e pluribus unum

I feel...lighter.

Tonight, a dear friend asked me what I would do differently with raising my kids from what my parents did with me.
"I would make sure they knew that they are not alone."
"You're not."

I know. At least, I've learned so, despite what I've been taught.


I am the make-up of everything around me. Absence of starlight sits in my soul, near leaves and smog and imperfect moons. I am crowded with others. My mother's strength, my father's imagination. Her masochism, his selfishness. My brother's loneliness, diluted. A bit of the faith in God of my sisters, and also a tiny growing spark of their faith in me. The healing of my boyfriend, in small measure. I am fundamentalist, fire-and-brimstone, hellbound, heaven-gazing, slowly expanding, peace-searching, solitude drawn, community grounded, hell-denying, ever-opening in heart and mind. I am always everyone I meet. I am never who I used to be.

And, I am humbly grateful.

Pick Any Verse

"He is a homo! A Sodomite! An abomination!"

So screamed the evangelist standing in front of the Tate Center on campus this morning. The jeering crowd around him fed off of their common hate for him. They screamed back. The boy the man was referring to was standing behind the evangelist wrapped in a rainbow flag and making faces. The crowd was reflecting back at the man the exact same hate he was subjecting them to.

All of this hurts my heart.

The evangelist does not seem to understand that he's only spreading hate. Animosity. Making a mockery of the religion that, through some fluke, we both claim as our own. The crowd around him is a testament to the revulsion that many are adopting as a defense against what this man would have them believe is Christianity. He called the boy an abomination - something hateful to God. That boy is a creation of God, and is as loved by the Lord as everyone else on this earth, including myself, each person in that crowd, and the evangelist himself.

Jesus preached love. Why are so many of us forgetting this? So quick to judge others, so quick to condemn, so quick to make war not only in other countries, but within our relationships to our neighbors. Love is not "spreading the word" that everyone's going to Hell. That is separation, a categorization amongst an illusory "us" and "them." There is no difference. Really, when it comes down to it, there is absolutely no difference. We are each human, and must share in the fate that God has wrought for us. We're in this together, so why are we so determined to wrench each other apart?

My prayer today is that God will give us the understanding and courage to heal the wounds we tear in ourselves.

sometimes it's difficult to notice

I went to the top of the North parking deck this morning because I needed to scout for a landscape drawing, and also because I was obscenely early to class. However, I ended up just staring. The sun was covered by blue clouds and cast pink rays. The clouds behind me were dark and soft. It started to rain, gently. A person carried a red and white striped umbrella. A girl in her car let two other cars on the road - she didn't have to, but she did. I watched rain drops fall to the ground far below me, and they swayed and skipped their ways down. I turned around to make sure no one could see me, and then I grinned. Sometimes, it's just good to be alive.
Thank you, Lord, for this day. It's amazing.

cookie-cutter

The 'oneness' felt at football games is only valued because there is a lack of oneness elsewhere.

Wearing the exact same clothes as another is an attempt to connect with someone, anyone.

If so many people here look so alike, it's only because they share the same desperate desire to be loved.

I shouldn't be angry at them. I should be angry with myself for denying them that love.

I thought I was getting over this

I try not to dwell on it, but this past week has been very difficult. And I've been ignoring that.

Yesterday, I browsed the Gospels for some comfort. But it felt like I had read it all, and the important parts many times over. It seemed irrelevant. I knew it wasn't, but that's how it felt.
I put the Bible back on the shelf.

I'm incredibly frustrated by my life right now. With my inability to inflict any change with my family, how little I've changed, the way I'm living, my disconnect with friends who used to be close, not being able to be openly friendly, my lack of a social life outside of Ryan.
As much as I like to think I've learned about dealing with the crap happening around me, I'm still pasting on a small smile and speaking calmly. I still have so much anger, so much hate built up inside of me - I'm directing it at every person I pass on the street, every building of my school. They're not special enough. They're holding me back. Not letting me be myself. I know full well that I'm to blame for all of that, but realizing that doesn't seem to improve anything.
But it's almost as though I don't want release. The only outlet I'll allow is that every few days I'll sulk when Ryan's around, and my silent disconnect hurts him more than any amount of yelling. Being angry feels too valid, hurting others feels too deserving.

My roommate needs to sleep, and I have a report to do.
I have to stop this.

Summer's Ending

How on earth can typing take so much effort?

The preceeding was a half-hearted excuse for not updating.

Now then. Today marks the beginning of my last full week at Jubilee Partners, which I will leave on August 8th. I'm not sure how I feel about the time I've spent here. I was expecting something monumental, an obvious turning point. One thing I should've learned by this point in my life is to not expect things to be so simple. At my low points, I feel as though the only thing I've learned here is that there are many, many wrongs that I am guilty of or contributing to simply because I was born more priviledged than others (white, middle-class, American, able-bodied, and reasonably intelligent). I can't plead ignorance about this anymore, but I also feel powerless to do anything about it. In other words, I feel less and less worthy of the space I'm taking up on earth. On the good days, I feel like God is paying attention to me - which is humbling, though still uplifting. At any given time, I'm less and less sure about who I am, what I'm doing, and the words that come out of my mouth (I stutter a lot these days). No, I haven't found any great answers. Not even any okay answers. I haven't met my salvation or finally figured out what paths I should take. But I'm a little more open, a little more patient, and, at times, a little more hopeful. That's something, at any rate.

I'm looking forward to being back at school (remind me to read this sentence when I start complaining). I'll be working towards a goal, feeling more connected, pleasantly distracted, and using high-speed internet. Most of all, I'll constantly be near Ryan, who has decided to stay at UGA for at least one more semester. No more of the endless wishing he's here, no more of him visiting just long enough to say goodbye, no more having to beat myself up about being so hopelessly dependent. For now. We've been together nearly ten months now, and I still can't get over how weird it is. I thought I wasn't like this. I was proud, blindly driven, no one's prisoner. Now, I'm second-guessing whether I should study abroad because I don't know that I could spend another summer being so far away from him. I was also stubborn, cold, and relentlessly alone. Now, I wonder why I feel as though I have to fight against being this happy.
There. I said it. I'm happy.
I don't get it either.


Right now, these words speak the most to me. They're carved around a playground structure in the center of Jubilee, and as I look back on all the trials and mistakes and miracles that brought me here, I am certain that, somehow, this is where I'm meant to be.
"For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Romans 8:38-39, New International Version

of course it would happen this way

I was sorting new books for Jubilee's library when I came across a phrase in one of the book's blurbs. It was something like reconciling the dichotomy between the belief in a merciful God with no justice or a just God with no mercy. I find the concept of Hell very disturbing. We are supposed to believe that God loves his/her people so much and does not want them to go to Hell, where they would be in a lot of pain. However, this Hell is a place that God created, or, at the very least, allows to exist. A place specifically for the people who choose to be separate from God to go and suffer.
A loving God would create such a place?



An anecdote from one of the Partners: After a hurricane devastated parts of Nicaragua, an aid worker from the US was talking to a Nicaraguan woman, with the Partner translating. The Nicaraguan woman had spent five days trying to escape from the flooding. She and her family started by climbing on the table. As the water continued to rise, they climbed into the rafters. Then, onto the roof. Finally, she had to assist her older children into a tall tree and carried the youngest on her back into the branches. On the fifth day of trying to escape the rising water with little or no food, the rain stopped.
"Where was God in all this?" the American aid worker asked through the Partner. The woman didn't understand, and the Partner had to translate and re-word the question many times. Finally, the woman grasped the meaning of the question and said she could answer it.
"Praise be to God," she said, "He stopped the rain on the fifth day."

That, at least, I understand.

************************************

Ryan finally got his response from Northwestern. He was accepted into the School of Arts and Sciences, but not the Journalism School, which was his whole point in going. He can either choose a different major and go to Chicago, choose a different major and stay at UGA, or stay in the UGA journalism program. Many choices, but no answers.

I didn't imagine a situation in which we'd both be crushed at the response. God works in surprising ways, but it's difficult to convince Ryan of a divine plan when after all his hard work and doing everything right, things still did not work out for him. He has to decide by the 19th. I'm trying my hardest to convince him to make a decision that doesn't involve me as a factor and to not lose hope. If anyone should be able to understand his need to leave this place, it should be me. Besides, he's meant for so much more than this - destiny crackles around him like static electricity. If he can just keep from giving up I know he'll change the world in unimaginable ways.

One-Track Mind; or, It All Comes Back to the Same Thing

Sequence of a Lover's Mind:

Thought #1: Wow, my roommate and my boyfriend both go off on tangents about imaginary and ridiculous situations. I should make sure they're properly introduced - they'd get along great!

Thought #2 (Immediately Following Thought #1): What if they got along too well? MY ROOMMATE AND MY BOYFRIEND MUST NEVER MEET.


Yes, that actually happened in my head. No, I'm not that jealous. I just think it's funny how much that part of me has changed.

**********************

The summer continues to run at an alarming clip. Each day is both mundane and extraordinary, and it's amazing (and depressing) how often the extraordinary parts pass without my notice.
I'm feeling a bit guilty that I'm not spending more time with the other Volunteers over the weekends, which I usually spend with Ryan or hidden while reading or struggling with art. I want to connect with my fellow Volunteers, but Ryan is my priority (I'm in love - I can't help it) and it's hard not to indulge in books I actually want to read and art that I have had to deny myself during the school year. Also, after spending so much of every day surrounded by people, my patience wears thin. Maybe they'll forgive me. They'd forgive me less, I think, if I silently clung to their coat-tails. That gets annoying for everyone.
Northwestern says they've sent off the final acceptance and rejection letters as of Friday, and their website should be updated with decisions by Monday or Tuesday. I must brace myself I must brace myself I must brace myself. No outcome of this can be altogether happy for me. Either Ryan gets in and I'm selfishly sad and lonely until whenever he graduates, or he is rejected and broken-hearted (and me with him). I can never make these things easy on myself, can I?
Two of my Burundi students leave for Atlanta on July 12. The third student will leave shortly thereafter. Lord, help me to prepare them as best I can. Their new lives will not be easy. In fact, they will be incredibly difficult. God help them.
I never really write about happy things, do I? Yeesh, I need to watch some sixties musicals or something. You know, all those people running around, dancing, telling each other how great life is while in perfect rhythm and harmony, all while stepping in unison? I could take a lesson from them. Uh. Maybe.
Ryan dreams in musicals sometimes. My dreams are always very violent. Maybe I can blame all this trite complaining on my subconscious. It obviously has some serious issues.

on Truth and other impossible concepts

This week, Jubilee got a letter from one of the death row inmates that some of the Partners visit. Al read it out loud as part of his devotion session, and while the prisoner did not seem particularly optimistic about his situation (for good reason), he did have some very wise words to say, in his own way. I remember him saying something along the lines of: one can not choose whether one is good or evil, or what sins one is destined to commit, because saying that you have free will is to put yourself higher than God. But no matter what our actions turn out to be or what fate the Lord has in store for us, we must accept that it is our role in this life, and we must remember that God is within and around each and every one of us. We must 'Let Go and Let God.'
Scheduled to be murdered with the consent of society. What a lonely, lonely place to be and fate to accept.
I have been trying to wrap my mind around the concept of the Lord being above good or evil as of late. This isn't to say necessarily that God does evil things, but that our concept of good and evil is flawed. With so much in this world consisting of shades of grey and the goodness or badness of every situation being relative to points of view, for us to say that God would be simpler is absolutely ludicrous. I must learn to accept those parts of myself that I have labeled as evil as simply being parts of myself in the way that God has made me. Yes, I should try to change myself into a better person, but this means changing myself into a 'more true' person as opposed to a 'more good' person. While the 'more true' mostly lines up with what I used to consider the 'more good,' it also involves accepting and loving the faults in myself and the faults in others. As to how much I think I have figured out of what Truth is, Love is as far as I've gotten. Right now, I hope that it's as much as I need.

Jesus basically told his disciples that he could tell them what Truth was, but they wouldn't get it. I will have to content myself with the particles of it that the Lord chooses to show me.

Too Much for Words

This summer keeps barrelling on without much regard to how much time I have to update my blog.

Today marks my seventh day as a Volunteer at Jubilee Partners. It's been scary, unexpected, familiar, too far, and too close all at the same time.
The other Volunteers are all very nice and I get along with them very well so far - although I sometimes go off to brood or read or sketch, which may be coming off as anti-social. Well, that wouldn't be too far off the mark. There's a couple of people here who seem very "main-stream". I don't mean that in the Counter-Culture Elitist way so much as the fact that a few seem very interested in partying and drinking and popular culture, which I didn't expect from anyone who wanted to come to Jubilee. It probably has something to do with us being such a young group. Perhaps they are the ones who will most benefit from being here.
As far as faith is concerned, I'm still finding myself very confused. Part of me feels like I should be staying home and looking after my family, as fruitless and thankless as that would be. A great deal of me wants to escape to Ryan's room and never leave. Sometimes I get nervous when there are a lot of people in the K-House (the main house where the Volunteers live and the entire community meets for meals). The other Volunteers are either very mainstream (as I mentioned) or I've-Been-Doing-Service-My-Entire-Life-I'm-So-Close-To-God-type people. Neither type helps me feel less alone in where I stand. If I can't recover my spirit here at Jubilee, I don't know where else to go. This is my last option, and possibly my last chance.
My chief jobs at Jubilee are (in descending order): driver, correspondence assistant to Don Mosley, painter, laundry person for the K-House and when the refugees leave, and back-up computer consultant. I will also teach the advanced beginner class and do refugee childcare.
The word "advanced" is very relative. Coming from Berundi, which suffered the same genocide made famous in Rwanda, the refugees I am teaching are having a difficult time reading analog clocks and can only comprehend the present continuous tense so far. They can count money and are more-or-less literate in their own language, but chances are that they will never meet a stranger in Atlanta who also speaks Kirundi. They only receive two months of instruction at Jubilee, no matter what their level. Then, they are removed to Atlanta, where they will receive two months of financial aid before being let loose in a country that's 'foreign' to the absolute extreme meaning of the word. My students have children, few job skills, and no way to comprehend most of what will be going on around them in Atlanta. I can't fail them. I can't let myself do that. Of all the injustices they have suffered after being removed from their homes and imprisoned in refugee camps, me not being able to help them would be the greatest sin of all.
It just hit me last night that Ryan will hear from Northwestern in the next week or so. There is no reason he wouldn't be accepted. I must stop day-dreaming about what fall would be like if he were to stay at UGA. It won't happen.
I'm so scared. I've been dreading this throughout our relationship. I knew it was coming. Oh, Lord, I don't know if I could survive losing him.

I leave with my first word in Kirundi that I've learned, spelled phonetically.
"Ensawa" = "Good"

Salir

A day and a half left in Mexico. At the very least, I will leave here with a renewed sense of humanity and humility. When the social levels and blind luck are stripped away, we are all made of the same dirt and water when brought before God. The only real difference is what we make of it. Here, as with anywhere else, most people are making the best they can.
The crowded thousands in the mercados - they scrape together their principles with their dirt and choose to try to better the lives of their families.
The long-dead builders of temples - they used blood and clay to make the future aware of their existance.
The silly little foreign writers - well, they do what they can, too, although it often means giving up. Or placing themselves on the highest of pedestals. This trip, perhaps, will be one more chink in the destruction of my own.
However, I'll be glad to be back in the States. Back to the luxuries of flushing your toilet paper, drinking from the tap, and seeing leaves every once in a while. Regardless, may God keep me from ever forgetting this trip.

Mexico

Hopefully, I'll get a chance to write more on both Mexico and Missouri in the next two weeks, but here's a brief description of what I've done thus far.



Tonight, Hannah and I are spending as much time as possible at the nearest internet cafe (which, by the way, has no food, just computers - but it's still a cafe) so that we don't have to go to 'Youth Club' to socialize with the insufferable youth group here. They're basically the source of Hannah's misery here, and will only sometimes acknowledge my presence. However, the family that lives here at the church seems extremely nice, especially the mother, Yolanda (it was the pastor's family, particularly the daughter, that was giving Hans a hard time). Yolanda keeps feeding me, though, and is very offended if I don't clean my plate. She's a great cook, but thinks that I should eat about as much as my father. If I return ten pounds heavier, you can blame her.
We have gone so many places and done so many things! I've seen the most priviledged families and beautiful buildings, only to return to the 'lower middle class' La Mancha district, where we're staying until Sunday. The lower middle class here can only dream of the luxeries offered our lower class; here, I shower on the roof and Yolanda's four-person family inhabits one room. I've never seen so much blind wealth in such close proximity to destitution. Never let me complain about being poor ever again.
I've burned quietly under more cat-calls and objectifications than any human being should have to endure, and I've only been here three days. If women here don't move farther in this world, it's because they're reminded every thirty seconds that they are animals.
I've stood inches away from walls touched and transformed by Diego Rivera and the very worktable where Frida Kahlo dreamed and planned paintings that would change the West's views of Latino intellectualism forever.
I've blown my nose only to see that what came out of it was the color of exhaust.
I've walked and walked and walked and rode and rode and rode over and under so much of this massive city.
I've watched the sun set on the tiny little houses, potted plants, dirty cats, and bright orange lights that make up La Mancha.
And I've only been here four days.

Missouri

I must try to make this quick - the library is closing.

A very, very long drive. Fourteen hours through Atlanta, mountains, Tennessee (and all of its mountaintop fireworks shops), Kentucky, endless Illinois (including Metropolis, the proud home of Superman), and flat, green Missouri.
Days on the lake near a permanent carnival of a town.
Surprisingly, people in Missouri have accents. More surprisingly, that surprised me.
The sun set three times.
An overnight drive back.
I finally saw the Mississippi River.

I must leave now.

7:43 AM, 7 May 2007

I have spent my last night in Boggs, the last night of my first year.

I will shower, dress, pack, clean, and leave.

It was a beautiful year, and now it's over. It will never be the same, but, oh, no one can ever take this from me. This is is mine, forever.



Time to go.

rewind/fastforward/dontmove/fullspeed

This school year is ending, and for the first time that I can remember, I feel more alive for the fact that it happened.

I've dug my pit deeper, pulled myself to its rim, and was carried far away from it (it sometimes casts the shadows in the corners of my room). My relationship with God has waned to the point of desperation, risen high enough that I've caught sight of my old faith, and been warped to the questioning of rightwrong specialuniform changingstatic whoiam whoimmeanttobe. I now know that I can survive without my best friends around, although who I am changes without their influence - I don't know if for better or worse. I still don't know what I'm doing here, but I'm trying to make that into something more or less good.

I've fallen in love.

And really, that's what has changed everything.

I no longer feel old. I no longer feel that time is a better friend the faster it moves. I am so much stronger - I've cried already this year, and it wasn't even for sadness. I still get dizzy and my body still has trouble dealing with stress, but I've kept my weight (a little too well, actually). I've had a couple of conversations with my family that were more than superficial. That should be a goal this coming year, to learn to talk to them a little.
And hey, I'm still writing, aren't I? I must be more than just alive.

Yes, I've been living for about six or seven months now. My life is good. I am always just being born, and I thank God for that above many, many things.

This summer: Lake of the Ozarks, Mexico City, Jubilee Partners. I won't write here often, but I will write.

"Now is only soil. Ideas, the seeds we plant in them, exist outside of that. Now is just a neutral substance, something that lasts forever but never really starts.
Now, we will live forever. Now, we will love forever. Now, we are as the same person, sometimes." - RB

Serpiente: a Petty, Petty Subject

So, I've been fussed at by one girl for leaving my MySpace and LiveJournal accounts. I don't consider our friendship important anymore, so on, so forth. It's so exasperating, but I guess that in many ways she's right - I've moved beyond many of the people I hung out with during my last year of high school. That's not necessarily saying anything bad about them, but I choose a few strands of friendship that I build up and cling to; I'm not interested in having many friends, especially those who could care less about what happens to me and who I am (and vice versa). I'm not interested in remaining friends with people who discourage my spiritual growth for selfish reasons or who don't care enough about where they're going in life to care about anyone else. This particular girl had her chance to be one of the close ones. I clung to the strand that was our friendship until it lashed out at me too many times, at which point I finally let go. After some wrongs committed and realized on both sides she has tried to reconnect that tie, but, once again, I'm not interested. That's the truth.
She has the link to this page; she may very well read this. I know that I'm not being as forgiving as I should be, and that this entire entry has me coming off sounding like a complete jerk. Perhaps I am one.
However, one of Aesop's Fables comes to mind. A farmer cuts off the end of a snake's tail. In retaliation, the snake bites the farmer's son, and the son dies. The farmer approaches the snake, saying, "Please, let's stop this: let's forgive and forget."
"I'll agree to forgive," said the snake, "but I will never forget the loss of my tail, nor you the loss of your son."
By this time last year this girl had caused me and some of the people I love a lot of pain, for various reasons. Aside from her causing me emotional pain, she also caused me to not be able to throw my heart into the welfare of other people in all the time since. My best friends were constantly having to worry about me and exchange frustrations to each other about my situation. The family that had been kindest to her were constantly taken advantage of. The entire situation took a toll on everybody's state of mind.
Yes, the situation has been amended. Yes, plenty of time has passed. Yes, forgiveness has been exchanged on all sides.
But I will not forget the loss of my share of innocence, nor she the loss of her pride and her friend.

another first

Welcome to my latest little endeavor. Here, I plan to write words of a little more substance than I usually do - try to find my way around inside my own head. My faith, my trials, my joys, my thoughts on what's happening around me. Basically, this is here mostly for my own benefit, though you're welcome to read.

In other words, I hope to chronicle here my own search to make one tiny mark on the world I live in.

Or dissolve into meaningless rants. Only time will tell.