NorthernChristian.org

Brilliance drives by.
Filter horizontal stripes
Onto headlights
Cornering shadows,
And together they dance the
Brief waltz that
They die to live for.

Horizon leaning,
Diagonal spinning,
The fade then flashes.
Cars distancing
The dim nighttime hues
That fall between
My fingers like time’s sand.

Pillow cools my mind.
Breath shortens
While form escapes me.
Stanzas are failing.
The night’s music that
Chimed so lovely then
Now forebodes that sanity’s a temporary vapor.

Thoughts evaporate as
The sound of raindrops mists them.
I still feel but
No worries are left in the game.
I feel peace and
Wonderful love and
Even see the potential future today.

(Submitted from my phone.)

two girls are supposed to be studying and i’m here on the laptop trying to not distract them.  two finals are to be done and then we’ll go gallivanting for the rest of the day like we have every other day.  yesterday was our adventure day and i discovered more reasons to love this place.

9.  it’s beautiful and full of not-too-strenuous outdoor fun.  i am not much of a hiker so we took the very easy trail.

10.  anyone else grow up watching “Adventures of the Wilderness Family”?  i’m convinced that they filmed the series here.  this plane is more proof.

11.  old abandoned buildings beg for you to explore.  so we did.

12.  the one thing i wanted to see and yesterday we saw several.  a real deal ranch!

are you ready to learn some more reasons to love idaho?

7.  i tease that they have no history here.  after a few days of driving around i asked where all the old buildings are.  i was taken to a fort that was built in 1880 and realized that my family house is older than the town of coeur d’alene.  i forgot how young the west is.  but although there’s still a sense of newness, sometimes you feel like you stepped back in time.  like when i passed this laundromat.  (click to enlarge photo)

8.  yesterday i woke and walked a mile to the lake where i proceeded to sit outside and eat breakfast.  please north country, open some fun places.

day number 3.5 here.  it’s different than the east coast and somehow different than the california west coast i know.  i’ve been trying my very best to figure out what it is that makes it so unique.  the trees are quite similar to where i live.  there are mountains and lakes and lots of pleasant people.  there isn’t much of an accent and although dirt bike racing is popular, everything else seems to be quite normal.

yesterday afternoon i figured it out.  this is a hick city.  there are thousands of people surrounding me, a million starbucks, stores at your right and left — they even have a target!  and yet everything is completely hick.  the combination of urban life and rednecks is completely confusing.  so while i pass a massive herd of people on my way to the coffee shop downtown, these are a few things i pass which are reasons to love this place.  so completely hick.

reason 5.  massive ugly and dirty trucks seem to abound here.  and this kind is the definition of the west.

reason 6.  they eat/drink the strangest things.

one girl i met told me i needed to eat rocky mountain oysters to get the real idaho experience.  like the naive trusting thing i am i said i would.  i was then told what they are — bull testicles.  not everyone likes them, but it’s not unusual for all the men to go out for beer and oysters together.  gross.  i think i shall stay away from such Fear Factor-ish delicacies.

one more reason to love this place:

a few years ago, in the midst of many people in a small school building, a boy met a girl.  they didn’t think anything of each other at that point but since they discovered that they both came from the same town, the boy and girl continued to hang out after the year in germany finished.

fast forward three years and they’re getting married.  last night i went to the rehearsal dinner and today i shall go to the ceremony.  and i can’t tell you how wonderful it is to be here to celebrate as the two of them make this covenant together.

life is good.

i’m here.  in idaho.  my schedule has been planned for me and packed every second of every day since my plane touched the ground.  coffee get-togethers, birthday lunches, breakfast parties, small group studies, bride-to-be helping, live music listening, and walks and walks and walks.  i’ve been loving it.

but now, i’m here at starbucks sipping my free americano with white mocha and i have a few moments to just be.

i told you i would have you loving idaho for more than potatoes by the time i come home and this seems like a prime time to start.  so, here are my first few reasons for how lovely this forgotten state is:

1.  although i’m in the north west and i didn’t expect it to be too “western” there are constant reminders that i was completely wrong like this one.  click the image to enlarge and see the smaller sign in the left-hand corner please.

2.  it’s beautiful here.  although it might be a tad bit chilly, the sun has been shining the whole time and i’ve found many wonderful places during all my walks.

and 3.  i get to spend every waking moment with this dear wonderful soul.

and now i’m going to spend some time reading.  i shall give you more reasons later.

Please pray for God’s guidance throughout the release of this website.

someone came into my blue office last week and told the coworker and i that we lead very boring lives and we should get out more.  they were sure to remind us that we are always to return but suggested that leaving the confines of our four walls we sit in for most of the year wouldn’t be such a bad idea.

i told them i do get out now and then.  and i do.  in fact, i’m getting out early tomorrow morning.

i’m flying off to potato country idaho.  i shall see jolly faces that were part of my year abroad –  i’ll even be present as two of them make promises till death do them part.

i’ve received many a teasing remark as everyone wonders why on earth i would go to this forgotten state.  i’m convinced there must be wonderful things there and i intend to find them and share them with you, my dear reader.  although i can’t commit to posting every single day, i shall try to share my adventures as frequently as possible.  perhaps after a week of stories and pictures you shall love idaho for more than potatoes.

leaving is always such work though.  so many loose ends to tie up.  so much laundry to take care of.  so many things to think through.  and tonight, mere hours before i shall have to wake and leave, i feel exhausted.  i’m most thankful that the friend i’m flying to see works at starbucks.  i shall be in desperate need when i finally arrive tomorrow.

i would ask you to pray for her.

this afternoon i held her hand and read this aloud.  she closed her eyes and the words seemed to settle her soul.

i kissed her forehead and told her that she could take a nap when the clock told me i really needed to go.  she looked at me for another second and i wondered if i could step away and leave her alone in that bed.  i squeezed her hand again and forced myself to turn.   i stopped at the door and glanced back to see her laying there, eyes closed, with that one hand that moves clutching her sheet.

right now she needs a miracle to live.  so please pray.

Promise me you’ll never forget me, because if I thought you would, I’d never leave.
Winnie the Pooh

i wake up to michael jackson’s thriller every single morning.  judge if you must, but you can’t help but start moving when that greets your ears.  his song turned on fifty minutes ago today.  i laid in bed not sure where i was, what day it is, and if i had already been awake or if i was still in need of living this day.  bizarre life-like dreams will do that to you.  i hate them.

what i hate more is that i don’t remember the dream.  whatever the dream — all i know now is that it’s made me feel like “rest” was not accomplished during the quiet dark hours.  yes, that is frustration.

i started a pot of coffee.  if you ever have me make coffee for you, please ask for a full pot.  my full pots taste like golden goodness to the soul.  anything else turns out like a faint resemblance of golden goodness to the soul or black gruel that wants to kill your soul.   i’m not sure what my problem is.

i opted to not shampoo and condition my hair in the shower.  this is mind blowing since i don’t feel fully awake, clean, or ready for my day unless that happens.  but my tired body won the mind game by saying it didn’t have the energy for caring for the hair after the shower.  i now feel dirty, groggy, and not quite sure i should head to work like this.

i made a delightful cake last night.  i am most happy with an apron on in the kitchen.  see?

i am an avid food blog reader and i can’t tell you the number of recipes bookmarked, links saved, starred entries, etc. that i have just waiting to be tried.  last night i tried a cake recipe.  it’s light and not too sweet and has a blackberry sauce poured over it so i deemed it good enough for a breakfast bite with my coffee.  i am the epitome of health.

and then i read one simple verse in a translation i don’t read often.  and i’m struck to the core.  i thought i’d pass it on this morning.  don’t revel in just an incredible performance of doing the right thing like i so often find myself.  performance all by itself is empty.  and not pleasing to Him.

“Going through the motions doesn’t please you,
a flawless performance is nothing to you.
I learned God-worship
when my pride was shattered.
Heart-shattered lives ready for love
don’t for a moment escape God’s notice.” – Psalm 51:17 The Message

i shall now go to my little blue office to keep her company for the day.

you know the look? the one that tells you in the space of one second that the person giving it thinks you’re crazy, out of your mind, obnoxious, overwhelming, scary, and quite possibly annoying?  yes, that look.  i find that i have a tendency to provoke the look quite often.

i was there in a cramped elevator full of quiet smelly strangers.  our eyes were all fixed intently on watching the number go higher knowing with each change we were that much closer to our freedom from the stuffy confined space we found ourselves in.  my phone jingled — text had just come in.  “someone’s got a blackberry,” a woman muttered recognizing the sound.  “it’s me!” i gladly volunteered.  i held up my lovely pink & white phone for all to see as i said, “isn’t it sooooo pretty?”  the woman just gave me the look while everyone else remained silent.

i brought a friend to a new mexican place in town.  i stood on one side of the counter as the worker stood on the other asking if i wanted this kind of salsa or that kind of cheese or would i like some sour cream with that as well?  rather excitedly i asked, “can i really get guacamole with that?”  she nodded yes.  “oooh!  i just love this place!” i exclaimed while yes,  i’m afraid to say, clutching my hands to my heart.  she gave me the look and replied dryly, “i can tell.”

surrounded by faces i thought i knew i yelled into a cell phone that wasn’t mine (or my conversation to be yelling into) and hugged every neck i could get and pranced about to greet more faces and then noticed the quiet girl standing right there who i’d never seen before.  i introduced myself by name and then knowing she had observed my shouting and prancing and laughing and hugging felt the need to add, “i’m really not a freak all the time.”  she nodded her head ever so slowly to politely agree with me while she gave me the look. i knew she would be staying as far away from me as she could the rest of the evening.

i was once told that i shouldn’t treat the world as if it’s my best friend.  people think it odd.

i’m thinking they were right.

someone please take my computer away from me.

when exhausted, stressed, overjoyed, frustrated, delighted, or overwhelmed…

i shop online.

it’s very, very bad.

1.  i’ve got prettiness hanging above my bed.

2.  i received a “notice of delinquency” from the government today.  i’ve never found anything quite so humorous.

3.  i’m looking at tickets to go to idaho.  what in the world is in idaho?  friends.  and a friend getting married to another friend.  and faces and people i haven’t seen in over 3 years.  spending time with them?  that, my dear reader, is great news.

4.  i’ve never been too much of an addict of any tv show.  in the last six months though there are three of us that pile on my bed and watch a certain show.  and tonight, my heart hurts a little bit from it.  who knew that bones could touch the soul in such a manner?

5.  i started work on my own little bedroom in this house full of people in mid-january.  fresh paint, new decorations — everything was reworked.  my wall hangings sat on the floor for months though.  there was one pathetic attempt to hang them on an emotionally frenzied afternoon that ended with nothing hung and my mums sending her 21 year old to bed for a nap.  i know — i am the picture of maturity.  but today i finally tried my hand at hanging framed wonders and we have a few up.  although the end product had my shoulders slumped in defeat since i wished that one was an inch lower and the other an inch higher, they’re up and my walls aren’t bare.

good enough.

i think i shall start wearing my lipstick just like this.

i have much to be thankful for.  photos to illustrate my items of thankfulness are so much more entertaining.  so i used my handy-dandy cell phone to try and collect a few throughout my last 24 hours.

1. my rock star sister.  she’s been driving around the states for the last few weeks in a bus full of other musicians.  yesterday was the last show she was playing in so the mums took all her “younger girls” down to pennsylvania to watch and bring this rocker home with us.

2.  the mums who took us.  and suggests ideas for her bored daughter to try.  and asks how life is going.  and listens to as much beyonce and ke$ha and shania twain that her crazy girls want.  and drives quietly hour after hour as we they giggle and screech out noises that girls in tight quarters should never screech out and is generally amazing.

3.  the crazy girls who giggle and screech and are fun and cute and my favoritest in the world.

4.  a reminder of my mornings in germany.  can life get any better?

6.  shoes.  i love shoes.  and i love cute shoes.  and i love flats.

7.  summertime sun warming this girl on april 5.  i’m not sure i’ve ever loved life so much.

squishy claire.  the youngest of our babes.  i tell her that she’s the prettiest and the happiest and the most kissable and everything else wonderful.  and sometimes i get lucky and she’s in the same room as me for a whole evening.  like tonight.

you don’t mind a post full of her precious face, do you?

good.  here they come.

(how i wish this had focused properly!)

and here, i’ll slip one in of aubrey, our other red headed girl, because she’s so darling too!

today was… today.  at one point i said i hated it.  another time i exclaimed that i loved it.  with head in my hands i cried and said, “it’s just hard to love Jesus when you don’t love much about your life.” (selfish, i know).  this evening my fingers played my prized possession and i sang a few songs in anticipation of this upcoming sunday morning celebration and wondered if i’ve ever loved Him more.  i had planned on doing much and remembering much and dragging everyone i could get along with me tonight but in reality, tonight found me not wanting many around and the desire to stick close to home (okay, so having a car in the shop might have helped that a bit).

have i ever had such a confused day?  i cried and i laughed and i grumbled and i praised and i wanted busyness but did quiet instead.

the good news is that i wore the shirt that brings joy to my heart today.

yes, that one.  giant body flop.  there are so many reasons it brings joy, but on days like today when i myself am steeped in confusion, it’s wonderful because it causes everyone around me to be confused as well.  wondering if my theory works?  put it on and walk into the madrid bank.  trust me, it will work.  especially if you’re me.

i visit this bank once a week.  at first i found this job a bit intimidating since small town cliques can be so hard to break through and everything about that place is a huge part of my small town-ness.  and the real intimidating part?  every single lady there knew exactly who i was and everything about my life and i didn’t know a lick about them.  but at this point, after a year of these weekly visits, i’m the queen of small talk, know they’re names, where they went on vacation last year, and all about their opinions on not “spreading siblings out too far” (score for louissa — she’s on in the “in” of this clique!).  so, the tellers know me, i know them, they’re usually a bit amused by what i walk in wearing (these conservative ladies give me the up-down 99.9% of the time), but today all four women gave me a shocked/double-take.  i’m guessing it was the shirt.

or maybe it’s just that this shirt inspires me to do crazy things like my spread my arms out and run around like an airplane.

yes, maybe that’s the reason for the double-take.

yes please, i would like to be this darling.

so, dear jesus, please move me to a place with many thrift stores to thrift through.  thank you and amen.

Easter Sunday is full.  starting before the sun rises to when the sun slips beyond the horizon we have our traditions.  the celebration of life begins through the morning greetings, to the life-filled colors we wear, to the worship surrounded by hundreds of other grateful souls, to soaking up the presence of those we’ve been given to live this life beside.

i like the idea of life.  of new life.  i like the idea of no more bondage and no more fear.  i like remembering there’s more to come when these days seem difficult to plod through — that true life is still to come.

my soul has never thought much of Good Friday.  i slip into preparation mode for a filled Sunday so easily and forget to remember.  i’m going to this year.  i’ve determined that it must happen.  work will be set aside even for just the evening to love the Savior who died for me.

but i’m not sure what to do and how to worship.  what are some of the ways you celebrate Good Friday?  what family traditions do you love?

there once was a midget sprout named peach.  she was a jolly sort who enjoyed her days surrounded by a googleplex of other sprouts.  although happy little sprouts, the wind and rain and dirt had not been kind to them and they never could get their leaves to sit just right after being blown about.  one day a lion happened upon this patch of jolly-souled sprouts and thought to himself, “my, these sprouts do look uncared for.”  thankfully this lion never left his den without his trusty comb in his back pocket.  out it came and the jolly sprouts became even more lively and eternally grateful to the kind lion who arranged their leaves to the right way.

the end.

i’m sitting in bed and noticed that my left big toe is asleep.  odd, right?  it doesn’t really worry me but looking for some entertainment, i google.  apparently there are many others who suffer from the left big toe asleep disorder and most are urged to go see their doctor.

i just went to my doctor this past tuesday.  i hadn’t seen him in almost four years and they made such a fuss about it i assumed i must have unknowingly committed some crime.  they went through paperwork and weren’t very polite when they realized that they had to actually photocopy the insurance policy from my father’s folder and put it in mine.  then they brought me to a crowded small closet of a space where i was weighed, my blood pressure was taken, and they took my temperature.

did i mention that i drove forty minutes to get to my doctor’s office?  first lesson: find a doctor that lives closer.

anyway.  i answered all the questions the nurse that’s been there since i was a babe asked and was ushered into an overly warm room complete with poster after poster of all the awful things that will happen to you if don’t do _____ & _____ & possibly _____.  the exam table/bed/whatever they call it was covered with dr. seuss paper.  as i plopped down i felt twelve all over again.  only my mumsie wasn’t in the room for my support this time.

then the wait began.  so, we have a forty minute drive.  five minute discussion on how they could get my insurance policy by simply photocopying the one from my father’s folder (which is only a few folders down from mine and didn’t seem like that big of a problem to me).  five minutes being interrogated by the nurse.  and then i waited for quite some time in a stuffy room full of scary could-happen posters while sitting on crinkly seuss paper that made the biggest racket if i moved an inch.

i waited.  and i waited.  and i waited.

finally the man in the white coat bounded in the room.  that’s right, mr. adams doesn’t do anything other than bound into a room saying, “well, well, well, what do we have here?!”  he sat down, glanced at my folder full of the nurse’s notes, spent two minutes talking to me, looked at a bump on my finger and a strange rough patch on my foot and declared me to be paranoid.  i was told to stop applying so much pressure at the base of my left pointer finger and put inserts into my shoes.  i finally was paranoid enough to go see a doctor about something and that’s what i was told?

thanks for that helpful prescription.  it was totally worth all that time.

he left, i put my coat on, and after only a few minutes in the presence of the physician, i climbed back into my car and drove the forty minutes to home.

my toe is still asleep but no thank you to going to a doctor.  i’ve had enough of the doctors office to last me another four years.

i’m a list sort of person.  i have lists at work scribbled on random pieces of paper as things come to mind.  i have a list always open right in my email full of personal and yet again, work related projects.  i have lists in my head of people i want to spend time with and things i need to do.  right now i have a list of my friday and saturday and as i realize how quickly they’re filling i’m frantically sorting through how i’m going to be everywhere i need to be and do everything that i need to do.  i had a bucket list before i even knew the term “bucket list” (that movie was rather strange, don’t you think?).

and i’m currently putting together a list of accomplishments for my summer.  no, not like the one i had last summer that never saw any item crossed off — i’m determined to actually see some of these things happen.  my summer list is full of canoe paddling, cake eating (i think i’m realizing how much my world revolves around food), music making, hiking attempting, picnic feasting (more food), and color celebrations (good one, right? that was my addition!).  yup, the few months we have of green grass and hot sun are going to be enjoyed.

what are some of your favorite summer activities?  what should i add to my list of wondrous summer fun?

is there a much better way to end your day than a heaping plate of citrus goodness?

i didn’t think so either.