since when did 54 degrees feel nice?

it's been a while since i've posted something from school! i have a few hours before meeting a friend for lunch, so naturally i'm kicking off my free time by drinking some hot tea and blogging. oooh the silliness!

i am tired today.

my body and my mind and my everything is just tired. not bad tired, but that tired where you know you're just spent. where you know you've been working hard and you can't wait for a day, just one, where you can be sedentary and of no use to society. well, maybe not of no use but just a day where you can sleep and mend and tie up loose ends and do laundry.

i've seen boone more snowy than ever this past week! i feel like i'm becoming a little alpine woman and i'm slowly mastering the art of dressing in multiple layers. but today it's supposed to reach a balmy 54 degrees and everyone has left their skiing jackets at home. as for me, i'm only wearing one layer of leggings and my snowboarding jacket has been swapped out for a nice hoodie/jackie combo.

i just stepped out of my car to walk towards campus this morning and it was just one of those moments in which, you feel like a hidden camera should be on you and that you should most definitely be a main character in a really beautiful and somber and quirky art film. i know you've had those moments.

to express what i've been up to a lot these past few weeks, i will post a series of pictures and links, but mostly pictures.

national body challenge

supporting my boys in another level

i don't know why they make this look so bland and boring.

being really really cold.

make the bed!

still mourning the loss of african nectar tea but enjoying two leaves and a bud, also the tea used at Fido.

they're playing my ipod in the wired scholar because, apparently people don't like listening to red hot chili peppers at 9 in the morning at high decibels? and they don't have anything else to play back there that is "coffee shoppy". glad i could be of use. sufjan's seven swans has never sounded so nice!

my Jesus is good. merciful and loving and mighty and gentle.

onto online homework.

excerpt from new york journal

from january 7, 2009

new york city
(and other thoughts from the sleepless streets)

we've been here nearly a week and i'm ready to be on the road once more. what an exciting and motivating way to begin this new year. i'm beginning to understand myself and my hopes and motivations that rise and dip like a roller-coaster. after a long while of leaving more than enough room for me to not let myself down, i'm ready to challenge myself. i understand that this rise comes before a dip and that pride comes before a fall.

so the issue immediately at hand is to keep my pride in check.

it takes a certain type of person to live in this city and be happy. i know i am not that type for long-term city living. but for the first time in a long time i can honestly look around here and say that i could do this for a little while. i could if i was in the right place at the right time.

today is the first day here that i am able to sit and observe at my pace of choice: warm, sitting, with a hot apple spice in hand. it's cloudy and gloomy and beautiful in that way, especially viewing from inside. we're just on the edge of NYU's campus and that makes me feel like i'm a part of authentic new york goings-on. i like this new york. and what a great time to be finishing (finally) Franny & Zooey.

what a blessing to be here, singing, with friends.

friends are people you wouldn't mind dying with, i think. let me put it this way. there have been times, riding in a car with people i know, for instance, that i've thought to myself: if something were to happen, i do not want to die with these people. friends are people you could die with.

for the sake of my future self, and in ode to my past self, here are assorted memories from this trip:

-gig at Ace of Clubs, and thinking to myself "no inhibitions, here i AM new york, this is my best"
-shrek the musical
-liking mcdonald's again
-irregular choosing of my irregular choice heels ♥
-hot dog in chilly central park with sax player
-getting lost (again, and again, and again) on stupid new jersey highways
-falling in love with the metropolitan museum of art and realizing that i could have a future in museum careers...
(and walk in central park/streets of london/have an apartment/fall in love/ put flowers i buy in a market in my room (thanks, joni)
-wo-hop chinese diner!! best food and service and hole-in-the-wall and sense of humor ever... and my first taste of chinese beer
-knowing and vowing that i will come to the city in a transitional season because i associate nyc with being miserably cold. i want to wear a dress in the warmth next time i'm here!


maybe everyone will experience having someone they will always go back and think about. big places, standing in the "shadow of tall buildings" where you know important people are doing important things... it makes you feel small. it leads you to grab onto your significances. to cut to the chase.
and to cut to the chase, being here has made me think about that someone i always go back and think about, benji. i miss him. maybe i just need another someone who treats me as well as he did, who makes me laugh like he did, who makes me proud to just know him, like i was proud to know and be associated with him. another someone who can remind me that benji is just a boy figuring out how to be a man, he is still guided by the same God i know and confide in. he is in a different place experiencing all kinds of successes and trials, he is meeting new confidantes and people who are making life worth while, he is changing, and living a life i am not a part of, and that's okay.

i want to be okay with that but in my heart i am still battling with hurt and bitterness; i want him to know that the decisions he made and continues to make, however small or insignificant they seem, did and still continue to hurt me. being here stings me with thoughts of him. i wonder if he battles with the memory of me, or if his battle has been won, unbeknownst to me.

thoughts from the couch

you better believe i'm watching the real world: brooklyn.

today:

meeting my online class at 5
going to new life at 8


i am really enjoying my schedule of classes.
-spanish II
-advanced creative nonfiction
-computer applications
-applied anthropology
-gospel choir
-voice lesson
-seminar: the virtual life

and the timing is so nice. lots of during-the-day free time to get coffee, write, do homework, chat with friends, and
be a part of campus. i only have this semester and next semester to do all i want to do in college. time to make it happen!

i'm still praying for another job.
i need to make my bed.
i have a lot of embarrassing moments.
i have an unrealistic love for brendan frasier.

confession!

i HAVE to see "he's just not that into you"
and revolutionary road.
and slumdog millionaire.
and the curious case of benjamin button.

red box, can you expedite these??

mostly for me

things going on right now

-there is a pile of stuff in my room, waiting to be unpacked
-i started to get sick again and am DETERMINED to not let it happen
-i am watching karate kid part II and i'm feeling funny about it.
-i think i am addicted to french fries
-my foot is sprained. yes, my foot and not my ankle? true.


things that need to go on today

-seriously, i need to unpack
-rewrite statement of purpose and concentration curriculum
-post for my virtual life class
-not be bitter at my boss for only scheduling me 2 days this month. really.
-water my poor, neglected plants
-maybe i should go swimming since i can't run on my wonky foot?
-organize my week
-make my bed
-prepare
-pray
-paint my nails

things that will go on regardless

-practice for the national anthem around 5
-ear candy meeting at 8


if you remember, please pray that i find another job quickly. tomorrow begins the frustrating search.


p.s. new york was an absolute blast. more on that later, i'm sure.

come on! it's new years time!

happy birthday nancy!!

is it seriously already 4 in the afternoon?

am i seriously still in my pj's and, after a short stint downstairs making mac&cheese, back in my bed because it's so cold in my parents house?

yes? yes. yes!

i am listening to myspace music, waiting on laundry, and thinking about a lot of things. like how last night i got to dance in the new year. haha! what a fun time!

side note:
due to a difficult financial time, i am about 10 albums less of where i want to be, and, subsequently, have resorted to listening to whatever i can on myspace (which i have previously deemed the "butthole" of the internet, but now i somehow feel like i should retract that statement since i am hearing new music without actually having to buy new music. it's not SO bad.)


i'm really, genuinely excited about 2009. there is a lot of real promise, hope, faith. i feel like the Lord is saying, "just keep asking, and wait on me!" and i'm thrilled. because that's all i can do in my life right now.

over the span of this coming year, i will have figured out what i'm doing this summer, and DONE it. i will have taken my last classes of college. i will have worked over my resume and talked to mentors and searched and listened about my next step post-college. (that is scary but terribly exciting, because it could be ANYTHING! and i'm up for anything!)
this time next year, i will know what my next step will be. it could be the smallest step, or the biggest step! but i will know. i will have watched the Lord put people in my path to guide me, aid me, and be the church to me. i say this confidently not because i think i deserve it, but because i need it! if that makes any sense at all. i need the Lord in every detail, so i am asking and waiting, and i am truly looking forward to seeing Him unfold things before me. He does not disappoint.

surrendering your own strength and understanding is the scariest, most humbling, most freeing and rewarding conundrum ever. a conundrum to wrestle over with every new day.


2009 is thick with possibility, like all the thickness of a great song or grass-scented summer air. that's how i feel about it.

and i get to start it out by playing music with some great people in new york city.
also:
-metropolitan museum of art
-buying a scarf
-pizza!!!
-starbucks
-photographs
-fancy dinner with my pals
-new lip color debut

i wish you all a joy-filled and blessed new year!

maybe i should get out of my pj's.
-sam