I wish I could say that I only view you as the "best friend" you often term me, seemingly teasingly. Yet I believe you mean it when you call me so. They say distance makes the heart grow fonder, so perhaps it is no wonder that I have such angst in my heart at the fact that that you are my next-door neighbor. I sometimes wonder if I had caught you earlier on, if we had spoken more maybe I would have had a better chance with you.

After spending one week on a mission trip with you, I discovered the beauty of your selflessness. By then I also discovered through another group member that you had a girlfriend you were really in love with. I guess I just find it odd that you have never brought this up to your "best friend", I wonder if you think I know already or expect me to ask or what.

If I’m Honest (with myself)

I once told you that ‘nothing in life is free’

I told you that when someone does something for you, it isn’t without a price.

I quickly apologized seeing your offense, trying to explain that was everyone but you.

As I discussed this with a friend some days later, I admitted that I still believed it true – that nothing in life is free.

If a small-town mobster decides to pay off everyone’s debts in that small town, wouldn’t they all be grateful? But what would be the real cost?

Not everyone is a small-town mobster of course, but everyone is human. Expectations don’t just go away, because we are human.

Expectations aren’t necessarily bad, I can say ‘wow, I am so grateful for this person in my life. For what they did for me, I really want to make it up to them’. Of course, that is also the more idyllic version of positive expectations.

Reality hits when I am honest with my own intentions. With asking you to borrow a wrench to fix my bike, I already knew that because of your good nature you would want to help me out. Truthfully speaking, I just wanted to spend time with you before you leave to another side of the world, or back to your lover’s arms. I guess I just find it difficult to believe that you have someone else, when you hugged me the way you did. I consider that a guy whom I recently grew interest in, would be someone I would not hesitate to leave (the idea of) if I knew I could be with you. At the same time, I know it’s not logical to be with someone like you because our lives are taking us different paths, but mostly because you are already in a relationship and have never brought it up.

I know that we are so different.You are Trinidadian by inheritance, but Indian by blood, and I am simply put, a Mexican born on American soil. You love to listen to Christian reggae, and I love Christian Indie music. Your career will likely soon take you to the other side of the world, and mine could very likely keep me here. Also, I'm pretty sure you're in a relationship. Why don't I bring this up, you (reader) may ask? I feel like I've already worn my heart on my sleeves. I feel he knows that I've been interested in him. I feel that he sees me as a sister, and I am ashamed that I want something more.

I remember telling a friend of mine that you went out to buy me an actual laptop after realizing that I had been without one for a whole semester. She asked "Who does that?", surprised that someone would be so kind! I of course was beside myself when you arrived with your friend at my door saying you had something for me to help me out in my studies. Of course, since then I've discovered that you are so incredibly giving of your time and general resources with everyone you meet. You are so insightful about life, and are not afraid to express your emotions. You are such a great motivator to me in my spiritual walk, and I'm sure whoever she is she is a very special person.

If I can only be your friend that is fine, but it is hard to bring myself to tell you anything beyond that...

"It's weird to think that in this very moment someone is lying alone in their death bed, balancing between life and death or reuniting with an old lover tightly wrapped in a warm embrace or writing a suicide note, pondering different ways to say goodbye right in this moment someone's heart is fluttering from a first kiss and someone is breaking from a goodbye." 

~ H.C. ~

Crying Woolf

The eyes of others our prisons; their thoughts our cages.

Virginia Woolf

Priority Mail

I am a wildflower you discovered on your daily nature walk.

I am a simple species, or so I like to believe.

Lacking the extravagance of certain exotic and favorite blooms, I often sway in nature’s hidden rooms. 

When you find me you will know whether I am a keepsake, replaceable, or merely admirable.

Then, by how the sun continues shining on my face or if I feel a new embrace

– I  will  know  too.

Love Letter

In love perhaps we are all too careful

When we fear we’ll be unraveled.

Perhaps we are too suited, too layered up.

Not opening up of self, not emotionally available enough.

I want to tell you that—

I LOVE YOU.

I liked you with time, and soon loved too.

I want to share all that I am with you,

And I hope that you can see this desire.

Don’t give up on me, and I hope to not push you away in the mire.

The world out is dark, could we light one last spark,

Make it a hearty flame that no one can tame?

We’ll warm by it like it’s fall, like the season of my birth.

Sharing joys, and hopes, and mirth.

I want you to be mine.

Story of My Life

Well said 8-year old somewhere in the world, well said.

For Whom The Birds Chirp (They Chirp For You)

     It's Friday, June 5, 12:39AM and for some reason all the birds in my neighborhood are having a get-together on our lawns. This is the fourth night in a row that after my night shift I come home, to my room, and sit on my bed to the whistles and chirps of these night creatures. It's funny, it's silly, it just doesn't make sense to me. I'm sure there are some peer-reviewed articles in the endless web from an ecological journal society dedicated to the phenomenon I have observed, but I have not taken the time to look it up. 

...................................................................................................

   I kind of like not knowing why these birds are all of a sudden so awake, so seemingly energized this late/early. Call me a dreamer, a right-brainer, a sentimentalist but I kind of see it as God talking to me. The truth is "upon every flower is written God is love" and I'll take any notion of that I can find. I guess that's what desperation does to a person. I'm just glad God doesn't give up on desperate people.

 The life of a scientist is one of constant ambiguity. One has to be okay with theorems, almost nothing is a fact. I like science. Growing up I was okay with not having an answer for everything — so long as I knew I would get to one eventually. Science is finding a potential answer until you find another potential answer, etc, etc, but mostly science is just about finding.

There is hope for the helpless

Rest for the weary

Love for the broken heart

There is grace and forgiveness

Mercy and healing

He'll meet you wherever you are

~Third Day~

Make Me Strong

I know I’m waiting
Waiting for something
Something to happen to me
But this waiting comes with
Trials and challenges
Nothing in life is free
I wish that somehow
You’d tell me out aloud
That on that day I’ll be ok
But we’ll never know cause
That’s not the way it works
Help me find my way

My Lord show me right from wrong
Give me light make me strong
I know the road is long
Make me strong
Sometimes it just gets too much
I feel that I’ve lost touch
I know the road is long
Make me strong

I know I’m waiting
Yearning for something
Something known only to me
This waiting comes with
Trials and challenges
Life is one mystery
I wish that somehow
You’d tell me out aloud
That on that day you’ll forgive me
But we’ll never know cause
That’s not the way it works
I beg for your mercy

My Lord show me right from wrong
Give me light make me strong
I know the road is long
Make me strong
Sometimes it just gets too much
I feel that I’ve lost touch
I know the road is long
Make me strong

II: Farewell Mr. Lingers

"I had been looking for you for quite some time, and now that you're right here before me things aren't the way I imagined. I'm not dressed in the right clothes, I don't have the right hairdo, it's raining and cold out, and I'm late for a meeting. Either way, if I don't tell you now, perhaps I never will."

Mr. Lingers was taken aback to see his friend after so much time.

"Ms. Blinters, I had no idea you were going to be here - ..."

"Yes?"

"..I'm just surprised"

As always Mr. Lingers was short on words, he was one of those outgoing introvert types whose inner nature is that of a louder mind than tongue.

"You once asked me why I never spoke with Ms. Lares, and I told you that it was none of your concern - basically that it was between us. What I wish I would have told you, or rather asked, is for you to consider why Ms. Lares never came to me herself with the issue. You see, I never had anything against Ms. Lares in that period, in fact we had both talked over issues years in the brewing. So to know that she felt not only comfortable to tell you that I had not spoken with her, but to involve you in our issue whatever it may have been speaks volumes - at least to me. Perhaps you were offended by my reply to you, but the truth is I don't agree with what I believe her to have begun. Much more for Ms. Lares to have spoken down about me - no matter how minor - to you, only highlights the past to me and that she has not changed much. Ms. Lares is still the same girl who told me that I needed to find someone to befriend my own age. The irony here is evident."

"You came all the way here to talk to me about Ms. Lares?"

"The role of Ms. Lares in our friendship is a lot more significant than you may ever realize, perhaps because by the time you do you will both be in agreement about something I can and will no longer prevent. I am here to try and help you understand an issue that I can't actually tell you about."

"I wish you would stop talking in riddles."

"Oh, Mr. Lingers, how deeply I reciprocate that feeling.."

To be continued...

When I understand family, I come to understand why God is love.

Your love is Green and Whole

Have you ever tried a snack or food from one of those whole foods or health grocery stores?

Just now, I was finishing up a half of my Subway cookies (gingerbread & double-chocolate) on our way out of the house. I didn't have much time to make something, so I also brought along a lemon fig bar. Two completely different snacks on the nutritional value chart
:-) As I was eating I began to think that God's love is a lot like that lemon fig bar.

Not a lot of people want to consider lemon fig bars for a couple of reasons: they are a bit more costly than other snacks, and simply because they are healthy. Although there seems to be somewhat of a health trend with my generation, it's so much easier to just opt for a 60¢ cookie at a deli down the street. The cookie tastes good, and by golly gee if it's from Subway how bad can it be?

Each Subway cookie has 18g of sugar and 30 carbs, opposed to the fig bar nutritional content of 10g of sugar and 20 carbs. Needless to say that because the ingredients for the fig bars are natural, the bars become a sort of super food. Yes, I went there.

After finishing my fig bar I don't feel like I want to eat more like with the cookies, I felt satisfied.

We really are what we eat- i guess this puts me somewhere in the middle. :/ More than anything we are what we mentally consume. 

I saw a friend post this today, and thought it was too good not to share. :)

Love::Insanity

They say insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results. I think of how God pursues us, and how we have free will. God already knows what our final choice will be, but in a sense we still have to make that choice. Would it be wrong to say that God pursuing His children is God doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results from us? Would it be okay to say that love is insanity?

So it is the winner and runner are quite the same...

I have spent years trying to actuate a certain image for myself, often without realizing that the most ‘lovely’ image of myself was quite possibly throughout my journey of life. Throughout the journey most are unaware that they are being watched or admired. In contrast, individuals who are at the destination or believe themselves to be so are in reality just on another journey entirely. So it is that the winner and the runner are both quite the same. The ideal is to believe that everything is a journey and everything can be accomplished in time, patience, humility.

#lifeisahighway journey life easiersaidthandone peacebestill triedandtested

The Silence of God

 Is the silence a thornbush, halting my path? 

Is the silence the whisper of God?

Selfies From Awhile Back, because..Just Because.

I once read in an article that all the people that we see in our dreams are people that we have seen at least once in our lifetimes - pretty crazy huh? Well it's comforting to me that there's an explanation for it, because I did wonder about it. In fact, my belief that there's an eventual explanation for everything is comforting.