faerie tales

kate, you'll enjoy this story:
I went for a walk this morning, about 10 blocks down to the grocery store, and as I am strolling down the sidewalk, carefree and singing songs to the sun and sky as my audience (one must keep up the appearance of being a faerie, after all....) a car going the opposite direction as me honks, and they act as though they recognize me. I don't, however recognize this guy, not in the 2 seconds I have to look, but then after a delayed reaction I realize (or think I do) that the guy driving is a customer at booktrader....he comes in all the time with his wife, and they are one of the nicest couples ever, practically our favorite customers.... So I quickly turn to wave and smile thinking i know this smiling, honking man. but he pulls into the gas station directly behind me and so i turn to say hi quickly, and realize once I am within 15 feet that it is indeed NOT the man who is our favorite customer along with his wife. His face looks remarkably like the favorite from thirty-five feet away and no glasses. It is a complete stranger. I give a bemused look that says "who are you, and why did you honk at me, and why did you turn your vehicle into the gas station?" He asks if I would like a ride. I quickly reply "no thanks, i'm fine" and continue walking on my way. It's a busy main street, people walk up and down it all the time. I'm not even carrying anything heavy. It's a beautiful day out. Why would I want a ride??
...maybe after I went to the store and am toting 30 some poounds of assorted vegetables, fruits and other edibles......

And it pisses me off. Seriously, there are (i am pretty confident of this fact, what with yale students and all) thousands of prettier girls in New Haven to hit on or offer rides to. Why do you need to hassle me? Can't he go find other girls to hassle?

Hasn't anyone ever been warned of the danger of faerie-redhead combinations?

well they should be.

Maybe rich is right. Maybe I am oblivious.
well, I guess that's my punishment for not wearing my glasses this morning. I can see much better 35 feet away.

I'm so far down, I'm beginning to breathe

I've been avoiding writing, actually it would probably be accurate to say I've been avoiding almost everything the past couple months. It's the delusion of thinking that somehow, if I just ignore the state of confusion I am in, maybe it will altogether disappear. I have a wry grin stored up for myself on that one. I know just how absurd it is to think that anything will right itself if just ignored for long enough.
It's fine. I'm confused. About almost everything you can be confused about.
And the only reason I am confused about any of it is because, like the silly human I am, I stubbornly refuse to admit that things can and will probably look vastly different than any sort of expectations my mind has conjured up. That is life. That is what it means to trust in something beyond your own plans, beyond your own humanity. Evidently I have issues with that little word and it's implications.
Trust.
Evidently most of us do.
And it seems to me, the more you cling to the things you want, the more you try to make things what you think they should be.......the more they evade you. We were never meant to be master over our lives in that sense. After all, you don't really get to choose whether you live or die. (some people chose when, unfortunately) And you didn't get to choose whether you were born. (yes, we were given free will, but there are some things we don't get to choose, only how we respond ...I'm not gonna get into that)
So I think maybe it's time to stop pushing so hard to 'figure things out'....maybe it was never about that. Maybe in the midst of feeling as though I don't know much of anything I am much closer to the truth than when I am arrogant enough to actually think I see half of what God is doing, or planning, or trying to get me to realize. Maybe this is the only place I really need to be. I don't have the slightest clue why I am where I'm at right now, I don't know how God is using it, and I don't really know what He is trying to teach me. And add to that a nice (or not so much) dose of pain.

But what I do know:

Regardless of what I see, what I'm going through, God remains who He is. And He has always been there, He's always been walking with me, trying to get me to hear his whisper and see his face. Nothing ever separates me from his love (because nothing can ever erase what Jesus has done) And I would rather have that one certainty and have everything else in mass chaos, than to be sure of everything else without it......
I will trade all my plans, all my expectations, all musings of how life should be; I will trade everything for one sure love.

an infant crying for the light

Somehow Tennyson always makes me feel better.....
and this is how I feel tonight:

Oh yet we trust that somehow good

Will be the final goal of ill,

To pangs of nature, sins of will,

Defects of doubt, and taints of blood;

That nothing walks with aimless feet;

That not one life shall be destroy’d,

Or cast as rubbish to the void,

When God hath made the pile complete;

That not a worm is cloven in vain;

That not a moth with vain desire

Is shrivell’d in a fruitless fire,

Or but subserves another’s gain.

Behold, we know not anything;

I can but trust that good shall fall

At last–far off–at last, to all,

And every winter change to spring.

So runs my dream: but what am I?

An infant crying in the night:

An infant crying for the light:

And with no language but a cry.

Elfland.....

"The splendor falls on castle walls
And snowy summits old in story:
The long light shakes across the lakes
And the wild cataract leaps in glory.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O hark, o hear! how thin and clear,
And thinner, clearer, farther going!
O sweet and far from cliff and scar
The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!
Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying:
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.

O love, they die in yon rich sky,
They faint on hill or field or river:
Our echoes roll from soul to soul,
And grow for ever and for ever.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying."


still one of my favorite poems.........

daffodils

this is what i've been up to this afternoon.

I had the privilege of spotting my first bee a few minutes ago. (of 2009) Normally, I really don't like bees all that much. It just might have something to do with their ability to sting, who knows.
But today it made me grin.
And then I noticed the flowers, ......and even the dandelions looked cheerful. Who (or what) wouldn't be? I think it may actually be spring in the northeast....I'm stepping out intrepidly.
And hope of all hopes....maybe the trees will actually have leaves again soon.

time to go actually do some stuff and stop being lazy. although being lazy every once in awhile is oh so nice.

I know it's folly,
but right now I wish life were like a fairy-tale and only had happy endings.