dostoevsky is the best ever. period.

i am doing nothing other than procrastinating from what i really need to do.
read A Severe Mercy yesterday. good book. you should read it. i could say a lot more about it, as i could Crime and Punishment, but it would feel so contrived here. and you didn't ask. read them both if you have not.
i wonder if anyone even reads this anymore. i'm on here too much, i cannot wait to get a job, and a life, and a little independence back. some responsibility might be good too. those of you that are cursing it right now, just remember that i'm wishing for it. life is not so good when there's nothing in it; i suppose adulthood is another form of childhood...but different. very good in its own way, i guess. i hope i never settle in to middle age. ugh, yuck.
the days are lost on me lately.
not only do i have to take the GRE in two weeks--i discovered yesterday--but i also must take the psych test. crap, i'm so bad at names, and that's half that test. so i'm obviously not applying to any big schools, like UW, DU, Boston anything, etc. because i freaking dropped the ball and waited too long. that's okay, i guess, but i really would've liked a shot at DU since i totally agree with their philosophy. christian schools it is for me, then, i suppose. and i decided to stay with psych bc there is a reason i chose it in the first place, and even though i would probably be really good at teaching literature, etc., it is no great loss to give up a might for a will. and it's not like i have to be a one-sided brain all my life and give up all my creativity just because i want to help children in the sex-slave industry. that is, perhaps, where my gifts and more of my passion lie, so it is obviously the better choice, even though i do love literature. i suppose i can always go back and do it later. the whole point of this was to say that i have two tests to take that i haven't studied for, which i am disappointed in myself for because i have had the time, but haven't done it, and should feel stressed about it in some way (perhaps more as punishment and a reminder for discipline in the future) but there's nothing i can do about the lost time now, except study in the time that i do have. so that is what i will be doing for the next two or three weeks. yay.
and i am so confused as to why everyone hates socialism so much. "watch out, it's scary! it's scary!" (do you rmmbr that, n? funny.)

Bad Hair?

Rebs found this on myspace. I thought it was worthy of sharing. Step right up and check out a bunch of ugly hair.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I thought you girls would enjoy this... disco turkey

Sometimes I forget there is a sky

Sometimes I forget to look up. I forget that the sky is more than an outdoor ceiling just slightly out of my 5'4" reach. I forget that the sky is an infinite expanse of space stretching toward the heavens, sprinkled with stars, planets, and things that shine and burn and freeze. What does this mean? It means that I'm looking eye level or, more likely, downward. I'm preoccupied with the tangible, the immediate, and the earthly. Of course I am. I'm in the midst of it. But still I need to remember to look up. I need to remember that creation is bigger than the radius of my arms. God is bigger than what I can grasp. I need to remember to take time to look up and wonder, to "ooh" and "awww" in wide-eyed wonder, or at least to gaze and smile at the beauty of the incomprehensible God. I think I will do that some time this week in honor of thanks giving. I will take time to go sit somewhere and just look up. Maybe then I will be thankful, not for turkey or pie or trite things, but for the things that a child of God should be thankful for.

I wish I had something good to say, but all I have is this poem

I hardly recognize myself now,
museumed-out eyes, hollow rounded
nostrils on smooth skin, like marble edges
worn down. I've explored every curve
of this self-disappearance, tried this perfection
to insanity, white and geometrical teeth
smile back at me. I know the girl is fake.

This town is my ever-expanding
cage, it seems to encompass the
forty mile radius to coffee shops
in neighboring cities, its wires creeping
even into the place where I grew up.
Beauty and home deplete into
lonliness, when it is all
we have.

My head is split with knowledge
too heavy, a diet of one thing can
make anyone empty. Who will ever
poke around inside? I feel I could die
and no one would notice, weeks on the
carpet, my brains crusting over.

What a waste, they would say, when
they found me.

feet in the gutter, i don't walk on water, but still have faith

so, now, are we sure, before i commit my ephemeral life to the study of people, that i should not do literature/creative writing instead? yes, one says, because you are not flannery o'connor or chesterton or a few other of the greats and no one but them should ever have written. 'that is not true,' i say, 'there is something to appreciate about diversity and uniqueness.' you are right, you say, as always. that did not really happen, and you did not really say those things, so let's move on: does anyone else think that life is too short to become a stuffy old professor? i certainly do. i would rather travel, take pictures, write stories, and love love love people. ('maybe when you are less selfish,' you think.) 'but to what end?' i ask myself. nothing is worthwhile without purpose. personal happiness is not quite an end; some people think it is, but it is not really satisfying and becomes dull. there is no real purpose in that. oh this practicality that tortures me, i want to kill it. i have to be able to support myself since i may never marry and support my parents when they are old, i will not do that by traveling with a camera and a notebook. but i want a boy who is poetry too. oh, these things that hold us down.
i am itching for a trip. that means i am itching to see you. i need i need i need to see you. i hope that we are not all so happy in our own lives there is not room for one another anymore. there is room for you still. i was nice to a girl i didn't know the other day. i told you guys i'm nice in the real world, but biola just freaks me out.
i know i have been blogging too much too, like naomie thinks she has. although i could never agree with her, unless she starts reasoning with me, then i would be forced to agree, as i always am, being awed by her powers of intellect.
you all must forgive me for my language. i reread myself and realize that i curse every time i post. (i hope no young girls ever read this, what a bad example i could be. but they won't; i googled myself and it is hard to find me. good.) but it is because there is tension within me--i am having difficulty transitioning--and it flows out from my frustrations of missing you. and you're the only people i can curse with. otherwise my witness is unreliable in the court of unbelievers. ha. but there is no art in my speech. and that happens whenever i feel like total crap, which i do, which we all now know. so here is some art for you: i feel like shit. except right now. please pray that i get a job, it is easy to despair when the days pass by so languidly. do not demur.
except you see, that i am here because God wanted me here, and not only does he know the future better than i, but he knows me far better than do i, so i am trusting Him in that. here i am for a time, but i will not be here forever, nor will i be doing this forever, nor will we always be together, so i love you while i may. forgive me for sometimes not being so forthcoming with it. i think it is hard, when you are steeped in yourself and nothingness, to care much about anything else because it simply does not matter. nothing touches you, so there is little motivation to touch anything. this solitude is likely to drive one mad. i am simply frustrated, not yet mad. so do not fret your pretty brown eyes over it, dearies.
why why why am i posting? because here is what i need to do: write a story. here is my assignment: write a story. but i have no ideas for a plot. poetry is so much easier, because my mind is not consumed with conflict, climax, resolution, but with better things like flying, hope, and the like. if i could be anything in the world, well, i would be myself because there's nothing i could be more beautiful being than to be myself and what i am meant to be, but then i would be a bird, and then i would be music. but let's not get overly practical again so that i can get back to what i was saying before: if i could be anything in the world, i would be music. i would move and express feeling while still having words to use, good words, since i would be good music that takes your thoughts to better places and reminds you of better things that are beautiful and lie outside of yourself. and it would be good. but i am not music, so i move differently and write poorly and take the days in stride.
oh how i love you.
how terribly i miss you.
i am off to: write a story. but even though i have been blogging too much already, i may return yet.

rebekah's christmas gift

i've found naomi's.... not here's Rebekah's
http://www.urbanoutfitters.com/shopping/product/detailmain.jsp?itemID=4795&itemType=PRODUCT&iMainCat=1226&iSubCat=1242&iProductID=4795

i'm gonna be a supermodel

one of my favorites of naomi. she's hot.

do you guys ever think about things that your friends could say that would come out of nowhere? like, molly: "i'm pregnant." or naomi, "i've decided the complementarians are right, as are the calvinists; i don't know why i never saw it before--i must not have been predestined until now" as opposed to anna, "i'm choosing to become a feminist and an armenian." or mary and rebs, "we've decided to be celibate for the rest of our lives."

Okay, I've been blogging way too much lately, this is the last one for a while

But I had to write it because something exciting happened. I'm sitting in Peet's studying and a man comes over, asks me what I am studying, I say mechanics, he displays the mild disinterest that I myself feel for the subject, but then we start talking about how he just came from Italy and was going back, he really liked it there, apparently he's been there seven years. And he's a professor of world literature. So I ask him about the Russians and he's spend two years in Russia, and then we talk about my minimal travels to the UK, apparently he's studied Kierkegaard at Cambridge. It was just a really good conversation, one of those when you can't get the words out fast enough because the thing you are trying to say is so important but the other person understands you anyway. Like what was so otherworldly about Ireland (a thousand shades of green, he said, and the mist moves sideways) or how the world was so intense to Kierkegaard, everything so deep, he seemed to live life deeper. And we talked about other philosophers and other places, and it was just so nice to meet someone who knew and loved the same things, and to talk to someone who knows what you mean. Such an interesting person, and he said I was fascinating and I enlivened his soul (as he did mine). So I wish you all such conversations.

One of my favorite pictures of Liz

She almost looks like she is flipping off the camera.

A child

That is what Emmitt is. He wakes me up at all hours of the night. And in the morning, he claws my head (at 6 am!) until I get up to get him food. And then at 8 he does it again. As if I don't remember that I just fed him two hours ago. It would be okay if I really cared about him enough to feed him and give him all the attention he desired, but really it just makes me angry. I swear at him (!) and push him off the bed. It would not be bad at all if he didn't stab me with his death-claws. But it hurts. I don't know how my parents stand it. I could lock him in the bathroom, but I think this would be mean, so I won't let myself do it. One of these mornings, though, I might just lose it.
Any suggestions for the Christmas break book? I'm thinking Les Miserables. I've never read it. We could all read it. Or A portrait of the artist as a young man. Or the devils. Actually, I think we could fit in Joyce and one long one. Joyce and Hugo. Who's with me? I'm really excited for the Hugo, actually. Aren't you??
Hmm, what else? Today I do not feel like a failure. But that is just today. And my cat is happy because I picked him up and rubbed his head. And I went on a run. 2 good things! And life is manageable. Christmas is my favorite. I got B a Christmas present. I think I know what I'm going to get Wendy. Have you guys ever read Till we have faces? I think it is definitely the best book C.S. Lewis wrote. If you don't have it I will send you my copy. It is so worth reading. I'm not joking. Almost as much as Mark's blog. I read the end again today. How do I have time to do all these things, you ask, to pet my cat and run and reread the ends of books? I don't, I will be killing myself tomorrow. Peace out, friends, goodnight.
(Why is this book so good? Because it shows the answers to our struggles and pain cannot be worked out in propositions, because our pain can hardly be worked out this way. And it portrays selfishness in such an interesting light, we are all so selfish. And the person of Christ is the answer, and we become like him. It is so beautiful, I love it. It is not at all trite like some of the early Lewis.)
One other thing, I think that I grow bad ideas when I do not talk about things with you all. Like today in the grad student BS (ha. bible study) I am in, I said that I don't think we need self-control, that if I don't feel like doing something perhaps I should change my heart. (My deep heart, I need to get in touch with my deep heart, deep inside, hidden, we all have a deep heart, I learned this from I-forget-his-name, but he sure knows that in my deep heart I want to be beautiful and to share in his adventure.) Of course, this is idiotic, we all do things we don't feel like doing, as far as getting out of bed, sort of trivial actions that we know we should do. I suppose what I meant was pertaining more to forgiveness and love and the like. But I didn't say this, I said something totally stupid. I thought that they should kick me out. "You're too stupid for our BS, we are not wasting our time on you anymore." But they didn't, I am grateful. Shoot, perhaps this bad thing cancels out the two good things I did today and I am back down to being a failure.

Is this appropriate?

Tom on myspace sent one of thoes mass e-mails about the new myspace CD they are producing. DON'T STOP READING HERE JUST BECAUSE YOU THING MYSPACE IS LAME. So I was reading what groups were on the CD and I happen upon an interesting song:
"Every Man Has A Molly"-- by Say Anything.
I only got to hear a 30 second clip on Amazon.com but I thought it might be amusing for you all to check out. It's about a guy who has his heart broken by a girl named Molly. I also found the song lyrics

Choose your own adventure part II

Okay losers, even though you didnt chose your own adventure, i'll post part 2 anyway.

Option A

You feel a little awkward about what you've resolved to do. After all, you don't want to leave embarrassing butt prints on the machine for the first person who comes in tomorrow. However, you know the look on your friends' faces will be priceless when they realize what you have sent them. "Friends come first" you tell yourself. You then proceed to hop up onto the copier (with your thong underwear on) and make 10 copies for your closest friends. Strange how glass that was once so cold can warm so quickly as that beam of light scans the surface! Quite pleased with yourself, you return to your desk and convert your cheeky prank into holiday greeting sure to get laughs from your less savory friends, creativley making your own envelopes from brightly colored company fliers. "Time to go home!", you tell yourself as you walk toward the elevator. You are so excited about the remarks you know are sure to come that you don't even notice that one of the cards falls out of the stack and lands on the floor. The next morning your homophobic co-worker Juan comes into the office extra early. Jaun is probably your least favorite co-worker. He is vain, presumptious, and a bit of a whiner. It is his birthday and being the narcissist that he is, he wants to be at his desk first thing in the morning so that everyone who gets off the elevator will have to say hi and tell him "Happy Birthday". On his way to his desk he sees the fallen envelope and assumes it is for him. Greatly offended upon opening it he takes it straight to your supervisor alleging sexual harrassment. Unfortunatley for you, you signed your name on the card and you are fired.

Option B

After experiementing with various chairs, you find the optimal vehicle that is both aerodynamic and permits powlerful leg thrusts for propulsion. You've mentally planned a route that traverses the entire floor, but avoids precarious obstacles like artificial trees and expensive office equipment. With a quick thrust of your right leg you start to race down the aisle. How exhiliarting to feel the wind in your hair whilst not fearing any bugs splattering on your teeth! You clock your first lap at 7 minutes 45 seconds. "I can totally get that down to 6 minutes!" you tell yourself with bravado. Your second lap is better at 7 min 3 seconds. You are getting a little tired but want trt one more time before you go home. This time, with a running start you leap onto your chair. You lose your balance for a moment, but charge on once you've regained your equilibrium. You're rounding the last turn when you see a ripple in the carpet ahead. "How did that get there?". Before you have time to fully process this thought and take evasive action you've hit it and the chair flys out from underneath you. You face-plant into the elevator doors and are knocked unconscious. You awake the next morning surrounded by concerned faces. Too embarrased to tell them what really happened, you allow everyone to assume you were mugged and take personal leave to "pull yourself together".

Option C

you begin winding the rubber bands in a a small mass but then the unthinkable happenes. one of the rubberbands snapps and stings you in your eye. oh the agony! havig completely lost the vision in your right eye you become affectionately known as the cyclops around the office. unfortunately this secures your fate as an unmarried sap.

Choose your own adventure!

It's Saturday and I'm at work with nothing to do. So I'm going to write a choose your own adventure blog. after you each select an option I'll post the next installment for you to continue. Sound fun? Yes? Good! Ready, Set, Go!

You've just gotten a new job in corporate America. You, being the self-respecting non-conformist that you are, are not to happy with your situation. Alas, it is a paycheck and you get to take all expenses paid business trips to see your distant friends. Still new to the company, you want to make a good impression on your boss so you offer to put in some overtime for an important (i.e. boring) project. It is after hours on a Friday and you've been sitting at your desk for 2 hours. You are the last person left in the dimmly lit building. You realize that you are on the brink of suicide by boredom and must act quickly if you are to keep your sanity. Do you (a) hop over the the copy machine, drop trou, and start working on this year's Christmas card (b) mark out a race route for this year's office chair olympics or (c) commence building the largest rubberband ball this company has every seen?

Naomi, I found your Christmas gift

it's the gift that keeps on giving...
http://www.thinkgeek.com/clearance/7498/

Possible directions of Mary's life

Right now, it could go one of three ways:

Option 1: One day, you go crazy on the bitch at work, and backhand her. You get arrested for assault and battery, but of course they find the drugs on you. You have so many that they consider you a dealer, which because of your other two strikes in california gives you death. You plea bargain for life in prison and fall in love with your lawyer, who unfortunately you can only talk to through the glass wall. You spend the rest of your life in prison, you and your lawyer are in love but cannot be together. He visits you whenever they let him. Then, you are let out at 80 because of good behavior, marry your lawyer, and then die six months later.

Option 2: You begin to notice the fedex guy at work (the one with the tatoos). You decide you want to marry him, and so quit Azusa in order to be around when he comes by to drop off the packages. Sadly, he quits soon after. So you marry the trucker guy who you don't love, but you have a lot of kids and work the temp job for the rest of your life. In your free time you write Christian romance novels with sex in them, because you are tired of the Christian romance novels with no sex. You create your own genera of literature and are famous. People in Christianity today write articles about you denouncing what you are doing, and they create a new 'hot topics' folder in bubbs just for discussion of the infamous 'March novels' (yes, you kept your name when you married). Then you die.

Option 3: In the year 2014, the space station is ready for people to move and live there. You are invited as a top marriage and family counselor. You leave your husband and family to go on this important expedition, hoping that they will follow you after you are settled in and things are more stable. But just after you leave, nuclear war breaks out and all people on earth are killed. You wait on the space station until it is safe to return. You and your 74 companions are the only existing humans, and must repopulate the earth. You spend the next 15 years of your life pregnant and giving birth until you die in childbirth at the age of 45.

I vote for option three. It's like you're Eve. The first is very melodramatic though, it's almost worth it for the waiting, you know. But I say three. Choose that one.

Is my soul showing?

Every one asks how school is going or how I like my classes, but most of the time I don't know how to respond. Of course I don't like homework. Of course there are cool things I'm learning. But please don't ask me to give a global assessment of my enjoyment. I was so looking forward to grad school but now that I'm here it is no big deal...most of the time.
Today we had a discussion about integration after our exam. We talked about what it means to be a Christian therapist, the calling some of us have felt, the desire to bring healing to another's heart, and the way that God uses us as instruments of reconciliation. The thing is, I get bored with school when I think of it in terms of work and exams. But when I think about the work God has called me to and all the lives that could be impacted in my lifetime, I am filled with energy. You guys know that I thrive in relationship, but this is so much more than that. There is this indescribable joy that I feel knowing that I will be partnering with God in his work and that I will be an instrument of his grace. It is almost like a taste of the Kingdom to come in which we will be serving and worshiping unencumbered by the things of this world. Do you guys think about these things? I don't often, but then I wonder why not. It lifts me so and puts everything in perspective. It is so easy to be shortsighted about our purpose, distracted by what we are immediately feeling, or preoccupied by acquiring possessions. I need these reminders to keep me grounded and remind me of what is important.

chai, chai's gone away, will i get some more some day?

yes, it is true, i drank my last bit of trader joe's chai today. i would make a suggestion as to how to remedy that, but i would like you to believe that the good deed you are sure to do for my benefit comes from your heart.
thank you for listening to your subconscious.

alone in your room, you blew up your television

so who thinks liz has suddenly become boring?
me. dammit.
that's why i deleted this post, because of all things it wasn't, the one most lacking was interesting.
i wish the nation could have a profile picture, bc i want to put the broken phone booth picture somewhere permanent. and just to guard you from believing that i am overly sentimental (which i am), my sister is also sad that they fixed the crack in the sidewalk.

Liz, I thought particularly of you.

Mary, you would have to change your mind about some things, but it could work:
activist? leftist? take action, get action!

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more about ideals

I read in an article recently that marriage need not be about love, it is more about companionship and childbearing. And for an instant, I thought, that would not be so bad, a friend to raise children with. But of course it would be bad. I would forever regret such a decision, every time I met someone I could love, I would think, had I only not married him, life could be so different. Of course, there is the possibility that I will never meet such a person, one that I could love (who would love me back), but dammit, I will spend my life alone then.
That is what is missing, the thought that everything will be alright, the thought that my life is special, that it is impossible that it be anything but wonderful, because I am wonderful. And I am realizing that I am ordinary, the world is not my playground, I pay bills and am not the smartest or prettiest girl around, I am just me, and people around me may quite justifiably ignore me and pay attention to someone else. I am not the epitome of interesting and insightful. This is the hardest thing, and I know it in my mind, but I seem to be frustrated at the fact that I am not better than everyone at everything. In fact, I am bad at a lot of things. I feel like a failure. And I am losing something of myself in this, I think it is childishness, in the good and bad senses. Somehow I think I should be amazed at the world in light of my own deficiencies, but it seems only to disappoint me.
But I would like to hold onto my idealism, I would like to think that there is a problem, where is the boy that can dream and love and is not so interested in me or themselves as in the world, someone who is honest with themselves and with me, who does not just want a family, but wants a family for a purpose, who lives thoughtfully and intentionally? I'm tired of being seen as a means to an end, as a fulfillment of some childhood fantasy of what they think happiness is (or rejected because I do not fit this mold), how banal. We are all just sitting around complaining because our needs are not met, searching for someone to fill these needs. We are sad because we are ugly, we think that if someone tells us we are pretty this will go away. We feel like there is not much good in ourselves, if someone makes us feel like there is a reasonable amount good in ourselves, everything will be okay. But maybe the stark and somewhat beautiful truth is that there is nothing very good in ourselves, that I by myself am nothing at all, a waste of space and food and water. Or perhaps that there is so many dark and terrible things that I am capable of, and every once in a while God works through me to create something precious and incomprehensibly wonderful. So why would we want people to think we are good, when we are not? We should say to one another, 'you are everything wrong with the world, but somehow I love you still, so much, and I do not know why.' So I refuse to make someone happy. But I would desperately like to make someone feel alive, to help them do things, to love passionately, and to tell them when they are wrong or ugly or evil. Perhaps this is a lot to ask. But I do not understand why people would want to be comfortable, why laughter is sometimes our greatest comfort, as if distraction will make us good. Why can we not be honest with one another?

the business of church.

i went to "work" at church for the first time today. it was interesting. suddenly i feel as if everything that was ever sacred to me has been defiled today. i'm such an idealist that i would like to believe that churches have not become businesses, but they have, and it's run by the head pastor. how interesting. some random men, employed by the county, are also pulling up the sidewalk in front of my house tomorrow, taking out that massive crack that has been there all my life. the crack that i've tripped over countless times, that i purposely rode my bike over, that made me wonder if we ever got earthquakes here, that i would sit on top of when the gutters were flooded with rain and send popsicle sticks down the current as if they were boats, and that i looked at in wonder about ants, grass, and the world in my early years. that is something i do miss: that ceaseless wonder of the world that i simply cannot seem to recapture. that was what i liked about a boy once, all of his wonder at the world; he was wonder-ful, if you will. but what's the use talking about boys i like? they don't like me back. and so now i am back to how everything precious to me has been wrenched from me. but at least i voted today, for the first time, voted for the future of my state. i'm going to vote forever now, because i think it's responsible for myself and for the generations that come after me. they will never know i thought of them, but i have. perhaps they will all find something sacred in life, in this world, and they will all fall in love, believe in God, and live happy lives as far as it is possible in the beautiful world i've created for them.
but who wants to know the absolute worst thing i did today? in a moment of feeling charitable i commissioned myself to go to a high school conference as a leader where they're going to go around the big city and share their faith door-to-door. i didn't know this until after i said i would go, and after that wanted to rescind my offer. but i had already confirmed my ticket. not that i don't believe in spreading the good news, but simply that i find it distasteful when people do that to me, and do not prefer to be such a vexation to others. i find it better to do as an intimate thing.
i have an interview on friday. everyone PRAY. i desperately need a job. i am wasting away. and tolstoy draaaaaaaaags oooooooooooon. whenever i read him i feel as if i am caught in some sort of bog and it is a great effort to extract myself. auh. he is not so hopeful. i don't think he ever got himself out.
i like your thoughts, molly. it is a pleasant one, clinging to one another as this painful place washes past us, kindof like the rain that rushed through gutters when i was child. but now they're taking away my sidewalk. life is hard.