real things

let's become free--
like steam,
fog in morning
an improvised melody.

let's learn to dance, the kind without steps, but movements.
the kind that will make the watchers uncomfortable- uncomfortable with a joy they cannot contain.

I'm going to Europe, alone.

A quiet excitement,
a quiet fear I am trying my best to stomp on.

magnetic poetry
vivid dreams
singing
dancing my own style
a great friend
hospitality/simple
phudge
pop music
warm lights late at night
books
sweet words from friends

wanna tell you, you're swell!

also, two friends just got engaged!
I'm runnin' to Europe! :) hahaha

I am so lonely today.
It is days like these that make me slightly panicky inside, starving for human interaction.

Days like this when I cling to God, begging him to let my life not be lived in loneliness.

delicate things

collar bones and wrists,
the delicate things
twigs that hold on through winters,
and butterfly wings.
paper snowflakes and pencil lead.
the wavering wail of a far off train whistle,
something coming but you do not know when.

I like being single!

When I was little, daydreaming about the future, it was always just me. No man.

And now, when I actually think about it, I like being single. But it seems there are NO resources for women who genuinely enjoy being single. It's kind of making me mad. All of the blogs seem to say that I should be desperately wanting a husband and I should enjoy being single... I DO! All of the articles say the same thing, pale encouragements for women who desperately want to be married. But nothing out there for those of us who think we actually like being single.

Sometimes society gets me, and sometimes in a group of people I get to thinking I want a relationship too... but I don't, really. I like this life. I do have concerns about being lonely, but I think God can take care of that :)

Anyways, I'm annoyed, because there's nothing (seemingly) out there for those of us who LIKE BEING SINGLE!

comfort = with + strong

“The word comfort is from two Latin words meaning “with” and “strong” – He is with us to make us strong. Comfort is not soft, weakening commiseration; it is true, strengthening love.” -Amy Carmichael

This. 

Is what I want to do with my life.

comfort, hospitable, peaceful.

make food,

give back rubs

sit in silence

sit and talk

walk and talk

eat

drink water

simple things.

and together with ones I dearly love.

vulnerable and transparent.

big

I have a paper to write, a large paper. But I need to write this down first. I've wanted to write for awhile now, and every time I open up a new post I just end up shutting out of it again.

Several things. randomish. perhaps I will sort them into some sort of beauty later.

Thanksgiving.
I do not mind this role. I do not mind standing at the kitchen sink washing the china so my father can have a conversation with the Arab men in the dining room. I do not mind the back stage.

I have suddenly found in me a strong desire to live in a large city. Where has this come from? I find myself pretending I am walking in some metropolis, or the lights outside my window go longer into the distance. Hmm.

I am listening to O Come O Come Emmanuel. Many versions. Enya, Phil Wickham, Veni Veni, I love this song.

And I found this today too. Do you know the way you move me?

Lately I have been thinking about how God is much bigger than I think, uncontainable and indefinable. Any time I think about it, it overwhelms me (happily). That this vast being, who spoke to Moses and Noah, and became a man, the God of the stories I claim to believe, He loves me. He wants to be with me. It's absolutely crazy to think about.

Lots there, and I've been trying to live like that. Bold, courageous. Today He gave me an opportunity. It was easy, and the person I talked to did not reject it, like they inevitably someday will. But they were so grateful, and I was so grateful to be used.

And then one of my refugee friends messaged me on facebook. It is amazing to me that they still share their lives with me, that they still want contact, and that they use translators to talk with me. He said something- bad English aside, that sounded, (read) like "i wish you to bless my destination" (with typos hehe). I don't know exactly what he meant, but I wonder if he was asking for prayer... I don't know, but it was sweet.

oh, life

Today I tried to make real chai tea, but I didn't really follow a recipe, hehe... it's not terrible, it's not great. But it was super fun. :) This last cup I put in hot chocolate powder- bad idea. Actually, I think it was a great idea, it just didn't really work. It didn't add flavor, just made it lumpy and grainy. mmmm ;)

Then I walked around, an adventure I said. And on a whim I called my friend and she's buying me lunch tomorrow!

I committed to being single for a while- I signed a piece of paper in blue ink and set the dates and everything :) and I feel so freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

and now I need to buckle down and TYPE SOME WORDS!
(homework or novel writing, but I gotta do SOMETHING!)

May your day be filled with vibrant colors!

just stay

these days, they don't wait for my heart to catch up, they just run.

these days they don't wait for my heart to breathe to decide they just run away.

heart, 

please stay with me here 

where it is safe and warm where it is home.

dear heart,

please stay with me here

where you are whole.

please heart

please stay.

you are loved

but please 

please 

STAY.

i know you're aching

but this is for the best

dear heart,

please just wait here

you can still dance 

you can still sing 

you can still beat stronger than these broken khaki days

please just stay here

you can still have meaning here

and purpose

and make this place your home

please stay here 

and wait here

you're not waiting for nothing

you're gonna be okay dear heart

just stay

please STAY

dear heart please stay with me today

i'm here i'll be here with you 

this is where we are to stay

this is what we are to be

to day this is today this is not yesterday or tomorrow just today please just stay today

heart just stay today

just stay today

don't open up that door

you can open the windows feel the air on your face you can breathe deep mountain air

and the sea 

you can still swim and love and be,

but you just can't leave.

trust me.

we'll leave together later,

when he says it's time to go

but for now you've gotta stay

here

please stay here

these rocks are the same

and the sky is the same

and the sun is the same

and the love is the same

and his love is the same

so please stay

please come back to me heart

please come back to me

please come back to me

please

come

back

to ME.

please heart,

i know that this is hard

and you are impatient

but please know this is for the best

just stay here

you know she's beautiful

you know she's wonderful

you know she's everything that you wish you- are these things don't even speak 

if you can't be kind about yourself 

just be quiet

receive.

just wait

and receive

and love the one who loved you first

don't chase down the other one

don't please

please

stay.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2b7lCZ2Kpo&feature=related

Remembering

A few years ago when I was wondering whether I should change my major, I contacted a few organizations that work to end human trafficking. I received an email from, I believe it was the London office of Stop The Traffik. It was personable, and the woman who wrote back said that I could basically do what I wanted. She said they had people with theology degrees, people with psychology degrees, people with no degrees at all.

What I understood is that if I want to help, there will be something for me to do.

I need to remember this, because it comes up again and again.


Stop worrying about it, self. There will be room for you, to help.

me

I'm living like my life is about me.

If it's about me, I'm right to be afraid of people. I'm right to hide, to not speak when I have words that need to be heard. If it's about me.

But it's not about me.

It's about the King of the universe.

And the way I am living is not fitting to represent him.

God is not disgusted with me like I am disgusted with me.

God will not abandon me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P--Sxx5VjN8&feature=related

bells
wind

this room is freezing.

God will not abandon me.

To avoid the weight of the world cliche,
it feels like the weight of a baby elephant is on my head. (not really, that's just a good image) but there are some things that are pressing on me right now.

no fun.


God will not abandon me.

Assignment for school- NOT finished

These are khaki days. They sleep too much and sing too little. Dull, no one calls the brown-grey a favorite. No one dances to a khaki beat. These days do not respond, they wait. For usefulness, for light, for the smell of dust to fade. They hold sorrow in their seams. The mornings are exhausted and the nights are restless. These are khaki days. They wait.

 Laleh sits on the steps to wait for these khaki days to fade into the shadows of yesterdays and last weeks, three months ago, a year ago, “when I was a child.” Of course, she isn’t a child now, though someday maybe she will have been.

 These days she is neither child nor adult, but some resplendent being, caught in a place between home and everywhere else. Her life lived on the peripheral, not in the news shows, the papers full of politics and war, reports of what her country has threatened to do to all the rest. It is simply here, sitting on the steps in a grey place, waiting for the world to say hello, to welcome her in.

 This fresh-wet morning she watches a brown bird bounce in the fresh mud, pulling its wriggly breakfast from the soil. She is quiet. Quiet because there is no one to talk to, quiet because there is nothing to say.

If she were home, with her parents and her brothers, there would no doubt be some extraordinary music escaping the stereo, cello strings or the ivory hammers of a classic piano; she and her mother would dance a story about lavender, the color of the walls in the kitchen, twirling about the living room, annoying the father who just wanted to listen and the brothers who just wanted to play. If she were at home, there would be the smell of milk tea wafting from the kitchen, warm and waiting for lunch. If she were at home, the velveteen cat would be curled on the sofa, longing for a delicate caress behind the ears, purring along with the lavender music, dreaming of milk tea and cerulean forests, stalking birds and pouncing flowers. If she were at home, the room would be illuminated, the incandescent day-star pushing forth warm light onto the rug, its savory colors turning gold-orange in the strong-soft light.

 But she is not home and the light is not warm. There will be tea with lunch, but not milk tea. The cat which paws at her feet is not her velveteen cat, but sooty brown, a sack of fur and skin and fleas and still licking leftover lunchtime fish from its whiskers. Laleh reaches down to run her fingers through its fur but it dashes off through the grass, off to coax the sparrow into chase, to frolic with the day, chasing men with lunch pails, teasing children on tricycles.

 Laleh waits on the steps for lunch; she’s been sitting here since breakfast, watching the free animals not tied to places that are home or not, and the people who mill around the road, the central vein of this place, a highway of tricycles, a pathway for plastic soles and the bread trucks. Everyone joins the path once a day, becoming blood, alive, helping the vein to move, to keep this place breathing beyond the barbed wire and guard shack, beyond strict cement walls, even if they are painted orange. Once a day, they surge out of the burrows and barracks for lunch, at least to gather their pans of rice and noodles, their chicken or beef, the orange juice  they pretend tastes like milk tea. Once a day they remember to breathe, to come out for air, into the steamy wet summer day, out of their daydreams and BBC News.

The khaki days, Laleh sighs, and waits, wanting velveteen cats and the way her father looked, cross, straining to hear the cello strings and piano notes over the giggling of his smallest daughter, the way her brothers whined for quiet and begged for soda not wanting tea.

Maybe tomorrow they will come, maybe tomorrow the air will be clear and the worms will rejoice, burrow deep into their soft-warm caverns with their families and be safe.

           

           

*had to use special word and techniques, writing exercise. I will explore it more later. 

           

            

for my love

I will write You a song about love,
using wind and rain,
the smell of leaves,
an inheritance better than sons or daughters,
the way that You catch my eye, the way You set aside air for my lungs.
not to shy away-
but there is something better,
more delicious,
stronger.

And I will run to that.

things that have been floating around in my head

living extravagantly for Jesus/ freedom

I think I listened to a sermon on- was her name Mary... or was that something else- the woman who poured her perfume on Jesus, "wasting" a whole year's salary on it.

My friend is on the world race and learning freedom. 

free to live extravagantly for Jesus

free to "waste" on him.

choices- doing what I'm passionate about- if/when my passions line up with His.

letting Jesus pursue me, instead of chasing Him through other peoples' measures.

taking rest. Today I sat, for a short while, on the steps to a building on campus and enjoyed the soft wind and the sunshine and watching people. No music, no talking, just being.

the freedom to not worry about what others think of me. and by others I mostly mean my community, my brothers and sisters in Him. It stings when the world doesn't appreciate my life, the way I am, but it flat out hurts when my community misunderstands or doesn't approve. but I'm trying to learn that His freedom transcends even those who love Him. 

learning that even a cup of water is valuable if it is for Him. 

big things.

that maybe I can't live free because I'm trying to do it on my own. If I just chase harder, run faster, talk more.... that maybe I need to just stand in one place and wait for Him to come to me. maybe instead of seeking out people, to do more more more I need to sit in my living room and wait. or sit on the steps and enjoy the wind. maybe I can't live free because I'm afraid He doesn't like me. but He DOES like me. because I don't fit, I wonder if that means I should try different things. 

NO. 

No. I wasn't made like them and I think we lose a lot when we try to cram ourselves into each others' molds. I know I have (lost a lot).

so these are the things floating around in my soul.

big things.

made for

Today, I had international (and some American) friends over to play bananagrams and catchphrase, drink tea or juice or water, and eat chex mix.

It was so simple, and it was what I was made for.

My apartment is not at all luxurious, I was coughing the whole time, and all I had to share was chex mix. And it was so fun.

I don't know if my guests had a rip-snorting fun time, but everyone seemed happy. It was so simple, so easy. We played for an hour and a half, and then they left, and I rinsed the bowls and washed the mugs and went on with my day.

Hospitality.
feels so good.
fits these passions.

Then my roommie and I went on an adventure on the bus to Kroger, and had a grand old time there, and then we cooked a real dinner (together, that's the best part) with spaghetti and extra stuff :) and then we made muffins. with lemon glaze. and homemade powdered sugar.

"we're so domestic" she said. I didn't ever expect it to feel so good.

Today was real life!
And now, 10:16, I must do my homework.

It's worth it though.

For Christmas 2010, I went to Syria. It was beautiful, and I was so impressed by the hospitality of the people. I would go back.

And now... that beautiful place is hurting, crumbling.

I spent the summer with refugees. None of them Syrian that I know of, but next summer they probably will be. I hope I can tell them I've been to their home and how beautiful it was.

It is a bit crazy to think that a place I've been, that I really enjoyed, is producing refugees now...

just crazy.

Five Minute Friday: Grasp

Grasp.
Start.

I can grasp at the wind
but it will not stay in my hand
it will not stay with me.

I can grasp at these things
that I think maybe I want
but they will not stay with me

I can grasp with the fingers of this heart
knuckles turning white and tired of holding so tightly
to these things that aren't meant to be mine.
I can grasp with these fingers until it hurts to let it go.

more than these things I want You to just take them
but I think what you want from me is to give them
to deliver them from my hands
to walk to your throne and put them in your hands

I can grasp at the wind
but it will not let me hold it still.
I can grasp for these things that I think would be good for me.
but I ask You to take them away when I realize they're not for me.
but I think I need to let you have them,
one finger of my heart's hand at a time
you can pull these fingers back
my hands will shake when I let it go
you can take it
but i think you would rather have me give it to you

I grasp the thought of this becoming true,
these silly things that are not you even if they are good
at these things that look so beautiful

stop.

starting writing- or continuing rather.

There is barbed wire. It did not startle me, I expected it. But, if I were running out of fear for my life, and I arrived in this strange but beautiful land, and I came to this gate, and there was barbed wire, I would be concerned. If this place was to be my permanent residence, for awhile, and if I had children, and it was sort of home to them, I would be concerned about the barbed wire. If my home, the place that I loved was destroyed, and I arrived in this place, that I hoped could someday maybe be my home, and there was barbed wire, I would be concerned. If I was all alone in the world, if my parents had died, and I had somehow arrived here, far from anything I knew and loved, and if there was barbed wire around this place that was supposed to be my sanctuary, supposed to be a place that was safe, I would be sad.

If the wire and the walls were a remnant from some other time, I would wonder why they didn’t pull the walls from the ground, or rip the wire off the top. I would wonder, is the wire to keep others out? Or me, in? And if no one in the town even knows this place exists, why do we need to keep them out? And if the food here is not so good, and there is no special equipment, no special toys for the children, why would they want to come in, ever? And if I had no other place in the world, why would it discourage me from leaving? 

There is a willow tree. The boys grab clumps of branches and swing. And sometimes they fall. The girls laugh at the boys, when we are with them. And then one afternoon when we are in our room on the fourth floor of the Immigration building, we glance out the window and watch the girls swing from the willow branches. And sometimes they fall.

The women sometimes sit in a small gathering on a grey, wool blanket under the tree. They take off their shoes and perch on the edge. Sometimes they bring out cups and glasses of orange juice- not the fruit, the color. And sometimes they bring little pieces of cake- not sweet like American cake, but more like cornbread. It is the most beautiful place, a blanket and women under a willow tree in the summer, a perfect place of shade, sunlight slivers dancing through willow branches, women telling the little boys to play somewhere else.

They are the most beautiful women I have ever met. 

I can feel it in my soul
I can feel it in my bones

pry my fingers open
release these white knuckles from their grip

expose me to the wind.

my soul wants to run
wants to dance

the road is narrow but I will not fall off.

Five Minute Friday: Wide

Here's the deal. Sometimes on Fridays, I join with these bloggers and write for five minutes flat, no editing, and on whatever comes to mind regarding a topic. The topic today is wide.

start.

wide. that is these northern Ohio fields- corn and whatever else off into the East and West for miles. We walk along the trail, seeing far into the distance and never seeming to get any closer to our goal. There is no circle of trails, just straight one way and then we turn around.

wide. I smile wide inside.

a rain drop would be wide to an ant, or a young spider- what is young to a spider anyway?

I sit in this wide room- the computer cord stretched all the way across it- and listen to the tires in the rain, and the refrigerator, and a low humming I can not place, and wonder if my roommate is coming home any time soon, and try, try to do some homework. Statistics. harsh.

wide. a friday night.
a train whistle
a train, if you measure it that way.

one
more
minute
stretching across the clock

a leaf off my liberated bonsai tree.

9/19

There is so much
going on inside my soul, but I cannot get it out.
I want to scribble on the walls,
fling wide the doors and windows and huddle
in a pile of cold.
Run until my knees give out, at night and into dawn-
stain my hands purple with sunset and wildflowers.

I want to rip the pages out of this book
and make you eat them so you understand
the tired.

To erase my trail and melt back into yellow, European sidewalks.

I want to laugh with the cold wind and have it be normal-
to love the snow.

solitude-
no. I will not help you with this good thing. I am resting.

If the floor was made of linoleum I would let the rain in. Splash the puddles on the floor.

Summer 2013. I am going back to Hungary.

Much to do before next summer, but I can already taste it, the sweet relief at being back. I let that place take the home slot in my heart, a little bit, and I long to go back.

Five Minute Friday: Focus

Hi! It's Friday, which means sometimes I join up with these ladies (perhaps there are men too, I don't know) and write freely for five minutes- no editing- on a topic. And today it is focus.

and start.

I sit in the quiet, in the dark- well, kind of. (Day, but there is rain.) I try to focus on God's voice, because that is all I really want to hear. But other things squeeze in, some bird, some trucks~ it almost sounds like the city, but in this quiet, semi-dark room it is incredibly calm. I listen to the rain pound on the roof, and then it stops.

Trying to focus on what the professor is saying, but my mind is far from here. Funny, because in that place I was so focused, my distractions could gladly wait for August. And now, it's halfway through September already, somehow, and I've been pining away for some other place. Every day I think to myself that I cannot focus on anything except thinking about the summer. (And my excitement for winter to come, but that is some sort of uncontainable joy that I live with every fall. ;) )

And then the day becomes stunningly beautiful, and I have to walk to do my errands, pay my rent, and it is gloriously good. The day feels full. I don't know if it's because the rain or what. But my focus is nowhere near this day, and yet this day, here, in this town, fills me up.

today it slipped out, almost unknowingly, "I like to teach."

oh...

For most of the important things in my life, I feel like God has let me do pretty much whatever my heart decided to attach to. Okay, not everything, but a lot of things.

Like missions trips. Mexico, I just decided to go, just decided that if I didn't raise my support, that would tell me not to. Or Hungary, I waited and listened and basically just asked God to close a door if it wasn't what he wanted.

Like college. I just picked this one because it was convenient. And then I almost transferred, but just, didn't. I feel like either of those colleges would have been okay.

I know that God has infinite options for any of these paths. Maybe my faith isn't ready for lightening bolts and thunder, or maybe God just hasn't chosen to speak to me in loud ways.

hmm... still thinking about this, but wanted to get this down.

the thoughts of sunsets

People are people, wherever you are.

I am convinced that our stupid arguments about politics, and our dogged opinions about things that don’t really matter, like tattoos and lip piercings come from a place in us that is empty and bored, and perhaps too afraid to truly try and understand each other. I think we will find that when we get outside of our comfort zones and try to see a person for who they actually are, outside of their culture, or what they do, or what they have done, or even what they believe, these things will stop being so important to us.

I think people generally understand this when they are thrown into a culture they do not understand, or maybe even agree with. I think the people in that culture, will understand that you do not fit into their culture, and I think they will see you for more than yours.

I think sometimes we’re afraid to go deep with people. I don’t know why, but I think we are. And I think sometimes we would rather dislike them, than feel for them. I think sometimes we forget that we don’t truly fit, either.

I was just thinking about this, as I danced in the window blind shadows, in a rectangle of sunset on my door. About people, and how people are so much more than cultures, or what culture they fit into or don’t fit into… and how sitting with someone, drinking juice- or not, and watching the sun go down, silently, is enough. No discussion needed… I think we understood that we came from very, very different places. And it didn’t matter at all.

I think, I want a tattoo.

chocolate chips and dancing

I am going to sit here and eat chocolate chips, and tell you what I am thankful for.

chocolate chips
three and a half spacious rooms to enjoy
tap water
dinner with a friend
walking places I need/want to go
the Black Swamp Arts Festival- and that I can hear the fun music from everywhere in my apartment
swing dancing- and the fact that we had nine guys and six girls! miracle!
being productive today- working hard
roomie time yesterday with lying on the floor and Mona Lisa Smile
the rain that finally came yesterday,
and how gloriously beautiful and sunny it was today!
and the breeze!
that it felt like fall
my honest, beautiful friends
the song "lions in cages" by Wolf Gang
turkish pants
sitting in the sun
having a balcony

Five Minute Friday: Graceful

Graceful.

today I sat for two and a half hours in a sliver of sunlight streaming though the window, through the curtain. in silence.

thinking of Mariam, and calm.

waiting for fall, waiting at least for rain.

and now, it falls gracefully outside my window. drops on the glass, making the train tracks dark brown. I like how I can hear individual drops fall, the pattern of drops landing.

and thunder, finally.

thinking I would like to hear Mariam laugh, gut laughter, the kind that makes your belly ache.

graceful, and I think Mariam.
and where I was thinking of her, just today.
and how meeting her will be with me forever.

this rain.

bright

The whole world seems brighter today.

...It's the first sunny day in several, so it actually is brighter... but still.

My parents came to visit yesterday- just left a while ago. They brought my flute, so I've already played that this morning, and a train went by, and some bell tower played ten bells for ten o'clock. There's chicken in the crock pot, sunflowers on the kitchen table, and Balmorhea in my ears.

Just, a better day.





...and now there is rain. but at least the sky is doing something, not just sitting heavy grey.
it is still beautiful.

there are crows right near my window, and rain, and it sounds like wild, sounds like life.

I imagine the way I miss Hungary, he misses his family a thousand times more.

maybe more than a thousand.

i do not blog about these things, not so openly anyways, maybe tucked in some poetry here or there. but i am just baffled.

he is not the things i want in a man. why on earth do i keep thinking about him.

driving me crazy, but not in the usual way.

i. am. not. attracted. to. him. physically or emotionally.

bah humbug!

bigbluewatertower

just. be.

Sarah said pain is beautiful. that it is allowed. that suffering is allowed. that American society doesn't let people hurt or suffer. 

let me hurt. i need to.

usually i find creative writing classes really boring. weird maybe, cause i have to write, but there's a big difference in writing and in talking about what someone else wrote. and though my professor for my modern poetry class is my absolute favorite professor, i'm usually incredibly bored in there. (i had her for a different class too.) BUT. sometimes, people get comfortable and start to spill what they really think and it is BEAUTIFUL. when people get comfortable in the not knowing, settle down for a good discussion. DELIGHT. 

I have decided that all poetry is spiritual. 

solitude, fragility, urgency, and emptiness.

and later i read a sociological article about social deviance, and it's almost enjoyable. and an airplane flies over, which has somehow always been a very comforting sound to me.

freshman year i could see the big water tower out my window, far in the distance and i loved that- it was the escape route, the highway, and i could see it. and now, there is a big, blue, pretty water tower just outside my window. 

and i'm wearing turkish pants.

and i guess i should eat, but i ate so many starbursts i'm not really hungry yet.

and i'm addicted to ellie goulding's "anything could happen."

and i want to dance- not because i'm happy, but because dancing is free. gotta get it out somehow. 

my friends are doing crazy cool things with their lives! 

like, woah, things.

!!

i need to unlearn my culture. or most of it. yeah.

workin' on that. 

just be

pain

sarah says pain is beautiful. crying is beautiful. because we carry this weight, crying is how we release.

suffering
is
allowed.

don't try to cheer me up.
i'm grieving.

it sounds dramatic and awful
but
it
literally
feels like
my heart got
ripped out and left.

and i know that
feeeeels,
doesn't matter all that much.
but it does.


can't focus on anything
i listen to crickets
and sad music
and look at my textbooks but don't soak in the words.

i need someone to just be with me.
SILENTLY.

i am allowed to need extra time
space
and silence.
i am allowed to hurt.

--

boys.
TURN
DOWN YOUR MUSIC.

my heart used to ache for maine. i could look at a picture and just ache. and all of my ache has been swept into this other place, willow tree and a barbed wire wall.

quietbeats

the music, quietbeats, like those from airplane headphones, channel eight on your arm rest
and you cannot slouch.
my head nods down, surprise,
cause the street is filled with yells and hollers
girls and boys
trying to be old-
though the old watch the news and things like jeopardy and laugh track shows
and dance on wooden floors-
we dance too,
waving our arms so they would not fit in clubs or bars,
our ears being interrupted by frequent trains,
laughter of the guys downstairs.
eleven eleven
time
for
bed.
if only I could unfold myself from this chair and crawl into the other room, maneuvering fire hazards of notebooks and shoes, brush my teeth and climb.into.bed... goodnight moon,
bedtime for bonzo.

the sound of tires on gravel.

solemndays

these solemn days we drink tea on the balcony

my heart rests

in knowing you’re alive.

my nonsense speaks volumes

of love.

because any real meaning aches to put to page.

a year ago their definition of love

was thin,

non-fat milk for real, rain forest coffee.

didn’t work,

nothing true.

though their words were scientific,

my nonsense words say more.

she writes because she can do nothing else,

i write to breathe.

and these days,

even writing cannot unclog this nose.

even writing cannot touch this.

even writing cannot show,

only telling these days,

and that they say i am not allowed to do.

just a break in the walls of these strong feelings.

my heart rests

in knowing you are safe

knowing you are His.

in these small words i sit and wait

and wait

trying to place faith in One

instead of seasons and hours

and wait.

i say there are other things-

there are,

and there are not.

my heart rests

somehow,

and then we fall apart.

these small words

speak volumes

of falling apart.

I just need to write for a bit. I mean, I need more than that, but that is what I can do right now.

I sat with a friend today, outside. She used these terms, like she thinks I'm a writer or something. I'm not a writer. I'm just a girl, sitting on a bench, listening to cicadas and wishing she was in the woods with Jesus. Just a girl.

I'm kind of depressed.

I love being able to see the clock tower from my bedroom.

I love the sunsets.

I love that I can see the courthouse clock tower from my bedroom window. I love how it looks in the morning and during the sunset. I love that I can hear the bells on every hour, if I listen close.

I like the cool breeze through my window in the morning.

I like watching clouds melt into blue.

I like that I have a few days to adjust.

I'm thankful for sitting with A yesterday, and realizing that no, I'm not yet ready to jump back into life here. I'm going to think about that today. Make a list or a paragraph or something.

I'm thankful that I got to skype with K, a teammate from Hungary and then later talk with S on the phone. I love those girls.

Thankful for Songs of Water music.

August 16. New Apartment. I sit on the couch and eat my turkey sandwich. A sparrow lands on my balcony and it gets me. Because if He cares for the sparrows so much, how much more will He care for me! And BLAM! Love! What a special place I get to live in~ with sparrows that land on the balcony and a beautiful view. Instead of looking at a busy street or ugly college houses, I get to look out at an empty lot full of wild flowers. And tonight there is a rabbit too. (Yes, Bowling Green is overrun with rabbits, but I haven’t been here in a long time. Tonight it is new.)

I start thinking about this weekend, how I am lonely. But at the same time, how I don’t want to seek people out too much just yet because I need this alone time to think (and perhaps cry) about Hungary. I miss that place a lot. And not only the place, but how I was in the place. My nastiest places were loud there, or at least, to my heart they were, but I was aware of them, working on them. I learned a lot there- a lot that can’t be translated into words or lessons. And most of all I experienced the love of God.

When I think about it, I MISS that place and my team. But it isn’t a forlorn (?) sort of missing. I also feel rather full, my soul does, thinking about it, all that we did and got to witness. I’m still rather blown away that I even got to go experience it. Rather blown away that I was chosen for that glorious experience.

Sitting here on “my” couch, laughing out LOUD, over these pictures. Like the one we took on the last night, wearing our gifted jewelry, all thinking we looked pretty good and then we turned the camera around and AUGH! It was the true us, tired and stressed and eyes red from laughing too hard.

Different now. More of who I should be. 

Dentistry

I count to ten in Farsi to keep myself calm. It's not that I'm not calm, it's just that I don't want them to think I'm not. My jaw hurts, you see, after having it open so long, and sometimes a tear or two will slip out my right eye. So I'm distracting my mind from the pain. Farsi numbers, I use the alphabet, A is for apple, B is for balloon, C is for caribou... My toes do a jig in my sneakers- a secret dance. It is for this very purpose that I do not wear my fun shoes.

They used to have a large painting of a lake scene on the wall, with children and ladies and umbrellas. I would imagine about those people and their afternoon. But they've replaced it with a picture of a window, and a pot of flowers. Sure, you could write a world about why the window is blue, and why Mr. or Mrs. So And So chose yellow flowers, and why the pot was put there to begin with. But the picture is hard to see across the room and around the hygienist's gloved fingers- too hard to see the details, anyway.

The "polish" is orange flavored, and I strongly consider ripping her hand out and warning her that my gag reflex is strong, especially for orange flavored teeth polish and I might throw up but then I figure that if I tell her, I most certainly will. So I don't.

She makes a big deal of the fact that I'm not a pop drinker- every time, but especially today.

And then finally, finally, after the doctor comes and prods his metal stick into my gums to scrape away any residual dust, and after one tear escapes my right eye (hoping no one sees), I finally am released from the chair and handed my floss, my little bag of toothpaste and my cool orange brush.

And then I walk home, talking out loud to myself about the fall.
glorious.

"He wants to cut lettuce for you and hear your story. He obviously likes you."

I sit here and I read these words, over and over and over, cause they're Your words, You know. The others don't exactly, but You know. They're delicious to me too, cause You gifted them to my fingers. (except the July 24th ones. haha)

I need desperately to write- at least, I think I do.
but You haven't given the words yet. so I'll wait.

So much swirling going on inside my heart.

so much.

It's like I'm mourning a death or something.
this is affecting me way more deeply than I thought it would.
been home almost a week and still I always feel just on the verge of crying.

A Compilation

“There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.” –Earnest Hemmingway

First: People often talk about the people who spill their souls on Facebook. That’s me. But I will gladly tell you everything the same in person. I want people to know about this place and these people, and I will tell you with every possible medium. I would prefer to tell you about it in person, but down into my soul I am a writer, and I want you to read it too. I want you to understand, though I know that you never can, not without experiencing it. But I think the closest way for you to understand is if I give you my raw emotions- I’m not going to polish anything up for you. I’m not afraid of sharing my fragility or my rawness with you- in person or online. I know that you are just as fragile.

Second: This is just a compilation of some of the thoughts taken from my journals. This isn’t the big stuff I wrote. I’ll be compiling those eventually. This afternoon I was sitting down near the Little Miami River and I realized I needed to start sharing it, and immediately. So here you go. A little bit of what I wrote, my first attempt to make you understand. This, I suppose as I compile it, is more about my response, and less about the actual stories of the people. But more writings will come.

June 17. Fathers’ Day.

God hits me with blasts of love at such inappropriate times. And I love it.

You need only to be still.

June 19.

I’m not as excited as I should be.

Terrified, God.

So many things I have wanted to write down but haven’t gotten the chance.

June 20.

Thank You for quiet joy.

my slow soul

takes sweet time

becoming your girl-

these parakeets squawk joy from the trees

announcing their king

laughing fast-

I laugh slow

deep,

all this pent up fear

busts into loud joy,

when I let it.

June 24.

And we’re all so different.

And some of us are afraid.

and You are beautiful.

June 25.

long day. I can’t remember when it started.

Your mercy.

June 26.

…But I felt only light.

“This tastes completely different from anything you can get back home.” (in many variations J) -Russ

June 28.

This experience is worth being broke[en].

“Nothing says ‘hey I’m an independent adult’ like living in a foreign country and using a squatty potty, you know?” -Sarah

June 29.

People are people and everything is complicated. I cannot explain, and you probably won’t understand. such a mix of things. feeling raw. Hold me steady, J.

June 30.

Thankful for laughter, listening to Sarah sing, echoes, sunset, “conversing” with refugees, lunch, time alone, laundry, cherries, yogurt, and G’s assurance that I am full of value.

teach me some melodious sonnet.

July 1.

And now it was July, and the air was thick and You were the same.

“The glory of God is man fully alive.”

-soft steps on stone floor

-the way our knees bend into these pew walls.

July 2.

Your love papa

coaxes oceans into puddles

and rain drops into life.

please carry me.

coax these strong words

back into my veins

and pour them out.

July 3.

“if you were any braver, you would be a lioness.”

of course I am overwhelmed. But it is all right. I taught with J, and he sat in the second row.

Jesus, let them see You when they look at me.

This is a good exercise in faith…starting from the bottom, and also being thrown into it.

It is an honor to be here. even if it doesn’t help their English at all, privilege.

July 5.

Teaching was hard today. M.

But. Tonight.

We sat in the heat for two hours, between the family building and the willow tree- stars above and lights in the distance beyond the spatter of trees. We talked with the woman who speaks English, of how she came and her former teachers. There are crickets, though they do not sound like American crickets. And halfway through, I realize, this feels like home.

They ask if we will stay six months or a year, because it is easier to learn for longer. They ask if we will tell the world about them.

She walked over mountains to get here. days and days, a year ago.

My young student grabs my hand.

The concrete is warm, even this late at night. My head hurts but it doesn’t matter.

Even compassion for M.

The crickets are loud tonight.

The day was overwhelming. But the night was beautiful.

“This is nothing. We are not home.” They feed us cake and tangy orange juice.

July 6.

A lot of show, but today I cannot find the genuine. too much today.

I start and end in You.

physical manifestation of what Americans are like on the inside.

Boil it, she says.

pray fervently.

to not hide.

“Will you help me cook my cauliflower? You can sit on the couch and watch BBC and tell me how to cook it.” (not an exact quote.)

July 7.

It isn’t a prison, but some days it sure feels like one.

A little girl and her papa on the bus.

kind of makes me feel like crying. because she doesn’t understand, because she babbles on and on, because he loves her.

It’s the small things that hit you most.

July 8.

Acts. Despite persecution, there was joy, and the message spread.

All day we sit.

I talked a lot.

We read Your words.

I had expected to be shocked and overwhelmed all at once, right away. But it isn’t like that. It’s a slow, seeping, subtle emptiness that sneaks up on you when you least expect it. I was prepared for hard heart break, but not this subtleness.

Everything is visible, and everything is hidden.

It is like a physical display of the American mind. They are bored. They wait for months or years and they rarely get answers. There is nothing to do. They play football and volleyball and tennis in the evenings, but that is all there is to do. They are forgotten.

It’s empty.

Kids always running and fighting and shouting.

July 9.

I want to be faithful in the small things.

I can’t do this on my own.

keep my eyes on You.

intense dreams. disoriented.

July 10.

oh golly.

joy last night. birds this morning.

apples with breakfast- light green, like the stars at dusk.

The little girl from the bus gave me a hug!

not friendly but we’re nice. success.

they respect us.

“You will forever yield to the slightest touch from God.”

July 11.

don’t want to fight You or lie to You.

There is so much and somehow it translates into so little. And it’s making me tired. I just want to be enough. I want to run and sing and breathe and write. just to be with You. My nastiest places are becoming loud. All I want to do is sleep- because it is all I can do. And make them understand. All of them. But it’s not about me. I do not have the privilege of escaping. Jesus please carry me, I cannot carry myself. I cannot breathe on my own. I cannot love without Your strength.

“You are eternal, and I am eternally Yours.”

“If you would know me at all, one half an iota, you would know I really like men.” –Sarah

“What good is chocolate if you’re not gonna share it?” -Sarah

July 12.

people at the gate. sunsets, flies ants.

small patches of wilderness

wherever you can find them.

especially during sunset,

when the sky’s so gold it disorients you.

and when your friends approach and you, for a minute, do not recognize them, because you are outside and when you are outside you must tune everything out.

July 13.

The emotions are so strong here, but I do not feel that I can let them out.

I want you to understand but I don’t even know where to start.

My soul feels heavy, but I don’t feel justified to cry. Really, I think I’m angry, but it comes out in laugh attacks. It’s not funny, laughter is just the way the emotion spills.

July 14.

I am LIVID- is that the word? ANGRY. I can’t NOT do anything. Help me speak. Tell me who to tell. I’d rather be passionate and angry and heartbroken and HELP than run and hide. I want to help. Give me words to SPEAK. If you want, I will write a book. J. Give me words. (That’s what I wrote- not a rant.)

“Politics and real life do not mix.” -Russ

July 16.

“For since the world began, no ear has heard and no eye has seen a God like you, who works for those who wait for him!” Is. 62:4

(5:45 am)

He doesn’t ask us to be powerhouses or scholars; he asks us to love him. And that will be enough.

July 17.

I’ve known these people for one month.

no control over my impact, only G controls that. A cup of water is valuable to Jesus, if it is for him.

How to tell people at home,

how to explain.

Tell them anyway.

Pain is meaningful.

J, let me breathe.

I don’t want to go home and forget.

I don’t want to share because they won’t understand and I can’t expect them to.

My soul wants to curl up in a ball and protect itself.

A soft, quiet, persistent shove sideways, so you hardly notice it at all until you’re stuck.

It’s not extreme at all, just under the surface. lurking, seeping oppressiveness.

“I could seriously do with a can of tuna!” –Sarah

“I’m sitting here basically holding my mouth shut!” –Sarah

“…except you’re still talking.” –me

“I can see the wind but I cannot feel it!” -Kristin

July 18.

à Girl, why do you feel the need to be such a grump? Feeling a bit insecure about something, self?

They turned up the music and covered the windows and turned off the lights. Because the men aren’t allowed to see.

A woman brought her baby girl- 2 months old- born in camp. (woah) Watching M hold her, we could see the pain on her face, and the love.

When we walked back at eleven the stars were incredible.

felt purposeful, just being there was enough.

I’m not ready for tomorrow at all, but God has blessed me beyond belief.

Women are women and I’m honored to be one, slightly scandalous Bollywood videos and all. ;)

“I had a crush on a guy for six years. He had a head shaped like a basketball.” -Sarah

July 19.

Ramadan.

Being eaten by the awful subtlety and rejuvenated by how beautiful people are.

Overwhelming. Because in America I am not even a teacher, let alone a good one. But for some reason, God has chosen me to come here. And I might be the only English teacher these women have ever had. To hear them say I am good is overwhelming.

I’m so honored to be here.

You need only to be still.

July 20.

Too tired to think about tomatoes.

I sit on the floor of the train and Sarah braids my hair.

July 21.

I couldn’t even explain to Kristin, and she’s going through the same thing. I don’t really want to leave~ it’s frustrating and heartbreaking but it’s also kind of home.

My head can’t even engage because I’m thinking about how to think about it. God has blessed me so much. This summer has been difficult in ways I didn’t imagine and wonderful in ways I didn’t either.

I’m gonna miss these people. but it’s worth it.

{heartbreaking, but it’s a sort of purposeful feeling, a sort of relief.}

Apparently, we have one more weekend in Hungary, one more week with refugees. I’m not ready for this. It’s the almost end of July and I’m way less ready to go than I thought I would be. And I don’t know how to process it.

Let’s see. I love this place and these people. And as hard as it is, it’s beautiful.

“I don’t have my glasses on so I can’t hear very well.” -Sarah

July 22.

This July.

At the end of it, I realize that there are more important things than worrying about this distraction. I can feed myself with other things.

{thirsty cows}

“This is what it means to me to be twenty. To travel in Europe with a backpack and a sundress.” –Kristin

July 23.

evening- S’s mom, M, and S came out and gave us bread! And some of it is chocolate! and they’re not even eating yet because of Ramadan. warm on a slightly chilly night. Jesus. I want to love people better.

July 24.

Tonight I watched a group of kids and a father corral a cat and then stuff it into a plastic bag and pull it tight. I’m pretty sure they killed it. It made me angry. I cried a little. In public. I thought to myself, oh *, I’m crying over a * cat.

I feel like crying every time I see ____. He’s so visibly angry.

And then I realized I’m perpetually grumpy. And I’m wondering if it’s fear masquerading as anger.

can’t relax.

I don’t want to always be angry.

and then we went for orange juice and played with ___ and ___ and it made me sad but was also quite soothing.

(This [summer] has been good for me.)

“I’ll beat you!” -Kristin

July 25.

What have I learned?

How can I change from it?

How do I change my behavior?

The fourth thing Muslims pray for during Ramadan is their teachers.

“You break through the ice and then you fall through it.” –I don’t remember

“The sky is purple.” –Kristin

“SOMEBODY GIVE THAT COW SOME WATER!” -me

July 26.

Class today was fun. I’m really going to miss them.

headache- but I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve had a headache here.

Every morning around nine, I walk down the stairs to go to my classroom, or make copies. And three out of four mornings, I walk down to the gaze of eight or six or two men. Some days I say hello. Some days I don’t. I never get used to it.

A psychiatrist came to camp today. I saw many of my [women] students waiting.

Depression.

Then we walked through camp and saw some of the older guys teaching the littler ones how to play cricket. It was way cute. There are definitely parts of this culture I really like.

how to be boldandvulnerable.

Today I was not angry. Irritated, yes, but not angry.

BUG INFESTATION. EVERYWHERE BIG BLACK BUGS. And! The lights are off in the bathroom. (always an adventure!)

July 27.

I want to sing You a story, paint You a song…how these children play, coaxing water from the fountain, running, laughing, and then they disappear between bushes and benches. these word doodles, amidst sparrows and brown sandals, a language I do not understand- quiet. I blend in, an afternoon, a fountain. (1:45)

The sweet sound of fountains. Like all those nights waiting on benches was for this.

July 28.

This summer my community was as it should be.

…not entirely sure how to permanently change.

“A love that never runs out, a love that never gives up, I will always need.”

Six weeks ago, I did not even know these people existed. And now, my story will always be intertwined with theirs.

We sit silent. My favorite thing, some days.

These are bigger things to think of.

how to fight emptiness, how to be. I refuse to go back to small American thinking, small American fears. She walked to Hungary from Iran for goodness’ sakes. And I’m afraid of what.

How to share, how to tell.

Teaching. Men and women. Completely different experiences for each. Watching the women be safe enough to take down their scarves and let their hair breathe for an hour. Listening to them say, “I am beautiful” as they form sentences in English. Timidly, like they’re afraid to say it, but strong too, because they know it’s true. Listening to S talk about M, how she left four children in a hard place, how she’s depressed. So many questions I have about these women. The day she comes in and her lip looks like she’s been hit. Has she been hit? When my class tells me things not about lessons. 2:00. Immigration. Positive or Negative. They’re so nervous. I’m nervous for them. They tell me, too, nervous. I go on with the lesson because I don’t know what else to do. They don’t speak anymore English to talk about it. But I’m in, you know, I’m in. They trust me to share in their joy and sadness. They did not ask me to come, but (and) they let me in. Quickly, they let me in.

We can breathe through this

blank ink-

it won’t be enough.

enough to start a gasping for air,

but not for life,

not for quiet.

We can fill a page with

these drops-

it won’t be enough.

enough to make questions,

but not to find answers,

not for rest.

We can watch the sky and write,

can breathe this blank ink

but it won’t be enough.

July 29.

sitting on a bench in the square outside Gilbert’s, soaking up the shade. Walking along the street, with the pigeons, a little Libertango… mmm.

July 30.

comfort:

with

strong.

“Comfort is not soft, weakening commiseration; it is true, strengthening love.” –Amy Carmichael

“How is it that you can eat HEN UTERUS but think raspberries are disgusting?!” –Sarah, to Russ

August 2.

I am in Frankfurt, and I am alone.

I didn’t know what to share, so I told about being angry, and the women. Those things spilled first.

And then jumping pictures and dessert.

And then Kristin and I stayed up until two, talking in the dark. It was so lovely.

…And then suddenly and without a decent goodbye, I am alone, travelling across the ocean, and there are men all over, and debriefing was so brief and my feelings so fresh.

It is rather overwhelming.

And I fiercely miss my team.

And I am so excited to be with my family, and Mama Pearl and Aygul, and free.

but I ache too, loudly.

also, I can’t sleep on planes. :/

“I think your laugh would be like a current jam.” –Kristin, about bottling Sarah’s laugh.

August 6.

My heart is catching dragonflies.

Help me not forget a single drop.