inspire me.

Birds pass by to tell me that I'm not alone
Well, I'm pushing myself to finish this part, I can handle a lot
But one thing I'm missing is in your eyes

~rogue wave(s)

inspiration.

random, nonsensical, meaningless, or meaningful?

being outside inspires me.

sun, rain, clouds, wind, night, day, dark, cool, bright, warm, whatever it may be... it all serves to inspire...to provoke thought and wonder, to cause feelings that could never begin to brew had i stayed inside.

books inspire me.

there are so many good books just waiting to be devoured and so little time. here are the new and old things i love about reading:

i love that it introduces you to worlds you've never known before. i love that reading takes you into other people's lives and you get to feel with them.

if we are brave enough to go there, there are so many worlds we can come to know and better understand through reading a book.

i'm not putting limits on what i read any more. i have been conditioned to judge a book by its cover, or to steer clear of books that really delve into "real" life stuff.

but i find when i read those books...my eyes are opened, my heart is changed, and i am a more empathetic being. a lot can happen when acting and praying in and with empathy.

what else inspires?

reading is...

walking into other worlds I would not have otherwise known.


i love reading when life is good, when life is hard, when life is busy, when life is slow. i love it for whenever. jumping into a book is like jumping into another world. i love the experience you can have when reading a book. it involves such active participation of all of our senses.

the emotional committment reading involves is interesting. you have to think about what you are reading, you have to process what you are reading. you have to see what you are reading. you can smell it too. you can hear it, if you listen hard enough.

you are there. you are an observer. you are part of the stories. you can fall in love. you can cry. you can come to know and love the characters you meet, or you may hate them. you can travel across the world, or meet someone interesting. you can see a real life event that happened many moons ago, or 1500 miles away, but it can be like you are experiencing it firsthand.

reading can open your mind to possibilities, it can challenge the way you think, it can bring you comfort or excitement.

currently i am fretting alongside catherine moreland over henry tilney, i am walking alongside robbie turner during WWII in deep anguish, i am seeing the events and the people involved in the columbine massacre from a much more emotional and detailed perspective, and i am learning more about how Jesus connects with us in our hurts and sorrows, and seeing His hurts and sorrows in a deeper realness than I ever have before.

"Don't Think or Judge, Just Listen."

I Loved this book! Seriously, one of the most enjoyable reads amongst YA fiction, amongst the books I've read in the last two years or so. The story of Just Listen follows Annabel Greene as she navigates her way through a messy chunk of time, where life deals some crushing blows, but also brings some wonderful gifts.

Lessons learned:

Some lives may look pretty perfect on the outside, but we never have any idea what is really going on in the inside. (Yes it's cliche, but a truth we tend to forget when we get stuck in the idea that the grass is always greener wherever we aren't, etc.)

Honesty is the best policy. (Yep, I wholly was convicted by this whole embracing lying lifestyle. Lying in the sense that we do it to keep others out, to keep from dealing with the real raw stuff in our lives, to deceive others, and to deceive ourselves.)

Family matters. Friends matter. Share, love, and be there for one another.

Just Listen.

i cannot live without books-thomas jefferson

okay, so this list is just going to be the books i'd like to read this summer...yes i realize it is still extraordinarily long, and will probably be added to, and some will be taken away over the course of the next couple of months :) and it will probably transition into a fall, then winter, to spring, and then summer again reading list :)

Reading List:
To Kill a Mockingbird
Farenheit 451 (reread)
One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest
The Catcher in the Rye (reread)
1984
Lord of the Flies
Hamlet (reread)
Great Expectations
The Outsiders
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
The Great Gatsby
The Host
Jane Eyre (reread)
Emma
Persuasion
The Illiad/The Odyssey
The Relentless Tenderness of Jesus (finish)
The Glass Castle (finish)
The Garden of Eden (finish)
Evening
East of Eden (finish)
The Shack (finish)
The Diary of Anne Frank (finish)
Joe Jones
New Moon (reread)
Just Listen
Someone Like You
Along for the Ride
Lock & Key
That Summer
Love's Long Fatal Chase
The Abstinence Teacher
If you could see me now
Story of a Girl
Sweetharts
Columbine
An Unlikely Disciple
All the Living
Confessions of a shopaholic
The Third Angel
Loving Frank
The Looking Glass Wars

to kill a mockingbird (the second time around)

so i am almost finished with to kill a mockingbird for the second time. this time around it was so much better. i was totally immersed in this truly moving book. i decided to watch the movie earlier this week and while of course, it is never as good as the book, i loved the inclusion of a particular key quote/concept that transformed beautifully from book to film.

(Atticus to Scout) "First of all, if you can learn a simple trick, Scout, you'll get along better with all kinds of folks. You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view-until you climb in his skin and walk around in it."

such a great topic for a classroom discussion! :)