give into love or live in fear.

i know i've dropped off the face of the blogging planet, and perhaps i'm inspired by the way that the events in iran are being followed and maybe even shaped by all the blogging and twittering... crazy what our technological world has become! anyhow, i do want to continue to use this blog to keep everyone abreast of both the events in my life and the thoughts that accompany them, as well as the internet can do that.

the most substantial "event" in my life as of late is that david and i have cancelled our wedding and broken off our relationship. this has been the culmination of a long, hard struggle, and it has been full of pain and hurt and sadness. yet, it has also been full of growth and claiming, for me, who i am and who i want to be in confidence and freedom. i am a strong woman who cares about women's issues, who feels Christ's call in her life to be a compassionate accompanier and empowerer for those who are oppressed or struggling, who claims for herself and wants to share with others the belovedness that each of us have from God, who experiences and wants to give to the world celebration, joy, depth of relationship, peace, faith, hope, life, and love. how amazing it is that God can use the pain and the hurt even to bring deeper strength and understanding and life. so even in the heartbreak, i am still grateful.

i am also continuing to work at joseph's house full time through the summer, while i live with one of the nurses and her family in the generous hospitality of their home a few miles from j-house. at the end of the summer, i will move into an intentional community with my best friend emily and 5 other lovely men and women and share life with them there. i'm looking forward to those relationships and that community - thanks be to God for providing a life-giving home! and at the end of august, i will begin a masters in social work program at catholic university here in dc and stay at joseph's house very part time. lots of new relationships, new learning... my life has no lack of transition or newness to it. and there is excitement about what may come - through social work, or maybe going back to africa for a while, or who knows - i do have faith that God will lead me.

i want to close this post with some lyrics from the musical rent, which is of course one of my favorites and which i was given the gift of going to see live here in town a few weeks ago! the song is called "another day," and the lyrics i love are this:

there's only now
there's only here
give into love
or live in fear
no other path
no other day
no day but today

i want to live each moment of each day choosing the fullness of love, not fear or anger. yes, i am grieving and hurting, and i want to acknowledge that and let myself feel it as i move through the heartbreak. and yes, keeping my heart open, choosing love over fear means that my heart will be broken again - each time i love a new resident that i know will probably die, i know i will mourn; each time i open my heart to another human being, i know i could be hurt. but as john writes in 1 john 4, love is from God, and when we love one another, God's love is made complete in us. i have experienced that love and want to live in the power of that love. that is living, my friends. may it be so in my life.

what's important.

i must say, i had no idea what i was getting into when i started planning this wedding. i've realized how much weddings in our culture are such an industry, full of marketing ploys and over-consumption and stress! i think as a bride especially you are constantly bombarded with messages that say, "if you don't buy this, if you don't plan this, your wedding will NOT be perfect!" even for someone like me who is trying to be conscious and conscientious about the way we're putting on this wedding, it's hard not to get sucked in. trying to get a caterer that works on social justice, to find a used wedding gown to lessen consumption, to be creative and make decorations and gifts instead of buying everything, these things help me believe in our wedding more, but they also are a lot of work and are still, ultimately, buying into the cultural model of what a wedding is. and maybe the whole trying to be conscientious makes the stress level even higher because it adds another factor of... dunh dunh dunh... guilt!

so i guess what i'm trying to do is keep my focus on what i believe is important. david and i are going to get married, one way or the other, with matching bridesmaids dresses or not-matching, and it's going to be great. we will start our life together with a commitment and a celebration of who we are and who we want to be, and that's what this is - the start of something that will last forever. we want to include as many people that we care about in the ceremony as we can, but that's limited, so we're having a big party the next day, july 18, in algonkian park in virginia, to which everyone we know is invited! and it is also important to me to be able to be present to my friends and community now, in the present moment, to stay grounded here and not always have wedding details zooming through my head. this is such a unique, precious time. and actually, i refuse to live in stress and angst and conflict for the next four and a half months - i reject the notion that a bride must live in this tent of stress and busyness for the months leading up to her wedding. i believe that Jesus came to bring joy and peace and life, and i am claiming that for my life, even in the midst of all this planning.

it's actually been good to be living in joseph's house during all this; it's given me good perspective on what's important, on what matters, to live so close to the edge of life and death. j-house has been hit by the financial crisis like many other non-profits, and it's been amazing to see such a strong, resiliant, caring community make sacrifices to keep this place going, and more than just going, but strong in its care and its mission. it was also really great for me to spend a lot of time with a resident that passed away last weekend who was 28 years old. she was a beautiful young woman with two little kids, and probably because she was so young, i really felt connected to her. sitting with her the day that she died, i had a visceral sense of connection to her and to anticipation of my own death. what will it be like when i die? i actually haven't asked that question very much, surprisingly, even though i've spent so much time with those who are dying. but what will my death be like? will it be painful, long, drawn out? will there be things unfinished, unsaid that will make it hard to let go? will it hurt a lot? will i be alone? will i die first, or will david? i know, it seems a little bit morbid, but it's also just real. i will die someday. i'm not sure if i wrote about this before, but in the book "a year to live," the author talks about how we will die in the same way that we lived. if we live in a way that's peaceful, aware, intentional, and open, we will die in a way that's peaceful, aware, intentional, and open; not to say we won't have pain or suffer. but the way we live our lives now, this is the way we will die. so what is important to me, both in thinking about the wedding planning and thinking about my own death? it's to be in relationship, to be present and open to those around me, to celebrate, laugh, wonder, enjoy, to be honest about how i'm feeling, whether its fear or joy, and to stay grounded in the peace and love of God. may it be so in my life.

weeping, wheaton, wedding.

thank you to all of you who still check this blog... i know i haven't been very good about updating it regularly, but i do appreciate your care for me and interest in my life! the past two months have been full of holiday travels, including a trip to utah to spend time with david's family, applying to grad schools for a masters in social work program that i hope to start next fall, and most recently a trip to wheaton.

it was so fascinating to be back on that campus; so much feels like it's changed in the past two years for me. i had the privilege of speaking about joseph's house at a class that i took when i went to wheaton called the rhetoric of AIDS; it was a great blessing to be able to share about my experience, and i also felt so grateful for my life. i remember what it was like, sitting in those seats at a table, listening to lectures and reading texts and thinking, "how in the world am i going to do anything to help? i'm sick of talking and reading and writing; i want to do!" and here i am, doing it... and sometimes, doing it consists of washing dishes or cleaning dirty toilets. ah, the realness of life. i think the combination of talking about joseph's house, especially remembering so many of my friends who have passed away, and seeing the beautiful and heart-wrenching photo exhibit in the billy graham center on campus about AIDS in africa led to a major breakdown, a sob-fest like i haven't had in a long time that ended with me sitting on the floor in a stall in the bathroom with a wad of toilet paper. i guess it sometimes takes space from this place, from joseph's house, to really mourn and grieve fully. beyond that, though, i also got a deeper sense of the immensity of this epidemic - for every person that comes to j-house and dies there in comfort and love, there are thousands more all over the world dying alone and in agony. i really want to believe and trust that with Christ, the kingdom of God is here, now, as well as coming in all its fullness. i believe that Christ came to bring life to the full, but i don't see Christ's resurrection made real in this awful disease; death seems to have the victory where AIDS is concerned. i pray that God would stir the church and stir my own heart to act both with compassion, to care for those who are sick, and with justice, to combat the poverty, the ignorance, and injustice that lead to the continued spread of HIV. Jesus, we need Your love and healing in our broken world.

my time back on campus made me reflect that, despite the fact that my journey is pretty different from the evangelical subculture of that place, i am so grateful for the education i received at wheaton and for the friends i made there. my trip out to the midwest was also a lovely time to connect with friends from all walks of life and to spend some really nice time with my family. the reason for my trip to wheaton was my sister emily's senior piano recital, which was simply amazing. she gave me such a gift in asking me to play my flute with her for one of the pieces, and i am always blown away by the joy it is to make music with my dear sisters. it is definitely one of my absolute favorite things to do in life. and she performed the piece that my grandfather wrote, which was pretty incredible. i have some pretty awesome, beautiful, talented, amazing sisters.

so other than traveling, waiting to hear from grad schools, and trying to stay grounded here at j-house in the midst of it all, the other new thing is... david asked me to marry him last weekend (no, he didn't get down on one knee because we were sitting on the edge of the cliff at great falls park, overlooking the river as the sun set on the opposite side...sigh)! we are engaged, and that's still a little crazy to write! it's so exciting though, and i feel so blessed to have in him an incredibly kind, compassionate, passionate, fun, loving, Kingdom-seeking man to journey on this path of life with. my greatest joy in life, i think, is to journey together with others, to really be together and connect with another person on a soul level - this seems easier on the edge of life and death, which is one of the reasons that i love j-house so much. so i am so excited to start this journey with david, committing to one another and to living out God's kingdom together. and our shared commitment to being in community makes the possibility for this journey together even richer. i ask for your prayers for the two of us as we embark, as well as for the process of planning a wedding hopefully for this summer. and i am grateful for the communities that surround us in our families, our friends both here in dc and all over, our church, and j-house and c-stone. what a joy to be able to share our joy with you all. thanks be to God, and Lord, hear our prayers!

washington post article.

for any of you who didn't yet see the article, photos, and sound clips from the washington post on joseph's house, which is really quite beautiful, the link to the photos is here, from which you can see the article and the sound clips.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/gallery/2008/11/30/GA2008113002282.html?hpid=multimedia1&hpv=local

and the pendulum swings...

as i should have know and somewhat expected, things at joseph's house have once again swung in the opposite direction. remember when a month or so ago, i was struggling being in the house because it felt so hard to live with so many people who were too "healthy" (meaning independent despite their precarious physical states), dealing with the hard issues of living together like conflict, trust, addictions, relationships, and all that human stuff? as much as some of those factors remain, the feeling of the house has once again shifted, and four residents have passed away in the past few weeks, as well as one in the hospital who just today flatlined and is on life support in the ICU. it's interesting how there always seems to be more death around the holiday season... and sad. something about the holidays lends itself to an increase of emotions, whether it's love (as seems to be evident in the fact that everywhere i go, there are couples making out! including at the kennedy center during a performance of handel's messiah. i mean, really??) or sadness. anyhow, it's been hard actually after being so used to the residents who had been here for a while to have things shifting and changing, and to once again be around so much death and sadness. it especially affects the community when those who have been here for a long time pass away, because the residents both acutely miss their best friends and see their own mortality in the passing of their friends. it's amazing, though, the kinds of relationships that the residents have with one another, relationships full of love and friendship unlike they've perhaps ever experienced before. i find myself without tears when i hear about someone passing away, but to see the other residents around his or her body, speaking words of sorrow or anger or tenderness, gently helping us wash the body, kissing the face or the hands of their friend, the tears seem to flow freely. and today, with my friend in the hospital dying, being revived but now on life support, i am once again overwhelmed with the shock and finiteness of time, of opportunity, of chances to love and care. life is happening now! i want and need to be more present to each person i'm with in each moment...

the pendulum swing also seems an appropriate metaphor in my own life. last year, i felt as though i had tireless energy and time to give to this house, this place, these people. but this year, especially recently, i've felt much more tired and prone to want to withdraw, be alone in my room, spend time away from the house than i did last year. it's been hard to figure out, especially because it's not as though i'm spending more technical hours working. but it was helpful to have a friend suggest to me that perhaps the pendulum has swung back in my own life, that the overextension of last year is only now showing some signs of burnout, and i need to listen to them in order to try to find more equilibrium in the future. another season, another state of being to adjust to. so here i am, trying to have grace with myself and allow myself the space i need, but also to live fully and presently into each moment and relationship.

part of the reason i've been doing some more reflecting lately about the past year is that as the new year approaches, which always lends itself to self-reflection, so too approaches (this sunday!) the year anniversary of my and david's first date! (which, funny enough, i didn't realize was actually a date until afterwards, when i really hoped it was one!) it's been quite a year of growing and learning in that relationship too, but i am incredibly grateful for him and for the ways in which i've learned more about myself, the world, and love through and with him.

so in all things, through all seasons, through the up and down of the pendulum swing, i still say, "thanks be to God."

updates.

just in case anyone is curious about what's going on for me right now...

my back is continuing to heal from my little biking accident a few months ago now. it's been quite the learning process, and pretty frustratingly slow, but i do feel much better and got back on my bike last week to ride to church. i still am amazed at how much i'm learning about taking my own physical health for granted, even living in a hospice, and about being able to ask for help. thank you all for your prayers, cards, packages (grams!), and love.

joseph's house is still keeping on. i've been working some more overnight shifts lately, which is a little hard for me but also can be a really nice time to connect with people in the house more one on one when everyone else is gone and things have quieted down. it's especially nice tonight after having been gone for a few days back to PA for thanksgiving. the feeling of walking up these steps and through these doors and have my friends here say, "we missed you!" and "it's good to have you back," and "welcome home!" it's beautiful. i continue to be grateful for this place of so much learning. and, i'll probably put a link to it on here when it comes out, but look for a big article about joseph's house in the washington post on tuesday december 2nd.

time back in pa for thanksgiving was really nice - it's always good to see family and friends, especially when i don't have school work looming over my head the whole time. and it was really nice to share all of that with david. i'm amazed at how, thoughout my life, i have been blessed with so many beautiful relationships.

as i look to the future, i've begun looking into different masters in social work programs around the dc area... i want to stay here, as it feels more and more like home, and i can't imagine leaving j-house, new community church, or my friends here. i feel a little uncertain about applying to grad school because i don't have a really clear vision of what i want to do with the degree, but i know that my options would be vast, and i feel like next fall will be about the right time to start something new. we'll see. please continue to keep me in your prayers as i work on applications and discerning what the next step is.

with abandon.

i've been thinking about how this year at j-house has been so radically different thus far from last year. last year was full of so much learning about death and dying and about poverty. i'm still learning lots about both of those things, but it seems to me that this year is more about learning who i am and how to live with others, facing my own humanity and theirs. part of this comes from the nature of j-house right now; the house is almost full, but everyone in the house is fairly independent and no one needs bedside care. it can be incredibly joyful to live in community with one another with so many people feeling well - we had a great time celebrating halloween by decorating the house as oz and dressing up as different characters from the movie (i was dorothy, complete with ruby slippers and toto!); there are so many joyful moments gathered around the table sharing a meal together. but having so many healthier people in the house also makes things harder sometimes - there's more chance for fighting, for drama, for someone to slip back into feeding addictions, for stealing, for suspicion... it's hard to live together sometimes! and so, right now, i am amazed at how i am learning to see my family who lives here with me, to really see them, as human like me. i can't just "other" him and her as someone who is poor, or black, or HIV+, or sick, or any other label i'd like to give them that makes me different from them. no, we are the same. we are brothers and sisters, family, human beings interacting with one another and trying to care for each other in this crazy world. and it's often messy and imperfect and hard. but as pastor jim said last week in his sermon, love isn't love unless there is some risk involved. surely God risked it all in giving us Jesus, and i want to learn how to risk my all, how to live with abandon, in trust and faith that God is a merciful, loving God who will take care of me. in the midst of all this humanity, all these relationships, i want to learn how to live without clutching so tightly to my own things, my own desires, my own needs, and to live more and more fully in God so that i can be poured out for others. i don't know exactly what this looks like, but i am grateful for God's mercy and presence with me on this journey, as well as for the incredible community i have surrounding me and supporting me. and i am grateful for this year, this gift of time and space to really learn about who i am at my deepest core, what makes me feel most alive, and to explore what it means to live out of that place, trusting God as my creator to use me as i am made to be. to live with abandon.