like love.

055

2011-12-19T22:22:00.002-05:00

i have always loved the distinct smell of my gramma jane. & tonight smells like her. i don't know why. i can't seem to rid my nose & brain of her scent (nor do i want to).

i remember the day of her death like it was last week, and at the same time it seems like ages have past. i still miss her more than i know how to say.

i could really go for a gramma jane cuddle right about now.

054

2011-12-17T18:51:00.003-05:00

it's been awhile.

this month i've joined some roommates & friends in unplug & cuddle. no facebook, less wasted time, more real life interaction!

i've been enjoying spending time with people in real life, learning to not be so reliant on computer interaction & even doing crazy things like picking up my telephone to call people.

i'm enjoying the Christmas holiday, preparing my heart for the season as to not let the meaning of this holiday pass me by. i'm trying to get into advent, to really understand that the Son of God came to be born into this world to live & to die for us. i'm trying to not get caught up in all the commercialism & presents & cookies & whatever. i'm trying to spend this time loving others & worshiping the Lord & diving into deep & rich relationships (new & old).

-------

a friend asked me recently what thing in my life right now brings me the most joy. i said jesus. he said that didn't count, because jesus should always bring me the most joy. so i said friendships & relationships.

looking back on this year, it's been up & down (isn't it always, though? i guess it's just been a new kind of up & down). it was a rough transition back into life in america: living with new roommates, finding a new small group, being completely and totally done with the college phase of my life, working in the corporate world, starting VLI, meeting tons of new people, figuring out what my friendships with my college friends looked like as our environment and life situations changed, wondering what the heck i'm doing with my life, so on & so forth. it was overwhelming to say the least.

but by the grace of God, we're kind of getting some of it figured out (the relationship part of this, anyways. i still have no idea what i'm doing with my life, and i'm okay with that.).

my family, my closest friends, my (then new) roommates & my coworkers had so much grace with me as i transitioned from one extreme (living in a mud hut in rural africa with orphans & former child soldiers, all that stuff) to the other (living in a huge house in the first-world, working in corporate america, blah blah blah). they have continued to have grace with me as i keep figuring things out, as my emotions go up & down & up & down. they have pushed me, encouraged me, loved me unconditionally.

new friends have come into my life recently; i feel so blessed to suddenly have these deep & beautiful & rich friendships with people that a few short months ago were strangers. they are friends that have spoken so much truth & love into my life, people that have been teaching me & challenging me & encouraging me in fresh ways, ways that are different than the ways my long-time friends do these same things.

God has been using these people in my life so much. He knows who i need & when, how their unique gifts will be manifested in our relationships, how they will challenge me & teach me.

& i think that's really cool.

"as iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another."

i guess what i'm trying to say is that these people have been sharpening me in the places & ways where i most need it. for that, i am so so grateful.

so, to my friends who have sharpened me, THANKYOU.

053

2011-09-11T23:32:00.002-04:00

a few weeks ago, i started reading some journal entries that i was writing this time last year. my first journal entry, from the wee hours of the morning of august 16, is about the excitement & anticipation of meeting our team & heading off with them to uganda.

i haven't been reading much in between then and now, but tonight i wondered, "what happened one year ago?" so i picked up my worn red journal, flipped to the page labeled with "11 sept 2010" and scribbles.

it reads, "today i ate beans & moved into a mud hut."

it goes on to describe the details of our day: saying goodbye to our friends at hotel roma, our home for a few weeks; a journey from gulu town to a plot of land in the bush somewhere in masindi district; details of a 2-hour trip in a white van driven by charles, going from paved roads to dirt roads to a path that could barely qualify as a road; singing disney songs; all six of us doing ALL of our laundry at once until our hands bled (why we ever thought doing our laundry together was a good idea is beyond me); fred making dirty white socks look impeccably clean; slipping & sliding through the mud as we ventured to the latrine that night.

i wrote about the disadvantages of living in a mud hut: poop floor, termites behind every surface, spiders adorning our walls, the possibility of rats, a fresh sprinkling of dead bugs (ones small enough to fit through the holes of our mosquito nets) on our pillows each night, always dirty feet, etc.

little did i know how comforting these "disadvantages" would soon become. little did i know that soon our hut would become home, that we would decorate, that the rats never would show up (not that we know of, anyways), that the wall spiders pretty much keep to themselves, that termites really aren't so bad.

little did i know that the following day my journal entry would be so different than the day prior.

12 sept 2010: "i woke up this morning to the sounds of children singing. getting ready for bed last night we heard sounds of children laughing. the rain sounds nice on the roof of our hut. i'm still amazed that the inside stays dry. when we go to bed & turn off our headlamps, it's pitch black in here. when there is lightning, though, there is a line of light that comes in along the circumference of the hut where the mud wall and the thatched roof leave a gap."

pages follow of beautiful memories.

i'm so thankful to have these memories documented on paper & in my mind.

052

2011-08-18T23:56:00.001-04:00

why do i so often, without even thinking (or even sometimes at times when i take a second to think things through), say things i don't mean?

for some reason, in the moments when so much more could be said, i speak words that are trite & untrue in order to fill empty space in conversation, hoping to avoid potentially awkward situations, to stay at the surface, & to brush over whatever lies underneath.

i had a brief conversation with an acquaintance today.

to his, "hey, how's it going," i respond with truth.

"it's going alright, how is your day" (off to a good start.)

"eh, i'm alright."

"just alright?"

(i'm paraphrasing here) "yeah, you know, getting through it. i'm still alive, that's a plus." (insert a sigh here. not a sigh like "oh my life is terrible and i want the world to know," more like a "today is really rough but i'm trying to keep my head up" kind of sigh.) he continued, "i'm putting one foot in front of the other, trying to make it through."

maybe i was trying to be empathetic, or perhaps i was left tongue-tied by his charming good looks & momentarily forgot how to speak words of substance; i responded with, "yeah, i know that goes."

BUT DO I?

in my naivety i assumed that he was having a rough day at work, that maybe he had a bad night's sleep, that the cause of his downtrodden disposition was something i could relate to.

in my naivety i assume far too often that i can relate to the situations happening in peoples' lives. i assume it's something i've been through. i assume that maybe they're overreacting when they say things are absolutely terrible & falling apart. i assume that they're handling it just fine or that they don't need anyone to talk to about it.

(and you know what happens when you assume…)

but here's the reality: i have NO IDEA what is going on in the lives of anyone i encounter unless i ask, really ask how things are really going. no idea. none. none at all.

it's always a possibility that i cannot relate, that it's something i have not and will not ever experience. it's possible that they are not overreacting, not in the slightest, but that really & truly their lives are falling apart. it's possible that they are not handling it fine and that they are in dire need of talking about it.

so why do i assume the best?

why don't i ask the questions that are a little tougher to ask? why do i say, "oh, i totally know what you're going through," when i am clueless as to what is really going on in your life?

why don't i say, "do you want to talk about it?" why don't i invite people to share a meal and share our lives? why don't i offer a prayer to the Lord on their behalf? why don't i speak up and let people know that someone cares?

i'm a coward. i'm afraid of asking tough questions, afraid to go to deep, afraid to offend, afraid to help, afraid to be rejected… the list goes on.

i don't want to fear that anymore.

i want to stop saying words i don't mean. i want to stop pretending that everything is peachy. i want to ask tough questions.

051

2011-06-22T23:26:00.000-04:00

i have a million things in my mind and not enough free time in a day to adequately process them. i think this post might just be an outpouring of the feelings in my heart and the thoughts in my head.

let this be your warning: they may be ugly, they may be skewed by my distorted perception of things, they might not make much sense at all, they might not resolve. but i need to get them out.

(i'm not looking for answers.)

sometimes i feel like i'm not sure where i fit lately. i'll be among family and friends with whom i've always felt perfectly snug, but something just seems off. i feel inadequate. i feel like a third wheel. i feel like someone who is present but not involved, sitting in on someone else's conversation. i feel discontent going back to the places where i grew up; i am anxious and fidgety in middle-class america. the places and situations in which i once felt belonging, i feel i don't belong. i feel a switchfoot song coming on.

(well shoot. i just got distracted and some old switchfoot lyrics refuse to my head. dang it, jon foreman, you can always write my feelings far more eloquently than i can.)

i feel moments of beautiful community and love and life and in a flash it feels so empty.

i feel bold confidence and self-assurance mingled with fear and insecurities.

and then i'm humbled as God gently reminds me that it's not about me. i feel peace as He calls me back and says, "it's the already and not yet! there are parts of heaven on earth, glimpses of what is to come! but it's still earth and it's still so broken and imperfect. and you, my beloved, you are broken and imperfect. but my grace abounds."

His grace abounds.

in my brokenness, my selfishness, my sin, my narcissism, my impure thoughts, my false motives, my lies, my insecurities, my materialistic nature, my wandering heart, my anxiety & fear...

...His grace abounds.

He is so good. and He reminds me time and time again that, yeah, i don't belong here. but while i'm here i need to get off my high horse and get down in the dirt and serve. i need to put aside my selfish ambition and follow Him. i need to serve before i demand, love and not hate, to give before i take. i need to stop expecting anything in return. i need to be aware that this world has nothing for me, we were created for a place far greater.

oh, and i don't belong here.

050

2011-06-03T17:58:00.002-04:00

i feel like my fiftieth blog post should be something extraordinary. it won't be.

i'm sitting at panera bread, grabbing a quick dinner between commitments.

evidently, fridays here mean chess night for a half-dozen men between the ages of 35 and 75. i regret the fact that i've always been too stubborn and impatient to figure out the rules and strategy of chess.

(i have, however, made it a goal of mine to be able to solve a rubik's cube without any aid this summer.)

there's a man here that i've seen at this panera at least four times in the last five months (i swear i don't come here daily). we exchanged a friendly hello; as i went up for a refill on my free baby cup of water, he smiled and chuckled. in my mind, i heard him say, "i see that you are also too frugal to spend $1.39 on a fountain drink today." he used his baby cup to sneak fruit punch and a slice of lemon. sometimes i feel guilty consuming a sugary drink for which i haven't paid. maybe at 70 i won't care, either.

049

2011-05-24T23:14:00.001-04:00

i haven't written in nearly three months.

whoops.

048

2011-02-26T23:43:00.001-05:00

(surprise!) i've been thinking about uganda the past few days.

thursday night, i had a dream that i saw some of the kids. i remember seeing norbert. he said to me, "irene, i have been missing you so seriously! you come and give me a hug with both of your arms!" (sometimes, certain kids would give half-hugs, so we would tell them to hug us with both arms.)

friday at work, i was chatting with my friend kathy. her cubicle is on the other side of mine. she said, "so erin, what's the story with these kids in the pictures you have hanging up over there? i heard you went to africa or something?"

soon, i was talking with her and pam about my love for these ugandan kiddos, dreaming of seeing them again soon.

last night, i was talking to someone i went to school with who i hadn't seen since school ended. (after spring semester last year, he spent some time in india; his love for that place, i'm pretty sure, is like my love for uganda.)

he asked how my trip was then asked me a simple question. "are you still there?"

i smiled, thinking that those four words together formed the perfect question. "yeah, i am," i told him. "you're still in india?"

he nodded.

this morning, i was talking with my friend rachel about all of this. she asked if i would rather be there; if i had the opportunity to go there now, would i? while my heart longs to be there, i've been coming to the realization that right now in my life, the best way to help these kids is to make the most of the opportunities i have in ohio.

yes, if i was in uganda, i could show them love more tangibly. i could hug them, play cards with them, tell them i love them. (and if i had the ability to transport there even for like three days just to show them love, believe me i would.) all of those things are good.

but right now, i have loans to pay.

more importantly, RIGHT NOW i have the ability to tell TONS of people about the things i saw and how they can be a part of this. right now, i live in a place where there are hundreds and hundreds of people with more money than they know what to do with. (i'm still figuring out the best way to reach all these people, but it's possible!) i am in a nation with some of the wealthiest people in the world.

so what am i gonna do about it? (i'm slowly figuring this one out.)

brooke fraser sings this song called albertine, written about a girl she met in rwanda. brooke promised someone that she would write a song about this girl, to tell people what she had seen.

she sings:
"i am on a plane across a distant sea, but i carry you in me
and in the dust on my feet...

now that i have seen i am responsible
faith without deeds is dead
now that i have held you in my own arms
i cannot let go till you are…

i will tell the world
i will tell them where i've been
i will keep my word
i will tell them albertine"

who is your albertine?

what have you seen that has changed you? what fills your being with righteous anger? what moves you to get up off your butt and do something? what must you tell the world?

i listened to this song in the car today while driving from columbus to pittsburgh this afternoon. i may or may not have cried (i'll give you a hint--it's the first one).

thinking of what i've seen, those 67 beautiful kids we lived with this fall, the thousands and thousands of others just like them all over northern uganda, southern sudan, and the congo that have had their lives radically altered (in horrible ways) by the stupid LRA. i think of norbert and fred and clinton and peter and solomon and gloria and faida and joyce and janet and gladys…

now that i have seen, I AM RESPONSIBLE.

likewise, now that you have seen, you are responsible.

so now let's go & tell the world.

047

2011-02-18T13:26:00.001-05:00

oh, i was not created to spend eight hours a day in a grey cubicle.

don't get me wrong, I LOVE MY JOB. i love what i do, i love who i work with, i feel incredibly blessed to be a part of the thirty-one family, and i would not trade this if i could. i realize that so many people are without work. i know. i love columbus, i love the people that i get to live life with; i am blessed to live in this place. i am not complaining in the least.

i just don't think i was created for cubicles, computer screens, fluorescent lighting, regulated air temperature, paper clips & post-it notes.

my entire being is filled with longing.

my skin longs to soak up the sun's warmth.

my body longs to lay in fields of grass for a mid-afternoon nap.

my nose longs to smell warmth, sunshine, and beauty.

my lungs longs to breathe in fresh breezy air, unpolluted by cars & airplanes & people.

my fingers long to be interlaced with those of beautiful little children.

my ears long to hear their singing & yelling & laughter, little squeals of delight.

my feet long to wear flip flops (or no shoes at all); they, along with my ankles, long to be lightly dusted with dirt & earth.

my eyes long to see the beauty of God's grandiose creation all around me.

my head longs to be used as a carrying mechanism, to transport bags of citrus fruit from gabriel's home back to our home, where we can use it to make freshly squeezed orange juice & limeade.

my arms long to hold little ones close to me.

my mouth longs to make attempts to speak languages to foreign to me, to whisper, to shout, to sing words of praise & of love & affirmation.

my toenails long to be sloppily painted a million different colors by a million different children.

my back longs for a toddler hanging on as we explore the compound.

my hands long to be used to clean out wounds and bandage them with love & care.

my legs long to carry me through journeys unfathomable.

my heart longs to be somewhere that feels a little more like home.

046

2011-01-21T21:32:00.000-05:00

processing more and more.

since being back in columbus, i started going to a new small group. it (conveniently) meets at my house monday nights. three of my roommates attend/lead the group. i had been thinking about how i should get connected with a new small group since my CCAD days are over, and this one was too perfect to pass up. so i started going and i like it a lot.

this past weekend, i had a couple of breakdowns. i realized that i need to start talking about things with people. monday night at small group proved to be the perfect opportunity to start doing that.

i sat on the floor of our living room with five other beautiful and wonderful women of God, talking about what i saw in uganda, the things we see (and don't see) all around us daily: injustice that surrounds us, the ways in which we change that makes our once-normal life not so normal, the hunger and disease that steals away so many innocent lives, et cetera. and we (some of us, anyways) cried. and talked. and prayed. and it was good.

i don't want to ever forget these kids. i can't. i don't, however, want to be stuck in the past, longing for days gone by. i want to take what i saw and what i learned and move forward, to help change things, to live my life differently.

but how?

i guess i don't really know what that looks like yet, exactly. i have ideas and glimpses of bits & pieces of what that means, but i can't know for certain. we just have to see how things unfold.

i was messaging with suz this week, we talked a bit about crying and emotions. i said how i've been emotional; she said she's been emotional too. she said, "it's getting better, but we will never forget you know."

no, absolutely no; we will never forget. we won't. we can't. and quite frankly we don't want to.

and things will get better. maybe for our emotions, yes, but also as we see more clearly what the future holds for us and for these beautiful kiddos.

i think crying is okay, good even. it means that God is moving something inside of us. it's good to be mad about injustice. it's good to mourn with your brothers and sisters. "mourn with those who mourn, rejoice with those who rejoice."

sorry for another abrupt ending, but this concludes today's thoughts.

045

2011-01-10T23:10:00.001-05:00

(i'm processing things. this is part one of i don't know how many. and it might end abruptly, but because i'm not finished processing, i don't really want this to resolve at the end.)

how do you put into words the experiences of four life-altering months?

where do you begin? what do you say? what don't you say?

how can you possibly write down on paper (or type on a computer) the things you saw, the love you felt, the lessons you learned, the wisdom you gained, the ways God stretched you?

when people ask, "how was uganda?!" how do you give an adequate response in a short enough time?

how do you sum up four months into a thousand words or less?

you can't.

anything i tell you of my experiences will never be enough. as much as i might want you to, you can't understand completely. but i really want to try.

i'll start with things i learned.

i learned a lot. i grew a lot. i was stretched a lot. i realized that american culture is a little bit (okay, maybe a lot) messed up. i learned that i would be ridiculously content living in a mud hut eating rice & beans twice a day everyday (still hate beans, but i could do it) for the rest of my life. i learned to love simplicity. i learned to clean wounds without passing out. i learned to live in community, to share what is mine because it really isn't mine anyways (it's God's!); i learned that if you can't let go of something and give it to someone else, then you probably shouldn't have it anyway. i learned that you really only need a couple of items of clothing to be clean. i learned to more fully appreciate good dinner company (i LOVE eating with the boys at grace!). i learned how to say a couple of things in acholi and i learned how to speak english with a ugandan accent so that the kids understand me better. i learned how to deal with always-dirty feet and fingernails. i learned to love the termites in our floors and walls and roof, and even more i learned to love the geckos that ran around the tops of our walls ate them. i (kind of) learned to dance like an acholi woman. i learned to live life with five people, whom at one point i barely knew; i learned to love them, to become family. i learned that sometimes (a lot of times) i just need to get over myself. i learned again & again about God's grace and His great love.

i learned a little bit more about loving people, sometimes so much that it hurts. about falling in love with children, kids who were once strangers but quickly became your best friends. kids who don't care what you look like, how much money you make, what kind of car you drive, if your clothes are clean, if you bathe regularly; kids who don't care about what you have to offer them, kids who don't care if you speak the same language (and thus have to tell you the same thing five times in a row until you understand... and giggle at your ridiculous attempts at speaking their language), kids who just love. i like to think i learned a little bit about how to love like they love, how God loves. i think i understand a little teeny bit more about a parents' love for their children, about the Father's love for us.

i learned that unfair things happen to people. (well, i knew this before, but i just became infinitely more aware of it.) 5,000 people die of AIDS every day. 30,000 kids die of hunger and preventable disease every day. in the united states alone, over 1 million children go to bed hungry every night. 27 million people around the world are enslaved (human trafficking, prostitution, child slavery, etc.). i learned that statistics aren't about just numbers. every person that died of AIDS today has a name. all 30,000 kids that will die today of preventable causes loved to play or run or laugh or sing or dance. each one of those one million hungry american kids has a precious face and a favorite color. of the 27 million people enslaved today, all 27 million of them have a story to tell (so open up your ears & listen.)

i learned that while terrible things happen, we should still praise the Lord. these kids, the people of Uganda (and people all over the world), have been through atrocities beyond anything i can imagine. the thought of them going through the stuff they went through breaks my heart and, honestly, makes me really really really mad sometimes. i'm mad that their childhoods were stolen away from them, that they were abducted, that they were forced to kill, that they were raped by men two or three times their age. it breaks my heart to think of them going to bed hungry day after day, to think of them without guardians to love them, to think of them with terribly infected foot wounds and distended bellies. it makes me proud to know that they made it through. it makes my heart joyful to imagine them summoning up enough courage to escape from the LRA, to imagine them working hard to feed their younger siblings. it amazes me beyond belief to know that they had the strength to face their past, to deal with it and process it, and to grow from there. it inspires me to see & hear them praise the Lord morning, noon, & night, to cry out to Him, to thank Him for being so good to them.

in the mumford & sons song, timshel, they sing, "it will steal your innocence, but it will not steal your substance." i think of that in terms of what these kids have been through. their innocence has most certainly been torn away from them, yet their substance remains. they don't lose sight of who they are as beloved sons & daughters of our King. (by the way, the next line of that song is, "you are not alone in this." and that is true & that is beautiful.)

i learned how to be flexible. i learned how to deal with feeling like you're useless and being okay with it. (i don't mean this in an, "i'm super lazy and don't want to do anything today," kind of way. i mean this in an, "i'm in uganda and want to be used, dagnabbit, but right now i'm feeling like my skills are of no worth, i can't do anything, why am i even here?" kind of way.) i learned that sometimes the best thing in the world you can do is just sit and be still with the Lord. sometimes the best thing in the world you can do is just sit and talk (or not talk) with someone who just needs someone else.

i learned that people are the same everywhere you go. babies cry. kids love to be tickled and hugged. everyone loves to be loved. everyone laughs and smiles and loves.

i learned about what a well-run & (moving towards being) sustainable nonprofit looks like. i learned that a lot of what america and the western world think that they're doing to help is really just hurting. (i didn't learn enough to tell you all the things we need to change, but leilah is writing a paper about it, so you & i can both read it someday.)

i learned for the umpteenth time that life is beautiful and every day can be whatever you choose to make it.

044

2011-01-09T22:02:00.002-05:00

sorry it's been more than a month. i keep writing the beginnings of the "i'm home and this is what happened" blog, but i am unsure of 1. where to begin 2. what to say 3. how to say it.

043

2010-12-07T22:45:00.001-05:00

(i wrote this my tuesday night... internet pooped out just before posting, so here it is a few hours late.)

yesterday morning we said a tearful goodbye to 67 dear friends.

i woke up at 7am to find out from collin that peter, fred, and norbert had just come looking for me. i went and found them cooking behind grace, i greeting the boys and joska, giving them sleepy hugs. we went back to my hut where i changed my last set of foot bandaids (complete with duct tape to make them last all day). peter gave me the last craft of this trip--a bracelet made of whatever he could find: some dark orange, stretchy, tube-ish string and 17 beads. it's the right size to fit a baby's wrist, but it stretches enough to fit mine.

a bit later, leilah, brynn, & i handed out 67 bookmarks that we made for each kid.

we hung out, talked, laughed, hugged, held hands. i tried to figure out an acceptable and truthful answer to the question, "when are you returning to uganda?"

three white vans pulled up into the middle of the homes, and soon the kids were piling their bags in the back.

we hugged the kids as they loaded into the vans and rosie's car; they waited there for a painfully long time. from outside the vans, we talked to the children piled inside. we held hands through the window, expressed our love for each other, made jokes. norbert and peter wrote a message on my arm in red marker. we cried a little bit and wiped each other's tears.

the vans left one at a time; we stood there waving, yelling "amari! i love you!" as each van left, it got a little bit harder to say goodbye.

when the third van finally pulled away, we sat quietly in front of faith. with robbie in my arms, rachel in leilah's, and aaron next to us (robbie, rachel, and aaron are three of the little kids--children of the house mothers), it was hard not to smile and laugh. the rest of the day went on. we read, journaled, ate, painted, organized, walked, talked, laughed.

but it isn't the same.

this place is insanely quiet without the sounds we're used to hearing daily.

there are 67 less school children, 9 less house mothers, and 6 less babies of those house mothers.

there are no school bells being clanged between classes.

there are no shrieks of laughter coming from the bore hole, no children smiling at us asking, "where are you going?" as we head to center for an evening walk.

the windows and doors at love, hope, grace, & mercy are now closed up for good.

there aren't dishes & clothes drying outside, no one is behind the homes cooking the next meal.

momma kath and pants-less baby remy aren't there to greet me when i go use the latrine.

there aren't little voices outside of our hut calling us out to play cards or put on bandaids.

as i'm sitting here in the office writing this blog, fred or clinton or solomon isn't going to pop their head in and say hello.

today i spilled everything i have with me out onto my bed and my mat on the floor in an attempt to organize. we finished painting the mural. i took my last bucket shower. i ate my last dinner of rice & beans around a fire with my ugandan family. i took my last team walk to mileaboro. i made my last cup of fresh squeezed ugandan limeade.

these things are lasts for this trip, but i pray that they aren't lasts forever.

here's what's happening next:
tomorrow (wednesday) morning, we're leaving village of hope bright and early. we're going to jinja in southern uganda for a few nights. the night of 12 december, we fly from entebbe to london. brynn, leilah, & i have stop-overs for quite some time. coll will fly home while the three of us explore scotland. on 19 december, brynn & i will fly home while leilah spends more time in europe with a friend of hers.

042

2010-12-01T10:34:00.004-05:00

i have a post written up and photos ready to go for a blog about our ugandan thanksgiving. but, this is africa & our internet isn't cooperating today. the images won't upload. maybe there will be a thanksgiving post another day. and maybe there won't. but not today.

so i guess i should write something else instead... but really, i'm not sure what there is to be written.

we're still just living life, playing cards, singing songs, making crafts, laughing, loving, living. it's really really good. that's all there is to say.

i want to encourage you:

go live life. soak it up.

love boldly. live abundantly. pursue God passionately.

041

2010-11-22T09:24:00.002-05:00

this is home. (i apologize for writing a blog with song lyrics. i know that, potentially, this could be really cheesy. but i don't care, it's how i feel.)

more and more in my life, i've been learning that home isn't so much a physical place as it is a state of being.

switchfoot's 'this is home' (which, by the way, we have acquired rights to use that song in the documentary) starts off:

i've got my memories always inside of me / but i can't go back, back to how it was /
i believe now i've come too far / no i can't go back, back to how it was /
created for a place i've never known

i feel like these words accurately portray some of the things i'm learning lately.

as the written-in pages on the left side of my journal grow in number and the unwritten pages continue to decrease in number, i'm realizing every day that our time here is quickly coming to an end. the kids leave the village in two weeks to go back to their guardians at the IDP camps (some of them will return only to take care of themselves) (the government is requiring that the kids go back for the holiday after this school term ends). in less than 30 days, i will be on a plane heading back to the U.S.

i'll be leaving my ugandan home of four months to return to my home of 18 years in pennsylvania. after celebrating the holiday with my family, i'll move 180 miles away to a home (which is brand new to me) in ohio with some wonderfully amazing ladies.

upon moving back to ohio, it will be ridiculously tempting (and easy) to fall back into being the person i was when i left in august. i'll be with old friends (and new ones) and living in a familiar city. every morning, i'll get in to my car and drive on the same roads to the same place, a place where i get to spend 40 hours a week designing and being with incredible coworkers. i'll return each night to the same house to sleep in the same bed, only to wake up and do similar things again the next day.

while many of my experiences will be new (new house, new roommates, new friends, new location for work), inevitably, things will be familiar. what is unfamiliar will become familiar and, once again, it will be easy to fall into routine.

"but i believe now i've come too far, and i can't go back to how it was."

i don't want to fall into routine. i don't want to fall back into being the person i used to be. i don't want to be the same person that i am today. each day i want to keep growing and changing and pressing on.

this is home / now i'm finally where i belong / this is home /
i've been searching for a place of my own / now i've found it / maybe this is home

this home i've found isn't a physical place. it's the way i want to live my life because of what i've seen in these people and in these children.

they've taught me to smile in all circumstances, to praise the Lord no matter what trials come my way.

they've taught me to invite anyone and everyone into my home, to feed them the food on my plate and share with them the drink in my cup.

they've taught me to give what little i have without expecting anything in return.

they've reminded me of the joy of holding hands and too many hugs and tickling.

they've taught me that it's good to tell the people you love when you're sad and afraid and hurting, to carry each other's burdens.

they've taught me that i'm a little bit helpless and it's okay. sometimes all you can do is listen and love, entangle your arms and fingers and sit quietly together. no words required.

they've taught me more than i can put into words and probably more than i can ever fully know.

belief over misery, i've seen the enemy / and i won't go back / back to how it was
/ and i've got my heart set on what happens next / i've got my eyes wide, it's not over yet /
we are miracles and we're not alone

from these children and from the people of uganda, i'm learning about the spiritual battle that is always going on. there is evil in this world. terrible, horrendous, unjust, unfathomable, and atrocious things happen to people all over the world (and even in our own backyards).

i can't sit around and do nothing. i can't fall into routine, i can't close my eyes, i can't spend my money the way i've been spending it, i can't live comfortably anymore.

i have at least 67 reasons why i can't. for norbert, patricia, solomon, clinton, sharon, susan, peter, nancy, patrick, allan, harriet, scovia (all five of them), emmanuel, joel, denis, joyce, gladys, norman, ceasar, moses, gloria, charles, irene, stephen, vicky, paska, kevin, justin, fred, and 35 more.

leaving here won't be easy. leaving here means i don't get to spend afternoons with these kids. i won't get to eat meals with uncle mike, auntie janelle, and the rest of the staff that lives here. i won't get to live in a little mud hut with my three wonderful roommates. there won't be walks down red dirt roads to the town center to buy freshly made chapatti for less than ten cents from the man with the corner shop. there won't be cold bucket showers every evening, there won't be the sound of kidega's motorcycle outside of our hut when he returns home every night. i won't have the simplicity of eating rice & beans everyday, twice a day. there won't be afternoon soccer games and little babies babbling to me in acholi. there won't be tipper rides and boda rides to bweyale and back. i won't have saturday night movies with the kids and little hands to hold while walking home through the moonlit night. there's a lot to miss.

but i'm excited for what is yet to come.

and i've got my memories and i've got my eyes set on what happens next.

and now after all my searching / after all my questions / i'm gonna call it home /
i've got a brand new mindset / i can finally see the sunset / i'm gonna call it home.

i'm figuring out what it will look like to change the way i live. i'm figuring out what it will look like to stay connected and committed to these kids and this place for the rest of my life. my mindset is changing and i'm trying to figure this all out.

i don't know what this looks like, but i know that change is on the horizon.

now i know this is home / i've come too far / and i won't go back /
yeah, this is home

040

2010-11-10T08:00:00.000-05:00

tuesday with the boys & a conversation with fred

tuesday, brynn & i spent a significant amount of our day hanging out with some of the boys at grace. they invited us to stay for dinner, not giving us plates of our own, but insisting we share with them.

among other things, we talked about how i wanted to come live with them at grace forever, until i become an old woman and they are all old men. they thought this was really funny and laughed a lot. i pictured us all sitting in our exact same spots fifty years from now and laughed a lot, too. they told us we were welcome to live with them forever.

at study that night, i took a break from reading to talk with fred. we were talking about how i have to go home to work for a few years and pay off loans, then maybe i'll move back to uganda. the next part of our conversation went a little something like this:

fred: erin, what do you want to be when you grow up?
me: fred, i kind of am grown up. i have a job, remember?
fred: (giggling) i forgot! what do you do for your job?
me: i am a graphic designer!
fred: oh i remember. do you like it so much?
me: yes fred, i like it so much!
fred: that is good. but designers, they don't make any money!
me: (laughing) i make enough! enough to pay back the money to the bank.
fred: (giggling) i am going to go to the bank and tell them that you have died.
me: (laughing a lot) haha! what? why?
fred: i am going to tell the bank that you have died so then you can live here and you will not have to pay them that money!
me: fred, someone will still have to pay them that money. who will pay the bank if they think i am dead?
fred: me! i will pay them the money for you and you can stay here!

i thanked fred for his kindness and went back to helping norbert read from his social studies book. i think it sounds like a very great deal.

039

2010-11-08T12:42:00.000-05:00

"but because of His great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions--it is by grace you have been saved." eph 2.4-5

i've never really worked with kids like these ones before, with people that have experienced the things these people have experienced. but i'm pretty sure that one of the first things you learn is to not ask about the past. talking in detail about these things, especially LRA involvement, is equivalent to having them relive the most traumatic experiences of their lives.

at village of hope, the most important thing is protecting these kids. we don't ask them about their past, about their involvement with the LRA, about how much food they ate before they lived here, about how their lives were affected by the war. (these kids have all talked about what they went through and processed together with a therapist, and most importantly they have moved past it.) for most of these kids, we've never heard their stories (nor will we ever). for some of them, though, we've heard secondhand summaries of the things they went through, so we have some small idea of the atrocities they experienced.

brynn dreamed up this idea for the documentary awhile ago of having the kids say a sentence about how life was during the war, then also have them say a sentence about how life is for them now. brynn sat down with rosie one day (rose is the director here in uganda; she has known most of these kids since before village of hope existed, she knows so so so much about each kid, it's incredible) to figure out what each kid would say. they spent time considering each kids story along with how much each kid would be comfortable saying; also, rose knew who could say what without bringing back a flood of painful memories.

this past tuesday was filming day. brynn & collin found a quiet place to set up the filming equipment. i helped the kids read and learn their sentences. some of the kids learned their sentences before they even got there; some of them, however, had trouble reading one or all of the words written on their slip of paper, so we struggled through reading and memorizing from beginning to end.

round one of filming was during the kids' lunch break. i spent the majority of that time sitting with my friend solomon. while he speaks terrific english, he couldn't read the writing on his paper. word by word, i helped him read, "my name is solomon, and all of my guardians died one after the other. my name is solomon, and now i have a safe home at village of hope." over and over we read those words until he had them memorized. i couldn't help but imagine little solomon experiencing death after death after death of his guardians and the pain he must have felt.

round two of filming was after school. the kids wandered over and sat on the concrete slab that runs alongside the staff housing. some of the older kids--stella, geoffrey, charles, & david--were sitting there with papers in hand, so i asked them if they had their sentences memorized. they said yes, so i asked to hear them. i sat with them one at a time, and reluctantly, they told me.

"my name is..." and, "i worked to feed my younger siblings," "i was abducted by the LRA for three years," "i watched my parents die," "i was forced to kill."

what do you say in response to such weighted words that just came from the lips of children you love?

norbert was sitting alone a few feet away from the rest of the kids. i sat down on his right as he looked at his paper, lips moving along with words as he sounded them out. i asked him if he could read it. as he folded the paper in his hands, he said yes. gently, i asked if he would read it out loud to me.

there was a long pause as he stared intently at the ground to his left. he unfolded the paper, took a deep breath, and began to read. "my name is norbert, and i was... i don't know this word," he pointed to the paper.

"forced," i read aloud, explaining, "it means you are made to do something that you do not want to do."

"my name is norbert," he started again, "and i was forced to kill my parents."

i knew before that moment this terrible truth, but to be sitting next to this adorable 11-year-old boy, to have him tell you face-to-face as he reads a small part of his past off of a crumpled piece of notebook paper... now that is something different entirely. the sorrow in his dark brown eyes was obvious as he looked into mine.

"you read that very well, norbert," i told him, putting my hand on his knee. "now read for me the second one."

he half-smiled as he looked back to the paper, which was now folded again in his hands. "my name is norbert, and now i can play and be a kid again."

"great job!" i told him as a smile grew on his face, quickly suppressing it (as norbert often does) and putting his hand on his head.

"let me keep practicing."

fred was now on my right, so i turned to him to help read his. fred and i worked on learning his for about five minutes. the whole time, i felt norbert scooting in closer on my left as he whispered the words to himself; he was trying to get paint off my legs (i was painting earlier that day), he was spinning my bracelets, he was touching the scar on my toe. when fred was comfortable with his words, i told norbert how i got my scar (we dropped a mini-fridge on my foot while moving it into my dorm room freshman year--it resulted in a late night at the ER and 8 stitches.).

he and fred grabbed both of my hands, turning them over, exclaiming, "your hands are so soft!" "your hands are so white!" they compared them to their own little hands, rough & calloused from everyday chores. fred left to go say his sentences to the camera; norbert was amazed at the blue blood vessels inside my wrists and hands. i told him what they were and that he had the same blood vessels in his arms, too.

the afternoon continued. norbert said his line to the camera and we went and played frisbee with other kids. the boys in grace invited me over for dinner again (the kids invite us most days) and i joined them for a delicious bowl of rice and beans. the kids go study in one of the school rooms every night; most nights we join them. so to study we went, helping peter with math and the alphabet, getting taught ugandan history from patrick & geoffrey. on the way out, we get hugs from 67 pairs of arms & walk the kids to their homes.

then it was night time and i processed the day. and i realize for the umpteenth time how ridiculously amazing these kids are.

to have lived their lives, see what they have seen, experience the pain & trouble & bitterness & terror that they have experienced--and to bounce back from that, to acknowledge their past and grow from it but to not be hindered by it, to have been through things that have matured them tremendously but to still run & play & laugh as children should.

they inspire me.

i can't imagine losing a parent, let alone both at the same time while i'm a child who has no one else to care for me. i can't imagine watching my parents die on a hospital bed; these kids have seen their parents be brutally murdered and they have been forced to be a part of the killing.

when these kids returned from abduction, so many demons were cast out from their precious little bodies. these kids know that this isn't a battle flesh & blood, but it is a spiritual war. they have seen it & they have lived it.

what is most beautiful is that these kids are made new. their past is past, it's over, and it does not define them.

on tuesday, i had over a dozen kids say to me things like, "i had no home," "my guardians all died," "i had no one to care for me," "i watched my parents die," "i was abducted," "i went days without food," "i was forced to kill."

then they told me how their lives have changed, "now i have a home at village of hope," "now i have a family here," "now i have a mother to care for me," "now i can continue my education and excel in school," "now i can eat until my belly is full, "now i can play and be a kid again."

that day, after they told me the things of their past, i had the opportunity to look them in the eye and reassure them that their past doesn't change my love for them; that even though their families and friends from their former villages might reject them, we still love them and nothing is going to change that.

every single day, we have the opportunity to love people unconditionally.

every single day, we can also know and experience the unconditional love of Christ. God knows us more intimately than anyone ever. He knows that i have a past, He knows that i have messed up, He knows that i am going to continue to mess up. He knows my imperfections and my flaws and my frustrations and my inability to love like He loves. and still, He looks us in the eye and reassures us that our past doesn't change His love for us.

i am humbled & i am amazed.

oh, the beauty of grace.

"therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come! all this is from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to Himself in Christ, not counting man's sins against them. and He has committed to us the message of reconciliation. we are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making His appeal through us. we implore you on Christ's behalf: be reconciled to God. God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God." 2corinth 5.17-21

038

2010-11-01T15:58:00.000-04:00

ever since i can remember, my parents have always told me that they love me more than words could ever express. i understood in my mind what that must have meant, but now i think i understand in my heart a little bit of what that means.

words cannot express my love for these kids.

tuesday night, fred invited me over for dinner. i told him no, that i had to eat at my home that night, but he kept insisting. he told me they were having peas (i tried a bite of his the previous saturday and liked them a lot!) and dragged me with him. i said i wasn't going to eat there, just visit. to make a long story short, he and the boys and the assistant house moms, aggie & joska, convinced me to stay. (i think fred is learning that i'm kind of a pushover.)

soon, i was sitting on the floor of the living room of grace, home to 17 sweet, sweet boys, priska (their wonderful house mother), aggie, joska, and two precious little guys, isaac & robbie (who belong to priska & joska respectively). atop the cold, cement floor sits a woven mat; i sat there with fred & justin, lit only by a small, hot, kerosine lantern, while the other boys ate on the front porch. i asked fred if we could sit outside with the others; he said no, we had to stay inside with the light. so we stayed inside.

while we ate, fred & justin asked me about my family, about home, about our seasons in america. justin said, "i heard that sometimes in america there are only two hours of daylight." i told him that doesn't happen where i live, but explained how the sun shines for so long in the summer days and so short in the winter days. he asked me if frogs bite (the kids here are afraid of frogs, they think that they are poisonous or they bite) so i told him no.

before i was done eating, fred brought out an atlas. each page had a different region of the world and pictures of places there and people from different cultures. soon, others joined us. norbert, stephen, norman, both peters, alfred, tony, allan, morris, patrick, innocent, joel, aggie, joska, & even little robbie. they weren't all there at once, they rotated in and out; we looked through the whole thing at least three times, each time with new excitement and new questions. "where is this building?" "what are those people doing?" "what is this animal called?" looking at a picture of cheese in holland, "are those cakes?" i tried to explain cheese to them, a completely foreign concept. no luck. we looked at a picture of the statue of liberty: "is this someone's home?" one time, we took a break from the atlas to look at a book about space. they asked me more questions (i had fewer answers this time). i tried to explain to justin what a galaxy is and told him about the sun and stars and the milky way.

at one point during all of this, the rain started pouring. wind was blowing in the front windows, carrying some rain along with it. some boys ran to close the window while others seemed not to notice the rain at all. some boys ran out to the front porch to play in the splashes. at one point, i thought to myself, "hmm, it's going to stink to walk home in this." after the rain fell for awhile, in walked collin & tom with my rain jacket & an umbrella. what wonderful brothers.

the rain ended up stopping a bit before nine. the kids go to study & prayer most nights, but the rain stopped them on this particular tuesday. by nine, most of them were headed to bed, so i thought i should go, too. i said goodnight to the boys, went out the back door, slipped on my flip flops (which i bought locally; they're made out of old tires!), hugged joska goodnight, and headed home. i was just around to the side of the house when i heard little feet coming along behind me. i turned around and saw fred. i said, "fred, are you following me?!" he giggled and kept walking. "i am walking you to your home so you are safe," he said. so home we walked, through mud and wet grass, dodging spider webs, tree branches, and frogs.

i would write more, but it's late at night and the power is about out. here's what's up. these kids are incredible. they amaze me every single day. they teach me things every single day. i love living life with them.

God is so good.

037

2010-10-25T14:33:00.000-04:00

today i don't know what to write about. so i'm going to go through my journal and tell you about a few of the little things that maybe aren't so exciting but what make life here really really great.

in the last seven days, clinton and solomon have caught for us three different creatures. last week, it was a huuuuuge black beetle. most recently, they brought leilah a small plastic jar with two snails in it. we put them in a bucket in our room. after two days, they started to stink. suzie put them outside. baby esther picked them up, one in each hand, and brought them back to our hut.

a few weeks ago, collin went to the market with one of the workers. they met a boy who took them to his home. there, they saw a magical orange forest and met gabriel, the fruit farmer. ever since then, we've been making the trek once or twice a week to buy oranges. we watch gabriel knock the fruit off the trees, then we pick it up and load up our bags. we pay him (about 50 cents for 50 oranges) (sometimes we get limes, too), put the bags on our heads, and make the journey home. they whole way, there are tons of little neighbor kids to whom we give the oranges. we say "ee miro muchungwa?" (do you want an orange?). they always accept. then the smile a lot and yell "byyyeeeeeeeeeeee!!!" and wave and it's just great.

it's currently round two of rainy season. it's supposed to be mostly over by now, but the rain has been coming every day. i guess they are anticipating excessive rains all over eastern africa until mid-november. after that, they're predicting a drought. the effects of this weather can potentially effect the food crop here for up to two years! it's crazy.

i now love beef jerky and trail mix more than i ever thought possible.

i'm ridiculously grateful to have learned how to wash laundry by hand (it's not easy to wash your bed sheets in a 5 gallon bucket) and some days i really miss washing machines. at the same time, i love being able to take an hour out of my morning to just sit and wash clothes and talk to people. i'm really going to miss that when i'm back in ohio.

on tuesday, brynn and i were visiting some of the house moms. one of our favorite moms is priska. she is the house mother at grace, one of the boy homes. there are two helper moms there, aggie and joska, who are both really great too. on tuesday, we went for a visit and ended up spending much of the afternoon. priska showed us her passport and told us about her family. afterwards, we sat in the back against the house and sorted rice (when you buy rice, there's all sorts of things in it (bugs, rocks, plant things) that you have to get out!). shortly after we were done sorting, the boys were getting home from school. soon, brynn & me & a half dozen boys were kicking around a soccer ball. brynn & i aren't good at soccer (well, brynn's pretty okay, i really stink at it) and we were being really goofy, but still they let us play. and it was SO FUN.

the kids study every night at school. afterwards, they sing praise to God and pray. sometimes on their way home, clinton & solomon come to give us hugs and tell us goodnight. it's precious.

there is this little girl, gladys, who is just super cute. she's very independent and kind of weird in a really wonderful and lovely way. sometimes i see her walking all alone and she kind of hops and flails her arms and stuff. and sometimes she just dances. i love it.

on wednesday, i went to the clinic. there are two benches outside on the porch where you wait to be seen. five boys were there (clinton, solomon, joel, fred, and kenneth), so i sat and waited with them. fred had some clay, so i made a bunch of little snakes and spelled out all of our names on the bench. clinton asked me why i was there. i told him i was sick. he said, "what is wrong?" so i told him of my cough and sore throat and stuffy nose. he said, "let me see if you are really sick." he proceeded to press down on my right nostril and said, "blow." then he repeated this on the left. i sounded stuffy. he said, "wow, you really are sick!" he learned this from susie, he's catching on quick.

later on wednesday, brynn and i walked to the boar hole. aggie and concy (house mom helpers) were there pumping water, so we decided to give them a break and help pump. soon, fred and peter came because school was out and it was their day to help with the water. there is this big wooden thing with two wheels that holds 12 jerry cans used to push water to wherever it needs to go. (we figured out that when that thing is full, it weighs almost 600 pounds!) little fred and little peter started to push that thing home, but after about 50 feet they were stopping for a break. brynn & i decided to help push it home. boy, was it heavy!

leilah and i were playing uno with the boys at grace the other day and justin said he wanted to learn the chicken dance, so we taught them right there in the living room!

this past thursday morning, we went up to gulu. it's about a two hour journey from the village to gulu town. we needed a mini vacation. and we really wanted to eat pizza and ice cream... anything but rice & beans! in the morning, we jumped into the back of the tipper with five of the boys who were going to see the doctor in town. uncle mike drove us all into bweyale, it's on the main road (gulu highway--it goes from kampala to gulu). once there, we waited for an hour or so and caught a bus up to gulu. upon our arrival in gulu, we went to coffee hut to eat delicious sandwiches and headed to hotel roma where we lived our first three weeks here. it was so great to see everyone again! in the next 48 hours, we reunited with many friends who we missed so much; ate lots of pizza and really really wonderful food (including the best sandwich of my life); met the sweetest boy, stephen, who worked at one of the local cafes; hit up the market; relaxed. it was great, but the whole time i was missing the village. saturday morning, we (me, leilah, suz, and tom--brynn & coll stayed in gulu to do some filming) caught a bus back to bweyale and then took bodas back to the village. oh, coming home to these beautiful people was so sweet. it is the most loved i have felt in a long time.

when we got back to gulu saturday, i was talking to fred. he found out i had nothing to do, so he said, "you come to my house and play with the children." so i did. best idea ever. after a few hours of cards, i headed to the back of hope where joyce was teaching tom how to cook. she cooked us a delicious dinner of rice, posho, and greens. later, fred made me eat some of his peas. they were delicious, too!

fred thinks it is really funny that i don't like beans but i eat them twice a day. a couple of times a week, when we're talking about food, he asks me if i like beans. i say, "no fred, i still don't like beans." he giggles and says, "what do you eat?!" and i tell him, "fred i eat beans with rice two times every day!!" and he laughs and laughs.

the moon disappeared for a few weeks and now it's back, lighting up the sky and everything within its reach. saturday night, leilah and tom and i sat outside and looked at the sky and talked about winter time and comfy beds and i started missing my soft and warm comforter.

sunday afternoon i took two naps.

some of the older boys are getting pretty decent at guitar and it makes my heart so so happy.

i was on the computer sunday night and fred came in to visit. he said, "i want to see your father." (one time, i was skyping with mom when fred and two other boys came in, so we video-ed her and they got to talk to her. for awhile he would always ask to talk to my mom, but he has since given up.) so i loaded my facebook album from the day before i left for uganda and showed him my father and family and friends. he asked their names and told me how you say different words (like grandmother and uncle and stuff) in acholi.

i read the following in my utmost for his highest the other day. i like it a lot, and i want you to enjoy it, too:
"we do not need the grace of God to withstand crises--human nature and pride are sufficient for us to face the stress and strain magnificently. but it does require the supernatural grace of God to live twenty-four hours of every day as a saint, going through drudgery, and living an ordinary, unnoticed, & ignored existence as a disciple of Jesus. it is ingrained in us that we have to do exceptional things for God--but we do not. we have to be exceptional in the ordinary things of life, and holy in the ordinary streets, among ordinary people."

036

2010-10-18T15:13:00.002-04:00

i kind of have two blogs in one. i hope that's not excessive.

thought no.1: what i'm learning

"a wonderful thing about God's silence is that His stillness is contagious--it gets into you." -oswald chambers

if i've been learning anything lately, it's the importance of being silent before the Lord and how, as a result of being in His presence, we ourselves learn to become still. through a series of thoughts, talks with random people, and things i've read, i have no doubt that this is something God is really trying to show me.

so often, i measure my worth by what i have to show for my time at the end of the day. because of our culture, we always have to be doing something. we make contests over who has the most work today and who is running on the least amount of sleep. i've spent the last four years of my life in an environment where everyday i was working on multiple projects, where i was constantly going and learning and creating and doing. such is the american culture.

but this is africa. things are slower here. people aren't lazy, but people here make a conscious effort to spend time doing important things--building relationship, talking, relaxing, taking time to smell the flowers--things that i so often forget to do.

for a couple of weeks, i had projects going on most days. about a week and a half ago, i hit a lull. i haven't started the next painting projects and there really hasn't been a whole lot for me to do. this lead me to spend time reading and praying, playing guitar with the boys, playing cards, visiting the house moms with brynn, taking long walks to the town center and to the magical orange forest, taking walks with baby esther, sitting and literally doing nothing for an hour. it first, it was really getting to me, this doing nothing. i didn't know why it was bothering me so, but i figured it out.

so often i find my worth in what i do. when i look back at the end of the day, i want to have something to show. i want to be able to say, "well today i accomplished this list of tasks," so that i can pat myself on the back and maybe get a back pat from whoever cares. i'm realizing, though, that those aren't the things that matter.

i'm learning that even when i don't feel productive, even when at the end of the day i don't have some physical product to show for my hours, it's okay. i don't need a completed "to-do" list to tell me who i am. if i am pursuing God, if i am worshiping Him & loving others, it's good.

i am God's beloved daughter. nothing else defines my worth. nothing. it is in God & Him alone that i find my identity & my worth.

i'm also learning the importance of being uncomfortable. when you're uncomfortable--that's when you are pushed, stretched, broken, shaped, growing. that's where change happens. in order for new life, things must die. i must die daily, to myself and to the world. i must put aside my selfish ambition, my vain conceit, and my desire to be comfortable. i must love people even when it's weird (and when they're weird). i must love people even when it hurts & when they are hard to love & when it doesn't make sense. i must deny myself, die to self. i must try new situations even when they're unfamiliar. i should look at people and smile and talk to them and spend time with them even when i don't really want to, even when there are barriers. i must decrease to God can increase.

too often when i do things, my motives aren't pure. somewhere in my mind i'm thinking, "what can i get out of this?" whether it's praise or honor or nice thoughts--it's all wickedness. i should do things because the love of Christ compels me to do them.

let Christ's love compel you.

nothing. else. matters.

thought no.2: a saturday night story

saturday nights here are movie nights. we figure out what the kids want to watch (tom tries to persuade them to want what he wants to watch), then after dinner we all head to the shed. collin and auntie janelle set up the computer and the projector, and we sit in the moonlight and watch animated favorites on the side of the shed's white walls. we recently received an abundance of sweets from a visiting team, so during the movie, each kid has been getting some candy. this week each kid got a tootsie roll. also, last weekend we started spending saturday nights sleeping with the kids in their homes, so all day friday and saturday, the kids are buzzing about what movie we're watching and who is sleeping where.

after the kids are done with their morning chores, saturday afternoons are filled with all kinds of fun. it means that my quiet reading time in the church window will undoubtedly be interrupted by joel and stephen coming to practice their drumming. it also means that i'll probably spend at least two hours of my day playing cards with the team & with the kids. it's great.

sometimes, saturday nights mean dinner with the kids. this past saturday, tom and i joined the girls at Love for dinner. momma sunday made posho (it's made from flour and water and is about the texture of really thick mashed potatoes) and greens. the girls fixed us heaping platefuls of food, and we all gathered on the concrete floor of the front porch to eat together. it doesn't matter where or what you're eating--food shared with others is beautiful. before we were done eating, a dozen kids from other homes lined the perimeter of the porch, leaning over the railing, peeking through the spindles, laughing and loving and talking in acholi and in english.

before we even finished eating, the kids were talking about the movie. they found out we were watching shrek (they call it "green people") and couldn't contain themselves. brynn joined us at Love, and after all the food had been eaten, we headed down to the shed; kids were shrieking with excitement, sassy gloria was yelling "shrek! shrek! shrek!" over and over, i had gladys's hand in my left and allan's in my right, we skipped and giggled all the way there. oh, it was beautiful. we gathered chairs and benches and mats for sitting, arranging them as we do every week. the kids invited me to sit, but i had to go bathe so i could go straight to Love to sleep over after the movie.

after bathing, i came out to join the movie watchers. it was windy and cold, and after about five minutes, the sky opened up and the rain came, slowly at first; it was pouring before we knew it. the computer and projector were taken to safety inside the shed, along with about 30 people who crammed into the small shelter. we couldn't hide there forever, though, and soon we headed back into the monsoon-like rain to seek a more permanent refuge from the storm. i stopped by my hut to put on a dry shirt. i grabbed some dry PJ pants, wrapped them around my neck like a cape, put on my rain coat, and headed into the dark, rainy night.

on my way to Love, i stopped by Mercy, home to eighteen boys. my friends solomon and clinton turned their front porch into a slip-n-slide. they were collecting run-off water in buckets; they poured the water across the porch and dove across the smooth concrete belly down. after laughing with them a bit, i headed to Love. i knocked on the front door (which was locked), but they couldn't hear me over the rain. i heard singing next door coming from Hope, so i went over and joined brynn, leilah, & the girls who were worshiping before bed. after worship & prayer, i decided to try knocking at Love again. this time, the girls answered.

they saw i was soaking wet and pulled me inside, locking the door behind me. faida started to take off my rain coat; she and sassy gloria had the most astonished faces when they learned that everything underneath the raincoat were perfectly dry. they took me into their room, and after i changed into dry pants, they attacked my wet hair with a towel. faida and stella spent a solid five minutes trying to get my hair to dry (even though i explained to them it would take all night). i felt so loved.

it was decided earlier in the day that i would sleep with janet, a super sweet little girl who is 12 or 13. i crawled into her bottom bunk with her, and moments later, she gave me one of the best presents i've gotten in a long time. i'm not sure where she had it hiding, but she said, "i have something to give you!" she smiled so big and pulled out half a tootsie roll in it's half wrapper. she said, "i saved this one for you!" oh, little tootsie roll, loaded with artificial flavoring and high fructose corn syrup--who knew you could mean so much to me! these kids LOVE sweets and rarely get them, so the fact that little janet saved half of her little tootsie roll for me meant the world.

soon the girls were asking to hear stories, so i told them a story from when i was little. a handful of them told me their stories, stories of how they lost their parents at such a young age. how they couldn't afford food or clothing or school fees. how their older siblings found work wherever they could to earn a little bit of money to keep their siblings alive, how some of them were the older sibling who worked so hard to keep the younger ones alive. they were stories that would break your heart. but all of the stories ended with hope, how now they have village of hope, how they aren't hungry now, how they get to go to school with their siblings, how they praise the Lord every single day that they are alive.

oh, how often i forget to praise the Lord for all the ways He has blessed me, for life.

these kids have a faith so different than the one i know. i learn and talk of loving the Lord because He gives me food and family and shelter and life. these kids have lived through hunger, pain, and hurt greater than i will ever know and they praise the Lord. i wake up to them praising every morning when they rise. they praise Him every afternoon before lunch. they praise Him every night before going to sleep. after they sing, they lift their prayers all at once, a hum of voices, a generation crying out to the God who provides. they know of His providence not because they read about it in a book somewhere but because it is the reason why they are alive.

and maybe it's not so obvious to me and to you, but it's the reason why we're all alive.

035

2010-10-12T05:01:00.023-04:00

i've been trying to figure out what to write about. but when you're just living life, it's hard to figure out what's worth telling.

after writing those first two sentences, i took a seven hour break. i came to the conclusion that i'll post photos from the last couple of weeks. they say a picture is worth a thousand words, and since i have no idea what to write, i'll give you photos.

this is lillian. she is the language helper and guest hostess; she is often found helping the cooks prepare for meals. her husband is jimmy, the security guard. she is also mother to the cutest baby girl in the world, esther, who brings sunshine and joy to our lives daily.

we're learning to become real african women. leilah is a really great bean sorter!

the boy with the guitar is fred. he's one of the coolest 11-year-old boys i've ever met. the first day we arrived at the village, he helped us with our laundry. since then, he's taught me some acholi, he's taught me about cooking, he's shown me how to dig--he's just great. the baby in yellow is lillian and jimmy's daughter, esther, who is ridiculously cute & wonderful.

two weekends in a row, we had different teams here. from september 23-27 was a six person team from pennsylvania; october 1-5, there was an eight person team from hawaii. both teams had different goals and brought different talents & gifts, but we were immensely blessed by both. two weekends in a row, we had field days, both of which included relay races. there was also jump rope, crafts (lots of crafts!), a huge colorful parachute, and much more. i have some photos from the races which i think you will enjoy.

for this race, the kids had to fill cups of water and carry them on their heads down to the bucket on the other end.

this is gloria. she is so sassy.

this is joel. he's really quite good at carrying water on his head.

i just love the expressions on all the kids faces as they watched the cup fall from his head!

this is innocent.

this is mercy. she is so beautiful.

this is david. i love this picture.

this is some girls jumping rope.

this is lillian making a craft!

this is sweet baby esther.

justin, solomon, & joel dancing.

the kids dancing :) they are great (and they let us dance with them!)

the next weekend, we added a new relay. we had funny clothes that they had to put on, run to the other end, and give them to the next person. so fun.

fred slipping into giant socks.

gladys putting on some sweet sunglasses.

kenneth looking awesome.

joyce laughing.

nancy racing back to the finish line.

this past saturday was uganda's independence day. most of the workers that are usually here were home for a long weekend. it was only the mzungus, the kids, the teachers, the house moms, and a few others. it was great.

saturday afternoon we were hanging out at the homes with the kids. some of the girls got their hands on my hair that morning and my head was full of tons of little braids. at one point, it started raining. brynn & i wanted to play in the rain and convinced some of the kids to join us. soon, they were running to the boar hole to "bathe." brynn, tom, & i kicked off our flip flops and followed.

the dirt around the well turned to mud; the kids would fill up jerry cans and pour them out, creating a mud slip'n'slide. it was so fun. laughter and shrieking filled the air, kids slipped and slid, joyce fell into the mud at least ten times, the rain sprinkled down on us, it was great. then, we gathered around the well and the kids cleaned our feet.

that night, the six of us split up among the homes to sleep. they kids were so excited and let us sleep with them in their beds. i didn't sleep terribly well, but it was worth it.

since then, we've been hanging out & living life. i've finally caught on to the card game that the kids always play (i've even won a few times!). we've been teaching engligh. suz & leilah have been hard at work getting together a library for the school. coll & brynn have been working hard on the documentary. tom has been working hard with the men. i paint things when needed.

so that is life. thanks for reading :)

034

2010-10-08T09:45:00.002-04:00

i apologize for the lack of blog this week. the internet has been down, & frankly, i have been having more fun living life with these kids than trying to write about how much i love living life with these kids. so instead of writing, i've been living. i'll take a short break sometime soon to tell you about the love i feel, though.

i am learning, i am growing. things aren't perfect, but i love it. i am exactly where i want to be.

033

2010-09-27T13:55:00.000-04:00

life is beautiful.

yesterday, i seriously contemplated the idea of writing a blog with only those three words. that is how i feel. as i thought about it, though, i thought maybe it wasn't a fair blog to write. yes, it's how i'm feeling, but there is so much more.

i don't even know where to begin.

you know the bridge in 'hosanna'...

"heal my heart and make it clean
open up my eyes to the things unseen
show me how to love like You have loved me.

break my heart for what breaks Yours
everything i am for Your kingdom's cause
as i walk from earth into eternity."

that has been my prayer for so long: to have my heart be broken and to be healed, to have it be made clean; to have my eyes be opened up to the things that i haven't seen; to feel the love that God has for me and to learn how to love like that; to give everything i have.

these are things that i see happening in my life right now.

i'm realizing, too, that you don't have to do great and extraordinary things. like momma t says, you can't do great and extraordinary things, just small things with great and extraordinary love.

maybe it's silly that i had to come halfway around the world to really learn this, but for it i am so incredibly thankful. yes, i'm in africa. but really, i'm just living life. it makes no difference whether i am here or there.

life. is. beautiful.

it's the little things.

it's painting fingernails and toenails (and having your ten fingers painted ten different colors) only to learn that the kids can't have their nails painted at school so you have to clean it all off again.

it's watching league soccer games in a field, surrounded by cheering fans (mostly children) who sing praises to the Lord to get the players excited and who swarm the field when their team scores a goal.

it's eating queen and worker termites fresh out of the ground because, as my new friend thomas told me, "when in rome, do as the romans do. so, when in uganda..." eat a termite.

it's taking the time to help your new best friend, a 10 year old boy who calls you silly names, make his first hemp bracelet (and finish it for him when he gets tired... and then make more crafts for more kids).

it's laughing with the cooks and dancing with babies and letting little kids play your guitar when they have no idea how.

it's remembering faces and names and being intentional about loving and caring, really genuinely loving and caring, the people that you see every day.

it's laying in fields with your newest friends, staring at billions of stars that burned out years ago, laughing until it hurts and tears fill your eyes and your nose gets stuffy.

it's eating the food you hate most day after day because it gives you sustenance and because it keeps you alive. it's learning to love people who are hard to love. it's learning to do things that you wouldn't normally do. because that is what stretches you, what breaks you, what grows you.

oh, God is teaching me so much through these kids, through these people, through this place.

one of my favorite things about being here is that everyone thinks my name is irene. irene is a much more common name than erin (and easier to say, i guess) so all the ugandans call me that (except for about three of them).

like i said, one of my new best friends is a 10 year old boy named solomon. my other new best friend is an 11 year old boy named fred. they are so sassy, i think that's why we get along. the first time i met solomon, he made me draw a picture of him. i spent 30 minutes doing a decently rendered drawing of him, which i then gave to him. the next day he told me he lost it and asked me every day to draw him again. that's how our friendship began. saturday i drew another picture of him (this time i only spent about 60 seconds on it) and he lost it again. ah, i love him.

fred somehow began calling me "latin matidi" which means "little baby" in acholi. also in acholi, to call someone crazy/stubborn/sassy, you say "e ding." those are basically the two phrases the three of us use to tease each other, and recently, other children have begun calling me latin matidi. it's endearing, really. needless to say, every once in awhile i'm walking and hear "irene latin matidi!" and look over to see little boys giggling at me.

oh, life is beautiful.

i'm losing my train of thought. george just came into the office and is talking to me.

life is beautiful. God is so good.

032

2010-09-20T05:09:00.011-04:00

life in masindi

this is home. the entrance to VOH is at the bottom right of the map. where the yellow road begins at the bottom is about where the boar hole (the well) is.

the three buildings furthest to the right are the school buildings. the top one is where the four primary classrooms are. the bottom one is now being used for a church, the office, a teachers room, and storage. the small building in between those two is a little shelter where the teachers take tea in the morning and hold meetings

the building in the top center of the photo is the new church. it's just about finished and will be used hopefully soon!

the grouping of huts below that is where we live. mike and janelle live in one of the huts, as do some of the other staff members. we are also preparing for another team of six to come on wednesday, so their guys will be living with our guys and their ladies will be staying in one of the huts. there is also another small pavilion type thing where we eat breakfast and lunch; for dinner, we build a fire and sit around it.

the small blue building to the left of the huts is the staff bathrooms, the ones below the huts are the kitchen and storage. the hut below that is where the new office will be (i'm in the process of painting the VOH logo on the office!). the blue building in the bottom center of the map is where the nurse and counselor are.

the five blue homes on the very left of the map are the first five homes that kids are living in. currently, three are occupied by the children, one is filled with corn and is still needing work done inside, and the fifth is still being completed.

the buildings in the bottom left of the map are staff housing and toilets.

this is our hut. behind it to the left you can see the boys' hut and the staff toilets. behind it to the right is cindy's hut. to the right is where we eat breakfast and lunch (it's also where the motorcycles park).

this is lunch. a huge plate of rice, two bowls of beans, two bowls of goat (it was a special day), and some nasi nasi (pineapple!). this feeds our team of six, mike and janelle, the teachers, and a lot of the workers.

speaking of lunch... someone found this little guy (we named is sweet pea) saturday morning (leilah's birthday) out in the field with a broken wing. we ended up cooking it (okay, so vicky, one of the VOH girls killed and prepared it) and ate it as an evening snack. she was tasty.

this is my friend shammah pumping some water. we worked hard that day. (actually, we pumped about half of a jerry can. and don't be fooled, we rarely pump our own water. there are staff members whose jobs it is to get the water for the rest of staff and the kids fetch their own water as part of their daily chores.)

this is asunta, leilah, brynn, and shammah with some of the kids one afternoon last week.

this is teacher dennis. he knows the basics of guitar, so i've been trying to teach him more and in return he is teaching me how to play the adungu. they want me to teach some of the kids to play guitar, so teacher dennis is going to help me so much (he is the music teacher!). one of the carpenters, wilfred, is a ridiculously talented musician, and a handful of the other teachers play the adungu as well. one guy also plays this one-stringed violin-esque instrument called the dugi dugi. a handful of them get together almost nightly to make music.

the older guys play soccer every night. this consists mostly of the guys on staff and our guys. games can get pretty intense. they love their football.

we made bead bracelets and necklaces with the kids the other day. this kid reminded me of me when i was young, the way he sorted out all of the beads into piles like this. mom, i think you'll appreciate this photo.

aaaand that's all for now :)

031

2010-09-13T14:29:00.001-04:00

i've woken up the last two mornings to the sound of children singing (and sometimes a rooster cock-a-doodle-doo-ing).

saturday afternoon we moved to masindi. we are now living at the village with the children, staff, & three dogs (and the cows and shepherd boys that wander by periodically).

we live in round huts made of brick covered with mud; i live in one with suzie, leilah, & brynn. the roof is made of sticks and grass. the floor is made of dirt & cow dung. there is one wooden door and three small windows. there are four single beds with mosquito nets. we have one bunk bed and a small table in the middle that we put our things on.

somehow the grass roof keeps the water out even when the rain pours. at night, it's pitch black, perfect for sleeping. at the top of the walls around the circumference of the hut, there is a gap between the top of the wall and the grass roof. most nights there are storms that light up the sky so beautifully, and when we're inside the hut, the rim of our room is illuminated by the lightning miles away.

yesterday (sunday) was our first full day in masindi. church was from 8-10. when these people worship the Lord, they worship. it is so humbling to watch children half my age worshiping God and holding nothing back, to see a grown man cry as he sings praises to his Father in heaven. the sabbath day really was a sabbath day; we spent a lot of time getting to know the staff and kids.

mike and janelle are the only other mzungus here (we met them the day we landed in uganda and have seen them one other time before coming to masindi). they are full-time missionaries that are living here at the village. talking with them, hearing their stories, watching them live & simultaneously living life with them is so great. i decided to call them uncle mike and auntie janelle, they have quickly become like family to us. yesterday at lunch, they introduced us to much of the other staff (everyone lives at the village), including jimmy, the security guard. after dark, jimmy walks around patrolling with his bow & arrow, keeping us safe. evidently he is a ridiculously skilled archer. i think it's great.

after lunch, leilah and i went up to see the houses that the kids live in (there are currently about 65 kids living here) and met some of the girls. they were teaching us acholi words, mostly body parts, because in church, pastor told all the kids to teach us because we want to learn. then we tossed around a volley ball (which leilah turned into the name game!) and played guitar and sang songs until about dinner time.

in gulu, we bought mats to use for yoga. today, after waking up around 6.40 to the sounds of the singing children, we headed outside to the football (soccer) field with our mats and did yoga as the sun was rising in front of us (well, we tried, anyways. the dogs followed me over to the field and wanted to play, bite, jump on us, sit on our mats, and pester us instead.). the sky was beautiful.

things really are going so well. life is beautiful. every moment, however, is not always romantic and wonderful.

the truth is, sometimes things stink. in the literal sense, the latrines always stink. our toilets are essentially outhouses, two with western-style toilet seats, two are holes in the ground (squatty potties are surprisingly great). there are termites in the roof of our hut; if it's quiet enough, sometimes you can hear them rattling around up there. the boys have more bug problems in their hut than we do. the reason why we have to keep our things off the floor (and away from the walls) is so the termites and rodents don't get in it. our water has sediment in it, even after it's filtered. my fingers were literally bleeding from doing laundry on saturday. we eat beans for lunch and dinner every day, which is great if you love beans, but if you are repulsed by beans (like tom & i are), it stinks a little. when it rains, the dirt ground outside turns to mud, which is quite an adventure to walk through on late night trips to the bathroom. i just right now almost ate a bug. really, though, it IS so good. (i actually have to think harder to find things i don't like as opposed to things that i do like.) i'm learning to die to myself (or trying, anyways).

i am surrounded by people who have lived through a lifetime of war. men my age who were kidnapped as children, brainwashed, and forced to kill friends, family, and strangers. the kids here don't have parents. they don't have have the luxuries we grew up with; so many of them haven't had the essentials. people are constantly fighting malaria. a lot of kids and staff members are HIV positive. i am living in a country where people are dying of hunger and preventable diseases, where far too many people cannot afford an education or shoes or clothes.

still they have hope. still they praise the Lord with everything they've got. still they smile and they laugh and they love life.

to have less makes you that much more thankful for what you do have. to see death so often makes you thankful for life. to not always be guaranteed a meal makes you thankful when you do eat.

why do i waste so much time complaining when i am richly blessed?

when i spent time buried up to my eyeballs in homework and projects, i should have been thankful that i had the opportunity to go to school. when i am stuck in traffic on my way home from work, i should be thankful for my car, for paved roads, and for a job i love that pays for my living. when i have a full fridge and full cupboards and complain about having nothing to eat, i should be more than thankful for so many options, for modern refrigeration, and for a full belly. when i don't know what to wear in the morning, i should be thankful that i have more than two outfits. when i argue or get annoyed with my parents and family, i should be thankful that they are alive and that they are a part of my life. when i'm out of ice and can't drink a cold cup of water, i should be thankful that i don't have to walk a mile with a 5 gallon jeri can on my head to get a drink. when i get freaked out by the termites above my head and the possibility of intruding rodents, i should be thankful that i have a roof and walls to sleep under.

we are richly blessed. God gives us all that we need.

but i digress.

things here are beautiful. thanks for your prayers.

030

2010-09-04T04:11:00.001-04:00

hours after posting my last blog, we learned that our time in gulu isn't as close to being over as we had anticipated. we've been working on sponsorship things for the kids in the camps--taking their photos, interviewing them so we can send updated info to their sponsors, having them write letters and draw pictures to send to their sponsors. it's been really quite fun... and we have a lot more of that to be done in the next week or two.

yesterday we spent the afternoon at obiya. the first time we were there, i met a little girl named lulu who is four. the second time we went back, i got off the bus and she ran to me. yesterday was our third time there. i found her again; she had a light blue knitted winter hat on. tom told me the other day that her mother told him that she had malaria.

while we were interviewing kids for sponsorships, i held lulu. she fell asleep in my arms. at one point, there was so much noise and i couldn't hear the girl that i was interviewing and i could hardly hear asunta translating. for a brief moment i was so frustrated.

then i felt lulu's hot body against mine, her belly rising and falling as she snored quietly and drooled on her arms and on my shirt. i looked up and the rain was sprinkling slightly and the sun was shining brightly, the sounds of yelling & shrieking & laughing floated through the air as my mzungu family chased around tons & tons of acholi children through the dirt. smiles adorned their faces, joy radiated from them to me.

it was magical and it was perfect and it was exactly where i wanted to be.

029

2010-09-02T05:53:00.002-04:00

we've been in uganda for almost two weeks now. i'm losing track of time and i love it. i know what time it is when i wake up in the morning and i know what time it is when i go to bed at night. i lose track of the hours in the middle. i lose track of days.

our time in gulu is coming to an end. we've been spending mornings with the kids at the safe house and afternoons with kids at the IDP camps. hotel roma has become like home. the staff here is like family, the other lodgers our good friends. and while i will definitely miss gulu, i am so excited to head down to masindi in the next few days.

i've been learning so much already.

i've learned how to live with five other people that i only met a few weeks ago. i'm learning who they are as human beings, what makes them tick, what they are passionate about, what makes them laugh, & so many other wonderful things.

i'm learning the correct way to wash clothes by hand. i've also learned that for awhile, doing laundry is going to leave the skin on my wrists & knuckles raw & stinging with pain. i've learned that washing our dirty laundry leaves my hands and fingers so incredibly clean.

i'm learning to love every moment that i spend with these children (ones that i know and ones that i don't know), even though about 70% of the time we cannot understand what the other is saying.

i'm (kind of a little bit) learning how to dance like an Acholi woman. but i'm still so very terrible at it and the kids always laugh at me. as long as they are laughing & willing to teach, though, i will continue to try.

i'm learning to love more and live more. i'm learning to let go.

i'm learning to enjoy eating the same thing day after day after day.

i'm learning that there are a lot of crazy and messed up things happening in this world and that i want to do my part to change at least a little. i've also learned that, as cliche as the saying has become, you really do have to become the change you want to see in this world.

i'm learning that it is surprisingly refreshing to see and meet other mzungus (white people), especially ones that love the Lord and are here for similar reasons that we are.

i'm learning that as awfully cold as our showers are here, i am so blessed to be one of the few people in this country with access to running water. i'm learning that my feet will perpetually be dirty and i'm learning to be okay with that.

every day is a new and exciting (some days more exciting than others) experience. thank you for the prayers & for being a part of this. thank you for your encouragement. thank you thank you thank you.

"as you have heard from the beginning, His command is this: live a life of love."

028

2010-08-25T14:17:00.002-04:00

it's crazy to think that only nine days ago we began this journey together. it feels like it's been so much longer than that. it feels like i've spent a short lifetime with these people. i like it.

our hotel here in gulu has become our home away from home.

we're getting into a routine as well. the mornings are spent painting at the safe house; in the afternoons, we go to IDP camps to meet the children that will be joining us at the land in masindi.

mornings at the safe house are so fun. julie and florence cook us food. clinton, maureen, and bright all help us paint (they are young, so things get interesting. bright is only 4 or 5, he loves to help and he is so funny). the kids teach us songs and clinton teaches us acholi words. we have been learning so much. haha, also, when we talk to natives here, we speak in an accent so that they can understand our english better. it's so funny, but i've noticed i'm enunciating words so much better.

as far as the IDP camps go, they are similar in many ways but still so very different. so far, we have been to koro abili, obiya, laroo, and tutuku. picture a round mud hut with a thatched roof. now picture a bunch of those surrounded by red dirt floors & sprawling bush, blue skies & a shining sun, children dancing & singing & running. often, when we arrive, they sit us down on chairs in a line. they face us, often singing songs about how we are welcome, reciting poems, & dancing. oh, how they dance. dancing is so important in acholi culture and it is so beautiful.

i'm still trying to figure out how to best describe to you all that has been happening over these days, so bear with me over the following posts. just know that it is good, so good. the team is bonding, we have become family. i love them. i love the ugandans we are working with, they are also family. the kids are great, the people are great. the food is even great (i haven't had to eat any beans yet thank goodess!).

God is good.

027

2010-08-21T16:02:00.000-04:00

oh, it is so good to wake up in africa.

here is what the travel process looked like: we left leilah’s house in milwaukee at 3pm wednesday afternoon & hopped on a plane to london. during our twelve hour layover, we had some time to take the train into the city and explore for a bit! exhausted after exploring, we headed back to the airport for our next flight; we arrived in entebbe yesterday morning around 7.30am (we are seven hours ahead of EST). we were picked up by friends from village of hope in a van; we strapped our luggage to the roof and began our journey in uganda. we met up with rose at shoprite in kampala (i got to see my friend annette—it was so lovely seeing her!!), ate some lunch, bought toiletries and things, and headed to gulu!

after 48+ hours of travel we finally made it!

for the time being, we are staying in a nice hotel here in gulu. we are so blessed to have running water and western toilets. even though there’s pretty much no temperature control and the shower doesn’t work, it is still so great! we are planning on staying here for about a week and a half. we will then be moving the masindi to live in the village. (the children are on break right now and will be returning to the village in early september.)

today was our chill day. we met rose’s husband, charles, & brynn’s friend, julie ,who are both so wonderful! julie took us out to explore gulu; we went to the market and bought avocadoes and things. we had a wonderful lunch up the road. julie taught us how to wash our laundry like african women do (actually, julie did most of the washing because she says we are too slow).
tomorrow and this week we plan to go visit the children at their various IDP camps in the afternoons and paint the safe house here in gulu in the mornings.

brynn just said to me, “i think i could live here.” i think i agree.

it’s so good to be here. smelling the smells, attempting to learn acholi, spending time with the team, meeting new people, red dirt, huge amounts of rice and chicken.

please continue to pray for us. for supernatural health (can i please just say how incredible steri-pens are? so great.), for continued team bonding, for building relationships with the kids and people here, for rest, for all kinds of things.

God is good.

026

2010-08-18T10:52:00.003-04:00

the past few days have flown by crazy fast. to make a long story short, the six of us have finally been united. we spent yesterday driving around milwaukee buying last minute things. we leave TONIGHT at 8.10pm! we get into london at 9am their time, we're gonna spend some time touring the city and then fly out at 9pm. we arrive in entebbe the next morning!

it's all happening. it's so exiting. everyone on our team has such different strengths, but it's beautiful to think that we were all brought together on purpose. i can't wait to spend the next four months of my life with these people.

please continue to pray for us. for team unity, for safetly traveling, that we live abundantly and fully every moment of every day.

025

2010-08-13T23:56:00.002-04:00

(sorry if my words seem trite (and disorganized), but this is what my heart is feeling/thinking.)

where to begin?

these last couple of weeks, particularly the last few days, have been filled with lots of lasts (until january) & see-you-laters. last buckeye donuts run, last time hanging out with people, last day of work, last small group potluck dinner, last trip to the river, last time getting my favorite parking spot in the garage, last night sleeping in this apartment, the list continues on. a lot of these things are just the last until i come back after Christmas, but some are really truly lasts.

i think i've been falling in love with columbus. there were times over these last four years when i absolutely hated it. sophomore year, i couldn't wait to graduate, leave this place, & never look back. now i don't want to be away for too long. i am learning new things here and discovering new places and having a blast. i am more excited than i can explain to be going to uganda. it feels so right. but i also know that when i leave uganda, there is much to look forward to here.

in preparing to move out the last two weeks, i've been running on an average of less than five hours of sleep per night. for those of you that know me, you know i prefer a solid eight to ten hours. needless to say, i am exhausted. few times in my life have i felt this tired. at the same time, though, i feel so alive. over the last month or so, i've been learning what it looks like in my life to really live--to be alive in every moment. to laugh deeply until i'm crying, when i'm sad to not hold back tears but to let it go, to experience emotion fully, to share joy when my friends are joyful and to be sad with them when they feel sorrow, to live life abundantly. yes, i feel so alive. it feels so good.

as i finish packing up the last two years of my life into cardboard boxes, strategically cramming them all into my car and driving everything to my parents' home, i feel mixed emotions. it's bittersweet. mostly sweet. i'm ending one chapter of my life and i'm getting ready to turn the pages to see what the next chapter holds. sorry for sounding cliche, but for reals. this chapter has been good, one of the best yet; while i'm sad to see it end, i am so thankful to have had these experiences. they've shaped me into the person i am now and have helped prepare me for what's next.

monday the whole team will be together at last. in one week, we will be waking up in uganda. rice & beans. nonstop dirt-covered feet. no central air conditioning or cheeseburgers. anti-malarial medication mondays. hand washed laundry. beautiful people.

oh, my heart swells with joy at these thoughts of what is yet to come. this is exactly where i am supposed to be. :)

024

2010-08-08T15:14:00.001-04:00

we're hopping on the plane in 10 days.

$5000 = raised. and then some.

God is so good :)

023

2010-07-20T21:42:00.002-04:00

in 31 days we'll be on a plane heading for uganda (well, actually it will be heading for london, but after that we'll get on another one that will take us to uganda). that is less than 750 hours.

i still need $700. that is roughly $1/hour left to raise.

oh, uganda. it's so close i can smell it (and i mean this quite literally--i have been breathing in uganda-like smells over the last couple of days. i breathe in this ohio air and i am swept away to uganda.)

i am (kind of a little bit) beginning to wrap my mind around this. four months. 17 weeks. 123 days. four months of dirty red feet. four months of beans and rice. four months of new experiences. i could go on.

yes, we are aware of the bombings and the declaration of war on uganda by al shabaab. we know there is risk. but God has called us and God is greater than all of that. God's perfect love expels all fear, so we are not afraid. God is for us and therefore none can be against us. God promises and protects and will make the way for us. oh, it's happening. :)

022

2010-06-06T22:59:00.001-04:00

"we have the idea that God is going to do some exceptional thing--that He is preparing and equipping us for some extraordinary work in the future. but as we grow in grace we find that God is glorifying Himself here and now, at this very moment. if we have God's assurance behind us, the most amazing strength becomes ours, and we learn to sing, glorifying Him even in the ordinary days and ways of life."

oswald chambers

021

2010-05-09T01:13:00.002-04:00

thursday night after small group, a bunch of us went to steak n shake. around 1am, we were getting ready to leave, when i (kind of jokingly) said that we should go to hocking hills. that night. well, lydia and benji thought it was a good idea, and soon sara and corey were in on it, too.

by somewhere around 3am, we were piled into sara's van with blankets and pillows. when we arrived, we parked in the lot by old man's cave, prayed that no one would approach the van while we were in it (whether it be cops or crazy people), and drifted off to sleep. i set my alarm for 6.40, but the sunshine was up before we were and woke me up at 6.39. i grabbed my comforter and headed out into the chilly morning. the dew on the grass froze my feet, but i didn't care. few followed me out to the parking lot, but left soon because of the morning chill; i sat alone in a parking lot wrapped in a blanket, staring at the blazing sun as it shone in the morning sky.

after about 10 minutes, sleepiness won, and i headed back to the warm van to cuddle in the back seat and take a two-hour nap. at 9, we woke up and headed back towards the highway, stopping at the little convenience store to load up on coffee. turns out, this place also had 24 flavors of soft serve ice cream, so between us, we conquered 4 cones in 3 different flavors (21 more flavors to go!). anywhere that serves ice cream that early is my kind of store :) we ate our cones on the front porch before heading home (and stopping briefly at mcdonald's to use their toilets), a lovely little drive and a great way to start my summer.

it wasn't a long trip. the sunrise wasn't the most gorgeous thing i have ever seen. there weren't incredible stories of overcoming obstacles.

but.

it. was. beautiful.

to wake up somewhere different, to get out of this city of concrete and metal and asphalt, and to get closer to the trees and the fields and the grass and wild animals. to smell the smells and see the sights and breathe in fresh air. to make the most out of ordinary moments.

to go somewhere with friends that i love and spend time with them, making a memory that only we will know.

you don't have to do extraordinary things to live a life that's worth living. live in love; live life abundantly and fully. and in the words of noah and the whale,
"life is fleeting, yeah but all is good."

020

2010-04-08T17:13:00.000-04:00

film for hope: uganda!

019

2010-03-28T03:27:00.004-04:00

if i drank my coffee black, my day would have been a little less extraordinary.

today i woke up craving coffee with fancy creamer, but being that i finished all the fancy creamer before heading home for spring break, i had none. what i did have was a coupon for more and the desire to get out in the sunshine and take a trip to kroger.

before leaving, i thought i might check to see if the bank in the grocery store was open. i'd been meaning to find out if i could open a secondary checking account to help me keep track of funds for uganda, not to mention i had more than a dozen checks to go deposit. i found out that, yes, the bank was open until 3pm. so i changed from my pjs, put on my flippie floppies, and headed to kroger.

i went to the bank first. the girl i talked to first asked this other lady (i think her name was heather) to help me open a new account. she said, "i love opening new accounts!" so we headed back to her little desk together.

she asked for my social security number and my drivers license. upon seeing the PA license, she asked about my being in ohio. i told her about school; she asked me if i knew what i wanted to do upon graduating. i told her that i hoped to get some work in the summer and said, "actually, i'm heading to uganda this fall, which is why i'm here." heather said, "do you have something you can give me, like with more information about this trip?" i answered that no i did not, but we proceeded to talk in detail about film for hope.

to make a long story short, she started talking about the Lord and hearing about His plan for your life. we talked about traveling and God's calling and scorpions and small groups for about 15-20 minutes amidst her setting up my account.

i thought it was wonderful! here is this woman, just an average woman, a stranger who i just happened to meet because i happened to want coffee creamer and today just happened to be the day when i would finally go in and set up this account. here we are, in a bank in a grocery store talking about wonderful things!

strangers. sisters in Christ.

she could have not said anything about anything. she could have kept quiet about her faith. instead, she spoke boldly, not knowing for certain whether or not i was a Christian. i admire her willingness to share her heart with a stranger. i admire her honesty and openness.

i was so encouraged.

oh, and she also told me i better bring in a jar or two with a sign on it about VOH. she said she would put it on the counter at the bank. she said, "i don't know if i'm allowed to do that, but i'll do it, and if they don't like it you can just have whatever money we make from that."

paul writes, "when i first came to you, dear brothers and sisters, i didn't use lofty words and impressive wisdom to tell you God's secret plan. for i decided that while i was with you i would forget everything except Jesus Christ, the one who was crucified. i came to you in weakness--timid and trembling. and my message and my preaching were very plain. rather than using clever and persuasive speeches, i relied only on the power of the Holy Spirit. i did this so you would trust not in human wisdom but in the power of God." 1 corinth 2.1-5

colossians 4.5 says to, "make the most of every opportunity."

i so often think about what i'm saying and how it sounds to people. can i compose my words in such a way that they are compelling and convincing? how will my words come across to the one with whom i am speaking? am i making a fool out of myself?

what does any of this matter?

simple. it doesn't.

know nothing but Christ crucified. FORGET ALL ELSE. in our weakness, God's power and glory are made known. rely on the power of the Holy Spirit, making the most of every opportunity!

018

2010-03-26T01:23:00.001-04:00

"giving is more contagious than hoarding,
love can convert hatred,
light can overcome darkness,
and grass can pierce concrete."
shane claiborne

that is all.

017

2010-03-17T00:21:00.002-04:00

"consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds. for you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything."

016

2010-03-09T14:27:00.001-05:00

"...everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. for his sake i have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that i could gain Christ and become one with him. i no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, i become righteous through faith in Christ. for God’s way of making us right with himself depends on faith. i want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised him from the dead. i want to suffer with him, sharing in his death, so that one way or another i will experience the resurrection from the dead!"
philippians 3.8-11

NOTHING. ELSE. MATTERS.

015

2010-03-03T01:27:00.002-05:00

jim elliot said, "wherever you are, be all there. live to the hilt of every situation you believe to be the will of God."

and right now, i don't think all of me wants to be here. i want the sunshine to melt the snow and the blue sky to overcome the gray cloudy mass and i want the grass to grow up through the warm earth and walk through it with my bare feet. i want it to be spring break, i want it to be summer, i want it to be in uganda.

i don't want to miss this, though. i don't want to be constantly looking forward to what's next in my life. i want to be here now. all here, 100%.

014

2010-02-23T00:41:00.003-05:00

today i drove to cleveland and back (after already driving 10-12 hours over the weekend) in the fog and rain and did lots of music listening and thinking and talking to God. along the way, i was listening to some mixes from friends with whom i went to uganda (thanks to the traveling cd case and modern technology!) and on the way home, as i was listening to passion's 'knees to the earth,' i was just overwhelmed by God's love for me. all these thoughts were running through my mind and i knew i had to pull over soon. then i saw the blue sign with the words 'rest stop 1 mile' and i knew i was in luck. so a mile later, i pulled off of i71, re-listened to the song, had some jesus time, and journaled.

knees to the earth
wonderful Savior, my heart belongs to Thee
i will remember always the blood You shed for me
wonderful Savior, my heart will know Your worth
so let me embrace You always as i walk this earth

be blessed, be loved, be lifted high
be treasured here, be glorified
i owe my life to You, my Lord
here i am

beautiful Jesus, how may i bless Your heart?
knees to the earth, i bow down to everything You are
beautiful Jesus, You are my only worth
so i will embrace you always as i walk this earth

i just kept thinking about how that is how i want to live my life, always and in everything i do, embracing Jesus, blessing his heart, finding my worth in Him alone, remembering His sacrifices, my knees to the earth.

i kept thinking of isaiah 6.8: i heard the voice of the Lord saying, "whom shall i send? who will go for us?" and then i said, "here am i. send me."

i thought about all the things that hold me back. i listened to a sermon on fear while i was driving friday, in which the pastor talked about these fears we have that we don't even realize are holding us back. not the obvious things, like dying and heights and getting hurt and whatever. fear of man, fear of rejection and of failure and of success.

i've also read two of francis chan's books over the last few weeks (crazy love and forgotten God -- both recommended), and in one of them (i can't remember which, i think crazy love) it was talking about what it looks like to live a life of faith. it means taking chances and going out on limbs, yes, but doing it to such a degree that if God doesn't come through then you will fail. because that's what faith is. it isn't about doing things in our own power and letting God come along for the ride. it's about God's plan, his divine plan for this world and for our lives, it's about having the audacity to trust Him wholeheartedly. take a look at your life. if you took God out of the equation, would it look any different than it does right now? if we're living lives of faith, then the answer should be yes.

but now i'm rambling.

here is what i wrote on the side of the highway.

God doesn't call us because we're equipped. He doesn't call us because we're fearless. He doesn't call us because we are eloquent speakers and great thinkers. He doesn't call us because we're capable and because we've got it all together.

God calls those who aren't ready, who aren't good enough with their own power. He calls those who are lacking courage and those who fumble with words and those whose minds go absolutely blank at the most inopportune moments. He calls the broken and the weary and the downtrodden. because in our weakness God's power shines through and He is glorified. He uses the lowliest of people to bring glory and honor and praise to His name.

"let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify the Father who is in heaven." matt 5.16

c.s. lewis said it well. "i'm just one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread."

013

2010-02-16T21:00:00.002-05:00

i haven't written in a very long time. and i don't know if right now will be the beginning of another blogging phase in my life or not, buuuut yeah. last time i updated this, it was april. so much has happened since then.

here is what's going on now.

1. i graduate from college in 88 days.
2. i'm going back to uganda in mid-august.
3. life is crazy and i love it.
4. i'm learning to trust God more and more and more. and i want to live a life that shows that, to live in such a way that it wouldn't make sense if God did not exist.

so that's where i am right now.

012

2009-04-07T14:55:00.002-04:00

it's been quite some time since i've posted anything of substance. i've been so busy living life that i have no time to document it. and i am more than okay with that.

my latest thing has been trying to get this last bit of money to go to uganda (i need about $850 in the next two months... i've already raised about $3800, praise God!). my latest money raising attempt involved some friends and me making music on the sidewalk during gallery hop on saturday night. (the first saturday of every month in columbus, they have gallery hop, where basically people hippity hop between the galleries, shops, bars, and stuff. it's kind of a big deal.)

rachel and i decided late tuesday night that making music there might be a good idea to make some money. so she talked to alex the next morning about maybe getting a drum or something and he was up for it. and i talked to michael the next day about playing his melodica and he was up for it. soon i was brainstorming songs, and then we were practicing them, and rachel, sara, and marty were making send erin to africa signs. and then all of a sudden we were walking around in the short north a little after 8 on saturday night looking for a good spot. and then before you knew it, we got past the awkwardness of playing music on the sidewalk two feet away from the strangers walking by and we were having fun making music.

we must have looked quite ridiculous, all of us lined up along the wall of the empty store front. me with my guitar, michael with the melodica, alex with a drum (and sometimes ben with his banjo!). rachel and sara and marty and pallavi taking turns holding one of the two signs they had made earlier, singing along and smiling at strangers and asking for money.

it was a beautiful night. the sky was clear; you could see the moon and the stars. it was only slightly chilly, and it was a comfortable kind of chilly. there were people, lots of people, all kinds of people, wandering the streets. some ignored us completely, some told me not to go to africa. people would walk by and read the signs aloud, many would ask, "who's erin?" and "why do you want to go to africa?" so we would tell them. some just danced and some wished us luck and some stopped to talk. we saw old friends and acquaintances, talked to people we do not know and will never see again, and everything in between.

and God was there. i breathed him in with the night air and my heart was light and full of joy.

and guess what? we were blessed with $87.50 for uganda :)

011

2009-03-10T01:36:00.002-04:00

two things.
1) i stink at updating blogs.
2)i'm going to uganda in less than 100 days.

010

2009-01-11T23:49:00.002-05:00

if we keep laughing like this, i think we're gonna live til we're one hundred.

009

2009-01-09T22:20:00.001-05:00

i am back in Columbus and it is oh so wonderful :)

008

2009-01-03T02:51:00.004-05:00

i few hours ago, i was looking back at old posts on my xanga (from 2004-05). at the time, i thought i was the coolest thing ever. i realize now that i was ridiculous (among other things) (and not to say that i am not still, but i pray that i am not that same girl). i felt embarrassed when reading them and hoped that no one else would lay eyes on that site ever again. i contemplated deleting it forever, but i realize now that it's good to look back and remember how much i have changed (plus i do not know how to delete it).

i am wondering now why i decided to sign up and get this new blog now. will i look back on this in 2013 and shake my head in embarassment? will i even care?

i like to think that once in a while i'll have something to say that is worthwhile. at this moment, i feel like i have much to say, but i don't know what to say, how to say it, where to even begin.

. . . . .

i would like to make one resolution this year: to live. not just go through the motions, but to be alive, truly alive. to be free and to be real and to embrace God and all He has to offer.

"you never know what temporal days may bring
so laugh, love, live free, and sing
when life is in discord
praise Ye the LORD"

007

2008-12-19T20:15:00.004-05:00

last night i finished reading donald miller's through painted deserts... for the third time. it is beautiful. one of my favorite parts of the book is the author's note (lame, maybe, but i don't care. i've read it over and over again and again; it is beautiful.). it has always resonated with me. i want to share part of it.

he is talking about change. (the book is basically about a trip donald takes with his friend paul.)

(i must say, it is hard to pick only a part of it because it is all so good.)

"everybody has to change, or they expire. everybody has to leave, has to leave their home and come back so they can love it again for all new reasons.

"i want to keep my soul fertile for the changes, so things keep getting born in me, so things keep dying when it is time for things to die. i want to keep walking away from the person i was a moment ago, because a mind was made to figure things out, not to read the same page recurrently.

"only the good stories have the characters different at the end than they were at the beginning. and the closest thing i can liken life to is a book, the way it stretches out on paper, page after page, as if to trick the mind into thinking it isn't all happening at once..."

[here he says more beautiful words about books and life and change. then he says this...]

"we get one story, you and i, and one story alone."

i love the concept that things must die in order to be born. for seeds to grow, they must first die. death is a requirement for the seed produce much fruit. it is the same for us.

to live, things must die.

jesus says this in john, "truly, truly, i say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit."

so there is that.

006

2008-12-19T17:49:00.001-05:00

005

2008-12-13T11:33:00.006-05:00

i have the coolest friends ever.

(here is some proof. this is us dressed up as santa ninjas. yeah.)

i have the coolest friends ever.

i had the most fantastic friday ever.

i am so blessed.

i feel alive (i'm not just living).

God just keeps on rocking my socks off.

i am full of joy.

004

2008-12-11T00:00:00.001-05:00

003

2008-12-08T23:33:00.000-05:00

002

2008-12-07T02:57:00.002-05:00

i am blessed.

tonight was our ugly Christmas sweater potluck dinner. i must say, i had a lovely time. good food, great friends, fresh snow, hot chocolate. it was splendid :)

i realized last sunday that it was coming up on a year since gramma died. i have been trying not to dwell on it, but i still think about her. it was a year ago. the saturday before the last week of school, like today.

so unexpected.

my friend jamie from michigan came to visit that day. she was suppposed to be in cleveland for a conference, which ended up being cancelled, but she was still in town and came down to columbus to hang out. she and i went with my then-roommate, taylor, to wendy's for a late dinner. it wasn't more than five minutes after we got back that my dad called. "are you at your apartment?"

"yes..."

"i'm here, come let me in."

my heart started pounding. was he in town on a business trip that i didn't know about? what was the occasion? i headed down the hall to the door to let him in and saw my uncle over dad's shoulder. my heart sank and i knew something was terribly, terribly wrong.

"gramma jane had a heart attack today, sweetie." he hugged me close.

"and...?" i asked, not really wanting to hear the rest.

"she went to be with jesus."

i did not fully comprehend the meaning of his words. i stood there in the hallway of the building just holding on, closing my eyes tight, and praying that i would open them up and realize i was only dreaming. but everytime i opened them, i was still there in the poorly lit, dingy hallway.

tears came, but not for long, as it did not seem real to me. dad and uncle dale came into the apartment. we all sat down and talked for awhile. i decided to go home for the night, apologizing to jamie for the sudden change of plans. (she, of course, was very understanding.)

the next week was a blur. i honestly don't remember much other than trying to get through classes. the viewing in pittsburgh was not until friday. (gramma and pappy lived in florida for years, but are from pittsburgh originally. there were viewings in both states; the funeral and burial in pennsylvania.) i drove home thursday afternoon and was soon joined by the family arriving from florida. the rest... lots i could go into. but i will not.

i kept running that saturday over and over in my head.

and... i don't know where this was going. somewhere, i'm sure, but i have long forgotten.

my mind is not working anymore, sorry for that.

001

2008-11-29T00:42:00.000-05:00

i have a blog now.

nothing much to say yet. maybe someday this will get more interesting.

oh, this is good... my newest love is making videos. i made my parents help me out wednesday night. we covered billy joel's it's still rock & roll to me. good good good.