I love my lips. Gusta(v)!!!

So, yeah, this whole tropical storm/hurricane Gustav business is concerning. Please pray for those along the Southeast United States this coming week as this hurricane is to hit. Pray that Sarah and I and our families will be safe, and that my campus will not be blown away like Union University.

Proud Mary

I have officially eliminated internet and television from my home. No, I'm not typing this at home, I'm in the safety of a university owned and operated computer lab. With this new "free time" I will be able to more fully devote myself to self-awareness and exploration, soul spelunking, reading, prayer, background music, and piles of school assignments.

This change has been really telling. I find when I get home that I immediately want to turn on the television to see what is playing. I had no idea I was so hard wired. Several times a day I question what am I going to do with my time not watching TV (for there is much of it). The answer is everything that I should have been doing the past 3 semesters when I was watching TV. Tasks and devotions that result in growth and development rather than simple time swallowing.

I would really appreciate it if you would join me in praying for clarity and direction from the Lord in a couple of specific, unsaid areas.

New Beginnings

Welp, here I am again. The start of a new semester. I am incredibly certain and uncertain of what it will bring. I know that it will bring the future closer, our wedding date closer, my master's degree closer, my future job(s) closer, etc. In the same hand I am uncertain that this semester will bring relief and not added anxiety instead, that my plans will align with the Lord's plans, etc.

Still, I love new beginnings. I love the idea of newness; all is gone from the past and only possibilities and choices lie ahead. I remember when I first went to college that I decided I was going to change who I had been for 18 years to someone new. I had a chance to leave behind (so I thought) everything that I did not like from the past and could recreate myself. I found truth in that and found that the past is right there behind me when I turn around to look at it. I feel similar with this school semester. I am certain that the Lord is renewing me and definitely allowing challenges along the way to test me in that newness. I pray that I would not be like Lot's wife and turn for the past that only bears death, fire, sin, and lost hope. I pray that I would fix my eyes on the unchanging and that I would be in constant change to be fully refined in His likeness.

(I hate that the computer lab on campus is only open until midnight tonight instead of the usual 2am closing time.)

I am reading The Picture of Dorian Gray currently as a bedtime story. I am not sure yet what I think of this work. I think I would be wiser to read books like this in one big sitting so that I could soak up as many details at one time as I could like a sea sponge. However, this will not be so as bedtime stories are meant to help one fall asleep (I assume).

I miss all of you who know my heart so well, regardless of the physical and/or metaphysical distance between us. peace friends.

Too Long

So, I can't believe it has taken me this long to update, despite how many times I have been on this site since I last posted. Well...I guess I can believe it, but I will work to be better.

Like Mr. J often speaks of, I ponder on the things I could write that would be really impressive and wonderful and I'm left speechless. Thus, I'll try and do like my other good friends and just write cause that's what it's about.

I'm kind of at peace. Not at a place where I'm solidified, but at rest...in my innards. That's a nice feeling.

Social work: Oh how I'm not sure what to do with you. I am currently in my 3rd of 5 semesters of the master's program. Let me say that I am very ready to wrap this up. I find myself wanting to distract myself in many things other than academia. Relationships, the church, reading just to read, drawing, listening to music, singing, writing music, exercising. While I could probably do some of these while in school, it simply is impossible to delve into them as much as I would like.

Still, we did some art therapy in my social work with groups class last night. I had forgotten how much I LOVE drawing despite my ineptitude at it in terms of technique and skill. I am going to work to increase my drawing time spent.

Tomorrow, I leave to go to Pensacola, FL with my lovely fiance(add accent mark over the "e") to see the Blue Angels air show this weekend and spend time with my Dutch step-relatives. I'm very excited about it. My pale skin is all prepared and ready to roast.

Thump. Thump. upon my head and heart.

Tonight I was assailed by the fear of getting married. I think a lot of it is the magnitude of the decision and commitment to get married. Don't get me wrong. I'm not wanting to back out of it by any means, but I am prepared to say that I am more nervous than well.....I am extremely nervous.
and fearful.

I had no IDEA that I would be this nervous and fearful.
I am fearful that I will miss the big picture.
I am fearful that I cannot/will not be the man I need to be for my family.
I am fearful that it will take extreme consequences for me to find true freedom.
I am fearful that I will fail to learn intimacy with God and thus fail to show true intimacy with my wife-to-be.
I am fearful my baggage will weigh more than just me down.
I am fearful I will be too messy for marriage.
I am fearful of my flesh. (It's so hard to remember that it's flesh when working in a field that recognizes it as so many other things such as environmental issues, psychological maladjustments, developmental impairments, obstacles, addictions, disturbed behavior, etc.)

Enough of that. I think that covers the main ones.
I don't know why I am so taken aback by these thoughts and emotions tonight but I am. I am.

Okay, so

I went and saw The Incredible Hulk at the theaters at midnight last night, and let me be the first to say that it











































































was AWESOME!!!!!!!

Yep, maybe not awesome enough to merit caps AND all those exclamation points, but it deserved at least a good four of those exclamation points. Yes, I am thoroughly proud of Edward Norton and Liv Tyler. You SHOULD spend the money to go see this on the big screen. This isn't exactly a sit at home kind of movie. Great. Go see it.

Okay, my rant is done now and I am off to see my lady friend for the weekend.

Preparing for the season

Father's Day.

It's always interesting. My Dad died on January 31, 2000. This will make the eighth Father's Day without him. This is pretty much only the fourth year I've actually felt anything from his death. I often wonder if what I feel around this time of year are feelings that resurface that are triggered by reminders of memories or whether it's me forcing things to memory so that I can continue to lament.

Tonight, I miss my Dad. I don't always, but right now I do. I think if he were here he'd be proud of me. I think he'd tell me, "you're doing a good job, son. Keep it up," about my schooling. I think he would love Sarah almost as much as I do. I think he would realize that I'm more like him than either he or I ever realized during the 15 semi-together years we had. I think I would be honest with him and tell him where I am in life, even when I knew he probably would not understand.

I miss his hugs and kisses. I miss that when I went in for for a kiss (kind of like when the "airplane" of food is headed to a babe's mouth) that he would use his tongue to swing the ever present toothpick into his mouth so he could kiss me on the cheek and not stab me with a splinter of wood. I miss the way he protected me. I miss doing things with him I dreaded and disliked like fishing for 6 hours at a time. I miss having opportunities. Opportunities for more opportunities. Opportunities to learn trades from him, to cook like him, to be funny like him, to play the harmonica poorly like him, to work on vehicles like him, to fish with unmatched fervor like him.

I just miss him.
It's strange. I haven't felt this way in a quite a long time.



I think he would support my wedding and be ultimately proud of me. I think he would beam with joy over me with his love not only because of the path I have walked, but because of the decisions I have made on paths that were too often decided for me.

I miss my Dad, Hawkeye. He was more wonderful than either of us realized.

Happy early Father's Day Dad.


PS: I don't own a picture of me and my Dad together. I hope there's one in existence.
PPS: Thanks for walking down Memory Lane with me (if you made it).

Extended Vacation

Well, it seems that I've been quite a vacation from the blogging world. As some have experienced, vacationing is not always sunshine and rose buds. This has definitely been true for me. I am in the midst of an intense battle I expect to be clearly defined and quickly eliminated. Unfortunately, this battle is made up of gray lines, time, processes, and journeys.

I must say I'm glad to be back to the blogging world. However, I do not want my blog to be the bulimic bucket of my life. Still, I cannot help but write about my present life. I can and will no longer live in the past but in the present and own all that which is me.

This is my stalwart, my stronghold, and my song.

Time warp

The past couple days I feel like I'm stuck in the past. I don't know why. It's as if I think on memories too much I'm carried back to them. I'm not only carried to the memory itself but also to all the peripheral feelings of the time at which point the memory occured.

I had one of the strangest dreams last night were I felt that my heart was going to go into anti-philactic shock or something.

All of this just leaves me really confused. It's as though I can only escape from my past by forgetting it all, but I don't want to lose all the good things from the past. I'm so torn. Thanks Natalie.

Today I learned that a man that I work with is 52 and taught himself how to read 11 years ago by reading the Bible. This floors me, for several reasons. How in the world did our educational system fail so badly that people are making it through high school, or middle school, or elementary school, even, without the ability to read? How? Seriously, this should be an archaic problem for English speaking American students in the twenty-first century. Obviously, it is not. God's depth also amazes me. He transcends teaching, abilities, opportune brain development for learning, suprememly challenging home lives that distract from book learning, and other powerful obstacles. This can be hope for the hopeless, the unlearned, and the illiterate of the world. The Word of God will not come back void, even if no one is reading it to others.

I think this has great implications for God's might and for the limitations that I place on God ALMIGHTY. yeah, I forget that last part sometimes and what it can really mean.

Thank you God for your providence shining through the darkness of Mississippi.