Tonight

Tonight...

• I'm missing my best friend, who is currently across the world in East Asia, and will be for the next 6 months
• I'm thinking about how life and conversation in our house has become consumed by the topic of weddings
  
• I'm grateful for freshly laundered, still warm from the dryer pj's to curl up in
• I'm thinking about what needs to be done and packed before my next flight leaves on Wednesday night
• I'm praying for friends scattered across the country and around the globe
• I'm thinking about breath
• I'm close to tears
• I'm thankful for a small, unexpected sum of money that arrived today
• I'm lighting candles
• I'm smelling the scent of rose oil
• I'm feeling oddly uncertain about many things
• I'm also feeling deeply reflective
• I'm hoping that passage that talks about the Spirit praying when we don't have words is true, for my heart just doesn't have words.
  

Sci-Fi Geeks - the Photos

This one was posed. L. was quite amused by this guy's antics, and asked him if he'd pose for a photo with her. This "lovely" costumed character was waiting just around a corner, sort of "sneaking" up on hapless concert-goers as they came around the corner to enter the building.

In this case, L. was so amused by the costumes that she pulled the "take a photo of me when you're really taking one of them" trick. So, notice L., but mostly, notice the costumed symphony goers in the background.

Sci-Fi Geeks

Can I just say that I always forget just exactly how into a theme some sci-fi geeks can get?

I attended the "Lord of the Rings Symphony" with my brother, roommate and a friend tonight.

There were people - audience members - in costume. To attend a symphony. And not just one or two in costume, but dozens.

We took pictures - the sneaky kind where you stand in front and off to the side of what you're actually trying to photograph. My roommate even asked one particularly elaborately costumed person to pose with her. He obliged, in between skulking around corners to startle people arrived to attend the symphony.

I'll upload the pictures when I get a chance. But for the moment, I'm finding infinite amusement in remembering the rather goofy looking people scattered amidst those dressed up to attend the symphony.

Articles Catching My Attention

Emily Stauffer's Faith Remembered

And CBC presents "On This Day"... I don't think I'll ever forget sitting in a social studies classroom, with the memorial for Pierre Elliot Trudeau playing quietly as we studied. I won't forget the moment when his son, Justin Trudeau stepped to the microphone to deliver a eulogy to his father, and I'll forget the moment etched in my memory, as he ended his eulogy with a simple and poignant "je'taime papa."

This is the day (the prayers of my heart)

As I was opening the blinds in my bedroom this morning, I glanced out the window and saw the faintest beginnings of the sunrise, and slowly, like a mantra, these words began repeating themselves across my heart.

This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and give thanks in it.

I am not, by nature an easily optimistic or joyful person. And yet, this morning, my heart is seeking to find joy, to speak with my Abba, in the midst of many things. I am being drawn unwittingly into deep places, and am so thankful for a dear friend who has often reminded me that a heart can pray with or without words.

As I drove to work this morning, and watched the sunrise, and then, the spattering of raindrops across my windshield, my heart was drawn deeper and began to pray.

Today (among other things) I am praying for:

• a friend who recently visited our home from New Zealand, and is currently undiagnosed and not responding to treatment, in an induced coma in a New Zealand hospital.
• two precious little girls
• dear friends interconnected, and scattered across four provinces
• some people I love who are grieving
• the family and friends who will gather today in Edson to both mourn and celebrate the life of a young woman who was killed late last week
• other friends scattered across the globe - in Europe and Asia, and other parts abroad
• deep and difficult lessons being learned by a friend who finds herself quite isolated in a foreign part of the world, filling roles that are foreign and less than satisfying
• the healing and restoration of some I love deeply
• two friends recently engaged, and two more enjoying the first days of married life
• restoration of relationships that have borne much strain
• airplane flights scheduled

And so, as I turn my attention to the days' work, I will let my heart continue to pray. I am seeking to rest, to give thanks, to live in a space occupied by peace and joy.

This is the day that the Lord has made. I will rejoice and give thanks in it.