Chillin, mad style. With sentence fragments.

It's a Friday night and I'm in my dorm. Perfectly content. It's cold and wet outdoors. Depressing weather. I've got some Ryan Adams playing quietly, and him combined with the blanket over my feet makes this room feel warm. Earlier I had to walk around out there, and man does that chill set in fast when rain is in the mix.

Yesterday I moved myself from Griffith to Hall 20. No easy task. Once I finally got everything out of my room, into a cart, down the elevator, loaded in the car, driven all the way across campus, out of the car, up the stairs, and into room 207, I was exhausted, because I had to do that pattern five times. FIVE. How was I ever able to stuff all that in my small Honda and get it from Abilene to here? That's what I asked myself repeatedly for five mintues while I stood staring at all the bags and boxes that covered the carpet. How. Amazingly though, I was able to get all my junk put away quite neatly.

All this packing and unpacking made me realize how much unecessary crap I brought with me to college. In fact, I have a whole box designated just for these things. I wouldn't say I'm a pack-rat, I freely throw away what I find to be junk. My problem is that I see beauty and purpose in everything. Yes, a problem. It is a problem because a hand-made turtle whistle that I cherished as a child is presently sitting on my already crowded dresser top. I do not need nor do I ever get the urge to play a quick didley on my turtle flute. Yet, there he is, in all his pointless glory, next to countless other things most college students do not have in their room. In a storage box the same size as the 'pointles things' box, I have my entire book collection. In Griffith I dedicated 75% of my shelving to these books. My lovely books. Half of these books I have never read, but I find it comforting to have them with me. Here there are no shelves. Thus, under the bed they go. My poor books.

Tonight, after some sushi (deelish), I went to further culturize myself at the art opening downtown. There was some really great stuff there. It was all jewelery, and none of it the everyday Zales kind, not the everyday anything kind. These things were weird. I quite enjoyed myself. At one point though, it felt really strange to be there. I thought any minute I would turn around and see my Aunt or my Dad. Actually, this is probably the first art opening I've been to without seeing one of them there. Both artists, my dad and his sister know all the local artists in Abilene. So its guaranteed that whenever I go to anything artsy I will find one of them or one of their friends. When I first realized this it saddened me. I felt lonely in a way ...disconnected. Then I spotted Chris Talbot, then Garfeild (whoops skipped his class on wednesday. avoid... avoid...), and oh there's Gary my previous drawing teacher, and later I talked to Sarah. OHHhhhhh. This is my time. I get to do the schmoozing. No parents to introduce me, I like this. This is a challenge. And most likely my future. I'm an artist. Independent.

A cup o' joe would be great right about now. And a someone to snuggle with too. Is that too much to ask?

Yesterday I interviewed for a summer job at Pine Cove. I really feel like God's leading me towards this one. I had two people who don't even know each other encourage me to apply, and my whole interview went extremely well. Sunday I'm starting Intro to Theology at Grace and that's really going to grow me. I've got two possible mission trips lined up for spring break. I may get to go on both but I don't know what God wants yet. I even get to share about the winter mission trip on Sunday at Crosspoint. I can definitely see that the Lord is pushing me into being more of a leader than a follower. How extremely exciting is that?! I'm your's God, this life is your's.

I think I'll read now.

Sweet Lil Gal

Today I was completely blessed. Completely. I was in the Houston Galleria ice skating with some friends. I didn't fall and I didn't get a snowball thrown at the back of my head (snowball meaning some scraped ice off the ground compressed in a hot hand). But these are not the things that touched my heart. The things that brought a huge genuine smile to my face were two small hands in pink gloves. Taking a break, I was sitting on the side of the rink just enjoying the other people who found it fun to go in circles over and over again. Being MLK Day, there were people everywhere. A happy buz filled the air. Lost in my own thoughts, I was surprised to see on wall in front of me two hands pace one over the other. Slowly, oh so slowly. Nice and steady. Careful... These hands had no face. Whoever they belonged to was shorter than waist-height and a first-time skater. So I sat there laughing at these precious pink paws go from my left to the right, first her left hand, then her right. She was hanging on to that carpeted wall for dear life. So. Cute. When she finally came to the corner where I would be able to see her, my anticipation was awarded with the sweetest little girl I had ever seen. In all pink.

If this had occurred a year ago, I would have cared less. But sometime recently, my motherly instincts began to kick in. Don't worry, i'm no preggo, but I have learned to love children. Their precious innocence and moldability are foreign somethings in the adult world. I look forward to the day when I can pick up my own little Pink and hug her because I'm so proud that she made it all the way around the rink, even if she hung on the wall the entire way.

I don't even like the color pink.

well that didn't work

Earlier I was in this amazing mood to write something incredible. Now I feel like I lost it. It's just like deja-vu, for me at least. When it first happens it's so real and mind-boggling but then a second later it fades away like a lost memory. But then again, that's what it is, right? There I go again, explaining in circles. crap.

I'm in a cranky mood tonight. I'm mad at myself, first of all. I realized this afternoon that I've been concerned with things that are trivial and immature. Like facebook, what i wear, how i act, what my friend's think of me, the list goes on and on. I spent some time reading this afternoon (praise the good lord for 3-day weekends) and it really made me realize how shallow I have been lately, how much information I do not know, and how I've neglected myself, my own being. I want to be able to speak intelligently on politics. I want to tell someone my dream job in complete detail. I want to comfort a friend by backing-up what I say with scripture. But I am not able to do any of these things. I have been slacking.

In desperate attempts to name my blog something both thoughtful and catchy, I brought up the trusty dictionary/thesaurus to assist me. I felt like I was naming a band. I can't imagine how hard it must be to name a band. Everyone has to agree on it AND it has to make you famous. Both mildly difficult tasks. Or maybe it was more like naming a family pet. Similar to the band thing: everyone has to agree (which in a family is near impossible) AND the dog has to like it. Hm. So I typed in "aspire" and bingo sha-bam it spoke to me. I thought the latin roots were so cool. I've always liked latin... maybe i'll take it? Aspire means to hope for. Like I would aspire to be a photographer. The root words for aspire are "to breath." I want to breath photography. How cool is that? Go Latin. We should all aspire for something, small or big. Breathing keeps us alive. We do it whether or not we realize it. We long for things whether or not we realize it. It's built into us. For a purpose. Without hope, without breath, we would remain stagnant, we would die. So this blog is a personal attempt of mine to tap back into my creative thoughts. Writing has always been therapeutic for me. I am not writing this blog to entertain you. I'm writing it to keep me breathing, to take note of how I inhale and exhale situations. Making simple things beautiful is my aspiration.

"Without vision, the people perish"