A few words

"One understands a word much better if one has met it alive, in its native habitat."

C.S. Lewis, Studies in Words

5 things that made me laugh...

or 4 (can't think of a 5th right now). Anyway, minor amusements in the life of Hannah:

1. The cow who kept sticking her head out of the back of the trailer in front of me to stare at me rather vulgarly; or to look at surrounding countryside every once in awhile (maybe you had to be there for that one...)

2. A sign: "try our new shrimp items go Jackets win!" (the 'Jackets being the local high school football team--and yes, it would have been funnier without the "try our," but I'm honest)

3. When I was sitting in the waiting area of a psychiatrist's office last week (waiting for a rider to finish), and the psyche dr. came in and said (in a tone and accompanied with a hand motion used toward children and dogs by people who don't understand them) to me, "come on back, Maggie!" I'm afraid my eyebrows were a little rude (she interrupted Fitzgerald, and I was wearing red, too), but the rest of me tried to be polite. (There's nothing they can do anyway...)

4. Another sign: "flea/farmer's market" (no comment)

On the Road

The red rivers intersect and merge on the white page beneath my finger, calling to the red within my veins. I follow them a little absently, tracing my finger across miles no bigger than an elm bug. In my mind they are transformed; no longer red lines (whether curved or straight), but blinding ribbons of white furling ahead of me, smoking along behind; consuming me in the rhythm of the road. Each has its own siren song number; it is a delight to recognize old friends traveling in new places.

I am a faithful wanderer. A fugitive from my comfortable home. I seek safety from the mundane through something larger than myself. And I have joined the eternal Quest, unsure of what I am questing for. Not the end of the road, for real roads have no end I can find. Knowledge? Only of my frailty and ignorance, since there is always more road to know. I recognize my own limits through my love.

I am a jealous wanderer, having a passionate impatience for those who travel in front of me. Not for being in my way, but because they are having my experience before me. I meet people with curiosity, wanting to know what they have seen; knowing what they are about to see.

The center stripe reflects the joy of sunflowers, and I am free.

How do I know God loves me?

Because of sunflowers.

A Better Resurrection

Psalm 121; 119:145-147; 39:4-7; 51:10; Job 23:10; 2 Corinthians 4:4-18; 2 Timothy 4:6-8; 1 Peter 1:3-9
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I have no wit, no words, no tears;
My heart within me like a stone
Is numb'd too much for hopes or fears;
Look right, look left, I dwell alone;
I lift mine eyes, but dimm'd with grief
No everlasting hills I see;
My life is in the falling leaf:
O Jesus, quicken me.

My life is like a faded leaf,
My harvest dwindled to a husk:
Truly my life is void and brief
And tedious in the barren dusk;
My life is like a frozen thing,
No bud nor greenness can I see:
Yet rise it shall--the sap of Spring;
O Jesus, rise in me.

My life is like a broken bowl,
A broken bowl that cannot hold
One drop of water for my soul
Or cordial in the searching cold;
Cast in the fire the perish'd thing;
Melt and remould it, till it be
A royal cup for Him, my King:
O Jesus, drink of me.

~Christina Rossetti

Question

For my entertainment (borrowed from others):

What does my name (first and last) sound like I should be? (if I weren't what I am, of course)

Anyone want to offer an opinion?

Study in Strangers I

"There are chance meetings with strangers that interest us from the first moment, before a word is spoken."
~Crime and Punishment

Our eyes locked in a crowd.

I turned mine down--
Unwilling he should see a secret
Burned in fire and trembling--
But not before
A smile had slipped between us:
Knowledge of our mutual ignorance, an instant's
Curiosity, or interest, it may be; recognition
Granted innocence and possibility. Unanimity
In living strangers, sharing
The hunger and humor of humanity
In silence.

Whose face, whose smile, what name from long-ago?
I'll never know;
I'll never need to know.

Nostalgia

Okay, so I’m suffering it: post-college withdrawal. I miss…lots of things. Not quite the tests, but I miss Latin parties, and I miss metaphysical parties with Someone sitting with a jar of sugar cubes on her head, and I miss taking personality tests at three in the morning when we have a test at eight, and I miss "studying" at coffee shops, which always turned into something more important. I miss intelligent conversation and people who get my jokes (which, as the Lyonesse heretic noted, are two things not related—but I would like to point out that she was the one who started the conversation, "if you were a french fry…" I love you, Ashley! ;). I miss "sprawling" in the hall for backrubs and talk (or just plain giggling); I miss trying to fit too many people on a bed to watch a movie, and ice cream at the slightest excuse; I miss dancing around the mirror in the morning with all of us trying to get ready; I miss being a french shrub or an ewok. I miss hiccups through the wall, and I miss told being not to drink coffee, and I miss throwing snowballs at our RA’s window, and I miss the nod and saying, "we know." Lyonesse, and the Dragons, and the World, and the Radical Freudeggerian Feminists Against Interpretation and the Older Sisters of Brothers on Campus and the Brothers in Burqas Society and the Society for the Defense of Hannah and the League of the Sleep Deprived. I miss you people something awful.

But I don’t just miss the people: I miss the place, and what was possible there. I miss stalking security guards (or occasionally assaulting them, although not usually when they were on duty—there was that time when one tried to break into the bookstore…) and Viking burials for goldfish and funeral ceremonies for de-Caput-ated knights and warm-fuzzy wars and Hobbit parties and duels and haunting the main building and play rehearsals and dancing and engagements (and all things attendant upon those occasions). I miss a place where I could wear red hats to finals and where red wigs were out of dress code (it looked pretty awful on me anyway). I miss a place where boys could propose just to give someone the pleasure of rejecting them, or where we could expect email proposals every time it snowed. I even miss ASEs and Councils of War. I miss knowing more about everyone else’s lives than I ever should have. I miss the Chestnut race and the GSE and the ever-present game of Ultimate. I miss the professors. I miss the way they ate with us and played with us; and I miss being scared to talk with them for fear I would say something stupid; my distant adoration. I miss the way their eyes lit up when someone understood.

I miss chapels, and I miss praying together, at planned and unplanned times; the spiritual challenge and encouragement by people who were sold out for God; the way we were bound together in Him.

I don’t want to be one of those people who’s constantly remembering college as the best years of my life and believe life goes downhill from here: I think it does get better, because I have that as part of me now, and I can go on to new and exciting things God has for me. But there are moments when I just miss Us Being There.