the big picture

one of my favorite things about blogging and journaling is going back and reading old entries. i recently read part of my journal from my second year of college. at the time, i thought i knew what i wanted: the career i was studying in school, the boy i was interested in, what i hoped to get out of everyday life. eight years later (holy cow!) i found myself laughing at my former dreams. now that so much time has passed, i am able to see the bigger picture. i know now that had all those desires been met, i would have ended up pretty miserable. and i can also see now that not getting what i wanted at the time ultimately lead to where i am today. and life is pretty great today.

i would like to say that seeing the big picture of my past has enabled me to realize god has reasons for not giving my all of my current desires, but it's not that easy. but i think i'm getting there. one step at a time.

a numbers game.

last night i was asked, on a scale of 1-10, how much do i open up to people about what's really going on in my life, why i'm struggling with, what questions i'm bringing to god, etc. i said i was a 2, at least when it comes to social settings in groups (which is the context in which this question was asked of me). but i'm not a 2 because i don't want to share; i'm a 2 because i don't know how. it takes me a long time to process my thoughts answers to deeper questions, and sometimes, like when i was afraid, it can even take weeks before i know how to share my thoughts. and so i think that's what this blog has been for me lately: a place where i can be more like a 6. i can see my thought written down and edit them before they are really out there. and most of what i share on here comes after several days of planning. (but it's all written in one sitting.)

and i do have a few people i can be 9s and 10s with, but they are few. i think none of us wood survive long in this world if we didn't have at least one person to be a 10

a weekend in the mountains.

i know that tomorrow is photo friday, but this post would not do my weekend justice if i did not include pictures.

my roommate is a nanny, and the family she works for owns a cabin in maggie valley, north carolina. so a group of us went out there to spend the weekend away from the city, away from the busyness of our lives, and away from internet and phone service. it was incredible.

we got to the cabin late, around midnight friday night. when we woke up saturday morning, this was our view:



thankfully, all five of us loved snow. we were acting like kids on christmas morning.
this was the walkway up to the cabin:



after our pancake breakfast, we all headed into the mountains to go for a hike. we hiked the boogerman trail. it was so snowy and gorgeous.



and we were all acting a little silly...





on our way out of the park we drove through a meadow with about two dozen elk.



we got back to the cabin, made a fire in the wood burning stove, drank wine, and played clue (it was colonel mustard with the rope in the hall).



sunday morning we cleaned up the cabin and headed back towards nashville. we drove through the cherokee reservation and then went to the top of clingman's dome - the highest point in the smoky mountains.



it's been in the 70's this week in nashville, and i already miss the snow. being out there this weekend made my roommate and i want to come home and decorate for christmas. (but don't worry, we haven't... yet.)

i'm so famous.

(please note the title of this post is dripping in sarcasm sauce. someone invent a dang sarcasm font already, please?)

anyway. check it out. npr used one of my photographs for an article. much thanks to my friend jace for finding this and sharing it with me.

look for me on the big screen

about six years ago, a group on my college campus was giving away copies of don miller's "blue like jazz". i thought hey, why not, and read the book. and it changed my life. this book helped me realize that it was okay for me to question my beliefs, to challenge the christian ideologies i had grown up with. this isn't to say i ever stopped being a christian, or doubted the existence of god. it was more of a "do i believe in god because that's what i was told to believe or do i believe in god because i see the evidence of his existence in my life and in the world" kind of doubting. and it was hard. and it was good. and from that, i grew. i don't think it's possible to grow without questioning.

and the thing that i liked about the book was this raw honesty. and don's writing is so conversational, it makes for a quick easy read. my friend and i always joked that it felt like we were sitting down with him over a cup of coffee and just having a conversation with an old friend.*

well, a few years ago, some filmmakers from here in nashville approached don about turning this book into a film. so they worked together and changed some aspects of the book to turn it into more of a storyline, and hired actors and a crew. and then about a month ago, they announced they no longer had the funding to go ahead with the filming. until two guys started up a kickstarter campaign on behalf of the film. they set the goal low - with as little as $125,000 they could scrape together what they needed to get rolling. but records were broken and at the end of the campaign (which was this past monday), they ended up raising almost $350,000. and they began filming yesterday. and i got to be an extra.

so really i spent all day yesterday sitting in a lecture hall pretending to be a student at reed college. we sat in that room for about 10 hours, which will translate to probably 10 minutes of film. and though it had it's boring moments, it was still exciting, especially knowing the story behind the whole thing. and the actors were all incredibly nice. marshall allman is playing the lead character, and as a huge fan of lost, i was totally geeking out over the fact that tania raymonde was brought in as well. and of course, don was around for the whole thing.

so when this movie comes out, keep your eyes peeled for yours truly. there's maybe an 80% chance my shoulder will be seen. if you're lucky, i might sign the dvd when it comes out.

*ever since then, having coffee with don has been on my bucket list. so if anyone reading this knows anybody or has any strings they can pull, please, hook a sister up. he'll be in town for about a month.

hindsight is 20/20

the thing about hindsight is you can look back and see exactly where one small decision led to another decision which led to a life-changing decision. here's one example in my life:

-spring of 2004 i made the small decision to go to my friend angie's church.
-fall of 2004 that church planted a new church and i made the small choice to go with my friend jenna.
-spring of 2005 i made the decision to be a part of the internship that church was having in the summer.
-summer of 2005 that internship totally changed my life (which is a post all of it's own)
-spring of 2006 i chose to move to nashville, which probably wouldn't have happened if not for the people i met during that 2005 internship.

and when i reflect on moments like that, it makes me wonder what small decisions i am making today that will change my life a few months or years down the road. it's kind of crazy to think about sometimes. i guess it's sort of along the lines of the movies "the butterfly effect" or "sliding doors". will my life have a completely different outcome depending on whether i choose to go to frothy monkey or fido to get my daily caffeine dose? i would say most likely not, but you never know.

i think this is just a reminder that god is in control. if he wants to use a cup of coffee to change my life, i'm all for it.

ipod playlists, revisted

back in august i mentioned that i needed more playlists on my ipod. and i'm getting there. here's what i have:

8th & walnut - songs that remind me of the summer of 2005. a very life-changing summer. this list pretty much consists of coldplay, ben folds, and gorillaz.
falling for autumn - songs that mention or remind me of my favorite season.
favorites - self-explanatory.
flashback to younger days - self-explanatory.
get off your butt and do something with your life - songs that inspire me.
i dare you to just sit there - songs that demand to be danced to.
nashville artists - self-explanatory.
new music - an ever-changing playlist, where i stick new music until i learn it well.*
praise be to jeevus - songs about god, whether that was their intention or not. "jeevus" is a joke with my small group.
say no to miss kitty cause kitty go to dabbs house - the name is based off a joke with some friends, but this is a playlist of cheesy love songs.
slow jams for slow days - self-explanatory.
sometimes you have to move a little bit - songs that make you move, but not quite as much as the "i dare you to just sit there" playlist.
sometimes you need a little kick - songs that are a bit "crunchier" than what i normally listen to.
sunny happy driving with the windows down - self-explanatory
the evolution of a band - all of the songs by my favorite band, in chronological order.
the sky is falling - rainy day tunes.
there is no good category for songs like this - completely random, some of which just make you go "what just happened?"
this playlist is full of all kinds of awesome - a more picky version of my favorites
welcome to the south, y'all - i don't typically listen to country, but i have a few songs i like, or a few that are borderline country, and they all go in here.

*new music playlist currently consists of: grant terry, jon troast, and matt haeck. what new music have you been listening to? what playlists do you have?

i left a piece of my heart where i've never been.

that might sound weird. but it's true. for years now, i've felt like a part of me is in portland, oregon. but i've never even been there. while it is at the top of my list of u.s. cities to visit, part of me is afraid.

afraid that if i visit, i'll want to move there. but i don't want to move. i love nashville. maybe the two cities are playing tug of war with my heart.

maybe i'm full of crap. maybe if i visit i'll hate it. that scares me too. i don't know why. i don't even know anyone who lives there.

but everyone who has visited has told me i would love it.

i've always said the world is too big to stay in one place for too long. i used to think that meant i wanted to move a lot. that was before i fell in love with nashville. i just need a job with lots of vacation time. :)