Lent Day ...Five?

What day of Lent is it? I'm guessing it's five. Today was pretty good. Nothing much to tell, I've been around people a lot. People. That's a funny looking word. People.

Good heavens, people!

Anyway, whilst celebrating a friend's birthday at Cheddars today I heard a very interesting sounding song that I didn't actually recognize. So I of course excused myself to the restroom (where the music is loud and clear). Memorized some lyrics and found it online tonight. Such a great sound.

I know that Niki has been a big fan of his for years but I never payed him that much attention until now. Someone said he was Otis Redding reincarnated or something like that. I think they may be right. And he's from Scotland :)

This week I have no plans so I'm guessing that the Lent experiments are really going to have to kick in now. I've been with people for the past 6 days, very little time to myself, definitely out of the norm. Now is the time to get my game face on. Put the pedal to the metal.

vroom vroom

Shalom

Lent Day Four: I Skipped One

Today has been really great. I'm spending the weekend with friends and I've had some great conversations, very little media (I'm not going to inhibit others from media but I don't seek it out). I love how when you turn off the television the conversation has room to come in.

I remember my first summer working at camp, the TV in the SHO (staff hang out) was broken so we talked, we played cards. Then they bought a new bigscreen tv. The movies turned on, the video games were brought in. You walk in on any given night after people have come back from dinner, the lights are off and you can barely make out peoples faces in the flickering light of the screen. No one is talking.

Today I spent the day with my boyfriend, had a burger, walked the dogs, it was a beautiful day outside. Tonight there's bowling. Active and social all in one! I'm really happy with the way things have gone this week but I'm also ready to get back home so I can get to work on my many projects. I also bought some material today to make an apron. I wish I was the kind of girl who made her own clothes and was just fabulous all the time. I think it would be tiring though to always be dressed to the nines. Some days I just want to be wearing jeans and an oversized t-shirt (like I am now). But at least I'm getting started with something. I have a lot of ideas for posts from Bollywood to cooking to thoughts on relationships. I just need some down time to sort them all out. Until then,

Shalom

Lent Day Two: Where's the Noise?

So today was a bit different. I came home with the general feeling of...okay what next? I'm not really sure how to begin doing all the things I always wanted to do but never made time for. And, as expected, it is very VERY quiet.

I talked to God some while I ate dinner and then I talked on the phone to about 5 different people for about 2 hours. Not that I was running away from the silence and my own expectations (not completely anyway) but people that I needed to catch up with or check on. It's been good so far. No brilliant epiphanies of greatness but not too awful. And I now have weekend plans so that's a plus.

I think this Lent is definitely going to push me to be more social. I was thinking earlier that this whole thing would be a lot easier if I had roomates. Instead, whereas before I would come home turn on the tv or get on the internet and not feel so lonely whilst being quite alone, I have to realize that I am by myself most of the time and there's nothing to help fill it but God, friends, and my own creative spark. Here sparky sparky!

I did make a list tonight of all the things I wished I did. Here's a small sampling:

have a garden: geraniums, lavender, sage, basil, that hot pink ivy that I don't know the name of

sew my own clothes

learn to Bollywood dance (more posts to come about my obsession with Hindi movies)

learn Spanish

recite poetry: poe, cummings, neruda, seuss

write short stories

follow a daily skin care routine

I'm going to reorganize the list later into categories like Health, Skills, Novelty tricks, etc. I did find something interesting when I was searching the internet earlier for Lent ideas. For anyone who is new to the idea of observing Lent or to read some really cool articles check out

bustedhalo.com

It's a website run by Catholics but it has articles from all sorts of walks, Christian (Catholic and Protestant), Jewish, pagan even. They're pretty good stuff and if you're interested in conversations about faith and not opposed to listening to someone very different from you I highly recommend it. It also (and here is the helpful part for all the Lenten Virgins out there) has a calendar for Lent that includes a daily quote and three things to do to make yourself more aware of God during your day. Todays quote comes from Mother Theresa and the three things include not complaining and instead offering encouragement to others.

If you're open to the conversations I also suggest reading the articles whose titles excite you ... and also the ones that make you squeamish or irk you in some way. Because if the only voices you listen to sound just like your own the song gets pretty boring.

That's why God invented Harmony.

Shalom

Lent Day One: Ash Wednesday

So far today hasn't been that hard Lent-wise. My brother (Joel Rudy) came over to hang out and then we went to the ER to take care of another friend of ours. Which sounds like a drag but it was probably the most fun I've ever had in a hospital. I feel proud of myself. I've been social three times this week already and it's only Wednesday.

I was going to write about something else but I can't remember what. I wanted to talk about some of my goals, what it was like to start out today, something really profound.

Instead, God had me helping someone and being with friends. I'm really glad that I got to be there for someone who is always there for me and to be able to help someone else. That's what a fast is supposed to be all about. Not about what you give up but what you do with what you are given. It was a great way to start this season.

I did want to clarify that while I will be staying away from Media in general, there are amendments where it is allowed, so long as it is for a specific purpose like reaching a long time dream/goal/wishful thinking idea.

Example: I never exercise. Ever. But I plan to start walking most days after work. However I'm pretty sure that idea is going to lose momentum fast if I don't have some music to put the spring in my step. Then, and only then, will I be listening to anything. This morning I turned my radio off as soon as I got in the car. That's okay. Most mornings I'm too groggy to appreciate music anyway.

I'm going to sign off for now. Hopefully God will give me some time to be more introspective in the future. Until then, Shalom.

And by the way, my friend is going to be okay. Check Joel Rudy's facebook for more updates about that.

2 Days and Counting

Lent begins this Wednesday. When I had figured out what I would do for Lent this year I was excited and nervous but it seemed so far away. Now that it's right here staring me in the face I'm feeling a lot less excitement and a lot more dread. Am I crazy for doing this?

Everything in me wants to back out and choose something easier or to allow myself some comfort, books or the radio in my car. Something. But I know that I have to be true to the standard I set almost 2 months ago.

46 days media free.

I am voluntarily putting myself in the woods a couple of centuries ago, entertainment wise anyway. There will be no input and the only output will be what I create for myself. Who knows what that will be. Why try?

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life... I wanted to live so sturdily and so Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life... to drive life into a corner to know it by experience and be able to give an account of it in my next excursion.

I've never read Walden but I think Thoreau had some interesting ideas. If life is, as Donald Miller says, my story and it's my responsibility to make it a good one I think it's time to shut off the television, close the book, turn down the noise and live my own story.