stairwell accompaniment:Radiohead

I WILL BE HERE INDEFINITELY
(click)

new days.

stairwell accompaniment:howie day

josh is in the basement now--making biodiesel out of vegetable oil. of the many and varied inventions and projects he is continually pursuing, this one makes me smile. he's smarter than he thinks. and cuter.
in the moments i feel hopeless and helpless, he brings the small bits of humanity necessary for grace. given and received.

i'm not sure the official becoming of a RN (soon!)would be possible without josh here to cheer me. i was writing an email to my long lost and beloved schmanda this week in which i was questioning her level of medical knowledge now that she is married to a medical student. i told her that josh and i spent time at a bookstore this weekend(again). i studied nursing, josh absorbed all sorts of random bits of knowledge he grazes from books with subjects ranging from cosmology to history to wilderness survival. he is a sponge of infinite trivia.
i was taking a practice NCLEX test and there was a(funny)question about "burping" a colostomy bag because the patient is complaining about how her bag "fills up with smelly air". i read it and laughed to myself, passed the book to josh--the king of bathroom humor--and straight-faced said "babes (we pluralize terms of endearment), i need some help with this one...." he read it and without a hesitation of doubt or laughter responded: "it's (A)burp the bag". my engineer husband has grown into a great man of nursing knowledge. my heart is full of laughter and pride.
(did i tell you i have dreams of him taking the nursing boards and passing as i fail miserably? in truth, he probably knows as much about nursing as I do about engineering, which is to say enough to be both annoying and dangerous.)

we have a logisitically overwhelming year ahead and lately i've taken to staring at the map on our bedroom wall and wondering: is it even possible?

josh is here to lovingly reassure me: with God, biodiesel and wilderness survival skills, ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE.

(i hope that by "anything" he means graduation, nursing boards, relocating, utah, oregon, washington, idaho, montana, Huster, wyoming, costa rica, road trips, international nursing, storage spaces, grad school and finally, eventually and ultimately: colorado. (you are welcome to join the parade.))

we continue to laugh more than we expected. we are still writing our book. through our black pens and in our lives. each day another page hoping that when read, will make you laugh, us blush, you cry, us imagine more than we see. we will show you ours. patching our torn clothes. accepting gratitude. asking without self-interest.

we believe in a God who doesn't tell us to have it all together. dry up all our tears. talk right. sit up straight. act your age. He doens't require us to abandon our occasional antisocial tendancies. our small delights. our procrastination. our weird humor. our sentimentalism. He sees our mistakes. our scraped knees. our typos. our insides. outsides. past. present. future.
we fall short every day. wash. rinse. repeat.
(we are loved.)

stairwell accompaniment:Guster

back in school, yo. trying not to drown. i've arrived at my longed-for preceptorship in women's health. two more months. only.

stairwell accompaniment:Spoon
Hello 2008.

two years ago.
there is nothing more raw, old, deep, or more necessary
our hearts, paper-thin
we are acting out something bigger
not taking grace for granted
it is endless

stairwell accompaniment:Dave Matthews


Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance, order, rhythm and harmony. -Thomas Merton

Today we found happiness running the trails along the river. Lose your footing. Bruise your knees. Breathe the cool air. Listen to the water. Over the smooth rocks. Taking small moments to allow large thoughts out. In the open.

I want to be known and let the words that are in my head fall somewhere near your feet. I don't want to lose out on beautiful things because I've given a definition to beautiful that has to be forever.
And things won't be as I had planned.
And things will be beautiful.


Today I have you here to awaken me, preferably with a coffee, and a kiss. Two things I love:hand written notes and a kiss to wake me up.

We try so hard. We wait. We are so needy.

stairwell accompaniment:Nat King Cole
Merry Christmas!
We'll update you with pictures:
We celebrated with our house church Christmas potluck-

Jon Black is in town from Montana and we always enjoy his company-

I took Selah's annual Christmas pictures-

We celebrated Christmas early with my family in Ohio-

Then drove to Kentucky to have Christmas with Josh's brother Ryan and family-

And then continued on with a long drive to Alabama-


Here we are. The temperature is far above freezing. Southern Christmas.