Giving Thanks. ha.

When holidays come, I miss something that I don't even know. I love my family. my brother. my cousins. They're great. But somehow when I come home, I just want to be held and cuddled and hugged the whole time. And when that doesn't happen, I get melancholy quickly.
Maybe I am insecure. I thought I didn't care, but i need acceptance and love and to be important and heard. just like everybody else, i suppose. :)
Aunt Laurel is so proud of Hannah being at Yale. She doesn't care if Whitworth does the exact same thing as Yale (ie having elective/specialized style courses count for GE, in this particular case).
I may really dislike my school for a variety of reasons, but I reserve the right to be the only one to criticize it. I actually really like my school a lot. its just the other people there.
Derek points out when I'm being bitchy. I can be pretty bitchy sometimes. I'm mostly okay with it. I'm mostly done caring about anyone and anything. Is that sad?
I need Soul Care next semester.
cuz i need you jesus to come to my rescue. no one else will do. and i will grab hold of you.
My back hurts a lot. My neck hurts and I drove a lot today. my eyes are dry, i think because i put this eyeliner on.
I want a boy to call, but he's off in washington-land, and has only been gone all of 12 hours from campus, hasn't even thought to miss me, nor should he, he's experiencing American Thanksgiving, a whole new adventure.
Why do I feel so isolated?
I felt more included in the Seattle U conversations than anything else I heard tonight at Hannah's Reunification with High School Friends Game Party. Social Justice, small school, Christian-inclined. Washington State. There's a connection there. But I feel intentionally repelled by Ivy League talk, and have no good frat or sorority stories. I do drink, but I feel like I don't wanna put added pressures on my younger cousins who don't (even though all their friends do), how considerate and nice of me.

Fuck it all. I do good stuff to be Nice now. I worship the same Idol as everybody else at my school, my indoctrination is complete. Its not that Nice is bad. I just prefer Love. Ideally, I could Love people well. fully. authentically. love God. worship. serve. authentically, wholly, honestly.

but instead I'm a cranky bitchy hunchback who gets depressed when she has time to sit back and reflect. oh dear.

Being Honest

I crave being held. I crave being cherished.
However, that isn't what my identity is.
. . .
I've recently become close friends with a boy who challenges me.
My response is to try to mold him into someone who he is not. I have been trying to conform him to my previously constructed ways of relating (to men). It doesn't work so well. And just because I can make something happen, doesn't mean that it is good for me for it to happen.
. . .
So I'm back to determining who I am and where I'm going.
I found a cool place that I'd like to live next year. Romero House in Canada. I'd live alongside refugee families awaiting decision on their status. I'd receive a monthly stipend. I'd do homework club with kids, do immigration case work, and live in the world's most multicultural city.
. . .
Thats the Christine Barker I remember. That is who I want to be.
I recently stepped in without thinking when a guy was choking a woman on the street in Seattle. I said, Hey, Hey, what are you doing? He took her around the corner, and I followed them, and said Hey you, you need to stop, what are you doing?
He shouted obscenities at me and a boy for a good half-block. I'm really glad he didn't attack us. She got away.
I step in. I do what I think I should without stopping to think.
I care about people. I empathize probably too much.
A boy and I cried at a war memorial with the names of everyone from Seattle carved between quotes. I don't know why he cried, but I cried for the homeless man rocking back and forth as he drank out of a brown paper bag in front of the Vietnam portion. He splashed some names with his drink, and sat there and rocked for as long as we stood there.
. . .
Its not that this boy and I don't connect. Its just that I want a boy to be a boyfriend-role in my life (even for six or seven months only). A boy from another culture doesn't fit that role for too many reasons to elaborate. So now, I need to be honest with myself and remember who I am. And keep being Myself. Christine Michelle.
I care. not so much what people think, but I do care what they feel. I don't like it when I'm a bitch, even though I'm so much more inclined to do it since coming back to Whitworth from Stellenbosch. I am interested in what people think. I like being challenged in classes. I love a Jesus-guy, and I claim redemption and Love in the small and big things.
I recently survived Swine Flu that turned into Bronchitis and I WILL graduate this May. I believe in small children. I believe in learning and infectious Joy. I think that there is much to learn through living in solidarity with those I want to spend my life serving. I love to read. and to Be in silence around other people. I am an extrovert too. I love coffeetalks and meeting new people in authentic ways.
I drink alcohol. a fair amount. I love drinking with my roommates, and clubbing with friends. I don't like dirty dancing all up in anyone's grill. I like that song Down. I think I'm getting distracted.
I stand up and Lead when I think it needs to be done.
I question whether I'll ever get married. or have children. or do any of those real normal life things. I don't have anything against those institutions. I want them, I think, but I just don't really see it happening.
. . .
I'll do good things in my life.
I'll live intentionally near Maddie for some part of it.
I'll have a huge library no matter how poor I get.
I'll Love Fresno with my life. just as soon as I go a few other places first? maybe? please jesus?
I'll be a teacher somewhere along the way.
I'll love people always.

Who Am I Again?

What am I doing here at Whitworth University?
What am I doing in life?
This is bad timing for a freak-out seeing as I need to submit sample applications to all my top priority life-options in class tomorrow.
meh.
bleh.
shit foo.
unrelated: why are no boys ever interested in me?

in imitation of ee cummings

I who have lived have died again today.

And this is the anniversary of all my scars; this is the day
Of pain and of bitterness and wounds and of the grave
Great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any--lifted from the no
of all nothing--human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

RFP #952-4733

She tells us afterwards the best analogy she can come up with.
Its like finding out you're pregnant.

She's the mother who for so many reasons has been telling us to turn this grant in early.
For our well-being, for our health, for our futures, JUST LISTEN TO HER.

We'd worked really hard, we'd created so much good material. we were really going somewhere.
Until we looked down and saw that we were Late.

Desperately speeding down to County Purchasing. Shoe stuck in the door.
Getting there at 2:01.

The pit that dropped then, it settled, it is quite comfortable in the depths of our stomachs and psyche.
The terror that she tried to convey, through e-mails, loving support, conversation after conversation.

Even Sophia's admonishments the day of.
were nothing.

compared to this. this lethal potion of guilt-judgement-failure.
Its something we'll never forget.

We did not live in terror, and that terror was not the final line for us.
And we turned in our proposal late.

She says she's disappointed and sad, with us.
now we're marked. we've joined the club. of those with denied dreams

that Late-ness was all that mattered.
kinda like being pregnant.

Its three am, i must be lonely now

So the sermon today at UPC was about Solomon, when he asked for wisdom.
and the point was that we can't just ask for anything. we have to love God first. and then within that, desire that which we desire.
I really want something to happen. But I'm being outwardly passive and patient, and possibly being really obnoxious in the regularity that I pray for that to happen.
but in other news, I love those GAYG girls so much. and its so crazy that some of them are going into COLLEGE!! i feel like they're my baby sisters, and they're not allowed to be that old yet!
but at the same time, its so nice that they're maturing, asking deeper questions, really asking advice.
i'm gonna miss them a lot a lot. i could probably cry.
but part of that is also because its 4am by now, and I still haven't finished writing the grant material stuff.
hm,
maybe i should get on that. :)

I'm home in Fresno.
Avoiding some things.
easing into some things.
diving into FIRM again, and UPC too, to a lesser extent.
spending lots of good time with my family.

I just came home from a day on the lake, where we wakeboarded and tubed and swam our hearts out. We went with some old family friends.
I'm tired.
I'm always tired.

I had a little self-satisfying cry when we came home from the lake. I'm just so bad. I'm so bad at anything related to strength or athleticism. I tried and tried to get up on the water but just kept getting pulled straight over out of those boots.

When we got in the car to go home Kyle congratulated me on actually being a good sport. which served to just piss me off more. before i was frustrated and a little withdrawn. after he said that, oh, and telling me that i had just done a Nathan Berend (one of his friends who really is a good guy, but it really wasn't helpful)

anyways. i'm mad at my brother and i'm feeling sore and out of whack. its so easy for me to get out of sync with normal life. Sharon says that that's normal, and she felt out of sync with society for a long time after she came back from Korea.

Its pretty selfish though. and wallowing never gets sympathy, which is really what i'm craving.

So I picked up Donald Miller's Blue Like Jazz. That book changed my faith in High School. I've read it plenty of times since then, and loaned or given it to probably all my friends. The way that he talks about Jesus and God, it soothes my soul. The shared reality of faith and life and doubt. Of talking about Jesus with friends. Of important realizations. This Jesus-guy who came down and dwelt among us. Its pretty amazing. and i love him. and i see him in the Gods Asian Youth Group girls. I see him in the staff and clients of FIRM. Its so much easier for me to see Jesus in Hmong and Lao faces than anywhere else.

Its right about at the God dwelling among us, living our experiences, that I put my book down, and ask/command God.
but your dad didn't leave your family for another.
your dad didn't leave you, forget you, ignore you, replace you.
your dad didn't choose your former children's ministry director over you.

mine did.

how do i know that you won't leave. that you won't find someone else that's better.
i understand that you love me now, that you have always loved me, but how do I know that that's gonna stay. and how can you be in That?

its almost like i have to surround myself with people who I know you love, who I see your care for and concern for and devotion to, in order to even continue to remember You.

I don't trust people. I don't open up to people in order to make new friends. I try to avoid the surface fake stuff, because I still have my high-school era disdain for inauthenticity. But I don't have the trust or the guts to be authentic to everyone. I'm generally removed and probably judgmental. and i never have anything to talk about. i do hate though, when i talk and people laugh at me for talking too intelligently. thus, it takes me a while to have everyday conversations.

except with my high school girls. thank God for his grace. it amazes me that I get to be a part of their lives, and even an agent of Him, in spite of everything.
and i get to keep working at FIRM. and seeing His Love work amazing wonders.

i don't know. its like whenever i stop and really think about it, God and my fathers choices are irrevocably tied together. And I love Jesus for bringing me through all that, and Being with me during the worst of it. But I'm still so scarred. and i feel like they're always gonna be there, and i feel like i should be over it by now, seeing as i have a completely different relationship with my father now, (which is almost miraculous in and of itself, except when he completely disappoints me all over again)
and my dad just wraps himself with biblical language, and rights and wrongs, and prays so much, and runs a ministry. but he still lies. and he still says he'll do things that he doesn't follow through on. so how...? i dunno. how am i supposed to have the deep faith that is in all parts of my life?
because all deep questions run back to my father. and his selectivity in his participation in my life.
and no real answers ever seem to surface.
no matter how many times we have this conversation with tears welling in our eyes.

i do know about God's feelings on:
the oppressed
the hungry
the aliens
the widows
the orphans
the prostitutes
the sick
His World

thus, i still want to do humanitarian work for the rest of my life. maybe to help me figure out where i'm going, where God's moving. maybe for deeper spiritual reasons than that. maybe not.

ps: this is why i need to blog more regularly, so I don't post seven blogs all in one. sry

thanks.

My father says that after True Thankfulness will always come Joy.

my father is a man of great wisdom, even if he has hurt a lot of people along the way and doesn't seem to acknowledge it.

He told me to try it. just to see if it would work.

So I wrote an e-mail of true thankfulness to my stepmother, who alongside my father, decided to let me have $200 for a birthday present a few months early. It allowed me to go to Mozambique for a few days.
In Mozambique I had the best prawns (shrimp) known to man-kind. I had matapas? matadas? some kind of delicious spinach and prawn liquid that you pour on top of rice or pap/mealie meal.
I met great adventurous spirits.
I laid in a hammock in the afternoon sun.
I slept a lot.
I experienced life in a normal city that didn't feel touristy. It was normal Maputans eating in the restaurants and buying vegetables from the women on the sidewalks. It was school kids who passed me on the streets not beggars. The police presence perhaps had something to do with that, and I know that I missed seeing a lot of the city, the poorer and more desperate areas, I'm sure. I walked around the business areas. the government housing areas, the beaches, most of the city center.
All the streets are named after leftist revolutionaries. including Mao Tse Tung and Kim il sung. and Karl Marx. and Lenin.
I am thankful for that adventure.
And I am thankful that I had some time to get away from Stellenbosch to process my time here. And I didn't cross the Atlantic, so when I came back, I could remember the parts that I really do love, and acknowledge the many idiosyncrasies that I have gotten used to. And I got to take more pictures.
I am thankful for all of that.
See you soon America

http://www.churchworldservice.org/site/PageServer?pagename=action_ghana_program_job1

I want this job in a few years...



or I wanna do the Peace Corps.

or Teach for America

or life in Fresno
- teaching credential in math
- work at a high school until i burn out
- get better access to the various communities in poorer parts of town
- Live, Love. choose peace. do something good for the place where i am from. the place that continues to claim me no matter how far away i go.

I read blogs instead of writing big papers...

I can’t stand your religious meetings.
I’m fed up with your conferences and conventions.
I want nothing to do with your religion projects,
your pretentious slogans and goals.
I’m sick of your fund-raising schemes,
your public relations and image making.
I’ve had all I can take of your noisy ego-music.
When was the last time you sang to me?
Do you know what I want?
I want justice—oceans of it.
I want fairness—rivers of it.
That’s what I want. That’s all I want.

this is what eugene cho has to say about the message's version of Micah: http://eugenecho.wordpress.com/2009/04/28/everyone-needs-to-read-this-because-maybe-this-is-actually-about-you/#more-4323



and...
A Fransican Benediction

May God bless you with discomfort,
at easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships,
so that you may live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger,
at injustice, oppression, and exploitation of people,
so that you may work for justice, freedom, and peace.

My God bless you with tears,
to shed for those who suffer from pain, rejection, starvation, and war,
so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and turn their
pain to joy.

And may God bless you with enough foolishness,
to believe that you can make a difference in this world,
so that you can do what others claim cannot be done.

Amen.


thats a Fransiscan benediction that I found here:
http://gracerules.wordpress.com/

and finally
Christian holiness consists not of trying as hard as we can to be good, but of learning to live in the new world created by Easter, the new world which we publicly entered in our baptism. There are many parts of the world that we can't do anything about except pray. But there is one part of the world, one part of physical reality, which we can do something about, and that is the creature we call 'myself.' Personal holiness and global holiness belong together. Those who wake up to the one may well find themselves called to wake up to the other. -NT Wright

that I found here:
http://www.parablesofaprodigalworld.com/2008/02/top-10-3-excerpts-from-nt-wrights.html

Someday...

I want to be able to...
-be okay with spending money on quality things like museums and theatre and haircuts
-know myself well enough to intervene before my depression hits
-be able to budget and save money
-be better at appreciating co-workers and bosses and people who work under me
-know the right thing to say to an abused child
-be able to keep my room decently clean without getting overwhelmed by the mess
-appreciate my mother better
-trust female people that I meet enough to actually be friends (without needed acquaintanceship for a few years first)
-be more faithful to my Jesus in my everydays
-exercise regularly without falling into obsessing about weight
-have a better way to deal with stress than eating
-find a stable routine that rejuvenates me enough to let me keep doing the harder/deeper stuff without killing myself
Its not the hard stuff that wears me out. Its the mundane things like dishes and laundry and money that become too much to handle when I wear myself out emotionally

I hate being negative. A lot of the people that are around me right now, who I do love and appreciate, seem to all be in this negative place right now. Laura is really homesick. Jessica is pretty homesick and pissed at how patriarchal and horrible at dealing with rape/women's issues this society is. KP is KP. i love KP, but she does tend to be pessimistic.
I love my afterschool program, but it drains me.
I love these kids, but they drain me.
I was supposed to write a huge research paper this week.
I spent a good 5+4+4+4 = 17 hours with my kids this week, all 12-14 year olds. (not including the 3 hours I spent in class talking about my kids)
I'm leaving so soon. Just as they're starting to trust me and open up.
and there's nothing i can do about it.
I hate feeling powerless.

There is a Jesus who makes a whole lot more sense when I'm surrounded by suffering. He is Good and He is God.
Proverbs for today
Do not withhold good from those who deserve it when its in your power to help them. If you can help your neighbor now, don't say, "Come back tomorrow, and then I'll help you." 3:27-28
And a Psalm for Jacob Zuma and my township kids
Give justice to the king, O God,
and righteousness to the king's son
Help him judge your people in the right way;
let the poor always be treated fairly.
May the mountains yield prosperity for all,
and may the hills be fruitful,
(because the king does what is right.)
Help him to defend the poor,
to rescue the children of the needy,
and to crush their oppressors. 72:1-4

Easter and Shalom

After sending a miniature essay facebook message to my friend in Spokane, I realized that I've become my own little expert on Africa and aid... I realize that I sort of have an educational backing that is more authentic, but I haven't really been spending that much time in rural areas at all. or in bigger cities. its mostly been Kayamandi township
I went on a roadtrip across the southern coast, which was BEAUTIFUL. it was also touristy, in a chill/beachy/mountainy/occasionally hippie sort of way.

but really, who am i to know Africa? or even South Africa?
i've been so secluded here.
and i'm learning a lot from my classes.

but i've been living in paradise. a small safe town with cheap food and cute shops.