bits and pieces, odds and ends

Gone.

2010-08-17T13:17:00.000-07:00

Help me help Haiti!

2010-01-17T01:31:00.000-08:00

Here's the deal: 100% of purchases from my etsy shop will be going to help those hurting in Haiti. 50% will go to either Samaritan's Purse or the Red Cross, and 50% will go towards sending me to Haiti next month to join the efforts. Your support would be much appreciated!!

You can find my shop at www.sarahbeth84.etsy.com

11 Practical Ideas to Combat Slavery

2010-01-11T12:17:00.000-08:00

11 Practical Ideas to Combat Slavery

Who Dat!

2009-11-29T19:51:00.000-08:00

Here in New Orleans, we're all holding our breath for the Saints v. Patriots game tomorrow night. Even those of us who couldn't tell a fumble from a fullback are hyped up (I'm not necessarily including myself in that one...I'm not football-savvy, but I'm at least a little knowledgeable).

In honor of those boys in black and gold, I made a special Who Dat necklace for my etsy store. Who knows...maybe this will finally be our year!

Isaiah 58

2009-11-04T19:40:00.000-08:00

6 "Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of wickedness,
to undo the straps of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?

7 Is it not to share your bread with the hungry
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover him,
and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?

8 Then shall your light break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up speedily;
your righteousness shall go before you;
the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard.

9 Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer;
you shall cry, and he will say, 'Here I am.'
If you take away the yoke from your midst,
the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness,

10 if you pour yourself out for the hungry
and satisfy the desire of the afflicted,
then shall your light rise in the darkness
and your gloom be as the noonday.

11 And the LORD will guide you continually
and satisfy your desire in scorched places
and make your bones strong;
and you shall be like a watered garden,
like a spring of water,
whose waters do not fail.

12 And your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;
you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
the restorer of streets to dwell in.

13 "If you turn back your foot from the Sabbath,
from doing your pleasure on my holy day,
and call the Sabbath a delight
and the holy day of the LORD honorable;
if you honor it, not going your own ways,
or seeking your own pleasure, or talking idly;

14 then you shall take delight in the LORD,
and I will make you ride on the heights of the earth;
I will feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father,
for the mouth of the LORD has spoken."

Twitter, twitter, twitter

2009-10-12T10:03:00.001-07:00

Just made a new twitter account for my Etsy endeavors. Follow me!

Invisible People

2009-10-06T08:32:00.000-07:00

Strong pots, strong women

2009-09-29T09:35:00.000-07:00

By my family's standards, I officially entered grown-up womanhood this week. There have been a lot of milestones in my life: first words, first school dance, first apartment. Then in 2005, my dad's aunt named a cow after me. Yeah, that's how we roll on the Barnett side...real women have livestock named for them. However, my journey to adulthood seemed to be lacking something.

That's right, a 15" Magnalite roaster. Laugh if you will, but while one side of my family marks womanhood by livestock, the other marks it by cookware.

There's a lot of significance tied to this pot. I remember "cooking" in one of these as a kid playing in our olive green and yellow kitchen. I remember the sound it made when you hit the side of it just right with a wooden spoon. I remember dropping the lid and almost crying with relief when it didn't land on my foot. My aunt and my mother have both cooked from this pot, and now it's my turn.

I come from a line of Italian women with big noses, sharp tongues and a need to cook for hordes of people. I inherited my maternal grandmother's blue eyes and her sassiness, as well as her recipe for spaghetti sauce. My mother and aunt sat in the kitchen with her and learned firsthand, and they have taught me. Nothing is written down, nor is it really measured. It's one of those it-has-to-feel-right kind of recipes that sits on the stove all day long and makes your hands smell like garlic for days. Six hours of stirring and waiting, and you have magical spaghetti. Most importantly, it's a recipe for a 15" Magnalite roaster.

My mother taught me to cook when I was thirteen. Every few months, we would drag out the Magnalite and spend a day stirring enough sauce for an entire army. It never failed that as we cooked, my mom would share stories about the sauce, about eating it every Sunday, about how when my parents were dating, my dad ate two plates of it the first time he met the family and then realized that was only the appetizer, about my grandfather stealing the cloves of garlic from the pot when my grandmother wasn't looking. It's not just a pot of spaghetti. It's my history, my heritage, steeped and served and passed down to each of the women in my family.

So after 25 years, I bought my own pot. After hunting around for just the right one (and after making my aunt haul out her pot and measure it with a ruler to make sure I got the right size), I ordered my own Magnalite. The time has finally come. My aunt and my mom both congratulated me. In just a week, I'll have my very own spaghetti pot and I'll join a long line of women I can only aspire to be like, women who do amazing things both in and out of the kitchen.

Etsy!

2009-09-12T15:18:00.000-07:00

Not only am I still alive, but I've also managed to revamp my Etsy shop! Check it out!

Pink Lady Necklace

NOLA Necklace

Japanese Lantern Earrings

Where you should be tonight

2009-03-25T07:01:00.000-07:00

THE RESCUE screening/houseparty

Vintage Church

9pm

Throwing money at a cause isn't enough. Being sympathetic isn't enough. Get mobile and do!

Everything I needed to know in life, I learned from Project Runway

2009-02-16T00:14:00.001-08:00

Santino by Bit Boy (BitBoy)

"Lighten up, it's just fashion!"

One of Santino's many pearls of wisdom (and reiterated to me by a very wise friend)

If you pay me enough, I'll sing these songs at a karaoke bar

2009-02-02T05:34:00.001-08:00

Epic. All of them. I will not detail what sorts of steps may or may not be necessary to ACTUALLY convince me that singing any of these in public would be a good plan, but I trust that one of my dear friends would be wise enough to formulate something...

Time After Time by Cindy Lauper

Just Can't Get Enough by Depeche Mode

I Will Always Love You by Dolly Parton

Georgia On My Mind

2009-01-29T21:46:00.000-08:00

My favorite parts of Atlanta so far:

The Waffle House waiter offering to take off his apron for me at breakfast this morning
Cheap Fiji water!
The crapton of overly underly stylized folk at the Variety Playhouse
SEAN WATKINS!!
Pulling up to (and departing from) a small-venue show in a white, unmarked 15-passenger van
Wearing matching outfits with Kat for the next two days

I'm sure I'll keep adding to this. Stay tuned.

When I realized I was a grown-up

2009-01-24T09:11:00.001-08:00

When I walked into a classroom of students (who were all decidedly taller than I) and they all greeted me with a big "Hello, Ms. Barnett!"

SALE!

2009-01-17T05:50:00.000-08:00

Go check it out!

Decompress

2009-01-07T05:37:00.000-08:00

I spent yesterday morning at a juvenile detention center...one of the many odd activities for my job. It was great to be out of the office, and I genuinely love site visits. They help keep me centered and remind me why I do what I do. Over the past few months, I've been to every corner of the city searching out new ministry opportunities and getting lost trying to find the old ones. Those are my favorite moments of my work week.

Yesterday was no different, except that I had to go back to my car twice, once to leave my bag and cell phones, one to change my shoes ("it's for your own safety"). Then I had to sign my life away in paperwork. Social security number, birthday, height, weight, eye color, employer. I signed contracts stating that I understood my role as a mandatory reporter. I signed contracts stating that I understood the confidentiality clauses. Then I had my picture taken.

When I walked into that meeting yesterday with the center's chaplain, I never expected what all I'd be getting myself into. All of this just so I can send volunteer groups to work with the juvenile offenders in this facility! Except now I have a name badge and a file. Now I'm attached.

After the hours-long meeting, I met some friends for lunch at one of my favorite restaurants. We talked and joked around, and I was my usual charming and amazing self (kidding...but I do crack the jokes and entertain). I went back to work to attack the mountain of paper on my desk. I fixed dinner with friends. And it wasn't until I sat still in my friend's apartment and let myself get lost in my own thoughts that it hit me: I spent my day touring a prison. A PRISON. A PRISON OF CHILDREN. I saw them in shackles. I saw the shamed look on their faces when the chaplain would introduce me. I saw the defiance in their eyes.

These boys live in a home where they can't leave unless they are in chains that rattle and clank, a reminder of their indiscretions. There is one dormitory in the facility for the sex offenders, juvenile sex offenders.

I was overwhelmed. My eyes glazed over. My friends asked if I was tired, I mumbled some excuse about needing to leave, and I spend the next hour walking around the rainy streets of the neighborhood wrapping my head around it all.

The weight of my job seems heavier every day, and yet I am not part of the doing. I plan. I call. I make charts. What am I doing? I am not called to make charts. I am called, as Isaiah was called. I serve a Father who has called me to do.

"I am the LORD; I have called you in righteousness; I will take you by the hand and keep you; I will give you as a covenant for the people, a light for the nations, to open the eyes that are blind, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, from the prison those who sit in darkness."

Miscommunication

2008-12-06T22:04:00.001-08:00

Oh, December...we've been waiting for you!

2008-12-01T07:15:00.000-08:00

Happy No More 2008 Hurricanes Day!

It is a week of ooey-gooey Christmas celebrations with Carols and Candlelight tomorrow night, Christmas-y crafts with the church kids Friday night, and real-tree-getting with Kim on Saturday!

Sufjan says it best...Santa Claus is coming, hear the banjos strumming...

Love Letters

2008-11-18T14:14:00.000-08:00

Read through them. They're heartbreaking.

The prodigal has returned!

2008-11-12T09:42:00.001-08:00

I'm a stranger to Etsy no longer! After taking a ridiculously long hiatus, I'm back. I did a craft fair and a festival last week, and now I find myself with a case of exhaustion and an abundance of extra earrings and necklaces. I'll be adding more as soon as I can get it all photographed. Go check it out!

And while you're browsing, go check out my friend Corrie's shop. It's pretty fab. Happy shopping!

Amen!

2008-09-29T06:27:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow You Will Eat Your Words
By David E. Crosby, Pastor
First Baptist New Orleans
September 29, 2008

If Jesus himself were running for political office, I would not give him an endorsement as pastor of my church.

But Jesus is not now—nor will he ever be—running for political office. He taught us clearly that politics itself is far too feeble a tool to get done what he is trying to do on this earth. Jesus is not blind to politics and politicians—he sees right through them.

The church is a force for good in this world because it is beholding to no politicians. It speaks and ministers by the authority of no earthly government. It salutes the flag of God Almighty and answers to him alone.

This transcendent task and independent status of the church is essential to its nature. If the church becomes the benevolence branch of government, it loses its own soul.

So the church rightfully insists that government not intervene in its internal affairs.

The vote is a sacred trust in our democracy. It is our most fundamental right and responsibility as citizens. Every eligible citizen should be registered to vote and should take the time and make the hard choices on Election Day.

Pastors should not be endorsing political candidates as part of their official duties in the church. Such an endorsement trivializes the house of worship and threatens the constitutional separation of the institutions of church and state.

Tax exempt status has been granted to the churches for generations because churches are partners with government in seeking the well-being of the citizenry. Churches and other houses of worship seek to care for the sick and dying, reach out to the poor and needy, and help those who cannot help themselves.

Additionally, churches are supported financially through the voluntary gifts of citizens who pay taxes. Taxing these charitable gifts amounts to double dipping by government.

Pastors who endorse political candidates threaten the balance of this arrangement between the church and the government. They do so, not because they are denied opinions on current issues, but because they seek to reconstitute government in their own image.

The founders of our country did not want pastors running the affairs of government. Such an intrusion would violate the democratic principle of elected representation. So the U.S. Congress was prohibited by the First Amendment from making any law which established a favored religion or prohibited the free exercise of any religion.

That means that churches do not do their work with tax money, and government does not do its work with church money. The institutions operate separately but jointly in an effort to bless the citizenry.

Pastors are at liberty to address any and all moral issues in this country, complimenting and criticizing government and government leaders for successes and failures as they see them. These comments do not threaten their tax exempt status.

But when churches start acting like political parties, rallying their constituency and endorsing candidates for office, they are intruding on the institutions of government and seeking by religious means to achieve political goals. Their tax exempt status is in jeopardy.

Houses of worship are properly concerned with eternal standards of behavior like justice, truth, and love. Pastors endorse these qualities of human conduct as ideals toward which we strive both as individuals and as societies. Pastors are responsible for speaking out when these standards are violated whether that failure is individual or systemic.

Individual politicians and political parties never embody these perfect virtues perfectly. A word to the wise: if you choose today to endorse a candidate or a political party as “Christian,” tomorrow you will eat your words.

One of those kind of days...

2008-09-16T07:01:00.000-07:00

I overslept this morning, in a major fashion, there were only cinnamon RASIN (aka cinnamon DISGUSTING) bagels in the coffee shop, and when I got to work, I realized my shirt was on inside-out.

Can I call for a redo?

Version 2.0

2008-08-29T06:23:00.000-07:00

As if today isn't hard enough. I'm clumsy and shaky and a little weepy every time the calendar gets around to August 29th. Now I'm clumsy, shaky, and a lot weepy. And totally overwhelmed. I have spurts of survival mode where I'll run through the apartment and unplug everything. Or I'll have a moment of clarity and remember exactly where it was that I left those papers that I need to pack. Otherwise, though, I spend the rest of the time frozen.

God is sovereign. God is sovereign. God is sovereign. It's my mantra.

Generation gap, bridged

2008-08-01T22:27:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I had the privilege of chauffeuring my 13 year-old niece around every corner of town. I had Sigur Ros in the cd player, but I kept the local Top 40 station on. (I just got her into eating gyros. Icelandic music is still a bit of a stretch.) During the "vintage" show at noon, "Don't Speak" by No Doubt came on, and we both started singing along. Slightly eerie that I was the 13 year-old in the passenger seat 11 years ago, singing along with Gwen about heartache and bad break-ups, thinking she was singing just for me.

Sing it, Gwen. All of us 13 year-olds are still singing along.

¡Vive la France!

2008-07-14T21:31:00.000-07:00

My father was a pseudo hippie. Long hair, flip flops, against the Vietnam War, take-this-job-and-shove-it attitude (which he put into literal practice at one point). I speak in past tense because he's now a cynical conservative with a hint of dormant pseudo hippie that he refuses to let me see, lest he fuel my idealism. Nonetheless, I am my father's daughter, and idealistic I remain (at least until I turn 50 and earn a few gray streaks). I have a tendency to romanticize revolution and all that they represent: the messy, all-consuming glory of bringing down the oppressive and waving the flag of the oppressed. As such a romantic, I cannot help but be thrilled with today, Bastille Day. I've mentioned it a few times today, but sadly no one is as interested as I. Though there were only seven prisoners in the fortress at the time, the image of this great stronghold falling was, I'm sure, thrilling to all involved...one rather huge act of rebellion in a land desperate for it.

My fascination with the French Revolution began long before I watched Marie Antoinette one million times, so I feel it's legitimate. No matter the source of my intrigue, I have celebrated my freedom from oppressive monarchies today. Nothing extraordinary or earth-shattering, nothing the Third Estate would find particularly striking, but I count it a small victory for myself.

Yay for small acts of rebellion! ¡Vive la révolution!

What you should be doing

2008-07-04T14:17:00.001-07:00

Now that I'm in the process of finding new employment, I think I'll try my hand at being a life coach. Let's see how it goes.

1. Listen to the Figs. "3/4" is especially lovely.

2. Read this article and report back. I'm torn.

3. Borrow and watch Volver, even if you hate subtitles. It's totally worth it.

In real life, I'm working non-stop, learning the art of spending oneself broke, and considering never using shampoo again. Apparently that's a big thing these days.

Let's frolic about in our summer skins

2008-06-05T12:41:00.000-07:00

I love...

playing "Exquisite Corpse" with the Wed. night kids (and having to call it "You Can't See Me" to make it slightly more appropriate)
the smell when you walk into Whole Foods
late-night conversations over hookah
good questions from people who actually want to hear the answers

I mark my life by summers. This one should be no different. Happy June!

My Soapbox, Part 1

2008-05-28T08:32:00.000-07:00

Vagina.

It's not a dirty word. It's not a crude insult. It's not a name to call your buddy when he's being ridiculous.

It's a body part.

For the past few months, it's become my mini-mission every time this issue comes up to rail against this awful idea that "vagina" or any euphemism for the term is appropriate as an insult. I see it mostly among my guy friends. One of them will say something stupid, and the others will respond with something like, "Shut up, you pussy," or "Quit being a vag!" And I'm tired of it.

I've actually had lengthy discussions about this, and the resolution most guys come to is as follows:

"It's not an insult to women. In fact, it has nothing to do with how we see women. I am a man, not a woman, so to call me a woman or a female body part is to insult my manhood. It's not because being a woman is bad, it's just bad for me...because I'm a man."

So it's okay for me to be a woman, but not you. Somehow, it's an insult for you to degrade yourself to being a woman. Theoretically, it's good to be a woman...unless you're a MAN. What kind of screwed-up, crapola logic is that?! Follow it through. Really think it out. If it's bad to be a woman, if it's an appropriate insult, then women are the lower, weaker, demeaned sex. That's what you are saying, whether you mean to or not.

It's the same as if you said something so ridiculous like, "Oh you BLACK PERSON!" and then defended it with the statement that it's okay for black people to be black, but if you're not black it's an insult. Same thing. Same degradation, same overbearing logic.

Until we can change the way people talk, we won't change how others think. It's been so ingrained in our culture, even now after decades of fighting for liberation and equality for women. Girls today struggle with enough as it is, dealing with self-confidence and self-image. Don't add to it. Set the example. Be the difference. Quit calling each other female genitalia. Because until you do, you're screwing it up for the rest of us.

Summer Reads

2008-05-24T00:22:00.000-07:00

So here's my list so far:

Love is a Mix Tape by Rob Shoffield

What is the What by Dave Eggers

Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott

Be forewarned...incompletion is highly likely, as are last-minute alterations.

What I've been up to lately...

2008-05-11T17:10:00.000-07:00

"Oh wonder, how many goodly creatures are there here, how beautious mankind is, oh Brave New World that has such people in it." (I have to use that English degree sometimes.)

I think we've got what it takes to get this heart start beating again

2008-04-24T17:29:00.000-07:00

Not to get all mushy gushy or anything (ok, yes to get all mushy gushy), but I seriously can't get over how lovely my little 3 and 4 year-olds at church are. Last night lesson-plan-free, so we did some coloring, some playing, and then...drum roll, please...

DANCE FREEZE!

That's right, the greatest game known to man, Dance Freeze. Basically you turn on some music, have the kids dance around, and then once you stop the music, everyone freezes. It's like musical chairs without the competition. Kat and I have tried this game with them before, and there were some reservations, but not last night. The best part? They dragged me over to the "dance floor" (aka the carpet with the colored squares), and we had a dance free-for-all.

Sara was a Barbi ballerina. Joey was a robot. Jake was a jester. And Mikey wanted to dance with a woman...so he asked me to be his partner. Definitely one of my top 10 moments in life.

Get out and play some Dance Freeze. You'll thank me later...

Why I love preschoolers, take 1

2008-04-11T14:09:00.000-07:00

Wednesday night in Mission Friends we were praying for a dentist and his family in Asia. Sara wanted to pray. She's three. It went something like this:

"Dear God, thank you for the dentist, and for teeth, and for Mommy and Daddy, and for all the sparkles in the world. Amen."

Sparkles. Thanks. Amen.

Mille Tendresses (Tift Merritt)

2008-04-04T06:33:00.000-07:00

La nuit, les bruits s’embrassent sous le vent,
La pluie ici, qui tombe tout doucement.
Il n’y a aucune chose qu’on peut tenir proche
Sans toutes ces milles tendresses.
 
Un rêve secret qui croise au fond des yeux,
Un geste, un mot, et tout à coup le feu.
Ce que je chante, tout ce qui passe,
Est dans toutes ces milles tendresses.
 
Si mon cœur cassait, je l’ai sauvegardé,
Je me suis cachée dans toutes ces mille tendresses.

Si ton cœur cassait, je l’ai sauvegardé,
Je t’ai caché dans toutes ces mille tendresses.

Et si on se perd un soir du printemps,
Envolé comme paroles de chanson,
N’oublie jamais, je te retrouverai
Dans toutes ces mille tendresses.

If my heart breaks, I have saved it.
I have hidden myself in these thousand tendernesses.

If your heart should break, I have saved it too.
I have already hidden you in a thousand tendernesses.

And if we lose each other one evening of the fall
Flying on the air like the lyric of this song
Never forget that I will find you again
In 1000 tendernesses, in each tenderness I find.

Bits and pieces

2008-04-01T14:19:00.000-07:00

When I was in college, I wrote this one paper on Esperanto for my history of language course. There's this innate desire in us to create a oneness, to bridge the misunderstanding and the miscommunication, and many think Esperanto is the ticket - a universal language that could convey anything to anyone in any culture. I disagree. The problem? Words are not just words...they carry nuance, history, meaning, relevance. My words carry pictures. Are you receiving in your glass what I'm pouring from my pitcher? For Esperanto to work, there would have to be not only a new language, but a universal culture.

My argument against Esperanto was simple: we were too broken to try and reunite with a common language. My metaphor was a crystal vase that started out as one piece but had been smashed to bits and pieces. Recreating the vase is impossible without cracks and holes and a lack of strength. I argued instead that we must use the broken remnants to create something new, a mosaic of the old made new again.

I've been very destructive lately, crashing around smashing things. It's time for me to create. It's time to piece something new together from the rubble.

This could potentially make my life...

2008-03-26T14:08:00.000-07:00

If you feel so moved, send donations. I'm not too proud.

Existential perfection at 2 am

2008-03-19T23:44:00.000-07:00

"Remember how it was a way long time ago that we went to South Carolina to see Needtobreathe and stopped at IKEA on the way back and got this catalog? I mean, that was back in, like, September...a long stinking time ago, but what makes me really sad is that the catalog says that all prices are valid until June 30, 2008, which is ALSO ridiculous way far away. So the problem is that we are stuck in this period where time is moving impossibly fast to have made when we got the catalog seem so far away, yet simultaneously impossibly slow to make the future date seem so impossibly far away." -Kathleen Ingram Garber, girl-wonder and local prodigy

Proof positive that I'm an adult now

2008-03-19T20:44:00.000-07:00

It's Wednesday and I'm still recovering from the weekend.

The girls Kat and I worked with at the Disciple Now kept asking to buy Monsters from the gas station. They wanted to get hyper. We chew Mad Croc to stay awake and study.

We're old.

Remember that one time

2008-03-08T08:02:00.000-08:00

that I planned a trip to Prague and then thought, "Whoa, you're 23. You can totally do something crazy like plan a trip to Prague and then actually GO." Yeah. Heavy.

P.S. You should:

listen to St. Vincent
read Grapefruit
eat at La Boulangerie
watch Wonderfalls

And we are just breakable, breakable, breakable girls and boys...

2008-03-03T16:02:00.000-08:00

I have a thing for bones...not like a creepy, I collect them sort of thing, but just an interest. If anything is interest-worthy, don't you think it would be bone? They allow us to move, to stand, they keep us from puddling. That in itself is pretty fantastic (I imagine it would be hard to feel girly and pretty if I were a puddle). So intricate and strong. Fragile. Strong. Let's just chalk it up to a latent Victorian fascination of mine.

Anyway, I've been listening to Ingrid Michaelson's album lately. I totally admire her because she tries to say as much as possible in as few words as possible...to me, the mark of good writing (and a skill I need to work on!) Her song "Breakable" has been stuck in my head for a few days. I'm also thinking about planning a trip to Prague this summer, where I totally intend to visit this, the Sedlec Ossuary. Yes, a little bit on the morbid side, but still worth seeing.

Maybe I should work on curbing my bone fascination.

"And we are so fragile,
And our cracking bones make noise,
And we are just,
Breakable, breakable, breakable girls and boys."

3 wishes

2008-02-19T15:16:00.000-08:00

If you can make any of these things happen, it would be pretty much fantastic. Thanks.

Unfortunate

2008-02-15T06:17:00.000-08:00

I just wasted a precious bit of sleep on a dream in which I was making out with Van Morrison. And not even Brown-Eyed-Girl Van Morrison...significantly-older-than-most-people-I-know Van Morrison.

I probably just should have pulled an all-nighter.

What you should know...

2008-02-14T13:10:00.000-08:00

...is that just because I'm currently unattached (relationship-wise) does not mean that I don't:

love the color pink
enjoy flowers
revel in love stories
get all emotional when I watch/read Pride and Prejudice
like Valentine's Day

Bitter singles of the world, stop giving the rest of us a bad name! To the rest of you, happy love day!

Not your typical Valentine...

2008-01-28T09:11:00.000-08:00

Fact: Heartfelt vandalism is a lot more impressive than a mushy-gooshy card and some chocolates.

Dear Ms. P!nk...

2008-01-11T07:41:00.000-08:00

I've had VH1's Jump Start on for a little background noise this morning, and P!nk's video for "Dear Mr. President" just came on. (And yes, she really does spell her name like that). It's shot live at one of her concerts, with the Indigo Girls singing back-up, and the crowd goes wild for it. Here's my question for P!nk, though. What can she tell the president about hard work when it comes to being a single mom making minimum wage? What can she tell him about being homeless?

I appreciate her effort, but it doesn't really ring true coming from a globe-trotting superstar. P!nk's idea of being politically aware, according to the bio on her website, is being actively involved in PETA. I get that she gets to be a mouthpiece because of her fame, but I still don't think she can tell the president what it's like to rebuild her home after it's been bombed. Sorry, P!nk. Try again.

Declaration

2008-01-04T05:07:00.000-08:00

I hold that today, January 4, is Universal Perspective Day. Get some.

Can someone hand me a kleenex?

2007-12-30T14:35:00.000-08:00

I broke my own hard and fast rule...that's right, I watched A Walk To Remember even though I'd already reached my once-a-year-viewing quota. Now I'm going to have puffy eyes for two days. Thanks, Mandy Moore.

On Blood Spills and Customer Service

2007-12-28T15:47:00.000-08:00

After an incident in Wal-Mart today...

Me: "Excuse me, I'm bleeding. Do you have a first-aid kit?"
Pharmacist #1: "See the pharmacist in the next window."

Me: "Excuse me, I'm bleeding. Do y--"
Pharmacist #2: "I'll be with you in a few minutes."
Me: "Ma'am, I'm bleeding. I need a first-aid kit!"
Pharmacist #2: "We don't keep things like that in the pharmacy. Hang on a sec, the manager's going to want to talk to you."

Manager #1 (upon seeing me holding two bloody paper towels): "Did you hurt yourself?"

Me: "I just wanted to let you know that there's a pool of my blood in the pharmacy and no one's cleaned it up."
Manager #2: . . .
Me: "Ma'am, my blood is on the floor. My blood!"
Manager #2: . . .
Me: "BLOOD!"
Manager #2: "I guess I'll call someone with a mop."

Reality

2007-12-19T23:30:00.000-08:00

The other night I had a dream that Walt Whitman and I were getting married. What's the problem with that scenario? Oh yeah, most of the free world is fairly certain that he was gay. And he died in 1892.

Tonight at work I told Joy we were going to go flying with the airplanes just by using our arms.

Reality doesn't have any particular place in my world, waking or sleeping.

I'm not the ant...I'm the grasshopper.

2007-11-30T07:45:00.000-08:00

I think I have a study hangover. And it hurts.

Tea, anyone?

2007-11-28T13:24:00.000-08:00

It seems lately I spend most of my time bouncing from one coffee shop to the next. This is visit #3 this week, and it's only Wednesday. In my defense, though, they are generally different shops, different vibes, different motivations behind each visit. (Also in my defense, I've switched to hot tea today instead of my usual frothy mocha espresso something or other).

My Rue visit the other night (read: serious study time) proved a little more ironic than I had anticipated. To understand the New Orleans coffee shop mentality, you have to examine 1. a New Orleans mentality and then filter it through 2. a caffeinated outlook on life. This particular cafe attracts a fairly type-casted clientèle. It's not far from the University District, so most tables are crammed with law students, med students, lib art kids with messy hair and dirty chucks, and the like. As I was wrapping up some intense note-taking for an impending paper, I noticed a young police officer walk in. Now I do genuinely respect law-enforcement personnel, but there were a few things wrong with this picture. First, poor guy had the worst-fitting uniform ever! It looked a bit like this:Yeah...inverted pyramid. Highly unflattering. To make matters worse, though, he wore this bulldog-tough-guy expression the whole time he was standing at the counter...getting a lesson from the barista on how to choose a hot tea flavor. That's right, ladies and gentlemen. Tough guy pyramid man was selecting a hot tea, and the barista was teaching him how to tie the string of the bag to the stirrer to let it steep.

Meanwhile, what was going on outside while I walked out to my car? A high-speed chase. No lie.

Oh, New Orleans.

Send me to Colombia!

2007-11-25T18:17:00.000-08:00

I'm going back to Barranquilla in February, and news flash, friends: mission trips are pricey. So in an effort to alleviate some of the costs, I'm selling my jewelry online these days. Check it out. Buy my stuff. Send me back to Colombia!

Overheard

2007-11-10T18:55:00.000-08:00

I spent the afternoon at the bookfair on Frenchmen. It was quite the affair.

By the book collective booth [in reference to person #1's significant other]:
#1: "He's like a drunk yeti. A drunk yeti on acid."
#2: "Really?"
#1:"Yeah. Violent too. I mean, really perky? Yeah, perky."

Front door at Ray's:
kid: "Otto told me that this [the hollow at the base of the neck] is the toughest bone in my body."
mom: "Oh yeah? He said that?"
Kid: "Mhmm...and that if it were any higher, it would make my neck blow up..."

Handicrafts/Vegan table:
"And these pom poms on here? Yeah, they're symbolic...of moles."

Seriously, one of the more entertaining afternoons I've had lately!

Things I learned in Theology today...

2007-10-31T08:31:00.000-07:00

*Note: What follows is a fairly snobby diatribe. If you perhaps may be offended by my momentary snobbery, please read elsewhere.

Somehow we got off subject today and began discussing entropy. Now there's no chance in the world that I can explain to you what the second law of thermodynamics has to do with systematic theology (at least not as it was being discussed today), but I can tell you this: the word, friends, is ENTROPY, not ANTHROPY. If we're going throw around big words for the professor, let's make sure they are actual words.

Buy me a pony!

2007-10-26T06:25:00.000-07:00

That's right, friends...only 59 days till Christmas.

To do:

2007-10-19T00:40:00.000-07:00

take Islam midterm
read Divine Nature and Human Language
read Interpersonal book
write reviews on said books
get jewelry together for craft fair
sew poodle skirts!
learn everything about cognitive/behavioral therapy
reinvent the wheel
buy my mother a fabulous birthday present
discover 12 new uses for uranium
get on some sort of normal sleeping pattern

“The busy man is troubled with but one devil; the idle man by a thousand.” -Spanish Proverb

What about the idle woman who is simply ignoring the fact that she's so busy??

My procrastination

2007-10-04T08:46:00.000-07:00

has become an entity in and of itself. With tiny arms and teeth. Sharp ones. That are now biting me in the butt.

I think I'll name him Charlie.

Dislikes

2007-09-16T13:30:00.000-07:00

Movies that aren't in alphabetical order
Phase 10
Hubig's Pies
Waking up three minutes before the alarm is supposed to go off
Lint from the dryer
Cds that skip
Racism
Banana trees...the kind with hooks that sit on countertops
When someone asks how I'm doing, and when I tell them I just got back from a funeral, start talking about themselves.

Just say no to porn!

2007-09-11T08:46:00.001-07:00

I'm a fairly laid-back person in most areas of life, but lately this issue of pornography has been irking me more and more...the prevalence of it, the nonchalant view of it, and the wide acceptance of it. I'm not just speaking of the Christian world, either...this is not an issue that is just something that should appall Christians.

There is this crazy breakdown in thought that justifies pornography. It's just someone's body. How did we get to the point where body and person can be so segmented and compartmentalized that we can justify objectifying other humans? And what's ironic is that this compartmentalization seems to have just the opposite effect: instead of separating body and person, it ends up defining person by body.

Some statistics show that over 40% of all internet users are viewing pornography and that in 2006, there were over 13 million searches for teen porn alone. 13 MILLION! What the crap?!

I know some people who say that the pornography is out there anyway, so their use of it makes no difference. I say that with every click, every dvd, every solicitation, you are saying, "Yes, it is perfectly fine that you sell your body, that you chop away at your self-worth, that you give away pieces of yourself as if they were worthless." We are raising up a generation of people who view themselves and others as nothing but commodities...nothing but trash. Make it stop...make it stop.

Thanks, Maggie Mason

2007-09-06T12:58:00.000-07:00

Mightygirl.com is quite the inspiration. Since I've only been around for a little over two decades, I may as well lay out both.

My first decade:

Age 1: Still have not begun to walk. Mom panics and brings me to the doctor who says, "Hey, stop carrying her around like a princess, and she'll do it herself." Translation: I'm lazy.

Age 2: I invent my own language. Memorized The Little Lost Puppy as well, and can "read" it perfectly. Yes, a prodigy, I know.

Age 3: My party dress stage. With a British best friend, who even at three attends tea time, I cannot be made to wear pants or touch dirt.

Age 4: JR is my first crush, and I name the white bear with the blue corduroy overalls after him.

Age 5: Big kid school starts. I learn to actually read and am punished when my ever-expanding vocabulary includes "sexy" (in reference to the Peaches 'n' Cream Barbie my sister has on the shelf). This is also the year when I learn in one fell swoop that the Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus are an elaborate ruse. All while standing in the seasonal aisle at the grocery store.

Age 6: First grade and the beginning of the pageboy haircuts. The first one is from Mr. Vincent, my grandfather's barber. Definitely a sign of things to come.

Age 7: Loss of the two front teeth and a bit of dignity. I now have a lisp and a name that starts with the letter "S."

Age 8: My mother is diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis and I assume the role of Polyanna. The haircut goes from bad to worse, and both buck teeth and large pink glasses are added to the scenario.

Age 9: I begin reading the "Little House" book series and become convinced that I am related to Laura Ingalls.

Age 10: Sister gets married. I am forced to wear ugly lace and a flower in my ever-poofing hair. My best friends, identical twins, pass the 5'6'' mark, and thus begins the awkward girls-maturing-faster-than-boys phase of my life.

Oh, to be Jane Austen

2007-09-04T16:40:00.001-07:00

It's true, Jane and Shakespeare were not contemporaries...not even by a long shot. The two are inextricably connected in my mind, though, and after watching Becoming Jane yesterday, I am rewatching every screen adaptation of her work. Sense and Sensibility today. Sonnet 116. Sigh.

Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wandering bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sickle's compass come:

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Seriously, I was so born in the wrong century. And on the wrong continent.

The Sacred Heart

2007-08-10T00:43:00.000-07:00

There's something very appealing about broken holy things [Greenwood Cemetery, New Orleans]. In my head, this seems appropriate...as if Jesus is so busy with compassion and mercy that he has no time to scrub himself up and look all shiny. Maybe I'm just superimposing my humanness...or maybe it's because he superimposed his deity-ness that he's allowed to look so broken. Food for thought, friends.

Thought Soup

2007-08-02T17:35:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I lock my thoughts away and let them have a field day only in my own head. It's as if I forget how much I crave banter and fairly intelligent conversation and let it course under my skin but never surface.

This summer's been a weird one. I didn't expect that. Last summer was full of little oddities, and I fully planned for that. The first summer post-my-new-life...naturally that's going to feel a little funny and not quite normal. It was a lonely summer, though I was never alone. This summer, however, I've been much more alone, though I haven't been lonely. For that I'm grateful.

I was sitting in a worship service the other night listening to my friend Greg preach on love, and out of nowhere, I was deluged with flashbacks from my experience during the hurricane in 2005. Literally, memories I had blocked for nearly two years came rushing back to me without a trigger and without any connection to what was going on around me. I sat on the cold linoleum tile and closed my eyes and pulled my knees in close. It lasted about 20 minutes, and I endured it with much more composure than I could have hoped for.

Fairly unconnected (though nothing in my thought process is truly ever unconnected), I've been reading The Mermaid Chair, and today I came across a passage about how life in a monastery is much like a tiny experiment in life...an attempt to actually live together in peace and love...to coexist. It stuck out to me that this sort of existence should happen outside of cloisters as well, right? Sometimes I wonder if that's what Christianity is or not. It's what it should be...a web of human experience enduring this life with grace and love that's not our own. Why is it, then, that we hurl rocks at one another? We throw grenades, we attack, and we sit back to watch the aftermath. There's a sadism to the way we treat one another despite our call to do exactly the opposite. How are we to show the difference Christ makes in our lives if we are too busy chipping away at our relationships?

"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." -John 13:34-35

Start a revolution

2007-07-13T23:36:00.000-07:00

Happy Bastille Day!

Have you ever...

2007-07-07T05:27:00.000-07:00

been completely aware of every molecule in your body all at the same time? I feel very small and very alive. Maybe pseudoephedrine sulfate should no longer be my drug of choice when it comes to sinus congestion...

I read this poem once...

2007-06-30T21:07:00.000-07:00

THIS SKY

this

sky

where we live

is no place to lose your wings

so love, love

Love.

-Hafiz of Shiraz

The more I see of the world, the more I cry for the love we need. And the more I cry for the beauty. And the sadness. And the ache. This summer I am working with a group of amazing women who physically, emotionally, and spiritually guard those around them with love. It's a strength that amazes me every day...a strength I long to grow into. Love is so much more complicated and so much simpler than we ever imagine.

Cool people doing cool things

2007-06-26T06:26:00.000-07:00

So there's a general consensus among my friends that Crocs = not so cool in the fashion world. For all their oddities, though, these shoes have definite positives. When I was planning my trip to Guinea, I even picked up a pair. No matter, though, this woman's collecting them for kids in the Congo...check it out!

Crocs for Orphan Tots

Only the Shadow knows...

2007-06-23T06:55:00.000-07:00

piece

Margaret Wertheim

The Shadow Goes

On Thursday, on the summer solstice, the Sun will celebrate the year’s lazy months by resting on the horizon. The word solstice derives from the Latin “sol” (sun) and “sistere” (to stand still). The day marks the sun’s highest point in the sky, the moment when our shadows shrink to their shortest length of the year. How strange to think that these mundane friends, our ever-present familiars, can actually go faster than the sun’s rays.

I remarked on this recently to my husband as we sat on the porch with our shadows pooling by our chairs. Nothing can go faster than light, he insisted, expressing what is surely the most widely known law of physics, ingrained into us by a thousand “Nova” programs.

That is the point, I explained: Nothing can go faster than light. A shadow isn’t a thing. It’s a non-thing. It’s the absence of light.

Special relativity dictates that we cannot move anything more quickly than the particles of light known as photons, but no law says you can’t do nothing faster than light. Physicists have known this for a long time, even if they generally do not mention it on PBS documentaries.

My husband looked troubled, as did my sister and some friends I regaled with the story that evening. Like the warp drive on “Star Trek,” faster-than-light travel is supposed to be a science-fiction fantasy. Isn’t it?

They are right about the travel: According to relativity, no physical substance can exceed the speed of light because it would take infinite energy to accelerate anything to such a velocity.

Yet the laws of physics pertain only to that which is. That which isn’t is not bound by relativity’s restraint. From the point of view of relativity, a shadow (having no mass) is a non-thing, an existential void.

It’s quite easy to conjure up a faster-than-light shadow, at least in theory. Build a great klieg light, a superstrong version of the ones set up at the Academy Awards. Now paste a piece of black paper onto the klieg’s glass so there is a shadow in the middle of the beam, like the signal used to summon Batman. And we are going to mount our light in space and broadcast the Bat-call to the cosmos.

The key to our trick is to rotate the klieg. As the light turns, the bat shadow sweeps across the sky. Round and round it goes, projecting into the void. Just as the rim of a bicycle wheel moves faster than its hub, so too, away from the source our bat shadow will fly faster and faster, a consequence of the geometry that guarantees the rim of a really big wheel moves faster than a co-rotating small wheel.

At a great enough distance from the source, our shadow bat will go so fast it will exceed the speed of light. This does not violate relativity because a shadow carries no energy. Literally nothing is transferred. Our shadow bat can go 10 times the speed of light or 100 times faster without breaking any of physics’ sacred rules.

My sister leapt to the heart of this apparent paradox: Why isn’t the light itself traveling faster than the speed of light? Isn’t it also rotating in space? Actually, no. The bulbs that produce the light are spinning, but the light particles leave the source at 186,000 miles a second, the vaunted “speed of light.” Once emitted, the photons continue to travel at this speed directly away from the source. Only the shadow revolves around the great circle. The critical point is that no object, no substance, defies light.

My husband was right to object that you’d need one spectacular klieg to produce a detectable shadow thousands of miles out in space. Still, the theory is sound.

The anthropologist Mary Douglas noted that all systems of categorizing break down somewhere, unable to incorporate certain forms. By standing beyond relativity’s injunction, shadows suggest the limits of all classification schemes, a tension that even modern science cannot completely resolve.

In the terms recognized by relativity, shadows are non-things. Yet before the invention of clocks, shadows were the most important means for telling time. Weightless and without energy, shadows can nonetheless convey information — though they cannot, despite our giant klieg, be used for faster-than-light communication. That’s because the shadow’s location cannot be detected until the light, moving at its ponderous relativistic pace, arrives.

“Here there be monsters,” said the medieval maps, signaling the limits of reason’s reach. As a map of being, physics is flanked by the monsters of non-being whose outlines we glimpse in the paradoxes of quantum mechanics and in the zooming arc of a shadow bat going faster than light.

In Christian theology we are told, “God is that which nothing is greater than.” The scientific corollary might be, “Light is that which nothing is faster than” — a statement true both in spirit and fact.

What to do, what to do

2007-06-13T09:52:00.001-07:00

I got an email a few days. Being the romantic that I am, I sort of wish it had been a letter, but email will have to do in this technozoic age in which we reside. This email could change things. A lot of things. Let's face it, this email could change everything. Right now it's sitting in my inbox...I haven't even opened it because I don't need to. I know what it says. It says, "Sarah, here's a shot at changing everything."

Now that's a pretty bold statement for an email, even for something as weighty as a letter, but nonetheless, there it sits...waiting....waiting for me to respond with yes or no...or nothing at all.

At least in the last few years, there has been this growing longing within me to be more nomadic, to let go a bit and broaden my world view. There are so many ties keeping me from this, though...some natural, and some I've created. These ties are strong, almost elastic. They let me get a little space and then yank me back. I love them, I do, but I don't know how to loosen their grip on me. Can I let go of what I don't really have control over in the first place?

I want to go. I want to stay. I want to go and be assured that everything will stay the same, waiting for my return. I want to stay and still my wandering heart. I want, I won't. I can, I can't. But I will...?

I like grand gestures...

2007-06-09T23:11:00.000-07:00

and I make no apologies about that.

How old are we again?

2007-06-06T12:26:00.000-07:00

So last night, Arthur and I made a late-night Cafe du Monde run, and while half the place was taken up by Presbyterian teenagers on a mission trip, the other half had its fair share of characters. Most notable was the crew that sat at the table next to ours, a father with his four young kids. None of them could have been older than nine, and they were all dressed up. While I was busy wondering where they must have spent their evening, the dad got up from the table. As he walked away, the kids began chatting...yes, chatting. The most adult-like small talk ensued, and I watched these kids in awe as two of the sisters were chatting animatedly while the other wiped the face of the brother as he unbuttoned the top button of his shirt under his man-boy sweater vest. All I could think were how mature and strange these children were. This from the girl who is used to kids peeing on her while shoving their fingers up their noses and talking about video games. I was amazed at these mini adults.

Of course, what were Arthur and I doing this whole time? Eavesdropping on the Presbyterians and throwing spit balls at each other. Yeah.

Sometimes

2007-05-30T19:00:00.000-07:00

I hate the internet.

Summer Reading

2007-05-20T05:58:00.000-07:00

So nearly all of my female friends are gone for the summer (or gone from NOLA forever), and it is going to be a male-filled few months. Whether I actually acknowledged this fact while at the bookstore on Friday, I do not know. I have, though, whether consciously or subconsciously, surrounded myself with women in the books I am reading for the summer. Defense mechanism? You be the judge. Here's the list, I'm not aiming too high numbers-wise this year...no need to disappoint myself from the get-go.

The Dive from Clausen's Pier - Ann Packer
The Heart is a Lonely Hunter - Carson McCullers
Eat, Pray, Love - Elizabeth Gilbert
The Year of Magical Thinking - Joan Didion

I'll let you know how it goes! Happy reading, and happy summer!

Eavesdropping on a Friday Night

2007-05-13T19:32:00.000-07:00

Diner talk:

"Mike's totally looking for a girlfriend. He get's his braces off this summer."

Freshman year of high school seems so long ago.

I don't care about history...rock, rock, rock n roll high school...

2007-05-09T08:17:00.000-07:00

I've been swimming in papers so much that I'm amazed I'm not overrun with paper cuts. A few of the topics?

The Baptist Friendship House and their work since Katrina
Urban missions tactics as applied to IDP Camps
Ebenezer

One more book review and a mountain of finals, and then maybe I'll be able to absorb some of what's going on around me. Have I mentioned how ready I am for summer?

What we are saying is give peace a chance

2007-04-30T06:27:00.000-07:00

Still taking it all in. I'm not ready to parse it just yet. But soon.

The world is on fire.

2007-04-28T07:19:00.000-07:00

So today's the day. Displace Me. And I can honestly say I'm a little nervous...but while some of those butterflies in my stomach can be attributed to the PR fiasco that is about to go down (aka none of the media is willing to show up), the majority of those butterflies go to something else.

I think the thing I'm most nervous about is what's going to happen Wednesday. And next week. And next month. I'm nervous about how this is going to change me. But I'm glad for it too...this is a welcomed change.

This event, the books I've been reading lately, the people I've been talking to...it has to mean something bigger. It can't all be a coincidence. Something big is on the horizon, and I can't quite see it yet.

All I know is that it's true. We need to live for more because Africa (as well as most of the rest of the world) needs more to live.

Blessed be.

I'd rather be...

2007-04-24T05:33:00.000-07:00

Well, pretty much anything other than prepping for this Greek exam. For a brief moment in my life, I am totally okay with mediocrity. If I could only get out of this class with a C...nothing higher, nothing lower...smack dab in the middle.

Just a few more hours and then I can move on to the bookreviewgeographyexammissionsprojectresearchpaperonEbenezer. And a little bit of activism thrown in for good measure.

Verse of the day? "Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up." - Galatians 6:9

Jesus, we've all come here to bring you our struggles...

2007-04-16T22:05:00.000-07:00

Jesus, we've all come here because you struggled too.

I bought a window box and seeds today...as an affirmation of life.

"The mass of men lead quiet lives of desperation." -Henry David Thoreau

2007-04-14T10:05:00.000-07:00

My apartment is cluttered with scraps of tulle and bits of thread. Up till 4 sewing. Puffy eyes, big headache. I wonder if this is what it's like to be hung over.

Adding to the bleariness of the day are the gray clouds and a horrible fight with the one person I trust most in the world [and the one who seems to do the most damage when he lashes out at me]. Sometimes I'm scared to death at the thought of being a parent, knowing the hurt we humans cause one another. We tear big holes, the kind I can't sew up with my needle and thread.

I once heard a speaker talk about "daddy wounds," those marks we still carry around in the land of earthly fathers...the imperfect ones...the ones that break things. Just another reminder that I'm still not home yet.

Assorted thoughts

2007-04-05T13:50:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my dusty, rickety brain for a day. Feel free to explore. Bring a flashlight and a snack...you might get lost.

I've never been so aware of my female-ness as I have as a student of NOBTS
My apartment is full of cardboard. If we don't use all of this on the 28th, I'm totally building a fort to protect myself from finals
I love highlighters but I hate reading highlighted portions of text
I'm tired of being a consumer
Tomorrow's Kat's birthday!
10 cent markers rock the planet. Thinking about who I'm affecting by purchasing said markers, not so rock-ish
My dad put a bug in my ear about acting like a grown-up and buying a house...WHAT?!

Oh, for a list that would end!

You and me and ol' Tennessee

2007-04-02T08:58:00.000-07:00

Jeff and I went to the last bit of the Tennessee Williams Festival yesterday. We made it just in time for the STELLA-A-A! contest, and it was worth the walk and the heat and the awkward crowd.

I'm reading Region, Race, and Cities: Interpreting the Urban South. It fits well. Here's a quote to munch on and probably the reason I couldn't live long-term past the Mason-Dixon Line:

"Yankees always make the mistake of going home the moment they realize they are going mad, which is why they have never understood the South. They do not grasp the simple fact that losing one's mind is the most important prerequisite for fitting in with southerners." -F. King, Southern Ladies and Gentlemen

"sarah"

2007-04-01T21:17:00.000-07:00

(this poem was composed in my honor, thus the reason for it being titled after me. enjoy.)

you're a girl
i'm a guy
and together
we share a lot
taco bell
food from the [cupboard]
you and i
me and you
we're just like food
we mix better, together
la la la

There's one for you and nineteen for me, cause I'm the tax man

2007-03-26T06:42:00.000-07:00

So I've discovered about myself that there's very little about mundane life activities that I enjoy. For instance, today I have to file my taxes. Just the thought makes me cringe...not because it's an arduous task, not because I'm nervous about it...but because it just seems like such a waste of time when I could be doing something so much more magnificent and fabulous.

But no, I'm sitting here under these fluorescent lights all by myself in this office, working while the rest of the free world is tanning this or climbing that or something more spring-break-y than this, and what am I doing? Filing my taxes.

Sometimes the grown-up world just makes me want to cry.

Extended Metaphor

2007-03-22T04:52:00.000-07:00

Sarah: Dating to me is like a kiwi.

Allison: Okay.

Sarah: I want to like it. Everybody seems to be a fan. It goes well in fruit salad and is a really pretty shade of green...but I just can't get past the fuzzy skin.

Allison: Yeah. I think you're supposed to stab it with a spoon.

Let's sift through the static to find a simpler sound -Kevin Devine

2007-03-19T21:22:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I wonder if grad school isn't some of that static. Hmm.

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee;
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.
And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.
I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

Let's Piece I

2007-03-05T06:39:00.000-08:00

"500 Noses are more beautiful than
one nose. Even a telephone no. is more
beautiful if 200 people think of
the same number at the same time.

a) let 500 people think of the same
telephone number at once for a
minute at a set time.
b) let everybody in the city think
of the word 'yes' at the same time
for 30 seconds. Do it often.
c) make it the whole world thinking
all the time.

1960 spring"

Wisdom from Yoko. Who knew?

Mardi Gras Mountain

2007-02-20T14:28:00.000-08:00

I got beads!

I love love.

2007-02-13T06:13:00.000-08:00

I know tomorrow is Valentine's Day and all, but no, I'm not writing a mushy, gushy v-day post. I'm not talking about rainbows and kittens and little hearts dotting the i's sort of love.

Last night/early this morning, a severe storm system moved through New Orleans ravaging house after house in a non-sensical pattern. Tornadoes spun off the system and struck in various parts of the city (completely unheard of outside of Katrina's wake...tornadoes never strike in New Orleans proper). I woke up this morning to my aunt calling in a panic to make sure I was safe (some struck in the Gentilly area, not too far from school).

As I watched the news this morning, seeking all-too familiar images of damage and destruction, the camera panned over to a mother and son whose house was torn apart by the tornado. When asked what they did to stay safe, the son said that he ran into his mother's room, pulled her out of the bed, and they both crouched down on the floor beside her bed. He said he pulled her underneath him and laid ontop of her just in case the roof came in, that way she wouldn't be hurt.

He was going to bear the brunt of the pain for her.

I love love.

2007-02-08T22:16:00.000-08:00

"There is a lot of goodness in this world, and more goodness every day, and this fantastic human-made fabric of excellence is genuinely responsible for the fact that I am alive today."

I don't buy it. And I could be the most optimistic person you'll ever know. We're all hiding shiny scissors under those cloaks of "human-made fabric." Don't think for a second that we're not.

Reminisces on books and what used to be

2007-02-06T12:35:00.000-08:00

As an office assistant in a fairly quiet part of campus, I inevitably have a lot of time on my hands, for better or worse. I fill it with Greek homework and amazon.com searches among other things, but today I stumbled upon the English department's course schedule at Loyola...and oh, did it make me homesick.

I'm into my second semester of graduate school now, studying biblical languages and histories of Christianity and methods for effective ministry in the real world, but today I am longing for my warm, cozy spot in the Monroe Library with all my dear old friends, the well-worn volumes that sit heavy on those dusty shelves. There's something so appealing to me about the literary world, an escape into another time or life or situation that I cannot help but miss. Sure, I can do all the side reading I want...after all, I live alone and am the boss of me. It's not the same, though. I miss that distinctive scent of Bobet Hall, binding glue, chalk dust, and over-practiced literary angst. I miss diving into the worlds of Austen and Rushdie and Shakespeare. I miss being an English major.

It's not that I don't love where I am now. I may be a little restless, but I'm happy for the most part. I just missed the comfortable feeling of discomfort when reading something new, if that makes any sense.

Maybe I should be studying library sciences instead of divinity. Maybe.

You're a poem of mystery, you're the prayer inside me

2007-01-30T23:48:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I'm convinced that the world is made up solely of people desperately seeking to connect with someone else and all the time missing. Like we each know that no matter how hard we try, we cannot know each other fully, but we still try anyway. I blogged about this ages ago on my old journal site. My thoughts haven't changed much on the subject, although I'm convinced of the beauty in it. It's sort of a painful beauty, but a beauty nonetheless. And sometimes we get it right...and oh, what days those are. The white ones. The ones that stick.

Five Facts

2007-01-26T21:15:00.000-08:00

So Joe talked me into it. And I figured this blog could use something a little more lighthearted as of late. So here goes. Five facts about me.

My right ear is smaller than the left. A womb thing, apparently.

I was born in Houston, and when I was a little girl, my mom used to play the song "The Yellow Rose of Texas" for me. She told me it was about me, and for a while I went around telling everyone that I was the yellow rose of Texas.

I've never been to Disney World.

As much as I love to read and learn, I absolutely hate studying.

When I'm by myself in a public restroom, I always use an end stall. I have a fear of the middle ones.

Me in a bulleted list. Hope you enjoyed.

I'm Sorry, Andrew

2007-01-26T17:09:00.000-08:00

He lifted his hand to touch

her face, but she turned her head.

His hands were always dirty,

those long thin fingers reaching out from wide palms,

the skin stretched

almost translucent

over the bones,

every muscle connected by intricate tendons.

They were gentle, the hands

of an artist. They sketched her,

and she was beautiful,

and they were beautiful until

the charcoal smeared.

Lines blurred, image blurred.

Whose mistakes? No matter

how many times he washed them,

his hands would never come clean.

If it weren’t for the dirt,

she might have loved him back.

It's a rainy night. Of course I have to post.

2007-01-05T00:20:00.000-08:00

My heart always swells on nights like this, and I'm so full of things to write. But once I get to actually setting them down, pulling them outside myself, I've become uninterested. Tonight, though...tonight I force myself to punch the keys on this laptop. I need to pull this outside myself.

A friend of mine noted today in passing conversation how odd it was that we make such a big to-do out of New Year's. What's so great about celebrating a whole new year? he asked. It doesn't even always feel like a new year. Nights like this, though, remind me of why it's natural to pause and celebrate the beginning of something new. Yes, it's just another successive 365 days, but it's more. It's natural to stop because it's natural to need a new start. A redo. Not even a redo...a do altogether separate and different with no re's involved whatsoever.

[The rain's remarkably steady at this point, and I can't help thinking that water never seems to leave my tiny world...that it is both my damnation and redemption at times.]

Anyway, back to New Year's. In my opinion, I've let it become just a disappointing holiday...an excuse to wear extra eye shadow at best, and that I miss the necessity of it. When else do you have the chance to make life changes and people be accepting, even expecting it? We get the chance to say, "Hold up. This part needs to be tweaked a bit," and it's a-okay with the world?

[That was by far the biggest thunder clap I've heard in ages.]

I struggle with change. So much of it is forced upon me, but honestly, do I really face any more change than the next girl? We all have great things asked of us, whether we accept them or not. And the greatness of these things (for the sake of this post, changes) is relative...a sliding scale that we are not always atuned to. But these changes are not easy. I watched Adaptation today, and this stood out to me like nothing else. Meryl Streep's character says at one point in the film: "[Adaptation is] easier for plants. I mean they have no memory. They just move on to whatever's next. With a person though, adapting almost shameful. It's like running away."

So that's where I am...not an orchid, not willing to adapt and forget and run away...but still deep down longing for a clean start, a do instead of a redo, a chance to tweak and change. We'll see, we'll see.

Do you like Shakespeare? Jeff Buckley? Watching movies on Sundays?

2006-12-15T01:51:00.000-08:00

So I'm still on my exam sleeping pattern, which explains the 4 am blog. I have, in the past few hours:

put clean bedding in the "guest room"
sorted through pictures and pulled out the ones to frame
framed a few of said pictures
made two necklaces
cleaned bathroom/vanity area
fixed my wall outlet
made a grocery list

Now, of course, AFTER exams are over, I can't seem to get my brain out of high gear. Hmm. No matter. As I ran from one end of the apartment to the other with all these chores, I was checking out Susan Cagle's Subway Recordings, one of my finds during my monster cd shopping spree with Jeff. Today was Tower Record's last day, and everything was $1 or less...I'm up to my earlobes in new music. This Subway Recordings, though, it's interesting...and the sugar-pop first song has already gotten stuck in my head...and it got me thinking about lists.

She goes through this whole Q & A session (all in the matter of one chorus) with a possible significant other. My already over-driven brain naturally went through the lists I've made throughout the years. It's shifted to reflect my ever-changing interests, and somehow it would get longer and longer and looonnngggeeerrr. I try to steer clear of these things now, knowing that boxing myself in like that is only asking for trouble. God's bigger than my lists, as are his plans.

The last list I wrote like that, though, was different. It was actually for a creative writing class, and it was in the form of a dialogue between two lovers, basically presenting a contract full of contingency clauses and warnings. I realized my last list wasn't a What-I-Want Checklist. Nope, this time around it was a Who-I-Am Checklist. Instead of writing out what I want in a guy, I wrote out a warning label of who I am...sort of an up front, this-is-what-you're-getting-yourself-into list. Of course, human warning labels make life a little less complicated and a little less fun.

I was heading somewhere with all this, but now I've lost my place. I know where to find it though...asleep in my bed. Exam-guilt-free sleep could be the greatest rest I've ever known.

My bathroom just got kicked up a notch...

2006-11-27T13:42:00.000-08:00

That's right. It's finally here. And up. And amazing...the CBGB shower curtain.

And it came to me then that every plan is a tiny prayer to Father Time

2006-11-25T20:28:00.000-08:00

It's been a year now since I first came back to New Orleans. A whole year, and only a year. This Thanksgiving was much more...thanks-filled? Last year's circumstances were so different. I was forced to be thankful just like I was forced to leave all sense of normalcy forever. Yes, my family and I made it out of a horrible natural disaster relatively unscathed. Yes, I was temporarily accepted to a wonderful school in a wonderful city. Yes, people were so generous and kind and genuinely took care of me. So much to be thankful for, and yet, I didn't want to be thankful. I was angry and confused and wounded, and more than anything, I just wanted to hate the world. But I couldn't. I couldn't hate anything because I was supposed to be thankful.

This year I had a choice, and oh, what a difference it has made.

I stopped writing a while back. It's been nearly two semesters since I've written anything non-academic (and even that, if I'm being honest with myself, hasn't been all that academic). I don't know what I'm waiting for. I don't know why I'm still holding my breath. Have I forgotten how to exhale?

Feeling a bit green...

2006-11-17T08:20:00.000-08:00

Yes, I've been remiss about posting. Yes, this will be a quick shot of my internal soup instead of a carefully marinated meal. Yes, I do apologize.

Just wanted to dash down a note about a class discussion I got into yesterday. Oddly enough (or perhaps NOT oddly enough), it was in my Spiritual Formation class. We somehow began to discuss Christianity's mistreatment of the environment, fed and fueled by the "get the heck out of dodge" mindset that seems to settle on us. We get so caught up in heaven-bound thinking that we forget that Jesus came that we might have life more abundantly for the hereafter AND THE HERE AND NOW. Because we forget this, we seem to buy into the thought that we don't need to take care of our environment. We forget that moment in the garden when God granted man responsibility for caring for the physical world. We forget, we forget.

It's been said that we've left behind our cenozoic era for one of the technozoic persuasion. And that's a scary thought. Yikes.

There is more I'd like to explore with this, but not just yet. I promise a nicely marinated mind meal soon. Thanks to Joe for getting my thought process kicked into high gear this morning.

Happy Reformation Day!

2006-10-31T18:40:00.000-08:00

I'm up and down these days. My winter of discontent has settled on me in autumn. Oh, for a heart that would not break.

It's 6:20 am...

2006-10-24T04:27:00.000-07:00

And it's been a while since I've seen this side of the morning. For the record, I don't see what the big deal is about it.

I've stopped and started a post for about a week now, and since I'm still awake at such a ridiculous hour, I figured no time like the present.

I took a road trip last week. Yep, me and Roberta (my car) packed up and headed to Birmingham. I just needed a breather. It hit me that trips like this are going to become a staple in my life if this is really where God's calling me to be for the near (and/or not-so-near) future. Driving back into the state was a beautiful thing...my heart skipped a beat when I saw the New Orleans sign, and it felt good to be home instead of constantly stressful.

There are several things I would like to post about, but it's all swimming around in the soup that is my brain. Instead of straining a few and tossing them out there, I'll just leave a poem by e.e. cummings. Every once in a while I'm reminded of why I love his work so much. Enjoy.

i carry your heart with me (i carry it in
my heart) i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)