GRAVITY BY SHAWN MCDONALD

His lyrics are truth.

 

They are simple.

 

No fluff.

 

No lies.

 

His music is pure and raw and alive.

 

It welcomes you and it welcomes God.

 

I need him--especially tonight, if not every night.

 

I'm truly afraid of who I would be today had A-- never made me listen to him freshman year.

 

His latest brilliance, interwoven with matured musicality, is out today: Analog Sessions.

 

It maintains the originals' essence while presenting them with new life. With a few new future hits as well.

 

And tonight, GRAVITY says what I needed to say even though I didn't know it yet. He always finds a way to say what I've been needing to. He always finds a way to God's heart, and thus mine too. Listen to our honest prayer tonight:

 

 

 

 

 

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new lilly pad

Anne Lammot tells us about the lilly pads in our lives. People, places, things, that were simply there to get us to another location or place in our life. I think this blog is now a lilly pad I am in the process of leaving. Gotta move forward right? So I am starting a new blog called

www.devilsconfusion.blogspot.com

I guess I will find out who actually looks at this one still ;)

thanks for reading and following up with my thoughts.

Music and Water

Thoughts...

Let's say you were to put a glass a water next to speakers and play a song really loud, wouldn't the water move, vibrate or something? Does the ripple from the middle out look cool?

And there was that study by that one guy with the words and bottles of water. He looked at the chemical structure or something before he wrote words on the bottles of water. It was a blueish clearish whiteish snowflake looking thing. A bunch of different snowflakes layered overtop oneanother.

He wrote something like "I hate you!" on one and something like "Love" on another. The one that said "I hate you!"'s chemical structure turned to yellowy, orangeish red shards of glass looking. The one that said "Love" looked like bigger bluer snowflakes.

What does this mean for us, as 90% water when we listen to music with lyrics? No wonder music can be healing. But does that mean what we listen to can also have a negative effect on us? I don't know about you, but I want to be a snowflake.

Poetical Irritability

This is for Roomie. I finally think I understand you...I think. You, my love, are a poet.

Poetical Irritability by Edgar Allen Poe

"That poets (using the word comprehensively, as including artists in general

and you are an artist

are genus irritabile, is well understood; but the why, seems not to be commonly seen.

you came back from Mississippi the first time different and we didn't understand it

An artist is an artist only by dint of his exquisite sense of Beauty--a sense affording him rapturous enjoyment, but at the same time implying, or involving, an equally exquisite sense of Deformity of disproportion. Thus a wrong--an injustice...excites him...

from talking on the phone with you admit that you get worked up ;) ...this next part is beautiful!

Poets see injustice never where it does not exist--but very often where the unpoetical see no injustice whatever. Thus poetical irritability has no reference to "temper" in the vulgar sense, but merely to a more than usual clear-sightedness in respect to Wrong:--this clear-sightedness being nothing more than a corollary

(a deduction from a proposition already proved true)

from the vivid perception of Right--of justice--of proportion--in a word,

here is my favorite, I think...

of Beauty (in Greek).

I can't write in Greek on this blog. Most wouldn't call Poe Christian, but I would. I honestly from reading him don't think that is too far fetched. If not then you have to admit he knew A LOT about faith, and one that seems Christian. But either way, from a Christian perspective, how beautiful is this!!?!?!

But one thing is clear--that the man who is not "irritable," (to the ordinary apprehension,) is no poet." -Graham's Magazine, May 1849

Roomie,
Any time you want to call and vent some poetical irritability to me I would be honored to get excited with you, honored to have you show me where there is injustice in this world. May you always hold on to and utilize, to the best of God's ability through you, this "poetical irritabilty" and continue to see through the "veil of the soul" and then show us where this world needs our help. If our hands are dirty or bloody from hurting this world may you help us stop. If they are clean may you tell us where we can get in there and help.

Guitars and God

Do you think a guitar would rather look well used but rarely ever be picked up or look brand new-never-before-used and be played everyday?

Think God feels the same way?

Think it matters if you look like you have a relationship with God, or if you actually have a relationship with God? What does Matthew 6 say about how we should be Christian? In secret maybe? For only God to see maybe? An audience of One hearing us play? Maybe.

Dance

Still working out the moves on this one...



I say I love You, yes I say it's true. I tell You I love You, but is this something I do? I say I love You, yes I say it's true. I tell You I love you, but is this something I do? I say I love You, yes I say--

He says He loves You, yes He says it's true. He tells me he loves You and it sounds like he does it too. He says he loves You, yes he says he loves You. He says he loves You and it sounds so true. He says He loves You, and He says...

Life is a dance, just a dance.
Life is a dance, so dance.
Life is a dance, just dance.
Life is a dance, let's dance with You.

I wanna dance like You so I can dance towards You.
I wanna dance towards You so I can dance with You.
I wanna dance with You, so I will dance with You,
And we'll dance forever, and for and ever.
And we'll dance forever, and for and ever.

We will dance with You because we love You.
We will dance with You.
Clunky at first, smooth with practice, we will dance into the abyss.
We will dance this romance like it's our last chance to show You, we love You.

Life is a dance, just a dance with You. Let's dance.

Do We Need A Superman?

I am one of the few people in this world that knows that there are five Superman movies, and I am a girl! My first love was Christopher Reeve. Instead of Disney movies being watched hundreds of thousands of times when I was younger it was Supes, well Superman or a Nadia Comăneci movie (the gymnast).

I never read comic books, I think thank God because I would be homeless from buying them, but I do know a lot about the mythology, the Superman Cannon if you will, though most look at me like I am crazy when I talk like that. And everything I learned I learned--like a good student in the front row of class never taking my eyes off the Teacher, ready to scoop up knowledge like ice cream or to grab my big neon straw when the ICEE was about to flow--from movies and TV. And over the years, starting with two Jewish boys in the early 1900s, to comics, to the radio, to comics, to cartoons, to comics, to TV, to comics, to cartoons, to movies, to comics, to TV, to a movie, to comics, to TV and back again, all involving people trying to evolve the Man of Steel so he works and sells to a current audience.

Superman adapts to the world we live in today. He has to sell now...and he does! I do not think the idea of Superman can ever die. He will live on forever. Looking at our world, he has to. There is no reason he wouldn't.

So this makes me think, think deeply about all these Superheroes we have around, all these supernatural shows and movies and comic books. They are everywhere, and I think, I think I do not believe there was much of a time when in some way a hero didn't exist. There have always been leaders, heroes, throughout time and history they have existed or been wished into existence in the imagination of our hearts. Our story contexts desire, no need, heroes. A main character we like, love, want around, to do something. To affect something. To effect something. Story, life, involves heroes. Don't they?

Looking at story as a metaphor for life we always have a hero. They have always been around and they always will be, it is just that these are super to live up to the super-uber-badness and evil we live in. Something has to be bigger than evil, we need to believe that. Doesn't story, life, involve heroes, and don't we wish they were super? But do we need them to be super?

This world we live in now, it is pretty ugly isn't it? I think it is. I turn the news on and am disgusted, my intestines get knotted and my pulse increases, my heart is thumping loud at the sounds of pain and destruction and hurt in this world. And I think, it is not getting better; it is only getting worse. And it is. It is getting worse. You can't tell me honestly that it isn't. Evil grows. It adapts. It evolves with the Times, shouldn't good?

Evil is strong, and it needs someone to fight it off to maintain balance. If you can take a good look at the world, not just the fairy world of America or California (and look closely enough here or with squinted eyes, depends on how wells yours work and if they transmit images from and to your heart as well as your brain, evil is super, and if evil is super, we need a superhero.

We live in a world longing for help, crying out for it really. Longing for peace, crying out for peace, yet we ourselves seem unable to produce it. Everywhere, every second, people are dying, getting hurt, hurting someone else, stealing, blowing things or people up, crashing cars, crashing planes, getting in accidents, starting wars...cats are stuck in trees, old ladies can't cross the street, young women are tied to railroad tracks, and there is a baby stroller somewhere about to get hit--Lois lane is hanging out of a helicopter as we live and breathe people--this world needs a hero, and he or she needs to be super.

This world needs the X-Men, a Bionic Woman, Clark Kent, The Flash, Batman, or Peter Patrelli after he figures out Adam is the bad guy. With Sylars and Lex Luthors out there we need someone to stand up to them. The world is sick. All we ourselves as mere humans can do is band aid the problems. We are not the doctor. We need the Doctor.

We need a Superman. If we could save ourselves don't you think we would have done it by now? We can't do this on our own people. Admit it. Evil is Super and we need a Superman. We need a Savior.

Game Over

Devil, Ishbane, Screwtape, Whoever You Are,

I don't officially know what your specific purpose is. I have the general idea: you want to pull me from God, or to forget about Him, or be mad at Him or break morality and hurt His feelings, something like that. But I feel like you are watching me, smiling, rubbing your hands together in excitement for some scheme you have planned and that has me a slightly worried and curious. I feel like if I figure out your plan then I can thwart it.

It is something, isn't it? Your plan I mean. You have something. This disease you planned. Not God. He is using it for His purposes too you know. I give in to the Principalities of Darkness sometimes, or often, depending, I admit that. I admit your Imps of the Perverse I have noticed have a huge effect on me. The "mobile without motive" as Poe would say, the thoughts turning to a desire, the desire to a wish, the wish to a longing, and the longing to an impulse. I impulsively do stupid stuff. But you know what I have noticed changes that, reason. If I just take 5 minutes to think about an action first I can outthink you. It is when I don't think that you win. Thus drugs and drunk driving and peer pressure are some of your easiest tricks. No thinking or reason is involved.

Reason. I guess I just got to think this out more. But you have been winning lately, haven't you. I am tired and weak and exhausted. Think more Zoe. Think things out. God. God. God. Think God. Jesus. Christ. All those words in a letter to you. I don't see you smiling any more. Lord. Savior. Not so happy are we. Think more Zoe. God help me think more. Reason more.

So you have a plan, plans to use this disease and many other things against me. Guess what, I know that. Most don't. I am aware of you. I know you are here just as surely as He is here. I know your basic plan. And God and I are going to thwart it. Your thrawl with some day be useless on me. And maybe with this letter to you someone else will beging to beat you, oh so very weak Princes. You do realize it is prince right. God is King. You always play second fiddle to Him. He sees all of Time at once. What do you see, today and yesterday. Guess what. So do I. So how are you better than me if He lives in me? You are not. You are nothing, and I am going to prove to you that is true. Keep trying. I dare you. God and I will still be good. And I get closer to Him every year. You may win today, or one moment here and there, but I will spend Eternity with Him. And then where will you be? How can you hurt me if you can't hurt my soul? You can't.

So good luck, cuz it doesn't matter. He already won. Game over Imp.

Love, Zoe

Dear Friend

Dear Friend,

I just don't know what to do about us. A great part of me wants to move toward you, but who you have been is causing something in me to resist. I am standing here looking at you, unable to move.

My soul doesn't belong here you know, in California. It doesn't really belong in WA if we are going to be technical, because we know it belongs with God (key word, longs to be with God). But there is a Garden of Eden feel and look to the NW and it feels like that is one of the closest places to heaven I can find on Earth.

You can't change so quickly you know, who you were I mean, and I don't think I can really help you. I think it is something you and God need to work on alone. I think if you really want to be diving deep and not splashing around in the kiddie pool, you've got to do it--I can't, I won't, do this for you, I won't push you in. You need to let Jesus pull you under, into Him, deep inside. You got to let Him pull you in. I just don't think I will have much affect...

Plus I have been and still am and still am in the same spot you are about to be in, in the swimming deep part. Consciously making that decision more often. Swimming to Him is something I have to do on my own (with Him). And it is something you have to do on your own. Alone time with Christ. It does us all so much good.

But I wish you well, on this trip to find yourself. And maybe when we know ourselves (in Him) a little bit better, we will run into one another somewhere in the deep abysses of His love. Something will cause us to be together again, just as surely as something is causing me to stand still right now. We will swim to one another soon!

See You Soon,
Zoe

Blessing In A Dragon-Like Disguise

In reply to a mom talking about her son, who has stills disease (February 2006):



My name is ZOE, one of a few in this group. I am 19 and live in Spokane as I attend college. I want to give you a brief story about me and Stills from a younger perspective. There will be tangents all over the place cuz I don't have a lot of time, as Spring Semester starts tomorrow.

I was diagnosed when I was 18, in Nov. 2004. It was my first semester of college. I have struggled a lot here and there. There will be many peaks and valleys to come. As a mom, I can not know how you are feeling, but I am very close to my mother. She is a nurse and I know it breaks her heart to have her only child be so sick and she can't do anything to make it better, or so she feels.

I have amazing parents that have been here with me, not in presence, but in love, support and spirit, as I learn to live with stills. Knowing they will always be there. Knowing how much they care. Knowing they would do almost anything for me is exactly what I need. They help keep me on track of meds and doctors appointments, etc. I love them for that and that is the support I need.

I am very proud of you for being a part of the group. I know the emails are discouraging at first, especially when you are reading about the possible future of your son, but you can not live in denial of this disease. You have to be prepared for anything and everything. Every day I play worst case scenario in my head. I don't want to be caught off guard. I know it seems like a depressing thought, but when you get past the idea at first glance, you realize it can be a life saver down the road.

This disease effects everyone differently. I randomly met someone with stills who is in LA trying to be an actor. He goes most of the year not needing any medicine or doctors appointments, unless there is a flare, which may last a month or two. His life is amazing and he gives me hope.

Stills has changed me and my life, and it always will. I wanted to play competitive softball forever, and now I can no longer play. I wanted to be an athletic trainer, I got into one of the best athletic training programs in the country, and had to drop out. I am now an English major who can't take more than 5-6 credits at a time. My life has been altered, but it has NOT been completely taken away from me. This is not the life I saw for myself, but I will have to say I feel lucky. I feel blessed. Mind you, it is my faith that has carried me this whole way, but my faith has been strengthened due to stills, and for that I thank God.

I appreciate life so much more than my peers. I appreciate the good and the bad. I appreciate every new rain fall or snow or meal that isn't from the hospital. I appreciate being alive. I appreciate being able to drive. I appreciate being able to go to school. I appreciate living in a house and experiencing the college life. I appreciate every friend I get or even had for a short time. Everything is a blessing, and that is something you never could have taught your son. Your son isn't cursed to have a challenging life; he is blessed to know how to appreciate this life.

Every moment will mean more to him. Every love, every relationship, and every class he finishes, every task he accomplishes will mean so much more. His family and parents will mean so much more. He is and will continue to mature in ways you didn't know were possible. Yes he will endure more than most, but it will only make him stronger. His life will mean more to him, and he will use his time here on earth more wisely than many couldn't even dream possible. This will be hard. You will walk down the roads not often taken with him many, many times, but it will only make all of you stronger. It will bring you all closer together. You will appreciate this world and this life in ways that are unfathomable to most. At first glance the unfamiliar, the unknown, is very scary. But with each others help, support, and love you will prevail.

Giving up what society tells you you need will be hard, but with every loss, it might get a little easier, and you will learn that there was never a loss at all, but rather your emotional, mental, spiritual, and intellectual gain. You do not need what society tells you you must have. Life will be simpler, and more joyous with everything you endure with your son. Every day will be a miracle that you will appreciate more and more. To experience light's true brightness you must endure the pitch-blackness of the dark. Stay strong, keep fighting. Living with stills is more than possible, it is a blessing in a dragon-like disguise.

The more God encourages me in subtle ways to give up my life and my dreams, the more I am blessed with living God's dreams and a life for Him. To society I look, at first glance, like a quitter, or a loser, but I am not. I am simply surrendering to Him and to the life he GAVE me, yes gave, as in a gift. I don't know you or your faith, but I just wanted to share mine.

Whatever you believe, hold on to it. I want you to know that you can either look at these emails in fear, or you can be amazed at the strength your son will build up, and be so very thankful you are not experiencing what others currently are. Hold your chin up. Use this time you have now to grow with your son, to love him, to support him. We have but a few days here on earth. Use them as wisely as possible.

You are a great mom. Your responses are natural. But, you are also going to need to build up some strength. Your son needs to see in you and your confidence that everything is going to be ok. He doesn't want to see you afraid, because if he does, he may be more afraid too. I pray you receive strength and wisdom through everything you and your son and your family experiences in the next few years. God bless and take care. Any more questions, please let me know. I am busy, but God and this group come first.

In His strength,

Zoe




Days after this I dropped out of school. Days after that I fell to the floor and cried out to God to fill in the gaping hole I felt like I had inside. He has.

Prednisone: Committing Suicide

Prednisone is one of the most complex drugs I know. I could write about it a hundred times, or think about it everyday like I do, to try to make sense of it for myself, so I can make sense of it to those who haven't experienced it on a long term basis, but it doesn't seem to help. But that doesn't mean I am not going to keep trying.

Prednisone for a prolonged use at higher doses, above 10 mg, is like committing suicide slowly. It will cause problems and take decades (plural) off your life. If you take high doses for a long time it will cause serious complications to organs and then kill you if you keep it up. Guess what? I have been on it for three years. Anywhere from .5 mg to 80 or 100 mg. Right now I have to go from 8 mg to 10 because life is hard. I am scared.

So yes, it helps me. It reduces inflammation and pain and gives me a false sense of energy. So that is good. It helps so many people all the time, in ways in helps me and in many other ways. It can help with allergies too. All kinds of things. It even saved my life, literally. Without Prednisone I would have died, but with it for too long and I will die. So Prednisone and I have mixed feelings.

I am telling you it is good because that is what makes deciding what dose to be on so difficult. I could be on maybe 40-50 mg right now and be able to go to school, be able to have a job, my dream job. But how many years of my life would I be sacrificing. I play the scales all the time. And when I decided to drop my dream job, when I decided to drop out of college, this was because I was lowering predisone to save my life, in the long run and in different ways.

Short term long run if I flare again and things get bad Prednisone is the only thing that will save me, literally possibly save my life from the imflammation that could surround my heart and lungs again. If I am on 40-50 mg and I flare, how much higher will the dose be in order for it to work--too high people! Too much of a risk there, and then you have the scary complications. So school, a job, it just isn't worth the risks involved with Prednisone, and Prednisone is the only way I can feel healthy enough to do those things. So I appreciate everyone wanting me to go back to school or thinking that I can suck it up, and you know what you are right, but it comes at a price, a very high price, and one I have decided I am not going to pay. And I need you to take a very deep look at yourself and think if you would risk higher doses of prednisone just to attempt to be normal. Would you? Would you commit suicide slowly, for a job, for school? I hope you wouldn't. I am telling you it is not worth it!

I haven't even mentioned other side effects I have experienced from higher doses. Acne, all over. Increased appetite. Weight gain. Sweaty all the time. Hands sweat. Less sleep because it is a steroid. I am a girl, it messes with my menstration cycle. It plays with your emotions. Your body craves it and doesn't know what to do when you miss a dose or have to lower it. You feel literally like hell when you try to lower it just a little bit. Like there is a whithdrawal and you got hit by a semi-truck. When I lower just a couple mgs at a time I become aware of every single joint in my feet, my ankes, and my hands at first. Then when I lower it even more, by back goes, every joint in my spine, then all over my body. It thirsts for it like I am stranded in a desert and it is fresh mountain ice water of an unlimited supply. I am sure there is more, but I think I have proved my point:

You don't know me. You don't know my disease. You don't know Prednisone. You don't know my life. You don't know why I quit my dream job. You don't know why I dropped out of school. You don't know my fears of daily experiences. You don't know much of anything. You don't know what it is like to need steroids. You don't know what it is like to know you are taking decades off of your life and to imagine how much shorter life would be if you were still in school and it scares reality into you. But now, now maybe you know a little more. God and I can only hope.

Here is an earlier version I wrote:

Many people used to be able to see an almost normal, healthy, and happy me. I was working close to full time in a vigorous, demanding, and exhausting job, while going to school fulltime. What they don't is that it was all an act. The real problems and daily struggles were masked behind my stubborness and more importantly masked behind a horrible drug called Prednisone.

Prednisone had at one point saved my life, but I soon was forced to learn that it could end it as well.

I started medicinal steroids (prednisone) Nov. 2004 to reduce inflammation from AOSD. I have not been able to come off of them since.

I tried twice, and I went to the ER twice, and one of those trips led to hospitalization.

You see, being on Prednisone for a long period of time is very dangerous. There are life threatening consequences that I have been forced to face. I knew back in Sept. 2005 that I was not going to continue the risk of those consequences. I knew I had to change things around in hope of a healthier future. I gave up my life then (working, my dream job, school, any sense of normalcy) so that I had hope for later. Dropping out of school, and then being able to lower my dose of Prednisone has added years to my life. But this is not the end.

I am only 20 years old now and will battle with Prednisone for the rest of my life. I may never come off of it completely and that is a very scary thing to think about. People hear AOSD and they only think of arthritis. It is so much more than that. There are mental, emotional, spiritual battles every second of the day. On top of all of that there are the millions of medications we are on and will be on for too many years. Medicines help people, but they are usually only used for a short period of time.

When you lengthen their use, especially for 10, 20, 30+ years, the side effects from all the meds may become very dangerous. We not only worry about AOSD leading to an early death, we think about stress, secondary conditions, weakened immune systems, and side effects of these medications being the cause of an early death. There are so many demons associated with conditions like Stills. It is so much more than anyone can ever know. Fears surround you from all directions. Sometimes letting go of the things we love now will be able to let us love something else for a little longer down the road.

Time's Knots: The Knot Theory

I am not completely sure what it is now, but I have no concept of Time. Mind you I can't have a job and I can't go to school, so I have no real responsibilities or times to be somewhere doing something. Even if I did I probably wouldn't be able to physically make it, unless I play with Prednisone (that is a different blog though). But I can't understand Time anymore.

I don't know what day it is. What the date is. What month it is. What year it is. Time is a blur.

An example is that it doesn't even feel like Christmas. But I think that is less something to be sad about and more like a good thing, because every day feels like Christmas. Every day is full of magic and light and love and joy and celebration. To you Christmas is rare. To me it is everywhere everyday. I think it is less sad for me, like you are thinking and more sad for you like you are totally not thinking. Every day is special. I felt sad about it at first for sure, that is the normal reaction. But tonight, I don't. Like in Blue Like Jazz God is actual magic, not just an illusion. And I am aware of that. So no more sadness. Only joy!

My mom said, back when writers didn't officially realize how underpaid they were, that she knew why I watch TV. It is because that is the only way I know what day it is. Cue smile.

Sunday: Extreme Home Makeover and DH
Monday: How I Met Your Mother, Big Band Theory, Chuck, and Heroes
Tuesday: Bones and House
Wednesday: Pushing Daisies and Bionic Woman and Life
Thursday: Smallville and Greys

Friday and Saturday wishing it was any other day

Between TV and my AM/PM weekly pill container I know what day it is. Other than that, not so much...Sometimes.... Maybe....ok, occasionally. Isn't that strange though? Imagine not knowing what day it is at 21.

I used to be one of those "I work too hard seven days a week with a full day planner" Rory Gilmore with athletic ability types. And now...now all I have to do is:

wake up, get out of bed (which is harder than you think), muster strength and appetite to eat something, take pills in correct order at correct times, read, write, talk to God, play the guitar to praise God, spend time alone with God, fall in love with God, listen to music, enjoy some part of the day, find beauty in the day, hug mom, hug dad, pet dog, occasionally shower, sleep a bit if at all, watch TV.

And all that really doesn't take up much time in a day. And I do the same thing every day, so it all blurs together.

I can't remember much about the different days anymore either. I can't remember if I just thought something or if I said it already. And with an imaginative mind that thinks way too much now as a writer, it is even more blurry. I facebook or text people stuff that I am not sure if I have said before. I hope they know I truly mean it if I end up saying it more that once. And it has obviously been on my heart and mind a lot if I say it more than once. So don't feel like I am just saying it again for attention or whatever, or think it has lost its meaning. It hasn't! I am just lost in Time's line. I really am.

It is more like a knot really, to tell you the truth. Stuff overlaps and gets confusing and I get so lost trying to follow it in a line. And all those moments sitting above Time with God taking a good look at everything that confuses me down here.

But who knows what Time really means anymore anyways? And I bet it has knots in it anyways. You just might not be aware of it. Or maybe my Time within my reality is full of knots and yours isn't. Or maybe Time is a bunch of knots. We don't really know.

I guess I am just trying to say, this is hard, this life that isn't a line, that is all knotted. It is hard for me, and it is hard for you, either your life with knots or you dealing with mine. But this is the way it is and I want you to know that. My mind is lost all the time. And I can't follow life in its line, if it is even straight and knot free. So I know you don't understand this life I life because you don't live it, but I do, and I am telling you it is hard and confusing, and I hope that explains part of me to you, though it probably doesn't. It kinda confuses me more and I am writing it. But this changes me. This knotted life makes me different from you in ways you don't understand, and I want you to understand me, or to help me understand me. And that is why I am talking this out with you. That and there are others like me. Who are sick, who are tired, who are sick and tired, who are sick and tired of being sick and tired and not living life in a line. Who are tired of trying to undo all the knots, or who have given up on trying to unknot life and are realizing that where life loops deformity back in time of forward in time, you too will find beauty. But that doesn't mean deformity is gone. It just means we are trying to focus on just one of the lines of string and knot the other one :) Is any of this making sense. It feels quite non-sensical.

All I know about today, is today I am alive. Today I feel the pain of both beauty and deformity at the same Time, and I believe Time exists within God, and us within Time, so us within God and that is all that really matters, not the knots, but that doesn't mean they don't affect and effect me (us) in ways we still seem to be completely unaware of. Time's knots probably have more effect and affect than we may ever know. I mean, forget string theory. What about the Knot Theory.

I Asked (Merry Christmas!)

It is Christmas, the time to hope for stuff, to ask for stuff, to give someone else something in anticipation that they give you something. We make lists for others and we make lists for ourselves. The one time we can really have a list of stuff we want and not just stuff we need. We hope, pray and ask for things. So that got me to thinking...There are a lot of things I ask God for on a regular basis, or have asked Him for, been asking Him for, for a long time.

I ask for happiness regularly. You know what He has given me? Joy.

I asked for a career, the career of my dreams. You know what He gave me? A purpose, the job of His dreams for me.

I asked to not feel so lonely, and He taught me how to spend more time with Him and never really feel lonely.

I asked for a man, a boy, someone to be in love with. He gave me Christ.

I asked for knowledge, and He has given me wisdom. I have to work for it by reading and trillions of hours alone with Him lost in thought, but I have a bit of it now.
And there are other things...

I asked to be more like Christ, and now I suffer physically on a regular basis.

I asked to know Him more and so now I have time to do that.

I asked to finish in last place, before I knew what that really meant, and now look at my life: no job, no education, no health, no social life, no money, no much of anything. That is last place in the world's eyes for sure.

I asked to appreciate life more, and now the sunrises and sunsets and moon and sleeping puppies and clouds are more beautiful and precious than they ever were before.

I asked for a Christian community and He gave me my parents. And He helped me realize I had a great Christian community I took for granted for so long.

I wanted to not hate my hometown as much, and those drives I go on have made me love part of this area.

I asked to walk by faith, and now am finding myself make so many decisions only on faith. Decisions most would consider rash and impractical or unthought out, but decisions that are lead by the Holy Spirit directing the wings of the butterflies in my stomach. And they always work out, for what feels like I am exactly where I am supposed to be doing what I am supposed to be doing right when I am supposed to.

I know most look at my life and think sad thoughts for me in their hearts and minds. I appreciate that. And to be honest, that is what I want. You need to respect this disease and never take it lightly. Too many lives I have known to be completely destroyed by this disease. But me, my story. It is full of pain and fatigue and zero sleep and a body that feels like lead and fears of waking up in a hospital unable to lift my arms to wipe the tears from my eyes, when I consequentially want to die...But! But I am ok. All those things above, you wish you have been given from God. Trust me. You wish. Because life is full of beauty just as much, or more if you pay attention than deformity.

I have since being diagnosed, as many friends and family members have as well because they love me, asked God to heal me. I am 99.9% sure we have been asking for a physical miracle. Like Paul being healed of his blindness. I am thinking though, the best part of Paul being healed so he could see again, wasn't that he could see, but that he could see with Christian eyes that were birthed from a change of heart. He told people that it was because of an illness that he was preaching to them. The spiritual miracle that he experienced came with the physical miracle. And if Paul, or I were given a choice, we would always opt for the spiritual miracle. And that my friends, when we asked God to heal me, is what He did, He healed me spiritually. It has been a battle. The Devil went to God and said, "I bet if we take everything away from Katie she won't be all that everyone thinks she is. She will crumble and fall away from You." And God said, "Do what you want, just don't kill her."

God knew I would come back from the Devil's schemes, God's tests, and prove that I trust Him. It took a year or so to get on the right path, to circle the right letter on the test, and then I had more questions, and short answers and a couple essays along the way, and the test is far from over, but I think I am doing well. I have filled in the circle that says "spiritual" under the physical or spiritual miracle question. And that has saved my life, this one and the next.

We asked for a miracle guys, and He performed it. It just sucks that so many of you are still in your blind phase like Paul and I used to be. I hope someday you ask to see and then God heals the eyes of your heart.

If you ask, you will receive. Just remember it may not be in the way you thought. It will probably be better! And remember, it is because of an illness that I am preaching to you!

Merry Christmas, may He give you all you ask for, in His way!

Breathing Blood

There is a lot about myself I can't quite understand. My inability to communicate well or often is just a tiny part of the mystery that I am working on discovering in Christ. More than that, I pray every day I can do something about it. But leave it to Donald Miller to solve just a bit of it for me.

I often chalk some of my isolation up to depression because that is what so many people tell me, or assume. But I have always felt there was something deeper than the broad diagnosis of depression, and Don has helped me continue to believe it is more complicated.

He answered why there are some people that I am drawn to and why there are others I slowly yet quickly pull away from.

"Sometimes I think the reason we don't like certain people is because we feel insecure around them. We like to chalk it up to political or philisophical differences, maybe, but the truth is, if we are honest, we are drawn to those who validate us and affirm us, and we resist those who don't." (To Own A Dragon page 86)

Since having a rare systemic auto-immune disease and consequencially dropping my dream job, then dropping out of college, then barely physically being able to do much of anything I feel like I am endlessly needing to defend myself. Part of that is me jumping to high conclusions, part of it is true. I can give you less than a handful of people who validate me and my disease, my life with my disease, and an infinite seeming number of people who just don't get it.

I don't know what I am really saying yet, other than Don is right, and sometimes in my life that is why I pull away, why we all pull away (if we are smart, believing we are people who need told who we are and we believe too quickly who people tell us we are). But I think that is all I got for now. It is late and I am exhausted. And my brain needs to breath even more blood over this one (Lair, by Robert Pinsky).

Love Me Back

So I am reading Romeo and Juliet to work on one of my relations with Christ, the Bride to Bridegroom relationship because Juliet can be a Bard's Christ figure. And I got to thinking, to connecting thoughts. I am still working on it, but here are some of the thoughts.

We all have dreams, things, or goals that we love. Someone may love their dream job, playing the guitar, singing, sports, gardening, video games, whatever. I mean we really love them, ya know? I love TV for example and reading. We show the things we love, love. But here's the thing, we aren't in love, the thing and I aren't in love. Sports can't love me back like a person can. TV can't love me back like a person can. I show TV a lot of love, but we aren't in love. It can't love me back.

Take that with Sexy Carrots in mind. Take that with green lights, with Daisy, in mind. Take that with Rosaline, whom Romeo shows so much love for, in mind. None of these things, or girls loved those who loved them back. Wouldn't it make much more sense to love something or someone who loves you back, only then can you be in love instead of just showing love, instead of being the only one who loves.

This just made so much more sense to me, to be in love you have to have someone who loves you back. Christ loves me back. God loves me back. They are things to chase, because they truly love me. As beings who are like people in that they can love, and love perfectly, that is someone priceless to chase for the rest of my life, this life, so I can be with them in the next. To be with someone who loves me back for forever. How horrible to not know love. To not be loved back. Gatsby kills himself over it.

Immediately Romeo loves Juliet. I mean immediately!

FRIAR LAWRENCE:
"Holy Saint Francis, what a change is here!
Is Rosaline, that thou dist love so dear,
So soon forsaken? ...
Art thou changed?"

And Romeo wonders to the Friar why he is being scolded for loving Rosaline, and the Friar wisely responds with,

"For doting, not for loving, pupil of mine."

Doting: to show love, not to be in love.

FRIAR LAWRENCE:
"Thy love did read by rote, that could not spell."

Meaning something like he was reciting loving things from his memory, not from experience, not from a book of love (their relationship); he wasn't reading as he saw it, as he experienced. He had been using iambic pentameter, that we are used to from Shakespeare, when talking of Rosaline, but he uses free verse, love flowing freely from his heart, when talking of Juliet. The difference between loving someone who doesn't love you back, and being in love. The difference between showing someone love and being in love with someone.

Romeo says he has already forgotten Rosaline's name, the name that means woe. He is changed. And so am I. I am trying to forget the Rosaline's in my life, the Green Lights, the Daisy's, the Sexy Carrots, all the things I chased for so long, all the things I loved but couldn't love me back, and focus on being in love with someone who loves me back. Christ loves me back. Make sure you are chasing something or someone who can and does love you back! Take those vows with Christ.

RUN TO HIM and He will welcome you with open loving arms. What Green Light (Daisy), or Sexy Carrot, or Rosaline of yours can or will do that? Don't you want to be loved back?

(Romeo and Juliet, Act. 2 Scene 3)

Love Is Our Strength

A very dear friend gave me something that is precious to her, and now it is precious to me. She gave me something the helps her through, and now it helps me through. It is a ceramic Mama Bear. The Mama Bear symbolizes strength in adversity, and yet I am thinking maybe it symbolizes love more, because she gave me something she loves because she loves me. And then I got to thinking that love is our strength in adversity. And I was just thinking about all of this and wrote a little diddy. P.S. Mama is on my desk now looking at me :)


Mama Bear knows not fear
All she knows is what she holds dear
Love is her strength
To care for, protect, and guide her young
To teach them how to sing songs yet to be sung
Love is her strength

And Mama Bear stands strong
Looking her love into me
Guiding me along
Teaching me how to fight
Teaching me how to battle some light into this long night
Love is my strength

Love is our strength in adversity
Love is the strength that gets us to the top to look back and see
Just how far we have come
To see who we were and be proud of who we have become
Love is our strength
To live life, well and strong, in its length...
Love is our strength

How Did Romeo Know

How did Romeo know, and what does that mean for us?

"I fear too early, for my mind misgives
Some consequence yet hanging in the stars
Shall bitterly begin his fearful date
With this night's revels, and expire the term
Of a despised life closed in my breast
By some vile forfeit of untimely death.
But he that hath the steerage of my course
Direct my sail..." (Act 1. Scene 4. lines 113-120)

Perhaps this foreshadowing, with Galations 2:20, can be kept in mind with us Christians. I see the North star shining in this Christmas sky, and I feel what is about to happen in the coming year.

Please expire the term of a despised life locked away in my chest.
May I die to myself more often.
May He live in me and guide my sails.

Revelation, A Haiku

Not many can read
Even less can understand
But I can do both

Hymn

At morn--at noon--at twilight dim--
Maria! thou has heard my hymn!
In joy and woe--in good and ill--
Mother of God, be with me still!
When the Hours flew brightly by,
And not a cloud obscured the sky,
My soul, lest it should truant be,
Thy grace did guide to thine and thee;
Now, when storms of Fate o'ercast
Darkly my Present and my Past,
Let my Future radiant shine
With sweet hopes of thee and thine!

Got you to read a side of Poe you didn't know, again...hehe...I am starting to win--to change all you think you know about my dear old beloved Poe! (Hymn by Poe)

A Joke

Once Upon A Time...there was a Daddy Scientist Alien and a Momma Alien and two baby Aliens, a little boy and a little girl. One day Daddy Alien and Momma Alien were arguing over a laser that could shoot into space and plant a seed that could grow all kinds of life. Of course as they were arguing, about whether or not to use it, the baby Aliens were fighting and playing and running around and it knocked the laser off its stand, shooting it off into the abyss of space! BANG! The seed was planted! And from it all kinds of things grew. Like a planet and other planets and animals in the sea and on the land and in the air. And only God knows how much longer later some Apes were found playing Cat's Cradle. The rest is History.