, and I started tearing up. I don't cry (as) much anymore. I think I bottle up my emotions and then work/stress eventually catch up with me and I start leaking. It's a gradual explosion. But then I felt better because I hung out with the jane murchison/liz ross crowd and they always make me smile. I do wish I had more consistency in my life, in general. balance or something. i wonder if that's an ideal i should stop aiming for, though.

I really want/need to go to an Art Museum. And a bar. But I'm not legal, so I have to wait. Bah. Maybe I'll go to Galen's party on Friday and hang out with the photogs. It won't be as fun as CPJW, though. That was the best.

Okay, I'm going to go eat lunch now. ciao.

product of boredom

In middle school I would fill out surveys on a monthly basis and send them out in mass emails. Did everyone do that at that age, or was that some wacked WCA thing? At any rate, I still enjoy filling out surveys. mwhahaha

1. What is your natural hair color? dark brown
2. What color is it now? dark brown
3. Do you bite your nails? when I'm bored, but usually, no.
4. Do you like to go shopping? i like thrift stores, produces, shoes, and music. shopping for any of those. Oh, and I like to go shopping when it involves a particular panamanian mall and particular panamanian boy. :)
5. What do you do on a typical Friday night? Eat Indian food or something tasty like that, watch a movie, take a walk, talk on the phone after midnight at the Old Well near my dorm, take off my socks, the like.
6. How long do you take in the shower? when I'm really depressed, 15-30 minutes. Otherwise I guess it's around 10 minutes. Showering has become a hobby of sorts.
7. What is the worst day of the week? Wednesday. That second 8 am is wretched, and that second DTH shift is even wretcheder. (like my grammar?)
8. Who is the last person you talked to on the phone? the mormon missionaries, for my photo story.
9. When was the last time you saw your dad? on easter sunday, at home.
10. When is the last time you went to the doctor's? uhh...in february when i was sick perpetually.
11. Have you ever stayed overnight at a hospital? yes.
12. How many siblings do you have? 1, and an imaginary one (Fred).
13. Do you know anyone named Bob? personally, no.
14. Did you used to read those "I spy" books when you were a kid? no. But I spied for a time.
15. Which magazines have you had subscriptions to? some photography thing, newsweek, uh..american girl?
16. Did you ever read any of the Babysitter Club books? YES. they are my life.
17. What is one weird thing about you that many people don't know? i stuck a bead up my nose when i was six and it hurt.
18. Are you a light sleeper or a heavy sleeper? really heavy sleeper. apparently i move a lot, too. just ask poor carolyn.
19. What color shirt are you wearing? puke yellow with blue stains. it's really ugly. It's from my lost childhood.
20. What is the worst feeling in the world? hicupping in the library (everyone stares). I'm experiencing this right now...and I didn't think it was the worst feeling until it happened.

musings

how about a nice narrative?

today was a lovely spring day spent rolling in the grass. I smell like sweat, grass, and mud. And I look horrid, clad in my 1997 children's choir shirt that has aqua-blue paint stains on the left sleeve from that day karah and I painted my bedroom.

Epiphany of the day= running in the woods is an activity that should be done more. It's a solitary activity in which you don't feel alone, paradoxically. I don't, at least. I'm away from the crowds, the deadlines, the blinking digitial clock on my wardrobe top...and all sense of time and place kind of floats away as I let my mind wander, loosening the fetters. And it hurts...my chest hurts and my shins ache, but I just keep running...half-talking to myself, half-talking to God.

Some of my most vivid memories from high school stem from long runs in the woods. They are timeless. They are free from anxiety about the past, present, or future. Just me and the weathered trail, maybe some running buddies, but inevitably I am alone with the trees and the ground and the crickets. It wasn't even a particularly beautiful park. But that's what I remember most vividly...the experience of running in the woods.

I feel like I'm wasting my energy, my youthful physique (ha!). Eating, Exercising, my body image and the like...gosh, it's been such a struggle since senior year. freshmen 15 and then some, that's for sure. I just want to run again...to not worry about how I look or how far I've run or how many calories I've expended. I just want to get that release again. But it's so darn hard working up to it...every day is like day 1. I never really get past that initial run.

So I doubt I will ever be able to reclaim that vigor I once had. I'm too jaded. I'm also too fat. I'm also more content with life, with inconsitency, with myself. Running used to be an escape from the unknown. I don't want it to be an escape. I just want it.

But I still doubt I'll ever be able to do it. And I guess I have to be okay with that.

On a different note, the semester is almost over. Pretty soon I will be in Florida with RUF, then at Yale with my big sister, then St. Louis for a couple of weeks, and then Chicago for the remainder of the summer with Jules. I don't really want to think about the summer. I don't want to have any preconceived, romantic notions about what it should be, since what it will be is always drastically different (and usually, hopefully better). I can still have goals/desires, though. I guess they are as follows:

• that I can finish the school year with some sense of peace. It all will end so darn quickly...and I want to savour the last two weeks with some of my best friends who will be leaving, venturing out into the Big World next fall. I want to run in the woods (we've already established this), and I want to just BE. Just be with friends, with my roomie, with my church.
• summer...wow, that I can slow down and enjoy each moment for what it is. That I can stop comparing every second of every day to this unrealistic, unattainable ideal that I carry heavily in my head.
  
• That I can approach God with regularity and spontaneity (ah, because I still maintain that the former is important). I want growth in God to be a goal...it's a nagging desire I've had brewing inside of me this past month, but I haven't gotten to really devote myself to prayer/fellowship/study of Scripture the way I'd like to (maybe this is another one of those unattainable ideals). Granted, I know it is God who grows me, not myself, but what can I do to speed up the process? I say that with a hint of sincerity. :)
• That I can put serious "photo" thinking aside...that ever-present anxiety about the future, about doing all that I can be doing to hone my skills and crap like that. there is more to life than my career, there is more to life than work...and I desperately want to grasp that. It's come in glimmers the past two years. And again, maybe since perfectionism is my devil, this is another unrealistic ideal...i can never be anxiety-free. But as far as my focus goes, I don't want to be stressing out about photo.
  
• as for smaller things...I'd like to sing more. Outside of my car, that is. I'd like to sketch landscapes. I'd also like to play the guitar. Maybe my sister will lend me hers, which was a Christmas present she never really used. I'd like to be more of a hippie. Maybe get my nose pierced and eat granola.

Oh, and of course, I'd like to write more. And take pretty pictures of nature and put them up on this blog. Because I haven't done that in (gasp) over six months.

april showers

I'm a wave-riding sort of girl. I think I am, by nature/socialization/some personality conditioned to be extreme and driven, but deep down I crave stability and happiness. love, friends, family, church, the body of Christ, enjoying the world that I'm living in and looking forward to the hope I have in heaven. But I get so distracted and easily tossed around, especially when dealing with authority figures telling me what I should do with my life, or what I should want to do with my life. And especially with regards to photo.

I was about to launch into a lengthy exposition on why this is the case, but I just now decided not to. I'm sick of being all stressed/fearful about my future. I've wasted the last hour worrying, where I could have been talking with someone or listening to music.

Okay, well, my creative juices have evaporated and now I'm going to go talk to Joey and listen to Over the Rhine. I don't know why I titled this "april showers."

I want to make a photoblog.

March

I missed an entire month.

I didn't miss experiences, but I missed writing about them and discovering hidden secrets through that process where all things are illuminated.

I'm sitting at the UL and I'm supposed to be studying like a good student for her upcoming Studio Lighting Midterm. But my thoughts keep taking me elsewhere...to the safety of my high school bubble and the baby-blue comfort of seeing the same crowd day after day. Even though I prefer the broader spectrum of shades and depths at college (can we say the real world, yet?), that part of me that is still a child longs for the olden days of black and white. Thinking critically (and I'm not talking about inside the classroom) is fatiguing and scary. The days of When. When I would skip class with Julie and Karah or lay in the grass after 4th period. When I had lacrosse practice and touring choir and piano lessons on Tuesday nights. It's a time of my life that is growing more foreign by the minute. So much of it was mechanical...but it made the memory-making so much sweet. The grass, the road-trips, the rainy tuesday evenings driving down Lindbergh Blvd. with Jules or Lydia listening to Iron & Wine or whatever band I had just discovered. And I love that life isn't as mechanical anymore, but I miss that the friend-times aren't as spontaneous.

Does growing up mean that you lose all spontaneity? Will I one day stop swinging at the elementary school playground? Will I stop taking a two-hour walk at midnight when I feel that tightness well up in my chest? Probably. It will be replaced with better things. Not stability and routine, but children and work and responsibility. I just hope that my relationships can always retain that youthful elasticity and vigor.

Right now I am lonely. I won't be tomorrow. I wasn't even lonely for most of the day. But I'm sitting here thinking about the good friends that I have made this year that are suddenly leaving. Emmanuel is going to Canada tonight to become a father. Laura and Melanie and Dave are graduating. Even those people that I'm not particularly close to but I just like being around..are not present. Tory is in Spain. Alex is in Cuba. But I mostly just miss Emmanuel, and if I wasn't so saturated with technical photography terms I would start to cry, ever so softly.

I know that God is faithful and that He's all I need. But that doesn't mean that I don't need people in my life. My ministry is to partake in the building up of the body of Christ. To discover the beauty of relationships and learn about mutual encouragement and friendship. I am adopted into one gigantic family that takes joy in what I talk about at the dinner table when we're feasting together. And even though people are leaving geographically and maybe even a bit socially, they are just as much my family and Christ is still just as much the Head, who makes sure that we care for one another. It makes me long for heaven...when we can all be together again without ANY barriers...physcial, geographical, psychological, emotional, mental, spiritual, racial, gender(al)?. When the world will be restored to the way it was created and the fullness of Christ will radiate through our entire beings. There's a glimpse of that now, and I pray that God can keep revealing his splendor and love to me so that I get "hot for him," as ben might say. Earth is one large pre-gaming session, and heaven is the real party.

I hope that I can become less self-reflective and more God-reflective. Or that the self-reflectiveness can forever point me into the latter.

This letter isn't really about March. Or is it?

back to the slate

One word answers:
1. Yourself: average
2. Your girlfriend/boyfriend/crush: nonexistant
3. Your hair?: swept
4. Your mother? sensible
5. Your Father? gregarious
6. Your Favorite Item: SLR
7. Your dream last night: anxious
8. Your Favorite drink: coffee
9. Your Dream Car: stick-shift
10. The Room You Are In: sunlit
11. Your Ex: invisible
12. Your fear: myself
13. What you want to be in 10 years: abroad(er)
14. Who you hung out with last night? carolyn
15. What You're Not? rational
16. Muffins: scones
17: One of Your Wish List Items: telephoto
18: Time: afternoon
19. The Last Thing You Did: napped
20. What You Are Wearing: retro
21. Your Favorite Weather: moody
22. Your Favorite Book: stream-of-consciousness
23. The Last Thing You Ate: cheezits
24. Your Life: yellow
25. Your Mood: complacent
26. Your body: regular
27. What are you thinking about right now? love
29. What are you doing at the moment? pondering
30. Your summer: growth
31. Best part of your life: God
Current Music: silence