figure it out /// also i'm not dead yet

I'm sitting here trying figure out how it all works.
How i can remember details from my first day here,
like when the iron crackled, it sounded like tires on a dirt road
and then from my fourth week here when we had to drive 20 minutes to find a dirt road
How 'normal' constitutes 97%, but we learn about the non-normal 3% 50% of the time
How i can be so addicted to coffee, and yet i still don't drink it as much as i used to
How twins can share nutrients and still not get equal amounts
How un-matching furniture reminds me of home
How greasy hair and no makeup don't matter anymore because homework dictates all
And 2 am is familiar
And 11 pm is early
And i wear a watch now because i have to be able to take a pulse
And when i eat food that looks like everyone else's they get confused because they think i'm eating what they're eating and half the time i am its just that its my gluten free version, not normal stuff, and that makes them confused they don't get that i'm not gonna change
And how can i be more able to relate to these people even when i
have nothing in common with them
And how the last 4 years of my life were labeled 'waiting'
But 'waiting' is an understatement
That was boot camp
That was training
That was testing and working and patience and art and writing and figuring out pathways and equations that i could lay over situations so i could relate
And how other people didn't get that
And how people don't know that other people think I'm intimidating because i tried really hard on those first few days to be 'out there' and 'open' and 'relatable' because
I knew that if i didn't that would be awk-
ward

But what would have happened if i hadn't figured out step 1
That preparation
Im sitting here trying to figure it out
How to be autonomous
How to be me
And yet how to hollow myself out for more information and more homework and more time
How far can i stretch
And yet how full can i get of God
Because he's here
He's with me
And he is quite possibly the most tangible when I open one of my textbooks and see a photo
Of a condition
That a baby or mother can get
And lets face it
I wonder when the nightmares will hit of those photographs
And i wonder whether this was planned
Or whether this was result of falling
And I wonder if God cries when he sees this

And i think of all the good this will do
All this current preparation
The info being stocked away in my brain,
To pin together as more comes in.
I think of those far-off places with
Bad outcomes of birth and life and death and
How there is such hatred, and such sorrow
And what good it will do

And others say
'That place scares me'
And i'm right there with them
But i see that complication,
And those definitely-not-anatomical figures crossing the surface of the world,
And i see the mountains that make mine seem like pebbles next to a boulder
And the oceans that make the lake seem like a raindrop next to a fountain
And i see God and how he gave us the chance to be pain free

but how that
didn't
happen

I see those places and let me tell you
They scare me too

But i want to help
The pain
Because it doesn't stop at my world
It doesn't stop at the edge of my sight
And my world is a fraction of a fraction of a sliver
Of the whole world

And i know that.

And though i may not be able to take the pain away
I can give them hope of eventually being pain free
And the immediate choice of joy
And when i see that option
It seems gigantically more helpful than
Not doing anything at all

So scared or not
Figured out or not
Friends or not
Or financially supported or not
Or not
Or yes
Then yes.
I've figured that out.

WHOOOOOOO OKEEAY. I'm not dead.
And that is a terrible rough draft. BUT I HAD TO WRITE SOMETHING.
Mostly this is just me spouting bc i have no time and homework is already glaring at me but
NEWS: i got twitter. Although in my defense i am a student midwife so sometimes i use body words that may be considered offensive to some people but they're just part of my profession so basically just be warned. Also in my defense i'm pretty hilarious so #bonus. (First post, my roommates and I created a fictional roommate that we are gonna try to sell to pay for our schooling....is that even legal?) Follow me @roommateforsale (yes that is my twitter name thingy. It was late and i was unimaginative.)

ALSO NEWS:
remember that time that i told you that i didn't have anything past December figured out.
That's still a thing.
And December (or January...whatever) is rapidly approaching. SO PRAYER WOULD BE EPICALLY APPRECIATED. BC I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I'M DOING. SO YEAH.

AND NEWS #3: im gonna do a world dump soon. (Me + moving + school + new place + independence = new experiences that i desperately need to write about and a lot of terribly grainy iphone photos.)
I've been at midwifery school for 4 weeks and i have learned so much....and theres 8 weeks left.....and there is so much cool stuff here but the lack of both mountains and ocean makes it kinda lame. I mean cool, but no.

YA'LL ARE AMAZING. Is anyone even still reading this? I'm so confused........at what point to blogs just automatically get erased from the internet bc their authors are negligent students who don't have time to blog anymore. (#CRY)

Love ya'll....hang in there.
Life may not always be good, but that doesn't mean there isn't beautiful bits along the way.

Xoxo
Sami

P.s. I am terribly sorry for the quality of this post. The grammar is awful and i'm probably going to go back over this in about three weeks and want to kill myself for even considering posting it. 

if places were people no. 4

   

your eyes are blue. 

as blue as the rest of you, 

ranting and raging and throwing your wave arms up in the air with every 

gust of teasing wind. 

you told me once

green was your favorite color.

i doubt it.

it's not just one blue. 

but layers. 

almost black-blue, like sleeping heavens 

and then the cerulean lighter Caribbean pools,

streaked with the almost white of ripped denim and 

the deceptive brownish of sea foam. 

your waves are uneven, 

and they ripple across the surface of the sand like your skin

ripples across you 

the dips and curves making tide pools 

for crabs and sea anemones to take refuge. 

most people don't like you 

"too chilly. can't swim there. 

and there's too much wind and rain."

i like you. that's my kind 

of weather - messy and dirty and sad and yet simple

with only sand and water to get in the way of itself - the way you let the mist 

lounge about, 

sauntering from tree to tree, street to street,

storefront to storefront,

enveloping, muffling the distant song of water's heartbeat,

and it makes my jacket and jeans damp with its heaviness.  

when i walk down to your shore you throw wind at me

thinking i'll walk back  to the house for warmer shoes and some hot chocolate. 

but that's the thing

you don't know me. 

i'm a mountain girl. 

mountain girls climb mountains just to find wind that carries new scent.

i face that wind, 

and i let the water make my feet go numb,

it's iciness is threatening but

i'm not afraid of you. 

beach length waves shove against each other, 

racing to reach my ankles

a bet against time

a wager for the pretty lady. 

i think of what the jovial nature hides - 

harshness and honesty. 

chasms. 

doldrums. 

hurricanes. 

shelter to the water beasts

raging against the coasts. 

the way you never stop - 

you're a constant of wave, water, depth, shallows, 

somehow you cover every aspect and the sheer 

immensity makes me feel small. 

i think of

the way man has wanted to tame you

and yet you have remained just as dangerous as before 

they tied some sticks together and tried

to cross you. 

"we'll win the pretty lady,

pretty lady come home in our tub"

but you pulled them down in maelstrom and reef 

sent an extra breath of wind to make the waves psychotic

carved graves out of the feasting table

that sharks so often watch.

and yet how like man you are, 

those long waves equalling strong shoulders, 

bringing the wind and blocking it at the same time, 

gritty hands pulling at my feet, digging sand around,

kissing locks of my hair, mingling my blonde strands with your sandy ones,

light and bleached from salt and sun

and then kissing my lips with

your salty ones. scratching

my check with the bit of stubble, grit at the top of 

your cheekbone, sharp.

i can't tell if it's a scar that's yet to heal from 

the tiff with that shark last week

or if it's because you never shave when 

you're supposed to. 

you leave gifts on the shoreline:

seaweed, driftwood, pretty stones and shells 

and even the occasional sea star or jelly fish. 

some days you bring me sea foam in your hands, but 

it spills over, all over the bland sand and makes me laugh 

when it flies in your face. 

the perpetual lullaby, 

murmuring sweet things in a language i do not understand,

shhshh shhshh,

others say be careful. 

that you're dangerous. 

that i shouldn't swim too deep. 

you'll pull me away from them. 

i think of our differences. 

me climbing heights and you diving depths. 

both breathing oxygen but yours is in water and mine is in air

and i imagine your sandy hands pulling at my feet again, 

deeper, love, deeper, let me show you something beautiful. 

and how you love to tease the seagulls. 

i think of how you send me sunsets and 

i think of the way i found the mountain looking at the stream instead of at me

and i think of how i'm tired of air, 

and i'm tired of the brown and green of mountains and the mocking 

humhumhum

of the wind in the ponderosas 

you send a salty kiss my way 

and pull me deeper beneath your waves and i can see the 

sand dollar cities and 

a wall of sea stars and 

families of fish 

and a shark says hello

and how the water feels different in my lungs and 

how it feels different in my hair,

and I see the danger 

and I see your anger

but I also see the way you smile 

at me and i think i like your little gifts and the shades

of blue in your eyes. 

i think i like your lullaby 

and your allure

and the way you send me winds filled with new smells 

i like the way your hands are not big enough to hold the sea foam and how

you're wild, but you're mine. 

if places were people no.3

I thought you were a shortcut.

You took us the long way 'round.
With stops at every station.
Pauses after every sentence.

We never went
faster than
50 miles an hour.

26 hours is a long time to sit and stare
memorize each other's faces, skin lit up by
dimness of walkway lights, reflecting off the scratched, plastic-y windows.

Maniacal laughing clatter of steel wheel against steel track
annoying complaint of rubber window lining against foggy glass to the outside
Almost distant stubborn stomach grumble of the machine taking us to somewhere

You are that in-between place
That interpretation
That 'please wait while document loads' symbol.

You will always come back
But sometimes you will sleep
And Destination will take your place

Sometimes you will go on holiday
And Preparation will visit
To get us ready for you again.

Sometimes your face will change.
You'll grow a beard, or something else ridiculous will happen,
Like the time your eyes changed colors.
And sometimes I will need to memorize that face
Over again.
Take the journey twice.

Sometimes you don't make sense.
And yet you are almost constant and consistent
But you are nothing twice
You are never the same
You are In-between

We had better get used to it because
Consistent is different than static
And change is different from chaos

And sometimes you will drive the train backwards
And north will be west
And east will be south.

And I don't mind.
I love you very much, more than I thought I would,
Because I thought you were a shortcut, someone
I could pass by without a second glance
And you very much weren't.

Which is to say
I like your scenic routes better.

In-between is nice.
Even though it is the definition of patience
and You never had a dictionary.

Which is to say
I thought you were a shortcut
And you showed me the world
And stole my calendar
And my time
And my heart
And now,
I live for the limbo
The in-between
The changing
The unexpected hairpin curve that says
Pay attention.
You don't have time for second glances.
You may not come this way again.

(WHAAAAATTTT. Yeah. Hi. I'm not dead or anything I just haven't posted in FOREVER. Sorry 'bout that. But anyway, if you're interested, the idea for this one was from the train trip we took last October. Fun stuff. LOVE Y'ALL. I'm going to post again soon so stay tuned.)

(ANOTHER NOTE BECAUSE I FORGET THINGS: remember last year when i did that blogtober series? I NEVER DID DAY 18 (the horror) but it was supposed to be "This week I..." and really, that week before the 18th i had gone on a train trip, which is what this post was based on. basically: i finally finished blogtober and its july. isn't that great?)

the note to self series: guest post on kate's blog

Y'ALL SIT UP AND PAY 'TENTION.

Kate at the Goodness Revolt (just stop everything and go check out her blog IT IS AMAZING)  asked me to do a guest post.

this is the guest post. 

yep...this link right ---> HERE. 

and this is also the end of the NOTE TO SELF: series.  

*sad*

but don't stop holding on to the little lessons that are actually big lessons. 

#NOSHAME for the amount of links i put in this post. no shame.

(NOT TO MENTION I JUST HIT 100 POSTS ON THIS BLOG. yaaaaaaaayyyyy.......)

NOTE TO SELF: fourteen

This. This idea: to not let things get to you. figure out who you are, and what you contain, and then just learn from everything else. let it flow through you, but don't bottle it up. you don't have to process everything. sometimes you just have to let it run by like an icy stream on a summers day. it bubbles and pulls at your feet but you stand there. you don't let it affect you other than to let it make your bones ache and your skin cool and remind you that you are alive, and you are who you are.

MOVING ON:

guys. i am the worst. blogger. ever.

i just up and leave and decide to drop by to post these notes....

YES I AM FEELING GUILTY FOR LEAVING YOU HERE WITH NOTHING TO READ.
(on the other hand i'm kinda half tempted to be like what? go fend for yourself! i'm totally not responsible for your blogger feed being full and up-to-date. i won't do that though, because i know the feeling of an empty blog feed. *so sad*

me feeling guilty, the lack of posts here, this is soon to change. (translation: if i don't sit down and write soon, my brain and my fingers are going to run away on permanent vacation to the Bahamas and then where would we be?) (Answer: we would still be here, in montana, with semi-gorgeous weather and a 3.7 mile long to-do list buried underneath a full-time job and the incessant craving for coffee that i have tried (and failed) valiantly to curb.) (and we would so much rather be in the Bahamas, now wouldn't we?)

two more NOTE TO SELF posts, and then Kate at the Goodness Revolt has graciously offered to let me guest post on her blog about said note to self series. (i am equally terrified and thrilled. i've never guest posted anything before, so i'm getting that jittery feeling in my gut that happens when i go over to someone's house for the first time and all i can think is i really hope i don't break anything.) (wait. can you break things on blogs?) (*worrying intensifies*)

WELCOME TO MY WORLD.

after this....I have absolutely no idea what i'm doing.

(other than the if places were people series because i've got some sparking ideas for that.)

this is gonna be great.

NOTE TO SELF: twelve

a compilation of my best pranks (aka: happy april fools)

i have done all of these pranks with ultimate success. use my knowledge wisely. (.....on second thought, don't try these at home.)

1. find a bunch of old office supplies. put in box. mail box to friend, while putting a different friend's address on the return label.

2. if you work in a food chain which prepares its food as ordered (ex: Papa Murphy's Pizza, Subway, etc.) switch the ingredients. What you normally start with, put at the end. Put the end ingredients near the front. This prank is best done the night before when your manager isn't there. And then let them make the first order the next day.

3. that friend that is always pranking everyone? dissassemble their car, bring it up the elevator on one of the campus buildings, and rebuild it on top of the structure. make sure that you don't help them when it comes to getting the vehicle back down.

4. move everything in the house 4 inches to the left. (so evil. so hilarious.)

5. change your relationship status on facebook. This one is so fun, especially if no one knows you're joking.  make sure you keep it going for long enough that everyone starts to actually freak out.

6. hide alarm clocks in target's bedroom. set them for horrific times during the night. (2:08, 2:10, 3:37, 4:48, etc....keep it unpredictable).

7. Lock them out of their house and hide ALL the keys. Or just change the locks completely.

8. rewire the brakes on their car...so every time they hit them, the horn goes off.

9. get their mom in on a prank call. (I don't care who you are or where you came from: your mother angry at you will always be your worst fear.)

10. hire a musician to follow the target around for a certain number of hours. either have them play one song over and over and over and over and over again (i recommend "Barbara Anne" first sung by the Regents but you've probably heard the Beach Boys version, "Baby" by Justin Beiber, or "Its a Small World After All" by Robert and Richard Sherman)...or have them base the current song off of something they said... (ex: "seriously, dude, get lost." turns into "HIT THE ROAD" ::: "i can't hear you over the sound of this bozo making noise" equals "Say something" ::: and every time they answer their phone "HELLO...ITS ME..." :::
NOTE: only use this prank on your very worst enemies.

Please remember that April Fool's Day is not Make Everyone's Day the Worst Day of Their Lives Day.
Confuse, don't abuse. And please be safe.

I'm laughing so hard...APRIL FOOLS. Did you actually think I did all these? LOL NOPE. but i would. mwahahaha.... (These are actually pranks that people that I know did, or I found the ideas on Pinterest. #mostdangerousplaceever #youmustnevergothere #beware #happyaprilfools) 

when the cat scares you half to death

i did this gem of a post a while ago. i'd rather forgotten about it.
but then the this other thing happened (see below) and i was reminded of said post (really though, i didn't lock myself out of my caddi...) mostly because  I thought that my world was going to fall apart due to a situation was completely and 100% out of my control.

i was house sitting for these people that we've known for basically forever. their daughter was my first real friend. i know them, they know me, i've been to sleepovers at their house and know their animals and really house sitting shouldn't be a big deal, right?

WRONG. i realized after the first two nights that i had always stayed there when everybody else was there. the house had always had people in it other than me. i've tried everything - i've tried sleeping with the dogs in the same room, i've tried the exhaustion method (staying awake until you're so tired you could fall asleep anywhere), I've tried watching funny videos and listening to music right before I go to sleep, i've tried walking through the house every time I hear a creak. And let me tell you - there were so. many. creaks.  The 10-pound dog could walk down the hallway and it sounded like a bunch of 300-pound assassins playing football tag. The perpetual thought that maybe I wasn't the only one in the house was making me a little paranoid. 

Back to the point though: nothing helped. No matter, I thought, I'm almost done with this job anyway. It'll be fine!

Oh, the hilarity.

I was woken out of a sound sleep to the two dogs wanting fed and let out - as usual. It's early morning, so I fulfill the requirements and catapult myself back into bed. Laying there, half of my brain is still asleep, half is sprinting through the ideas of today and what it will look like. 

And then the yelling starts. I kid you not: it sound like a small child who's arm had gotten chopped off. A small child yelling help. Over and over and then BAM - the sound gets super loud. that three year old was standing in the kitchen. Help, help, help, help...in a solidly round voice with minimal pronunciation.

I grab my phone (honestly I'm wishing for something much larger and heavier that I can use to protect myself with but there really isn't anything in the bedroom that fits the description and I don't want to lug the lamp through the house because that is the farthest thing from subtle that there is). ANYWAY - the phone, and I'm pressing send because Mom was the last person I called. I start to make my way down the hallway towards the noise. Help. I tell myself to be prepared for anything (and anything at this point in my mind looks like child with blood everywhere and a missing arm) (too much NCIS, dang it). Help. The phone line buzzes in my ear. Help.

"Sam? Good Morning!" Mom's cheery voice goes up that the end, and I realize that I've either woken her or she's still in bed.

If you hadn't caught on by now, I AM TOTALLY FREAKED OUT. Yes, I'm still pretty groggy. Yes, I'm normally a really logical person. Yes, this situation SHOULDN'T BE FREAKING ME OUT BUT DANG IT I DON'T KNOW HOW TO REACT WITH ANY OF THIS. Why do i want to grab something to protect myself? shouldn't i be grabbing helpful items if the sound really is a wounded person?

And then part of my mind is going over the idea that if it is a kid that's hurt, what am I gonna do about it and are we both going to end up mentally traumatized from this? 

And then I'm thinking that I really hate the idea that I am going to try to be a midwife, but this whole scenario has got me jittery. I'm going to have to deal with probably a lot worse than this.

All this is racing through my brain while I'm trying to figure out how to make words to greet my mother.

The old orange cat walks around the corner, yowling the same sound that sounded so much like a wounded child.

"HEY. HEY MOM. SORRY - SORRY I DIDN'T MEANT TO - EVERYTHING'S FINE, MUM, I'M OKAY, EVERYTHINGS FINE SORRY - SORRY I JUST THOUGHT THAT UM, I'M OKAY YEAH EVERYTHINGS GOOD ITS JUST THE CAT."

"What?" My mom sounds utterly confused.  

"Ahhhhhh....The cat was making a really freaky noise but I didn't realize it was the cat until I called you. No worries!" I look down and my entire body is shaking. Like, uncontrollable, earthquake-is-happening, haven't-eaten-anything-in-17-hours shaking. I'm that scared.

And by now my mom has caught on that something is not quite right. So I tell her the whole ordeal and the cat keeps yowling and there's a part of me that wants to figure out all those ways to skin a cat because this one almost gave me a heart attack. 

___

moral of this little tale: (or tail...cat's tail...ok i need help.)

on little sleep, an attempt at a youthful heart attack, and kind of a second look on where I'm at emotionally (i.e., little things get me worked up), this idea popped into my head:

I'm an introvert. I'm fairly to the point. I don't like all the small talk, the aimless chatter. I try to make things comfortable for people but I would so much rather everyone just not care and do whatever they like. If someone has a problem they can leave. 

That makes me sound pretty cynical? Pretty closed off? Harsh? I'm a jerk, right? 

WRONG. I'm not all of those things together. I can be those. Sometimes I'm even really good at those. But in reality...when I thought that there was a bleeding infant in the house, i was freaking out because i didn't want them to die. I wanted them to be safe and healthy and, well...alive. I care. Just because i have the capability of being a mean person doesn't mean that i don't have the ability to be nice and caring. just because someone comes across as a little cold-hearted doesn't mean that's all the deeper their personality goes. usually they just have a wall up, or are preoccupied or have had a different upbringing from you.

maybe they're just having a bad day.

so before you judge - take a minute: how are they really coming across? do you think that their actions and words are based not out of a hatred for you, but maybe on their circumstances and life?

don't treat someone differently or wrongly just because they're not like you.

(wow. i'm starting to sound like Pocohontas.....i would totally be okay with that. i want her skin color.)

Next time you hear a yowling cat, think about this story, and think about how you are interpreting other people.

NOTE TO SELF: three

so for all y'all that are confused by this, see Kate's post here. its actually about working out but the part about going mental really got through to me on different levels. plus, her blog in general rocks my world. check it out.

NOTE TO SELF: two

NOTE TO SELF: the sticky notes series

i am feeling SO overwhelmed.

i love to blog. really really really love to blog. i would do this all day every day if i could make a living off it.

unfortunately i can't.

so - i'm cutting down. you may have noticed already that i'm not posting as much as i have been. (october was kind of a post overload...so aside from that.) i want my blogging to be real - not just something i pump out every once in a while because i feel like i should keep this up.

i want to post the highlights. the stuff that sticks.
old stuff that i love, new things i think are awesome.

things i would change, things i love and hate at the same time.

i would love to have red hair.
i fail at bible time but its a new years resolution to remedy that.
as much as it tries to kill me, i want to start running.
and i want to look at the good things.
i want to learn the little things and remember them.

i therefore introduce to you:

i will be doing two series at the same time. Note to Self as they come, and then If Places Were People every other week.

Note to Self  will be the little lessons that i learn that i don't want to forget. these lessons are actually written in my horrid handwriting on my bedroom walls, but i want to share them with you.

because somedays we just need little sticky notes that say it's gonna be okay.

I may not post as much. but hopefully these posts will be less of me blabbering and more of
look what i learned today! what do you think? 

plus - you know - these are probably gonna be on canva things so AWESOMENESS.

stay tuned, lovelies.

versus: 2016: factual

sometimes i think the years are at war with one another.

this will be my year i think as i barrel into 2016.

but really, last year was my year too.

it was a stormy year, yes.

if i were a ship, my hull would have holes, 

and my mast would be missing

and there would be tears and 

repairs needed everywhere.

but it was still a year. 

and one that i learned a lot in.

one that i had favorites in.

and if i did compare them.

if the two did go to war.

i would see that both had merits

and the war would end up being a duel

and the duel would end up being a miss on both ends.

neither would die.

because both were equally valuable.

of the year. what happened?
how did i get to this place
with these things
in this time
with these people

how did i become who i am right now
and what person does that steer me towards becoming.

song:
Wake Me Up - Avicci

quote:
"What a treacherous thing to believe that a person is more than a person."
and
"The town was paper, but the memories were not."
- Paper Towns, John Green

"One of the drawbacks about adventures is that when you come to the most beautiful places
you are often too anxious and hurried to appreciate them."
- The Horse and His Boy, C.S. Lewis

lessons learned:
people are meant to be loved, experiences learned from, and issues dealt with. but those don't define me. none of those make me who i am. that essence of myself is bottled up inside me.
i am my own source.
you will never regret being kind.
the world is sometimes a mirror. and sometimes you are a mirror. and you have to figure out which one is which, and which one is right.

important dates:
September 27, 2015: I got baptized! (The river was cold. AH.)
August 14, 2015: Baby Niece Eliza Marie is born!!
aaand sometime in December I applied for a midwifery school. still waiting to hear whether i've been accepted...but i'm super excited!

highlights:
train trip (i love to travel. period, end of story.)

down lows: 
bad things happen in life. Basically the last half of 2015 sucked. The worst part is that even though we're pulling through, things are never the same as they once were. and, i mean, life is about change. and i get that. but sometimes i just want things to be like when i was 6 years old and my biggest worry is if i'd picked up enough books at the library. that'd be good.

new things: 
possibly going to midwifery school
we got kittens
Eliza
i am making a goal to fully absorb and apply lessons i learn. even the little stuff.
(first one of 2016 is "The first words out of my mouth should be lovely ones.")

continuing things:
i feel like 2015 and 2016 are sort of mashed together (which is really bugging me because i like my years to be separate.) so i guess you could say that this "section" of my life is continuing.
piano. (duh.) writing/blogging. (also duh.) exercise. (did i ever even start?) love for travel. (i plan to do A LOT more of that this year.)

word:
immersion: noun; deep mental involvement; 
baptism by immersing a person bodily (but not necessarily completely) in water.   
Origin: late 15th century: from late Latin immersio(n-), from immergere ‘dip into’. 

things i'll never do again:
a Hamilton Playhouse Production (not because i don't love them, because i do. but #stress #ilikemylipswithoutcoldsores #justno #sorry). I love theatre. i just don't love being almost solely responsible for the background music.
train travel. because as much as i love travel, by train is just not the best. there's a post about that.

verse:
"So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord. So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him." 2 Corinthians 5:6-9

So YAY for 2016. may it be filled with lessons, and quotes, and good moments. may it shine, may it be worth it. may we learn much and be full and fill others. may 2016 be good. may 2016 be a year of peace, not war. may we be peace-lovers, smoothing over the rocky spots in our paths, helping others over the obstacles of life. may we be nice. may we be lovely. may we be. 

All the Light We Cannot See (book review #6)

WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE
From the highly acclaimed, multiple award-winning Anthony Doerr, the beautiful, stunningly ambitious instant New York Times bestseller about a blind French girl and a German boy whose paths collide in occupied France as both try to survive the devastation of World War II.

Marie-Laure lives with her father in Paris near the Museum of Natural History, where he works as the master of its thousands of locks. When she is six, Marie-Laure goes blind and her father builds a perfect miniature of their neighborhood so she can memorize it by touch and navigate her way home. When she is twelve, the Nazis occupy Paris and father and daughter flee to the walled citadel of Saint-Malo, where Marie-Laure’s reclusive great-uncle lives in a tall house by the sea. With them they carry what might be the museum’s most valuable and dangerous jewel.

In a mining town in Germany, the orphan Werner grows up with his younger sister, enchanted by a crude radio they find. Werner becomes an expert at building and fixing these crucial new instruments, a talent that wins him a place at a brutal academy for Hitler Youth, then a special assignment to track the resistance. More and more aware of the human cost of his intelligence, Werner travels through the heart of the war and, finally, into Saint-Malo, where his story and Marie-Laure’s converge.

Doerr’s “stunning sense of physical detail and gorgeous metaphors” (San Francisco Chronicle) are dazzling. Deftly interweaving the lives of Marie-Laure and Werner, he illuminates the ways, against all odds, people try to be good to one another. Ten years in the writing, a National Book Award finalist, All the Light We Cannot See is a magnificent, deeply moving novel from a writer “whose sentences never fail to thrill” (Los Angeles Times).

GOOD: STOP EVERYTHING AND GO READ THIS BOOK. seriously guys, it was amazing. it is now the best stand-alone book i have ever read. like, gaaaaahhhh.... *flails* *falls over* *cries silently* *lays still* *takes a deep breath* GAAAAAHHH. Here's why: 
a) this book is written from two different view points. you may have heard me rant about the difficulty of this. Doerr NAILS this. i've never read better. Werner is quiet and thoughtful, a constant battleground for good and evil. Marie-Laure is a forest clearing filled with forget-me-nots and daisies, always seeing the good even though her eyes don't let in the light.
b) description: one character is blind, the other is not. seriously, the chapters switch like that. Marie goes by smell, taste, touch, and hearing. She goes by memory, she goes by instinct. she is a sponge for knowledge and her chapters in the book are steeped in it. she is also obsessed with 3-D maps (you'll get that later) and the ocean. Werner, on the other hand, sees everything. His eyes are the sponges, flitting about, pulling in information and analyzing not only the facts but the feelings, the emotions, wondering why at every opportunity. and his chapters. oh golly. his chapters make me cry. and he loves radios. seriously, this kid makes. my. world. although he kinda breaks my heart at the same time.

BAD: there's some language. there's also some really heavy real life stuff. which is difficult to swallow sometimes. one girl gets raped. one character is willing to blow up half of Europe (oh wait, that was Hitler. okay, blowing up the continent would be an exaggeration but you get my point) in order to heal himself. characters are blown up, shot down, impaled, frozen by water in the middle of the night, and some are taken to prison camps. you know what? i fully expected all of that. this is a book written in the middle of the Second World War. There were bad things happening then. a book that doesn't detail these would be lacking historical accuracy and depth. 

DIFFICULTY: the undaunted book queen in me says not hard at all. i mean yeah the book was more than an inch thick BUT HEY who's counting? however, the tiny little girl in me disagrees. for it was indeed a difficult book to read considering the fact that there would be one sentence describing how the field was full of daisies and you could hear a cow's bell in the distance and you could smell the sea and life was normal, and the next sentence would be talking about how the character hadn't eaten in three days and they were on the brink of wishing for death. this wasn't an easy book to read as far as content goes. definitely not for the weak of heart. 

1-10 SCORE: 10. All the way. This book won 6 awards. and it won 6 awards for a reason. it will break your heart and then heal it again. for me, it is forever on my favorites shelf. 
let me put it this way: i normally don't buy books. normally i just borrow them from the library. 
i bought this book. 

OVERVIEW: All the Light We Cannot See is intense, a web of stories and people and facts and myth and time that weave together into one grand climax and leaves you wondering what the purpose of life is. It makes you wonder how you are living today. It makes you think about what you notice, what you give into the world. It changed the way i think. i don't see bad things anymore. i see empty voids capable of good or bad, equally equipped and with equal opportunity to take over that space. at one point in the story Werner is trapped in a basement, listening to a radio. there's absolutely no light, and yet he doesn't feel scared, because the voice that is transmitting over the radio carries light with it. it lights Werner's soul. this scene left me wondering if physical light is not the most important. maybe it is the light that's felt, and heard, the kind that changes our hearts, i think that's what matters. and oh how much there is of it, all the light we cannot see. 

that's what i got out of it.

darn you, john green (my 10 favorite quotes)

So, you say John Green quote and its like #heaven.

Rule #1. Don't read the books becuase they are not clean. There is a hearty percentage of non-Christian content in these. And that content is gross and repulsive.
Rule #2. If you do read these books, there is some really profound and intense writing (I am indecently jealous of John Green's abilities as a writer) which will make you think that it makes up for the bad stuff which is wrong. The bad stuff is bad enough that you shouldn't read these.

but I did. and darn you, John Green, you came up with some INCREDIBLE quotes.

Allow me to share them with you:

note: these are all from Pinterest. But PROBLEM: some of them are grainy. sorry.

i didn't know how to fix it.  dang it, technology.

Day 11: RANT: what if we were Jesus-oriented

ours is a performance oriented world.

doing your best is no longer the standard that you live up to.
it used to be. God is happy with our best.
if we give him everything
if we let him work through us
but for everyone else, it isn't enough.
the new standard is everyone else's view of your best, which is labeled "perfect"
in a scrawling, ridiculous, unreal script.


When we step onto the stage of life,
the lights blind us.
we stagger, dazed, confused, disoriented.
until someone pulls the rug out from under us.
and then we know exactly what happened.
our best - our dazed, disoriented best -
that trying in a tough situation
wasn't good enough.
and someone said so.


it doesn't matter that they don't know what it feels like to be you.
they said it. and it hurt.
like stubbing your toe, or hitting your funny bone.
enough to bring tears to your eyes and attempt to curl into the fetal position.
but not enough to kill you.


They say.
its not good enough.
you're not good enough.
work harder.
do better.
because otherwise we will throw you to the crowd
and who knows what they'll do to you...

You wonder why you are even on that stage.
you wonder why you're there.
who put you there.
there's a faint memory of wanting to be on the stage
of wanting to please.
but now it just doesn't seem to matter
it's pointless to try to please someone who can't be pleased.
they'll only make fun of you
as they rip the rug out
once again
and laugh as you fall flat.

So why try?
because suddenly
as you're laying on the floor with a sore bum and
a sore pride
you wonder why their opinion matters
why you ever used their measurement, their standard
in the first place.


We weren't made to be successful.
We were meant to be faithful.
We fail at it; we are faithless
and yet we serve a faithful God
who's standards never change.
who never changes.
who does not judge performances
because they will never be perfect.

our value to him is not what we can do
but the fact that we are us
and nothing can really change that.
the fact that we are a work in progress
a blob of clay
that will be put through formation,
burning heat in the kiln,
drowning in glaze,
and then burnt again.
sometimes we are even shattered and then pieced together again.
but that is what makes us beautiful
we are art.
we are ever changing,
when he is not.
we are us
and he is him.
can we be Jesus-oriented,
rather than performance-oriented,
focusing on the journey rather than the applause?
we serve a God who loves us
because we are messed up.
not because we are perfect.
Why can our value not come from God?
that the value is I am a work in progress.
I'm not perfect.
But I'm better than I was yesterday
and I'll be even better tomorrow.
Why can our value not be based on whether we nailed it
or not.
but on the fact that it's been worse.
why can we not be valuable because we are us?
Why can our value not be because Jesus was nailed?
because our ledger no longer runs red.
because it is as clean as a new driving record.
a blank cd
an empty wall
or a white canvas.
Why can our value be the fact that we have jesus
tattooed across our heart.
not the fact that we fail to have perfect
tattooed on our foreheads?

It seems this is the struggle of our generation.

forever looking to others to define us.
what do you think of me? my writing, my room,
my weird art projects, my future, my strange taste of music, my *insert whatever here*.
we care about what other people think.
But is that right?
what if unimportant opinions are being applied?


what if we applied the opinion that mattered.
the one that shaped us into our very literal best on the standard that mattered.
not the one that didn't but was used anyways.
what if we used correct
rather than incorrect.
and left the rug, the stage
the facial tattoos that were once so critical
behind.
because they didn't matter.
and we were jesus-oriented
rather than performance-oriented.
what if.