an update... Week 4

So, it's week 4 of my quarter! I have midterms next week, and then we're off to a running start towards the end. I feel like this quarter is going by really quickly, and it is sad because I really enjoy my classes. I think I am doing pretty well in all them too, so that has been very nice.

One of the best things about this week-besides my insane stress level due to PA (RA) applications- was last night. I went to the OPERA!!!!! A bunch of kids from my University Core class went to see Don Giovanni! My proffessor has some connections and he got us tickets half off, so it was affordable (yay!) and basically amazing beyond words. (the pictures are me and Kirsten, me and Karin [my roomie] and me and Nick)

Besides that, my week has just been busy busy busy. I have some more intense classes this quarter, mainly just a lot of reading. As well, I am applying to be a PA next year, and that has been time consuming (finding references and such). But I am loving the grey (the sun came out earlier) and actually, sort of missing the rain.

I recently started meeting with a mentor, that was really exciting. I may be joining a small gorup on my floor or a bible study off campus with my friend Nick. This depends on whether or not I decide to start training with the rugby team. Would you mind praying for me in this? I want to do it all, but I know I can't. Especially, because some of those things occur at the same time. I am having difficulty deciding, I really miss rugby, by I want to join the small gorup on my floor really badly. I also know that I couldn't really be on the team at least for about 7-8 weeks, because of some medical stuff--and by then the season will be close to done. I am thinking of just talking with the coach about what I can do to train for next year. But it's a big decision, so please keep me in your prayers.

I love you all a lot! Hope you are having a blessed week and you are coasting in towards the weekend!

sara

(sighing)

I can't decide how I feel about a certain friend. Ah me, I think I personalize too much of what is said. I should work on that.

Connor, Connor, will you ever updat? I can't even think about linking you until you update. You should be proud of me, though you'll never read this. I pick up the NY Times every day. I even read it. (and then I recycle. Yes, I am green!) I was right about Obama. Of course I was. I've been predicting it since last year. (and I mean school year not as in December 29th jaja) Do you think Hilary will make it out of the primaries? I don't think she will. I think it would be too difficult of a ticket for the Dems to propose. She simply has too high of a hate index, she's too controversial. I'm hearing that her lax position on the 'war' even has several Democrats against her. And what was she thinking spending all that time in Pakistan and Iraq? She let Obama have the entire state of NY to himself for a few days! What foolishness. Do you think Kerry will really make a run at it? And on the Republican side, all I have heard is the Mormon from Massachusettes. Who else Connor? Where are you when I need you to tell me who else in the beloved party is going to run? Somehow, I miss our sparing. Have I told you Connor? I'm going to be a PoliSci major. Who'd've picked it? I told Meyer, he just stared at me and then said, "but you slept through AP Gov." Jaja. What ironies of life.

I woke up this morning happy. Do you know how long it has been since that happened? And I didn't have a headache. Maybe this whole not cracking my neck/back oath with God really has some ramifications. Either way, I'm keeping it.

Either way, I was happy. Or content. Somewhere in my dreams, or perhaps in floor worship last night, something changed. God seemed to have changed, but then, that isn't possible. I guess I changed then. Of course, it seems so logical, so simple to say that. But something in it seems so much wider and deeper to me. I changed. I became more aligned with who God is. I fell down a level and deeper into the great waters of his love. I think the water up there, it was icy and cold, I had to be woken up to something. I had to be refreshed. Kenji says you can only be refreshed to a certain point before you want to climb back into the car and be comfortable again. But God didn't leave that as an option. He held my head under icy water, icy and then released me. I don't even think I came up for air before I sank down deeper. And there was something I found below the arctic. I didn't know which way was up or down, I was swimming in dark circles, full of pain and confusion. It hurt. A lot. And then I got down, somehow He pulled me down, and I found that the water below the ice is actually warmer.

Isn't that something? It was warmer. Sweeter. Not comfortable. But then not so painful. I think there must be words swarming all around me in the water. My eyes are being washed. Sometimes, silt and sand comes in and it hurts. It burns. But it seems to scrape a film from my cornea. And then I can see even more clearly. It's like an exfoliant for my eyes, and my skin as well. I'm being scraped of my humanness. I'm learning what it is to be without humanity.

And somehow, it is beautiful. In all its unexpectancy.

dead

I am really tired. I didn't sleep last night. The room was too hot, my blankets drowned me. Suffocated me. My light managed to flick on and wake Karin. (today, in the air of our room, I can tell she is still upset though she would never admit) I read. Oh, it seemed so long since I had read.

Has Romans ever awoken such sorrow and self loathing before? Have I ever felt so unworthy, so perfectly disgusting and tired of the world before? Have I ever known such pain?

It was even literal. My head pounded, it had for hours. Later, I would wake in the night several time to find my head still boomed with thunder in my temples. Perhaps the weather, for it snowed today. It is snowing. This moment.

The moment is gone.

Has Romans ever stirred me so painfully? This hurts, so deeply, so badly. Oh Lord, why did you make me this way? I am in such pain, such tatters of myself, I can not be a human being. What is this flesh that I am wearing? It can not be real. I am cut to the core, I am cut through all I am. This can not be real.

But I read Romans, it is, it is real. I have traded such treasures for the quiet of my room. For the loneliness I complain of. I have traded such grandeur for lowly scraps from the table of sitra achra. I should pray Krias Schema. would I fee better then? Would something wake up? Would it come alive.

I am like Ivan Ilyich. I am screaming, but no one hears me, they are ignoring me. I am like the man with the lizard. The angel is cutting it away with his sword. I gave him permission, but it hurts! It burns! I am dying! I am dead! will it ever become the horse?

Romans. I can not recall ever reading it. But my blankets dragged me down into an abyss. Abyss. what a slithering word. The light hurt my eyes. Blinded, burned. Karin woke, she's angry now, cleaning the curling iron. Rolling thunder in my head, now the pain stretches to my neck, my shoulders. What pain is this? Have I ever felt it before?

Romans.

But Karin's phone begins to ring.

straight from facebook:

Sara is everything and nothing.
all wrapped up in the glorious.


that's right.

[EDIT]

I WANT TO SHOUT FROM THE MOUNTAIN

oh my gosh. You guys. Do you realize how amazing God is? I have lately been seeing him in various things in my life. And he is insane!! He is so forgiving, so loving, so merciful, so incredible. Even when bad things happen, even when problems come up and we dont' know what to do, he is always there, working in hte background--working in the foreground. He is love.

HE IS GREAT.

I just want to stand on a car and sing at the top of my lungs. I want to run through the woods and dance over logs and laugh. I want to find someone and just hold hands, spinning in a circle, with our heads thrown back and our hair whipping in the wind, just screaming. I want to tell everyone. I wish I could stand on a mountain top, with the wind swirling snow around my ankles holding my hands up, leaning my head back, smiling, laughing, singing, with tears streaming down my face.

How could I have ever doubted? How could I have ever forgotten? How could I have ever wondered? And we did, we did forget. We did question. We did begin to believe the world. That apathy is all there is. That passion has no meaning. That love is small and easily discarded. That grace and joy are not the greatest reward.

And yet--they aren't! The glory of heaven, the glory of the Christian life--Glory-- is acceptance and welcoming by God into his arms. Glory is to be known. To be known.