Monthly Archives: April 2005

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Something’s Not Right

Ever feel like that? Like something’s off… but you’re not sure what.

I’ve felt that way all day. Perhaps it’s the wild turn our weather has taken. Two days ago it was in the mid-80s with sunny blue skies. Yesterday it was a windy 80 degrees with errant thunderstorms. Today it’s 45 degrees, blustery with spitting rain. It’s weird to have weather. Especially when it does 180s on ya.

Perhaps its they way I awoke this morning; with the taste of a strange dream in my head. Bugs crawling all over my room, brazenly jumping on my bed and on me, dead wasps in my hair (how many ways can I say, EEEEWWW!!) and forgetting my ticket and i.d. for a tour I was taking…. How can a person feel in sync with the world after that kind of greeting from the morning?

Perhaps its the rather unproductive day I had. I had a list of to-dos that didn’t get done. I went shopping but ended up putting back most of what I picked up before walking out of the stores all together. I stood in line at Blockbuster for far too long before giving up on the slow clerk taking three days to ring up one person and put the movie back. I spent the evening alternately surfing the ‘net and channeling-surfing.

Perhaps its due to the unsettling way I feel today — kind of like I’m going to get a migraine, but it hasn’t arrived yet, and kind of like I’m coming down with something but it hasn’t arrived yet either. Bleh.

Perhaps its the thoughts dancing around in my head. Thursdays are the days (right now anyway) that I talk with my counselor. Stuff always gets churned up on those days, like walking through the shallow waters of the Med — all the mud gets stirred up and the normally crystal clear water turns a mucky dark brown. It’s good for my soul, but puts my mind in a tailspin. This week was no exception. I came away with confirmation and affirmation on some things I’d learned and done last week, but also came away with new things to ponder and learn and choose to put into practice.

Or perhaps…. perhaps the answer is f) all of the above.

I hope tomorrow is better.

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Good Food + Good People = Great Night

I had dinner over at Manuel and Julie’s tonight. It was AWE-SOME.

They’re from LA too — moved out here two months ago — so it was so nice have someone to talk to who understands and is also experiencing all my little culture shock issues. This  kept Adria entertained all evening, as Nashville isn’t that much different than Indiana, so our fascination with the things like weather and our shock at things like segregated schools amused and intrigued her.

Anyway, Manuel made an absolutely delicious meal of carne asada, rice and beans, tortillas (that’s tor-tilliyas to you Southerners) and very tasty, but quite spicy quac salsa. YUMMMMMMM. Not to mention the great Margaritas he made.

:::sigh:::

I was in culinary heaven.

Manuel and Jules are, in industry lingo, good people. Solid, humble, fun, engaging, authentic….  Good people. What a great treat it was to spend time with them. I couldn’t believe it was 1am when we left. It felt like we had just started the evening.

I hope I get to spend many more days and evenings with them. God’s given me a new gift in their friendship.

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Mornings Are Much More Beautiful Than I Remember

At least that’s what it seems these days. Perhaps its just normal for spring in Nashville and this being my first year and all, it’s a novelty. Whatever it is, it’s stunning. Even at 6am.

As I drive to the Y each morning, passing the same beautiful homes with acres and acres of land on roads that feel like back-country lanes, I thank God for mornings. For Nashville. For my Life.

Weird. Not long ago I was begging God to let me die. Now here I am, thanking Him for not saying yes to my death wish.

I don’t know what I’m doing on this earth. I still don’t have any answers to the questions that have spun around in my head for the last two years. But right now it doesn’t seem to matter — my spirit is at rest.

Which gives my mind time to ponder new questions. And my heart strength to wrestle with different issues.

The last few days I’ve been listening to a lot of Erwin’s teaching cds. Especially one that Ron & Lynn sent me for Christmas. In it Erwin poses the question, "is it possible to love God and still have a bad day? To still have unfulfilled longings, unmet expectations, unrealized dreams?" As I listen, it reaffirms and reinforces the lessons I’ve learned over the last two years.

Yes, it IS possible to love God and have a bad day. And it IS possible to have a bad day and still be crazy in love with God. As I said yesterday, it’s in the depth, flavor and grittiness of real life that the Abundant LIfe is found. It’s those bad days I have that truly drive home to me how sweet and soulthirst-quenching life with Jesus is. Just having Him here. Beside me. At every moment of the day.

My attitude hasn’t been the greatest lately. Partly due to my being so much in my own head… It’s not that I’m in a foul mood, because I’m not. I’m genuinely enjoying life right now — which is a weird thing for me now. Its more that as I think through certain things, I get sort of agitated and rather snarky. I guess emotions are floating to the surface now from all manner of things and so I ride the waves as they come.

But I’m also finding that I’m checking myself a lot. I’m realizing when I’m not in the greatest of moods and doing my best to uncover the full extent of why (rather than striving to stuff the emotions down or "wish them into the corn field" as I used to do). Which puts me even more in my own head — as God and I process through all the emotions and discuss what to do with this stuff. I’m sure this must be unsettling for some of those around me. But I’m not sure what I can do about that.

Having the mornings to workout has given me time to cull through all the years of stuff collected in my heart and spirit and begin a sort of mental/spiritual Spring Cleaning — discarding used up worn out paradigms, getting rid of the mind-clutter and sweeping away the dust of old habits and thought patterns.

The drive back home for a shower and breakfast tends to take longer, as my country road route turns into a city thoroughfare for morning commuters. I don’t mind, it gives me time to enjoy the beauty of the morning, listen to the birds singing and let my mind wander….

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Deep In

I’ve been in my head a lot the last week, contemplating things around me, observing, learning. God’s been teaching me and showing me in practical ways how to live in a new way.

I’m loving it. It’s so good to have such a hard-core deep relationship with God. Processing through things with Him is such a powerful mind-bending experience.

You know, for seven years now my life has become increasingly dynamic and rich. It’s as if my soul and spirit are finally fully awake and alive. I feel every emotion, see every nuance and hue in the world around me, taste every flavor…. yeah, that also means that the painful things are felt and experienced deeply, but I much prefer life this way, lived and experienced to the fullest, to the monotone life I had before. Two years ago this month I came to the realization that this is really what Christ meant when He talked about giving us Abundant Life. Its not about being on top of the world, it’s about your soul being awakened to every nuance and flavor of life, both good and bad.

For me, even the bad is good. Because God meets me in the bad and walks with me through it. He doesn’t take it away, or make it less, He just fills up the space with Himself and we walk together. I’ve never been married, but I’ve been in a few serious, lengthy relationships and I gotta tell ya, nothing has ever come close to the power and intimacy of my relationship with God. No man will ever be able to satisfy and fulfill me the way God does. Does that sound sacrilegious or… sick in some way? I can’t help it if it does. Its just the plain absolute truth. No one can touch this.

"How can I picture God’s kingdom for you? What kind of story can I use? It’s like a pine nut that a man plants in his front yard. It grows into a huge pine tree with thick branches, and eagles build nests in it…. How can I picture God’s kingdom? It’s like yeast that a woman works into enough dough for three loaves of bread–and waits while the dough rises."  — Jesus, Luke 13:18-20

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Parallax

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about a freelance gig I’m working on. Collaborating with a friend to put together a book. I sat in on a meeting yesterday with a woman from a book publisher the organization currently works with. The conversation that took place got my mind spinning on this book and a myriad of other stuff that goes with it. Pieces of things I’ve read on writing book proposals and marketing trends began to make clearer sense as the meeting progressed. I was excited and busting with ideas and questions afterward. There was enough fodder in that meeting to keep me going for a week or more.

But my boss came away with a vastly different package. At least that’s the impression I got after talking with him about the meeting for a bit.

It fascinates me how two people can witness/participate in the same event and come away with two totally different takeaways and perspectives on what was accomplished. For me, the back-and-forth dialog stirred my creative juices, gave me ideas not only for the project we were talking about, but also my freelance project — and even to things beyond those. For him, well, he seemed to come away just as frustrated and concerned as when he went in. I may be reading him wrong, but that’s what I got from our brief conversation.

I wonder, am I just a weird thinker? Do I live in a dreamland while my boss lives in reality? This kind of thing happens to me enough in life that I’ve come to accept I just don’t see the world the way most people do. For a while I tried to change my view, so I could see as they see. But to no avail. Just as in a parallax lens, my view is askew.

I’ve come to accept this fact in me. But I don’t understand it. Nor do I think of it as a good/bad or right/wrong issue. It just is what it is. I know I come by it naturally. I can’t remember a time in my life where my view wasn’t askew from the rest of the world. But even so, it still blows my mind how different my view from everyone else.

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Another Sleepless Night…

I couldn’t sleep much last night either. I was in bed in plenty of time, but sleep would not come. Same story tonight. It’s not that my body doesn’t want it. It’s that my mind just won’t shut up.

I’ve been restless for several weeks now. I’m hoping my mornings at the Y will help settle me for a bit. It’s like everything in me is ready to move on to the next project, except I’m not done with the current one. Why do I always seem to do this? I have to fight to finish what I’ve begun… the beginning is always more exciting to me than the finishing. It’s only when I already know I have another project awaiting my attention that finishing brings satisfaction.

So now I’m restless, ready to move on to…. I have no idea. But it’s not time to move on yet. Concentration is hard. Focus is ridiculously impossible. Today I moved from office to office, short task to short task — only to find my way back to Barbara’s office and collapse in the arm chair in front of her desk with a heavy sigh and ask, "is it time to go home yet?"

Ridiculous. Absolutely silly, I tell you. I have work to do, dang it. I have things that should have been done long ago that I’m still struggling to focus to accomplish. AAUUURRGH! I feel like I’m back in grammar school staring out the window at the beauty of spring, swinging my legs under my desk in a wide arc (because I was always too short to reach the floor no matter how small the chair) dreaming that I’m actually on the playground swings, soaring ever higher into a sapphire sky.

:::sigh:::

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Morning Meditation

"Therefore, since through God’s mercy we have this ministry, we do not lose heart…

we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this allsurpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body. For we who are alive are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body.

Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." — 2 Cor 4:1,7-11,16-18

An email conversation taking place between some of my Mosaic teammates got my spirit chewing on things this morning, after I worked out at the Y (Yippeee!! Lu is finally learning how to get up in the morning and EXERCISE! I’m still not a morning person, but, hey, I’m still awake and thinking 7 hours after I arose. 🙂 Not a bad start to the new routine. PRAY that I can keep it up.)

I also read the Purpose Driven devotional email and saw a verse from this passage. Things began to click as my mind finally began waking up (a good hot shower always helps the mind-fog to clear).

How many times have I heard in my Christian life that, while suffering is a part of life in Christ, "joy comes in the morning." That is, the pain of suffering will vanish with the light of Jesus upon our souls — or something equally churchy, ethereal,enigmatic, and completely impracticable.

The reality of a follower of Christ just isn’t so pretty a picture. John the Baptist was left in prison to lose his head while Jesus healed and freed OTHERS. Peter died for Christ, Paul went through a litany of crap, John was banished to an uninhabited island, unnamed and countless other followers of Christ have been tortured and killed in our time, in places like Morocco, Libya, India, Indonesia and China.

All of us on my team are struggling and fighting and waging bloody dirty war every single day. Financial difficulties keep us all severely strapped for funds, unmet expectations and unrealized dreams taunt us and dog our every step, workplace strife and stress rips at our spirits and the hard, cold spiritual ground of Nashville leaves us with calluses on our souls as we till the land God has called us to.

I love reading the email of one teammate. He was so excited when we first began. Now he is feeling the beatings of the life of a Barbarian and is struggling to continue to seize every moment of this life to which Jesus called him. It’s such a beautiful sight to see!

Call me weird if you want, but I much prefer to see the struggle; to see followers of Christ contending with life, sometimes overcoming and sometimes being overcome by it, than to see an always victorious shiny person. Another friend is in the throes of wrestling with God over some issues in his life. I love that.

I don’t think you heard me yet. I LOVE THAT.

That’s real life. That’s the kind of life I want to live, the kind of life I want to journey alongside, the kind of community I want to be apart of. I belong in that kind of group. I’m probably the messiest follower of Christ you will ever meet. My life, my heart, my soul, my spirit. Every part of me is messy, muddy, bloody, gritty — and real. I’m not Janice Dickinson — nothing about me is fake and I’m absolutely not perfect. If you don’t like gritty, bloody reality, you better steer clear of me. ‘Cause I’m all about that kind of life. I’ve had my fill of the fluffy, no-complications kind of life most churches try to sell these days.

It is such a cool and amazing thing to be a part of a community where we all sweat and get dirty and bloody together. To watch my brothers contending with life is such an amazing blessing! It brings healing to my soul and courage to my heart. I am literally EN-couraged — filled to overflowing with courage — when I witness such things. Because it says to me, "there is hope for me yet."

There is hope that I can continue the Barbarian path I am on. There is hope that I can contend with life as they do. There is hope that our community will be real and authentic; a true community where hearts are bonded by the gritty reality of following Christ no matter the cost.

Fight on, my brothers! Your struggles buoy my spirit. Your untamed hearts give me courage to unleash my own. And your steadfast love for Christ spurs me on to greater levels of intimacy with Him.

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Through My Eyes

Here’s a quick glimpse of Nashville in Spring through my eyes. Its not a complete picture, because I ran out of film before I ran out of city. But hopefully it will give you a taste of the beauty I’m surrounded by in this amazing city.

(PS – These were taken today with my film camera and scanned by Eckard onto a cd…)


These are the trees I see outside my kitchen window every day. Amazing!


Sevenmile Creek runs right in front of my apartment complex


Even the Bumble Bees couldn’t resist the wonderful warm day and nearly clear blue skies


Isn’t this city beautiful!


I met some kids having a bake sale to raise money for a mission trip to Mexico

I stopped in at my favorite coffee house, Fido, and ran into a friend there.

Inside Fido

But I that roll got stuck in the bottom of my bag and didn’t get developed today. I’ll have it for you tomorrow.  However, I couldn’t resist posting this picture. It’s a typical scene at Fido

— coffee – check, Apple i/Power Book – check, headphones – check, wireless internet – check (Fido always provides)… you’re good to go.


I took this photo of Nashville’s skyline out the window of my car waiting at a red light. There are better views to be had of our beautiful and distinct skyline, but I ran out of film…. ::sigh:: See that funny looking spiky skyscraper on the far right? Everyone in town calls it "the Bat Tower" — because, well, you can see for yourself. It’s actually the Bell South Tower.


Here’s a view of the Bat Tower from my sunroof


Welcome to Music City!