Mission Trip

I saw a poster today at school for a mission trip this summer with HCJB. The trip is going to Cork, Ireland, and Kiev, Ukraine, to help with HCJB's radio work, or something like that... I'm not exactly clear on all the details right now. When I saw it I was immediately interested. The trip costs $4,500, airfare included. I know that if God wants me to go on the trip, I don't need to worry about the money. The problem is, I'm not so sure if it's God prompting me, or if it's just the fact that I've wanted to go to Ireland since seventh grade. Or even if it's God who gave me the desire to go to Ireland way back then. Anyway, I would appreciate prayer for knowing whether or not to sign up/apply.

For post's sake

Don't bother reading this. It's just a post for the sake of posting so I don't end up forgetting to post altogether. It seems to happen to me a lot. I'll do something for a while, and enjoy it. Then after a bit, I skip doing it a time. Then... I skip it again, since it was so easy to skip the first time. Then, before you (or in this case I, since I'm talking about myself here) realize it, you've stopped doing whatever it was you enjoyed doing in the first place, just to spend the time doing something stupid instead. Enjoyable, but stupid. So... here's a post/note-to-self to write.

This one time...

Alas, this time, my loyal reader(s?), you will be disappointed. The pithy, witty, and oftentimes profound essays on life, a) love and happiness, b) liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, or c) the universe and everything, will not be forthcoming on this occasion. Weep not, devoted reader. For I shall return, on some day not long hence*(editor's note: proper usage?). Tonight, however, I have other things. Important things. Valued and highly treasured things.** I will leave you with a short life lesson, as you are so insatiable in your (somewhat odd) desire to hear what I have to say.

If you find yourself enrolled in Computer Science II, and you are studying Java, and you happen to have a homework problem that the teacher went over in class to show everyone how to do it, and you have everything just the way the teacher had it, but it's still not working for some reason, and you have no idea, so you sit for upwards of four hours trying to figure out why it's not working, and you do everything you can think of to make it work (since obviously the teacher knows what he's talking about, after all, he does have his doctorate), and everything you try just isn't working, and you use an incredible amount of comma-splices in a single sentence. First, take a breath. That was a long sentence. Now, when you've got your breath back: do it the way you were planning on doing it in the first place. Your teacher did not give you all the information, so what you have is never going to work. When you do this, you will complete the program in fifteen minutes. MLIA?***

*Friday, probably

**Dr. Who, season 3

***My Life Is Abysmally-wasted-sometimes-on-homework-problems-that-really-shouldn't-have-taken-that-long-at-all-if-only-I'd-had-the-correct-information

Sometimes

Sometimes it's easy to write. Like my last post. I just started writing and it all just sorta flowed out. No thinking about what to write; no taking a break to collect my thoughts of what I wanted to say; I just sat down (albeit in the beautiful warm sunshine) and wrote 'til writing was done. Other times, though, it's hard. You just sit. Sit and stare. Sit, stare, and wonder why nothing is coming to mind about what to write, why nothing's in your mind, why nothing is appearing on the paper. So you wait. Wait for inspiration. For inspiration to come in a wonderful way and lift your pen right out of your hand and start writing on its own: beautiful, amazing, wonderful things. But nothing happens. Try as you might to will the pen to distribute its ink around the page in the form of exquisite artistry, nothing happens. So you get frustrated. You know you've written things before. You may have even liked things you've written before. But the thought floating around your mind is "You've done this before and it was easy. You're trying it now and it's not easy. Why keep going? It'll be easier some other time." But you don't want to write some other time. You just somehow know that you've got something to write, something important, something other people should read. But nothing comes. So you just start writing - writing nonsense. It doesn't matter what it is - the first thing to flow from your mind, down your arm, to your hand, and through your pen, you write. It's gibberish. Gibberish and meaningless words, all jumbled together on a page. Eventually, though, you write long enough and a pattern starts to emerge. A series of words, of musings, of ideas, all growing, meshing, joining together to become a single thought. You begin to recognize the shape, and begin to build on it. What started as a useless group of words has become something you can relate to, something you can share, something you can be proud of. And you realize that after all that time wasted staring at that page, believing you had nothing to say, you had it. You had it all along. You wrote. You didn't put it off 'til another day. You put down in words words hidden under the jumbled surface of your busy mind. And you realize with a start: you're a writer!

If they've never seen sun

Take a day like today,

and explain if you will

the beauty, the wonder of spring.

Do all that you can

to convince your best friend

that today is a wonderful thing.

But if they've never seen sun,

well, then all that you've done

is just show that you know of the door.

You could write a great speech,

you could talk 'til you're blue,

of light breezes just bringing a cool.

You could talk of the sky

and the warmth from above,

and how clouds are across skies playing.

But if they've never seen sun,

well, then all that you've done

is just show that you know how to talk.

You could try to use letters,

after all it is said

that the pen always wins all its battles.

You could write of the sound

of the leaves gently rustling,

how they leap and they dance for sheer joy.

But if they've never seen sun,

well, then all that you've done

is just show that you know some big words.

You could try to use song,

to express all the wonder

of the birds brightly singing their songs,

with some rhymes that you wrote

and a tune you can feel

and a sound that sounds perfect outside.

But if they've never seen sun,

well, then all that you've done

is just show that you know melodies.

So if you've a day like today,

with blue skies and no clouds,

with the sun shining brightly and birds chirping lightly,

and some cool breezes teasing

and green leaves just being,

and a ladybug sits on your hand,

And if you have someone,

have a someone you know,

who just lives in their room all alone.

and they only come out

after dark (so it seems),

and you've tried, oh you've tried to bring them the sun.

You've tried eloquent teachings,

and passionate speechings,

and even tried coaxing with song,

You've tried all you can think of,

and some that you haven't,

and still they refuse to see light:

Their hand you must grab,

to the door you must drag them,

outside you must rush if you want to revive them.

And as they stand blinking

in warm spring day sunshine,

you'll be glad to just hear them now say:

"All the time I have missed this,

so much time I have wasted,

this much now have I seen.

Enough with windowless rooms,

and with staying indoors,

and with carefully hiding away."

You'll listen and smile,

and agree when they say

that "Today is a wonderful day."

Tragedy

Google has failed me. It's sad, but it's true. I was looking back through my older posts (because I still amuse me even after I'm finished writing), and noticed a phrase that I know I got from a book I read. So I googled it. Nothing even close to what I was looking for. The phrase I wrote (and paraphrased a little from the original) is: " the arranging of letters into words and words into sentences." So if anyone ends up actually reading this some day, and knows what book that quote is from - tell me. Tell me what book it is. Don't just tell me that you know what book it's from and not tell me the name of the book. That would just be cruel.

I almost had something more to post today. I had inspiration, desire, a will to write. And write I did. Then... I stopped writing. I had lost the muse. I don't know what happened, really. One minute I had things to say, and the next I had nothing to say. All this to say, I have no words to say. Tonight, anyway. Say, maybe tomorrow I'll have more to say. Or even something to say. Instead of saying this. It's a worthless use of 'say.' [I'll eventually finish what I started, however, and I will post it. I promise.]

First picture

I noticed that the blog looks fairly boring. So here's a cheery picture I took, to brighten it up: