Flashback

I walked past a truck and its exhaust smelled just like Elmer's Glue. You know, the kind that is white and runny and that you use to stick glitter and macaroni onto paper as a kid. The Elmer's Glue smell, however, sparked a different memory in me. There was a boy from India in my fifth grade class. Actually he was there through all of elementary and junior high school. He used to write WACKA WACKA on the desks and chairs. Anyway, in fifth grade he used to eat Elmer's Glue. I think he even put it on a donut once. He was a wierd one--but most boys are at least a little wierd. I foudn out a couple of years ago that he ended up at Georgia Tech in the same dorm as one of my other classmates. Coming from Idaho, that is an amazing coincidence. I probably wouldn't recognize him if I met him and I don't know if we would have anything to talk about. But he remains in my memory with a vividity that I wish I could have for my school lessons from the day before. He is so firmly there that, after years of not having him cross my mind, he can spring into it on an idle Wednesday where I happen to walk past a truck with exhaust that smell like Elmer's Glue.

Possibilities

I recently found out that I am going to get to go to Nashville for an Open House for a position with a group that teaches overseas. It is the most amazing opportunity and I am so excited! God has done miracles with these coincidences so that it will cost me almost nothing to go for the interview. I had expected a lot more steps, a lot more doors that could be closed, and a lot slower progress. But skip steps two and three, go directly to step four! In some ways it is a little scary. But honestly I am more scared about the interviews than the actual job itself. I am really excited for these post graduation possibilities. I just have to be careful not to get my heart set on it before it is absolutely clear that that is is where I am supposed to go.

My feet are dry and dirty
My heart weighs down like lead
For tonight we have a'wandered
And our weary feet have tread
Upon the sidewalks many
And fields of grassy green
A symbol of the journey
Of where we've gone and been
And at the end we parted
As ever now we will
Our paths have now all started
To leave to find and fill
The company is broken
To be mended never now
Save in reminiscing
Of these when times allow

Disillusion

There hangs a tension in the air
And questions without answers
I see it all begin to fall
And marble lions crying
But then there's dancing by the moon
And singing in the starlight
A paradox is made complete
But only adds confusion.
The higher air, gentility
Is lost in simple joking
The gaeity and happieness
Have fluttered with the Empty
Zampano, and I wish you knew
The strings you have unraveled
How easily we stoop lower
And what was good has left us
The festival of nights is gone
And has been taken over all
By painted dreams of conceit
The wine of pride has poisoned all
and we have no resilience
It clouds the brains and heearts of them
The ones ethereal see
But doing is another matter
Time has come
To run and pray
Only looking
Back to say
It was fun while it lasted.

A Poem Without a Title--Any Suggestions?

Flocking farther and farther away
From home and hearth's head hidden do stray
Why do these poor people push and plead?
Why will this man so willingly bleed?

Five thousand gatherd, food they had not.
For cousin's death, he solitude sought.
But compassion, kindness he showed,
Even the cross, his blood free did flow.

Full five thousand fed he on that day
Many million more if through him pray
Twelve baskets they bore back, his gifts three
Two fish, five loaves, his death on the tree.

Yet these simple folk secured so much
More than a meal and his healing touch
An empty tomb and eternal life
What more could they want? But they gave strife.

_________________________________________________


They brought him an end
A payment for crime
Who thought he would spend
His life so divine.
On crowds who ignore
And men who betray
When counting the score
Who knew he would pay
The sins and the dooms
Of men even now
Were ransomed and rooms
Are built for them now
And built by a king
So loving and sure
All heaven will sing
For darkness made pure.

My Muse

My muse is full of sadness and of grief

My lonely company and some releif.

For only visiting in ruth she comes

And beats her verses as sounding drums.

Division

The discourse of disfunction
It's prevalent right here
Though men have no compuction
And women have no fear
And how's the body gonna work
If one hand binds the other
And if one foot all weight it shirks
Will it be walking with its brother?
Tolerate is the mantra
The nightmare shows its faces
Black and grim the contra
The sheepy mask erases.
The head of man uprises
A wolf from sheep-skin torn
Forgotten are the spices
Brought to the virgin-born.
Forgotten is the love
Neighbor shows in ruth.
Scorn not the One above
By casting off the truth.

You can get a glimpse of my pastor's youthful days here. I am so entertained by this picture!

Patience

I thank Steve for this game.

Soonly

I have gotten several comments on my posting having to do with anticipation, specifically the anticipation of heaven or Christ's return. I know so many (including myself at different phases in my life) who ask God not to return until they have done this or that or experienced this or that. Or that alternative is, "God, don't let me die until...." you fill in the blank. I am not trying to say that having desires for life is a bad thing. I think we all should (and I do) look forward to things in life like a marriage or children. I am looking forward to having my first kiss someday. These are God-given gifts and should be treated as such. The point I have is that these gifts pale in comparison to glory and beauty we get to experience in heaven, if we have sought Him and found Him. For we must "believe he exists and rewards those who earnestly seek him." One part of our reward is heaven. People's lack of excitement over heaven (which is coming soon by either individual death or Christ's return) I think comes from a general lack of understanding the awesome greatness that is God, even here and now. I love one of Keith Green's songs which talks about creation and heaven. He says that he doesn't know whether the Creation took 6 days or longer, but in that period called "6 days" God created the earth and galaxies and everything. But God has and continues to prepare a place for us in heaven and he has been working on that for at least 2000 years. Cool huh?

Blessed Inconveniences

"It is not for our sake but for the the sake of others. The beauty of the flower is not for itself. It offers itself to God's sunshine and rain, gives its fragrance to any who pass by, but it must wither and die before the fruit can be produced."
Elizabeth Elliot (from "A Path Through Suffering")

Reality?

In the depths of a misty fog
The grayness gloom of thickly clouds
As lidded eyes first flicker and move
And the heavy mind removes the shrouds
In this blue and purple precious time
The dream and touch can meet
And all seems real, etherial
You traverse down a foreign street.
The all exotic is right before you
Smells of spice and grasses, coffee
A million things you cannot tell
A flower stand wildly colored
Like a rainbow of promise bright
Without the order or the shape
But of the color tint and light.
A table with fabric, a rack of clothes
Some music plays above your head
And bells and jangles are added noise
Along with trains, and cars and moped
And as the dream fades as fast as it came
I find that my brain is not to blame
The dream is real and everyday
I walk this street, I live this way.

Magnet Refrigerator Poetry

hot moist nights
haunting laughs free
seeping and dying dancing
in the misty summer
perfumed wind dreaming
of velvet purple liquid diamonds
the delicate symphonies
of smooth pools
and a blazey shining
stream of green ocean
cold flowers flooding
breathing translucent joy
surrounded with hearty love
an elaborate red morning
brilliant sprays of champagne love
garden honey sleeping smile
springing from the sun and sky
a forest breeze wetly fresh
music in sweet shadows
delicious light like a deep star
marble goddesses of the universe
pink petals of roses fly
soaring gorgeously
poetry language like good rain
carmel candy and melon chocolate
the peace after a fractic time
smell a tiny grass road
discover one dreamy thing
explore wild open life
embrace dark rhythms
of delirious eternity
luscious juices and cake
an enormous clean moon
languid like an angel's beauty
baby born in bare skin to a mother
perfect and gorgeously small
picture of a gifted yesterday
a presentation kissing spring
perhaps every tender desire
makes a smell of colorful blooming
remembering together sweet smiles
green song and love flower gardens
visionly deep warm music
true secrets playing a fiddle
where peaceful cloud and water
full cool and fevered wild
will through a blind brokenness
melt the scream of fear
when night throb darkness
bellows like red fire
and swimming eyes look on fright.

Moving, School, Reminiscence

It has been several days since I posted last. I guess I have just been really busy. I moved into a new apartment. I went to two weddings. I am getting ready for school to start in a couple of days. Overall, it is an exciting and changing time.
I am sitting in a little room on campus. It has large arm-chairs, tables, and a piano. I was looking through a little notebook I have to see if there were any random thoughts that I could build on to make a post. I found the very first pages in the little book were written on my very first day of college three and a half years ago. The funny thing is that I was sitting in this very same room and waiting nervously for my first class. I was so excited that I hardly knew what to do with myself. Alot has changed since then. As I prepare in a couple of days to begin my last semester here, I am filled with a different sort of anticipation. This is the excited anticipation of something coming soon. In some ways it is the same anticipation one has when waiting for a friend to return after a long absence. The soonness makes all the difference.
Sometimes I wonder why, although I know that Christ is returning soon and I look forward to it, I don't have that same enthusiasm always for it or that feeling of soonness in anticipation.

Growing

The room is filled with strangers
People I don't know
And as the people mingle
Visions in my glow.
I see these people happy
Joyous faces all,
But then perhaps it changes
Life puts forth its call.
The warm friends that I remember
Dusky dreamy nights
No drugs were involved there
Just a fellowship of sprites.

OLD

I have just recently begun to feel old. Some of you may scoff at me for beginning this feeling at the raw age of 21, but this is what I am feeling. When I say “old” however, I don’t mean a decrepit aged feeling, but a grownup independent and adult feeling. This to any child is old. There are manifold reasons for it taking hold of my shoulders and shaking me at this particular time. It yells at me and says, “Look at your life! Look at where you are going! Look at where you have been! Look at the responsibilities you need to fulfill! Look! Look! Look!” In some ways this is utterly terrifying. I don’t know exactly what I want to do with my life, but I am the point where I have to start deciding. Up to this point in my life it was always some new step of school with a marked timeline and marked goals that someone else measured. The grades, the degree audits, the “academic progress” reports… all of these were hard and fast proof that you were actually accomplishing something. As I look forward to graduating in May, I realize that I will have to set my own goals and measure my own progress and there is nothing out there that is an “end time.” I won’t ever graduate to something else. I won’t be able to rely on a movement from year to year, from grade to grade, to prove my progress. It is sort frightening.

Another reason for this is the number of my friends that are getting married. Two of my good friends got married yesterday (to each other). I have two more weddings in the next week. Four of my friends are engaged and will be married in May or June. One of my childhood friends had a baby a few months ago. I sometimes wish I was where all of them were, but I also enjoy my freedom and that God has complete influence on my travels and directions. I love the fact that I can go wherever He calls me. But needless to say, all the things that have for so long looked like “the future” they are here. Especially last night; the guy was a good friend and classmate for many years. The girl also went to high school with me but she was a grade behind me. I remember picking her up from her home at 5:00 am for Volleyball practice. The two of them liked each other in high school. But they were wise enough to hold off until about a year ago when they started courting. Every time I have talked to him since their engagement, he has been glowing and praising God for how things worked out. They have no regrets. Every time I talked with her she was glowing and thanking God for the love of such a kind and fearless guy. That is the sort of wedding that I enjoy most: two people, solidly grounded in their faith and both giving glory to the one who deserves it. The warm fuzzies attack again. But at the same time… this is “the future.” High school sweethearts are actually getting married; having children. Unfortunately, I can’t ever be married to my high school sweetheart, because I never had one. Oh well, my romance will have to be of a different kind.

I guess I kind of lost my point along in there somewhere. I am beginning to feel old. I don’t feel like a child. As a teenager you don’t want to feel like a child. But at the moment, the responsibilities and stresses that come along with being adult are things I would be tempted to give up. But at the same time, the adventure expands. The possibilities are endless. And I would never give up those sweet times of seeing the expressions on the faces of my dear friends who are reaping the marriage sown from their patience and love.

My Life as the Spectator in a Romantic Drama--part five

The last advice I gave Sarah as she was complaining about the lack of affection she was feeling from Daniel was to “Give more, expect less”. She was expecting an awful lot out of the guy and their phone conversations did not seem to be going very well. Neither was satisfied. She wanted evidence that she mattered to him and instead he viewed the call as a chore. I challenged her to find out ways to give to him instead of just expecting things from him. I also challenged her to work on being encouraging. So, she wrote an e-mail to him apologizing for her attitude and telling him why she appreciated him and was interested in him. That was an idea, although I didn’t read it so I don’t know if she was sappy, spunky, sincere, or silly. But as always, I expected the best out of her. I often find myself expecting the best out of people, unfortunately I often am disappointed as well. But here, I don't know. At this point she had thoughts about doing other things too: sending a care package or something. (After all, the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.) She was unsure how far to push it. She really felt that her position was undefined (too bad she couldn’t look up her relationship in a dictionary, they really are useful most of the time!) and she didn’t know exactly what she could do in this bad position. There was a strange relationship-friendship dynamic, which was really difficult for them both, I am sure.

Finally, the difficulty overwhelmed Daniel. It really was a sad thing. He called her early (on Friday, not Sunday) and told her that they should not talk over the summer. He also called me and after leaving me a short, ambiguous message, he sent me an e-mail telling me what was going on… or maybe what was no longer going on. I think it shocked Sarah. She wasn’t expecting it at all. I wasn’t surprised; I saw the difficulty and both of their selfish natures. Long distance requires patience. Not that I don’t have a selfish nature of my own, I just know that it is there and try to deal with it. I have always been in for the waiting and praying. Maybe I am just scared of things like that. Maybe waiting just seems so much safer, because it does seem safer.

So that was their story. Another two people struck by infatuation, lose their minds and break their hearts. It is a sad world. I wish I could have done something about it, but I couldn’t. I did my very best. I prayed so much. But Sarah was not a girl to be controlled; nor is she easily influenced. Neither was Daniel.

Since their “break up” if they ever were actually “together”, Sarah was despondent. She nearly cried every time a green Chevy truck went by. Both eventually moved on to be happy and independent. They both were affected by what they learned… but I think, although both went about it in a completely silly (and often stupid) way, that they learned some good things. Sometimes the best lessons are learned by mistakes.

Sarah is now on her way to marrying a nice guy who likes to move quickly, which suits Sarah. That too is another story. Daniel's heart is set on the Lord and he will wait for a wife who is willing to wait for him and keep up with him.

This is the end of this chapter. But the true endings have not yet been written, not by me, not in time itself.

My Life as a Spectator in a Romantic Drama--part four

As time progressed, he became more serious, but was increasingly afraid due to the rapidly approaching summer months when they would be six hours apart. It is very hard to get to know someone over that distance despite the modern technologies that create our “Global Community”. There really is nothing like sitting down and talking with someone face to face. Then there was the added difficulty of theology. To most people, religious particularities are ignored, and wrongly so. Sarah and Daniel were right to evaluate the differences in their upbringing and beliefs. This is where they ran into a little snag. They had opposing beliefs on the issue of predestination versus free will. I will not bore or confuse you with the details of this, suffice to say that they both found it disturbing, especially Daniel. He knew that to raise a family well, there had to be a unity that surpasses Christian brotherhood and he was unsure if a unity could be reached on this issue that truly affects many areas of belief. So he set out on a mission. He set out on this mission, not unlike that of the knights of old, with all the fervor he possessed. She too, had a similar mission. They had to figure out what they actually believed. This is an enormous task to most, and even a larger one with a time constraint and emotional disturbances such as they had. So I chatted with them both. Every day I saw one or the other of them and we discussed the importance and relevance and issues involved in this doctrine of the mind and heart. I mostly felt like I could not help them. They had to weigh the information themselves, and despite how heavy both options seemed, choose which understanding they were to live under. Then they had to choose if that burden was one that they could bear together.

Despite the difficulty, he did go have a chat with her father where Daniel was supposedly going to ask him to date his daughter. Sarah sort of conned him into it. That didn’t really happen—maybe he was scared, maybe he was still just unsure—maybe who knows… I certainly don’t. But at least things had jumped out of the Jane and Bingley stages.

All of this was in process when Daniel left for the summer, promising to write to Sarah and maybe call her a few times. Imagine my surprise at this when (knowing as I did, that Daniel hated to write) I learned this. I was astounded and it only increased my respect for him and the realization of how much her really was pursuing Sarah, or so I thought if somewhat confusedly. I was, once again, envious of the attentions Sarah received. I didn’t want Daniel’s attention, just attention. It is a typical girl thing as I said, to want attention; or maybe it is typical human… So he left.

He left on a Friday; by Sunday he had left a message on her answering machine. Monday they talked. I guess the poor guy was going through the grand inquisition over this girl that he had suddenly become interested in. Remember, they had only known each other for a couple of months. Now, as evidenced by his pattern of calling the following Sunday, he was planning on calling once a week. This was going to drive poor Sarah to distraction and she told him so. I really don’t think Daniel had any clue about the way a girl thinks. In many ways he was trying to “be friends” with Sarah but “friends” of the opposite sex don’t write (not that she has gotten more than one postcard) and definitely don’t call and most extremely definitely don’t go have chats with the girl’s father. To a girl this is not “friendship”. This is COURTSHIP. Despite the lack of appropriate DTR and Sarah’s feeling of “floating” as she put it, neither seems willing to attack the confusion. Although, he may not have realized that there was confusion. It really could be a difficulty because it seemed obvious, at least to Sarah, that her attachment to him was really far greater than his was for her. It makes me wonder if this is common—the girl being more attached first. Girls naturally dwell in a relationship of any sort more. Girls are relationally and emotionally minded most of the time.

The result of the whole phone-calling debacle is that he was probably going to call twice a week. I pitied his phone bill—but he wasn't a penniless little boy; he could afford it if anyone could. He had also promised to visit. I thought she would probably make him. There is the quote, “Wrath hath no fury like a woman scorned”, but I think even more dangerous could be the woman with a deeply attached infatuation for a genuinely great guy.

I mentioned we had passed out of the Jane and Bingley stage. We seemed to be in some sort of stage from Sense and Sensibility. Sarah is Marianne and I am Eleanor. She has feelings that range and fly—but I am practical and sensible. I am always out for solid advice that requires action, not merely emotional dumping. Although, I have done the same dumping in the past I am sure.

--To Be Continued... Sorry, this is longer than I thought it was. And I am not sure if it really has much of a point in the end. I wrote it over a long period of time a while back (when all this was happening) and have revised it some on and off. I hope it at least makes you think, or smile, or something.