a nagging need for God, in all things...

"God creates and activates a nagging dissatisfaction in every person 

for an excellent reason - a need that only He can meet" 

Breaking Free - by Beth Moore 

Is this why i feel this dissatisfaction for so many things in my life? because i have a void that only God can fill? 

I continuously seek out perfection in many areas of my life, but so many times i come up lacking. I view myself as deeply imperfect. Compliments on any level i can not take, because i never see myself as good enough to accept a compliment. Never will i measure up to the level of perfection that i deem worthy of a compliment - always room for improvement. Often times i give up because i seek such a perfection in the things that i do.  Many times it is only the criticism that i hear, and i close off the compliments.

The tree in the photo above is imperfect. it is ugly and a little bit scary. But it still grew proud and strong. it does not care what the outside world thinks or even says about it. it will continue to grow bigger and stronger until one day man cuts it down. i often times feel like this tree.  i feel like i grow in areas of my life, and then someone will cut me down to size and make me feel less than human. it is not until i let someone interfere in who i am or who i want to become that i tear myself down and see my imperfections for what they are... my imperfections.  

God created us in an imperfect way so that we could strive to become more than what we are in our life.  Seek out becoming better people, more human in our nature.  To be human is to love, is to be kind, is to be better than what we are... I am learning to open up more, to love more each day i am here in my new life.  It is a challenge every day to see my new life as less then perfect. i have found the ugly in so many things... it is time to seek out the perfection.  I am hoping that God will lend me a hand in seeing what i need to see, and to help me become what i need to become.

leaning over and learning to overcome fears...

i am always one to follow rules... ALL of the rules!

i do not pee in public for a reason, not that i would... but geesh, it's a rule people!

So today when i disobeyed the signs saying "no parking at ANY time" to pull over to take this photo... 

my heart was racing, i was so afraid that i would be caught and hauled off to jail for taking a photo.

obviously nothing happened; and in fact several people pulled over in front of me to do the same thing.  They were much quicker than i was about jumping out of their car running up to the edge, snapping a photo and then racing back onto the road.  i stood there, i lingered just a bit and i took a few photos. After a moment i was not afraid of the rules posted right above my head.  But i was afraid of the heights of where i was standing.  i have a terrible fear of heights! 

But today, i stood close to the edge, and i took my photos. 

it felt good.

click your heals Dorothy... or click a button...

The real world is not so easy my darling.

Two thoughts about video games.

1. Cooking games. Do not let your children play these games.  Claire loves cooking games.  She loves making/creating elaborate meals and desserts.  She often calls me over to view what she has created.  I am often impressed by her "cooking" skills, and i've even wished i could eat the creation right off of the screen it looked so yummy!  Recently I have been trying to teach her how to cook.  I've been letting her peel.  I've been letting her cut. I've been letting her measure.  I've been letting her do anything that i think a 9 year old can handle.  I am learning very quickly that she is losing interest in learning how to cook.  

You see, cooking (real cooking) takes time.  You can not wash, peel, cut up, dice, smash, season, marinate, etc. the food in the span of 30 seconds like you can on a cooking game.  You can not turn on the stove/oven/grill and it be ready to boil/bake within an instance.  Some meals can take hours to prepare.  Sure you can cut corners and purchase things already ready, but that is not what i am teaching her.  Real cooking means real work in the kitchen.

Today we prepared a BOX meal. Rice and vermicelli. You put in some butter, wait for it to melt a bit, and then you pour in the rice mixture.  You stir it around a bit and wait for it to turn brown. This is where i lost her.  She got bored with stirring it and said, "i'll be right back." and the next thing i know Michael is standing next to me cooking her meal.  I was preparing my Thai food left-overs and making more asian noodles to really care at that moment.  But darn it! I do care. I refuse to let her grow up never learning to cook.  It is frustrating these video games they play. What happened to Pacman?  Most of these games make the real world seem easy.  It creates a false illusion of how things really are in the world.  Yet they mass produce them and sell them as something to simulate reality.  Sorry to tell you kids, life is not as easy as clicking a button!

2. I have become a "game" player.  Well, not really. They have these silly little games on Facebook where you grow a farm or take care of a pet.  Today i noticed something that had been there all along, but never caught my attention.  "Go Home" It's just that simple. If you are lost, if you are somewhere you do not want to be, or even if you are some where you want to be but you just want to go home... click a button!  It's the same in the Wizard of Oz. "just click your heals Dorothy..." 

Um, yes... excuse me, i'd like to go home now! Can i click my heals? No, that won't work. Can i click a button? No, i'm pretty sure i'd still be here. It will take planning and packing and saving... and more planning and more packing and more saving of money and ah!! Yes, returning back home will not happen for quite some time.  But wouldn't it be nice if you could just click a button or a pair of ugly red shoes and return from where you came from?

***

Today i actually packed up things i had already unpacked. Yes, it sounds strange. We have no where to put anything. So i had a pile of picture frames in one corner... another pile had photo albums... another pile had random cards and pictures that were hanging on a pin wall.  I keep unpacking and making piles only to realize i have no where to put things yet.  Michael keeps saying, "don't get comfortable here... we won't be staying."  i do not even bother with putting holes in the walls since we'll only need to fix them all later.  So today i looked around at all of my loose piles of nick-nack's and what's-its and i made the choice to stop looking at the mess and just pack it all back up again.  

This made me both a little happy and a little sad.

lost in the words...

I can not say that i have ever known that feeling of being totally lost in the language.  Having never been to another country, i am oblivious to that feeling.  But i am learning so much living in California. This area is 55% Asian 15% Hispanic 15% Indian (India) and only 7% Caucasian and a mix of other races making up the other percentage points.  Just by walking around each day i feel an odd sense of not belonging...

Hanjin (as seen in image above) is my brothers wife of almost 2 years.  She is super sweet and very quiet.  Each time she speaks to me, i try so hard to understand her.  I am not sure if it is that she is not speaking loud enough to be heard clearly, or if i am so-very-not use to translating the broken English spoken by a person not native to America... but there is a lot being lost in translation.

Today we went on an adventure alone with her.  It was i am sure the first of many to come.  She needed to go to the market, which seemed innocent enough of a trip.  I told my brother, "no problem, we can take her while you get some work done."  In the end i realized we were taking her to a Korean/Japanese/Asian market.  

I had been told before that this was an amazing place with lots of foreign goods.  The market itself was very neat, lots of normal foods, and many strange things that Americans probably would never eat (dried squid on a stick anyone?).  I love the Thai noodles that they make in the Thai restaurants but i can never find them in  a normal grocery store.  I was excited at the prospect of locating them in this store.  The asian noodle isle was huge!  Of course everything on the package was written in asian (which exact language i can not be sure), and of course Hanjin tried to communicate to me what kind of noodles i should buy.  I ended up with two different kinds because part of me was overwhelmed by the choices, and another part of me just wanted to satisfy her speaking to me saying, "you buy this one, no?" So i finally just said, "yes, i will buy this one" to a set of noodles.  Only to locate the ones i think i want (?) a few rows down.  I didn't have the heart to put the other set of noodles back on the shelf.  And i was kind of worried i would end up with dried anchovies if i grabbed the wrong item on the shelf. ;-) (ps- these WERE purchase by Hanjin)

The ride home was as quiet as the ride there.  I kept trying at talking to her about things, but i think she was just as unsure of having a conversation with me as much as i was with her.  We sat silently listening to the Juno soundtrack while Claire enjoyed her Asian doughnut and milk in the backseat.  This adventure was quite the learning lesson for me.  One day i wish to venture beyond our borders and see the world.  I only hope i can communicate on a level to where i do not feel like an outsider even when i am with family.  I really think i want to learn Korean now to make her life easier around us... not to mention being able to buy lots and lots of good noodles!

so much missing going on

Because we only have 17 days left in the mid-west (which only really includes a few actual meals here where we are staying), it doesn't make sense to purchase food that we will not eat.  And if my parents will not eat it either, then it's just a total waste of money!  So in no particular order, these are some of the things i am missing:

I miss ice cream. 

I miss vegan hamburgers.

I miss vegan hot dogs.

I miss vegan everything!

I miss my favorite snack foods.

I miss white chocolate chips.

I miss (so much) my bean, onion, tofu creation!

I miss my Thai food creations!

I miss clean water straight out of the faucet that doesn't smell like well water.

I could go on for days. Needless to say, i miss my good food. 

***

17 days until we move to California!

getting old... what?

back in the 1950's, getting old did not mean learning that much.  When you get old, you are suppose to just retire... play a little golf, drink some wine, sit back and relax while you enjoy your life.  You should not have to take classes to learn the new hip stuff!  I mean think about it... the phones back in the day, the ones that hung on the wall, they were pretty much the same ones that had been around for years.  Maybe they came in different colors.  Maybe the cord was longer so you could chase around your kids or cook a meal while still on the phone.  But the concept of having a phone where you rotary dialed the numbers, it was still the same old stuff as the 1940s.  The concept of the TV was pretty much the same too.  It was not until much later in the 70s or 80's that some people got remote controls, but even that didn't complicate the Tv too much!

today, getting old means learning a whole lot of shit! Cell phones, computers, internet, wireless systems, handsfree devices, iPods, DVR's, Satellite TV, DVD's, etc.  I just got a GPS. I am not old, but this thing is making me say... what the??? on a daily basis!

I can not even imagine what it will be like when i am 80.  Will i be like the Queen of England and have an iPod at the ripe old age of 83?  By the time i am 83, who knows what new hip thing will be!  I can't even figure out how to program the direct Tv DVR at my parents house.  The stupid thing keeps telling me there is a new message... all i want to do is watch the news! (OK, and i also want to watch American Idol and the Office)

The plan is to grow old gracefully... the reality is we will all end up looking like complete idiots to our grandchildren when the new technologies come out.

do more for those who can't do for themselves

Every once in awhile you come across something that makes you sit up and take notice of the world.  It makes you see what you have and what others do not have.  There are so many thing that we, as Americans, take for granted on a daily basis.  It is something so simple and easy to get... we can go to almost any place in this country and it will be there.  I am talking about Clean Drinking Water.

The reason that this story came out and pretty much called my name was this, my birthday was just the other week and i told all who wanted to give me something to NOT give me anything because i did not want to move anything more to California.  In stead i asked people to give money to a cause that they were close to.  I have no idea if anyone really took the 10 minutes it would actually take to sit down at a computer and donate to a cause.  But if they did, i thank them for doing that for me and for those in need!

Another reason i love this cause, the clip about having too much stuff for birthday's.  Every year we, as parents, purchase our kids so much stuff!  I can not stress this enough, i'm getting tired of saying it because i don't think anyone is listening. It is something that sometimes shocks me, to walk through the toy section at the store. There is no longer one Barbie sitting on a shelf that only has one outfit.... oh no, you have Barbie, her entourage, her car, her house, her sister, her pets, her office, her entire wardrobe, her 2nd house, her hot tub, her pool, her second-third-fourth-fifth job, her entire life now has 2 entire isles at our Super Target!  Not to mention they have knock off Barbie, and then there is the newer section of Bratz Dolls.  This is just one toy item, don't even get me started on the 6 months old and under toy isle.  How much can you buy for a new born, really?

Do we need it? Do our children really need so much distraction in their lives?  The things that all people need to live is, water.  Clean drinking water.  It is not something that we have to think about.  What would you do if you have to give your child a cup of mud water?  How far would your walk to obtain a glass of clean water for your child?  Luckily you will not have to worry about this issue any time soon.  The next time you turn on your faucet, and watch the clean water come out for giving to your child... think about what you have been blessed with in your life.

The September Campaign Trailer from charity: water on Vimeo.