Speechless

"You don't write because you want to say something, you write because you have something to say."
 - F. Scott Fitzgerald

I'm in need of a new year. These past fourteen months have been so interesting. I'm still not quite sure what to make of it all. My heart yearns for more. I get caught in the everyday drudgery that seems to endlessly permeate my mornings, afternoons, and evenings. I'm asked - what do you want to do with your life, where do you see yourself in ten years, what is your endgame? And it frustrates me. Because at 27 and counting I still don't know. But I don't see a fuse chasing me when I look behind me. I don't hear the crashing rubble from a landslide bearing down on me. I hear a still small voice that speaks beyond all distractions, desires, and ambitions.

I hear THIS.

And I can't help but wonder, when did this ever become solely about me?

10/10/10

The truth is...

Not My Time

I sit here, eleven months after leaving California. SO much has changed, so much that I am unaware of the majority of it. This morning back in California the men of my home church are finishing up a men's retreat. It is a retreat I have gone to for the past eleven years - one that is full of Godly friendships, great competition and most importantly a simple getaway from the everyday worries of life. I miss them all.

But today. Today I sit in a living room full of forty people who are all worshiping the same God together. The same God that my friends back home are praising. The same god that placed the desire to move to Texas on my heart. The same God that has provided for, loved, and guided me on a path that only he could have planned for me.

I sit here today torn between a life that benefits me and a life that only glorifies my Father. I yearn for the latter. I yearn for the life that Father has for me. I yearn to love and be loved by Him. And I can't do it by myself. Try as hard as I may, nothing I do can grant me the life that I know is best for me.

Except surrender.

Nineteen months ago a friend from my home church told me: "There will be a point where you realize 'you can't do this anymore.' This is a good place to be in, for that is where God will say - it's my time."

And that is all I know I can hope in trust in.

God, it's your time.

Now's not the time to blog. Apparently it's the time to sleep, but I'm not doing a good job of that either. These days are the dry days, no cool breeze, just consistent heat and blah. It almost matches the summer, although it has more of a winter feel.

I'm hoping one day things will figure themselves out. I'm hoping that's sooner than later. And as much as I'd like to be in control, well that's just not going to be possible. It's like telling me I'd have a chance at planning my future. Hah.

I was asleep about an hour ago, but now I'm stuck in "my body just won't let me fall back asleep" purgatory. Why even tell people you need to go to bed if you're not going to be asleep anyway. Only seems to make things worse anyway. Stay awake forever. My new motto.

Le sigh.


Goodnight blogosphere, I'll keep am eye open for you.

At least they never said it would be easy. Even if they had...

Caedmon's Call

It's hard to go to sleep when you're listening to brand new music. You want to listen to it over and over and over again. Caedmon's call just released two free singles in anticipation for their upcoming album. They're playing Saturday night about five hours away from me. Sadly that's too far to drive.

7/27/2010

I started writing this blog in a notebook. So should it be called a blog? Probably not, but by the time it reaches your eyes it's just as much a blog as it will ever be.

I don't write much these days. I've been reading though. Quite a bit. Late last year I started reading The Hobbit. I got hooked on the Lord of the Rings series and am so glad I did. Great adventures were had by Bilbo and Frodo. Think of how crazy it would be if all you knew of was the Shire, and then you're suddenly thrust out in the middle of, well, Middle Earth. Culture shock? Probably.

I moved to Texas and I got culture shock. Maybe it was given to me. Maybe it was thrown in my face. Maybe, just maybe, it blindsided me and knocked me off my feet. It hurt. It's not what I expected. It made my whole perception of why I moved to Texas in the first place change. I don't know hot to explain it to all you folks out in the blogosphere without getting too personal. But since the only people that read are the ones who probably care somewhat...

I came here to help serve an organization that I worked with in Costa Rica for four months. I thought (I don't know why) it would be the same in Texas. It wasn't. I came to find out over time that the people with whom I was working were not people with the same cultural background as myself. Our worlds collided and for whatever reason I just didn't fit. No one's fault. It just didn't work. But by that time I had a full time job. A church community that I was growing to love. And a living place that although wasn't the most ideal or warmest (you could see your breath in the morning in the winter for crying out loud), Texas was becoming my home.

I found purpose in knowing what it was like to once again hold a full time job. I had people who barely knew me who were challenging me to grow more than ever. And so far, it's been the most difficult nine months of my life.

Come to find out I really do love the beach.
Come to find out I really do love my family.
Come to find out I really do love my California church friends.
Come to find out I really do love my softball team.

And being away from all those things is tough, to say the least. But every day I press on. I know God, in His glorious infinite wisdom, has an idea of where my life is headed. Or at least where He wants my life to be headed.

I've almost been working a straight nine months. I've been at an animal hospital, and come to find out I really don't like animals. I need to read James Elliot's books I think.

Maybe that's where my reading list will take me next.

Ramblings

Reading makes me thoughtful. More than usual I think. Makes me want to write, to share with the world things that without the help of others would have never come to me in the first place. When does an author realize they want to be a writer for the rest of their life? When people around them tell them they're good and should pursue it? Or is there that passion deep inside them that everyone feels, albeit toward different things? I'd hope more towards the latter, but what of those that never thought they were good in the first place but are in fact, brilliant? Hmmm, something to ponder I suppose.

Woof!

Dogs aren't as cute and cuddly as you all might wish they were.

6/17/2010

What a GREAT day!

Happy Birthday?

I hate to say it, but my last two birthdays were kinda sucky. I'm not one to get melancholy about the past much, and I'd much rather be optimistic about the future.

I hope today becomes a day worth remembering.

Summer Days Drifting Away

I feel like June is almost over. I've been tired lately. I feel like my life is stuck and moving slowly, waiting for answers, watching days pass like months...slooow.

But what am I to do, rush life? My heart yearns for more, and yet how to fill it? This joy I've been promised doesn't seem to come so easily. Why is it so fleeting, so vapouresque?

There must be more than this.

Sigh.

Please Pray

Alina, the girl you have seen in a previous post (the two of us on a couch) just fell out of a second story window and is on the way to the ER with her parents. She ¨seems mostly okay.¨ Please pray that she is. Thank you.

Momma You'd Be Proud

I will do my best to see if I can post a video here.

A video of what you may ask Momma? My room.
Spick and span.
Clean.
NOTHING on the carpet save a backpack, a desk chair, a bed, a desk, and a bookshelf.

I am sorry momma, that this could not come sooner in life. But I know you will still be awfully proud.

It's cuz I love you.

May the Fourth Be With You

Star Wars!!!

Those two words cue an almost instantaneous thought of the creschendo of enthusiastic musicians as they blast the infamous opening title scene fanfare. It is quite amazing what music can do to remind you of memories of old. But this post definitely is not about music, although it very well could be.

Star Wars, every prepubescent teenager's favorite science fiction fantasy. At least when I was a teen. Or at least in the circle of friends that I had. To put it lightly, we were geeks. The very nerds that walked around wearing glasses and being afraid of changing in front of anyone in the locker room. That's right, we would run in from P.E. as fast as we could before anyone else showed up, only to change in front of, each other? I'm getting off-track though, let me regress.

It was 1997, and at fourteen years old I had been a Star Wars fan for a good two whole years. I was only introduced to the movies back in sixth grade by my good friends Mikey and Evan. But between '95 and '97 we had much to do, quite an assortment of time-wasting activities. Oh there were Sega Genesis video games and games of street hockey in the neighborhood, but our Hasbro Star Wars characters and our Micro Machine Death Star and Yavin IV base were the most thrilling. We would set Boba Fett up preparing Captain Solo for the cargo hold, mustering up the best voice we could find: "He's no good to me dead."

For a paper mache book report in sixth grade Evan made a Boba Fett mask and Mikey made a Darth Vader one. I think I made one out of the kid from The Hatchet or something (I wasn't as caught up in the SW lore as they were at this time). They were excellent, and Evan even used his two years later when we dressed up for the 20th Anniversary premier...but we'll get to that.

In seventh grade our friend Brian was pretty proficient with computers so he made us a geocities website for our small group of friends. I believe there were only five of us: Evan, Mikey, Brian, Neal and myself. Our webpage and group name? S.W.P. - The Star Wars Posse. I'd give you a link (I still know what it was) but the webpage expired long ago and all our info on the page was lost forever. We had audio clips and quotes, spinning emblems at the top of the page from the Republic and the Empire. We would spend hours perfecting the page to our liking.

We even attempted to make a movie once. We had gone over to our friend Nick's house a few times after school, as he lived less than a mile away, and we would act out fight scenes complete with dialogue and fake lightsabers made out of pvc and duct tape. There was even a point where we tried to record a few things, hoping our friend's dad would add laser effects, but that never came to fruition.

When we heard the movies were being re-released in the theaters in 1997 we were over-ecstatic. Plans were made for us to dress up, and storm the movie theater. No storming was done, but dressing up certainly was. I went as Luke Skywalker, Evan as Boba Fett, Mikey as Han Solo and Neal as a stormtropper (for some reason or another I don't think Brian was able to make the movie that night, something about curfew). We had a blast though, and we certainly got compliments about our outfits. I'm pretty sure Mikey didn't even pay, he just went right in and they didn't even try to stop him.

Our posse soon split up after that though. We all went to separate high schools and our times to get together quickly diminished. It was fun while it lasted, that's for sure. I kept up a little bit with the Star Wars Universe by reading books by authors such as Timothy Zahn and Kevin Anderson, at least to the extent of Han and Leia having twin Solo kids, and not to mention their son Anakin. When the names start repeating, you know it's time to start. Here son, be named after your dead grandfather who killed a lot of good people but turned good in the very end so he could be come a hologram only to be replaced by a pretty-faced boy who whined to much and didn't deserve even half his screen time. Even Luke, when complaining about not being able to go to the Toshee station to pick up some power convertors, wasn't half as bad.

So it died down after that, but before we knew it George Lucas decided he wanted better grass at his Skywalker Ranch in California so he decided to make three more movies. Mikey and I went to the midnight showings of the first two, with our friend Trooper during the latter. Aaaand come to find out he was at the first one as well but we just didn't know him at the time. Good times were had, I went in normal streetclothes though, but Mikey HAD to dress up so he made himself into young Obi-Wan Kenobi, complete with long braid as well.

It was a saga, and a period of life and time well worth remembering. Sure we were young and we were geeks and we didn't care less about what other people thought of us, but hey, that's what made it the awesome experience that it was. Something to reminisce about in the future, or even now if we so desired. Either way, we had fun. We spent our time on things we liked and were interested in, and that's all that truly mattered.

I suppose that's saying something.

So until next time my friends, may the force be with you.

Shuteye

sleep comes
slowly
thoughts race
over
under
across sheets
covering
skin
covering
flesh
covering
bones
protecting
heart
beating
restless
less

less


less



lest dreams
awaken
hope
courage
strength
for another
day
another hour
fully alive
live

live


live



love

Spring(?) Yes(!) Cleaning

I am supposed to be cleaning my room. There are still the neverending bits and pieces that always seem to find their way onto the floor of wherever I have lived, always thinking that they have some reason to be there. They are most definitely wrong though, for I have places for them in boxes to be stored away once again. Things like loose cds, papers from taxes and insurance, mechanical pencils without a home, birthday/going away cards, string, tiny boxes of matches! Goodness what am I ever to do with all of this.

I cannot be for certain, but I know sometime soon many of these things will have to find their home in the trash. La basura. El trasho compacto. Or something to that extent. I am awfully close to having a beautifully clean room, it is just the little things that always take the longest.

Sigh...someday soon.

In other news, well, I do not have much other news sadly. Ohhh yes I do!!! I bar-b-qued (okay so this is a WHOLE ´nother conversation that I will post about in the future [grilling vs. bar-b-queing], I just do not have the time nor the full knowledge of the facts) myself a piece of chicken today - mixed in a little bar-b-que sauce with some worcestershire sauce, mmmmm delicious! I cooked it perfectly, it was still tender and not dry, man I was impressed with myself.

A Makeshift Bookshelf

It'll do for now, and for now I'm amusedly satisfied.

I Call This Desk

I like craigslist. Always have, probably always will.

I like craigslist today because I searched for a free desk. I found one that had been posted this morning. I e-mailed them. Within five minutes my cell phone rang. We arranged pick-up. Andy drove me over with his truck and we had it quickly loaded. Within an hour from first search it was set up in my room.

It's not perfect.
It's not beautiful.
But it's free.

And I'm a fan of that.

Matthew 6:33

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and ALL these things will be given to you as well.

(Almost) May Day

Over six months have come, and subsequently vanished, after moving to the Lone Star State. It has felt just like a flash of time, a quick check and re-check of days passing by. It's hard for me to believe that I've already been here that long, but time is always fleeting so they say.

I've moved from renting a shared small one-bedroom house on the south side of the city to renting a room from a family on the north side. San Antonio is hard to describe in terms of location and city and county, etc. Let's just say that it's 400 sq. miles and I've moved from almost the furthest point south to almost the furthest point north.

This has helped for a number of reasons. To begin with, I'm quite sure I'll be saving money. Food is included in rent, and unless I'm super unwise with the way I spend my money on weekends and evenings I should be saving quite a bundle. I'm also 11 miles closer. Not only does that save me on time, as you found out from my last post, but it saves on gas as well. I'm driving 18 miles a day instead of 40, so I'll be saving a good 100-120 miles a week in gas. That adds up folks. I'm also much closer in proximity to the majority of the people I've found myself spending time with these past six months, so that's a big plus as well.

So far (one night) I'm really enjoying my time in this house. The family I'm living with is amiable, it's a mom and dad with their 19 year-old son. I've got my own bedroom, which is in need of a desk and a couple bookshelves but one thing at a time here folks. I'm looking forward to seeing how things work out here, I've got a good feeling about it so I'm sure there will be many stories to come.


So that's about all for now, as early (9:40) as it is right now I think I'm going to dig my nose into a good book and hopefully fall asleep before too long. So in case I don't see you; good afternoon, good evening, and goodnight.

Eleven

Elven? No, eleven.

Eleven. E-L-E-V-E-N. It took me eleven minutes to get to work today.

Eleven.

Goodbye Southside

It's been a good run, an interesting one to say the least. It's time to move on. Northside, here I come.

Slowly But Surely

Slow movement in the blogosphere. Pace will hopefully pick up soon. No guarantees.

WTG

Friends,

I've joined a cult.

Please follow with me.

WHAT THE GOD

Heart Strings

So I've been busy late then, I suppose it what it comes down to.

In all seriousness..

I have my good days.
I have my bad days.
I have my great days.
I have my sad days.

Life is so completely different that I ever expected it to be. I'm trying to hold fast to the truth that this is a good thing, but there are times when I want (want isn't the right word, but I don't know what is) to go back to the way things were. Comfortable. But then I write this down, or I think about all the stipulations that includes, and it's the farthest thing I could ever want for my life.

It's tough when the majority of people you love more than anyone else are not where you are. Maybe this only expands our hearts. Maybe it only causes you to long for a day when you will all be together. Maybe, just maybe, we actually catch a glimpse of learning how to long for what we're made for.

Something to think about.

Rabbit Trail

I've become a slacker at posting. I suppose you might be able to attribute this to the simple fact that there is no internet connection at my house, or possibly that I've been quite busy lately (gasp!) that the time to blog has slipped away every chance I think I might have. Whatever the case, I sadly don't see this changing anytime soon.

I try to make goals for myself:
write a poem once a day for a month even if it's an haiku
floss every day
eat breakfast, lunch and dinner
be to work on time

Those are only a few I can think of right now, but it seems that for the most part these will last for one or few days and then drop off into some black abyss, as if they weren't even important in the first place. As for poetry, I made it maybe two days. It's not that I didn't try, it's just that I was used to it enough to keep it going continually. I flossed every day for about twenty days. I was proud of myself, feeling good about the cleanliness of my teeth. Then I ran out of floss, and the next container I had hurt my gums so I quit. Sometimes I don't always eat breakfast. Sometimes I forget my lunch. These two usually happen because I'm trying to get to work on time. I make my best effort trying to be on time to places. I'm sure this annoys quite a few many people. I have friends that if they know something won't start until fifteen minutes after it is supposed to, they'll plan to be there at that time, and inevitably end up being late. Me on the other hand? I'll plan to be there 10 minutes before due time in order to make it "on time." I'll still find myself being late. Blame it on my high school baseball coach; when I was 14 years old I had it instilled in me - 10 minutes early is on time, on time is late, and late is unacceptable. Thank you, Terry Gaunt.

Gosh that was a long paragraph, and an even longer rabbit trail.

Sleep.

Snow and Free Pancakes

Texas still surprises me. Snow?! I mean sure, it's not sticking, but it's still snow! And free pancakes at IHOP..splendid!

Today is turning out to be a GREAT day!

Sir Coughalot

Every time I coughed at work today I was afraid our clients would react negatively in some way or another. But I made sure to say "excuse me" every time, so at least I was polite about it. They replied amicably, I don't think its possible for a human to get a dog sick, but then again I'm not sure.

I'm ready for my throat to start feeling better. It's been a few days now since it first acted up, I guess I'm just over it. Now, I haven't done anything to help speed the process along, but I should be fine in the next few days right?

I hope so...

Undercover Bossman

I just finished watching Undercover Boss. My boss couldn't go undercover without anyone knowing it to save his life. But if he could, would I be working in a way that would get me promoted, or at least a bit of praise for? And if I were, and I never received that praise or recognition, would I still be satisfied?

I'd like to think so. I'd like to think a lot of good things about myself.

I'd also like..

To stop asking God "why?" and start living with an attitude that joyfully accepts my situation and says bring it on. It's just so dern difficult sometimes.

New Years Eve

It's New Years Eve and I'm full of empty promises, I half pretend to keep this time, just like last year. The band is loud and I'm wandering the shadows, wishing I was never here. I persevere. A crowded room, these whitewashed tombs, they raise their glasses high, they kiss the past goodbye.

This New Years Eve, I'm waiting for tomorrow. My heart is on my sleeve, and yes I still believe, this New Years Eve, will turn out better than before, I'm holding on, still holding out, until they close the door... on me.

It's New Years Eve and I feel my insecurities, are haunting me like ghosts, this sinking quicksand. And then with thunderous praise and lofty adoration, a second passes by, yet nothing changes. I hate my skin, this grave I'm standing in. Another change of years, and I wish I wasn't here.

A year goes by and I'm staring at my watch again, and I dig deep this time, for something greater than I've ever been, life to ancient wineskins. And I was blind but now I see.

This New Years Eve, something must change me inside, I'm crooked and misguided, and tired of being tired. This New Years Eve, I'm waiting for tomorrow. My heart is on my sleeve, and yes I still believe, in You.