stink

Nick and I saved a stray puppy from the brush and wilderness on Wednesday. She has two siblings that are still out there that didn't want to be caught. It breaks my heart thinking about them out in the wilderness, maybe slowly dying? Yeesh. That's a horrid thought. Sorry. Anyway, we brought poor little Stink (we can't name her something cute, we couldn't get attached! PLUS-- she did stink, real bad.) to our home and gave her a nice Dove shampoo bath. Over the days she's slowly stepped out of her shell and right into our hearts. Amanda says she has abandonment issues... Amanda has soft-heart issues. And that formula equals a hard decision. Today is the deadline for decision. Keep her or find a home?

People keep calling or writing us saying they want her. But none of them end up actually taking her. Story of her life, I guess. And I hate that. As I'm typing this I can hear her howling and whining from upstairs. She doesn't like being alone. Man, this stinks.

horizontal

She tucked a strand of gray hair behind her ear as she dipped her brush in the paint. Her hand trembled as she put brush to canvas. She’d gotten used to the trembling, embraced it, even. She liked to think that her body was so excited to still be alive that it couldn’t contain itself on the inside any longer.

She loved to create. Beauty from the heart was the only way she measured her paintings. In her 91 years she’d honed this skill… the skill to see beauty, the skill to place things exactly where they deserved. Names didn’t matter, class didn’t either, it was just… a matter of perspective.

She finished the painting and took a step back. She smiled, her wrinkles taking their familiar places after years of laughing. At first glance this painting was… not breath taking. It didn’t look like the edges were finished and if you didn’t look hard enough the colors didn’t seem to mix. But oh, the depth.

Other friends, knowing her love for art, had bought famous paintings for her. Some were originals, some were copies... but all were highly sought after pieces, by the world’s standards. She picked up the painting and slowly walked over to the wall. With trembling hands she lifted it up and placed it among the others. She made sure that the painting wasn’t above and wasn’t below the one next to it. It was equal. It was just as good. “You deserve to be here,” she told the painting, patting it for reassurance.

Then, with a twinkle in her eye, she turned and slowly walked away.

burst

She stuck her head out the window and jetted her arms towards the sky. The air pushed at her, but she could take it. Sometimes the heart is just too full to be confined in a car.

2am... and we skype

"goodnight?"

"I want you to know that this whole 2am thing is your fault, because I tried to stop you at the globe when you were looking at India."

"Tara, it's almost time for MY bed time now."

E: "Hey, you were on Facebook when you were talking to me!?"

T: "You're on Facebook now when you're talking to me!?"

I'll sleep when I'm dead. But in the mean time...

also...

nick comes back on friday.

i miss my niece

We are intricate.

the search

I used to talk to Satan. They were long, pleading ramblings. I was super young, maybe 5 or 6... I distinctly remember sitting in my room and BEGGING Satan to just stop. Stop filling our world with darkness and despair. I told him that God would take him back. If he would just let down his pride... God would forgive him. My dad had told me that God loved everyone, and that meant him too. He had experienced Heaven... didn't he want to go back? Wasn't he sad to have left all his good angel buddies?

How could he not see what he was doing? He was ruining it. He was ruining the beauty and the joy. People were dying because of him. He was making people cry. Didn't he feel bad? And so I tried to reason with him. I was sure that I could change Satan's mind... if he would just hear me out.

One day I told my mom what I had been doing. Her eyes got really big and she immediately told me to stop talking to Satan.

Yeesh, thanks mom.
-------------

I've been thinking a lot about my relationship with God lately. The way it works for other people doesn't seem to work for me, I've decided. God and I don't jive with a 6am wake up call, a read through the bible, and a journal entry. We're not connecting through long silent prayers... cause I can't talk in my brain and not get distracted. It's just not gonna happen. I'm sure God isn't stoked when I'm talking with Him and He suddenly gets cut off because I'm trying to remember if I put my laundry in the dryer.

-------------

I have had a lot of conversations with great friends about the complexity of God... and just how BIG He is. And if God is so big... there have got to be more ways to do this.

Real. Authentic. Genuine. Raw. Natural.

These are words that I want to define my search. Actually now that I look at them... these are words that I want to define me.