Rough Morning

Jehovah Rapha: The God Who Heals.

II Corinthians 12:9-10

"And he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.'... That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."

"Because of my dad's death, I understand the gospel now in a way I never did before." -My Youth Ministry teacher, this morning.

Because of my mom's cancer, I understand the gospel now in a way I never did before.
Because of my mom's cancer, I understand God's love for me more than I have ever understood before.

I may still be struggling with the trauma of that hole in my past, and the way it impacted my 11 year old mind, but still, God is so good.

He really, really loves me.  And my mother.  My father.  My sisters.

Trials are blessings- and even though I'm still healing, and it's been almost eight years and I'm still not over it, God's bringing me through it.

God, please give me the strength to share this story.

Please give me the courage to share your amazing work through this horror in my life.

I feel you touching me with the Holy Spirit at this moment.

Work through me. Thank you for the cancer.  Thank you for healing my mother.

Thank you for always loving me.

I'm sorry that I've let the cancer keep me from being closer to you.

I'm sorry that deep, deep down in the hiddenness and bitterness of my heart, that I've been harboring anger against you.

I'm sorry for my rebellion.

I've tried to accept the cancer- and I finally have, but I'm still running away from accepting that it came from you.  That you allowed this to happen.  That you would ever let my family hurt so much.

I'm sorry I was blind to my anger- my aggression- my blame- my hurt.

I've gone through the years allowing myself to experience you in certain areas of my life- growing in harsh pride to think that I'm in control- and that I can grow closer to you in this area, but keep you away from that area, and definitely not acknowledge your presence at all in the cancer that wracked my mother's sick, small body.

Because how could a God of love and blessing ever bring that to her? To me?

.... How could a human being be so selfish?  How can I possibly be that ungrateful?

I'm sorry for my pride.  I'm sorry that I felt so scathed by you.

I count it all joy.  Everything you give is good, Father.

Forgive me, God, for my sin against you.  Heal me, please.

Turn the darkness into light.  Let the sun rise on my past.  Make me whole again- a new creation under you.

"If grace is an ocean, I am sinking."

"A line can be straight, or a road, but the heart of a human being?"

Do you know why I love my life?

Because as I sit here in my usual spot at Coach House, a fellow student looks at me, puzzled and asks, "Is that homework?" She motions to the 6 books splayed all over the table, the laptop on my lap and the earnest look on my face.  To which I lovingly get to reply, "Not at all.  This is just my life."

Yes.  This is my life.  Catcher, Eat Pray Love, Pilgrim At Tinker Creek, Bell Jar, Streetcar, Writing Down the Bones...

I only wish I also had Anna Karenina and Ariel with me, also.

It's a day for falling in love again with the books who first fell in love with me.

It's a day for dreaming of poetry lines to turn into tattoos.

It's a day for indulging the inner Stella Kowalski by immersing myself in my battleworn copy of A Streetcar Named Desire. I wish I could say I don't relate to Stella at all.  But I do.  Deeply.  All women do, in my opinion.  Stanley Kowalski is the ultimate misogynist, and thousands of women all over the world would sign up in a heartbeat to stay devoted to him forever, because his sensuous charm and ruggedness outweigh his arrogance and sexism in every area.  Sad, but true. Therein lies the true folly of women.

It's a day to continue in my dreamy delusions of a future romance with my own personal Holden Caulfield. (Because of my love for this character, I'm convinced that nobody I know is actually going to like the guys that I end up bringing home. What can I say? I like them bookish, misunderstood, multidimensional and highly intelligent. ;)

It's a day to be guided by the experiences and lessons learned and taught by Natalie Goldberg, Elizabeth Gilbert and Annie Dillard.  Be it in the arena of writing, truth-seeking, or insect stalking.

It's a day for finding and underlining my favorite quotes in The Bell Jar.  Ones just like this:

          "From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked.  One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor, and another fig was Ee Gee, the amazing editor, and another fig was Europe and Africa and South America, and another fig was Constantin and Socrates and Attila and a pack of other lovers with queer names and offbeat professions, and another fig was an Olympic lady crew champion, and beyond and above these figs were many more figs I couldn't quite make out.
          I saw myself sitting in the crotch of this fig tree, starving to death, just because I couldn't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet."

It's a day for rejoicing in the simple fact that I just got a job as a Haystack Interpreter for the Cannon Beach Chamber of Commerce, and I will be staying in my beloved hometown all summer long.

Hallelujah, amen and amen.

Fall in love with your favorite book today, lovers.

Spend some time loving your libraries.

All the good words and healthy hours of reading in the world,

Xx,
Hannah

Pinterest Finds

I have succumbed.

Judge me not.

Here are a few of my favorite Pinterest finds thus far:

Most of these are from two boards of mine entitled "Summer Lovin'" and "Love. Give. Purify. Reflect. Realise."

Just a few things that I  love more than I am comfortable admitting.

Happy Pinning, Lovers.

<3

Words of Love

Preaching  (Bear with me for a moment to allow myself an exhortation):

You are all beautiful people.  I am pleased, honored and blessed to offer these words to you.  I know them to be of the utmost truth, because you are all alive, and were created in the image of The Most Beautiful.

Please realize your worth, today,  and please continue forward, sharing with someone else their worth.

This world is in a dire need of validation.  People are looking for someone to follow.  People are seeking a way to feel complete.  People are searching for truth-  and while we may not be able to give them those things, we can give each other the gift of understanding.  The gift of compassion.

Self- Actualization is under-rated and under-shared.  People need people, even those of us who are introverted, and try belligerently to deny the fact that we need anybody else- we do desperately need you.  We need each other.

Never stop needing someone else, lovers.  I've had to learn a difficult lesson in my life, and I urge you to realize this truth now before you have to learn it the hard way like I did.  It's shameful and painful to try to deny, so please just accept this and love it for the beauty it possesses: needing people is not now, and never, ever will be a weakness.

Our co-dependence is our strength.  The human race is designed to be united.  Give thanks for that. 

Sermon over.  I digress.

Morning Reflections at Sleepy Monk

I sit.

Wood oaken table-  I lean heavily and rest my arms, my limbs- they melt onto the solid surface.

They rest, blanketed by a faded flannel shirt, with a pillow in the form of a book of poems, written about Martha's Vineyard.

I smile.  I'd like to go there someday.

"Death and a wilderness of dreams
Pursue my waking-
I have no poem for you this morning
Only surprise at friendship and farewell
The smoky trajectories of stars
Echo such music."

I sip.

An encompassing cup full of hot earl grey tea.

Lavender Bergamot is the soundtrack to my dreams- the scent of my memories.

I munch.

The most heavenly visitation incarnated into pastry- the bacon blue cheese scone.

It is for flavors like these alone that I carry through life.

I sit and I breathe and I close my eyes and I imagine Tulips and Desire and Sugarcane and I'm lost in a hazy reflection of moments gone by:

Moments of ocean, and moss.

Antique china and fresh oranges.

Harbors and paninis.

Fog and lilies-of-the-valley.

The clouds outside lift- the air heavy and thick with salt- and arid with daffodils.

I cannot tarry here long, my small coffee shop lover, the day pulls me forward with plans and goals and errands and business that will, no doubt, take a toll on my soul today.

But the Almighty is merciful- the universe is kind today.

For in the midst of my hustle and bustle day, I have received a blessed moment of peace-

And I am surrounded by the divine glow of love.

Her Infinite Variety

Oh Lovers.  I wish I could describe to you the way I feel today.

In order to describe how I feel, I'd need to organize my thoughts, and I can't.

I can't organize my thoughts because there are too many of them, they're too aggressive, they're scattered by the millions and they're beautiful and twitterpated and luminous and I'm so excited by their vibrancy that I've actually got butterflies in my stomache and my toes are tingling. Tingling!!!

 It's a day that is just brimming with inspiration.  The kind that makes me sassy and mischievous. I take hold of sagacity by the horns and I say "You are mine!"

There is sunshine and cold, Spring wind.

The entire Making Mirrors album is on repeat- the above tune an excellent example of where I am today.

There is a fire burning in my soul!

I am feisty and feminist and irresistible and full of gumption today- There will be writing, there will be good-natured aggression and argumentation, there may not be submission, but there will be laughter, and by God, there will be dancing.

The wheels in my mind are rampant- creating friction and sparks and heat which illuminate the cool damp of a psyche that has rested too long in dormancy.

• Multidimensionality
• Misogyny
• Shakespeare
• Argumentative Notions on the Theologies of Eschatology
• Victoria's Secret Pure Seduction Lotion
• Ocean Eyes
• Romance and Romance Killers
• Annie Dillard- Ani DiFranco- Elizabeth Gilbert- Alanis Morissette-
• "She will never have a Federal Husband so drop the pamphlets, write her poetry and take her for midnight walks on the beach instead."
• I JUST WANT TO BE VALIDATED
• Character Development: Sexy Conservationalist Nerdy Girl Artist With Messy Hair and Canvas Shoes Looking For Intertidal Protection and Creative Expression
• Controversy
• L'arte d'arrangiarsi

So you see, lovers- there is extreme passion today.

There is thirst, desire, need, raw and provocative.

There is a free form of conscious thought- there is poetry and imagery and metaphors and there is music.

There is love.  There is commitment- and yet, there is also a part of me that runs pell-mell away from any sort of commitment today.

My commitment is to be noncommittal for the next few hours.

And so here I go.  I venture out into the glorious day outside- notebook in hand, pencil perched precariously in the middle of my messy updone hair- I'm ready to fall in love with inspiration.


"Age cannot wither her; nor custom stale
Her infinite variety. Other women cloy
The appetites they feed, but she makes hungry
Where most she satisfies."
-Shakespeare-Antony and Cleopatra- [2.2.234-237.]

"In a world of disorder and disaster and fraud, sometimes only beauty can be trusted. Only artistic excellence is incorruptible.  Pleasure cannot be bargained down." - Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat Pray Love


Wishing you all of these feelings and more,

Xx,
Hannah

A List

It's 5:56 PM in the afternoon on a Wednesday.

I have 2 hours of free time before I have a movie date with several fabulous friends.

The college way of list-making:

• Laundry
• Put the sheets that I washed a few days ago back on my bed
• Pick up all of my worldly possessions from off of the floor
• SHAVE MY LEGS!!!  (Yes, I do always get this excited about shaving.)
• Paint my toenails
• Listen to Wonderwall REALLY INSANELY LOUD
• Attempt to eat a bowl of cheerios and then remember I'm out of milk and throw my bowl across the room in frustration
• Kill some rogue ants
• Distract myself with the curious business of eavesdropping on hall conversations
• Think of more stuff to put on this list
• Maybe get some real writing done  (Not likely.)

And in the words of Olivia Newton John:  let's get physical.

But not like that. 

Xx,

Hannah

El Shaddai

**El Shaddai= God Almighty, The God Who Is Sufficient**

Spent today steeped in the Word, lovers-

I felt like sharing.

Somewhere in the middle of last week, I started a new tradition of outlining my favorite verses and writing them on a sheet of paper stuck on the front of my binder, so that I can look at them all in one place, at the same time, to ease the process of memorization and meditation upon God's Word.

The page is already full, and I'm going to have to come up with a new place to put them all, which shouldn't be too hard because I just discovered several blank writing pages in my ESV Study Bible, and I think I'll transcribe them all there. Plenty of room, in the perfect place, and close to my heart always.

So.

Up until this point I've never really been able to say I have favorite Bible verses.  I never really spent much time reading my Bible.  Good thing I decided to come here, let me assure you.

But now that I have found these beautiful words, and not just beautiful by religious standards, but beautiful because of the way they strike me individually, through devotional time or through classtime, I desperately want to share them with other people.

And I want other people to share their favorite verses with me.

The Bible is quite expansive, if you haven't noticed- 66 books is quite a hefty library to carry around all the time- and I do not in any way claim to have come even close to reading the whole thing.

But!  Sharing favorite scriptures is a great way to excite yourself and excite others about searching for new truths from God's word, and to motivate yourself to read even more than you've ever read before, because it drives you with the desire to find more gems, but you want to find them in your own way, in your own personal walk with God.

Good things.

Anyways.  Enough blabbering. Here are some of the most impactful words from the Bible that I've come across so far.

"For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence

For my hope is from Him.
He only is my rock and my salvation.
My fortress: I shall not be shaken.
On God rests my salvation and my glory;
My mighty rock, my refuge is God."

-Psalm 62:5-7

"And Mary said:
My soul magnifies the Lord
And my spirit rejoices in God my savior,
For He has looked on the humble estate of His servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
For He who is mighty has done great things for me,
And holy is His name.
And His mercy is for those who fear Him from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with His arm; 

He has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
He has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate;
He has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich He has sent away empty.
He has helped His servant Israel, in remembrance of His mercy,

As He spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and his offspring forever."

-Luke 1:46-55

"A person cannot receive even one thing unless it is given him from Heaven."

-John 3:27

"If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all."

-Isaiah 7:9

"But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls."

-Hebrews 10:39

"Do not be anxious beforehand what you are to say, but say whatever is given you in that hour, for it is not you who speak, but the Holy Spirit." 

-Mark 13:11

"We love because He first loved us." 

-1st John 4:19

"Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life."

-Proverbs 13:12

"Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows;

yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;

he was crushed for our iniquities, upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace.
And with his wounds we are healed.
All we like sheep have gone astray; 

We have turned-every one- to his own way;

and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all."

-Isaiah 53:4-6

"But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ- by grace you have been saved."

-Ephesians 2:4-5

"For we walk by faith, not by sight."

-2nd Corinthians 5:7

"Keep my teaching as the apple of your eye;

bind them on your fingers;

write them on the tablet of your heart."

-Proverbs 7:2-3

"And my God will supply every need of yours according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus."

-Philippians 4:2-3

"For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control."

-2nd Timothy 1:7

"For our sake He made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God."

-2nd Corinthians 5:21

"Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness.  For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.  And He who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God."

-Romans 8:26-27

"For you are all children of light, of the day.  We are not of the night or of darkness."

-1st Thessalonians 5:5

"God is not a god of confusion, but of peace."

-1st Corinthians 14:33

"I have been crucified with Christ.  It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me."

-Galatians 3:20

"I appeal to you therefore, brothers... Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect."

-Romans 12:2

"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing."

-1st Corinthians 13:1-2

And perhaps, finally, my most favorite book in all of the Bible is found in John 21:12:

"Jesus said to them, 'Come and have breakfast.'"  <3 <3 <3

Goodnight, lovers-

Godspeed.  <3

Sweet Nothings

The sun has come out today, the skies have closed their torrential downpour and somewhere, a scent on the wind carries Spring throughout Cannon Beach with wild abandon.

It's another Manic Monday here, minus any sort of actual mania, because it's impossible to feel manic when you live in a small, rich, hippie-tourist beachtown, especially when the sun is shining.

I've got some sweet nothings for you lovers to nibble on, today.

Sweet nothings such as the joy carbonated water brings, and how wearing 5 rings at a time makes you feel like Esmerelda from The Hunchback of Notre Dame, (Which, if you haven't seen it in a while, let me assure you is a VERY good thing.  She's a babe.) and also how conversations over lunch with 81 year-old missionaries who call you "sweetheart" every five minutes and speak beautiful words of blessing and wisdom into your life can just make you want to sit down and cry because you wish you had grandparents who loved you the way this stranger loves you.

We can talk, also, lovers about how I'm rereading Eat Pray Love and I'm falling in love all over again with balance, devotion and pleasure and cultures, spirituality, travelling, relationships and compassion.  I'll never forget how that book really jump-started me on this pathway to finding divinity in every day life, and a new reason to celebrate thankfulness every single day.

Rereading Eat Pray Love makes me thirst again for my life now, and it inspires me to never, ever, ever give up on the desire God has placed in my heart for travelling and writing and eating good food in beautiful new countries with astoundingly graceful people.

People are incredible, and their stories are worth telling, worth sharing, and I cannot wait to get my hands on some of that juice to write about.

Lovers, let's not forget the sweet nothing that is the incandescent aroma of freshly-mown grass.

Let's give thanks for the sweet nothing that is the new novelty pin on my laptop bag that reads "Never Apologize For Your Art."

Sweet Nothings are beautiful, and I think that they alone are a perfectly good reason to live your life.

Let us add to this by acknowledging and loving the sweet nothing that is a chocolate peanut butter milkshake in the afternoon, and a few youtube videos of John Williams compositions shared with fellow ecstatic music-lover friends.

Yes, lovers, today is beautiful and life is a gift, so go out there and live it while you still can.

When Becca was here last week, we took a wee roadtrip down Highway 101 along the coastline and stopped at several small beachtowns and places we'd both never been before.  In one of these little miniature adventures, we stumbled across a framing shop called "Art Happens" and met a beautiful, white-haired, overall-clad woman who has been matting and framing pictures for many, many years.  She had these beautiful quotation cards made from leftover materials that she was selling for a dollar apiece, and so we each bought 7 or 8 of them.

I'll leave you with the quotes that struck me so much, I had to take them home with me forever.

Wishing you all the sweet nothings and the all-inclusive everything else's in the world,

Xx,
Hannah

"Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadow." -Helen Keller

"Do you want me to tell you something really subversive?  Love is everything it's cracked up to be.  That's why people are so cynical about it.  It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for.  And the trouble is, if you don't risk anything, you risk even more..." - Erica Jong

"Love involves a peculiar unfathomable combination of understanding and misunderstanding..." - Diane Arbus

(This one is possibly my most favorite:)
"Living involves tearing up one rough draft after another."  -Author Unknown

"The thing always happens that you really believe in; and the belief in a thing makes it happen." -Frank Lloyd Wright

"There is power when individuals discover that no one is coming to rescue them-- that if they don't do something different, nothing in their life is going to get better. When the thought connects, it's electrifying.  A lot of people turn their ways, simply because they decided to stop waiting for help." -Nathaniel Branden

"Love is the emblem of eternity; it confounds all notions of time; effaces all memory of beginning, all fear of an end." -Madame De Stael