If You Sing Your Way Home

Last night, I went through my 2014 calendar to prepare my 2015 calendar for use. I opened up each week in 2014's calendar and tried to breathe in the essence of it. Some weeks were stressful and I wanted to quit life. Some weeks were warm and cozy. As I went through, I took note of every birthday, anniversary, and death date, and had to decide whether they were worth remembering for the year that will soon be here. And as I went through my calendar, I was surprised by the quickness of life, which sounds very generic, but still continues to be true. All of the babies I know grew so much in this small year. There were so many little moments involved in the making of this year, and now they're all over. Now is the time to reflect on how they changed me. Did they change me?

Last January doesn't feel like yesterday, because it wasn't. I'm not sure what it does feel like though - it feels like such a long time ago, but also at least somewhat recent. 

I use my calendar a lot. It makes me feel like I have control to look at my schedule and figure out how everything will work logistically. While I am doing so, I often have irrelevant thoughts that I know I'll want to remember in five seconds when they're gone from my working memory. When that happens, I write down whatever it is I'm thinking about in the margins of my calendar so I don't forget. Some of them are things like "white leather cleaner" or "plan music teams," or sometimes they're more thoughtful and conceptual, like just the word "fledgling" and how that embodies my life right now in some ways. In going through my calendar last night, I found so many of these scribbled notes and thoughts - some that made sense and some that didn't at all. Mostly, though, they were notes that wouldn't make sense to anyone else but made complete sense to me. It's nice to be able to look at a phrase that I wrote down hurriedly six months ago and still be able to figure out what I meant by it. 

One of the things I am looking forward to the most in 2015 is looking back at the year when it's over and breathing in the essences of how days and weeks felt as they pranced through time and seeing the haphazardly-jotted snippets of thoughts that I felt in the moment to be important enough to remember for later. I wonder what things in 2015 will be worth remembering, both the thoughts that I write in the margins of my calendar and the events - will I make new friends? What will my roommate and I dress up as for Halloween? What kind of feelings will I feel? What kind of adventures will I have? Where will I travel? How will I grow?

In analyzing all of these inquiries I have about this coming year, I am reminded that life is to be celebrated, and not so much planned for. I write down the important days to remember in 2015 so that I can plan for them, but so I can plan how I will celebrate them, because days are gifts. They are meant to be happy, which doesn't mean that I will never be stressed, because I often am and I will continue to be. But, even through stress, I can be grateful to God for letting me have this day and each day and take a breather to decide how I can best glorify Him with it, and I can remember that He's in charge and be thankful for that, too.

At Camp, we sing a song called "Sing Your Way Home." The words are below - 

Sing your way home
At the close of the day
Sing your way home
Drive the shadows away
Smile every mile, for wherever you roam
It will brighten your road
It will lighten your load
If you sing your way home

Kind of like how Snow White whistles while she works, I plan to sing my way home - to be lighthearted enough that I can take life seriously but not too seriously while it goes by - sometimes life and I will go at the same rate, sometimes it will go faster than I, and sometimes I will go faster than life. At all of the speeds, I want to be found rejoicing and singing. 

Love,
Lauralicious

Faith Not In Flowers

When I am sad, I need to see something beautiful. Need is a strong word, I know, but when my heart is hurting I have almost a compulsion to be near to beauty. I am willing to compromise productivity, food, socialization, and gas money to go wherever it is that can illustrate to me that it’s okay, and then I tell myself: It’s okay. It’s okay. It’s okay. If it isn’t right now, it’s going to be. It’s okay. It has been before and it will be again. It's okay.

Usually, I drive near Camp: the sky is big there, the fields are open, and the roads are long. There are no stop signs and my favorite tree lives there. I always feel better after driving around for a while. I go from not being able to breathe to believing that I might not actually suffocate today.


This summer before a session of Camp, I was on a Sunday morning drive and happened upon a sunflower field. The flowers in it were cheerful and smiling widely. I fell in love with it and told no one, because this was going to be my secret place. I decided that this would be where I came when I was having sad days, and I stored it away in my mind for the future, for the next time I needed it.

So then, a few weeks ago, it was time. I was needing it. I felt myself pulled to be in a place of realness and aesthetics. I drove back to my sunflower field, telling myself that all I had to do was get there and I would feel better. I did get there, only to find the flowers gone. And by gone, I mean that all that was left of them were their black, shriveled, dead bodies. The petals were gone, the bright colors were gone, the happy was gone. Now it was just a field of something that used to be beautiful. 

I'd had my hopes set on those flowers fixing my sad mood. I guess flowers have to die sometime, and I guess sunflowers weren't even in season anymore when I went to see them, and I know that I can't put my faith in sunflowers to cheer me up, but I already had, and then was let down. I was disappointed. The sunflowers had failed me. 

It was the reminder I needed that there is nothing on earth that I can completely rely on. It will all fail me: starting with the sunflower field, but not ending there, because nothing and no one is foolproof and pure, except for the One who is. 

At first it seems discouraging to hear that nothing on the earth can be fully comforting. It sounds like something that would make me want to give up. But the more I realize that the earth can't console my fears and deflate my distresses, the more precious and valuable Christ becomes, and the more awed I am at His actions in His choosing to save me from my fears and distresses. I am so comforted to know that I'm not alone in feeling unfulfilled by the world. It is a relief to know that this isn't the best it gets - that the dreams I have of some perfect far-away place that I have never experienced are actually embodied in Heaven, and I'm not crazy for not being satisfied for what is given and available here.

Christ's love is the definition of love, and it is the realest thing I have ever known. His love doesn't disappoint ever, and it doesn't fail. It cannot fail and it will not fail. Unlike a sunflower field, Christ is always ready to impart joy. He is never finicky or stingy. He is what my heart has been wanting for all this time. 

How comforting it is to know that I am under the hand of someone who never fails! He doesn't experiment or mess up; He carries out the one and only plan. He made the world, which defies all logic and contradicts the law of conservation of mass, because He is bigger than that. He takes my best interest into His heart. I know that life with Him is going to be hard, but more than worth it. And that's why I don't have to be disappointed by ex-sunflower fields: because I put my faith in He who creates all things.

Love, 
Lauralicious

Home is Where My Literature Is

Even though I don't have time to read nearly as much as I used to, I like to think that people can tell from the swirly air around me that I'm a reader. I don't know if it's true or not, but that's how I think of myself, because words make the most sense to me and stories are such a source of joy to me. I read Sarah, Plain and Tall last night when I couldn't sleep. When I was feeling dramatic but none of my roommates were home one day, I turned to a random page in Gone with the Wind. And when I am very sad, I read A Wrinkle in Time until I feel better. I must keep these books (and others) with me in case the feelings (any feelings) hit me.

And then there are libraries. I could talk about libraries for a long time. When I am in a library, I feel comforted to be embedded in so much knowledge - it's like nothing could go wrong because everything in the world is right here. 

The reasons I keep books around: nostalgia, wanting to look cool and up-to-date, pure and honest need and passion and admiration for all that they contain.

People say that home is where the heart is. My sign language professor, when teaching my class the sign for the word "home," said, "home is where you eat, where you sleep, where you are loved." Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros say, "home is wherever I'm with you." My friend Allison says, "home is where your bed is." But I've decided that, for me, home is where my books are. For reasons previously stated.

And it's not that the place where my family lives isn't my home, or the place where I sleep isn't my home, or that I'm alone in the world but for books, because that's not true. But as I grow into being an adult, I have to find my places and my things. And books, under the greater realm of words, are my place and my thing.

And so I like to keep all of my most favorite books with me always. There isn't enough room in my apartment for all of my most favorites, so some of them live with me and some of them live at home. My home can't be complete until all of my books live in the same place that I do, and that won't happen again until I finish college and live somewhere as a real-life grown-up. That is very daunting to realize.

But this is what I have to look forward to: living with all of my books under the same roof. We will sit around together after dinner and I will try to choose just one to read and I won't be able to, in the best way. And we will be at home.

Love,
Lauralicious

Endings

I don't like endings. It scares me for anything to stop and never come back - because what if I wasn't done with it yet? What if I didn't learn everything possible from it? What if this was the best and I didn't know it but now it's gone? 

I know that there are far better things ahead than any we could leave behind (C. S. Lewis's words, not mine), and I know that that refers more to Heaven than it does to next week, and I know that I should be comforted by knowing that Heaven is in my future, but I am scared by any change or even chance of change in life. I don't like for things to go away. I am attached to right now, even though I know it's not the greatest that life could be - it's also not the worst, so I just want it to stay in case this is the best moment I'll ever have. I am afraid of forgetting and I am afraid of the future not being as full as the past. It's the most un-logical thing, and I can't let go of it.

Last Thanksgiving, I re-read Anne of Avonlea, the sequel to Anne of Green Gables, and the last line hit me in an emotional way. I read it and I cried serene tears. It said, "And over the river in purple durance, the echoes bided their time." So now this line is written on a notecard and taped to the mirror in my room. 

This line is real. I like it so much because it's the end of a book, but not the end of a story. Stories don't stop. They are fluid and they change, but slowly, and over time. Stories keep going because life keeps going. 

I often realize myself to be frustrated with my life because it isn't a story. It's choppy, haphazard, colliding, lumpy, and sporadic. The plot isn't clear, and it doesn't have a visible beginning, middle, climax, and end, like a proper story should. In literature, only one thing happens at a time, but in my life, so many things are happening always that I can't keep track of any of them. The events in my life are almost never concluded peacefully.

This book ends, but the story keeps going. It gives me hope that part of life ending does not mean that all of life is over. It's comforting.

The line describes the way I imagine bliss to be: somewhere, over a river, in purple durance, existing. It is a mellow patience. It has faith in knowing that Christ is coming back to bring all things to glory, to make everything okay once and for all. Durance is a pastel purple, and it smells a little bit like cucumber-melon lotion. The echoes bide their time, not in a way that leaves them sitting around waiting for something better to come, but in a way that gives them an air of quiet contentment. They float through their days and they take time to think about things. 

This line tells me that it's going to be okay. It's twelve little words, but together they build an idea, and that idea is a good one and a comforting one. It makes endings a little bit more okay.

Love, 
Lauralicious

To Those Who Keep Me Going

Dear feet,

I don't know if you can read or not, but I think you and my brain have been in constant communication for a very long time now, so between the two of you, you'll find a way to get this understood.

We have been together for twenty years (and a few months) now. When we first met, neither of us knew how to do anything. All we had were instincts and genetics. And now just look at us! We have done so much learning together - starting with kicking, then we progressed to figuring out how to crawl, then finally walking! And then from then on, we were mobile, and we could run and skip and gallop and swim and galumpher (an ambulatory word I made up in 4th grade, meaning any kind of obnoxious and funky way of getting around. It's a pretty general term).  

After that, our learning hit somewhat of a plateau. We were mobile and upright and that's most of the reason why people have feet. But - plot twist - then we learned ballroom dancing in high school. And that was hard for us, but we did it, and we haven't stopped since then. I'm glad we learned that together. 

Feet, you are ugly. I'm just saying it to you with honesty. But physical beauty is not why we are alive. You are functional, and for that I am thankful. You have been with me in so many places, some of which I don't even remember. Isn't it fascinating to think of things I did when I was a small child, before I was able to make long-term memories, that you and I were both there for but only you remember? 

You went with me to the most beautiful beach in the world in Cornwall, England (and one day we're going back), you've been with me through four years of Camp (as have my favorite pair of Chacos), and you go with me to class every day even when I don't want to go. You are my constant companion.

I have taken you to some questionable places, and you have done the same to me, if we're being honest. It at times appears that you have a mind of your own, and I don't even really mind that occasionally. I like that we work together, and I like that all arguments between us are generally resolved pretty quickly because there is only one body to transport us. 

I paint the nails on your toes periodically, usually with blue, and it makes me feel spunky. Thank you for giving me an outlet of creativity and spunk. Thank you for dancing with me even when you are tired and hurting and you won't stop reminding me. Thank you for keeping me on my toes.

Considering all of the learning that took place in our first twenty years, I am curious to see what we learn in the next twenty (as well as all the years after that). My guess is that we will learn fewer brand new skills (walking, etc.), and more endurance skills - like standing for extended amounts of time. We will expand on what we already know, and we will be pushed to our limit. I look forward to each of the rest of my years with you.

Here's to the good times, and I'm sorry for the bad times (they're usually my fault). Thanks for hanging out with me - and for not having bunions. 

Love,
Lauralicious

Eyes Wide Open

On my windowsill there sits a queue of nicely-postured books, standing tall and waiting patiently for me to lovingly pick them up and delicately stretch out their spines and give them some quality one-on-one time. They call to me every morning in their most earnest voices, asking me to please love them, which I so want to do. I yearn for unstructured, loose, flexible, cheerful, bright, never-ending time in which to read until I pop open with jubilance, but it's just not a possibility right now. I want to have hours upon hours to be emotionally invested in every single word written so thoughtfully into each story, but said hours simply do not exist.

I love to read, and it is actively hurting my heart to have to see my books daily but not get to read them. They want me to read them. I want to read them. But we both have to wait. Sometimes I think nostalgically about the sensation of un-focusing my eyes while staring at a page until all of the words become blurry, fuzzy blobs and then I am filled up with a great surge of joy and thankfulness for phonemes and ideas and literature. I miss inhaling and being pleasantly surprised by the smell of books twisting itself into my nostrils. I love the feeling of being so physically in but actually secretly apart from the rest of the world because I am emotionally invested in a story. I love having my mood contingent upon the mood of a story, and I love the feeling of closing a book for the first time in hours and looking around and feeling like I've just woken up from the most illustrious and satisfying dream. 

My heart itches to have time to read. This semester I am taking a class on teaching students how to read, and the other day I found in my textbook this quote by Paulo Freire (who I've never heard of but fully agree with): "Reading is not walking on words, but grasping the soul of them." I miss the souls of words. 

I mean no sarcasm when I say that this really is hard and sad for me. It is hard to love and be so near to something but not get to act on that love. I have been telling myself that one day before I know it, Christmas will be here, and I will have much more free time and I will invest myself into abundant amounts of stories. 

But that's just the thing: one day, before I know it, Christmas will be here. My days have been moving so quickly. I sit in class all morning and then I go home and eat lunch and now it's almost the end of September.

I'm pretty good at planning for the future. I make charts and master plans and goals with due dates. The whole point of (at least the academic part of) college is to be prepared for my future, but that often gets skewed into hyper-focusing on life plans. Looking ahead is good, but I forget increasingly more and more about what I'm doing in a certain moment. I forget to look around: look to the left, look to the right, look diagonally, look up, look down, look upside-down. I do not want to make a habit of only thinking about what's next and never noticing what is presently right in front of my face. I do not want to remember college as a period of major stress where I was doing all that I could to ensure that my future would be perfect. I do not want to bide my time until my most ideal life situation presents itself to me (because it won't). 

Biding my time like this reminds me of "the waiting place" in Dr. Suess's Oh The Places You'll Go - 

The Waiting Place...
...for people just waiting.
Waiting for a train to go
or a bus to come, or a plane to go
or the mail to come, or the rain to go
or the phone to ring, or the snow to snow
or waiting around for a Yes or a No
or waiting for their hair to grow.
Everyone is just waiting.

Waiting for the fish to bite
or waiting for wind to fly a kite
or waiting around for Friday night
or waiting, perhaps, for their Uncle Jake
or a pot to boil, or a Better Break
or a string of pearls, or a pair of pants
or a wig with curls, or Another Chance.
Everyone is just waiting.

I don't want to be a person stuck in "the waiting place." It sounds like Purgatory on earth, and that is certainly not what college or any stage of life is supposed to feel like.

One morning last summer I was driving around and pulled up to a stoplight next to a man in a little white car. The license plate on his car said "almost," and I have been intermittently pondering what that was supposed to mean ever since that day. Was it supposed to mean something metaphorical and melancholy? Was it supposed to mean something quite practical, and my brain is too imaginative to think of what that could be? Am I trying to give meaning to something that doesn't necessarily have any? 

I think it means always being "almost" to the next thing, as in life-planning. Once I get to one place, I think about everything I need to do in order to be prepared for and get to the next. I am always "almost" at the place I'm going to be next. But that is not a great way to live life. I don't want to spend all of my minutes in preparation for the subsequent minutes, which I will then spend in preparation for something else. If I do that, I will never notice the smell of the cookies or the taste of the coffee or the way that, if you tilt your head, the blobs on the ceiling almost make an amoeba. 

So the plan is to deliberately live through my moments. There are only so few minutes that I get to be awake for, so I want to pay attention to them and notice them - the good, the bad, the ugly, and everything else. I am aware that bad days happen. Sad days happen. Good days happen. Great days happen. I choose to analyze all of the parts of my days so that I can learn the maximum amount possible - about God, about life on earth, about people - and then apply all of this knowledge to my future moments. I choose to make the time I am conscious worthwhile. 

Love,
Lauralicious

Barges

Our evening program for Friday nights at Camp is called Barges. Barges are pieces of pine bark with birthday candles hot-glued onto them. Around dusk-ish, supervisors light the barges and lightly propel them into the lake (normally I think of Lake Hartwell as kind of yucky but, strangely, at Camp, I don't. At Camp, it's just the lake, and it's nice), where they affectionately float away while we sing - 

Barges, I would like to go with you
I would like to sail the ocean blue
Barges, are there treasures in your hold?
Do you fight with pirates, brave and bold?

Out of my window, looking to the light
I can see the barges flickering bright
Silently flows the river to the sea
And the barges do go silently...

Usually, I am fairly distracted during Barges because my mind is going a hundred miles a minute. I am counting my campers to make sure they haven't run away (not that my sweet old ladies would, but I like to make sure they're all there still) and making sure that they are emotionally intact (it can be kind of an emotional time). Also, I am encouraging certain wiggly people to be somewhat still while trying to sing the words to the song and occasionally glancing at the supervisors to see if there is anything they feel the need to communicate to me with their eyes (there isn't).

The Friday night of the first week of Camp, one of my campers and I were a little late to Barges, and she was too tired to walk down a lot of stairs and stand for a long time, so I let her sit on the steps and we watched Barges happen. We sat on these old wooden steps and listened from a few distant feet away as everyone in Camp sang "Barges," and she put her head on my shoulder and I rubbed her back and sang it along with Camp. Singing to just her felt like some kind of lullaby that was written for her specifically instead of the song that all of Camp sings every Friday night. 

It felt a little bit like we were spying on Camp. Everyone was so focused on each other, and it was special to be able to see the almost tangible bond that had formed throughout Camp, both in spite of and because of everything that had occurred during the week. We viewed the gentle care given by counselors to their campers, the great admiration by campers of their counselors, the trust built between counselors, the friendships found between campers. 

And then, so suddenly, Barges was over. It was time to go back to our cabins for shower time, and everyone in Camp started moving back towards their cabins. My camper and I quickly were back in the group and our special moment was over. 

But I was thankful for this moment that I had gotten to witness. I felt very proud to be a member of this place where unthinkably remarkable things happen so very often, where every minute is full, where people belong just as soon as they arrive. I felt nostalgic in my heart, because I love this place, and also I like it. 

Love,
Lauralicious

The Sweetest Little Dovelies

Every Friday night at Camp, we give awards to our campers. For our two-week session, my co-counselors and I made hand-bound books with leaves on the covers, kind of Peter Pan-esque. Inside the books, we wrote this poem that explains all of the feelings we have towards our campers and the time they spend with us at Camp - 

Once upon a time

Far, far away

There lived a little dovely

And she was more beautiful than any, I daresay

Her soul was as pure as a crystal

She loved all people so well

So wholly, so kindly, so happily

That she had a great heart, anyone could tell

Dear Dovely had a house

Where Christmas and Thanksgiving she spent

But every mid-July

It was down South, towards home, she went

Like all the best Dovelies,

She knew how to fly

To spread out those wings

And head straight for the sky

So she flew over here, of course,

Every mid-July

With her bags all packed

And her head held high

“Hello!” she said

With a smile on her face,

“I have come to bring

Happiness and joy to this place”

The people who lived there

Had been waiting all year

For the arrival of this Dovely

And when she came, with glee they did cheer

And with that,

She was welcomed right in

She was greeted with hugs

And reciprocated with a lovely grin

You see, at Camp, this Dovely was happy

All the whole day long

Swimming, playing, dancing,

And singing many Camp songs

But she couldn’t stay forever

At this place where her heart is full

She had to go and spread the joy

To teach others how to love by the bucket-full

She knows that this is her home

It’s the place where, of heart, there is no lack

And we don’t have to be sad

Because we know you’ll always be back

Every moment spent with you was precious

We are so glad you came

We are sad to see you go

But will always remember your name

Spending days in the sunshine

Is what we always liked to do

But we never knew how sweet it could be
Until we did it with you!

For the Moments I Feel Faint

A week ago I learned the names of eight ladies with whom I now share a cabin. It was this time last week when I took notes on their files in preparation for four days ago, when I finally met them, and it only took a few minutes for me to realize that I quite love them. None of them were shy when we met so we grew close quickly. On the day I met them, I helped them in the bathroom, cut up their dinner for them, and, at bedtime, kissed them each on the head and told them that I loved them. I normally don't tell people I love them on the same day I've met them so that's how I know how special these ladies are. And I do love them each, so much. I love them not because I have to or because I want to (although I do!), but because I just do. 

A week ago, I hadn't even met them. Then three hours ago, I put sunscreen on all of their bodies. Twelve hours from now, they will all be tucked into bed and I will already have kissed them on the head. In a week, it will be the morning of our last day together. Time is fleeting.

A lot of people say that if you love someone, you need to let them go. But why on earth would I ever do that? I don't understand. Because what if it is better for them to be here with me instead of in a far-away place where they are taught to bide their time? Here, we purposely make all of our moments special and it makes time so sweet.

Last night, after my ladies were asleep, I walked around the cabin and checked on everyone. I walked by the lady who is the loudest snorer I've ever met, the lady whose first words when she wakes up are "I slept good!," the lady who giggles as soon as she wakes up, the lady who wiggles her butt in the cutest way when she is happy, the lady who sleeps with her head at the foot of the bed, the lady who likes her hair done in two braids like Anne of Green Gables, the lady who sleeps with an oxygen machine that sounds like a vortex may be coming for us at any moment, and the lady who falls asleep as soon as she gets finished brushing her teeth, but always wakes up to say goodnight when we come around to kiss her. 

I sincerely believe that life would be better if I did not have to let them go. I understand that they have families who love them, and that maybe I would get burnout or something if we were together for every moment for the rest of forever, and also I have to go to school so I can learn to be a grownup, but I love them. So it does not seem fair that they have to go away and then I have to be here without them.

Here, I am my most artistic, my most kind, my most compassionate and caring, my most selfless, and it's because they make me this way. No other group of people could make me the way I am with them, and I am afraid that when they leave, I will go back to being self-absorbed and grouchy and possessive. 

I am afraid for next Thursday to come - our last day together. One of the saddest things I've ever felt is putting campers to bed the night before they go home. I always say, "Goodnight, I love you, see you in the morning." And I will see them in the morning, but that's it. They'll leave me after that. I won't get to see them that afternoon, or that night, or even the next morning. 

These ladies have my heart. They actually have it. I am here at a coffee shop on my time off, but they are back at Camp holding my heart between the eight of them. These eight, as well as all of the others I've known this summer, took a piece of me when we met, before I even thought to brace myself for it. But I'm glad they have it, because even though I had little choice over whether or not they took it, they take good care of it. They know how to get to me - to make me swell with joy and pride for them, and also sometimes go crazy with frustration. They know what they are doing with my heart, and I am glad they have it. I'm glad for each of them to have a piece of myself so I can point at them and say, "she is mine, and I am hers!" Time is hard and being with people is hard, but I am more than grateful for the time I've gotten to spend with these ladies and for the one more week we have together.

For the moments I feel faint, this is what I will remember: everything. The happy, the sad, the frustrating, the celebration of small things, the celebration of big things, the inevitable, the surprising, the moments.

Love,
Lauralicious

Missing from Me

The concept of missing people and things is fascinating to me. It is so interesting that I can be going about my day normally and then suddenly and for no reason get this taste in my heart for a person who isn't with me, or how I can hear or see one little thing and then instantly be thinking of a friend and wishing for and needing them to be with me in that moment. 

I love people. I also like to be alone, but I really love people. And when we are apart, I miss all the pieces of them - the faces they make, the things they do that make me laugh or roll my eyes in amusement, the way they hang on me like a monkey, the way they pronounce certain words, the feelings of pure jubilee that I have from being with one specific person, the way they hold (squeeze) my hand while walking until I feel like my hand is going to be torn off of me but still I don't want them to let go because I like being connected in this way.

My mind normally has a lot going on between what I am doing in a moment and what I am thinking about at that moment and preparing for what I am doing next and what I thought about what I did yesterday and wondering about things that aren't relevant at the moment but do matter and so much more. So I know that if I am going about my day with all of that thinking, then am struck with the thought of a person, I must really miss them. Because with all of that thinking and doing going on and then a person just waltzing into my head and then my heart so fervently aching to be with them - to enjoy their presence and their personality and their idiosyncrasies with utmost fondness in my heart - they are special and dear.

I saw a pin on Pinterest once that said the French for "I miss you" is "tu me manque," which, if translated literally, means "you are missing from me." I don't know if what Pinterest said was exactly true or what but the concept of it is nice - that I can be here, and a person can be away from me - in New Zealand, or Philadelphia, or just around the riverbend, but logistics for spending time together aren't working out - but still they are a part of me, and that part of me is missing. 

It's as if my heart is Voldemort's horcrux. I've split it into so many pieces and given it all around so that it is spread all over creation. However, unlike Voldemort's horcrux, slicing up and giving away my heart makes it more compassionate and more inclined to continue to do so. All of these pieces of me are spread around, but that doesn't mean that there is less of me wherever I am. It means that I am a friendship soup of all of the people I have ever known and loved. 

One day, I will be in Heaven with Christ and with all of these people who have pieces of my heart, and that will be the greatest - to never be separated and to always be with all of those whom I love. Until then, I will miss those to whom I've had to say goodbye (for a day, for six months, for indefinite amounts of time, for potentially the rest of our lives), and I will know and love those who I am with. Just know that pieces of my heart are out there floating around, inside of other people (whether or not they know it) and it's the best thing. 

Love,
Lauralicious

There Once was a Camper

There once was a camper. 

And I love her. She was old, she was blind, she had to be woken up once an hour all night every night to use the restroom, she once said the f-word to me in the middle of the lake and then said, "Jesus probably didn't approve very much of that one." She made beaded necklaces for everyone and gave them to anyone, regardless of whether or not she knew them, she walked slowly and needed to be golf-carted to most places, she wore long pants in 90-degree (or more) heat, she said "hot dog!" when anyone told her something exciting, she sang hymns while walking even if no one was listening, but usually people were. And she loved Camp.

She is older than my grandparents. And now she's too old to come back to Camp. She came to Camp consistently and dependably for forty-plus years. My boss cried when she found out and then when I found out, I cried too while we just sat together. 

I was worried about what I was going to do without her. I've had her cabin twice before and I was with them again this week, which was wonderful because they make every day the best day. But I was afraid that, since she was so special to Camp and for so long, it would not be the same without her. And it wasn't. It was different, just as every year is. But it was great.

As my mama says, all good things must come to an end. Even the best things. 

And just because it must end does not mean that it was not good, because it was. But now she must stay where she is and I'll stay where I am, which is hard because where I am is where we used to be together with joy. I am here without her and my heart is sad. 

No one is like her and I love her with all my heart. Knowing and having to articulate the harsh, unpleasant truth that I will likely never see her face again, never see her lick her lips, never hear her call, "Em'ly" in the middle of the night even though I'm not Emily, I'm Laura, is very hard or me to do. It hurts my heart ever to lost contact with a friend, especially if it is one who helped sculpt me as a person. She is one of the most spectacular people with whom I have ever made acquaintance. 

So I will remember her. I will remember what her singing voice sounded like, I will remember the sock monkey she slept with, I will remember her dark blue eyes. I will look back fondly on my old friend while moving forward, because Camp is fluid. I want so badly for her to come back and for everything to be just like it used to be, but that's not how life works. Life moves forward and fast, and events cannot be repeated. I get to experience new days with different people, but because I knew her I am now a little bit, if even just the tiniest bit, altered as a person. And for that I am thankful. 

Love,
Lauralicious

Camp Camp Camp

I spend my summers with my head in a great big happy cloud - the Camp cloud. I spend my whole year from August to June wishing to be back in this cloud - I decorate my room with Camp memorabilia, fill out my returner application just as soon as I receive it because I'm so eager to be there, spend time with/run into Camp friends and talk about how much we love it, and dream about my campers, wishing as hard as I can to be with them.

I am always excited for Camp, except for the month or so right before I go. The cloud of excitement and pure things that Camp is turns into a cloud looming near me that won't leave me alone. I get so anxious before I go because what if any shimmer of good-counselor-ness I had in my past years has dissipated? What if no one on staff wants to be my friend? What if the campers won't try new things? What if I can't sleep and then I'm too tired to walk? What if we never have chicken fingers for lunch and then I'm so sad that I run away? What if a camper gets hurt and I could have prevented it? What if I'm not the best counselor ever? What if something goes wrong?

Because I am nervous, I feel resistant. I get agitated when I realize that I need to go to Walmart for supplies. I start to commemorate all of the last things I do before I go - the last time I wear makeup (last Thursday), the last time I hug my mom (tomorrow), the last time I get to sleep in (today), the last time I eat my dad's grits (yesterday), the last time I wear shoes that are not Chacos (yesterday), the last time I use my electric toothbrush (today), the last time I see my college friends who are in Clemson for the summer (last Tuesday). 

It's always hard to go to Camp, but once I am here, I don't want to be anywhere else. And soon enough the summer will be over and I will be sad that I'm gone from this place where people are kind and fair. Then I'll be commemorating all of my last things at Camp and wishing to no avail that it could always be summer and I could always be here.

And I know this, but still, every summer before it's time for me to go, I pout over what I will miss. I won't get to sleep in and babysit my favorite three-year-olds and write a lot of words and drink a lot of coffee. But this is a job of sacrifice, and I know that. It's why I keep coming back, because Camp is where I am second and where that is a good thing. 

Last week was staff training, and tomorrow campers come. Staff training was great. I was nervous and grumpy before and I cried when I hugged my brother because it was time for me to leave. But I drove over to Camp even though I wanted to go back to bed and, just like always, it was wonderful. I was reunited with old friends and I made new friends. I look so forward to having campers with us, because they are why we all made the decision to give up selfish things to be at Camp, handing out pieces of our hearts. 

On Thursday night while watching last year's staff video, I realized two things - 1. That I am lucky to get to be at Camp. There are people who can't be here who are heartbroken over missing these seven priceless weeks. These people would not complain if they were here. They would be so joyful. 2. I can't stay forever. One day I may have to really grow up, to go to the real world where no one raises their hand at lunch to celebrate with all of Camp a fifty-six year-old woman blowing bubbles in a three-foot-deep pool for the first time ever, where the boys don't form huge dance circles to let the girls eat first, where I don't get to do the jig with my best Camp friend every Sunday night and Saturday morning, where the majority of my time is spent with people of my general age group and ability level, where there is air conditioning nearly everywhere, where nobody needs me to hold their hand while walking, where I don't get to wear a wooden name tag, where no one wakes me up in the middle of the night because they need to go potty or are scared. 

Instead of sulking in what I am missing, I choose to celebrate what I am getting - the chance to do life with people who simply love it. I am getting shown what real love looks like, and it looks like it hurts but it's worth it. I am getting growth, and growing hurts. 

I don't go to Camp because I want to be comfortable. I go to Camp because I want to help give this environment of safety and acceptance to people who don't have one but deserve it more than anyone. I go to Camp to give the most special week of all time to the most special people I've ever known. I go to Camp because I like getting to cheer on old ladies when they're shooting bows and arrows. 

I am aware that the whole world is up to other things without me and a lot of my friends have better-paying or longer-sleeping summer situations. I am here to be a friend, to be a counselor, to be at Camp. 

Love,
Lauralicious

The Significance of Handkerchiefs

Ten years ago, I turned ten. In celebration of this birthday, my grandmother, D’Mama, took me on a five-day cruise to the Bahamas. I had never been on a boat that wasn’t a rowboat or a boat on the lake pulling a tube or a kneeboard, so being on a huge ship with a lot of other people was a big change and an exciting adventure for me. D’Mama got seasick easily but I couldn’t tell the difference between having my feet on land and having them on our ship, the Jubilee. We had such a wonderful time together. She and I had always been special to each other, but having this time that was for the two of us and only the two of us was magnificent and a time of jubilee.

My favorite part of the cruise, however, was during the afternoons when D’Mama had to take a nap. She was very sick (although I didn’t really know it) and needed a lot of rest. She needed quiet while she slept and I could not be still, so I got to venture around the ship every afternoon. I ate so much soft-serve ice cream.

I had never seen Titanic, being a ten-year-old and all, but being on the deck of the Jubilee was very similar to the way being on the deck of the Titanic was portrayed. The wind whipped around everywhere so that there was not really a purpose to trying to hold down my hair. It was blown until it was unbrushable, and I loved that. I liked to stand on the side of the boat, just above the ocean, and I never tired of watching the ocean go by. It looked so peaceful and so consistent and I wanted to be floating in it with my face towards the sky.

My whole imagination was present and blooming all week. I pretended that I was the captain’s daughter and I was allowed anywhere I wanted. I felt so happy, just wandering around, being blown by the wind, running into people, going back to the main deck for more ice cream, taking the elevator down to places I was not supposed to be, watching the water move under the ship. I felt so happy and I just wanted to spin around with my arms spread out because I didn’t know how else to express the fullness of my heart.

After this cruise, D’Mama decided that it would be fun to establish a tradition of special trips for each grandchild when they turned ten. But then she died in October. As in, we got back from the cruise, the summer passed, then as I was settling into being a fifth grader, she died. She was much sicker on the cruise than I had noticed.

And so as the oldest, I was the only grandchild who got to embark on this ten-year birthday tradition with her. At her funeral, all of her friends told me how lucky I was that I got to spend that special time with her before she died. They told me how much she loved me, but I already knew, because I loved her just as much.

After she died, my parents and I went through her closet and I got to take home with me some of her jewelry and a lot of her scarves. I never wore them, but I liked knowing that I still had pieces of her with me because I was afraid of forgetting her. But slowly as I grew older and older, every time I cleaned out under my bed, I decided not to keep a few more of her things. I felt badly about it, but a person’s past possessions are not that person. I kept one beaded clutch that I still use, but that was the only thing of hers that I kept.

Then last week, I was cleaning out my room and found two flower-embroidered handkerchiefs that had belonged to her. I was very excited to find something else of hers that I would use and love.

I just turned twenty, which means that it was ten years ago when she and I went on the cruise and this fall will be ten years since she died. It was ten years ago that I ran around the Jubilee with no one but my imagination and found places where no one else was and felt like the only person in the world.

My grandmother was a real Southern lady. She had the Emily Post book of etiquette in her living room on the bookshelf and she had a fancy foyer that we had to walk carefully in on the occasions that we were allowed to go into it. She knew all of the rules of hospitality and social situations, and she taught me a lot of them, even though I don’t think I was listening.

A few weeks ago, I was at a bridal shower for a friend and some of the older ladies were telling those of us younger ladies about old Southern traditions for girls, particularly the passing down of handkerchiefs between grandmothers and granddaughters. They said that it was a great compliment to a girl to receive a handkerchief from a grandmother or older lady.

It may be pretty cheesy that I found these handkerchiefs so conveniently at the ten-year mark of our trip together, but I think it is such a sweet tradition and feel confident that she would have been someone to participate in such a tradition. Here's to handkerchiefs and memories and imaginations!

Love,
Lauralicious

Weeds

Just like most people, I ebb and flow between times when I think I'm the most wonderful person on the earth and times when I stand at a distance from myself in disbelief of how atrocious I am. I wish I could be more consistent, but I'm all over the place with how I see myself and it's almost never in a good or healthy way.

When I think I'm the best person ever, I am self-righteous. I make lists in my head of all the qualities I have that would make me a good wife someday. I ask myself how people could ever not like me or not want to be my friend. I tell myself that the reason people don't flock to me in social situations is because they are intimidated by how wonderful and graceful and superior to them I obviously yet diplomatically am. I say unkind things about people I don't like so that other people can see that I am able to think critically, but I say these callous things in a way that seems prudent and well-thought-out and in the best interest of all involved. I am self-sufficient and I (pretend that I) don't need Christ at all. 

But then, abruptly, I feel the exact opposite way. I feel like a sloppy, tarnished, lackadaisical pile of a person. My intentions are not worthy or kind. There is no point to trying to do anything because I'm just going to fail. People who would normally bother me a little bit turn into people I have to leave the presence of in order to not punch. It's these times when it seems like every mistake I've ever made is ganging up on me. I wish I could live in a cave and eat gummy worms and read stories about people other than myself, because then I wouldn't have any problems. I know I'm terrible, but I just can't help it and I can't stop.

Ever since I noticed this tendency to ricochet between these extremes, I've tried to regulate my actions and the way in which I view myself. I want to walk through my days knowing that I am sinful and broken, but that there is now no condemnation I dread and no need to despair in my blatant human-ness. I want to be able to rejoice in the grace which I have received. It is why I am able to live. 

A. A. Milne, author of Winnie the Pooh, said that "weeds are flowers, too, once you get to know them." This feels especially true in the spring. There are flowers all along the sides of the roads. They are happy and pretty and beaming. 

I'm a weed. I try and strive to be a flower and I do my best to masquerade as one, but I'm just not. I know this because I don't live in a flower garden or in a carefully painted flowerpot. There is no one to carefully pat the soil around me so that I can grow successfully. When it's time to mow the yard, I go down with the grass, and that's the end of that. 

But being loved by God means that even if I am a persistent old weed, He treats me as a flower. He buys special soil so that I can be healthy. He brings me inside on cold nights so the frost doesn't kill me. He waters me. And there are still scary dogs and thunderstorms and very hungry caterpillars trying to eat me, but I know that I was put here by the King of the earth for a reason. I know that He cares about me. He wants me to grow big and bright so that I can be a reminder to all the world of His glory. 

Tim Keller says "He loved us, not because we were lovely to Him, but to make us lovely." And that's why I am able to live a life worthy of the calling I have received. I don't have to drastically bounce between loving myself too much and hating myself too much. I can just live and grow.

Love,
Lauralicious

Words and Breakdowns

Words are important. They are necessary for communication - the fun kind and the necessary kind - they're used in music, learning, and literature. I love words - I legitimately love them, in full knowledge that "love" is a strong word and I should not use it trivially, and I don't think I am. I love reading words and I love writing words. I love what they do together. I love that a bunch of letters that look kind of like some quite well-groomed giraffes can be spaced near to each other and make so much sense that I want to cry because the person who put them together gets my heart. I love that these conduits of functional communication can be turned into pages and chapters and series of sincerely heartfelt written expression.

Words make so much sense to me, and if they don't, they just need to be rearranged once or twice until they do. I have always loved words, to the point where I decided that I should put words together and then let people read them on purpose. It was going well. I was doing good things, saving the world, etc., and occasionally writing about Jesus.

Then the other day I was trying to write a blog post and I edited and edited (I had been editing this one thing for weeks already) and it wasn't getting better. No matter what I did to it, it was still not great. And I got so sad. I thought I had lost my writing ability and it cut me down. I felt like maybe I was evaporating into thin air in the middle of a coffee shop. My existence was no longer necessary.

I was hit by this significantly more than I should have been. I thought maybe I was having an almost-quarter-life crisis (that is not even a thing, so I guess a plain old emotional crisis), but as I talked to my roommate about it, I realized that I was having less of a crisis and more of a tantrum. Tantrums are different now that I'm not six years old so I don't have the same symptoms...but still I have tantrums. These days, tantrums usually include long-term pouting and ordering fries - just fries at restaurants and expecting everyone and everything around me to conform to my standard of perfection and know exactly how to make me feel happy and fulfilled (yes, even and especially the inanimate objects).

I had made an idol out of my writing. I thought it was mine. I was convinced by myself that I was the best writer ever and that all the words I wrote were true because I wrote them and that I deserved recognition and praise and honor and a few book offers. I subconsciously but quite vainly thought that I was God's gift to literature (never mind that I have a small blog and that I'm a nineteen year old girl who has only taken two college English classes ever). I wanted to think those wonderful and affirming things about myself, so I did. My ego was pretty inflated, not unlike a cream puff.

Not that I'm a bad writer (because, now that I have come back to my senses, I don't think that I am) or that being a good writer is bad or knowing that you are good at something makes it automatically an idol, because those things aren't necessarily true, but I was off and I was wrong. My perspective of myself and the reason I was writing were skewed and then I fell hard, because old habits and vanity die hard.

In a small amount of time, I went from major vanity and overconfidence to no self-esteem. Out of nowhere, I felt that I did not have and had never had any original thoughts to share, that all of my words sounded obnoxious, that I somehow sounded too old-fashioned and too much like a millennial at the same time, and that I was destined to fail at anything I could ever consider trying in the future. 

The thing about my mind is that it doesn't stop to think about things. It tends toward the drastically, dastardly overdramatic, without my giving it permission to overreact to things. So instead of being slightly discouraged, I was crushed. My heart felt extinguished. I wondered, now that I obviously could not continue writing because I was so terrible at it, what I would do with my future free time. I thought that writing was my "thing" and now I wouldn't have a thing and I would be doomed to be aimless and move home and drop out of college and be a potato (of the couch variety) for the rest of my life. I liked having a cool, thought-provoking, vocabulary-expanding, therapeutic hobby. I very much wanted attention from people who thought I was wise and articulate.

I also wanted to write about Jesus, and I wanted to share Him with people. It wasn't really an afterthought; it just was not as much of a priority as eloquence and literary glory were. I wanted people to read my words and know automatically from whatever it was they were reading (even if it wasn't something explicitly about Jesus) that I love Jesus and I wanted them to feel inspired and convicted but in a mostly positive way after they were finished and then I wanted them to love me more because of it. 

I had taken something good, something God-given and God-created, and tried to make it mine. But, as I did not create the universe and/or everything in it, I was unsuccessful in trying to own all of literature. I wanted writing to be my thing. I wanted to lead people to Jesus when I felt like it, I wanted to be adorable and witty when I felt like, and I wanted to express thoughtful but not annoying social commentary when I felt like it. I like to control things, and I was trying to control the way people saw me - as a flawless, cute, genuine, wispy-haired, intriguing writer girl who also loves Jesus but not in an inconvenient way - and it did not work. 

I am a perfectly adequate writer. I am not the worst; I am a competent English-speaking and -writing individual. I want to continue to practice so that I can improve. But writing is not the only way I can (and do) represent God to the world.

I am representing Him all the time. On bad days where I'm wearing a baseball cap to school because I am in such a bad mood that I don't want to make eye contact with even one person and also on those days where I am so happy that springtime is finally here that I can't not skip around on my way to class. 

Whether or not I am consciously aware of it, whether or not I am ready, whether or not I want to, I'm showing the world who God is. I committed to having Him in my heart for the rest of my life, which means that I am representing Him through my heart and life for the rest of my life. This means that all of my accomplishments and all of my mistakes and all of the things in between are examples of what a child of God does and is. 

I've been given the ability to write and I am thankful for it and love it, but that does not make it mine. I want my life to be glory to Christ, which means that I use the things He has given me to make Him bigger, not me. If I was amazing at everything, He would not be glorified in anything. He must increase and I must decrease. 

Love,
Lauralicious 

Bananas

One time an old man told me that he didn't buy green bananas anymore because he was ready to go to Heaven at any point. He was very old. 

However, some (younger) people like to buy their bananas green, and some like to buy them when they are yellow, and some people like to wait until they are a little freckly, because different people like their bananas at different levels of ripeness. And while a person may feel strongly about what level of ripeness is the best-tasting, they are not wrong or right. It is a matter of opinion, because it is a banana, and not a matter of moral law.

But what about when a banana gets past the freckly stage and is straight-up brown? The store doesn't even sell them when they are this overripe. Nobody eats bananas after they turn kind of squishy. People eat them earlier solely because they think brown bananas are gross and want to avoid having to have brown bananas in their mouth and/or home. I've started to feel like people are bananas, and I'm a brown one.

I am sitting on a shelf waiting for exciting life things to happen, but not a lot is and I'm generally fine with that until I realize that all my fellow banana friends are gone. My friends are doing exciting things and I am be-bopping along. I'm busy and I'm doing life, too, but if you were to ask me what's going on, I would say "nothing much," and it's been this way for a good long while now. I am jealous of people who have lots of exciting things going on.

Yesterday afternoon, I walked by the pantry in my apartment. I keep my food on the top left half-shelf and when I quite hungrily looked up there for a snack, I saw that I have two brown bananas on my half-shelf. And then I remembered that I need to make banana bread muffins soon.

Brown bananas are the only kind you can use for banana bread muffins. They're soft and turn into muffins so readily because they are easily squishable. That doesn't mean that people who are brown bananas are so apathetic and hopeless that they'll do anything; it means that they are willing to be turned into something better, even if it means that they themselves have to change (and change is scary). They lose their whole shape and color and turn into something better, something with chocolate chips. 

Green and yellow bananas are harder to squish. And I don't mean that they are bad or lazy or that brown bananas are superior, because they're not. They know different suffering than brown bananas. But I like them. They are cool and they are my friends.

But brown bananas aren't bad either. They can be taken from the half-shelf at the top left corner of the pantry and turned into something that no banana ever even knew was a possibility. And so I can say, with the potential of my life being turned into the life of a muffin, there is hope for me yet. 

Love,
Lauralicious