I don’t often write in poetry form, maybe because I don’t really know the official rules or because my rhymes are usually a stretch. That said, I have recently found that I enjoy writing lyrics for some of the hubby’s songs. This morning is a morning of reflection and in a notebook of miscellany I found a Sunday morning poem I’d already written months ago. It seemed to capture the same sentiment of today so I thought I’d share it despite some of it’s inconsistent patterns.
Sunday Morning
Wake up to the quiet glory of the early Sunday morning Thankful for all you’ve done Staring out to rays of sun
There’s a certain mystery to the direction of the trees Luscious green, rolling clouds crashing waves, windy days
In the morning, I will sing of your love Show me where I should go Because my morning is yours
This is the morning, your morning Let me sing loudly of your love tiptoe into the day, keep on faithfully May it be with peace and with love
“Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life.”– Psalm 143:8
And we’re back! Back from a cold and snowy state we love, back from all the holidays and back from a month of very little blogging. I can’t say I have listed out my resolutions for 2014 yet (partly because I am still searching for last year’s list to see how I fared), but I will say that I hope to blog more. It’s a wonderful part of my life and sometimes people even tell me it inspires them. What’s not to love about that?
So we continue with the Thursday Three. Something about it is just a little charming to me. Clearly it’s been a while so let’s just make this three a wrap-up from where we left off instead of only about the past week, shall we?
1. Christmas is a wonderful thing. Some people get all crazy about it and I’m not to that level. There’s not months of Christmas music or much talk of Santa here. It usually is a busy time of work for the hubby and even a little bit of stress as we squeeze too many things in a packed month. But it’s still good. It’s a celebration of a Savior, a time to gather with family and share time and food with others. Maybe I’m all sentimental because it’s already over and our tree is lying cold and lonely on the curb. But let me say it anyway—it’s good. We got our first ever real tree and decorated it in simplicity. We went caroling, sang songs and smiled for the Christmas card. We talked to some kids about what Christmas means for a video we worked on together. We hosted each of our sisters and their families which included several dogs and small children. We exchanged gifts, watched Netflix and found ourselves in a Nerf war.
2. Snow and cold are not our friends. We moved away from that stuff but managed to visit right in the middle of winter. To Iowa we went to visit friends and family and celebrate a wedding of dear friends. We hit some of the town’s finest establishments, rang in the new year (and the hubby jammed along for a song on stage), visited my grandparents and watched two people say “I do.” It was fun and freezing, but we’re glad we got to go to all of it. And bonus—our trip got extended due to days of cancelled flights. Yay cold.
3. Being a grown-up is a funny thing. Sometimes I feel like I’m running around trying to chase down my life. Trying to check off all the lists, go after my dreams and be good at whatever role I fill. Some days I think maybe I’ve made it and I wish I could just walk away with a trophy. But it doesn’t work that way. It’s a constant process of learning and growing. So tonight I’ll sort through weeks of mail while eating cereal for supper at 11 p.m. and just be okay with it. Here’s to another year of who knows what!
This is the only photo we have from last weekend’s wedding, and I’m wearing a baby fur hood from the photo booth. The hubby was super excited about it and insisted we take this photo but somehow managed to avoid donning any sort of accessory.
As the snow falls and we greet the beginning of 2014, I’m trying to put my finger on just what to think. There’s something about the new year. A fresh, clean slate. It’s appealing and exciting. You stop to think about what you want to do and who you want to become. A whole bunch of dreams and goals are stuffed onto a list and even accomplishing half of them would be quite the feat. It can also be a time to reflect on the past and what has brought you to where you are now. It might be good or it might be plain rotten. Some of that impacts how you want your clean slate to look.
Everyone around me already seems to know just what the year should look like, and I feel like I’ve barely finished celebrating Christmas. It’ll take me at least another week to consider all my reflections and resolutions, but it will be time well spent. I can’t help but wonder if we place too much stock in the “new” and don’t spend enough time in maintaining the now. I’m not shy to change and love the idea of travel and a good challenge, but want to make sure I don’t overlook what is already in motion. I don’t want to reinvent myself. Sure, I want to grow and learn. I want to stop putting my foot in my mouth, and I want to see the world. But more so, I want to live the life I already have. I want to restore strained relationships and love those in my life right now and today. I want invest in my commitments and not jump to the next thing too quickly just because it’s new. I want to understand the depth of my blessings and continue to grow, even if from the outside my life seems stagnant or simple. There’s something happening right now and I want to be focused enough to experience it.
So now what? It’s been weeks since I’ve posted my Thursday Three and blogs are few and far between this month. Yet I have so many thoughts festering inside. Ideas and inspirations, pains and longings, goals and insights. But where to start?
I’m a fierce dreamer.
I mean this both in the literal and metaphorical sense. By night, I am running from science, secrets and gun shots but by day I am thinking of all I want to do and accomplish. The past week I’ve had so many harsh dreams (or nightmares) that it makes me wonder why. Why do I have such vivid and crazy dreams, so much so that they alter my days and throw me in such a deep daytime trance? What adult has nightmares several nights in a row or dreams that stick for years and still ache to remember? Does anyone else have dreams this intense and frequent? Is this just the way it is and something that will always happen? Or does it indicate something else?
During the day, I am constantly looking for what’s next. What great feat can we accomplish? If we plan to do XYZ by X date, then that will still leave time and money for something more. I daydream about what life will look like if I pursue certain passions. What it would be like to say that I’m published or what kind of mom I might one day make. Where I want to go and who I can help. I’m constantly pushing myself and even some around me to do things, maybe to a fault. While my intentions may be good (growth, experience, interest, knowledge, accomplishment) it can be a dangerous trait. It can mean I never follow through or rather, that I am so focused on achieving said dream that I overlook the costs and sacrifices required by myself or others. As we near the end of the year and I consider some of the resolutions/goals I set for 2013, I’m reminded of this. Some of these happened and in the right way, some became less important and still some frustrate me so since they are nowhere near what I had hoped.
You know what? I’d rather be a dreamer than live a stagnant life. At night my dreams are interesting, exhilarating and exhausting. By day, I’ve learned and experienced things I might never have otherwise, and it gives me a purpose and a goal to work towards. But some dreams are easier to give up than others and in the end, you can’t keep them all. So while I’m a dreamer and will inevitably continue to be, I’m going to try and focus more on what those dreams mean. What they require, why they seem important, and what they say both about me and to me.
So I suppose it seems like I fell off the grid for a couple of weeks, at least in the blogging world. Write something about life being hard and crazy sometimes and then go silent. Not exactly the most reflective of the latest. To be honest, I have a blog post or two just sitting, waiting to go public but haven’t hit the button. Something about this time of the year feels like everything is in fast forward, and I can’t keep up.
We are a third of the way through the month! Can you believe it? I sure can’t. There’s parties to attend, gifts to get, people to see, stuff to do. Between all that and everything ramping back up for both of us work-wise, I go back and forth between scrambling like a crazy lady and wanting to snuggle under some soft, warm blankets without tending to any of it.
Sometimes I feel like I have to fight and struggle to accomplish all the normal boring life things like paying bills and ordering checks (yes, I still use those), so adding anything else seems like a big deal. But somehow I’m going to find the time to sit still. To be. Be with people and not have to run to the other room to check something or do something else. My prayer today was that I could have a home that’s open and more importantly, available. I am so grateful for our house as it truly feels like a home and want it to reflect how I want to live. I want to see everyone and do everything, but not at the expense of our sanity. I don’t want to be a little stressball when things aren’t done yet, pushing out the people I want to be with and love on. I want to show love and care to others but not be so exhausted from running around that I have nothing left to offer. But hopefully what I lack in checked off to-dos I can make up for in sweet winter moments—alone, with the hubby, with friends, with family, with neighbors and with strangers.
Ever find yourself in the middle of one of those days? Those days that you have such a river of thoughts but know as soon as you start to really sit down and think about it, you’ll be opening the flood gates and aren’t quite sure you’re ready for that? This weekend was like that for me. All in all, we had a good weekend. Hung out, had a date night, spent time with friends and enjoyed our time. But underneath it all I had all sorts of thoughts bubbling up about ready to spill over. Sad thoughts about all that’s wrong in the world and how badly I want to help make it better. I’m a blessed and grateful girl, but that does not mean this life is not hard. It downright breaks my heart sometimes how cold and cruel this world can be. I want to bang my fists on the ground and cry out. I want to bless my neighbors and protect those I love. I want to start a movement and circle the world with wisdom. I want this messed up world to be turned on its head and make sense again. The brokenness makes me want to shout and scream.
It’s back and better than ever. Welcome to Thursday! I’m not sure anybody else celebrates Thursday quite as much as I do, but it’s nice to spread some love around the whole week, not just Friday. I used to go all out nuts on Fridays at 5:00 p.m. and practically run out of the building, only to realize I still had an hour and a half (or more) before my commute home was over. It was still this desperate moment of celebration after a week of longing to escape. Not really a way to live, so I am grateful to have a mile long commute now.
1. My dad visited the big NC this weekend. We made sure to show him around town (mostly by eating everywhere) and hiked at Hanging Rock State Park a few hours away. It was crazy foggy but still quite scenic. All in all, a good time.
2. A home theater now resides in our living room. The hubby had been wanting something that didn’t weigh 100 pounds and make a high-pitched noise every time you turned it on. So when a friend of a friend was moving and needed sell a TV for cheap, we came in to save the day. What I didn’t realize at the time of said agreement was how huge it was. Movies have been an entirely new experience. The first movie to hit the screen in our house?
3. I am content. On a drive home from dinner with a friend, I couldn’t help but think of all I had. I have so many good things to be grateful for. A loving husband, good friends, a decent job, an adorable little house, overall good health and plenty more. We live in a more, more, more society, but today I am declaring contentedness. Obviously it’s still good to work towards goals and by no means do I have a pair of shoes to match every outfit in my closet, but I am happy where I am right now with what I’ve got.
Isn’t it always a holiday season? We’ve got New Year’s, Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, Halloween, Independence Day and of course, Groundhog Day. A constant something to celebrate. A constant to-do.
Regardless of the holiday, I want to make an effort to cherish it but with a spirit of celebration, not of stress. Not expectations or disappointments. Not dread or longing for something different. Not comparisons or excess. I want to consider what it means, what it represents.
Decorations can be beautiful and get you into the mindset of the season, but sometimes it amounts to more stuff and clutter. Sometimes the food and costumes and traditions can cloud out the joy and meaning. I want to put that love and joy first, then the extras.
So regardless of the holiday, let’s put a little more thought into the true purpose behind it. Maybe it’s focusing on one holiday at a time or maybe it’s spending everyday in quiet thought about the current season. Consider what it truly means and embrace it with a joyful heart.
I think the Thursday Three needs a theme song. Waaa bow bow!! If only you could hear it directly as the phonetically spelled lyrics do not do it justice. Don’t ask… this is just half the crazy that’s in my head. But it is Thursday. Helloooooo (almost) weekend. You ready? Here’s the past week in review.
1. We got school spirit. That reminds me of my cheerleading days (can you believe it?) – we got spirit, yes we do, we got spirit, how ‘bout YOU? Sorry, I don’t know what’s come over me. Anyway, last Friday we put on some Carolina blue and headed to the basketball game. If you know us, you know that with the exception of the Olympics and a bit of March Madness, neither of us really follow sports (but you better believe I have my calendar already marked for opening ceremonies of the 2014 Winter Olympics). It was fun though to hit a game, catch a win and embrace the basketball culture we are surrounded with. We met up with a few former work friends and had a fun night, despite being able to touch the back wall we were so high up.
2. My dog longing was temporarily fulfilled. No, we do not have our own dog, but we did watch our neighbors’ dog, AJ, for a few days this past week. Oh, and it was so, so, so fun. We went on long walks, she destroyed a bone, we played catch, she chomped on ice cubes, we took all sorts of silly pictures of her being cute and ridiculous. Glorious. And then we picked up poop and had to lint roll our entire couch. In conclusion: I still want a dog, just one that doesn’t shed or poop. Okay, okay. Eventually, I want a dog (that doesn’t shed much), but not today. One day in the distant future.
3. We’re settled in, finally. People keep asking if we’re settled in and unpacked and I would now like to formally announce – YES. With my dad coming to stay for the weekend, we had a deadline and little choice but to finish the job. See that room up there? Well, that’s just a glimpse of it in the final cleaning stages. I seriously wish I had before and after pictures from this weekend because let me tell you, that room was completely filled with boxes. The bed was vertical up against the room because there was no space before now. It was embarrassing, but it was also a fact of life. If you managed to miss any of the blogs from the past three months I’ll fill you in—it was hectic. We were busy and exhausted so clearing out the spare bedroom just wasn’t a priority. But now, we’ve moved in. The job is done. There’s a few odds and ends but all of our rooms are fully functional and you can see the floor. It’s amazing, and we love our little house all the more.
