[prose#19] The Trouble with Haircuts

I have a friend who has perfect hair. I've observed this perfect hair during one of our many sleepovers. She wakes up in the morning, jumps in the shower (or not), and then lets her long chestnut hair air-dry. In an hour or so, instant perfect waves, no gel or hairbrush needed. It’s thick and luscious, but never frizzy. Our friendship is preserved by her quietness on the issue. She never talks about her perfect hair, because she knows every single woman in hearing would instantly send a dirty glare in her direction.

I was not blessed with perfect hair – few women are. For most of us, our hair is both our most defining characteristic and our biggest frustration. We are always in search of the perfect cut, the perfect color, the perfect stylist, the chase ever ongoing. Cuts change with the tide of fashion, always fleeting. For instance, bangs. Who would have thought those pesky little guys would come back? Even our own hair color eventually betrays us, turning white and gray and leaving us with the decision: to color or not to color? That, my friends, is always the question. And the stylist, oh that perfect man or woman who understands the texture of your hair as well as the intricate details of your personal life – there are no guarantees that the therapist-slash-miracle worker doesn’t move on to bigger and better salons, cities, or even countries. The nerve.

Every woman has her hair story, at least some piece of her identity wrapped up in her hair. Whether her hairstyle is always changing, letting everyone know the woman is in constant need of change, or if it has been the same for years and years, instantly recognizable, it tells a story about the woman. By no means is it exhaustive – I know no woman who wants to be judged by her hair, especially on those awful days – but it always has something to say.

For me, my hair story starts out at the beginning. Born with dark newborn hair, in the first few months it lightened and I became a baby blonde. At age nine months, following a terrifying diagnosis, those soft baby hairs fell out and were swept away, due to chemotherapy. Luckily, I didn’t have much to lose, and I just looked like a smooth-headed, big-eyed serious little tyke for a while. One year and one cancerous kidney later, I was pronounced as being in remission. But the hair started growing back, still blonde.

My mother kept my hair long. She would touch it on occasion, her hand lingering as it twisted around strands of hair, and I always knew, with the seriousness of my lost baby-hood, that she was remembering a shiny bald head, so old-looking on a brand-new head. Mom loved to curl my hair, crimp it, put it back in scrunchies. She liked it long, because it reminded her of those days when hair was the last thing she hoped for, but it was a outward example of life, health, and hope.

As I grew into a cautious and studious teenager, I stayed pretty safe, kept my locks blonde and long. There was a brief flirtation with chunky blonde highlights (thank you, early 00s) and some flippage on the ends (thank you, retro mod becoming popular again), but I’ve always been one to like what I know. And I knew long and I knew hairbrushes, and I knew I had absolutely no patience for blow-drying, curling, or straightening.

The thing was, every time I went to the hairstylist, it was exciting and scary. I always wanted to do something different, I always wanted to change, to cut it all off, to start fresh. For me, it was the most obvious thing I could do to change my appearance, my normally dowdy, chubby, awkwardly shy appearance. All I needed was that perfect haircut, and I would have everything. It would change everything because I would be seen by others in a different way. Not just others, but I also would see a new woman in the mirror, and maybe I would respect her more. But alas, I rarely did anything too dramatic. Snips here and there, trimming, layers, the like. Nothing too crazy.

There have been two times in my life when I have cut my hair short , i.e. just to or slightly above the shoulders, both for incredibly emotional reasons, nothing logical at all. The first came right before my senior year of high school. It was Friday night and my best friend was leaving for college on Sunday. In a giddy frenzy, I let her chop my hair off, a good four or five inches, so that it hung just above the shoulders. As far as I remember, it was done with regular old Fiscar scissors, and it turned out pretty straight for the experience level of the one cutting my hair. I also remember it looking somewhat like a triangle, due to the thickness of my hair. The Tuesday after she left for college, my mom took me to get it fixed. I liked the cut well-enough, but it required maintenance, and I decided to let it grow out, back to a length that I was more familiar with. See, the cut didn’t fill the hole that my best friend left, she in college having wild college times with college boys, me still at home in high school, finishing up for my diploma, working, doing everything I usually did. Nothing changed.

I grew it out for about two years. My motivation which I would have never admitted to myself: a guy friend I was crazy about only liked girls with long hair. He was pretty open about this, and while I rolled my eyes and berated him for his shallowness, I let my hair grow out, long down past my shoulder blades, in the hopes that he would finally see me. A few months into sophomore year of college, after a painfully long flirtation, he asked out my roommate, a confidant and vivacious woman with dark, straight, long hair. A broken heart is always cause for drastic change, and that Christmas break, I went in to my mom’s hairstylist, and told her to take it off. This time, the cut by a professional accentuated my natural waves, and it bounced up to just rest on the tops of my shoulders. I hoped it would make me feel strong, like I didn’t need him. The shock on his face was worth it, but I wasn’t any stronger. Love was all around me, and I had short hair that didn’t change the fact that I was alone and confused.

That time, I told myself I would never chop it off again, because the growing back was tedious and painfully long, especially once I realized I missed my long hair, my comfort, the shield to hide behind. Slowly it inched back to where it was and beyond, as I straightened it for graduation, curled it for weddings, and pulled it back for job interviews.

Finally settled post-grad, in an office job that ignored my degree yet gave me a chance to figure out who I am professionally, I realized I hadn’t cut my hair in over ten months. It had grown to its longest length, down to the middle of my back. I had seen a lot of change happen around me – friends moving away and getting married, and I was still in the apartment I lived in during college, in the town where I went to college, around college students. I felt suspended in space and time, in the frustrating in-between. I wasn’t sure who I was: no longer a student, but not quite ready to be a professional adult. I was caught. So I decided to chop all of my hair off.

I ignored that memory in my head, the one that said a change on the outside does little for the inside. The one that said this changes nothing. Instead, I scoured websites for the perfect haircut, asked advice from literally everyone around me, and psyched myself up. I was afraid I would bail and revert back to keeping it long, keeping it long, keeping it long because I was too scared to take a risk. I decided that this haircut would usher in a whole new phase of life, one where I was not afraid of change and the new things to come.

My haircut was at 4:45 on Friday. I went to work that morning, sure of my plan. Above the shoulder, layered for the natural wave, like that picture of Anne Hathaway at the SAG Awards in 2009. But then I started looking at my hair, how it fell, how the length complimented my face. I thought about how easy it was to maintain, how wash and wear it was. How I could pull it back into a ponytail or bun while it was wet and be out the door in ten minutes. The more I thought, the more nervous I became, until I sat at my desk paralyzed and nearly in tears.

Not prone to emotional breakdowns, I was caught off-guard until the reason occurred to me. I had created an idol of my hair. It sounds funny to say, but I had put all of my hope for the future in the perfect haircut. I decided that shorter hair would give me a new lease on life, a new perspective, outlook, confidence. I would be a new woman after 4:45 that afternoon. A better one.

Here’s the thing, though: change isn’t instantaneous. Change is a process. And sure, a great haircut can do absolute wonders for self-esteem. But there are always going to be those days when every hair is going the wrong way, and who you are cannot depend on the thread-like strands coming out of your head. If I want to change me, I need to start with a prayer and a look into the depths of my being, the habits and quirks that make up my existence. A few snip-snips with a scissors cannot do that for me. My hair is not the full representation of me – it simply keeps my head warm and is a decent accessory.

I sat in that chair at 4:45, asked my hair stylist’s advice, and she knew. She said, “I usually can tell when someone is ready to chop off all of their hair, and you don’t seem ready.” So I walked out of there, hair trimmed, layered, thinned, sidesept bands, but long as all-get-out and growing by the second. And I was happy, not because I was a new woman, but because I was the same woman with a lighter head and a lighter spirit who felt ready for change, change that happens in the abdomen and bleeds out through every pore. My hope is that people come up to me and ask if I’ve had a haircut recently, and I’ll say no, but I am beautiful because God is good. Then I’ll walk away, hairs probably out of place but ready for the world to begin.

triumphant return.

Okay, so maybe a more appropriate title would be "surreptitiously slinking back." I've been away, if you hadn't noticed, for about three weeks. I could list the things that I've done in those three weeks, but they wouldn't be very impressive. It would involve a lot of non-writing and a lot of tv watching.

If I were to be honest, friends, I became afraid for a number of reasons I'm sure to tell you about, and I fell out of the habit, and I locked words away even as they fought to get out. While I was doing it, I knew it was wrong, but I stayed away anyway. I don't regret it, but it's time to return. I have things to say. I have many things to say.

Thank you if you have wondered and encouraged but never pushed. Let's talk, yes?

Save Blue Like Jazz: the Movie

I'm going to be honest with you. The first time I read Blue Like Jazz, I didn't like it for a number of reasons. One, it was getting very popular. I have a natural distaste for the books and bands that are the latest rage (though, most of the time, I end up liking whatever is hip, because it's actually quite good, and that makes me more mad. So I try to avoid the situation altogether by being judgmental from the start). Automatically, I went into the book, a beautiful purple book with yellow letters on the front, with disdain. And then, I didn't like the way it was written. I couldn't follow it; there were too many stories and not enough tying them all together. It seemed scattered to me, circular. Pointless. I didn't get the themes. And furthermore, I didn't like the themes. Donald Miller's brand of Christian spirituality was not...typical. I was in high school, and I thought I knew everything about God and life and writing, and while I thought this Miller guy probably loved Jesus, he questioned the church and its motivations. He believed in God but he didn't really know about the answers to the big questions. Miller seemed to have very little actually figured out, other than knowing that Jesus was the way to go. That was threatening to me. So I deemed the book interesting enough, some good stories, some good morals, but...nope.

Then I went to college. A Christian university, but one that encouraged doubt and debate, faith and feminism, pacifism and prayer. Starting out, my mind was closed. But little by little, as freshman year so often does, everything opened and then promptly fell apart. I spent a huge amount of time on my knees with tears on my face, wondering who God was and why this world was so broken. Why I was so broken. I read Donald Miller's book again. And while it still was a little circular and meandering for a structured writer like myself, I got it more. I understood his struggle. I understood his friends. I understood his faith and his fears and his frustration with trying to walk this road with what feels like weights around your ankles. His doubts made sense to me, and his brutal honesty was unlike anything else I had read in the Christian sphere. And this time, I appreciated it, because I was starting to feel those same fears and questions rise up within me as I shed the faith of my family to make it my own.

I kept up with Miller's writing as he continued to write in the same engaging and honest style that he is now famous for. His most recent book changed my outlook on my life as both an artist and a human. A Million Miles in a Thousand Years chronicles Miller's attempt to edit Blue Like Jazz for a screenplay, which ultimately meant he was editing his life. He then goes on a journey to find out what it means to live life as an interesting story in which he is the main character.

Here's the deal -- the story is true. The movie Blue Like Jazz is real. Or it's trying to be, anyway. The screenplay is done, and the roles are cast. The only thing missing? The rest of the funding. As of a week or two ago, the movie was still $125,000 away from being fully funded and ready for production. Miller wrote a blog post and basically said the movie was not going to happen.

If anything, the Internet and social media has taught the Normal Joe that nothing is impossible. And so two guys in Tennessee decided to start up a grassroots campaign to fund this movie via Kickstarter, an online fund-raising website. Slowly it began and grew, and normal people pledged $10, or $30, or more. And now, a little more than $78,500 has been donated to get this movie off the ground. $47,748 to go and 21 days to go.

Here's why this movie should be made: it is a story worth telling. This book has changed scores of people's lives with its look at the life of a God-seeker in today's culture. It has told them they are not alone in their struggles. Honestly, there are many other people out there who do not read books. Instead, they see movies. And those people who only see things as pictures instead of text, they need to hear this story. They need to know that God knows their crap but loves them anyway and wants to change them. This is a story worth telling. We need more stories like this - where Christians are highlighted as loving, thinking, and good-crazy people instead of harsh, angry, and bad-crazy people.

If you think this is a story worth telling, if you have been changed in however small a way by this book and this author, donate, will you? Whatever you can give? If the movie is not fully funded in three weeks (Oct. 25), you will not be charged a penny. But I'm hoping, instead, that we will be charged and this movie happens. Because not only would it be a triumph for second chances (which is what Christ is all about), but it would show that there is a passionate audience for this movie. Plus, I love it when the moral of the story is about community and teamwork!

Please join me in sponsoring this movie. Let's do this.

http://www.savebluelikejazz.com/

[prose#18] Lin-Manuel Miranda is a Poet

Today was a long sort of a day. It's fall here in Oregon, supposedly, but the sun is bright and the temperatures in the low 80s. I'm never eager for summer to flee with the memories of cloudless days and lazy walks down my small town streets, but at the same time, this strange weather messes with my mind and heart. Usually when it's nearly October here, the trees start to change and the air starts to bite. But not quite this year. While the trees are beginning to erupt into flame, the warmth of the outside air confuses my body, this physical flesh that is invisibly grounded in the tides and the spinning of the earth. My bones know when the outside world isn't as it usually is, and that knowledge of my body affects my entire being and mindset - especially mindset. The rain can wait, but the heat can leave. For once, I'm ready to leave summer behind for the next season. Part of growing up means accepting and even welcoming the changes this world brings us.

This week I've had to deal with lots of other grown-up things. I've had lots of appointments, trying to finally get my medical insurance going. I got a cavity filled, I have an eye doctor appointment tomorrow. When I sit in the waiting room, I feel like a child again, except my mother isn't there, reading a magazine and answering the hard questions for me. And dear Hugo, my red car, had his own medical appointment with the mechanic the other day, always stressful when you're single and work and have no public transportation. I thought he was better, but today his "check engine" light -- which I paid a handful to get rid of -- told me he's not. Meetings, appointments, cleaning, cooking, all of these adult-ish activities pull me down. I want to revert back to that child who, after going to the doctor with Mom, is rewarded with a cookie and a hug, both of which are a necessary gift.

Today, I did a lot of driving, a lot of thinking about art, and a lot of panicking. I had the chance to talk to a writer today, a woman who is doing it, making it as someone who writes books for a living. Somehow, these meetings rarely encourage me. I learn so much about the process of publishing and writing, but instead of being thankful for the inside look, I let the information stress me out, wear me down. I leave thinking I'm incapable and unable, because it seems impossible that I could possibly do as this writer does. And then, spending time on the college campus I so recently left, I felt old and heavy with life. I walked past the 18-, 19-year-olds, studying for exams and going on late night Taco Bell runs, and I was going home to do the dishes and organize my bills. Disconnect was the word of the night.

Getting in my car for the seven-minute drive home, my iPod lit up as I put it into its dock. I knew I needed melody, for the silence would demolish me. The finale to the musical In the Heights came up. In the Heights took Broadway by storm in 2008, the unconventional telling of the way of life in the Washington Heights area of New York City. A lower-income neighborhood mainly populated by Hispanic immigrants, they fight to escape the poverty and maintain the community, to gain personal power without losing their heritage. The story is mostly told through rap/R&B songs, with some boleros, salsas, and traditional Broadway ballads thrown in for good measure.

The musical is the creator, Lin-Manuel Miranda. He started writing the show in college, a way of processing his own life, community, and heritage. After college, he began an eight-year process of work-shopping the show, making ends meet with odd jobs, composing on the subway, before -- finally and against all odds -- the show opened on Broadway, winning multiple Tony Awards and a Grammy. Miranda played Usnavi, the main character, because Usnavi was him. And he did so with such pain and pride, the lyrics flowing off of his tongue with ease.

Miranda is not a singer. He has good pitch, a good ear for music, but his voice cannot hold a candle to other Broadway leading men, not to mention even those in his show's ensemble. But it didn't really matter because they were his words, and he loved them as they came out of his mouth. They are embedded within him. This is most obvious in the rapping he does within the songs, created and performed in a beautiful poetic style that pays attention to the sound of words and the pattern they are put in. The man is a poet.

As I listened to the resolution of this musical, the final song where Usnavi reconciles his dreams with his reality, his hopes with his fears, his desires with his needs, I began to cry. Yes, it had been a terribly long day, filled with frustrating moments and grown-up stressors. But I cried because Usnavi found a home and chose his own life, and Miranda found a home and chose his own life. And he created a brilliant piece of theater that discusses socioeconomic disparities and racial tensions and rising property values alongside community life and new love and lasting friendships. Not only that, he believed in his work enough to work on it for eight years. Eight. He worked it to the bone, so much so that only one of the original songs made it from the beginning to the end of the process and saw the Broadway stage. Miranda believed he had something to tell the world, that his story was worthwhile and should be fought for. And because no one else would fight for it, he fought himself. And in 2008, he found himself rapping his Tony Award acceptance speech.

I don't think I have the vision, the strength, the passion to go that far for that long. But Miranda did not give up, and seeing that man's joy and love for the art he created, I know he must say it is worth it. I want my art to be worth it. I want to love what I am doing so much that I will fight for it for years. My poetry is not able to be rapped, it doesn't ebb and flow with the movement of language, but it has its own rhythm. I just have to solidify it, be prepared to make it better, and believe in it and myself. Lin-Manuel Miranda is a poet, and his poetry made me cry. I want to move people that way. Maybe then, real life - the muggy weather and endless appointments - won't matter so much.

[prose#17] The Art of Being Alone

Life as a single girl is really easy in some ways. The obvious benefit: my time is my own. If I want to go out to eat with friends, I do it. If I want to put on my stretchy pants and eat ice cream while watching a Project Runway marathon, I do it (often). Related, my money is my own. I decide how to spend it and I don’t have to justify every purchase (see the boxes from target.com, amazon.com, and oldnavy.com in my recycling).

But, as I’ve also alluded to (in this and every post), life as a single girl is also incredibly difficult, especially a single girl in the church - a topic for another time. Even a girl like me who loves silence and solitary ventures gets the mopeys. That’s why I’m trying out new things to do by myself. I’ve already gone to church by myself, hikes by myself, shopping by myself, coffee by myself. Pretty run-of-the-mill stuff that even attached (coupled? paired?) people do when needing some time away from their significant other.

I took a step today, though, and tried something else alone: a movie. Now, I’ve heard some people go to movies by themselves for fun. I can’t say that’s been my experience, but mostly because A) I don’t go to many movies, because B) they’re expensive and C) if I’m going to spend $10.50, I want to go with someone I care about and pretend the two hours we spend in dark silence are quality time. But I watch movies alone in the comfort of my living room – how is that any different?

Well, let me tell you – it’s the stigma. The social awkwardness of being alone in public. It’s like waving a giant flag that says, “Hey! I’m single and probably don’t have any friends. But don’t be sorry for me! I have a winning personality!” Or so implied most of the folks I told that I was going to see a movie alone. The conversation went like this:

Friend: What are you doing today?

Me: Going to see a movie.

Friend: Oh, with who?

Me: No one.

Friend: (silence)

Me: I’m going by myself.

Friend: (silence with sad eyes)

Then I had to backpedal and say how it was good for me to try it and I’ve never done it before and how it’s okay that they couldn’t come and they shouldn’t feel bad. And I meant all of those things – I just wish I didn’t have to say it, since saying it made me feel like I was waving that flag from earlier.

The truth was, I wanted to go see Inception again. It was playing at the local cheap theater for five bucks, and I knew it’d be worth it. None of my friends could come, which was fine. So I went. By myself.

The theater I went to is run by this one guy who also runs the adjoining drive-in. He’s basically our little town’s movie guy. I don’t know his name, but he’s always there. We don’t even get tickets at this theater. We just pay him five bucks cash (no credit cards), and he tells us the movie’s on screen 1 or 2. It's way less sketchy than it sounds, I promise you. That's just how things happen when living in a small town.

The movie theater is bigger than it looks, with orange chairs and faux wood paneling that were totally groovy in the 70s. The locals know that the back seats are the best, because they're cushier and don’t make you feel like you’re sitting on steel beams by the end of the movie’s exposition. They also rock, which is delightful. Just don’t rock too much – they squeak.

There’s only one other person in the theater as I make my way to a squeaky chair in the back center. She’s one row in front of me, two seats to my left. She sits very still, her gray hair perfectly coiffed and her white sweater with rosebuds on it very clean. Not exactly the target audience for the psychological awesomeness that is Inception, but I do not judge her because she is alone and I am alone.

The screen before me lights up with the previews – at this theater, there are no commercials for the snack bar or cell phones. No lolly-gagging, right to the point. I see the woman in front of me sit up a bit straighter. I wish I could see her face in the darkness. I wish I could sit next to her and ask what she thinks of the movie. I’ve already seen it so I know what’s going to happen, but I still get confused. I wonder if she’s confused. I rock slightly, making my chair squeak, and her head turns ever so slightly in my direction. I’m not very good at going to movies by myself, I decide.

Soon the story gets going, and I am entranced by this beautiful film and its complexities. The world is so vivid, the special effects seamless, the characters embedded into your emotions. I get caught up in the world of dreams. And then that final image changes everything that you thought you knew, and you are left plastered to your seat in a mess of confusion and wonder and happiness and frustration. It’s definitely worth the five dollars.

My Inception companion gets up right away and heads to the aisle. I have no reason to stay either, no partner with whom to make small talk or loud exclamations of movie opinions. I follow her out, and she opens the door to the bright outside world to me. I catch a glimpse of her face, and she smiles at me, a knowing smile that says, “We were just together. We just saw that world. Those people, your people are my people. And I have no idea what just happened, just like you.” I smiled back, because now we were sisters in the act of watching movies alone. Because we weren’t alone. We were together, with the characters on the screen, both part of the same world and lost in our own separate universes.

I like to think she went home, called her grandson, and said, “Guess what I saw today!” Or maybe she didn’t. Maybe she went to her home, made dinner for herself, poured a glass of wine, read a book, went to bed – all in silence. Either way, I want to be her someday. I want to go to movies by myself and smile at people when I leave because I understand that the art of story touches us, both creating community where there was none and singularity within a crowd. It’s the magic of the connection.

[prose#16] Silence and Small Groups

I love to go to monasteries. There are two near my home, and I enjoy going to them for different reasons. One has many trails that take you up into the woods surrounding the Abbey. They’re each marked with ribbons and colored arrows, and because I haven’t spoken to the nice old man in a sweater who sits at the information booth and drinks orange juice, I have no idea what any of the arrows mean. I just choose one and start walking, hoping that I’ll get to see Mother Mary’s shrine. This strategy hasn’t worked thus far, so I’m still in pursuit of the peace I find when I sit next to her. I also like to walk around this monastery’s garden. It’s large and wild, with no clear path through the plants, but it looks happy and free instead of contained.

The other monastery has the Stations of the Cross leading up to the main buildings, and I like to walk them backwards, wondering at what the story tells this way. I like to sit in the church, kneel in the pews, and listen to the monks sing, but my favorite part of this monastery is the cemetery. It’s just a small one, off the side of the main campus where the library and dormitories for the seminarians are. The old crosses are placed in nice neat rows, some with rosaries. I like to sit with these old men, quiet in their graves, and when I get tired of the silence, I go into the small prayer chapel and talk to Mary or Jesus, depending on whom I feel closest to at the time. They’re both in there, frozen in a statue of suffering – Mary’s heart breaking while holding her son, whose heart has stopped. I love Jesus, but sometimes I need to talk to a woman, a human one.

My friend Jay went to the Taize monastery in France during his travels through Europe a few months ago. During his time there, he spent a week in silence, only speaking for about an hour a day with a monk to discuss his time of quiet. I was relaying this story to my friends Heidi and Caleb, and I could see in Caleb’s eyes what I felt in my own – a sparkle. An interest. Heidi’s eyes, on the other hand, widened in horror. Naturally vivacious and admittedly chatty, she said, “I could never do that.” Caleb and I found the idea to be challenging but not impossible, in contrast, because he and I tend toward silence and solitude.

I realized recently that most of my spiritual endeavors are solitary ones. Going to monasteries, reading, praying, writing – all of these I do without the company of anyone else. I am a very solitary and quiet person, who enjoys the silence and will spend whole days marinating in it. It’s what I need, it’s what my dear introverted soul and independent spirit need to keep going. The silence, though it can get heavy and burdensome, is comfortable to me.

While that’s not a bad thing, it can be a crutch. It is safe, and so often I avoid stepping out into new spiritual experiences. So I’m trying something new, some crazy and a little bit scary:

I’m joining a small group.

Okay, so I know it’s not very crazy. It’s Protestant Christianity’s favorite thing ever! Create accountability and community by breaking the church into smaller churches and getting people connected. It really is a good idea, and it’s pretty normative, as church experiences go.

I’ve been in small groups before, but usually just because it was the thing to do. It was high school, about friends, not about actual spiritual growth. It was a place to gossip while sharing prayer requests and talk about school instead of God. No real accountability sprung out, and as a more timid individual, I tended to be silent during these gossip sessions, finding my place in the corner of the room and content to be there. I smiled and chatted as needed, but I never opened myself and let my spirit out.

That’s why this concept of small groups is far scarier to me than a week-long time of silence or a solo hike through the woods to find the shrine to Mary. Silence, to me, is normal life. Small groups are out of the box. It’s a risk. I have to step out and open myself up to a group of people who I do not know and do not understand. I have to get to know these people and let them know me. I need to share my life with them, my spiritual experiences, how I feel about God. And I have to trust that they will not be disgusted by my inner workings.

It’s terribly difficult for me to go into a group of strangers and say, “Here I am.” But I’m going to do it. Because God doesn’t just speak in the silence; he also speaks in the voice of angels and small group members, and if I’m never around them, how am I to hear him?

okay, hiatus!

Well, apparently I took a hiatus for two weeks. Goodness, I hadn't realized it was so long. It was more like 2.5, since my last post was a "I'm going to not post much for a week."

It's been a busy time - editing, writing, avoiding my blog. Coming to the keyboard daily to pour myself out is both necessary and painfully difficult. I'm trying to develop blogging self-discipline, but unfortunately, this isn't the only place in my life where I'm trying to cultivate self-discipline. I'm finding that I fail more often than not.

I'll be back tomorrow afternoon. Look for me then.