sometimes the hardest thing and the right thing are the same.

welcome to the longest post ever. it's been nearly three weeks since i have last written in here, a week for my personal handwritten journal. life has been a whirlwind and it is tough to digest it all enough to put it down coherently in words and phrases. but i'm going to try, so bear with me.

• i am halfway done with college. that's such a strange thing to say because it does not feel like i'm growing up to be an adult. i know that i am only because i feel like i'm picking up on the little details in life that'll shape the big picture that comes because of time and experience. i think i have grown up more this semester than any other time period in my nineteen years--i can feel it.
  
  
• i see crossroads ahead concerning the future. about school. about ministry. about where to be involved at. about friendships and relationships. it's tough because i want to be laidback but not passive; where's the happy medium? i know the Lord has plans for me, more than enough for my little head to understand. but how do i know that it's His desires and not mine? i want His will, not mine. i want to either love or hate something and not settle for mediocrity.
  
  
• i finished my first journal ever, from start to finish, with every line filled with my spring semester. one of these days, i will sit down and read through what the Lord taught me in a little over four months. does it feel weird for you to read what you write given a time gap? i do. so much.
  
  
• praise the Lord for the end of physics and human affairs. that wednesday 7:30 morning final was the final straw for me and i'm so thankful to be done. and surprise! i pulled off an A in that class just by a nudge. i'm done with science and almost all of my cores. usher in the AD/PR classes, 15 hours of credit, and 4 days of classes in a couple months, okay?
  
  
• i had a milestone two wednesdays ago: i caught my first (and second) frisbee in the BCM-invented box game (if you don't know what i'm talking about, you need to get in the know). seriously. considering how i was the only girl in a box full of at-least-a-head-taller boys, i was tickled pink. i'm glad i got the chance to hang out with the graduating fellows one last time--i'm going to miss them a lot.
  
  
• brett wagner amuses me so much--him and his serenading of random songs. there's nothing quite like hanging out in buch-droke.
  
  
• speaking of graduation, i have been to three in the span of eight days. fulbright, engineering, and BHS. i basically tripled my number (from one ever). i don't think i ever really grasped at my own graduation how life changes, how you emerge as your own person some way, somehow at each new level; i was too busy trying to keep my funny hat on my awkwardly-shaped head.
  
  
• JOSH'S DEGREE IS BEAUTIFUL. gosh, i love his mother and his grandmother so much and i am so blessed i got to spend time and laughter with them at the ceremony and at gloria jean's with leighton. strength in tea bags, in number. amazing.
  
  
• mothers' day + dad's 48th birthday + homemade upside-down pineapple cake = good.
  
  
• i think i am an owner of nomadic feet and whizzing heart. i traveled around oklahoma for five days last week. i enjoyed seeing familiar faces and making new ones familiar. shawnee. tulsa. bartlesville. how remarkable is it that with over 6+ billion people populating this earth, our world feels quite small? i love how God places people in our lives and makes it something beyond a chance encounter.
  
  
• i wish gas wasn't this expensive. how did it jump 20 cents in a span of a day and a half?
  
  
• conquering trees is really quite lovely. me and leighton. me and jesse. me, katie, and rachel (i love you girls so so so so much). me and clutter. i'm making up for the lack of climbing trees in my childhood now, barefoot and loving the feel of dirt and bark beneath my toes. it amuses me how hardcore, in-depth conversations can occur up high in the branches. something about God's visible beauty echoing the eternal beauty within our hearts--i love it.
  
  
• this was a beautiful weekend because my family from michigan came home and my sister graduated from high school (which makes me feel old). now she's long gone in the heartland of the north/the midwest for a couple of weeks--i'm happy for her because it's her turn to explore, to get away from the bentonville bubble.
  
  
• i think i can be very ignorant when it concerns some things in life. i choose to gloss over the given situation and hightail it away from the significance of it all; i am willingly blind to preserve myself. how selfish am i? "the fears you face determines how big God is to you." i am a work in progress, definitely. pray for me.
  
  
• grief comes in waves. as tough as that is, i'm glad for it because it serves to remind me of His sacrifice as not just a one-time thing. His pain is felt every day but His return is grander each and every time. the beauty of death is there, it is. and i know the Lord has it coming in waves (ripples and crashes) for a reason: someone once told me that if we had felt the magnitude of all of our grief and pain and hurt at once, it would kill us. i know He's looking out for me even when some days are harder than others.
  
  
• i leave for camp in about four days. i feel excited yet nervous. i do not feel prepared for seven weeks of growth--for myself, for the kids that are going to enter though the gates. what can i teach them? what can i do? how can i best glorify my Father when i'm expected to give 100% consistently, day in and day out? Lord, help me have a pure heart. help me die daily to my selfishness, to my sin nature. remind me that i am serving You first of all, the kids and fellow staff are just a by-product of that service. do not let me settle into this mindset of motion > passion just because i've "been there, done that." prepare me to have you stretch me in a completely different way this summer.
  
  
• confession: i'm a people watcher. i consider myself pretty observant. because of that, i'm learning through other's stories, reactions how i want to be and want not to be (if that makes any sense). i'm becoming more aware of His refinement in my life. God definitely has been teaching me how although we don't all walk down the same path in life, we can glance at one another's path and learn from each trip, stumble, or fall. it doesn't necessarily mean that we're safe from it ourselves, but we see hope that one can stand despite the obstacle.
  
  
• i'm collecting addresses for the summer. let me know yours. i've been enjoying relient k, regina spektor, corinna bailey rae, brandi carlile, and josh rouse a lot lately. the office makes me happy (jim and pam, gah).
  
  
• i think if i could be a personal shopper, a thrift store peruser, a custom collage frame maker, or a room tidy-upper, my life would be so much fun. if only, right?
  

i think i've rambled on long enough. keep me updated on your life. i love you.

"when you can't make sense of someone leaving, you sometimes try to make sense of what they left behind. and it makes it a whole lot easier when what they left you was beautiful."

braums with the girls.

sister's graduation.

me and emily at java dave's.

the new life ranch crew and i.

me and emily being silly.

me and jesse climbing his first tree at OBU.

hanging out in bartlesville.