* not with ink

The Pilgrimage So You Don't Want to Go to Church Anymore Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson Tales From Outer Suburbia Life of the Beloved When You Reach Me Road-side Dog Holocaust Poetry Provinces Persuasions for a Mathematician Why I Wake Early A Poetry Handbook Pilgrim at Tinker Creek Year of Living Biblically The Stone Carvers   Diverse AND numerous. Half a dozen need to go back to the library next week. Another half dozen belong to friends. And the others are mine. All mine.   (i heart books)  

Advent Thought #1: I can hardly wait ten minutes to hear from God; imagine waiting 700 years. Places I'mma visit this Advent: The Advent Door Godspace

I am totally digging this song.    And this song.

This week, I cried* a few times. I cried a lot on Wednesday. I cried when I saw my friend waiting to walk in to her mother's funeral. I cried when she got up to share about her mom. I cried when the minister choked up during her eulogy. I cried when I hugged my friend during the reception. I cried at the internment when I saw her nephew trying not to cry. I bawled* as my friend came over to two of us after and we mourned together. I cried again as I told my own mother about the day over the phone. This morning, at church, I cried.I cried when I saw the smile on my friend's face as she waited to be baptized. I cried when she said Jesus has been calling her for a long time and she's ready to say yes. I cried when another girl said she called herself an atheist not that long ago, but she has seen Jesus change her life. I cried when a big man choked up and couldn't speak. I cried when another big man shared that he has had dark days and has not been a good son to ...

Last week I walked past Occupy Toronto for maybe the fifteenth time. I have had a lot of thoughts about about the whole thing, and my friend and I got to chatting... One take-away was that methodology really matters to me. I am a big believer in free speech and open dialogue, but I'm also fairly easily put-off peoples' causes or perspectives by how they communicate. As I've grown more certain of and passionate about the things that I value, I often find myself unsure of how to communicate it all... I want it to be in keeping with my personality, I want it to be authentic, and I want it to be winsome. I do not want to be apathetic, falsely exuberant or in-your-face. It seems to me that we each have our own style of "evangelizing" the causes we love and beliefs we hold. I used to think my reservedness was due to insecurity, and I often tried to compensate for that. But now I'm at rest and usually don't feel the need to put-on the excitement and bold...

This fall, I have become startlingly aware of how frequently we humans bond over gossip or shared negative opinions.   I want to make a greater effort to bond over praise and shared love of life.   Anyone else want in on this? I wonder how quickly I will notice a difference in my own heart & relationships.

Today was the first meeting of the Saturday Brunch Club, founded by Karen. Everyone is welcome. These are the rules (So far. Still under construction.): The first member to the restaurant will have their coffee/tea paid for by the last member to arrive. There is a ten minute grace period for late arrivals. After ten minutes, we sit without you.  Unless agreed upon at the time of ordering, members are not required to share their food. Members need to bring cash for easy bill settling. I think that's pretty much it. We meet every two weeks, and next up is Lady Marmalade . Come and eat!

So last week, I asked you all what the pie chart of your mental energies would look like : what do you spend your time thinking about? Well. Amelia drew hers here .She compared it with ten years ago (or what she remembers from 10 years ago) and it was great. RIBBONS! (now you have to go read it to find out what that means). And Thom emailed me this witty image: But I had not shared my mind-pie with you. Until now. Here it is:   And here is my projected-memory of my 2001 brain.  At the time, I was almost seventeen and in my last year of high school. Now, I'm not going to do an entire breakdown. Mostly, it's self-evident. But I do think that it's important to note that the quality of some of these sub-categories have significantly improved, because that is not evident in the charts. I still think about boys and relationships a lot (probably too much), but in a very different way. It's not emotionally consuming anymore. At least right now. And there i...

Doug Coupland once wrote, "At twenty you know you're not going to be a rock star... by twenty-five you know you're not going to be a dentist or a professional... by thirty, a darkness starts moving in - you wonder if you're ever going to be fulfilled, let alone wealthy or successful... by thirty-five, you know, basically, what you're going to be doing the rest of your life; you become resigned to your fate." I have been thinking a lot about this recently. I still want to be famous. I dream of it less than when I was young, but I like to think of mingling with the bignames. I find myself wanting to name-drop, to sound like I am somehow closer to stardom than the masses. But I am almost twenty-seven, and the chances of that happening are slim-to-none. The realist in me is coming to terms with this. Mostly. However , I don't wonder if I will ever be fulfilled, wealthy or successful. I already am. I am in the wealthiest 3% of the world...

Okay, cyber-world. I am in a thoughtful and conversational mood these days (the two don't always coincide), so you had better hold up your end of the conversation. The next two posts I'm currently drafting are as invitational as the last one, and if I don't get any takers, I might just stop talking. And we don't want that, do we?

There are few things I like more than a creatively thought-provoking question. Like these two, asked of me by a couple different friends in the last week: 1.        If your brain were a pie chart, how much time do you spend thinking about _____? How does it compare to ten years ago? 2.        If you could write a story from the perspective of any literary character, which character would you choose? Brilliant, hey? The pie chart of my brain looks drastically different than it did a decade ago. Or five years ago. This makes me happy. I think I am content with 75% of my brain-pie-chart.   And the other one... I don't have an answer on this yet – whose story do I want to tell?? Who do I think has a voice worth broadcasting? I'm mulling it over. I take these nerdy kinds of questions very seriously. What about you? What would the pie-chart of your brain look like? (Thom, I expect a drawing on your bl...

1. For the last week, I have been drinking at least two litres of water every day. This is a phenomenal accomplishment for me. In Spain, I sometimes struggled to drink that much, and I was walking 25 kms a day!!! I think hydrating is benefiting many parts of my life, like metabolism and energy and general well-being. It helps that I sit at a desk all morning/all day. If I fill up my water bottle, drop in a little bit of lemon, and stick it in front of me, I will drink it. And I will snack less. 2. Tonight, I got discouraged and insecurity reared its head and I had a mini freakout inside my mind. Then I decided to call my sister (thanks for chatting, Sa-Sa!) and then I decided to re-read some personality info about myself because I am someone who needs validating. One personality-type profile I have on hand tells people who manage me to "stroke often." If that doesn't scream "emotionally needy," then I don't know what does. For those who care, I am a...

I would like to take a moment to tell you why you should check out The Civil Wars. 1. They are a little bit country & bluegrass. O Brother Where Art Thou kind of country. 2. Joy Williams has a perfectly suited name. The woman does not stop smiling. She also used to be a fairly-fabricated Christian pop musician. Her current work is better. (I can say that, cause I listened to her back in the day) 3. John Paul White looks like Johnny Depp. And has a wicked fun sense of humour. Which results in more laughter from Joy. 4. How many other bands do you know that keep an audience of 500 spellbound with one guitar and two fantastic voices? 5. They cover Jackson 5. And Michael. (oh yes, and they toured with Adele) 6. They sing about real life with honesty. "Poison and Wine" is about marriage, and what you might say to someone if you were being fully fully honest about how you feel. (They are both married, not to eac...

Yesterday, I did something terrifying. Well, terrifying to me. A risk I've wanted to take for awhile. Of course, there is no guarantee that things will turn out the way I would like. I have a small amount of hope that they will - or rather, great amounts of hope but low expectations (sometimes having hope is a pain in the butt). Today, I feel very happy that I did it. I am proud of me. Goooooooo, me! This morning, I weighed myself for the first time in almost two months. I was pleasantly surprised by the numbers staring up at me. This told me that my self-perception is no more accurate than it used to be...however, it also says that my sense of self-worth is much improved since years past. Although I thought I'd been putting weight on, it hadn't been ruining my life or consuming much emotional energy. So that's a plus. I am tempted to now allow myself to gorge on Halloween mini chocolate bars, given to me by a boss who wants them far away from herself, but...