easter at home

I got to spend Resurrection weekend with my family in Goldendale.... a place where the blue-sky dawn is ushered in under the yellow bellies of meadowlarks, and welcomed by the sound of their distinctive ballad. Just as the sun crests the eastern horizon, its pink light hits Mt. Adams in the west and makes it glow. The horses' breath mists from their nostrils in the still-frigid air and catches every ray of buttery light; the new calves begin to frisk and play "king of the hill" by the feed barn as the stillness of the world awakens to birdsong and breeze.

untitled

There are so many ideas swirling in my brain, waiting to make it to a page, but they're still so clumsy and undeveloped, like baby birds fledged too soon. I sometimes hate this stage of mental processing, when there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to my thoughts and yet I know that somehow they all interconnect. But I have also begun to get used to it, begun to accustom myself to flailing a little, to taking the time to slow down and listen and breathe and wait for God to clarify and redirect. I have started to appreciate the in-between period when I can both see the hand of God in the process of working and wait expectantly to see the result.

God has been teaching me, and this place of learning is such a delightful and refreshing place to be. For awhile I thought I was utterly isolated, irredeemable; I know what it is to panic in the pitch-black and feel irrevocably lost. And I think that's what makes this awkward time of idea-fledging and humble re-learning so sweet: just being able to see again a shaft of light, and know that the Truth still reigns and that whatever I have been or failed to be, I am not alone.

miss amy

 

This is my not-so-little littlest sister and best riding buddy. Drem and I have been teaching her to ride for the past few years, and it’s crazy to see her get more confident and do so well on her own! Also, I couldn’t believe what I was hearing when she asked if I could do her fifth grade pictures. Fifth grade? Already?!

this is my song

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pXRviuL6vMY

^ This is my song… this is exactly how I feel so much of the time.

But there are times when I don’t feel that way quite so much. And this is one of them:

untitled (aka, ramblings)

 

 

I went home for the weekend, and it was a delight to absorb the sunshine and the wide open sky. I took Amy riding, threw a Jamberry party with Hannah, went to (most of) Amy’s tenth birthday party, helped Dad with the last heifer to calve, spent time with my horse, and looked in awe upon all the beautiful mountains that I don’t see often enough anymore.

Tonight, I went to home group and, very typically, sat in the corner without saying a thing while everyone else engaged in an interesting debate on the topic of prayer. I wanted so much to participate but found I didn’t have anything to say that had not already been said. I am not the kind of person who processes information verbally; I can’t speak up in a group unless I have carefully thought over what I’m going to say. So I am perpetually “the quiet one” and tend to be talked over, for the simple and understandable reason that no one expects me to speak in the first place.

I wanted so much to participate, but I find that regular conversations move too swiftly for my slow-churning mind. I am still deep in thought about the initial statement when everyone else has moved on into debate. My mind works quickly, filtering through the information and making relevant connections and throwing out what is worthless, but my tongue is unwilling; not until my brain reaches a place of rest and satisfaction with its conclusion is my mouth ready to share it. And by then the moment of relevancy has passed by.

I don’t really know why I’m writing all this, except that this is how I process things—in writing. If only our two hours on Monday nights had a pause button so that I could write an essay on our topic of discussion in time to share my actual thoughts... If only there would be some occasion in my life when I felt like I “fit in” with a group instead of always meandering in the outskirts, mulling things over behind the scenes of those with quicker minds and tongues. Honestly there are times when I’m sure I must seem like a brain-dead mute.

I told my sister the other day that sometimes, I feel like I have no place in the world. That I feel lost and wandering, ever searching for the actual, non-cheesy, non-Sunday school answer reason that I exist. Her reply, at least, made me smile: “Hey, you know, that’s the first attribute of a superhero.”

I guess that’s one way of looking at it. ;)

silently

 

“I wish they could talk, like they do in cartoons.”

Ah, but they do, I thought—contemplating how to explain the concept of silent communication to my very talkative eight-year-old sister. Drem is watching me at a distance, ears forward, then flicking back ever so briefly. I thought you came out here to get us for dinner, I hear her say. Then precocious Splash saunters toward me with a saucy tilt to her ears, shying away at the last second and exploding into a quick lope. You can’t catch me! she taunts, nearly aloud, and I play along with her game of tag until her sides heave and her breath comes in rapid snorts.

Equine communication is the reading of body language at its finest. Small shifts in movement, posture, and weight are all it takes to alert the horse beneath me to my mood and level of confidence; likewise, I can enter the corral in tears, and Drem will soon have her head buried comfortingly in my chest. They are experts at deciphering the words never spoken and the feelings never expressed.

I have learned, over my brief seven years of horse ownership, how to interpret some of their language in return. They do speak, though silently; and I only wish I were half as good at understanding them as they are at understanding me.

grace, weekly // 7

 

i. one thousand gifts.

This week, I finally recorded my one-thousandth blessing in my little brown book. I started keeping track of thankfulnesses, both small and big, back in July—and I hope to keep doing it for a very long time. Sprawling on my bed at night to think over the day and look purposefully for the moments of blessing (not just “good” happenings, but also the little glimpses of God and whispers of Jesus that one finds in those stressful, sad, or frustrating events too) has shaped and changed the way I view life as I go through the day. And did you know that thankfulness is the threshold into the presence of God?

Enter His gates with thanksgiving And His courts with praise. Give thanks to Him, bless His name.
Psalm 100:4

Devote yourselves to prayer, keeping alert in it with an attitude of thanksgiving.
Colossians 4:2

Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
Philippians 4:6

ii. two favorite things in the view from my window: my horse and my mountain.

iii. tricky backlighting experiments.

iv. willing (or mostly willing) subjects to practice portraits on.

My sister is rather pretty, don’t you think?

v. Sam coming to visit me for the week and letting me teach him photography stuff (with Amy never far away).

This picture pretty much sums up my week. :)

vi. happy memories.

This picture makes me laugh. I’d forgotten I ever took it, and just dug it up accidentally while looking through some past photo shoots. I spent a lot of time last year looking at this exact view—sometimes doing homework, or emailing people back home in Washington, or catching up with friends on Facebook, or making projects. A lot of my life last year is summed up here. My love of Star Wars is represented, along with the vase in which I received bouquets of flowers from Sam; there’s sunscreen for the eternal Florida summer, an assortment of vitamins that I always hoped would make me feel better but never did, the iPod I took on my runs, two cans of Pepsi to tempt me during Lent, an array of Post-it Note reminders to help me keep track of a hectic life—and my Bible, lying closed and serene but ready at hand whenever I needed it.

vii. these two.

It’s so encouraging to know that someone loves my horse almost as much as I do… especially since pretty soon, I won’t be here to love her in person quite so much.

viii. a skiff of snow.

Snow on the ground just makes hauling buckets of warm tap water to the barn in subzero temperatures a bit more bearable.

ix. words:

This has been a hard one for me. I love to please people—too much. And the stranger my life looks compared to that of the average 19-year-old girl (most of my friends are in the midst of studying for finals at a four-year university right now in hopes of having an eventual career—not recent Bible school graduates who are about to sign a lifetime covenant of marriage!)—and the more I hear “You’re too young,” “You need to finish your education,” or “You should go see the world first”—the harder (and more important) it is to remember: “For am I now seeking the favor of men, or of God? Or am I striving to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bond-servant of Christ” (Galatians 1:10).

x. music:

It’s finally Christmas-music-season!

xi. Bible:

This I recall to my mind, therefore I have hope. The Lord’s lovingkindnesses indeed never cease, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I have hope in Him.” The Lord is good to those who wait for Him, to the person who seeks Him. It is good that he waits silently for the salvation of the Lord.
Lamentations 3:21-26

This is just a portion of a larger topic I’m studying in Scripture right now—a topic very much of interest this time of year: peace. Not necessarily “Peace on Earth,” but rather the kind of peace that you find inside those rare souls who have learned the secret of contentment. The kind of peace that everyone seems to want and no one seems to be able to find—the kind of peace that lately has been sorely lacking in my life. You may be getting more of my ramblings on this subject in the near future. :)

 

 

 

<center><a href="http://halliejophotography.blogspot.com/search/label/grace%20weekly" target="_blank"><img alt="Hallie Jo Photography" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjs8JQp9aHkWjN873iY-8FzwCZI8UjVHW7geUKwXxz5Kd12zTgtDJo0sriNWjVzsGlV6s8xbpbR8U53_tj67EvMZmSPTQBx6sacRqLPNITCDC8IkUGEX8o8byBQZYvW9jNLUhpR7W6ldKo8/s207-p-no/" /></a></center>