Tuesday, August 30, 2005

God it's great to be back at school...

TCNJ rocks! I go to one of the best schools in the NorthEast and I absolutely love it. Regardless of their stupidity level with construction, parking, student organization funding, and their liberal bias... I love this school. Had my first class, Contemporary Lit and am now waiting in between for my second one, British Lit. It just felt so good to get back into a classroom and talk about literature and writing and reading and I am so wired to be an English major it's not even funny.

We had a big IVCF 'reunion lunch' yesterday and that was just so awesome to see everyone there again. It feels like I've finally come back to my family and my home here at school. This school year is totally going to be exactly the break that I needed from summer. Honestly the only things I'm really going to miss from this summer are hanging out with E and G. Our random trips out of a plane, off of a bridge, into Philly, bonfires, and other excuses to get together were the absolute highlight of this summer. All I have to say is Colorado... minus 3 years and counting!!!

Tonight TCNJ's hosting Lollanobooza which IV is going to help set up for around 7pm. I think that's much better than having our own booth because then we get more time to 'mingle' and don't have to stay till like 2 or 3 am cleaning up. I intentionally didn't go to it last year and then kinda wished that I would have so I guess this is just making up for it.

So I've been going through and reading other people's blogs, and I think I'm finally beginning to understand just how powerful these can be and what they can be used for. Yes, to update friends on what's going on in my life to make everyone feel more socially connected with people they aren't around every day... but there's proving to be a lot more than that. Whether it's a celebrity blog like Wil Wheaton writes or a more news related social commentary like Professor Kim Pearson writes, there just might be a purpose and need for this kind of independent journalism.

Anyway, lots of life left to live today, so away I go!!!

Sunday, August 28, 2005

Starting School

So, after a most intense bout of Poison Sumac, two very interesting trips to Philadelphia, jumping out of a plane, fighting with certain friends, going to a Sarah Evans concert, and jumping off of a bridge just because all my friends did, my month of August has come to an end. In a strange way it really reflected my entire summer while being very different at the same time. It was still a time of extreme highs and extreme lows, but God carried me throughout it all, so in the end, it was all perfect. August was, just how July was, just how June was, just how May was.... just how my Summer was: according to His plan. I don't really get it, I don't know how I made it through it as well as I did, but I'm here, and I'm fine, and SCHOOL'S STARTING SOON!!!!!!!!!!

Yes, school starting excites me. I can't wait to get back into that routine. Normally I take my summers as a break from life, but this year, I can see it's going to be that life is a break from my summer... Lots of outreach work to do, lots of books to read, still gotta clean my room, and last minute planning for NSO next week!

Wanna know how to make God laugh? Tell Him all the plans that you have for your life......

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

A poem for my nightly heartache.....

Nightclub

You are so beautiful and I am a fool
to be in love with you
is a theme that keeps coming up
in songs and poems.
There seems to be no room for variation.
I have never heard anyone sing
I am so beautiful
and you are a fool to be in love with me,
even though this notion has surely
crossed the minds of women and men alike.
You are so beautiful, too bad you are a fool
is another one you don't hear.
Or, you are a fool to consider me beautiful.
That one you will never hear, guaranteed.

For no particular reason this afternoon
I am listening to Johnny Hartman
whose dark voice can curl around
the concepts on love, beauty, and foolishness
like no one else's can.
It feels like smoke curling up from a cigarette
someone left burning on a baby grand piano
around three o'clock in the morning;
smoke that billows up into the bright lights
while out there in the darkness
some of the beautiful fools have gathered
around little tables to listen,
some with their eyes closed,
others leaning forward into the music
as if it were holding them up,
or twirling the loose ice in a glass,
slipping by degrees into a rhythmic dream.

Yes, there is all this foolish beauty,
borne beyond midnight,
that has no desire to go home,
especially now when everyone in the room
is watching the large man with the tenor sax
that hangs from his neck like a golden fish.
He moves forward to the edge of the stage
and hands the instrument down to me
and nods that I should play.
So I put the mouthpiece to my lips
and blow into it with all my living breath.
We are all so foolish,
my long bebop solo begins by saying,
so damn foolish
we have become beautiful without even knowing it.

--Billy Collins



How is God everywhere?
If I've found God, what else do I need to learn before I have peace...?


Thursday, August 11, 2005

It's gonna be a year

The Things I've Learned Today... In No Particular Order

I'm in a big Will Smith mood
I'm very aprehensive about this school year
I've never been in a true position of leadership before
I'm scared of change
Unless I'm the one making the change
I'm really looking forward to my new job(s)
I have no solid idea of where I want to go in life
I don't think I can have a blog where people know who I am
I don't know what's arranged by God and what's not
I've always liked her.........



So I've got work tomorrow... yay... noon till six and no field trips so it's gonna be a long day. I'm finding my patience with the kids and some of my co-workers shortening considerably. It's not that I don't like either of them, I just need to move on, and for one reason or another, they are preventing me from doing so. I won't know any more about the new job till next week. Family vacation time kinda screws with knowing more about that. I like people, and I like learning about people, but it scares me when I realize I like people. I'm not intoxicated, just tired and confused. It's like, I know that I am Ice Cream, but there are sooooooooo many flavors of ice cream and I don't know which ones I'm allowed to or want to be...

Sunday, August 07, 2005

I only have one thing to say... and Tim McGraw says it best.

He said I was in my early twenties
With a lot of life before me
When a moment came that stopped
me on a dime
And I spent most of the next days
Looking at the x-rays
And talking ‘bout the options, talking
‘bout sweet time
And I asked him when it sank in
That this might really be the end
How’s it hit ya’ when you get that
kind of news
Man, what’d you do (he said)

C H O R U S
I went sky diving I went rocky
mountain climbing
I went two point seven seconds on a
bull named Fumanchu
And I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter
And I gave forgiveness I’d been denying
And he said one day I hope you get a
chance
To live like you were dying

He said I was finally the husband
That most the time I wasn’t
And I became a friend a friend would
like to have
And all ‘a sudden going fishin’
Wasn’t such an imposition
And I went three times that year I lost
my dad
And I finally read the good book
And I took a good long hard look
At what I’d do if I could do it all
again…and then

C H O R U S
I went sky diving I went rocky
mountain climbing
I went two point seven seconds on a
bull named Fumanchu
And I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter
And I gave forgiveness I’d been denying
And he said one day I hope you get a
chance
To live like you were dying

Like tomorrow was a gift
And you’ve got eternity to think of what
you did with it
What you did with it…what did I do with it

C H O R U S
I went sky diving I went rocky
mountain climbing
I went two point seven seconds on a
bull named Fumanchu
And I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter
And I gave forgiveness I’d been denying
And he said one day I hope you get a
chance
To live like you were dying