irrationality

sometimes,

when people get engaged,

i kinda wanna throw up.



i'm sure this sentiment will change,
someday.

winter

today it finally snowed. my window is completely encrusted with whiteness as a result of a typically gusty nebraska wind. the snow is flipping between peaceful giant cotton balls and piercing needles. and so is my decision to venture to the outdoors.

wash, rinse, repeat

oh gosh.

the cave by mumford has 110 plays on my itunes.

who's still obsessed? yeah... me.

poem by keri miller

last week i returned from a trip to athens GA, a city that for a brief weekend harbored many friends who shared in the same indescribable italian experience that i did last spring.  we cooked, we ate, we drank, we laughed together again, reminisced, and it felt like home. everything revolved around food and company, as it used to. here things revolve around jobs and homework and bills, and sometimes we forget to eat because we are too busy with other things. that weekend we all had time to enjoy our lives and each other's treasured existences. these things, like delicious hand- and homemade food, or friends with whom you can deeply connect and sit around the table with, were given to us for our enjoyment. and if you are blessed enough to have such things cherish and use them up until it's someone else's turn to be blessed. the lord wants us to celebrate the blessings he gives us. so take big bites and savor each one. because these beautiful blessings are just tastes of the future glory that the lord has prepared for those who love him.


this a poem is about cortona, italy. where i spent three glorious months of 2011. keri wrote this after our trip. and it's truer than you know, even a year later.




Long-Distance Relationship


I miss walking up the hill at night, slowly,
looking at the lights in the valley
of people's homes filled with conversations
we couldn't understand and the train
that we hadn't yet taken and the lake
we never swam in and the circus
we never went to--it left after a week.
Everything was so mysterious, it looked
like an unknown universe's constellation map.
Then it all became so familiar,
like the freckles I've always had on my left forearm,
and that's when it started to hurt.

coffee

the amount of caffeine in one thermos doesn't even get me through to 12:30.

i could have a high metabolism... or i'm an addict. i'm thinking the latter.

hello. welcome to the world of legal addictive stimulants.

a place

i want to live in a place where you can order a vegan apple cranberry streusel topped pie and not be thought of as an anomaly/freak.  where people don't stumble at the like vegetarian and organic, and ask questions like, "oh... did it taste ok... i mean, like, was it like good..?" like i had just eaten dog brains.

i want to live in a place where chain restaurants are taboo, and mom and pop still own the local eateries and grocery stores.

i want to live in a place where bars are coffee shops by day and pubs by night.

i want to live in a place where you can pick strawberries and then make a pie that afternoon.

i want to live in a place where live music is impromptu and intimate.

i want to live in a place where the man is forgotten, and people have gone on with their lives, living in a place they created themselves, not inconsequentially structured by someone else. there is ownership, richness and pride in those places.

ANNOUNCEMENt!

i would just like to announce that my brother is reading my most beloved book: pride and prejudice!!!

and also that he's one of those really good english students that will actually read the entire book (unlike myself. i like to skim.) so therefore i can be confident that he is digesting the entirety of this lovely piece of literature.

the end.

oregon... someday.

this video is beautiful. this magazine is also beautiful. i wish i had the dollars to subscribe. if only i could live in the northwest and go on trips to the coast. [sigh]. seriously in love with everything this magazine is passionate about. check out the website for more fantastic videos!!

australian

australian: so i would just like to say that you all should be very jealous of my intro to islam professor. he is Australian so it makes everything he says that much more interesting. he could turn out to be a terribly boring professor but he will ALWAYS be slightly LESS boring than any ol' american prof because of his glorious accent. the only way this could get better (actually it could get a lot better) is if he had a brit accent! sorry australians. and also sorry other UK countries. i wouldn't be able to understand any of your natives in a lecture hall. also his name is simon. and after i had first read this i immediately pictured a bald man. why? i don't know, but guess what. he is in fact bald. what a great intuition i have!

the hipster sport: i climbed yesterday. sunny took me. i felt very cool. in my climbing shoes and harness, listening to regina spektor on some climber's ipod. and also very silly at the same time. trying new things is stressful sometimes. the guy who fixed my brakes at the bike shop was there belaying climbers. you know how people you've seen before give you that knowing look but don't say anything. and then you keep catching their eyes as they look away because they're trying to place you... well that happened. one guy literally jumped, flew through the air, and grabbed onto the overhanging wall. he was a frickin acrobat. all in all very fun, though i was quite tuckered at the end. someday i'll be the coolest most awesome climber ever! maybe...

bipolar weather: i am sad that the weather turned sour. i wanted to wear my chacos with socks. despite fashion norms.

pride&prejudice: my roommate sunny discovered the gloriousness of pride and prejudice! the movie of course (i still have yet to convince any of my roommates to read it). after years of loving this book and idolizing elizabeth bennet, its protagonist, i thought i would eventually grow out of that certain way of thinking and move on. oh no. watching this movie again only assured me how much this fictional heroine has affected my thinking. i think the sudden holiday boom of engagements and unions has rekindled my personal satire towards relationships and such things. so pride and prejudice becomes all the more relevant in my life. i am still elizabeth bennet at heart, and now i doubt she will ever leave me.


~

"I cannot fix on the hour, or the look, or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun."

- Jane Austen, Pride & Prejudice

a year of music

these are songs that have defined this year. the memories: jamming out in a pub in florence, worshiping the lord when i'm at my worst, picnicking on the irish coast, the most amazing concert experience of my life, walking to class in the snow....

musical recall is magical.

deliciousness

this is the cookbook i got for christmas. so excited to try EVERY recipe. you know how everyone plans to eat healthier every new years? this book is my plan of action.

Super Natural Every Day by Heidi Swanson

~

find life experiences and swallow them whole.

travel.

meet many people.

go down some dead ends and explore dark alleys.

try everything.

exhaust yourself in the glorious pursuit of life.

-lawrence k. fish

hello friend(s). it's new years.

so blogging.... whoever is reading this can blame hannah for her nudge to know more about my life, as she remotely resides a few states to the left. it's a new year so lets try something new.

this is the first time that i have felt the refreshment of starting a new year. in the pasts my years were marked by the beginning and end of the school year, but this year was different. i clearly remember looking over the oncoming year in january and thinking of all the wonders and oddities it would bring me. and now all those unknowns have happened, and i look back at them instead of forward. i have trekked across months and miles and oceans and continents, and i have reached the other side and will let another adventure unfold this year.

last year i anxiously leaped from one fragment of my year to the next, needing the next "big event" to get me through. i missed all the spaces in between. and that was my mistake. i heard a good toast early on new year's morning that challenged those in the room to be a little more joyful each day. the people that we celebrate with this year are not guaranteed to be there for the next so savor each day in joy: joy for the people, for the weather, for the food, and for the opportunity to be joyful. that is my resolution.

~

"may the road rise up to meet you, may the wind be ever at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face and the rain fall softly on your fields. and until we meet again, may god hold you in the hollow of his hand."

- Irish blessing