it's not as easy as willing it all to be right

Oh life. Why so confusing?

saying hey-oh, baby lets go

Yesterday was my birthday. I am 21!

The most important thing about my birthday is that it SNOWED.



It's the first time since we moved here that it's snowed on my birthday. On Saturday my parents gave me my first birthday present and I also saw my first snow driving over the pass to visit a friend. It has felt like Christmas ever since. I wish I knew what it is about this season that makes it so impossible to be unhappy. Is it just all the good associations, or do cold weather and corny Christmas music really have the powers to bestow joy on their own? Who knows.

On my sixteenth birthday I got a copy of Stepping Heavenward from my mom, which is now my all time favorite book. It's the fictional journal of a girl growing up in the 1800's beginning on HER sixteenth birthday. I've read it almost every year since then, and yesterday I just happened to be at the part where Katy turns twenty one. I always like to compare myself to Katy because we are very similar in temperment and she sets a really good example while still managing to be almost painfully realalistic. It's both encouraging and inspiring. I feel like I'm living her life, just in a different time period. Except that she gets married the day after her twenty first birthday, and today I'm... well, not getting married. :-P

Also, I got a camera for my birthday! So now I can make picture posts.



Of course, this makes it far too tempting to dress up in all the new hair things I also got for my birthday and take pictures of myself.



This is a bad habit to get into, I'm afraid.

when the post has lyrics, what do you put in the title?

With the exception of about three artists up until now, I've never been one for albums or one-band playlists. Until now. This week I am a two sided coin, with Boys Like Girls on one side and Carbon Leaf on the other. Today I lay Carbon-Leaf-side-up.

I've been trying to write poetry and/or lyrics for the last several months, all to no avail. These guys do it so much better.

live a life less ordinary
live a life extrordinary with me
live a life less sedetary
live a life revolutionary with me

well I hate to be a bother
but it's you and there's no other
I do believe
you can call me nieve
but I know me very well
at least as far as I can tell
and I know what I need

This is what I wish I had- the simple candor to say exactly what I mean without being cliche or trite or pretentious.

if I could name you in this song
would it make you smile and sing along?
this is the goal:
to get into your soul
if I could make you dance for joy
could that be the second chance decoy
the burning hand
I would need
to help you understand?

Maybe someday I'll get there. Funny how helpful the words of others can be!

at last

UPDATE ON COSTA RICA STUFF:

I am excited.

Yay! I've been dreading this for so long, and lately it's like God has been pealing away those layers of resistance. There have been many, many reasons why I've been not wanting to go, but I think the main one is that I just got too comfortable in the life I have now. Which is in many ways a blessing, but I'm beginning to feel restless again. And weather I feel like it or not when the time to leave comes, I know this will be good for me.

I have been realizing lately how much growing up I still have left to do. For a long time I thought I'd arrived at adulthood and wouldn't really change much more ever again. I was so happy to be gliding along living at this platou. And then things started going wildly downhill, and the world started spinning, and now BAM- all of my faults have been shaken to the surface, and I've got at least another six months of weeding to do.

Now I'm questioning weather you ever really "arrive." But I guess I'm kind of glad. What I thought was a platou may have very well been more of a rut. Life would be so borring if we ever stopped growing, changing- comming to hate everything about ourselves and starting over again from scratch.

I just put together a budget for myself of everything I could possibly need or want between now and when I get back from Costa Rica at the end of next October. I tried to be generous, putting in spending money and lots of padding in case things don't go exactly as planned. Then I calculated how much money I could reasonably be expected to earn working a regular job starting in early December, along with working for Aunt Amy (babysitting) and the money I've already earned. As it turns out, I'll only need to fundraise $176. I can do that! Even if I don't get a job till January, I can fundraise more and go from there.

Tambien, mi espanol es MUCH bueno! I really enjoy it. The language barrier has been a huge fear for me, and now I don't even worry about it.

So. That's the latest! Thanks for listening and for all of your constant support- please keep praying that I will grow in grace and that God would pave the way for me to go if it's His will!