Life As an Afterschool Special

I’ve been wondering…

Who was the first person to look at a cow and say, “I think I’ll squeeze these dangly things here, and drink whatever comes out.”?

Who was the first person to say, “See that chicken there… I’m gonna eat the next thing that comes outta it’s butt.”?

Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a crisp

If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares, why is there a song about him?

If the professor on Gilligan’s Island can make a radio out of coconut, why can’t he fix a hole in a boat?

Why do people point to their wrist when asking for the time, but don’t point to their privates when they ask where the bathroom is?

Why does your doctor leave the room when you get undressed if they are going to see you naked anyway?

Why does Goofy stand erect while Pluto remains on all fours? They’re both dogs!

What do you call male ballerinas?

Why do the Alphabet song and Twinkle,Twinkle Little Star have the same tune?

Did you ever notice that when you blow in a dog’s face, he gets mad at you, but when you take him on a car ride, he sticks his head out the window?

anyone know the answers?

anyone been wondering anything else?

Did you know….

I peed on my step brother Michaels head once.

Not on purpose mind you, but I did pee on him none the less.

We were little, around 9 or 10. He was in the basement lifting weights and he asked me to spot him. He did a few reps and then he couldn’t do anymore and he asked me to help him pick the bar off his chest.

I straddled the bench and reached down to get the weights off but I began laughing at his frustration…. You know the kind of laughter that makes you unable to move… And the more angry he got the harder I laughed.

Then it happened. Standing there above him I laughed so hard I started to pee!

yep right on his head, as he was trapped helpless by the weights on his chest.

I couldn’t help it and him yelling at me just made me laugh harder. It was running down his forehead and onto the floor. It was pretty gross, but it was really funny.

The funniest part is that he suddenly got the strength of ten men and threw the bar off of him. He didn’t talk to me for a whole week, and in the past 15 years he has never once asked me to workout with him….

I think I will call him and see if he wants to hit the gym after work….

“But hey that’s just Jamie”

That was a statement said by my dear friend Tim last night after I apologized for having a meltdown.

At first, to be honest, I thought how very rude. Here I am trying to be real and you say “that’s just Jamie”! That wasn’t exactly the response I was looking for.

But then he elaborated.

Tim said he didn’t mean to offend me, he just appreciated honest emotion. He didn’t mind when I “freaked out” because it was real. It was me, being me, and that’s why he said that’s just Jamie.

Wait a minute.

After I hung up the phone I sat thought about his statement for a long time.

My whole life I have tried so very hard to be fun and silly and what I thought other people wanted me to be, and yet here was one of my dear friends, saying he loved me for everything ugly and raw and real.

wow. I just don’t get it. It so goes against everything I have been telling myself for 25 years.

and I know there are friends who tell me the same. My friend Emily in highschool… Susie and Tim, and Kathy and Tim, and Sally, Dawn, Kim, Sara, and Brian in Minneapolis.. And there are people here in Ohio too.

The few and far between that I break down my walls with and stand exposed and real and who love me despite my flaws or perhaps even because of them.

People who are brave enough to look at me, even in the middle of my meltdown and say “that’s just Jamie” with love and sincerity.

People who make me want to better and stronger. People who remind me that I am loved just for me.

And I am grateful, because last night, when I finally went to bed, it wasn’t with all the days drama or my meltdown on my mind. It was with the words “just Jamie” and a feeling of being loved that I finally closed my eyes.

I once wanted to be a writer.

A journalist.

I wanted to travel the world and see and touch and taste and understand the world and then communicate it in such a way that my reader felt what I felt and understood me. I wanted to paint with my words what Van Gogh could paint with a brush… I wanted to capture a moment a time and freeze it forever.

I used to write pages and pages in my journal about what I was thinking and feeling and dreaming. I was so expressive….

The key word being “was”.

I am not entirely sure what happened but somewhere along the way the blank page was no longer the friendly empty canvas but instead the mocking empty space where my words never seem to come out how I wish.

When I started this blog it was in hopes of recapturing that loss creativity. But today I sat my desk at work and started three different entries. The words aren’t coming out….

I think, to be honest, its because I am afraid of saying all I want to say. I can be so very good at being fun and silly and shallow that I am afraid to be anything else.

I am afraid that if I talk about my heart or my dreams or my fears that I will be rejected. That you wont like “that” Jamie.

Insecurities are funny that way.

But who am I really writing for? Who am I afraid of?

The truth is I need to write like I need to breathe. I need an outlet, a place to express and explore what I am feeling and seeing.

I think sometimes I may have to write what is on my heart if it it doesn’t tell the best story.

I am learning that I don’t need to write so that you understand me, I need to write so that I understand myself….

My friends Racheal and Maren recently posted about hope on their blog.

http://www.rachelmaren.blogspot.com/ You should check out what they have to say on the topic..

I have also been thinking about hope lately.

I think I feel more hopeless for others then even myself sometimes.

To be honest I had been overwhelmed in ministry and teetering on giving up.

It just began to feel like everything was so very hopeless, and no one was ever going to change.

I became so pessimistic, and I was so frustrated…

and it made me feel helpless. Like whats the point of ministry and moving down to the bottoms and talking to dancers and druggies and all these people if they arent going to change?

It was the sinking feeling of thinking nothing will get better

Satan was whispering lies and I listening….

and then I realized that my problem was not that someone I care about went back to a life of sin, but that I had little faith because I had little hope.

When I pray to God I often hear scripture as an answer… sometimes I dont even understand what the refrence is, but I know He speaks to me and i know he uses His word to do so.

So when I began to pray about hope I kept hearing Hebrews 11 in my head.

Hebrews 11:1
Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see

Ah ha! here is my answer! If I dont hope in God and his promises it is the same as not having faith in him…

If God is big enough to change me and cover my sin, surely he is big enough to do the same for others.

and when I doubt that, it is my Sin against God.

I am denying the power of the cross…

1 Thessalonians 1:3
We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Thats what I want for my life… I want to be inspired by the hope in Jesus… Praise God that he uses other people to show us where we are lacking….

and I guess I am just realizing that its in the fire that I see how far away from that I really am
but just realizing it has strengthened my relationship with God so much more…

when I looked up faith and hope in the concordance I saw how hand in hand these two spirital principals are.

and I am no where close to where I should be, just pressing towards the mark has changed me already…

Isaiah 38:18
For the grave cannot praise you, death cannot sing your praise; those who go down to the pit cannot hope for your faithfulness.

Romans 12:12
Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.

2 Corinthians 10
15Neither do we go beyond our limits by boasting of work done by others. Our hope is that, as your faith continues to grow, our area of activity among you will greatly expand, so that we can preach the gospel in the regions beyond you. For we do not want to boast about work already done in another man’s territory.

Galatians 5:5
But by faith we eagerly await through the Spirit the righteousness for which we hope.

Colossians 1
3We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints– the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth, the gospel that has come to you.

Colossians 12:2
But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation– 2if you continue in your faith, established and firm, not moved from the hope held out in the gospel.

1 Thessalonians 5:8
But since we belong to the day, let us be self­controlled, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet.

Titus 1
1Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ for the faith of God’s elect and the knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness– faith and knowledge resting on the hope of eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised before the beginning of time, and at his appointed season he brought his word to light through the preaching entrusted to me by the command of God our Savior,

Hebrews 3:6
But Christ is faithful as a son over God’s house. And we are his house, if we hold on to our courage and the hope of which we boast.

Hebrews 10:23
Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.

1 Peter 1:21
Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God.

I am moving October first. I just signed my lease.

Back to the Bottoms. The ghetto you might say.

home sweet home…

Funny thing is, all these people aspire to get OUT of there, and somehow, I keep moving my diva self back down into the slums.

Homeless people, rats, drug dealers and prostitutes… Bring it on. I am not afraid. I can handle.

My sister and I lived in the Bottoms a year and it was relatively calm.

The only traumatic thing that happened occurred because I was trying to be some Christian vigilante. Seriously, there are rules to safety and I broke all of them.

I mentioned this incident briefly in my first post.

It was last fall and it was starting to get cold. There is a bridge on Sullivent that all the homeless people live under, and my friends and I had this great idea late one night to bring them blankets and just talk to them about God and stuff.

So a group of us started walking the 8 or so blocks to the bridge at about 11 at night.

Now for those of you thinking about moving to the ghetto let me just tell you a rule to live by. Nothing good happens outside at dark. Honestly. And no matter how great your intention, you should wait till the morning.

trust me.

Anyways, we get to the bridge and start talking to the homeless people. A car drove by once slowly, then turned around and came back and shot at us. I mean really pointed a gun out the window and shot. We all hit the ground and the most of my group ran like hell towards home while the car turned around and came back for a second round.

I on the other hand was not so smart. I did not run towards home. I was angry. Way angry. In fact I ran into the street and shouted all kinds of nastiness at the car driving away.

I was crying and I think I shouted something along the lines of “What kind of *stupid* *jerk* shots a *stupid* gun at homeless people. You are *really* ridiculous. That is *really* *not nice*. That is *really* wrong. Come back here you *stupid* cowards. “

I may not have used that exact wording but let me tell you I was MAD. My friends Brandon and Tim came to get me in the street. I think the dirty words spewing from my mouth scared them more then then the gun.

We made it home without incident but I learned some valuable lessons I will take to my new house.

First, 11pm is probably not the time for a young woman to be walking the streets downtown. I mean, unless you are trying to solicit someone, stay at home.

Second, Run AWAY from the gun and not towards it.

Third, homeless people are pretty resourceful. They usually have blankets already. They don’t need them at 11pm at night and trust me, at 11pm at night God is the LAST thing they want to talk about.

and lastly the right thing at the wrong time is the wrong thing.

seriously. thats wisdom people

Cable is clearly from the devil.

Who else but but the prince of darkness would create 100 stations to satisfy all your carnel craving 24 hours a day 365 days a year.

Love Soap Operas? There’s Soap Zone

Food? There’s the food network.

History? the History Channel

Music? MTV VH1 CMT

anything you want at the tip of your fingers. Its dangerous.

Luckily I dont have cable or I would never venture outside.

I am not kidding.

I would sit in my house and order take out. I would become friends with the remote and panic if I ever lost my signal. I would wear sweats and eat bon bons and not even care about my nails (and we all know how I care about my nails.)

It wouldnt be pretty people. How do I know? Because my parents have cable, and when I am there I need it like my next fix.

In three days I watched four hours of the Real World marathon.
I watched a whole weeks worth of General Hospital episodes. Thats five hours.
I watched one day in the life of a soap star.
I watch them redecorate eight rooms for 1,000.
I watched a two hour documentry about 9-11.
I watched the MTV awards, and part of the post show.
I watched making of the new partridge family.
And i cant even tell you how many hours I watched of Country Videos or CNN and FOX’s coverage of the hurricane.

I didnt go to bed until 5 am because I couldnt convince myself to turn off the tv. Every time I wanted to a new BETTER show came on. It was dangerous.

How much time is wasted in front of the tv?

Even now sitting at my desk I am not thinking about work… Oh No…. I am thinking about how I dont have cable and I will never get to see who the new roommate was on the real world, or the reunion of New Kids On The Block…. I am jonesing man, jonesing I tell you…

Ok deep breaths.

I can NOT have cable. Its clearly from Satan…

Warning: this may not amuse you as much as it does me

I spent Labor Day Weekend with my parents at their house on the lake. It was uber fun. My best friend from highschool Emily came up too, and we spent the weekend drinking wine and laying by the lake. We talked about our lives today, but we also reminisced about highschool.

if you think I am involved and silly or shallow now you should have seen me then…

I was one of the fortunate people to have had a really awesome Senior year. I’m talking the stuff in sitcoms. My senior year was a cross between Saved By the Bell, Ferris Bueller, and 90210. I am not kidding. Em and I got away with almost anything.

By the time I was a senior, I was an editor of the yearbook, on Student Council, President of Drama Club, President of environmental Club, Vice President of choir, President of Just Say No, On the appeals committee, and cofounder of SOS. I wrote a weekly editorial called “A Students View” for the local paper. I was even elected to Winterfest Court.

So needless to say I was involved. Ridiculously involved. Emily was in just as many activities as me. She was also the other editor of the yearbook, an officer of Student Council and an officer of National Honor Society. She played Varsity Basketball and was also a cofounder of SOS. Em and I were everywhere. We didn’t just participate. We made up the rules.

Even though we both took AP classes we hardly went. Although we still did well. Em was even a valedictorian and won the Oxford Cup. We just had to many activities to go to class all the time. And as yearbook editors we had a pass to get out of classes basically whenever we needed. As cofounders of SOS we had meeting with the superintendent and others during the school day. We were busy. Not that we took advantage of the system… That’s just why my friend Bhree called me the female Ferris.

We got our girlfriends to rollerblading and ride their bikes to school and in the school the first day of class even though it wasn’t allowed (the boys hid and soaked us with water balloons and water guns as we went past).

We had Pajama Ramas.

We carpooled and caravaned to sporting events.

We stole underclassmen lunch tables when we ran out of room at ours.

We started a huge boys verses girls war when we took a friends car keys and hid his car in the janitors parking lot behind the dumpster.

We used a pep assembly to get back at a boy who had dumped Emily by making him into a human sundae.

We helped convince the teacher and the alumni to play us in donkey basketball, and helped convince the gym teachers to let us bring livestock into the gym.

We went to dances, and we went to field parties and we even ran away from the police once or twice. (apparently you aren’t allowed to have field parties)

We convinced our school to have a celebrate life day as part of SOS, where the whole school had a half day and only had assemblies and went into small groups where we gave out tee shirts and talked about what was on our minds. We even got the football coach and the teachers to grill hotdogs for lunch and let us have a picnic that day.

We had a good time.

And in my opinion we were pretty nice to everyone. It was all just fun and innocent. The kind of fun that still makes you smile 7 years later. And it wasn’t “the greatest time of my life” but good times were had by all. And it still fun, just to sit back and remember with someone who lived it too… So here is to Emily Ballenberger (aka ET aka Donna Maskill) and all our memories… LONG LIVE THE CLASS OF 1997!

I love my car. I really do.

It is a pink thunderbird

named “tink the pink.”

short for “tinkerbell the pink thunderbird.”

also known as “the birdie.”

when I bought the car I came into the dealership wearing a pink skirt and carrying a pink purse. The car sales looked at me smugly and said did you buy a pink purse to match your pink car.

I looked right back at him and said “No I bought a pink car to match my pink purse”

I love my car

she has a sunroof and her dash is all digital. when you start her it is like firing up a space ship all the lights and the gadgets glowing. oh yeah, its cool.

the seatbelts are automatic too.

I love my car because it makes me feel like a girl. a girl who can get from 0 to 60 in like 8 seconds.

a fast girl in the purest of meaning.

apparently it has a V6 and duel exahust.

but did I mention its pink. bright Fushia pink. Like the color of my favorite Estee Lauder lipgloss pink.

Oh Ive had cars before.

there was my first car Queen Vic the crown victorian.

And vinnie2 the volvo

and subie the suburu

and rex the crx

and vertie the lebaron convertible.

and my last car which I just called stupid crappy piece of poo I hate you car

but none of them hold a candle to my new love tink the pink.

what do you drive?

This was from an Old post I did on the Swoony Girl Board…..

“On the day that you were born, you were dumped in a field and left to die, unwanted.But I came by and saw you there, kicking helplessly about in yourown blood. As you lay there I said “Live!” and I helped you thrive like a plant in the field.

You grew up and became a beautiful jewel. Your breast became full and your hair grew, though you werestill naked. And when I passed by and saw you again you were old enough to be married. So I wrapped my cloak around you to cover your nakedness and declared my marriage vows. I made a covenant with you, says the Sovereign Lord, and you became mine

Then I bathed you and washed off your blood, and I rubbed fragrant oils into your skin. I gave you expensive clothing made out of fine silk and linen, beautifully embroidered, and sandals made of fine leather. I gave you lovely jewelry, bracelets, and beautiful necklaces, a ring for your nose and earrings for your ears and a lovely crown for your head. And so you were made beautiful with gold and silver. You ate the finest of foods-fine flour, honey, and olive oil and became more beautiful than ever.

YOU LOOKED LIKE A QUEEN AND SO YOU WERE.

Your fame soon spread throughout the world on account of your great beauty, because the splendor I bestowed on you perfected your beauty, says the sovereign Lord. But you thought you could get along without me so you trusted instead in your beauty and fame. You gave yourself as a prostitute to every man who came along. Your beauty was theirs for the asking.

You used the lovely things I gave you to make shrines for idols…”

Ezekiel 16:5-16

I love being a woman. I love jewelry and clothes and high heels and long hair and curves. I love pink and glitter and purses and nailpolish. I love crying at sappy commercials and covering my eyes at scary movies. I love being feminine. That is why the world thinks I am a woman.

But that isn’t who I am. I am Gods. I am HIS bride, HIS love, HIS queen. The beauty or splendor I may have only comes because HE perfected it. He has made me beautiful because he lavished me withHis love. That is what makes me a woman.

Now I must choose to return that same devotion or walk away. God isn’t forcing us to love Him; He is standing with open arms begging us to choose him. When we choose our own flesh we commit adulteryagainst the Lord. We don’t just make Him angry, we break his heart.

I want to love the Lord. He has called me by name and I am His. I want my deepest desire to be for Him. I want to hunger for Him. I dont want to choose this world over Him. I want HIM to seduce me with His words. Woo me with His character. Reveal Himself to me.