Captured, Packaged, Shipped, Received.

Today's mail: letters from two very missed friends, and my Ontario Health Card.  I live here. Officially, officially, officially.  Permanently (?)

Still waiting for my driver's license to arrive.

See D-S

The sun is hot, bright, and silencing.  People meander along paths through green grass, dotted with yellow dandelions and with the waiting wishes of flowers gone to seed, ready to sail into the wind at any moment.  The breeze is warm too, but the moving air makes the heat bearable. The community looks like one that you would see in an artists rendering.  A young woman in a t-shirt and sweats walks her dog, a guy, hair gelled and leather coat walks with a coolness about him, in step with the music playing on his ipod.  A mother sits on a park bench beside her stroller, her two toddlers in the grass around her.  A father pushes a little girl in a flowing dress and bouncing pony tail on a swing.  It squeeks.  There are some older women sitting on a retaining wall, shaded by a planted maple.  But the park is mostly empty.  The kids are still at school, parents still at work, people fearing the blazing rays of the sun,

I sit here thinking about life and plans and dreams – in both interpretations of the word.  Sometimes I dread going to sleep, not because I fear the dreams per say, but because I just don’t want to be dreaming them.  Sometimes I’m pleasantly surpised by them though.  Saturday night I was dreaming about being at church, and seeing my pastor from home…I thought I was hallucinating when I saw him and his wife at Grace on Sunday morning!  But I wasn’t. Hugs and words and jokes later, I think about being content where I am.  Which doesn’t mean that I don’t desperately want to hop on the first plane back to the Island, but it does mean that I see God working in this city.  I see him working at Grace, I see him working on D-Street, and I am so excited to be a part of what he is doing here.  

Yesterday I spent the afternoon and evening with three different families from church, just chatting and enjoying good (free!) food together.  Of course the inevitable discussion about what I’m doing and where I’m going comes up.  I wonder what else 20 year olds have to talk about? I’m studying French and History.  No, not French History.  French, the language, and history…in general.  I want to be a teacher.  Maybe I’ll go “out west” maybe I’ll stay in Ottawa, it depends on where I get in. 

Maybe you’ll meet someone here, and then that will be a factor too.

Maybe. Yes. It would be.  

My life depends on a lot of variables. 

I’m thankful for a constant, unconditional love.

They talk about their children growing up and their friendship with Pastor Gordon, who I know from home.  I think about watching my dad at Christmas time, looking at Gordon’s family and young grandchildren, turning to me and worndering “what next year’s return will be.” I think about how much I love reading stories and playing with kids and cooking for people and having someone to look after…and try to be a patient waiter.

Then the older couples begin reminiscing about their college days, and meeting each other, and family histories, which leads to war stories, which leads to current politics.  What would we talk about if it weren’t for current politics?

Coffee and tea get cold.  One person’s daughter told her that caffeine makes it so you don’t dream at night.  I consider the possibility of this and compare the benefits of sleeping without dreaming with the other effect of caffeine, just not sleeping period.  How much truth is there in either?

I sip my coffee slowly, finishing the cup.  It’s only my second cup of coffee ever. And it’s about 10 times stronger than the last cup I had.  I laugh at myself.  I think about how it sits in my stomach, and how my legs are tingling, and wonder if its’ from sitting so long, or from coffee, or from wanting to run away from swirling, aggravating, heart wrenching thoughts, and I wish things were simply like daisy petals, which are each plucked and when it’s over the yellow centre is tossed over the shoulder, and forgotten about.

My black keyboard is  soaking up the sun and burning my fingers.  I can tell I’ve been playing the guitar today, my left hand stings as my fingers touch the keys. The mom in the park beside me wipes tears from her young son’s eyes,  her knees in the sand as she tries to console him.  It’s time for them to go home for lunch now.

I feel the sun hot on my arms, and think about going inside to make lunch and get on with the day.  Writing some more cover letters, calling some places, sending out some more resumes, paying rent, tidying my papers,  going to the bank. 

I feel conflicting urges to lounge in the sun, and to do something really meaningful.  I want to be writing newsletters and planning events. 

I pray I get a job which will either incorporate those things, or allow me to have time to still do them.

I pick a perfect globe of soft, wispy dandelion seeds.  I rub the white milk from the stem over my fingertip, it’s soft and even still intrigues me.  Why is it white?  Clasping the stem between my fingers, I blow softly and watch the seeds fly through the air around me. 

A dream is a wish your heart makes.

Here’s wishing for good wishes.

Bountiful smiles, iced tea and lemonade.

Some photos from the last Month...slightly out of order.

Craft Time.  Like my face? Mmmm...glue and vaseline all over.

The beginning of the Tulip Festival

It's ringing, really...it is...

Statues...

Montreal!

Imprints 

Roomies.  We're in for a grrrrreat time!

Almost time to dangle and jump...Way to be the risk taker Carla!

Swings downtown? Best thing ever.

CLOTHES.

A Sunday Afternoon in Orleans, with Sydney and Kammy

What lovely roots you have!

Sydney in the Sun at Parliament

On the Locks

Sunset on a super windy balcony...

My last night of being 19...and I'm covered in chalk dust.

These cookies didn't even make it to the cookie jar

Our fort/sleeping quarters for an entire week.  

Welcome to our apartment, Carla! 

The Chalk Mural we created

Easter Sunday at Mer Bleue with the Cote family

TREES!

Rachael and I making some very Spontaneous, Artistic Ribs. 

Just to remind myself.

Please send me your favourite soup recipes.  I realize it's about to be hot in this city, but today it's cool and wet, and I stumbled across this recipe....and remembered how much I love soup, and pretty dishes.

http://simply-delicious.co.za/2011/05/23/chicken-curry-soup/

Scissors aren't enough by themselves.

There are some pink candles, a blue, plastic table cloth and a clear vase of yellow chrysanthemums on my table.  The flowers don't smell very good, but they were lively and happy (and cheap, or I would not have chosen a flower that reminds me simultaneously of Gilmore Girls, Anne of Green Gables, and awful English Classes which may have forever ruined John Steinback for me.)  I brought them home over a week ago, by last night they were looking wilted and dull.  I love that all it takes is some scissors, sugar, and fresh water for flowers to  perk back up again.   

SCISSORS: 

I think that I've been struggling with just the scissors lately. Are scissors ever any fun by themselves? You need the glue to make a craft.  You need rock and paper to make a game.  You need hands for all of the above: and not just any hands - skilled hands that know what they are doing.

I've been the awkward five year old holding the scissors upside down in the wrong hand, trying to cut on scribbled lines, and crying when I fail, but then, in a determined fit of frustration, picking them back up and starting again.   

SUGAR: 

I need the sugar: sweet things that make me smile.  Here's a few to remind myself of...

1. I'm not sure how this occurred, given that I may be the Queen of hitting the Snooze button (ask any of my roommates), but it seems that the earlier I wake up, the happier I am.  I love having time in the morning to sit in the relative quiet of my apartment, and experience the morning.  I love being up before car engines, brakes,  horns, sirens, garbage trucks, delivery trucks, shopping carts and construction overpower the wind, rain, and birds.  I am so much happier when I sit by myself, spend time with God, eat breakfast, and get on with my day before 7 in the morning. 

2. I love having a clean, organized house. Yesterday Amber and I spent the afternoon cleaning, and it was so nice to wake up this morning to a clean bedroom, a clean closet, a clean office, a clean bathroom, a clean table, a clean living room, and a clean kitchen. 

3. Cooking makes me happy.  Cooking for other people makes me happier, but cooking for myself is pretty satisfying too. Baking is my comfort activity, but cooking...cooking creates happiness.  I love cutting fresh garlic, soft mushrooms, vibrant red or orange peppers, deep green herbs or spinach, and purple onions or cabbage with my sharp  knife on my large wooden cutting board.  (Go ahead and laugh, but it's true!) This weekend I made homemade whole-wheat ravioli stuffed with spinach, fresh herbs and three types of cheese, served with pesto and tomato sauce.  I successfully made some beautiful loaves of French bread.  And of course, I made cookies, and numerous other delicious meals.    

I also for the first time in my life understood my mother's desire for a lower counter.  One major difference between my mother and I...she plans a kitchen with a low island.  I slip on a pair of high heeled shoes, and continue on, contemplating how much more useful this makes my shoes, and whether all those images of women in dresses, aprons, curly hair, pearls, and high heeled shoes was really just about fashion.  I had lots of time to contemplate this as I rolled my pasta and kneaded the bread dough.  I intend to cook in heels more often.  They make me look infinitely cooler, and make cooking easier.   I can picture myself later in life, in a colourful kitchen making something fabulous, sipping red wine,  and wearing an apron and some spectacular shoes. 

The colour of creamed butter, and the smell of cookie dough while mixing in soft brown sugar, vanilla and eggs...happy.

The feel of dough: bread, pasta, or cookie in my hands...happy!

Sneaking samples and slurping them, steaming, off a spoon...smiles! 

Peanut butter in vanilla icecream...try it.  So good!

Fresh basil.  Aaaahhh!

Tuna Casserole (although I still can't make it like Grandma Emery does...) -food for the soul.

Ok.  Enough about food.

(but did I mention the omelette I made for breakfast today?)

4.  Being outside in the sun, by a river, hearing no unnatural sounds.  Being outside in heavy, heavy rain getting soaked completely.  The smell of fresh air, and blooming flowers, and cut grass, and water. The peace of the wind.  The relief of the rain.  The intensity of colour on a sunny day.  Birds, squirrels, fish, turtles, laughing kids.  Puddles, soft green grass, buzzing bees, lightening, stars, clouds, sunrise, sunset...I am awed and so uplifted by nature.

5.  Art: felts, pencils, paint, fabric, glue (scissors), photography...

     Music: listening, making, praising.

6.  Sir Fredrick, our creepy plastic owl, who so far seems to be keeping the pigeons off of our deck.

7.  Being ridiculous with my friends...looking at photos... and laughing beyond the point of crying...to the extent of exhaustion and a headache. 

FRESH WATER: I need to be renewed by God.  And I know that through whatever is going on inside of me, he his so, so with me.  His arms are around me.  His heart is for me.  His spirit is in me.  His wings shelter me. 

SCISSORS (Part TWO)It's time for me to give the scissors to God.  I am his workmanship - and he is contstantly pruning and working in my heart.  Right now, it's a painful process.  But I've seen his work in my life - and I know that he has good plans, and makes beautiful things.  

Three Links...

1.  Jon Foreman - White as Snow.  I was singing this song while writing.

2.  The Skit Guys: God's Chisel...this is where God lead me where looking for a video to show for the GYG last week.  

3.  Gungor - Beautiful things.  I was singing this one too. 

I'll be more lively soon.

Please, please fill the other half of this cup.

Take one:
I'm feeling a bit uprooted.
Cut.

Take Two:
This is the type of blog post which could begin with a warning, like in Lemony Snicket's A series of unfortunate events:

      "If you are interested in stories with happy endings, you would be better off reading some other book. In this book, not    only is there no happy ending, there is no happy beginning and very few happy things in the middle. This is because not very many happy things happened in the lives of the three Baudelaire youngsters. Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire were intelligent children, and they were charming, and resourceful, and had pleasant facial features, but they were extremely unlucky, and most everything that happened to them was rife with misfortune, misery, and despair. I'm sorry to tell you this, but that is how the story goes."

Cut.

Take Three:
My fingers are kind of typing with their eyes closed.  I don't know what is going to pour out of them.  Maybe nothing.  Maybe something significantly darker than need come.  My heart's a little on the dramatic side right now.
Cut.

Take Four:
Take five deep breaths Jennifer.  And look at the purple sky outside, and hear the piano playing, and feel   God's arms around you. And cling, cling, cling to Him.

When I was in Montreal the other day, Carla suggested that we should try jumping off of this wall on Mount Royal.  I was lowering myself down it when the rock I had my foot on fell out, and I slipped.  I was surprised that my fingers caught me, and I dangled from the ledge, fingers slipping, until my foot found a stronghold, and I tightened my grip.  I didn't fall.

I think I've spent the last month building a rock wall inside.  Carefully piling happy moments and slathering smiles and cementing in this sense of false strength.  The rocks I place inside can't hold me up. They pretty successfully held me in though.  Take that loneliness! On Guard self-consciousness! Fie, all you little pieces of heart that aren't sticking together like they should be
Maybe I should have more thoroughly consulted a better strategist.  It appears that trapping everything in walls which are apparently too strong for me to break down was not exactly the best idea.  There is a small hole in the wall, kind of like that bared window in the stone walls of that turret of the highest tower.  Some princesses may let down their hair, or sing lovely songs to birds, or sleep in the sunlight that streams through.  But some princesses may just get frustrated, or realize the hopelessness and and helplessness of their situations.  Sure, there's a window.  And sometimes the room is warmed by the sun. And sometimes refreshed by the breeze.  But she's in a tower, and there's some sort of spell on her, and some kind of nasty dragon awaiting anyone who may come to rescue her, and she's at the complete disposal of whatever bold knight should happen to come her way, hopefully with a strong sword and a keen mind, and a pure heart.

How do these knights and princess and warriors know about these princesses anyway?

Through the bit of my wall that's crumbling,  enough emotion is seeping out that my defenses are failing, and at some point I'm going to burst. Enough light is coming in that I know something is wrong, but no amount of screams or sighs or tears or stories or talks or sleeps or icecream or whatever else is doing anything about it.  And the things that are inside the walls are bouncing around and driving me crazy.  Actually.  Crazy.

Outrageous ideas pop into my head: Jennifer, just go out and get really really drunk.  Stop worrying about good or right choices.  Just go.
Don't worry - I'm here enough to know that is not a solution, and that it isn't going to help.

But why couldn't God have told me things? And why do I have to care so much? And why can't I just get up, and walk out the door and get on with my life? And why can't I see the light? I KNOW it is there somewhere...but I go to pray and sometimes I feel so connected to God, and then it just drains away.

I think I'm scared of attachment, and dependence, and of not knowing .
And so I open the bible, and suddenly I actually can't read.  Words don't make it into my head, or my eyes can't see words on the page.  But I can read useless facts on the internet, and signs, and newspapers, and facebook updates.

And so I go to sing and I hate my voice.  I try to play guitar and I mute the strings.

Cut.

Take.
Take a look.
Take a walk.
Take a breath.
Take down the walls, God.  I can't do it on my own.  I dont know if I even really want to do it.  I know that you are there, and I know you've surrounded me with abundant blessing.  And I really, really want to dwell in you.  And I really, really need your joy to flow through me.  I know that you have an incredible plan.  I know that you are shaping me, changing me, growing me - and loving me through it all.

I don't want to see this cup half empty.  But right now, even half empty is optimistic.  I'm seeing it drained.  I'm seeing myself in an unreasonable, ridiculous hole that I've put myself into, and can't seem to climb back out of.


Please pray for me!