Of all the liars in the world...

My dad came with my new roommate and I to our new house for an hour tonight.

We had a couch stuck in our stairwell since Monday, propped against a wall, because we couldn't get it down the stairs when we moved a lot of the furniture on Monday. With Dad's help, we now have a couch in our basement.

He helped Jo - my roommate - assemble her dresser, while I puttered around doing a few little organizational type things.

Our kitchen is basically set up, and on Sunday we're going to move my bed, and I'll officially be living there. Crazy!

It's getting closer. Things are coming together. We have a few more purchases to make - things like spices, a couple organizational items, that sort of thing, but then we're down to simply arranging things the way we want and setting up housekeeping. Just at this moment, the fears have mostly taken a hike and I'm feeling very excited. (Not to mention relieved that this process has a foreseeable end!)

With that done, I'm going to take a shower. Jo and I are tagging along with my brother T. and some of his friends to a comedy club tonight, and have plans to take in the Stampede tomorrow for a few hours before the rodeo.

I also need to run a couple quick errands in the morning, so I'm signing off!

I love my hair today, even though I’ve pulled it all back into a pony tail. I went to bed with it wet last night – quick late-night shower to get the aloe vera and sunscreen that were protecting me from further sunburn off of my skin – and woke up with wild crazy curls and waves this morning. I piled it back into a pony tail simply because I desperately need a haircut that I can’t afford and to leave it down wouldn’t have quite managed the “professional” appearance necessary for work. But I just glanced in a mirror, and I’m loving my hair.

I’m vacillating wildly today between moments of planning my new bedroom in my new house, and being completely discombobulated and frightened because after 24 years I have a new house.

I’ve been listening to Jacob and Lily’s “The Cathedral” all day at work again. Something about it just grabs the deeper parts of my heart right now. (I wrote about that yesterday if you’re interested.)

Jann Arden was great last night. We only stayed for an hour, but she is so funny, and played some of my favorites, so it was enjoyable all around.

I’ve been reading the July issue of “Vanity Fair” the last couple of days on the train and my lunch breaks. It’s guest edited by Bono, and all about Africa. Definitely worth picking up and reading. Not my usual quick read in a magazine, but worthwhile.

I ordered internet services for my new house today. They should be in place sometime the middle or end of next week.

I don’t like the way Stampede increases the number of public transit users. The trains were a bit of a disaster this morning thanks to the parade, and I’m dreading the afternoon commute as everyone heads to the grounds to kick off their weekend. Should be equally gross all of next week as well.

As much as I love being warm, there is a limit to how much heat I can tolerate, and we’ve reached it. I shall be extraordinarily glad if the predicted “chance of rain or thundershowers” occurs sometime today or tomorrow – just so the heaven’s don’t open in the middle of tomorrow afternoon while I’m sitting in bleachers watching the rodeo.

I do believe that I may actually be completely moved by the end of this weekend. Not settled yet, but moved. I think I’ll be relieved when that’s finally over. The strain of this transition must be showing in my face. People at work keep asking me how I’m doing, and if I’m okay.

I think we’ll have a big housewarming party in the fall – once some of my friends that are currently traveling on other continents are home, and can attend.

I’m dreaming of my ultimate someday home (assuming I’m still single). I’d like to have a two-bedroom place, filled with books, and warm colors. One room for a bedroom, the other for an office/library. Imagine – a whole room just for books and crafty sorts of things – I love this plan! Rich colors, blues and greens, reds and browns. Whimsical touches – things that stand out a little bit. Lots of sunlight, but great mood lighting at night… (dreaming is rather fun, isn’t it?)

And with that, I suppose I should get back to work… there are things on my desk with no particular deadline, that I need to stretch to fill most of next week as well, but I should at least make the attempt at accomplishing something in the hour and a half or so left before I head home for the weekend! (Filing here I come!)

I haven't been very tolerant of music lately. So much of the stuff I normally listen to has been grating on my nerves, adding edgyness and discomfort to the rest of the upheaval in my life just presently.

There are, however, two albums that I've been listening to over and over.

The first is a new release from Jason Upton titled “Beautiful People”. I love Jason’s heart for God, and I love the theme of this album. Some of it is stuff that I’ve felt God speaking to me over the last year, and I’m delighted to find someone else expressing the theme of finding Jesus in the broken, in the ashes. One line that sticks out to me from the album (which is at home, while I’m writing this at work, or I’d tell you what song it was from…) goes “You live in the tension, you live in the tension, you live in the tension of creation.” I love that. I’m experiencing on a number of levels again lately what it means to live in tension.

The second album is “The Cathedral” by Jacob and Lily. I think I could listen to Karla and Caleb sing and play pretty much all day. In fact, I know I could, because, on one particularly bleak day earlier this week, where the clouds of mental confusion had closed in and were threatening to overwhelm, I simply played their album over and over on my ipod, through the whole workday. And my soul felt soothed. I don’t know if I can even pick a favorite song off this album. I just know that Karla’s lyrics, and the music that brings them to life have been speaking to the deep parts of my soul lately, and that has been such a surprising, beautiful and calming thing in this space on my journey.

Okay, so here’s where I’m at. I’m sunburnt – all across my upper chest and arms. My face less so, but also burnt. I’m going to have to go to the drugstore on my lunch break and pick up some aloe vera gel to sooth my aching skin.

I’m going to the stampede tonight to see Jann Arden play - $3 gate admission with the proceeds going to breast cancer, and then the concert is free. Marginal additional cost for the famous mini-donuts which will make the evening perfect. I’m still working to figure out what I can wear that will cover my very sensitive sunburnt skin appropriately to protect it from further damage, and won’t leave me roasting to death due to the heat wave we’re currently experiencing.

Hopefully by the weekend I will be fully living in my new house. At the moment we’re waiting to move my bed and mattress to the new house before I can sleep there. I remain of completely mixed feelings about this. I am completely terrified in that “Oh crap I’m an adult” sort of way, with deeper fear issues thrown in just for fun. At the same time I am totally excited to establish my own place, and live independently – which, by the way is expensive.

I’m having money issues. There is almost nothing on the planet that can stress me out the way that money does. I absolutely hate having to think about money, wondering if I have enough money from paycheck to paycheck, thinking about a budget, anything with numbers and dollar signs involved, really. My ideal job would be one where I made enough money to simply be able to purchase something I wanted, without weighing pros and cons of spending that amount ad infinitum. I would also be able to give a lot more generously to things and people whose ministries I would like to be able to support. I hate that right now when I become aware of a need, I have to think about whether or not I will be able to live for the upcoming week or month without whatever the amount is that I would like to give.

On Saturday, my mom, my new roommate and I are going to the Rodeo at the Stampede Grounds. I haven’t been to the rodeo for several years now, and I’m looking forward to taking it in. We’re also going to a stampede barbeque hosted by the church I’ve been a part of the last year that evening. Should be a busy weekend, but fun.

All of these things I’ve mentioned seem so surface level and boring as I look back over them. The trouble is that I’m having a great deal of trouble putting words around the things I’m feeling and wading through these days. I feel like so many things are shifting around me, and I’m struggling to keep my footing. There has been a definite onslaught of spiritual attack, and a corresponding drop in my emotional, mental and spiritual energy levels as I weather and fight the attack.

I’m reading through the Psalms again lately, identifying with so many of the emotions found there, and clinging to the promises. I read God’s covenant with Abram – a word that some friends spoke over me, and I have seen borne out in my life the last several months – on a nearly daily basis these days, to remind myself where my protection and worth lay.

“Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.” (Gen. 15:1)

I got this email from the Henri Nouwen society in today, and found it a bit challenging, so I'm passing it along for the rest of you to enjoy.

Becoming Fathers and Mothers

What are we going to do when we get home? When the two sons of the parable of the prodigal son both have returned to their father, what then? The answer is simple: they have to become fathers themselves. Sons have to become fathers; daughters have to become mothers. Being children of God involves growing up and becoming like God. Jesus doesn't hesitate to say this: "Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect, be compassionate as your heavenly Father is compassionate." (See Matthew 5:48 and Luke 6:36). How? By welcoming home our lost brothers and sisters in the way our Father welcomed us home.

I found this article on a drug rehabilitation system that is an alternative to jail quite interesting.

Okay, so after a day of moving boxes and furniture, with some major stuff left to go (when did I accumulate so many books?), I can't figure out why anyone in their right mind would actually LIKE moving.

I mean, this is the first time I've ever done it, and it's only about a five to seven minute drive from my parent's home, where I've lived since birth, but why would people LIKE this? It's exhausting, stressful, overwhelming, did I mention exhausting?

And with that, I'm going to go take a shower and read in bed or watch Gray's Anatomy in bed. Back to the working grind tomorrow morning early... and a busy week ahead between various personal and social commitments and finishing the move and settling in to our new home... pictures eventually.... I'll have to borrow a camera.

I'm spending most of the day today beginning to move to my new home.

It seems a little surreal to even write that sentence. I've lived in the same place since birth, and today I'm beginning to draw that to a close.

We won't be sleeping in the new place tonight, probably not tomorrow night either, but we're moving and beginning to set up our new place all day.

Crazy.

Blogging might be a little sparse over the course of the next week or two. My schedule is quite busy, and I'm not exactly sure when we'll have internet hooked up in our new place.

Pray for me - I'm finding this whole thing equal parts exciting and terrifying. And there are so many spiritual things attached to this whole process in my life.