morning is here...

And we have chickens!! I now get them via email. I think these chickens save my life a little bit every day. This was today's (the first link was an old one, also about music)

The other night, let's see, it was Wednesday, I skipped Bible Study to stay home because my stomach was acting funny. I guess it's a little ironic that I skipped Bible Study to stay home and ended up watching Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte.

Since my Season One DVD is still lost in the abyss and my VCR/DVD combo has decided it only wants to let me watch VHS for the moment (I need a vacation!!), I watched my VHS of Sex and the City Season 4, Volume 4. It's the one where Miranda gets pregnant because Steve didn't think anyone would ever sleep with him again after his testicular cancer surgery. (He has one less testicle.)

And Charlotte is dying to get pregnant and Miranda wants an abortion. Yeah. So Carrie can't concentrate, can't even pick shoes to go out to dinner with Aidan, and finally decides to tell him.

It's a hot potato situation.

Someone hands you something and it's so big, so whatever, and you can't keep it to yourself. So you pass it on, hot potato. Do you remember playing that game as a child? You had a ball, it was just a ball, but you pretended it was a hot potato, and as soon as you got it, you threw it to someone else.

"I had him swear on Chanel" is Carrie's response when she has to tell Miranda that she told Aidan. Miranda replies, "Oh, since he took the fabric oath..." (Aidan and Steve are pals--if you haven't seen the show it's sort of hard to explain all this...)

I was really glad that Miranda decided to have the baby. Just like I was glad when Rachel decided to have Ross's baby on Friends. So it's not the best situation, the whole unwed mother thing, but hey, it's a baby. There's the scene in the doctor's office, where Miranda is sitting with Carrie and Carrie is filling out the medical forms for Miranda. And Miranda says, "Is this my baby?" And then goes into, "what if I wake up when I'm 42 and I can't have a baby?" Carrie gives her a look, and Miranda says "42 is my scary age." Carrie says, "Mine is 45."

As a single thirty five year old woman, I understand. I really think you should be at least 32 before you can watch SATC. (Sorry Sis!) But truly, the issues are not funny, they are cut me at the bone honest. But then they are funny, because they are so true.

So here is where I live, in the balance of scary and funny and true to the bone honest. Why have I decided to go to the work picnic on the day before my vacation? Because Janice is coming, and bringing her baby.

It's Friday. In a few hours, I have my last appointment with the ladies at Women's Behavioral Health. Phew! I won't have to chart my every mood (although I think I'm going to come up with some sort of my own chart, I've been finding it helpful to keep track) and I won't have to measure when I ovulate (although that's been helpful too, since ovulation signifies that you've moved into week three.) But that's what the Internet is for. Truly. What an awesome tool. (Yes, I realize I then have to ignore all the "baby hopes" stuff, but it's a TOOL. Because whether or not I'm making babies, I still have the hormones. Oh, anyways.

Songs on the radio this morning:

Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store (Sixteen Tons, Tennesee Ernie Ford)

Oh, I know,
That the music's fine like sparkling wine go and have your fun
Laugh and sing, but while we're apart don't give your heart to anyone
But don't forget who's taking you home, and in whose arms you're gonna be
So darlin', save the last dance for me. (Save the last dance, The Drifters)

Have a little faith in me...

So this week in the Breaking Free study homework, we're learning about obedience. Or rather, we're learning about rebellion. I have a hard time with this, I suppose because I know that we learn best through positive reinforcement, NOT SHAME. And this morning dear Beth wanted us to copy out what a rebellious child of God does TWICE, at the beginning of the lesson and again at the end, like Bart Simpson writing lines on the blackboard, I will not tell lies. So I rebelled and wrote out what an obedient child of God looks like.

One thing I did grab well and good from the lesson though was this new word (well, it is a very OLD word, but new to me): bitchah*. Now before you slam me for using the B word, it's not what you think and probably not pronounced the same way, since it's Hebrew. It is a word for trust and it is only used once in the Old Testament (How often is it used in the NT, she wonders?).

It is the word that means "there is nothing more one can do." So you HAVE to trust. Have faith, and rest in that trust. This is where phoning and writing letters and begging that friend to come back is the opposite of what you should do. Perhaps there are things you did that you need to say sorry for. (There usually are.) But trusting God, trusting, truly trusting, is that word, bitchah. It reminds me of the John Hiatt song, "Have a little faith in me." Because they always play it on movie soundtracks right when the one character has lost faith and might be leaving the other character. (It's used on the soundtrack for Phenomenon and Look who's talking now--huh, I just realized Travolta is in both of those movies, wonder if that's a coincidence?) Whenever I hear that song, I think of someone driving down a snowy road in LWTN, and the melody cries out, have a little faith in me, trust me on this one!!

So many songs have lyrics where it's like, I'm the one for you, trust me, where really, that trust is really only meant for God. When Sarah Brightman sang, "Deliver me...all of my life I've been in hiding, wishing there was someone just like you, now that I've found you, I know that you're the one to pull me through," well of course that's a God song. Because NO PERSON can pull us out completely. So it is fitting that David Crowder took that song and added "Jesus Jesus how I trust thee, how I've proved you o'er and o'er, Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus, Come and pull me through."

And the song "How do I live?" sung by Leanne Rimes, the songwriter was writing about how she felt about music. That her life would be not real, hard to survive, if she didn't have music. Because of course we can live when that person leaves us, dies, whatever. (Which ties into A long way down, the Nick Hornby book I'm reading/listening to, where JJ can't imagine his life without music.)

Can you tell this is something I've been holding in for a long time? I never liked those lyrics that said, "My life was transformed when you came into it," because I've always felt that was something that God did. God may have put that person INTO my life, but it was God that did the transforming, not merely that person's prescence.

I recently read something where it talked about how God gives us people in our lives as a way for us to love more. That friendships are another way of God loving us, and of us expressing God's love. That we NEED that community to thrive.

But I can't find where it was. I thought maybe in Blue Like Jazz (which I finished re-reading last night) or The friendships of women (which I'm working through again.) But I can't find the passage.

But this passage, from The friendships of women, sort of explains it (but it's NOT the passage I was looking for!):

It's important to love our friends, to cherish them, and to be committed to them. Girls and women are good at that--and it's a beautiful side to our friendships. But we need to learn to be dependent, leaning on God, because He's the only one who will never betray us or die or move away. (Dee Brestin)

So anyways, that's my soapbox for the morning. Go and have healthy relationships with people and with God. Happy Sunday morning.

(Oh, and all of what I write is me saying this to me--I do not have this figured out yet, btw!)

--------------
*It's used in Isaiah 30:15: in quietness and trust is your strength... Okay, from Strong's Hebrew Bible Dictionary, I love this, it's the FEMININE version of another word on trust, betach. Of COURSE it's the FEMININE version. Hee...So I guess it's only used in the feminine version once in the OT...still no news on if it's used in the NT...

friends n'at

(S)he drew a
circle that
shut me out--
Heretic, rebel,
a thing to
flout.

But Love and I
had the wit to
win
We drew a
circle that
took her in!

("Outwitted" by Edwin Markham)

Well, I still haven't figured out a circle to draw Lilly back in, and perhaps we won't be as close as we were...I don't know. I'm not ready to fight that battle right now. My fighting gloves are off.

**********
Watched the end of "My life as a teenage drama queen" last night on ABC.

I love the lyrics to the last song:

That girl was a one time teenage drama queen
A hot, tough everyday wannabe...but she'll have changed her destiny.. now she's a somebody.
That girl was a wild child dreamer but she found herself.
Cuz she believes in nothin else and you'll look back
and you wont believe that girl was me.

Geez, maybe I should rename this blog Pink Sneakers and Lyrics I love. Well, but music is a thing with me. Good thing I'm dating a piano player...

More songs (Pandora rocks!)

So it's just me in the office, a dangerous combo with my monkey mind. I have Pandora on a station that pretty much plays a steady stream of CCM (Christian Contemporary Music.) I am falling in love with Sarah Groves.

When it was over and they could talk about it
She said there's just one thing I have got to know
What in that moment when you were running so hard and fast
Made you stop and turn for home
He said I always knew you loved me even though I'd broken your heart
I always knew there'd be a place for me to make a brand new start

Oh love wash over a multitude of things
Love wash over a multitude of things
Love wash over a multitude of things
Make us whole

Then this one (Darrel Evans, Trading my sorrows)

I'm pressed but not crushed persecuted not abandoned
Struck down but not destroyed
I'm blessed beyond the curse for his promise will endure
And his joy's gonna be my strength

Though the sorrow may last for the night
His joy comes with the morning

All morning I tried UNSUCCESSFULLY to import a Nancy Drew CD-ROM catalog record. I'll try something else. And I (lucky me) get to come in tomorrow as I lost 5 hrs this week between being sick and having my car inspected.

I love my job, I really do. It's just that I get into these destructive mental circles...luckily I have good friends and good music.

Songs in my head...

I often wake up with a song in my head. (I don't wake up to an alarm--I generally wake up around 6 or 7, and that's good enough for this time in my life.)

Yesterday I don't know if I woke up with it in my head, but the song I couldn't get rid of was, "Tears on my guitar." Well, and Mr. Eighteen Years Ago did break my heart. Broke it so well that I have been searching for pieces of it in every nook and cranny. And filling up the holes with not so healthy substitutes.

But Mr. EYA (eya, I like that!) wouldn't have been able to break my heart if I didn't have a longing to be loved. Which goes back to other stuff--no offense, Sis, but it was hard to be a teenager in a house of toddlers. I do not blame my parents, who did the best they could, but I longed to get out, to get to college, where I could have conversations at dinner. (The rule was we could only discuss what everyone could discuss.) (When I was fifteen, Sis was five. Bro was four. You do the conversational math.) (So all those people that think, "Oh, SL, your dad was with the govt, I bet you had heated political debates...No. Every night, I said, "This is a good meal," and that was the end of me talking aloud. Inside I was planning my escape.) (Sorry for all the parenthesis...)

These were the words I woke up with in my head this morning: "To know and follow hard after you." Thank you God for the Internet, I was able to dredge the rest of the lyrics:

Give me one pure and holy passion
Give me one magnificent obsession
Give me one glorious ambition for my life
To know and follow hard after You (lyrics here)

Lyrics later in the song (I feel like a detective, piecing this all together) are these:

This world is empty, pale, and poor
Compared to knowing you, my Lord
Lead me on and I will run after you

I keep having to relearn this one. I know it, but I often don't act it out. Lead me on is one of my favorite Amy Grant songs, but I won't go off on that tangent right now.

So what is my morning routine? (I knew you were going to ask!) (Well, I'm telling you anyways!)

I get these emails from Suzanne that are portions of books. You choose which kind of book you want, and they send you the equivalent of five emails of that book. Knowing me, c'mon, you aren't surprised that I chose "Christian non-fiction."

So Thomas Nelson sends me portions, and Suzanne tops it with her little column every day. She had a doozy of a day yesterday. The mosquito repellant she used attracted mosquitos by the droves and to calm the welts on her legs her husband gave her toothpaste instead of hydrocortizone cream. "So--I'm still itching, but at least I smell minty-fresh and my legs are tartar-free." She ends each column with her tagline: "Thanks for reading with me. It's so good to read with friends."

So this week the book I've been getting portions of is God at your wits' end by Marilyn Meberg. It's the story of her child with spina bifida and how people kept saying "It's your sin (as parents) that has caused this disability in your child." I love how she says "NO WAY JOSé!" (Figuratively. I don't think she said it literally.) In yesterday's portion she said if that was the case, EVERYONE'S child would be in crutches. And today she really brought it home. She started with Abraham, went through to Moses, and then finished off with Jeremiah, Ezekial, and the letters of Paul. This woman knows her stuff! I'll give you a little synopsis.

(Tell me you didn't see this coming--I mean, I woke up with "to know and follow hard after You.")

Okay, so Abraham gets the promise. "I will establish My covenant between Me and you and your descendants after you throughout their generations for an ever-lasting covenant"
(Genesis 17:7 NASB).

Then Moses gets the law. God said, "Now if you will obey me and keep mycovenant, you will be my own special treasure from among all the nations of the earth; for all the earth belongs to me" (Exodus19:5).

The people think this is great. We know the rules, we're gonna follow them. But they discover that while they can decide to not steal their neighbor's wife, they can't stop thinking about her.

Marilyn puts it this way:

But all the people found it impossible to keep from breaking the rules having to do with their minds, perhaps thinking thoughts such as, "I can stay out of my neighbor's bed, but I can't keep her out of my head. I can keep myself from stealing my neighbor's kinnor, but I can't help coveting it." (Sorry. I had to throw that in when I found out a kinnor had ten strings that were tuned pentatonically without semitones. Mercy! If I can't have semitones in order to tune pentatonically, I don't even want a kinnor!)

I'm sorry, but that gave me a giggle.

So here's the thing. God saw they couldn't keep his commandments, so he gave them a new covenant:

The new covenant promised divine enablement. It promised the Spirit of God would literally be poured into the hearts of His people, giving them power to obey.

This comes in Jeremiah 31:33: "I will put my laws in their minds, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people."

and Ezekiel (Lilly's favorite book.) "I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean. Your
filth will be washed away, and you will no longer worship idols. And I will give you a new heart with new and right desires, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony heart of sin and give you a new, obedient heart. And I will put my Spirit in you so you will obey my laws and do whatever I command."

She goes on to quote Paul:

This second covenant points to the future role of Jesus, not only for salvation, but for victory. It is clearly stated in Romans 8:1-4:

So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ
Jesus. For the power of the life-giving Spirit has freed you through
Christ Jesus from the power of sin that leads to death. The law of
Moses could not save us, because of our sinful nature. But God put
into effect a different plan to save us. He sent his own Son in a
human body like ours, except that ours are sinful. God destroyed
sin's control over us by giving his Son as a sacrifice for our sins.
He did this so that the requirement of the law would be fully
accomplished for us who no longer follow our sinful nature but
instead follow the Spirit.

How's that for great news? You and I can't keep God's laws. Not keeping God's laws is sin. The wages of sin is death. Jesus died for that sin. We are not condemned for what we can't do. Mr. Davidson liked to say, "God will punish them for their sins." Jesus says, "Not over My dead and risen body!"

I like that. Jesus saying "Not over My dead and risen body!" It did, it gave me a giggle. The good news is so good.

Rules aren't going to un-break my heart. But the love of God, the love of Jehovah Rophe (the healer, rophe means to mend, stitch by stitch) can work at it. And stitch by stitch takes longer than SHAZAM! but I'm pretty stubborn, so I guess it's good that God doesn't just zap me. He takes a long time because I take a long time.

Oh, look at the time. If I'm gonna walk, I have 10 minutes!!

More lyrics n'at

Loving a Person by Sara Groves

Loving a person just the way they are,
it's no small thing
It takes some time to see things through
Sometimes things change,
sometimes we're waiting
We need grace either way

Hold on to me I'll hold on to you
Let's find out the beauty of seeing things through
There's a lot of pain in reaching out and trying
It's a vulnerable place to be
Love and pride can't occupy the same spaces baby
Only one makes you free

Hold on to me I'll hold on to you
Let's find out the beauty of seeing things through
If we go looking for offense
We're going to find it
If we go looking for real love
We're going to find it

(Sara Groves, "Loving a Person")

Hmmm--very very true.

Last night I lucked out. Max (Mr. FF) had a biking thing, so I scheduled a hair trim. And decided to get a pedicure. I got out of work early (thank you, boss-lady!) so I had time to go to Border's before my hair appt. I had a $5 gift certificate ($1 for each year I've been at the Library) and so I browsed the bargain bins and got Jean Chatzky's Ten Commandments of Financial Happiness. I had it out of the library for AGES. Then I got a postcard of a close-up of a Edit Piaf record of Non, Je ne Regrette Rien. I paid 61 cents for both!! Then my hair trim came to $10 plus tip because I didn't realize I'd gotten up to how ever many cuts you need before you get $10 off! So when I found myself (lost) at MacIntyre Square instead of Ross Park Mall (I was very very tired yesterday) I decided to splurge and have dinner at the Olive Garden before my pedicure.

Olive Garden: can I put fresh cheese in your wine? (I'm serious, they wanted to put fresh cheese on my APRICOT chicken!) No, thanks but no thanks. Also, I got a free three sips of their featured chardonnay. Why is it called white wine if it's pink??

Pedicure: I had no idea those big chairs were MASSAGE chairs. Oh. MY.

Then I went home and slept from 8pm to 10pm, took my bedtime meds, (I set an alarm) and slept through to 7 am!! Woo hoo!!

Currently reading: Piano Girl: Lessons in life, music, and the perfect Blue Hawaiian. It's very good. And I had no idea the writer, a woman who paid her way through college playing lounge piano, was from Pittsburgh...

What's the story with no comments? I know yins are either all at BlogHer or reading HP #7, but toss a girl a bone!! Paula is excused, her son is visiting for a bit. (Although we did have a nice blogversation about book classification a few posts ago...)

I have gotten a lot done today: entered Welcome Back Kotter, Picket Fences (the TV shows), 300 (the movie), checked SCADS of Dewey #s, oversaw some stuff, deleted all my old OCLC files, sent a few emails about questionable catalog records...can I go home now?? Well, since I came in at 8:30, I can leave at 4:30, so I have about 40 minutes to go...oh, and I helped a very arrogant eight year old find some Dragon books.

Martina does it again...

Martina McBride is one of my favorite country singers. I've lived through a storm and a half and I'm still standing. It's Friday, WOO HOO!

"This one's for the girls"

This one's for all you girls about thirteen
High school can be so rough, can be so mean
Hold onto, on to your innocence
Stand your ground when everyone's giving in

This one's for the girls

This is for all you girls about twenty-five
In a little apartment, just trying to get by
Living on, on dreams and spaghetti-o's
Wondering where your life is gonna go

This one's for the girls
Who've ever had a broken heart
Who've wished upon a shooting star
You're beautiful the way you are
This one's for the girls
Who love without holding back
Who dream with everything they have
All around the world
This one's for the girls

This is for all you girls about forty-two
Tossing pennies into the Fountain of Youth
Every laugh, laugh line on your face
Made you who you are today

This one's for the girls
Who've ever had a broken heart
Who've wished upon a shooting star
You're beautiful the way you are
This one's for the girls
Who love without holding back
Who dream with everything they have
All around the world
This one's for the girls

Yeah, we're all the same inside (same inside)
From 1 to 99

This one's for the girls
Who've ever had a broken heart
Who've wished upon a shooting star
You're beautiful the way you are
This one's for the girls
Who love without holding back
Who dream with everything they have
All around the world
This one's for the girls
Yeah, this one's for the girls

and this one, "Wild Angels."

Between the perfect world and the bottom line
Keeping love alive in these troubled times
It's a miracle in itself
And we know too well what that's about
Still we made it through, only God knows how
We must've had a little help
(Must've been)

Wild Angels, Wild Angels
Watching over you and me
Wild Angels, Wild Angels
Baby what else could it be

Well it must've been hard, it must've been tough
Keeping up with crazy fools like us
'Cause it's so easy to fall apart
And we still break each other's heart sometimes
Spent some nights on the jagged side
Somehow we wake up in each other's arms
(Must've been)

Wild Angels, Wild Angels
Watching over you and me
Wild Angels, Wild Angels
Baby what else could it be

There are some nights
I watch you while you dream
I swear I hear the sound of beating wings

Wild Angels, Wild Angels
Watching over you and me
Wild Angels, Wild Angels
Baby what else could it be

Another reason Sarah Louise is weird...

I'm crazy about TV show themes and lyrics. I liked the show Taxi because of Bob James' wonderful theme. (I know own the album, Touchdown, and love every track.) I loved WKRP in Cinncinati because of the wonderful lyric: "Got kinda tired of packing and unpacking,/Town to town, up and down the dial." Seriously, a good TV theme would get me to return week after week or day after day (in syndication.)

I mean, c'mon: "Love, exciting and new..."

So ever since they took Clifford's Puppy Days off the air, I have been hankering for the song. And today, I not only found it, but downloaded it to my site. Woo hoo!!

Today is Hot Dog Day. It's this HUGE event at our library. More on that later, maybe.

A day in the sun...

Or the shade, as the case may be.

Read into what you will my last post. All is NOT well in wonderland, but I won't be blogging about that. Instead, I want to tell you about my day yesterday, which was such a day that I will hold in the pages of my heart.

First, when I awoke and turned on my email, my online devo finished up the book of Job. The point of Job not being that he ended up with twice of what he had before God smote him... (read below, from Words of Hope)

The narrator ends his story with a version of "They all lived happily
ever after." But that is not really the point. To conclude that
faithfulness always results in earthly rewards flies in the face of
experience and goes against the grain of what the book of Job is all
about. It's not about the goodies. It's about God, and God alone.
"Does Job fear God for nothing?" It turns out that he does.

Prayer: Be thou my vision, O Lord of my heart; nought be all else to me, save
that thou art. Thou my best thought, by day or by night, waking or
sleeping, thy presence my light.

Now, I take stock in when I hear or see the words of my favorite hymn. I first learned "Be Thou My Vision" in Vienna, (yes, Austria) when I was a sophomore in college. It was a hard summer--I was leaving Pittsburgh, transferring from Carlow College to the small school in Maryland I eventually graduated from. My parents were still living in Poland, so I was doing a lot of the legwork on my own. You might say I had to grow up fast. Well, and I did. But my parents offered me a gift: "Would you like to go to Vienna Summer School?" They had both gone when they were in college. YES! I would love to! So I spent a week with people my age traveling Europe, including Prague. Then I spent three weeks in Vienna, with weekends in Venice and Salzburg. The one weekend we were in Vienna, I insisted on going to church. So I found the English language church and some people from the program joined me.

The prelude was Schuman or Schubert, a violin solo. It was the most beautiful piece of music I have ever heard, and if I hear it again, I will leap for joy. (I never found out what it was.)

And one of the hymns was Be Thou My Vision. Which for many years I thought would be the processional in my wedding but then I came upon [German hymn, cannot remember it at the moment] which has a steadier walking beat. BTMV has sort of an irregular beat. (It is Irish Celtic, and the one I've since picked is German. Go figure.) (I'm finding the mental block fascinating, and strangely comforting.) (update at 11 pm: It's "Fairest Lord Jesus.")

That was the summer of D, who fits the profile of most of the men I've dated since (and bears a great resemblance to a certain fella.) A PPK (professor and preacher's kid), he was agnostic but brilliant. I tried to spend as much time with him as possible. We went to the art exhibits at Upper Belvedere--I had the sense that he had a girl back home, but we didn't talk about that. It was your quintessential "summer fling." For those three weeks in Vienna, it was us.

(Interesting tidbit--my father had the same sort of relationship with D's aunt when HE went to Vienna Summer School. D's aunt was engaged, and yet my dad and D's aunt spent the summer together, as friends.)

Converse to everything I say about what I keep or don't keep about former beaus (I generally get rid of everything), I still have the two letters D wrote me when I returned to my tiny college in Maryland. The second was a letter in which he told me he was getting married. I never wrote him again. But the letters, I cherish, as they are really the only "love letters" I ever recieved in the mail and D was very precious to me, for that period in my life.

Funny how writing takes you to places you never thought you'd return...so what I meant to write to you about was actually another song I learned, during the same period of my life. I think it was the next summer, the summer of my junior year of college, that I found an English speaking Christian fellowship in Warsaw. I was working at the Embassy, in the USAID office. Every Wednesday, I met with a group of people my age and we sang songs. I treasure that time, and many of those songs are songs that I have never sung with groups since.

One of them is this one:

You shall go out with joy
and be led forth in peace
and the mountains and the hills
shall break forth before you
there will be shouts of joy
and the trees of the field
shall clap
shall clap
their hands.
And the trees of the field will clap their hands (clap clap)
the trees of the field shall clap their hands (clap clap)
and the trees of the field shall clap their hands,
and you'll go out with joy.

I still remember walking down Dombrowskiego Street where my parents lived, the buildings pocked with what could have been WWII damage, and lined with WWII memorials which had fresh flowers daily. The year was 1991. It was summer, and light late, so I could take the tram anywhere. Off the tram I came, and walked to my parent's house, singing this song and clapping at the appropriate intervals.

The reason this song came back into my life was that on yesterday, this day of days, I accompanied Mr. FF to the church where he plays piano as a summer substitute. And we had to go early so he could attend a meeting to plan music for an upcoming picnic/worship service. And I was invited in on the meeting. Two of my suggestions, The Trees of the Field (see above) and Shine Jesus Shine, were added to the mix. It was glorious, to be welcomed in so quickly by these people, and included in the creative process.

Stay tuned, for more of "The day that I will treasure."

(Which in some ways resembled Lucy's experience in "While You Were Sleeping" -- the family welcomed her in. It was not FF's family, but the family that has taken him in at this lovely country church, but we were treated as family, and I was brought into the fold as if I'd been there for years.)

Sweet William strikes again...

Billy Joel has not succeeded at life, you say. I agree. He is a bit of a tormented soul.

But when I'm sitting here, browsing the New York Times most emailed list and realizing how much I am like my father (emailing apropos articles to friends), an instrumental of "Just the way you are" comes on my radio station.

And I stopped, stock still, and put my feet up on the side of my desk, and listened, filling in the words.

Don't go trying some new fashion
Don't change the color of your hair
You always have my unspoken passion

Looking at the lyrics, I realize it's Mr. Roger's song "It's You I like" for grown-ups.

And thinking theologically, I open my Women's Devotional Bible (NIV) at Psalm 139. "You hem me in -- behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me... (vs. 5)

"I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful (AND I'M ONE OF THEM, is the silent shout.) (vs. 13-16)

A little call and response for this Sunday morning.

It's you I like,
It's not the things you wear,
It's not the way you do your hair--

As my friend from high school Scott would say, Good morning.

Wherein Sarah Louise continues surfing and blogging....

Just came back from the latest Sandra Bullock flick--Premonition. WOW. It was phenomenal. First off--she does the housewife thing pretty well--rejecting the sweater that's not dirty, dusting the mantle. Secondly, well, if you've seen it, email me and we'll discuss. It would be way too easy to emit spoilers. And, who knows, maybe the critics saw a different movie or my standards are just very different.

So I talked to the 'rents for a requisite five minutes. Mama is grading papers and Papa is reading scholarship essays. Sis is watching 24. (So I didn't get to talk to her at all.)

I answered an email from Paula, who did a very creative post about the installation of her furnace her trip to New York City this Spring. Then I came over here, and saw that Blackbird had posted something new--a button movie!! You gotta see this--it is amazing. And if you like buttons (we do) it's da bomb.

What else? Oh, a lovely post from Juniper, a woman I discovered via bobbie, concerning blondes and hair issues. I could not stop laughing. She also has up the YouTube about the medieval help desk--you won't want to miss this...

I've been adding/editing my blogroll, so things are named differently, or in different order...hey, it's like moving your furniture around. You gotta do it every once in a while.

Oh, and you might be wondering if I found a therapist--I think I did. The office is tucked in a little nook where Pine Creek comes through, so you park right by the creek, and then go inside. When you get to the office, the ambient music is very New Age and calming. And I liked the therapist. I'll see her again next week.

Well, it's 10:15. I'm not going to do the homework for WBS--it was about bitterness, this chapter, and it hit hard and home. (Bitter? Me? Never!) But I do want to go to bed so that I can wake up and maybe even get to Bible study on time, for once in a blue moon.

"Just once, in a very blue moon, and I feel one coming on soon." (Nanci Griffith)

And a plate of pommes frites is all I need...

All the way home, in the snow blowing down 279, my tires coated in snow, I had one thought. It was a negative one. How easily we get stuck on that broken record groove.

My dad has a huge record collection. I have never actually seen "My Fair Lady" all the way through, but my favorite part on my dad's record is the song "A Patient Man am I" because the record skips and the guy keeps singing "A patient man am I, A patient man am I," as if repeating it makes it so.

Which it doesn't. Repetition, I mean. The negative thought that I had on the way home may or may not be true. But whether or not it is, it needs not flood my mind as I drive home in the dark, snow billowing around.

I have been struggling with this blog lately. I got rid of the site meter (it was making me crazy!!) and/but now I have no clue how many people and which ones are reading unless they comment. (Or walk up to me at my library and tell me so...) (Thanks!!)

I have been struggling at how private/public to be. There are some things I'd rather share with people in person than via this blog...I don't want this to be a substitute for getting to know me, or that me reading other people's blogs becomes a substitute for getting to know them. Of course, blogging isn't all about becoming friends--that can backfire too.

I have to build boundaries around my life. I want to keep my life fresh, unmarred...and yet, I am broken. I am banged up. We all are, just some of us are more prone to admit it. Sometimes I can't keep it in--I will explode. And this year, with the loss of three close friends, I feel a void of people to share my life with. And yet, this week, I have had many chances on and off line, in person and by email, by cell and regular phone to connect--and I thank you all for that. When I called my mom tonight to let her know I got home safely, I said, it's sometimes so hard to focus on what's good when you have that one negative thought. Wisely, she didn't ask what the thought was, and wisely, I didn't blurt it out. We focused on the good. She told me about this new technology at her school--she was so excited about it (I smile as I write this--my mother is such an amazing person and though I will be glad when she retires, I am grateful that she loves teaching so much--she is so good at it.)

I don't know what else to say, except thanks, to a few people who have made this week worthwhile. I bet you know who you are. And please, let's keep in touch. It's a rough world out there.

I guess I'll also say this: if I'm not reaching out to you, it's because I'm protecting myself in the only way I know how. This blog is anonymous for many reasons, but one of them is that it protects the breathing, heart-beating person that lives in the third floor garret. Maybe you are protecting yourself the only way you know how to as well. Only time will tell.

And this too: tears (the kind you cry) and tears (the kind that's ripped) sometimes make us stronger. I am not afraid of mourning this loss, if it is one, but I am not against stitching up the brokenness, either.

And if you don't have a clue what I'm talking about, that's okay too. Sometimes I just want to be a mysterious woman...who needs to defrost her refrigerator.

In other news, I got a letter from Lorelei today. All is well in the world. (Even if it isn't.)