mandolin

I have a new friend who has become someone very special to me. I was talking about him to Sarah today and she said, "Oh my gosh, Jack! The Jack from your dream."
Wow. First of all, I was shocked that Sarah remembered a dream I had at least ten years ago.
Second, she was right. Jackson. From my dream.
Promptly upon arriving home I looked for the written record of which I was sure I kept. The dream had made such an impact on me that I'd actually written it on the back inside flap of my Bible.

"Lord, I pray for Jackson Thomas. In Jesus' name, Amen.
My dream 2/10/99.

A tragedy had occurred. We, Jack and I, were standing on steps. He turned to me and said, "It's always been you. Why didn't I ever see that?" We were in some ceremonial, happy departure like a wedding but not. I remember telling myself to remember Jackson Thomas. The vivid color of the dream (beautiful white/yellow roses, petals in the wind) and the happy scene was not a wedding but I felt overwhelmingly loved, happiness, connected and solid.
It was the rest of my life."

I don't Jack's middle name and, quite frankly, am scared to ask.

Another detail that blows my mind is his heritage. He dad, his namesake, is Peruvian and his mom is Puerto Rican. His is from Peru, born and raised. Where does a Peruvian man get a name like that??? I asked Jack and he says his dad had told him before but he couldn't remember the details.

Why do I do this to myself?

I don't know if its the movie or PMS or the emotion the came with dad's birthday yesterday but I'm sad today.
There is a remote that I use with the TV in the living room. It reminds me of one that we had in our first apartment. It might even be the same one the way Ariel always saved those things.

I had finally gotten a job after moving to Grand Rapids. I was a carry-out girl at a florist. I was lugging 50lb bags of soil out to cars for the customers. One night, shortly after starting the job, we laid in bed talking. Ariel was telling me stories about his childhood. His voice was like the waves crashing into the shore. So melodic and peaceful. I kept falling drifting off. He would press the flash light button on the remote and tell me not to sleep because he had more to tell me or he would stare at me and stroke my face.

Its one of my favorite memories. In the time when everything was perfect and tumultuous at the same time. When youth and immaturity made me ignorantly hopeful. When I think of us, when I think of who I like the US to be, its that moment. When we couldn't get enough of each other.

With the guidance of the Holy Spirit, I am reading the Bible. Genesis to Revelations. I've been studying Gen 1 for a week or so. Today, the absence of a night is striking me.


3 Then God said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.
4 God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness.
5 God called the light day, and the darkness He called night And there was evening and there was morning, one day.


And it has continued this way. The only other time "night" is mentioned is when he created the moon. (Gen 1:14, 16, 18.)
I also wonder or am almost positive, that the creation of this light is the creation of Jesus. The sanctifying Savior.
I'm not going to read ahead but I am very curious when the first night occurs or is mentioned. That has to carry some significance. No night. No darkness. Sin hadn't been created? Genesis will tell me.

2 Cor 12:9-10:
9 And He has said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness" Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.

10 Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong.


He's back home. I'm having a hard time adjusting. Each word and every gesture stirs anxiety. We have spent some intimate time together, thankfully. Other than that, we haven't spent much time together. We hadn't had the opportunity until tonight. He's spent the whole night anywhere but here. The past two days he'd been cooped up in the house, without a car. He's likely stir crazy. I ask God to close the gap. Close this distance between us. I pray. I asked God to let me open my mouth. To let me to speak to Ariel the way I speak to God, pouring out my heart.


On Thursday night, I asked him to stay in the bedroom so we could spend time together. I needed to talk and listen. So we talked about the same things we've talked about for the past two years. The conversation was pretty on sided. I asked investigative questions and heard his answers. He doesn't want to spend time with me, he isn't in love with me. The marriage takes daily commitment and its more than the can take. We cried. I wept. I cried so hard I couldn't breathe. He comforted me and then he slept.


Then something very scary happened. My mind was of course turning and I was trying to stay in prayer. From no where my voice was in my head, saying horrendous things to God. It was strange because while the thoughts were there I was trying to fight them. Satan was attacking me and, unlike Job, for a brief millisecond he won. Jesus, my lawyer, please go before my judge and plead for forgiveness.


08/28
The night past and the next day began. We spent quality time together in the morning. We went about our day.


Bible study on that night was straight from the mouth of God. I am so thankful for los hermanos, Jorge y Evelyn. She spoke about peace. In the verses we studied was 2 Cor 12:9-10 and John 16:33. I began to cry when she read from Corinthians. After Bible study, I reviewed the verses. Read the verse from Corinthians again. As I moved on to the next verse, I bumped my Bible with my leg and it fell back open to Corinthians 12. I began, this time from verse 7.


7 Because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, for this reason, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me--to keep me from exalting myself!
8 Concerning this I implored the Lord three times that it might depart from me.


Paul then begins to talk about weaknesses. I'd always understood weaknesses to be a defect in character. Physical or emotional weakness toward smoking or drinking or sex. Carnal. God, through the Holy Spirit, allowed me to see weakness as times of trial and in that time of trial, depending on the Lord. Glory be God!


08/29
My brother called me this morning. It woke me up. My father is in intensive care. He is on a ventilator. One of his lungs was completely filled with fluid. They drained it but his body had become so accustomed to breathing at 50% capacity that once he had oxygen freely flowing through both, he stopped breathing. I am currently waiting in the airport to go back home to Michigan. My carry on luggage is half funeral clothes and have vacation clothes.


My husband wants to separate. This time its not merely a suggestion or a thought. I told him to use the time while I was in Michigan to think, he said he didn't need to. He cried. I cried. He says his life is going down and he doesn't want to take me with him. He wants me to begin or have a chance at the life I want.


On our way to the airport, God gave me the most beautiful rainbow! His mercy is immense!


Waiting for the flight, I re-viewed the verses again from last night. John 16:33, "These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world."


I read 23-33. Jesus speaks about prayer. Praying in His name, specifically. Jesus asks the disciples in verse 31, "Do you believe?"
32 "Behold, an hour is coming, and has already come, for you to be scattered, each to his own home, and to leave Me alone; and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with Me.
33 "These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world."


The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all. 2 Cor 13:14

My sister-in-law is very strange, to be nice. The other day she came home complaining about how hot it was outside. "Look at my hair," she said touching the kinks in her hair, "The heat made it look like this." Ok, I thought. Whatever. Later that day we went out, running errands and such. My sister-in-law loves to talk. She's gabbing away about her boyfriend. "We go to the same hotel all of the time. The manager knows us so well he gives us the same room each time. The last time we went the air conditioner didn't work. Yesterday we went and again, got the same room. I told my boyfriend if the air conditioner isn't working, you're not getting any." Again, I think, ok. Whatever. "We get into the room, he turns on the air and he says, see its working. So we are going at it and 2 mins in, we are sweating like crazy." She touches her hair and says, "I can't believe this." OH! It was so hot outside, huh.


Why does she feel the need to lie? Why initiate the conversation of her hair? I wouldn't have noticed her hair. This isn't the first time I'd found out that she'd lied. We were all talking about this in the kitchen, my mother-in-law, she and I. She's laughing. My mother-in-law says, "You have to learn how to know when she's joking." Joking? She's lying. Call it what you want. Its a lie. An empty one at that.


What does that say about my husband? He has a tendency to exaggerate stories. Then again, he is a functioning adult while she still and promises to continue to live at home. She cannot hold a job. Neither can he, though. He always manages to support us.


I guess we all have a little crazy in our blood.

These past weeks during Bible study our pastors have been teaching us about devotionals and worship and how they should be conducted. Last week, we learned about three basic principals or requirements of devotionals. One, the persons involved in the devotional must have been born again (Isa 38:19); two, a devotion must have direction (Psa 95:1-2); three, it must have two purposes: to reflect what He has done and who He is (Exo 15:1-3.)


In the second section, la Hermana spoke about feelings. She urged us to remember that Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, lives inside of each one of us. She lead us to Jas 5:13, "Is anyone among you suffering? Then he must pray Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises." And then to Psa 51:12A, "Restore to me the joy of Thy salvation," because Jesus wants us just the way we are but if one of us are suffering ask God to restore that joy.


Well, I had a rough week. And being physically alone, with hubby in DR, I began to feel anxious. I was having trouble sleeping and almost avoiding the Lord. When I finally went into His presence all I could ask for was relief. Relief from suffering. Is my marriage going to work? Will my sister begin speaking with me again? Will my husband ever want to have children? Will I persevere and be faithful til the end? Pleaded with Him to restore the joy. Like that day when He confirmed I was sealed to Him by Jesus' blood. I remember it more clearly than the day I was saved.


Lord, bless our faithful pastors! La Hermana began today's study with Jas 5:13. The verse thats been rolling around in my head all week. Great is our merciful Lord! There are a group of ten lepers are crying out to Jesus in grief and suffering (Luk 17:11-18), "And when He saw them, He said to them, "Go and show yourselves to the priests." And is came about that as they were going, they were cleansed." OK, not to discredit the marvelous miracles of Jesus but the New Testament is full of them. What hit home was verses 18. Of the ten lepers who are healed, one returns. Jesus says to him, "Was no one found who turned back to give glory to God, except this foreigner?"


"Is anyone among you suffering? Then he must pray Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises."


He is our relief. When I am suffering I cry out to Him and He heals me! He heals me so I can sing praises and give Him glory!


Oh, my heart was convicted and grateful in the same beat! We also read Acts 16 (:9-24.) In this chapter Paul is sent to Macedonia by a vision from God. He arrives and great things are happening! Lydia and her household are saved and baptized! Then things went south with a young girl with a spirit of divination. V 17-18, "Following Paul and us, she kept crying out, saying, "These men are bond-servants of the Most High God, who are proclaiming to you the way of salvation." And she continued doing this for many says. But Paul was greatly annoyed, and turned to her and said, "I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her!" And it came out at that very moment." Ooops! Paul got in trouble then! Because the girl's family made money off of that evil spirit. So Paul and Silas get beaten up pretty bad. They throw them in jail. Not just in jail but in maximum security which for Rome was allllllll the way in the basement. I can imagine some of my thought in that situation. What was I thinking to come to Macedonia? Maybe I mis-interpreted God's vision. I shouldn't have gotten annoyed with the girl. Why can't I be patient? Not Paul and Silas. Rather than staying in their circumstance they stayed in Christ. Vs 25-26, "But at about midnight, Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns of praise to God, and the prisoners were listening to them; and suddenly there came a great earthquake, so that the foundations of the prison were shaken; and immediately all the doors were opened, and everyone's chains were unfastened."


"Is anyone among you suffering? Then he must pray. Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises."


Anyone can give thanks to God. My prayer, Lord, is that I live gratefully.

I was getting a sandwich today at the grocery store after work. While walking down the isle, I noticed a red headed boy who was climbing on one of the refrigerated shelves. Later, while waiting for my sandwich I saw the same boy climb into the cart next to another red headed boy. An older brother. He shoved him. The mother interrupts. The the older brother places his hands together and bows his head. Seconds later raises his eyes to Heaven. Relief waved over his face.


I have no problem bowing in need. The presence of the Lord is the first place I want to be. When there's something else for me to do. I do that instead. I leave the Lord until the last minute. Until I need to go to sleep and know true rest only comes from Him, in Him.


I am called to more than this. The Lord deserves more than this. His grace and salvation, the life Christ gave to me, I am unworthy of. I cannot use that as an excuse. His blood has made me worthy. How do I change?


I lay it before Him.




I spoke with a Pastor at work today. I wanted to ask him how he does it. How he made the decision to respond to the calling.


My ego is to big. If I respond now it would be because I need it to keep motivated. I ask that when I respond its because of the glory of His grace. To be an overflowing clay pot.

Have I managed to convince myself that I'm pregnant?


My period was very light, I had no cramping at all. My breasts are still very swollen. I have times when I'm very sensitive to smells. However they are not the same smells all the time. I don't have nausea. I don't have frequent urges to go to the bathroom. I have gained weight that of course could just be me. I've been tired. I actually fell asleep at my desk during lunch. I'm over emotional.


I've taken 5 tests. Two didn't work and the other three were negative. So a week later, I decided to go to the clinic and have a blood test. I find out tomorrow. I have to go to the clinic at 8 AM. Which wouldn't be bad if I didn't have to go to work for 12 hrs.


Then, I started cramping slightly today. Then I began slightly spotting. At first, I brushed it off and began to research possible causes. Then, I saw another clot and I freaked. I wanted to go to the ER. If I had insurance, I would have. So I called Ariel. Who is, of course in DR for the past two weeks. I hadn't told him anything cause I wanted it to be a surprise as he was coming home the same day as the results. I'm crying on the phone with him. He's speaking to me on the magic jack on the shitty third work internet so of course, it was a horrible connection. I had to keep repeating, "I'm spotting and cramping....I thought I was pregnant!" And he has to keep repeating, "Maybe its just your period!" And I'm crying. At the end of the conversation, he says, "Oh, and I have something to tell you to. I'm not coming home tomorrow. I'll have to be home before the 26th soooo...we'll see then. And why, Ariel, do you need to come home around that time? Because your wife is waiting for you? Because we'll be married for 7 yrs on the 31st? No. Because he needs to submit unemployment papers.


Bathroom break. I went at 10:00 or so and it's 11:30 now. I've had a glass of soda. Is that frequent?


Ok. So, I'm pleading in front of God as I'm sobbing on my way home. I was listening to a Christian radio station and James 5:13 kept coming into my head. "Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone among out cheerful? Let him sing praises." I'm crying, I am suffering Lord! I turned off the radio. Why is the happening? Why do I feel pain? Why does my marriage suck? Why are there less good times than more bad? Lord, what do you want from me? Is this to teach me or to discipline me?


And then it occurs to me. Do I hold out hope for this positive pregnancy test the way I hold out for my marriage? Am I looking for all of the little signs to convince me that in X amount of time something beautiful will be born of this? My hope is in the Lord but I know that Ariel and the desire for this idyllic life reigns in my heart. My heart can't have two kings.


One thing I know, one thing my heart is convicted of, is that I avoid going before God sometimes. I'm watching Guilianna and Bill. Newlyweds with no animosity.

He blames everything on that one night.

So I am right to protect myself.
To keep in my mind this is still fragile.
He doesn't want to spend time with me.
He is angry at me.
I have less worth in his eyes.
I am riduclous to want children now.

God, what do yhou want me to learn from this?
What do you want for me, Lord?

Romans 8:16 "The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we may also be glorified with Him."

For several weeks, the Lord caused my heart to be convicted by that verse. I would try to hide from Him until I couldn't bear it any longer. I began pleading before His presence to allow me to know if I had the Spirit of Christ and that I had been sealed to Him. I went before Him on several occasions, never receiving a response. Only silence. Emotional turmoil began to surround me after Ariel and I had one of our discussions regarding the future of our marriage: dissolution or perseverance and I started having visions of myself on a slippery rock in the middle of churing waters. This is my theme during stress. I was driving home from work when I felt a need to spend time with the Lord and His word. Once home, I wept in His presence and saw myself on that rock in the middle of the water. I remembered, Jesus walked on water. I meditated for a moment on the thought, then began looking for the verses containing that miracle. My Bible opens to John (litterly, John 1:1-5 carries great significance to me) so I decieded to look through John because I knew the miracle was written of in each of the Gospels except Luke. The Lord guided me straight to the passage.

John 6 15-21; 26-27
15 So Jesus, perceiving that they were intending to come and take Him by force to make Him king, withdrew again to the mountain by Himself alone.
16 Now when evening came, His disciples went down to the sea,
17 and after getting into a boat, they started to cross the sea to Capernaum. It had already become dark, and Jesus had not yet come to them.
18 The sea began to be stirred up because a strong wind was blowing.
19 Then, when they had rowed about three or four miles, they saw Jesus walking on the sea and drawing near to the boat; and they were frightened.
20 But He said to them, "It is I; do not be afraid."
21 So they were willing to receive Him into the boat, and immediately the boat was at the land to which they were going.

26 Jesus answered them and said, "Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek Me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled.
27 "Do not work for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you, for on Him the Father, God, has set His seal."

God's mercy allowed two things to be revealed to me. One, I have been sealed by Him and have the gift of His Holy Spirit. Two, I need to step out on the water with Him.

The tide has come back in
around the rock.
The swells of churning water
threaten
to knock me off my feet.
I wasn't ready.
I had miscalculated the hours
and had to leap to safety.
Miscalculated safety.

Drowning, slipping, dry land.


Dry land. Walls of water but still on dry land.

I have maintained this journal since 2001. Though I am a day late, happy anniversary.

f'n started out fine. f'n ended shitty. ended with me and a lil' buzz. f'n alone. not what I f'n had in mind.




happy f'n new year

Raymond Carver

Eidolons


Eidolons

I met a seer,
Passing the hues and objects of the world,
The fields of art and learning, pleasure, sense,
To glean eidolons.

Put in thy chants said he,
No more the puzzling hour nor day, nor segments, parts, put in,
Put first before the rest as light for all and entrance-song of all,
That of eidolons.

Ever the dim beginning,
Ever the growth, the rounding of the circle,
Ever the summit and the merge at last, (to surely start again,)
Eidolons! eidolons!

Ever the mutable,
Ever materials, changing, crumbling, re-cohering,
Ever the ateliers, the factories divine,
Issuing eidolons.

Lo, I or you,
Or woman, man, or state, known or unknown,
We seeming solid wealth, strength, beauty build,
But really build eidolons.

The ostent evanescent,
The substance of an artist's mood or savan's studies long,
Or warrior's, martyr's, hero's toils,
To fashion his eidolon.

Of every human life,
(The units gather'd, posted, not a thought, emotion, deed, left out,)
The whole or large or small summ'd, added up,
In its eidolon.

The old, old urge,
Based on the ancient pinnacles, lo, newer, higher pinnacles,
From science and the modern still impell'd,
The old, old urge, eidolons.

The present now and here,
America's busy, teeming, intricate whirl,
Of aggregate and segregate for only thence releasing,
To-day's eidolons.

These with the past,
Of vanish'd lands, of all the reigns of kings across the sea,
Old conquerors, old campaigns, old sailors' voyages,
Joining eidolons.

Densities, growth, facades,
Strata of mountains, soils, rocks, giant trees,
Far-born, far-dying, living long, to leave,
Eidolons everlasting.

Exalte, rapt, ecstatic,
The visible but their womb of birth,
Of orbic tendencies to shape and shape and shape,
The mighty earth-eidolon.

All space, all time,
(The stars, the terrible perturbations of the suns,
Swelling, collapsing, ending, serving their longer, shorter use,)
Fill'd with eidolons only.

The noiseless myriads,
The infinite oceans where the rivers empty,
The separate countless free identities, like eyesight,
The true realities, eidolons.

Not this the world,
Nor these the universes, they the universes,
Purport and end, ever the permanent life of life,
Eidolons, eidolons.

Beyond thy lectures learn'd professor,
Beyond thy telescope or spectroscope observer keen, beyond all mathematics,
Beyond the doctor's surgery, anatomy, beyond the chemist with his chemistry,
The entities of entities, eidolons.

Unfix'd yet fix'd,
Ever shall be, ever have been and are,
Sweeping the present to the infinite future,
Eidolons, eidolons, eidolons.

The prophet and the bard,
Shall yet maintain themselves, in higher stages yet,
Shall mediate to the Modern, to Democracy, interpret yet to them,
God and eidolons.

And thee my soul,
Joys, ceaseless exercises, exaltations,
Thy yearning amply fed at last, prepared to meet,
Thy mates, eidolons.

Thy body permanent,
The body lurking there within thy body,
The only purport of the form thou art, the real I myself,
An image, an eidolon.

Thy very songs not in thy songs
,
No special strains to sing, none for itself,
But from the whole resulting, rising at last and floating,
A round full-orb'd eidolon.


Walt Whitman

One boy and one girl.  I don't think I ever named the girl but I named the boy Simon Maél.  Simon means he has heard and Maél is the Gaelic word for prince or chief.  The unsettling part of the dream was the absence of a father figure.

On the side of my torso between the bottom of my bra and just below the waist line of my pants.

A flower, maybe a daisy, with some of its petals blown off and floating in the wind. I want grass and dirt with roots which would fall just below the waist of my pants. Then a rainbow. I want a real rainbow, though. Like watercolors. Written in a delicate script: Love's Last Shift.



The rainbow is similar to what.

Alas, a tattoo like this would cost quite a bit and the hubby doesn't want me to get any more tattoos.

Once I walked above the ground.
It had been covered by inches of snow
then rain came and went and froze
again
The backyard was thick and untouched
and was able to support my weight.
So I laid down
and let Winter sink into me.
I laid down
and was able to be there again
last night I was finally just able
to be there.
Above the ground
floating on something so whole.
I heard him, his
voice
filled with joy
and it overwhelmed me with complete love.
I just laid there
I let it sink in and move through each ventricle of my heart.
No consequence or reason
I was able to be there.