christmas

My sister walks into my room as I'm glueing another ribbon on yet another christmas card. I'm up to 58 now with about 42 left and am getting tired out/frustrated. "Whatever possessed me to handmake all my Christmas cards this year?!" I puff out. She stops for a second, tilts her head to ponder and answers profoundly "love and stupidity."

You're so right, Anne, so right.

Survey

A survey that matches up your views with presidential candidates:

http://minnesota.publicradio.org/projects/ongoing/select_a_candidate/poll.php?race_id=13

thanks to Darius for this link and for always answering my questions honestly :-]

story time with sarah jo

Let me set the scene for you. It's 4:30pm. I am on Interstate 20 headed East through Louisianna, roughly 30 minutes from the Mississippi river and 1.5 hours from my destination. I finished a 12 oz. cup of gas station coffee and am making headway on my 16 oz bottle of water when I drive by a flashing sign that says "Road closed ahead". Huh. I surmise, based on previous traffic experiences, that an accident has occurred and I will be sitting like a duck for the next two hours until it gets cleared. I settle in for the wait.

My hope rises as, 2.5 hours later, we begin to move. Suddenly, I see we are being diverted off the interstate onto a small two lane backwoods road. Whatever caused I-20 to close was apparantly big: there was a line of cars inching by me in the opposite direction. Night has fallen and I have consumed my water.

Another hour passes. As I face a long row of tail lights in front of me, and mounting pressure in my bladder, I slowly pass a house here, an old church there, a warehouse here, some train tracks over there...no gas station and no sign of a town. It's hard to see what is out there, but it looks like shrubbery and some woods. Occassionally, when we move forward, we pass a substantial bit of shubbery and as the pressure turns to pain, I get an idea.

It was the perfect moment: it's been almost four hours, the cars were in gridlock with no movement, there was enough level grass to pull over, what looked like some substantial woods with a clearning beyond the row of trees and bush. I pull over, grab my flashlight. With a row of headlights illuminating me from behind, I pop my trunk, grab my emergency roll of toilet paper and head for the woods hoping to lose my audience behind the brush.

Said brush was incredibly dense and I almost lost my flashlight trying to push through. Using momentum and force, I rushed straight forward and was flinally clearing the undergrowth when..DANG IT! THERE JUST HAD TO BE A SWAMP DIDN'T THERE?! Suddenly up to my knees in muck and mire, I step forward but my unsubstantial pair of flats get swallowed. Knocked off balance, I'm trying to keep my momentum from pushing me forward into immersion while holding onto my keys and flashlight. I struggle ungracefully while the row of cars watches the beam from my flashlight disco around. Shoving everything into one arm, I reach into the mire with the other to rescue my shoes. I'm not leaving them behind! Holding onto my flashlight, toilet paper and keys in one hand and my muddy shoes in the other, I turn around to discover that I have no place to pee [I was standing in swamp water up to my knees still] and not nearly enough bush to hide my business.

I'm sure I was a sight stumbling out of the woods covered in mire, barefoot, clinging onto half muddy paraphanelia. I don't even know why I brought the roll of toilet paper (such as it was) back, I should've left it as a swamp offering. I was, honestly, covered, it was all down the front of me and my pants were encased with mire and stunk. I still had to pee!

Well, God heard my desperate prayer because 10 minutes later, with a light beaming from heaven, there was a Fina gas station. Ironically, I probably wasn't less than a mile from it for the past hour. Another girl and I were racing for the bathrooms and she beat me to the women's so I veered into the men's. When I emerged, still dripping with mire and covered from top to bottom in mud, the line of men waiting for the restroom were no doubt surprised.

I arrived at Hilary's at 9:30 p.m, a good five hours late. Though I had tried to warn her, her sounds of exclamation and laughter confirmed that I looked as bad as I thought I did. She kindly ushered me into the shower, took my clothes to her washing machine and then fed me.

In the few moments before I first exited my vehicle, I admit my pride was thinking how amazed my friends would be when I nonchalantly tell them I pulled over and peed in the woods because I was stuck in traffic for four hours and just had to go. They would admire my wilderness prowess, my fearlessness. Well, I fought the elements and lost. The Lousianna swamp may have taken my pride but it didn't get my shoes...or my laughter. :-]

The end.

samantha

I'm going to Mississippi for a wedding this weekend.

And this is one of my all-time favorite pictures.

witness

Last Saturday was my first time to go witnessing in Deep Ellum. I tagged along with Jason Martin. We didn't get very far geographically as we ended up engaged in a conversation with a guy named Quinton outside a very popular club for almost the entire night. At first, Quinton's friend, who name is Seven [very cool name :-], was there talking with us as well, but he left about 10 minutes into the conversation. Seven seemed to be troubled by our topic of conversation, I think in a good way though, a way where he was hearing the truth and it was uncomfortable, not in a detached flippant, 'I don't care' sort of a way.

In one sense, Quinton was awesome to talk to. He had lots of good questions and wasn't afraid to ask. Jason started talking to him about God's standard and how if we don't meet it we are going to get what we deserve: hell. He didn't put it quite so bluntly but stresed the point that poeple walk around thinking they are good but the Bible says we are not and if we really took a second to stop and examine us and our world we would see how completely ungood we are. Quinton had alot of application questions such as - if a man were to break into your house and threaten your family would it be okay to kill him, and would it be wrong to not pay your taxes even though the government is corrupt and if a judge were to follow the Bible doesn't that mean that he's supposed to forgive a murderer and not punish him, etc. He had a hard time understanding that God's punishment is just and good. This is understandable because we are confronted everyday by man's punishment of another man which is flawed and often not really just nor good. Sometimes, is hard to understand the otherness of God, and how He can be something that man cannot be.

Quinton's questions all stemmed from the core issues of justice and respect. I think this is partly because of the historical injustices that have been committed against African Americans. I was mentioning to Jason that often African Americans seem more respectful to you and will listen to what you have to say. They seem more conscious about giving respect because they know what its like to go without it - where, sometimes, people like me who have always had respect, demand it without thought. Because of this, Quinton had a hard time giving up his own sense of what justice should be. In the end, he kept asking the same questions wanting a different answer because he didn't like the truth.

Man runs around trying to be his own god. But he did not create himself, he cannot stop himself from dying or make the sun come up or add an inch to his own height. Who are we to decide what is good and what is evil when we cannot even do a simple thing such as cause our head to grow an extra hair?Man deceives himself into thinking he has control when all around him is evidence that he does not. Even as followers of Christ, we do this same thing. The Bible says the wisdom of God is foolishness to man. Quinton's struggles and his questions highlighted in me the constant need to hand over my life to Christ and my ideals of how things should be and to be sure that I am living according to what IS truth, even if its uncomfortable or difficult.

The night wrapped up around 1am with a brief encounter with a homeless guy [I think he was homeless] but I honestly forgot his name. I think it was John (or maybe Steve?) anyhow, he was really cool and was selling candy bars and I had wished that I could've bought some from him but I didn't have any cash on me. This made me resolve to take some cash next time. Who knows but that next time my abundance could bless someone in need?

winter

I do not know if winter brings the heavier posts or if is the result of circumstance. I feel like a spoiled child, crying when I don't receive some thing I deam precious and yet basking in the comfort of warmth, food, salvation, and eternal hope.

Yesterday, I was asked "What is important to you?" It caught me off guard and so I was forced to be honest: Jesus, my family, the lost. It really is that simple for me. Everything else I hold losely too. Perhaps that is why I often feel no direction, because I don't have a plan. I do not think its important to have a certain profession or live in a particular place. [It is only important if God tells you to do so.] I could go anywhere and do anything, that is why I often entertain the thought of going anywhere and doing anything :-]

Perhaps its because I'm a "free spirit", perhaps its because I've known extensive loss, perhaps its just my disposition. I cling to very few things. Sometimes, I get the feeling that I ought to care more about the particulars, that everyone is a little annoyed at me for not caring. But it just doesn't matter. Anyway I turn, time takes away what is precious and leads me to discovery newness. Its both painful and exhausting, joyous and adventurous.