So much for THAT idea...

Well, readers, so much for writing 9 posts before tomorrow! :-p It's ok, though... I'll definitely have more than enough to write about once I make my move to school...in 20 days!!!!!

 I honestly cannot believe that in less than 3 weeks I'll be moving more than 1500 miles away to live for two years. Yes, I'll be back home for Christmas and summer, but that's still a long time! Thankfully, I'm already "in the loop" with a church family back there... thank God for facebook! The pastor and his daughter have made me feel most welcome, and I'm really excited for August 22nd, because that is the Sunday that I'll get to meet all these fabulous people that I've only seen on facebook and heard about through friends. 

Thankfully, I know 2 people already. They are Master's Commission students from this church, and I got to meet them just a couple weeks ago. I'm really excited to see them again, and to start this great adventure that God has planned for me!

Just Because

In the year 2009, I wrote 43 posts. It's July of 2010, and I've written 33 so far. This will be 34, and the little bit of me that's competitive and OCD makes me want to write as many posts in the first 7 months of this year as I did in the entirety of last year. But I still want to make these posts meaningful, so here goes.

You've probably heard the expression "boys and their toys." This can be used to reference classic cars, tools, generally anything with an engine, or video games. This post will be about the latter.

I know there are too many articles and books written, and too many studies done, and on and on about people who spend their lives in games. We are all familiar with the evils of continual gaming; I remember a Lizzie McGuire episode when Gordo got caught up in a gaming community. I'm not going to get on the soapbox about lifelong gamers... I trust that since you're reading a blog, you're not struggling with intensive gaming. :)

However, I want to spark a curiosity in you about playing games in general. Or even watching movies or TV in excess of 4 hours a week. Why? Why spend your valuable time, made even more valuable by my presumption that this is your free time, playing a game? Why lose yourself in an alternative, imaginary reality when you live in an amazing reality? Why watch a screen when you can live your own adventures? Why listen to special sound effects when you can make your own soundtrack? Why blog when you can just talk to people?

I know. Not all of my questions and reasoning is fair. Great values can be found in some films and shows, and playing games can be a good bonding experience. I understand all this, and yet something in me holds out as a "purist," so to speak. Really, face-to-face interaction produces better relationships, and focusing on a screen during your interaction detracts from the bonding experience. I wish there was a part of me that could accept a happy medium, but right now I can only think in black and white, and I'm not even describing the extremely extreme!

Sorry if I'm rambling, dear readers, but this is what is battling in my head, and maybe you have some thoughts that can clear me up... thanks for reading.

In the Midst of the darkness, I'll look for the Light...

I leave in 30 days. I just met with a neurologist today, and he mentioned seizures. I have so many things to do at school, and nothing can be done until I get there. My room looks half-naked, because I've packed up what is staying into boxes to go downstairs. My grandpa gets confused so easily.

There are so many dark things around me these days, in the midst of this summery sunshine, and I have been thinking that I need to focus on all the things that God has given me right now that I can appreciate them in the now. So here's my list.

I love...

• red nail polish on my toes
• the smell of pineapples
• blue skies and sunshine
• having a job that pays well
• getting to see my sisters
• my mom's dinners
• my dad's birthday cake
• shopping with my sisters for my dad's birthday present
• my new jeans that my BFF helped me pick out
• thinking about my new school
• seeing my grandpa smile when I hold his hand
• petting my dog
• folding clean towels
• visits with friends 

There! Just by making this list, I have realized how much I have to be grateful for! Thank You, Jesus, for my life. I know that You hold me in Your hands.

It's Official!!!

It's official now! I just got the email from my college... I'm a junior!!! Woot!!!! There were some concerns that not all of my credits would be applied towards my degree (the downside of transferring out of state and to a private school), but it is officially official that I've done 2 years of college already! Thank You, God, for working some miracles! I'm so looking forward to seeing Your hand in more of this adventure!

This is what happens when you sit at a desk all day with no job...

I'm working for at a conference right now, as a temp, and my job is to sit at a desk and radio for help when people need help with their exhibition booths. So after checking facebook multiple times, and checking my email at least once an hour, and reading for approximately two straight hours, I have decided to put some of my thoughts on this blog.

Please note: these thoughts, separated here by an extra line or two, are not at all related. They are just in the same post because I have a thing with posting four or five posts in the same hour. My OCD gets the better of me sometimes! ;)

So here are my thoughts on a few varying topics. Please comment and agree or disagree, support or tear apart. I would love to hear from you, and I'd especially love to hear your own thoughts!

Topic #1: technology can't make judgments.

At the conference I'm working right now, the bathrooms are ENTIRELY automated. Toilet, sink, and soap. Oh, and a few of them have the air hand-dryers. All automatic. The purpose of these automated objects is to be healthy and germ-free, and to conserve water. Nice idea, in theory. But in practice, these automations tend to waste resources. They are motion-sensitive; how many times do you move in the restroom? Not to be crass, but my point is that when washing your hands, you could be moving your arms to rinse all of your arms, but the soap dispenser will sense the motion and release soap. Not wanted. Not needed. But wasted.

I'm sure most of us ladies have experienced the toilet flushing its own water when we open the door to leave the stall. How does that save water? I'm not on an environmental rampage; I don't agree with a lot of what the environmentalists are selling.

My point is this: technology cannot make judgments. These motion-sensitive machines detect motion and do their task, but because machines cannot "decide" if the motion is the "right" one that requires a course of action. Machines can only respond to their programming, but they cannot judge the motive, intent, or situation.

Topic #2: politics

How can one enter into politics and remain strong in their specific convictions about public policy, but not be too extreme so as to repulse voters? I'm thinking specifically of the conservative party: there are some conservatives who are definitely not liberal, but they are not extremely conservative either. How does an extremely conservative politician appeal to those voters without losing his extreme views? Take abortion. You're either for it or against it. I don't understand how people can say "I'm against it, but I think it should be legal." WHY!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

I don't understand how people won't use their place of influence to influence the arenas where they have convictions. I guess this is a matter of prioritizing. If I agree with a candidate on most issues, the big issues, then I'll probably vote for him or her. But what if I don't agree with one of the big issues, but I do agree with all the others, and the alternative candidate is definitely not going to get my vote? I think this is where civil activity comes in, and I would send the first candidate a letter or email and try to persuade him or her to my side on that particular issue. This seems like a case of picking the lesser of two evils. Thoughts, readers?

Topic #3: community

My pastor has been speaking recently about the importance of remaining in community, versus living in isolation. I was reminded of his message during a conversation with my co-workers. The gentleman was saying that he and his wife burned all their wedding pictures, because they realized the wedding was for other people. He said they had a little ceremony of their own after that, and if they had to do it over again, they would have just eloped. There was a time when I would have agreed with him. I have been torn, when considering my own wedding {off in the waaaaaay distant future, just so you're all at ease!} between a grand, cathedral-style wedding, or a small ceremony on the beach with just our immediate families.

After hearing my pastor's messages, and after listening to my co-worker's opinion, I had to reconsider. I definitely could do a small wedding on the beach, but is that really embracing the community that I've been placed into? I would have to shake my head and say "no." Now, I'm sure there are situations when the small beach wedding fits the families and the couple better, and I understand that weddings are seriously expensive, and I'm not condemning people for keeping a budget! No, I commend you!

But my point is this: community is good for us. It keeps us seeking the Lord, both with and for the people we are around. So the next time you have a choice to be alone or be with a group of covenant friends, or your family, or even co-workers, I'd ask the Lord and choose the group.

Ok, those are my 3 topics that have been hovering around my brain for the past three days. This is the last day of the conference, and it is the end of this post. Please comment and let me read your own thoughts on any or all of these topics! :)

It's Real

Ever anticipate something for so long, but then in the midst of your anticipation, you realize that the thing you've been anticipating is actually going to exist, and then you think maybe this wasn't such a good idea and what on earth have I gotten myself into and how do I leave and where do I run?

That's pretty much how I feel right now. I'm about to go on an approximately 1,500 mile journey and leave my family and friends and the familiar for over 4 months. Am I crazy!?!?What was I thinking when I said this was my first-choice school!?!?!? How am I going to survive?

And then comes the quiet peace, and Holy Spirit whispers, "It's ok. I'm going with you. You will not be alone, and you are in My will." And then my being sags a bit, as if all the air of a balloon was let out, and the stress and nerves that had me so wound up tight have been released. For now.

You see, tension seems to build itself in me, and I don't realize it until I think about leaving, and then the tension starts building a mansion, instead of just the little burrow it previously had made in my mind, and all of a sudden the mansion is taking over. Thank God for His Holy Spirit!

I got a letter today from my local school. They have some financial aid for me, which is great, except I'm not going! I don't know if they don't know how to take 'no' for an answer, or if they want to convince and entice me, or if they simply haven't received my 'thanks, but no thanks' letter. I'm not sure. I don't really care, though. I'm not going to their school; I'm going far away into the loneliness...

What if I stayed here and went to the local school? How would my life be different? Besides the obvious lack of distance in relationships, there's the not-so-obvious lack of new friends to be made. I'm not saying that I won't make any friends if I stay local, but I feel a calling, an urging to go to this far-away school, like I'm going to change the world by going there. And who knows? I just might. God knows.

Well, thanks for letting me spill my guts again, dear readers. I can't wait to regale you with tales of my far-away adventures...even thought simultaneously I'm dreading leaving.

"I'm going with you..."

Future Life?

A few days ago, I started reading Laura Bush's Spoken From the Heart. Why am I reading this? Well, my discipler told me, on our very first meeting, that she heard the Lord say that I am like Mrs. Laura Bush. So, being a diligent, if delayed, disciple, I ordered the book from the library, and it just arrived late last week. As I've delved into the first hundred or so pages of the book, I began pondering my own life. If I'm like Laura Bush, doesn't it follow that I too will write a book about my life? And if that is true, why shouldn't I get a head start on it, since I am obviously alive, and the past 21 years are a part of my life.

And that thought made me pause.

You see, I've thought about writing books before. I've considered writing fiction, or a children's book, or a devotional, or even just giving my journals to my children, when they're old enough. But I'd never considered writing an autobiography, because I'd never thought my life would be public enough for an autobiography to be necessary. But as I read Laura Bush's book, and as I consider that I could live a life like hers, with the influence she has, I realize that my life will definitely reach far and beyond what I thought possible. And that scares me.

But it also inspires and convicts me! If my life is going to be so public, and my influence is going to be so great, how must I live now so that my testimony later is as powerful as possible? How can I live today so that tomorrow my life can be examined and found to lack nothing? What choices can be made in the present so that the future will give all the glory to God?

It's like applying to colleges. You keep your MySpace and Facebook page as good-looking as possible, you volunteer for all sorts of events and organizations, and you don't get speeding tickets. But on a much bigger scale, how am I interacting with people today so that in 10, 15, 20 or more years, they will remember me and say, "She was a godly woman even in her twenties." I want that!!! I want the people who know me now, or even those who know my face or name, to later be able to say "When she was in college, she had integrity," or "When she worked for this or that employer, she made the company look good," or "I took a class with her in college, and she made class fun." What am I doing today that will be positively remembered later?

I hope that my life so far is an example of trusting the Lord. I know there are specific points in my life that I was so scared to let go of control, but I know also that overall, my testimony will be that I trusted the Lord, and He has done great things.

I hope that so far, I have lived a life of risk. I hope that I have risked something or everything so that someone else may encounter a piece of Jesus. I hope that some small act of boldness on my part changed someone else's life for the better.

I hope that I have been an encouragement to those around me. I hope that the people I see or talk to regularly have been uplifted by my words and actions, and I hope that I have supported my dear friends in their life battles.

I hope that I have made others welcome. If you were ever "the new guy" in my presence, I hope that I made you feel welcome and included. I hope that my icebreakers weren't too awkward, and that you were able to join the group with no hesitations.

These are some of words that will describe my life, I hope. If you have any to add, please feel free to comment on this post. I'd love to hear from you.