live. move. be.

The first week of classes always feels ridiculously long, and I realized over the past few days that I bit off considerably more than I can chew. For some reason I thought it was smart to sign up for seven classes, three of them being advanced literature courses. I conveniently forgot that every literature class involves typically involves more reading homework than my brain can ever contain....and that amount is infinitely beyond my abilities (and sanity) when multiplied times three. So when I mentioned to my friends how overwhelmed I felt with my semester workload, they immediately proposed a logical solution: drop one of the classes. Their reasoning was solid, as they reminded me that I would be able to get that same credit during the semester I'm planning to study abroad. As they listed all the reasons why it would make sense for me to make my life easier by dropping the class, I found myself arguing with them....and I couldn't even figure out why I was putting up a fight.

Ultimately, I didn't want to admit I couldn't do it. This was absurd... first, because it's insanely prideful, and second, because I imposed this workload on myself. Dropping a class seemed like an admission of failure, when I'm really just admitting I'm human and that I need my sanity. It was a good wake up call at the beginning of the semester, to see the unreasonable amount of self-worth I put in academic performance and success. This is the last semester that I get to invest in the lives of many of my closest friends....why would I want to spend it pouring miserably over literature anthologies?

So I dropped a class, and I feel really good about it. I'll still have plenty of work (lots of Chaucer, Donne, and Milton in my future) but hopefully not to the point of insanity.

On a less serious note (maybe)......
Great things of an “entertainment” nature this week: Watching “24” while decorating my friends' wedding invitations (that combination just seems ironic to me), enjoying the two hour Lost premiere (twice), and our annual viewing of Lord of the Rings (we only got through the first one, but I'm looking forward to more in the months to come)!

After a long, restful month at home, I am finally back to my other home in Greensboro. While my break at home has been wonderful, especially getting to see my family, I must say that I am thrilled to be back! It is wonderful to see all my dear friends after so long apart. I don't think I've been alone for a single minute since returning Friday night, which has actually been pretty delightful, even for an introvert like me.

Since my return, one word has filled most of our waking hours: wedding, wedding, wedding! Since four of my best friends (two brides, two grooms) are all getting married in just a few short months, wedding planning has become the favorite activity around here. On Saturday, I went wedding dress shopping for the first time as a friend of the bride-to-be, and let me tell you, bridal stores are bizzare places. We walked in and there was a whole wall lined with mirrors, all reflecting multiple women parading around in a variety fo wedding dresses, viewing themselves with a mixture of skepticism and admiration as their family members and friends surrounded them with loud commentary on the dress in question. After looking through racks of dresses for a while, it was fun to just sit down and watch people try on dress after dress, while my friends and I whispered our opinions of how each one looked (there are some brides with seriously bad taste out there, seriously).

I have a feeling this semester will be filled with many more discussions of dresses, tuxes, flowers, invitations, dancing, music, etc.....the next few months will be quite interesting....and exciting.

In other news, my house is the North Pole right now. Brrr....

New Year's Day was quite a day.

I had lunch with four of my best friends from high school (I didn't have many in those days, but the ones I had were wonderful and still remain amazing). We recounted the adventurous tales from our year and hopes for the future.....one just returned from Scotland, one arrived a few days ago from Thailand, one spent the spring semester in London, and one is about to go to South Africa in a few months. After lunch, I had coffee with another one of my closest high school friends, who shared experiences from her summers doing missions work in Jamaica and Moldova.

It just boggles my mind. When we all graduated a few years ago, we couldn't have imagined or expected the ways our lives would turn out. We couldn't have foreseen the directions our different paths would lead. I know my high school vision of the way my life would unfold was utterly different than the reality of my past few years....and yet, I wouldn't want things any other way. At every turn, my carefully laid plans seem to crumble, only to reveal plans more beautiful than my own, with such a greater depth and scope than my own small structures. One of my favorite songs of this past year was by Sondre Lerche, singing the refrain, "Better be prepared to be surprised." That line keeps replaying in my mind--I feel like that's the only thing I can prepare for anymore.

Today over coffee, my friend asked me what my plans for the next few years are. I thought about for a second and laughed before I replied, "You know, I've always had really elaborate, specific plans for my life. And consistantly over the last few years, God keeps stripping more of those away....and keeps surprising me with how He works. So I'll let Him keep working, and just live step by step, even though it terrifies me sometimes."

Over several days of my Christmas break, I was researching lots of options for the future....study abroad, internships, graduate school, careers, missions....and I started to feel really overwhelmed and afraid. Uncertainty terrifies me....lack of control really terrifies me. I panic when I realize I can't control God, when I can't direct His plans, when His work in my life and in the world doesn't make perfect, orderly sense in my mind. Then I take a step back, and think about His faithfulness....through sorrow, joy, friendship, loss, confusion, peace....and realize how little I had to do with the way my life has turned out thus far. I didn't meticulously plan and carefully research the most incredible opportunities of my past few years....they were handed to me. A few examples: My incredible family of friends in Greensboro (I couldn't have handpicked more delightful, fun, insightful, loving, creative, warm individuals to live in community with me through these years) were placed directly in my path, without me ever looking for them..... A guy in my dorm knocked on my door one night and said, "Hey, there's this camp I love, and I think you should work there".....A friend called out of the blue last October and said "I heard about this missions organization called World Harvest Mission, and it sounds like something you would be interested in." Deep friendships, my summer as a camp counselor, and my internship in Prague are only a few of the many, many doors God has opened for me that I could have never planned....and they've all changed my life forever.

And as 2009 unfolds, I'm filled with hope as much as I'm filled with uncertainty, eager to see what happens next. Two of my best friends in the whole wide world got engaged today, and I'm still grinning from ear to ear thinking about it. Another dear friend called me a few days ago to tell me about the baby son he saw for the first time on a sonogram. Weddings, births, and a million beautiful things I cannot forsee are happening this year, and it fills me with deep joy, the kind that makes you cry as much as it makes you dance.

I'm excited.....and expecting to be surprised.