I know, I know. I'm a terrible blogger.

I've just been overwhelmed. Sneaky carbonara post aside, the last time I wrote here was the day before I became a mom. On May 25, 2011, we got our first foster child. She was two and a half, super smart and cute, and we adored her. The first five days were extremely difficult, and I questioned our decision. I missed our old life and I didn't feel attached to her at all. Then it clicked, and I was in love. I felt like God had given me the child I had asked for (down to how she looked), and I was certain we would adopt her.

We had her with us for 9 weeks, and then she moved in with someone who had adopted her sister. She is there now, will likely be adopted there, and it is where she belongs. But our hearts were broken. Before I met the woman who is now her mom, I was prepared to fight it as much as I could. I wept and made phone calls and mourned and cried out to God for answers. Even though I know now that she's where she belongs and we weren't a good match, I could cry about her at any time at all if I wanted to. I haven't seen her since Halloween weekend, I have presents for her and her siblings in the corner of the living room, and I'm freaking out a bit about her mom not calling me for the past three weeks.

But I have to relax. One of the first things I learned as a parent was that God adores me and wants me to be loved and have wins just as much as I want those things for her. That was hard for me to grasp at first. I would pray for wisdom on how to react to her or think about how God would act, but I figured that I didn't deserve the same treatment since I'm an adult and should know better. Silly girl, I'm not an adult compared to God!

Even when I was in mourning, it wasn't as if I was worried about her. I was just so sad. My prayers started sounding a lot like her fits and crying jags. -Why are you crying? -Because I am! or -Because I'm sad! I'd like to think that I've progressed beyond the maturity of a 2-year-old, but apparently not. That's okay.

The Problem of Pain

Friends, I didn't write last night because I was tired & also because I was troubled.  I finished up The Problem of Pain, and one of Lewis's main ideas is that God gives/allows pain for our own good.  We get too comfy and think we're secure in our cozy lives, and we don't look to him at all.  He knows that what is best for us is to be surrendered to him, so he shakes us up a little.  Lewis also believes that we have to live by natural laws in order to have a stable universe, therefore miracles must be rare.  So, some things just happen, and some things (all things?) are allowed or sent by God to cause us to turn to him. 


This is all something I have to chew on a bit & work my head around.  It mostly makes sense, but then I get stuck again.  It's not as if the question of evil & pain is going to be completely solved, but I still want more.  One of the things I really like, though, is that he doesn't buy into that rubbish about it all being for God's glory.  When people offer that as comfort to someone hurting, it makes you think, "Well, bully for you, God!  I'm glad you're getting a kick out of this."  He points out that God is goodness and we are the objects of his love.  It is all for our good. 

Perhaps later, after my paper is written, I'll give you some of the gems I've come up with or the really great quotes from his books.  Later.

For now, I'm thinking I'm not going to meet all of my homework goals for the day again, and I think it's due to dairy.  Gah.  Yes, I'm getting over being sick, but it should be gone by now, and I think that gluten & dairy don't help. 

Fallen

  The topic for my sexuality class this week is sexual abuse, and if that's not a pick me up, I don't know what is.  (Please, oh please, get the sarcasm there.)
I only had to read one chapter today, and it mostly talked about the effects of abuse and the characteristics of the perpetrators. 
We're going to have to watch a video about abusers, and I saw that one of our essays this week needs to be talking about our response when we hear about abuse. 

I usually immediately pray and say to God, "Forgive us."  It's a prayer I use from time to time when I'm struck by our corruption and what we will stoop to do to one another and/or all that God has given us.  It's my response to the oil spill.  Forgive us.  When people are cruel and unthinking and rash.  Forgive us. 

In those moments, I don't know if I want Jesus to come back soon or not yet.  Sure, it would be a relief to be done with all this mess, but there are too many people who aren't ready.  I want everyone to have a chance to know him.  So many people have been shown a really crappy image of Christianity and have never actually been shown or told Good News.  Forgive us.

I know you're reading this

I'm sad because two of my best friends, Ben and Sandra, are moving to Arizona tomorrow.  As they set sail for that land of sand and racism, I figured I'd take the opportunity to send out a love letter in the form of a blog to them.

I met Ben at church a few years ago, and I wanted to like him because I had heard good things about him and my friend, Tracee, liked him, but I just didn't get it.  The night I first talked to him, I thought he was a little bit bratty.  As I got to know him a little better, I realized that it was just that he doesn't always have the gift of making it clear when he's being sarcastic or joking. 
We really became friends on my last trip to Mexico, in 2008, where the gift of sarcasm brought us together.  As the only ones with that gift on the trip, we often sought each other out to make snotty comments or jokes that no one else truly got or appreciated.  Also, we were often the last ones awake, and we chatted by the campfire, with the only topic I really remember being movies.  It impressed me that he had seen Once and loved it. 
I may have also claimed him as my new best friend, which he took in stride (at least on the outside). 

In the beginning of 2009, Sandra came on the scene.  The news of this fairly serious relationship came as a bit of a surprise to most of us, but I think it surprised the two of them, as well, because it happened so swiftly.  Ben had been out of town (out of the country!) for about two months, and during that time he realized just how much he cared for her.  One night, when I dragged him with me to Barnes & Noble to buy a couple of the Twilight books (see! He's a good friend to a girl.), he told me about her and the conversations they'd had and his feelings.  I was pretty geeked. 
At the same time, I was nervous.  It's always a little bit iffy when your friends start going out with someone you don't know, because I think we've all had the experience of one of our friends going out with someone we don't like, or at least someone who we just don't mesh with. 
I can still see her face when I walked into church the first time I met her.  I hadn't seen Ben in a long time and I came up and hugged him from behind while he sat (which is really the only way to hug him, being that he's 12 feet tall & about as cuddly as a piece of plywood).  She didn't look at me strangely or in any sort of possessive way.  She turned with her huge-normous smile that she has and said, "Robin!" 

I got to spend time with her alone a couple times, and was impressed with how smart she is, how widely read, her heart for God, and her loving spirit.  It sounds like she'd be a boring sap, but that's the best part!  She's not!  She's awesome and funny and sometimes sarcastic and everything that Ben is and is not.  They are wonderful.  Once she moved here and they got married, it was like I had a 2-for-1 best friend package. 

So, I got that for almost a year, minus their excessive traveling.  It makes it a little easier that they traveled so much, because sometimes it felt like they were already gone.  But now they won't be back next Tuesday or in a couple of weeks, and I don't know who I'll have theological conversations with.  They just seem to be the only ones that it ended up happening with. 

I guess I'll just have to get a bunch of Obama stickers and some Che Guevara shirts and go visit them in Arizona. 

I have nothing more positive to add about reading

I really want to be done with C.S. Lewis Remembered so that I can move on.  I have finally started skimming, and I am skimming with glee.  What are my fabulous plans?  Well, when I finish this, I think that I may have to split my time between Inside Out (Maria V. Snyder) and ChiRunning.  Of course, that will only last for a while, as my eagerness to not have to cram next week will have me either starting Mere Christianity, doing next week's homework for human sexuality, or both.  I do have to write my midterm for that class next week, so I'd like to get that done ASAP so that I can enjoy the C.S. Lewis class without stress.

What have I not been reading much of lately?  Oh, postings from my classmates.  It really grates on my nerves that this class is so fascinating and deals with truly practical, if thorny, issues, but barely any conversation is taking place.  We have weekly postings and are required to respond with some substance to at least two, but that is all anyone is doing.  They may ask a question or bring up something interesting in a comment, but no one seems to go back and read the 3rd level postings, so no real conversation is taking place.  It's really frustrating to me because I don't feel like I'm learning much from anyone or making any traction on figuring things out anymore.  I'm just getting a little bit of push on my boundaries by the readings & lectures (which aren't all that different).  I'm kind of sad. 

Lupin and Tonks!!

Here I sit, at 2:15am, finishing up The Deathly Hallows, crying my eyes out. 

This time around, I'm noticing different people.  Lupin and Tonks break my heart, and I do believe that Neville Longbottom is my new hero.  It's just all so real and terrible and wonderful.  J.K. Rowling is truly an amazing writer.  By this book, it is not at all a children's book, and young kids surely should stay away from the movies when they come out.

What's extra heart-breaking is how we've seen these characters on screen for almost 10 years, so it's as if we really know them.  With Daniel Radcliffe and Rupert Grint in my mind, I think back on Harry & Ron's first year and how little they were and just want to...I don't know.  It's almost as if they are really kids I know and in my care and I don't want them to go through all of this. 

Hopefully this braiding of fiction and reality will settle down again before November, or the movies are going to be very difficult to watch.  I'm definitely going into the last one with a box of kleenex, though. 

Um, spoiler alert?

Not sure that I have to warn people about a 3 year old book, but if you haven't read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and plan on it or plan on seeing the movies, you may want to skip this post.

Are they gone? 
As I told you before, the excitement of the preview being released finally got me to pick up the book and read it again.  I have previously only read it once, the day it came out, which was more devouring than reading.  Details did not stick to my brain parts.
I'm still pretty early on, just where all the pretend-Harrys are slowly showing up at the Weasley's house.  One thing I noticed is that the action starts with no holding back right from the beginning.  I had forgotten about Hedwig and what a blow that was and how I didn't believe it at first.  "Oh, she's fine." 
George has lost his ear and is making jokes with Fred, and I'm crying a little bit and wondering if I'll skip some pages later on in the book.  I love me some Weasley twins. 
I have a pretty busy weekend ahead of me, so I'm not certain that I will, well, should get much reading done.  If I do get a lot read in HP, it will be because I stayed up way past my bedtime or I didn't do as much homework as I'd like. 

Decisions, decisions.

It's only okay

I didn't write earlier, while it was still Sunday, because I had a headache and was busy feeling sorry for myself.  So there.  Harrumph.

I was feeling down because my teaching was only okay and I gave myself a stress headache beforehand and I was beating myself up about not being a perfect speaker.

I've only taught 5 times.  I know that no one else expects me to be perfect, but I feel like they're all quite ready for me to not teach anymore.  I don't know if they realize that I'm new to this and I have to grow and learn. 

My problem is that I have too many ideas that I think go together and flow, but they only really do so in my head, at least not without a lot more connection.  This isn't a new problem, but one I've run into writing papers- I get entirely too many sources- and here on the blog, where I quite often get long-winded when I don't mean to or want to do so. 

So I must learn to prune my works a bit and find the main ideas I want to express, keeping all the other stuff for a different work of its own, or as support for something else.  I don't have to express everything I'm thinking just this minute.

Reading:  I read my notes & parts of Hosea again, and I finished Out of the Silent Planet, which was pretty good, but Lewis went a little overboard with the descriptions.   I was often waiting for something to happen besides description of the flora. 

A chapter and a magazine

Today was a good day that kind of flew by.  I slept pretty late, but I always figure that my body needs a lot of sleep, so that's fine, if a bit annoying.  My sister slept even later, though, so I felt all up-and-at-'em. 

I had to finish up some homework today, so I had to read a chapter from a book on prayer, and it really gave me some mixed feelings.  It was talking about tearful prayer, and that a surfeit of tears is necessary for repentance and closeness to God.  It didn't exactly say that you couldn't be close to God without tears, but that's the impression I got, and I call that a bunch of hooey. 

Not to say that I don't think brokenness is necessary in our lives, but this author went so far as to say that if, after asking God for this tearful spirit, it doesn't come, you should keep knocking and asking for it, because it is just that important.

I think that if you ask God for a broken and contrite heart, and you mean it, and the weeping just doesn't come, than that is God saying, "That's okay."  Sure, examine your heart and make sure you're not being hard and trying to block out things, but move on in joy, already!  Sheesh. That author ticked me off and I told my professor so in my reaction.

I also swung by the library to return a few things and see if a book I'm waiting for was in, but it is not yet, so I just grabbed an Entertainment Weekly.  I've subscribed to EW on and off for years and years, and every time I cancel I end up subscribing again, because I'm just so sad without it.  I'm going to try to keep grabbing it from the library, for now, because I shouldn't need to have it delivered to me to enjoy it.  I read them very quickly anyway.  I'm already done with the one I got today, thanks to my hour on the elliptical and a few articles I didn't care about (24, Katy Perry, Shrek (double ugh)). 

A Self-Righteous Thought You Have to Deal With

I'm very glad that my faith isn't based on who I'm against.

I don't want Christianity to be about Us vs. Them, even though it's so very easy to get caught up in that. I find myself creeping (or running full-tilt) into Us vs Them with other Christians, and I have to constantly repent and correct my course.

But our command is to love God with everything in us and to love other people as much as we love ourselves. That means that we care about their feelings and opinions and that we want to protect people as much as is possible. Our needs aren't supposed to come first at all. We are supposed to be respectful and get along with people. Why are so many Christians not doing this? It really hurts my heart. A lot.

Could I be missing the boat sometimes or "soft on sin"? I'm certain that I am, but I also know that other than the moments when my head wants to explode from the hard-headed things I see Christians do (read: post on facebook), I don't live my life afraid and angry like many of them do, and I'm going to take that as a sign from the Holy Spirit.

Galatians 5:22-23 (New International Version)

22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Again, I'm really afraid of being smug or self-righteous. I'm just trying to express myself and in that expression, check myself and clarify my thoughts. I want to believe what's right. It's kind of like I'm talking it out with you. Feel free to correct me in love, as long as you're willing to listen, too, and possibly be changed.

They Did It!!

Friends, I'm too tired to compose a thoughtful post, but I wanted to write a little about The Time Traveler's Wife.

As some of you may know, The Time Traveler's Wife is my #2 favorite book of all time, after Jane Eyre. When I first heard that they were making a movie, I was pleased, of course, but also worried. I mean, how many adaptations of books that you love really end up working how you want them to? Plus, the lead actors didn't strike me as the best picks- too pretty or something on both counts, even if I do adore Rachel McAdams. Eventually, though, my hope grew and grew, which is often dangerous- expectations can be nasty. I was downright excited to see it today when it opened.

Well, it was awesome. Wonderful. Heart-breaking. The best book adaptation I've ever seen. It's true that I haven't read the book in a couple years, but I didn't feel like anything was missing or changed too much. Yes, they changed the ending a little bit, but I can see why. What they did made a little more sense than what happened in the book, and they actually made it somewhat happier (as far as that is possible) at the very end. They basically made it tighter, while still showing what was necessary, and they also cut out a bit of plot that always made me mad, anyway.

I did have a bit of a problem getting past the brand-name actors, but eventually they became Henry & Clare. As soon as I saw Ron Livingston as Gomez, I thought he inhabited him well, though his character is much less active in the movie than in the book. That's fine, though, because Gomez is a bit of an ass who I often want off the page.

Overall: see it. I'll see it again, but I'll take kleenex this time. I'll buy it; torture my husband into watching it (but he has read the book so knows what he's in for). Thank you, Audrey Niffenegger for a beautiful book, and thank you, New Line, for not ruining it!

Long time, no see

Hello, bloggity-blog and the readers out there. Of course, the majority of you that come here are looking for a poster of "A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Waste." Of course, you fine folks won't even see this post, because you'll be taken to an older one where I had a link to said poster. Others of you are looking for Bible verses about sleep. Hopefully, you were taken directly to that post, too. If not, hi! Welcome.

I don't have lots of terribly deep things to say, but it's a downright crime that I haven't written in so long. So, as I sit here, avoiding reading for class and suffering the effects of eating ENTIRELY too many apple chips, I shall recap a bit of life.

As you my know, my sister and brother-in-law lost their daughter in January. That really sucked. I have realized that I haven't really gone through the mourning process before, because this hit me differently than I expected. I suppose that when my grandma died, she had been sick, and she was old-ish, so it wasn't as horrible. I was mighty sad, but there wasn't a lot of confusion or back and forth about it. Just the knowledge that death sucks.

But with Adi's death, it was different. It has hit me in ways that I still don't even realize-just this past Sunday, I was telling someone about what happened and I cried again. I'm sad that this little girl died and that she was sick, but I'm mostly sad for my sister & bro-i-l. I hate the pain that my sister went through, the fear that my bro-i-l had to face, the sadness that they feel in their souls and bodies.

I want it all to make sense. To work out. To be clear. I wanted to find the magic bullet answer in the Bible so I could tell her that THIS, James 17:8 (no such verse) or the theological construct of God's providence and blah-blah is what will make it align, make life (and God) look fair, and will make the sun shine. I actually was pretty desperate for that for a while. I read, I asked pastors and friends, and I prayed and cried. And this was all more than a month after she died.

I knew that grief was a roller-coaster, but I didn't think I was going to be on it. But mine is definitely a kiddie ride compared to my sister's. I've had to learn to step back and let them ride theirs, and that I can't control it. Every up or down isn't their final landing place. They'll get wherever "there" is, and God is with them, whether or not they always see him or hear him.

But we're all doing better now. Well, most of us. They're going to be okay. I'm not worried, at least not today. Pharmaceuticals and C.S. Lewis have helped a lot.

This is from A Grief Observed, and it blew me away:

God has not been trying an experiment on my faith or love in order to find out their quality. He knew it already. It was I who didn’t. In this trial He makes us occupy the dock, the witness box, and the bench all at once. He always knew that my temple was a house of cards. He only way of making me realize the fact was to knock it down.

So, I guess I got deep after all. I'll write about Twilight next time.

Have I mentioned that I don't want kids?

I thought I may have done so.

I'm in MI for about a month visiting family. Circumstances are kind of grim: my sister was in the hospital, 6mos pregnant w/her first baby, complications ensued. I came to be w/her, she had an emergency c-section and the baby died after an hour. But I'm not talking about all that right now.

It's cold here, really cold, and this house is quite full. Me, mom, dad, sister, brother-in-law, grandma, and 3 year old nephew. Another sister flits in and out, while another, the mother of the kid, calls and calls. This is a small house. I hang out in the basement, and every step taken upstairs sounds like elephants stampeding.

My life? My cozy life w/husband and dogs in California? My life is only loud when and if I choose. Yes, my husband ticks very loudly from time to time, but that's a 1-5 second thing. Yes, I hang out with high schoolers at church, but that's once a week, and they can be made to hush if necessary.

What am I saying? I'm saying that I've been here a week and a half, and it's high time I spent the night elsewhere. I have 17 more days. Days I'm grateful for, even if I miss my husband terribly. I'm glad to have a relaxing time with my family and friends; to not have to schedule multiple appointments on each day to try to see everyone. I think it's all God's doing that I'm even here-- I used a free ticket that we got as a result from being bumped from another free flight. I got here about 36 hours before my sister's baby died, being able to see sis in the hospital happy before that happened. My sister and brother-in-law have a house on base that will be ready for them soon, so we'll be leaving on the same day. I'm supposed to be here, and I'm supposed to be here for the time frame I have planned.

But it's still hard sometimes.