Once a week. On Sunday.

Posted on 23 January 2011 | 1 comment

I get a poem from The Academy of American Poets delivered to my inbox once a day. Sometimes the daily poems are beautiful. Sometimes they are not. One of this week’s poems is exceptionally beautiful.

Rime Riche
by Monica Ferrell

You need me like ice needs the mountain
On which it breeds. Like print needs the page.
You move in me like the tongue in a mouth,
Like wind in the leaves of summer trees,
Gust-fists, hollow except for movement and desire
Which is movement. You taste me the way the claws
Of a pigeon taste that window-ledge on which it sits,
The way water tastes rust in the pipes it shuttles through
Beneath a city, unfolding and luminous with industry.
Before you were born, the table of elements
Was lacking, and I as a noble gas floated
Free of attachment. Before you were born,
The sun and the moon were paper-thin plates
Some machinist at his desk merely clicked into place.

My favorite lines, “Before you were born, the table of elements/Was lacking, and I as a noble gas floated/Free of attachment,” remind me of myself before I met Bec. I just sort of floated around, not really caring much about anyone other than myself. I suppose enjoying freedom doesn’t necessarily mean I didn’t care about other people. I cared about other people, just not enough to be stable or devoted. I was pretty ridiculous. And I was totally fine with the ridiculousness of being unattached. It wasn’t as if I was looking for someone to attach myself to. And, sometimes I wonder if I am still not a bit of a noble gas. It’s a good thing Bec is so understanding of my noble gas-ness.

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Posted in Literature, Relationships

How did it get to be the middle of January already?!

Posted on 16 January 2011 | 2 comments

Time keeps flying past, and I wonder constantly where God wants me. Today’s sermon was helpful, because Matt spoke about how we need to be open to be used and involved where we are. I struggle with this sometimes because I don’t really want to be where I am, for the most part. For the most part, I want to be anywhere but here in East Central Indiana. I like teaching and I love my students, but I always have this restless spirit that says to me (possibly it’s some sort of Tempter), whisperingly in my ear, “You could be so much more. Why are you settling for only this?” I have to slough that off, though, because I feel for a change that I am doing the best thing I could be doing right now. Since I’ve already posted my rant about the Methodist Church and their stupidly conservative policy about GLBT pastors, I won’t go on about that. However, short of being a pastor, my calling in life is to teach. And I love — there is no sarcasm in that — middle school students! I feel like I am right where I should be with that aspect of my life.

There are other areas where I feel restless. I feel restless in my inability to stay on top of grades, because this makes me want to stop teaching. I feel restless in my relationship with God, because I feel like I can never know enough, read enough, be enough. I feel restless in desire to be an activist for liberation (people, animals, the poor), because I don’t see a future in which we are all free; though I do have hope. I feel restless because of my debt, which traps me, because I feel as if my debt holds me back from doing so many things I am called to do. I feel restless because I own a house. That’s huge to me, owning a house. If you had asked me ten years ago if I thought I would ever be so grounded, I would have answered a resounding, NO! But if you ask me today if I enjoy my life, I would say, YES, but I do suffer from a heapin’ helpin’ of wanderlust. I can’t help it. I simply have a need to roam. At least having the ability to go on road trips is helpful.

If I wasn’t so grounded, so stable, I wouldn’t be able to experience things like these:

Delicious Homemade Vegan Pizza

Cat Boyfriends Pudge and Kermit

Beautiful Woman and Her Annoying Cat

All of these things are the perks of being settled. I suppose it’s okay to be stuck somewhere with all these beautiful and amazing comforts, or blessings, surrounding me.


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Posted in Family, Food, Grace, Religion, School, Teaching

Quite An Excellent Day With Amy and At Church.

Posted on 9 January 2011 | 2 comments

Today I met Amy at the worst Starbucks in the Midwest. If you are ever traveling across I-70, never, I mean never, stop a the Starbucks in Richmond, Indiana just off of I-70 on US-40. You’ll wait forever, and your coffee will be substandard. I have to admit, though, that today my Americano was tasty, and Amy’s cappuccino actually looked like a cappuccino. Well, at least it did until she put in the sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg and made the top part of the foam all pocked and strange. The Mexican restaurant on that exit is delicious and it’s where we usually have lunch or dinner when we meet. Next time, we’re meeting in Indy at Peppy Grill, so there’ll be a bite more to do than walk around the tiny mall and hang out at Starbucks. It’d be sweet if Becs would come along, too, so we can all hang out together for a change.

Amy and I had one of the best times we’ve had recently, in my opinion. Lots of honest conversation. Lots of laughing about stupid things. And shopping at Goodwill on 99 cent Sunday. We didn’t find anything worthwhile, although I did have to restrain myself from buying (count them) three different White Trash Nativity Scenes.I already have around 40 of them in my collection, one of which is missing its Baby Jesus, because the cats just keep stealing him, manger and all, and hiding him somewhere. It’s sad, really, the way Mary and Joseph continue to sit there staring at a place where Baby Jesus should be. All the while he is probably in the duct work, or in the basement, or inside of one of the couches. Who knows? But they remain vigilant in their never-ending pose of parental adoration. Sad. The other excellent part of the day today was that Matt, our preacher at Commonway, spoke about the book of Lamentations in the message this morning. He talked about how we need to stop looking back on our lives, wishing for the “good old days.” Instead we need to plant ourselves in our realities and spread roots. We need to be hopeful within the situations we find ourselves in. In other words, we need to stop wishing to be in other places in other times, and we need to ground ourselves where we are. At first I was a little resistant to the message, but then I realized that was probably because he was talking to me in a lot of ways. And using my favorite book of the Bible to do it. Good stuff.

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Posted in Christmas, Coffee, Food, Grace, Relationships, Religion

Seeing the Old Lady

Posted on 8 January 2011 | 2 comments

Grams is in the hospital again, and she seems to be getting better because she was her same old, mean self that she can be. She hadn’t been eating, and when we got there the nurse seemed very concerned and explained to Mom that Grams simply would not eat. She also wouldn’t let them draw blood. Apparently, she smacked two phlebotomists and tried to bite a nurse. Not bad defense skills for an almost (12 days away) 87-year-old lady. What I thought was amazing was the nurse’s reaction. She simply said, “I think it was just all the people coming in and out because she’s been just fine when I am the only one taking care of her. She’s been really sweet.” Of course, my mom snorted, because since when has my grandma been sweet to anyone? Anyway, I took this picture of her in the hospital after she got more blankets, because she was “freezing.” Of course she was. There’s nothing left of her!

On the way back from the hospital, Mom and I went a little bit north to go to a new 100% vegan restaurant, called Loving Cafe, that I’ve heard rave reviews about. The original one is in Cincinnati, but they recently put one in Fort Wayne. I had Sesame Chickenless, a spring roll, a summer roll, and a chocolate chocolate chip cupcake. All vegan. Delicious!

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Posted in Food, Relationships, Vegetarian or Vegan

I Have to Keep Reminding Myself . . .

Posted on 7 January 2011 | Leave a comment

that if I lose one pound each week this year, by this same date next year I will be 52 pounds lighter. I think the reason I never lose the weight I want to lose is that I get discouraged because it doesn’t come off as fast as I want it to come off. This year, though, I am trying something new. I am trying to mingle my weight-loss goal, my running goal, my creative-endeavor goal all into one fancy collection of pictures and short blips about my days. Each day I take a new picture and write down what I eat, how I feel, what exercise I’ve done, and what I’ve read. Once the year goes on a little more, I’ll put a link to that other stuff from here.

My eventual goal is to make an art project out of the whole experience, but in order to do that I need to get a decent digital camera and fast. So far, I have only taken pictures with my cell phone and Photo Booth, because those are the technologies I have, and neither device takes really good pictures. Although, my cell phone takes as high of quality photos as the camera Becs and I previously purchased for over $300. Maybe it was only $200, but at any rate my cell phone takes a similar quality of photograph. Oh, the strides technology makes in 6 or 7 years!

I hope my exercise regimen holds out, because by the end of this week I will have run 15 miles, walked 7 miles, rowed for twenty minutes, played racquetball for 60 minutes, and worked out with my new medicine ball for 40 minutes. And eating healthy has helped out quite a bit, too. I like it when I don’t cheat; I didn’t even cheat and get a Mister Misty (I can’t bring myself to call them Arctic Rushes!) at Dairy Queen last night. I feel great! I feel like a million dollars.

Now, just to keep this up for the next 51 weeks!

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Posted in Fat, Food, Running