Science (non) Fiction

I get scared that forgiveness is for better people
So I give up trying to fight
Jesus, you’ll have to come get me
‘Cause it’s too far to walk tonight.

This part of Andrew Osenga’s song ‘Too far to walk’ always gets me - how many of us haven’t felt at some point that we were ‘too bad’ for God to forgive, whether or not that’s a life-long feeling, or a momentary blip on the radar? I certainly have, and I definitely fall into the trap of ‘giving up trying to fight’ - comes with being a perfectionist firstborn, I guess If I can’t do something perfectly or 100%, why even try? (This may also have something to do with why I can’t keep my house clean, but that’s a whole other can of worms to open on a later day :lol:)

But I love the heartfelt plea in the song for Jesus to come get me, here, where I am, not up there where I want to be, but down here, where I am now, struggling, slipping. That total reliance on Him is something that I struggle with quite often (actually, reliance on anyone is hard for me, as I’ve noted on here previously), and I’m sure I’m not alone in that struggle. I want the control that I should hand over to God. So I have to rely on the promises of God:

Trust in the LORD with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding; In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths
Proverbs 3:5-6

So I’ve had a new (to me) bed for quite a while now, but I haven’t had a real comforter or anything for it. So I went looking for one, and found this tonight at Macy’s:

It came with matching sheets (which I need anyway), and it’s so great - very grown-up, but still fun! It’s all in the washer right now, so hopefully I’ll be sleeping on brand-spanking-new bedding tonight

(sorry for all the Patty references, I’ve been listening to her a lot lately I guess)

This pretty much sums up how I’ve been feeling lately - something about listening to Patty Griffin sing this song just speaks for my heart, about the unfulfilled dreams, and unrequited love, and useless desires that build up in my life. And sometimes the only way to let them out is to listen to music like this and let Patty sing it for me.

Say goodbye to the old street
That never cared much for you anyway
The different-colored doorways
You thought would let you in one day
Goodbye to the old bus stop, frozen and waiting
The weekend edition has this town way overrated

You walk across a baseball field
The grass has turned to straw
A flock of birds tries to fly away from where you are
Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye old friend
I can’t make you stay
I can’t spend another ten years
Wishing you would anyway

How the sky turns to fire against a telephone wire
And even I’m getting tired of useless desires

Every day I take a bitter pill that gets me on my way
For the little aches and pains
The ones I have from day to day
To help me think a little less about the things I miss
To help me not to wonder how I ended up like this

I walk down to the railroad track and ride a rusty train
With a million other faces I shoot through the city veins
Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye old friend
You wanted to be free
Somewhere beyond the bitter end is where I want to be

How the sky turns to fire against a telephone wire
And even I’m getting tired of useless desires

Say goodbye to the old building
That never tried to know your name
Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye old friend
You won’t be seeing me again
Goodbye to all the windowpanes shining in the sun
Like diamonds on a winter day
Goodbye, goodbye to everyone

How the sky turns to fire against a telephone wire
Burns the last of the day down
And I’m the last one hangin’ around
Waiting on a train track, and the train never comes back
And even I’m getting tired of useless desires

So I know almost everyone has issues in their extended family, but as the child of a mother who was raised in a large, Catholic family, those issues are often magnified by the sheer volume of people I’m related to. I normally don’t have to deal with most of it, though, since we’ve been gone from Wisconsin for over 15 years now, and my parents were pretty good about keeping us from most of the craziness. But when my grandfather passed away last month, the extended family gathered together for the funeral in Wisconsin. And while his death is still sad, and leaves me with only one grandparent now, it was actually nice to see some of my aunts/uncles/cousins, some of whom I don’t really even remember meeting (cause I was so young the last time I saw them). Especially because most everybody was on their best behavior due to the death in the family (ok, there were some glaring exceptions, but mostly).

Anyway, I was thinking about this mostly cause I got an emails of photos taken by one of the uncles at the house where we were all visiting before going to the church for the visitation - and this picture pretty much sums up my look for the entire day. Which is, ‘I’m really related to these people?’ (and actually, when this pic was taken, I hadn’t even met the REALLY strange, creepy cousins who came to the funeral later on in the day - scary!)

So we’re at the beach for the week this week, and I’m plugged in to veeeery slow dial-up here at Topsail Island. We’re staying at a friend’s vacation house (fabulous to have friends with nice things ), and they have all kinds of fun toys that they let us borrow. So today Matthew and I took the ocean kayaks out of the canal (where the house is situated) and into the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway! And while I had a moment of freaked-out-ness right before I got into the boat (I mean, it’s a tiny little boat, and even though you don’t get zipped into these ones, they’re still tippy and low-riding), it was one of the coolest things I’ve done in a long while. We probably rowed maybe 1-1.5 miles total, up the inside of the island and then back. Along the way we saw two beautiful herons (I think Great Blues), both of which stuck around long enough for us to get pretty close before flying away (very gracefully). And then, as we were getting close to the point where we’d decided to turn around, I saw what I at first thought were birds sitting on the water maybe a hundred feet ahead of me. After staring at the waves for a couple seconds, I realized they were fins!!! Dolphin fins!!!!! There were at least 2, maybe 3 dolphins swimming lazily up ahead of us, periodically coming up to the surface in that arch that lets you see their fin and silvery back. It was soooo awesome! I really wished then that I’d brought my camera, but I just wasn’t sure enough that I wouldn’t tip the first time out. We’re planning on going back out if the weather cooperates later this week (there’s some hurricane aftermath coming through that’s supposed to bring us some rain tomorrow and Thursday).

This weekend, I’m heading to Topsail Island for a week of vacation with the family. Given how much time all of us have had to take off in the last few weeks with all the chaos, we have all tossed around the idea of not going after all - but I think we all came to the conclusion that we needed the time off now more than ever. So we’ll be hanging out at Liza and Bruce’s canal-side house, on a very quiet island - and all the kids should be back in school, so there should be lots of peace and quiet I’ve decided that I don’t even care if it rains, cause I would love to just sit and read and nap and laugh and watch movies - though I will certainly be taking lots of walks on the beach if it’s nice! I will take my camera and strive to take more pictures than I usually do (which is to say, take more than none). Until I do, here’s a pic of the island so you can picture me in your mind

So, I went for a run this morning, my first since I hurt my knee over a month ago now. I probably ran for about 1.5 miles, walking some in between - not bad for essentially not being able to work out much in the past month. So far, so good - no significant pain when I ran, it didn’t give out on me, etc (of course, I did take some pre-emptive ibuprofen, just in case ).

Anyway, when I was running, jamming along to my iPod, I came to a song as I was running along this beautiful tree-lined street in the ‘historic area’ of town (incidentally, it was ‘As I lay me down’ by Sophie B. Hawkins). And as I was running along, I realized that part of what I love about my iPod is that is makes it feel like a movie sountrack running through my mind (yes, I’ve written about something similar before, but not exactly). It was like the scenes in movies like ‘Notting Hill’ where they do a long montage with one poignant song playing over the whole thing - that’s what it felt like jogging up the street with that song playing in my head. May be as close as I ever get to feeling like a movie star.

Actually, she likes the caps of beer bottles. I have no idea why, cause I don’t drink beer (have never gotten used to the taste/smell), so I don’t have bottle caps lying around everywhere. But when I go home, where my parents and brother drink the occasional beer, Dinah is in kitty ‘beer cap induced’ heaven It’s like watching other cats play with catnip-scented toys - she gets obsessive about batting it around, rolling over onto it, etc… it’s crazy. I don’t know if it’s the smell, or the tiny little taste she might be able to get from the lid, or what - maybe it’s just alcohol in general? And she’s not very discriminating - I used Pabst Blue Ribbon for a recipe yesterday (yes, and it was my first time buying beer, I think - I got carded ), and she was totally happy with the lid from the PBR. I don’t know what kind of cat I’ve raised…