this is just to say

that i have read through the entire bible, gensis to revelation, starting on new years day of 2006 and perservering right through to the 24th of October. i'm planning on doing it again next year, but maybe reading a different version - perhaps the lovely king james version. or maybe a new version like the message. quite simply, i love the Word.

LA woman (uncensored)

Today i hung out with a couple of my friends and a group of christians who know each other from what i (affectionately) refer to as the Paris Hilton of churches - a very trendy, hip crowd who flock together with effortless social prowess. needless to say about half of the people in this group were LA folk - singers, actors, musicians. instead of playing beach volleyball they probably could have put together a decent showing of "Rent." but if they sang and danced instead of playing volley ball, then my friends and i wouldn't be fulfilling our intent, which was to observe the unguarded behavior of men. my friend has this excellent theory that if you watch how guys handle themselves when playing a competative game, you can see their character pretty easily and sidestep the potential months of dating it takes to find out about the pent up anger or poor teamwork. i've come to think this a very entertaining idea, especially when it involves a sunny saturday at venice beach.

around this type of crowd, i usually try to keep quite so i don't reveal my lack of urban street smarts, not smile too much so i don't seem like an airhead and hope that they assume i'm cooler than i am. anyhow, today i decided to be myself unflinchingly. befriend everyone, one by one. divulge my infant caregiving occupation. state that i live in the suburbs of VC. confess my early childhood educational pursuits. and i smiled alot, and perservered at talking to everyone, even if they gave me the distant act at first. and i had a great time. most of them were not natives and were from places like arkansas and new jersey and vietnam and spain. i got to hear lots of interesting stories. i think the best was the guy who moved here from NJ and paid his beach condo rent from the profits of online gambling - for two years! no kidding. just gambling. this just became illegal though, so he's job hunting in a sense. a very close second was the girl who escaped from vietnam with her mom when she was 9, and their boat was robbed by pirates. aarrggg!

Anyhow, I ended up doing a lot more talking than observing. and was lucky enough to hear one attractive, successful ("I live in Hollywood.") guy say, without a hint of humor, that he goes to a church until he gets all he can out of it and then finds another church. I started laughing and said, are you kidding?, truly thinking he was joking with a straight face the way i sometimes do to strangers, but he said no. and then other people joined our conversation before i got the chance to politely grill him to see if that's what he really meant. i hope he doesn't, but i fear he does. (i wonder if he thinks that way about women?) "I live in Hollywood." the delivery was priceless. clearly a very significant part of the unveiling of his identity.

Fall

Fall and I are perfectly in sync this year. Normally I am sad at the light leaving so early, but this year I am smiling cozily at it as I walk outside and the light is fading or gone. I love these hot autumn days and the cool, early nights. It's nice for my eyes to rest against all the long days of the glare of summer. I'm ready for darkness and layering myself. ready to drive home from class in the dark instead of squinting against the sun. i also like all the cool air that pools into my room through the small opening in the window. and the extra layer of blankets on my bed. i love my bed, especially when it's cold. and i like the big winter robe that i put on in the early, early morning when i get up. and i like waking up when it's still mostly dark too. and i like sleeping in when it's cold too. oh fall, i love you.

I like walking around CSUN at night. Lots of the buildings are high and geometric and look sort of pretty with their evenly spaced out lights. and there are some parts of campus where i could almost imagine myself in the woods. it's slow and calm. and i see crickets everywhere - the sorrounding urban streets, the halls of the buildings. this is a good sign to me. lately i take my time walking out to my car and driving home. start my wind down time as soon as i leave class instead of rush, rush, rush and continue rushing to bed when i get home.

i'm feeding myself really well too from all of fall's bounty. honeyed yams, vegetable soups, buttery potatoes, good breads, string beans, squash, apples, nuts, cookies. yum. it's so fun to be a vegetarian when there is so much variety available. and i'm really starting to crave spiced sweet bread - like pumpkin and zucchini breads. i'm so glad that cooking is such a soul-soother for me. so many people hate to cook. i love all the scents and the chopping and mixing and the much-anticipated eating.

this is probably boring, but i am so relaxed right now. so at peace with the world as it is. fall is like a soft, warm weighted vest to me this year - like the kind they put on overactive kids. but i'm loving it - moving slow, thinking slow, feeling slow. and enjoying everything. a nice change in pace.

random snips

Lately my parents and I seem to go through this routine: whenever I don't feel like talking and am non-respondent (possibly termed "moody"), they suddenly become the World's Happiest People. They sing jazzy little song snippets, they talk to each other animatedly, they make little cheery, Pollyanna-comments to me and feign disappointment when I am not cheery back. Parents. Arrggg. I've got them in a bind though. If they asked me how I was instead of trying to pretend they don't notice, I would probably growl "I don't feel like talking." maybe slam a dish or two. possibly make a rude comment. i've got a pretty wide little pallate of responses designed to ward off any niceness. poor parents.

I recently was talking to a friend about how good a thing that reading through the Bible in a year (4 chapters a day, going strong!) has been in my life, how even though I don't always read for comprehension, reading the Bible daily has become such an ingrained ritual for me. I guess I must have sounded pretty amazed, because he said to me teasingly, "Oh Amy, you mean you've discovered the value of spiritual discipline?" There was a little bit of sarcasm in there, but it was loving sarcasm. And yes, I guess I have. maybe there's something to this consistency thing. hmmm.

Now that my brother is a Marine, and is deployed, suddenly I am part of a new network. Suddenly I have instant kinship with other people who have a loved one in the service. It's so much more of a reality to me now, what a sacrifice it is to send all that physicallness over into the breach. I think about all the love, food, rearing, food that my parents have poured into my brother for the last 20 years, and now he's floating off the coast in Singapore, perched in case of catastrophe. I mean, he's ours! That's our muscle, our legacy, our family blood coursing in his blood, our shared memories housed in that body, our genes. I find myself wanting to comfort people and hear all the details of their distant loved one.

yesterday I went to a huge family gathering in honor of my grandpa's 90th birthday. it sure is fun to have a big family. to hear all the voices singing happy birthday together, to watch the big mob of us try to squeeze ourselves out the backyard, and crowd together on the grass. to feel all that unconditional love that many of my aunts and uncles have for me, just by virtue of me being my father's daughter. they don't even see me much, but they look at me with warm eyes as if i am their own daughter. anyhow, i immediately felt within myself the desire to have at least 6 children, to be surrounded by so much love in my late years. (my grandparents had 12 children! 55 grandchildren at last count!)

a small observation: when all is fine with my world, i am just fine to sleep on my back. but when my emotions are running overtime, or my certainty is gone, there i am curling back into that side fetal position, hugging my big body pillow. so interesting how much emotional/spiritual comfort or discomfort one can feel by changing the position of one's body. sort of like shavasanna in yoga: hands on the belly and it is this nurturing, inward warmth; hands on the side of the body facing up and its a receptive, adrift kind of quality. probably related also to praying on the knees, or bent over forehead on the ground, or hands clasped together.

that amish school house

today the events that happened in that Amish school house on October 2nd set in. I have an image in my mind that is so strong.

I keep thinking about how little girls have those bony little shoulder blades that detach from their back and poke out like wing buds. Now I imagine the backs of those young girls as they stood facing the chalkboard, the tips of their delicate little shoulder blades held tense under the starched clothes. Those little girlish shoulder blades, the slight little angles of bone that are so small and vulnerable. The small frame of their torsos that would be torn with bullets - their fast beating heart like bird wings, frantic inside those narrow bands of bone worn so trustingly over the life they would contain only briefly.

I pray that those bullets were like winged doves, slowed by the power of God so that they gently parted the flesh that hides the heart, and and then shattered in the instant of contact, the pain a brief moment of esctasy that blurred blindingly into nearness with God. That in that instant their blood and bodies became Christ's, his life soaking up their pain, a joyous reunion.

i think about the knees giving way. their horrible waiting passed. the silence settling calmly in the valves and veins, as all slows weakly, and the pulse of this life is gone. covered heads, lifeless eyes resting on a wood floor.



one of the fathers said that they thought it was God's plan and they were going to have to pick up the pieces and keep going. reread that. and reread it. and put a stake down, right there in that exact spot. I think a year ago I would have screamed to the heavens that it most certainly was not God's will that innocent children would die, protesting in the name of the "God beyond God" as Tillich so eloquently put it. but i think that thinking was a chink in my theology, even though it was in the name of life and truly a desire not to see God's good name marred with "desiring" innocent blood. Now I think I would trod the same line as that father, and attempt the same brave, helpless trust in God. Faith in the surpassing ability of God's love to cover over all the sin of this world, and human responsibility to trust and keep going. thinking of Job who loses his ten (10, T-E-N) children in an instant and says shall we accept good from the Lord and not bad? The "Thou you slay me, I will trust you Lord" wild card. he gives and takes away; our minds must choose to trust God and not the situation. i hope it rains soon. i need a heavy sky to push down on me.

introducing Anne Lamott, ladies and gentlemen

"And one week later, when I went back to church, I was so hungover that I couldn't stand up for the songs, and this time I stayed for the sermon, which I thought was so ridiculous, like someone trying to convince me of the existence of extraterrestrials, but the last song was so deep and raw and pure that I could not escape. It was as if the people were singing in between the notes, weeping and joyful at the same time, and I felt like their voices or something was rocking me in its bosom, holding me like a scared kid, and I opened up to that feeling - and it washed over me.

I began to cry and left before the benediction, and I raced home and felt the little cat running along at my heels, and I walked down the dock past dozens of potted flowers, under a sky as blue as one of God's own dreams, and I opened the door to my houseboat, and I stood there a minute, and then I hung my head and said, "Fuck it: I quit." I took a long deep breath and said out loud, "All right. You can come in."

And that was my beautiful moment of conversion."

christmas cheer

well, it has officially happened. i was seduced into looking at Christmas stuff by a very prominent display in Home Goods. A big Christmas cookie jar was the bait. Christmas is three months away, and the rest of my little errands suddenly also had the additional weight of keeping an eye open for Christmas gifts because maybe i could get ahead...space out the spending...not have such a hectic holiday season...get the perfect gift for everyone. EXACTLY what marketers are hoping that i will think when i see christmas stuff in october. I looked at cards, ornaments, dishes, little angel dolls. and now I feel like i've whored myself to american consumerism, even though i didn't buy anything.

i'm wondering how this christmas will be. when i see all the glitter and ribbon and wrapping paper i must admit i get a little excited. but it's quickly cooled by the commercial overkill, the financial extravagance so synonomous with the season. Last year I started out the countdown strong, but then tapped out early: I brought all of the Christmas decorations upstairs, started to unpack them... but then let it lie...and finally my little brother and mom took over. i used to love doing the decorating, but for the last two years now actually, the holiday joy has been wearing a little thin. i did still manage to find an inordinate amount of joy in wrapping presents. I love wrapping gifts.

I must say to that the last couple years i have been more on the side of thinking that everyday is holy, everyday we should be celebrating the birth and resurrection (blah, blah, blah i know. bah humbug too) and that it's kind of sham-ish to get so hyped up for one day. i suppose the year would be pretty boring without christmas, and the rhythm would be off, but i think i've been sort of thinking about it as a non-religious holiday the past couple years. just doing the deeds of the season without trying to tie them to the fact that Son of God was born to a woman in the form of a vulnerable baby. Oh, but i do love christmas songs. the old hymns that bleed theology. oh, oh, oh.

i just wish we still had the big family christmas nights. i'm used to my big immediate family, and extended family, and dearly loved grandparents. now everyone has passed on or moved on. they keep getting smaller and smaller as my family becomes more scattered. my littlest brother is deployed now and will be spending his first christmas away from the family on duty. my sister is staying back east with her husband, and my other brother will probably drive up for part of the night in between shifts at the Cheesecake Factory in SD, a place that no one should eat at because of their nazi-like policies about holiday time-off. maybe i'll take off for bermuda.

i am planning on trying to eat more dark chocolate so that i have energy to get through all the night festivities that happen with friends...be a bit more exciteable than the boring, backing-out-of-plans-last-minute girl that i have been of late... i'm relaunching myself out into society folks, starting tonight with a little trip to city walk, a place called Howl at the Moon.

200,000!!!

well, i finally hit 200,000 miles in my car. and now i am thinking (stress thinking) about the next car i get. i'd like it to have air conditioning. and a main requirement will be that it have power steering, so as to avoid another incident like the one that almost killed me in may. how am i supposed to remember when panicking (?) that the steering does not work when the breaks are all the way down, but that it will re-engage and jerk violently when the car slows down? i like to stay in one lane of traffic, not veer back and fourth across 3 and a shoulder, thank you very much, and i don't care for embankments. no, no, no, no, no. i'm still amazed that: 1. i did not flip my car; 2. i did not end up down the embankment; 3. i did not hit anyone; 4. no one hit me.

in celebration, after i get a tune-up, i am thinking about going to Yosemite one last time before the season closes out. it would be fantastic to see all the fall colors in the valley, snuggle down against a cold night. i've been listening to my jack johnson cd that i listened to on my last trip there and feeling the pull in my blood to set out again. i'm trying to line up a small group, but not holding my breath. i need that stillness, the solemness that happens at night in those high granite walls. oh, i hope, hope, hope it works out.

i think the best part about hitting 200,000 is the status it gives me - the mileage i get out of saying to my peers that my car has over 200,000 miles. compete with that! i say to those daring to suggest that they are poorer than i am. it instantly confirms my social status - the the fact that I am an industrious graduate student paying my way as i go in a low-paying job, dedicated to a somewhat do-gooder occupation, and depending on a very shoddy little jalopy (that has over 200,000 miles on it!) to transport me all over the valley. woohoo! nobody ever wants to take my car!

for rachel.

it is yom kippur - the first day of the jewish new year, a day of self-reflaction concerning god's judgment. we sung this song in church today, and i could not help thinking about the jewish people in my life who i care deeply for, and thinking about their future restoration.


O come, O come, Emmanuel,
and ransom captive Israel,
That mourns in lonely exile here,
until the Son of God appear.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
shall come to thee, O Israel!

O come, Thou Dayspring, come and cheer,
our spirits by thine advent here;
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night,
and death's dark shadows put to flight.

O come, Thou Wisdom from on high,
and order all things, far and nigh;
To us the path of knowledge show,
and cause us in her ways to go.

O come, Desire of nations, bind,
all peoples in one heart and mind;
bid envy, strife and quarrels cease;
Fill all the world with heaven's peace.


Just a reminder from Isaiah that God is not done with Isreal: "You who call on the Lord, give yourselves no rest, and give Him no rest till He establishes Jerusalem and makes her the praise of the earth" (62:6-7). It will happen. God keeps His covenants.