On Love

Written on a flight from Portland to Chicago as I wave a teary goodbye to a place so many heartstrings attached themselves to during my stay.

Love is not what makes one's heart pitter-patter at the sight of another. Love isn't the warm feeling one gets when one experiences that delicate touch of someone special. Love is not thinking and dreaming about another person constantly, causing one to be ever distracted. Love is not what it feels like to hug or kiss someone - or more. Love is not excitement; not a purely physical bond; not hormones pulsating through one's body or some urge below one's belt line.

So, then, what is love? I've listed so many things that love is not that everyone should have narrowed it down by now in their minds, right?

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails."

As always, I shall disclaim everything I am saying (perhaps I should just put a general disclaimer up on my blog or wall... or perhaps I should stop worrying about how incompetent everyone must think I am): 19-year-olds probably know nothing about love. But I interrupt my disclaimer to ask: who does? And what qualifies a person as being all-knowing about love, anyway? If someone is 16 or 17 and has been in more relationships and/or had sex more than I have at 19 or 20 (actually, just insert into those spots any given ages; my point is still the same), does that make them more knowledgeable than me on the subject of love? That person may care to think so, and I'm not going to try and prove them wrong, but in my oh-so-humble opinion, I think it just might be the other way around.

Whether I know anything about relationships, love, etc., or not, here is what I think love is:

Love is when you can sit together in a room, keeping to yourselves, but being able to speak up at any time and have the other person nod, smile, chortle, or whatever. Love is when you wake up in the morning and you smell like crap, and they smell like crap, but you still sit down next to each other for breakfast and pretend like you can't smell anything... because your love goes way beyond how a person smells. Love is when you can't help passing gas in all manner of odd ways, but you aren't embarrassed. Love is doing things together - it's cleaning the kitchen, it's throwing a ball or a Frisbee, it's swimming laps, it's riding bikes, it's raking leaves, it's cooking dinner, it's making music. Love is not blaming somebody that the hot water ran out, even if it was obviously their fault. Love is coming to each other when a problem arises and working it out together. Love is encouraging one another to be better people and not just tolerating behavior that you know one day will be detrimental to them and to others. Love is serving one another in all senses of the word; love is selfless. Love doesn't do things for one person because they want a reward or some sort of acknowledgement for themselves - love does things for a person specifically to do things for the person. Love is not the bare minimum; love does all that is required, and then keeps on doing.

In Oregon, I came to realize how truly bad I am at loving. And, up until the time I said that last sentence, you may have thought I was talking about romantic love... and now you are pointing your fingers at the text and shouting nice things like "impostor!!" at me. But I was - the real romantic love is encompassed in unconditional love. The basis of all love is the unconditional, which we often forget.

Anyway, as I was saying *clears throat*... in Oregon, I came to realize how truly bad I am at loving. That sounds horrible, but it's true. Once out of my day-to-day life I tend to get caught up in, I was able to step back and reflect on my actions in general. After all, in preparation for my trip, I had gotten very slack in tolerance, communication, and servanthood, among other things. Are those things to be so conditional? I don't think so.

Oregon... my two steps forward and one step back. I jumped at the opportunity to improve upon my loving. And so much more than that occurred. I learned an incredible amount of things about loving, more than I ever thought I would in my whole life, especially what I would have assumed I would learn on the trip.

So, thank you, everyone and everything, in North Carolina and all that was in my new love, Oregon.

And you, my two dearest lands - North Carolina and Oregon - how I love thee! I believe I am to be torn between two lovers forever. Alas - 'tis a beautiful, bittersweet affair!

~Jessica

So it Begins...

A year and two weeks ago I graduated from high school.  It is strange, looking back, how much has changed in only a year!  Actually, it's more scary than strange.  It doesn't feel like much has changed; I feel the same.  But if I think about...um...everything...lots of things are different.  For instance...this time last year, I had no knowledge about how amazing Sweeny Todd is!  Or the awesomeness of Evita!  Even those two musicals have turned out to somehow affect me more than music normally does, that is only the surface of what has happened in the past year.

Directly after graduating, I was the same old me, I guess.  But the thing was, after I graduated, it was a little hard to get my thoughts together.  I had this feeling like I couldn't quite grip the floor to walk on it, and that cold air was being blown in one ear, through every nook and cranny of my brain, and out the other ear.  I don't know if this is the experience of everybody, or only people like me who, at that time, have no idea what their life's direction is.  Or if one even existed for me at all.  

I learned a lot.  Have I mentioned that?  I learned about freedom, serving, God, love, relationships, friendships, music, family....so many, many, many, many things.  

By the time I turned 18 in August, I had my head on straight enough to not freak out.  If I had turned 18 when I was 14, this would not have been the case, but there is a reason why I was not 18 when I was 14.  Still, a few days after turning 18 and starting my classes at Wake Tech, the temptations started pouring in out of nowhere like a giant vat of hot water in the sky got knocked over by someone.  Let's go clubbing.  Let's go to a bar.  Let's smoke.  I was almost lured in by the attractiveness of the "in crowd", the "cool people" who were "experienced."  (Yes, those were a lot of quotation marks.)  I don't know how I could have even for a moment considered wasting my time, energy, money, and brain power for an experience.  An experience that would cause me to compromise myself an hundred times in the duration of five minutes.  I thought about doing it without my parent's permission at first.  After all, I was 18!  I could do what I wanted to.  But...after a little thought, I didn't want to rebel.  It did nothing but give me a sick feeling all over.  I told my parents, and to my surprise they said I could do what I wanted to, though reminded me that they didn't think it was the best idea.  It didn't take much more thought to decline my invitations of "cool" status, and get on with my life.

In January I decided not to take classes in the spring semester.  I was tired of classes, especially since I was taking them without much of a clue as to where I was going in life (STILL).  Somewhere along the way, though, I sat down with my parents and discussed it all.  What did I want to do?  Well, I really like writing.  I'd really like to write a book; preferably more than one.  They agreed that, if I took my writing seriously, with my goals in mind, I could do that.  And another thing - I wanted to be a mom, right?  Right.  Then, there was one thing I needed to learn: how to be one.  I needed to learn more than just the basics of cooking, cleaning, and teaching.  Thus, I became, essentially, my mother's apprentice.  This has since developed into a split thing with my dad, since not only am I doing a little on-the-side bookkeeping for him, I am now working part time.  At this moment I feel bad because I am not getting as much done for my mom as I originally intended to, but I am working on better time management.  If anybody has any book or website suggestions on time management and all-around organization skills, I would be much obliged if you would mention them.       

I have learned a ton about God this year.  The main thing is that he is NOT just a shoulder to cry on or somebody I must resign myself to sharing my deepest thoughts with simply because I don't feel like I can tell anybody on earth.  I have learned more and more to appreciate what he has done for us.  How amazing his plan is.  He raised up the Israelites so that eventually they would help him save everyone.  I realized I can't give God anything he doesn't already have, even if the thought counts, because he gave me that thought.  I finally learned that works are for sanctification, but only belief can justify you.  And if you obey God, it's not for you; it is for his pleasure.  I don't know how I could have been so selfish to be constantly asking what the reason I have to obey God is, if I already believe in him and will be going to heaven.  I mean, I still wanted to do those things, but there was always the question of why.  And the only answer I could come up with was the half-baked "well, works must count for something; I'll probably get some trophies in heaven."  NO!!!!!  How could I have been so selfish?!??!?!  Works are for the good of mankind, and - primarily - to make God happy!  He has given me everything, and I don't even take the time out of my day to think that I might like to do something to make him happy.  I can't believe how ignorantly human I have been.  And another thing John Stonestreet (second favorite person now besides Jeff Meyers) said: "Look at it this way - the world was so bad, so terrible......that God died."  

Love and relationships!  Whoo-hoo.  Every year I grow a little wiser, I suppose, so that by some time soon I might actually be wise enough to get married.  This year, I learned a few very significant things.  One is that lust is bad.  Yes, I knew that, but I knew not what lust really was.  I thought it was something guys did.  Then I thought it may somehow include lusting about romantic happenings.  But now I realize it encompasses so much more.  A guy's cute face...staring at it...thinking about how cute he is...that is lust.  Dreaming about how a guy can satisfy you emotionally...that is lust.  I'm not trying to be legalistic here; the biggest thing about lust is it is an idol, and takes away from our passion for God.  We are concentrating on other things; things which distract from his glory.  And, really, it's not only lustful and idolatrous, but also covetous.  I will touch on this and others in later entries, most likely, so I will briefly mention other things I have learned in this category: close, one-on-one friendships with the opposite sex are not a good idea.  I'm not saying it's bad to be friends with the opposite sex; even good friends.  But when you get closer than that...let's just say for now that it is not a good setup for things in the future.  I definitely will touch on that in another entry.  Before moving on, I want to mention one more thing I've learned: Eventually, the amazing and very popular-with-the-giggly-girls-who-bat-their-eyes-and-twirl-their-hair guys with swishy hair DO notice the quiet, bookish, introverted, non-flirtatious girls after all, even if only for a moment.  :)

This year I have finally realized who my true friends are.  They are wonderful true friends; the best in the world.  For the first time in my life I have girl friends whom I can pour out my heart to, share everything with, and know they will understand and do the same.  I respect and love these girls with all of my heart.  I have guy friends, too, and while they are the best guy friends I could ever ask for, pouring my heart out to THEM is another matter addressed in the paragraph above; as in, I don't.  Nonetheless, I still love them like brothers.  Together we are one big happy family and I wouldn't trade my friends for anything in the world.  

Music may seem a little less profound than the other subjects, but it is a major change.  In late May I wrote my first real song on the piano, after having written songs only on guitar for the past 3 years or so.  I really like the song I wrote, and after I wrote it, I decided that perhaps my family would like me to play more on the piano besides that one song, even though it was the only one I really knew besides little bits of Mozart and chopsticks here and there.  So I played a little "Moon River" here and some "Fancier Chopsticks" there (the latter was me making an attempt at sheet music reading, which didn't go off to well).  Finally, in mid-June I went to a play that my friends were in, and where another friend of ours played piano during intermission.  That piano playing made me think it would be interesting to write a instrumental piece on the piano.  5 days later, that little 3-minute piece was completed, and I liked it well enough.  After this, I started to write more.  Since then I have only completed one other instrumental piece, but I have many other very long musical ideas ready for completion whenever the inspiration strikes me.  I have written a few more songs on the piano, and a couple more on guitar.  I also got a tin whistle in August for my birthday, and have been picking that up as well.  I got a violin for Christmas, but at this moment posses absolutely no talent for the instrument, so I am on the lookout for instructional materials.  

Family...!!  I already loved my family, but now I love them even more.  That is really all I need to say.  

Things haven't been all sunshine and rainbows all the time.  Fortunately, I seem to be able to look back and remember most easily the things that were good.  I remember some of the bad things, too, but only things that were really, significantly unfortunate.  I didn't remember how mad I was at some people at some point, until I looked back at my journal during that time.  And I can see that I was mad just because I was being immature.  Yes, they were also being immature, but I was just as bad, probably worse.  But all in all, I remember the good things, and only the good outcome from the not-so-good things.  I believe I am a better person than I was a year ago.  Yeah, it sounds all serious.  I promise to write more [less serious stuff] this summer.  This fall is.....going to be extremely hectic if I don't get things under control before they begin.  But I know that if I trust God to lead and guide me day-by-day, everything will all fall into place.  

Thus begins another year of growing, changing, and shaping for me.  I don't know what doors are going to open, which ones are going to close, and which ones are going to stay open and stay closed.  God has been with me more and more as this past year has progressed.  I know that this next year will continue that trend, even through the challenges.  And I say: bring it on!

On Optimism, Part One

I have wondered, this past week or so, why I always seem to automatically look at the bright side of things.  It wasn't as if a year or two or however long ago I said to myself, "In order to be happier and improve my outlook on life, from now on I will always look at the bright side of any given situation."  It just happens; I just do.  And I have begun to think that the reason is some combination of events in my life thus far.  Vague, huh?  Let me try and explain...

When I was very young I would often go to my Grammy and Papa's (and then, Aunt Sue-Sue's) house.  Okay, I still do that, but for some reason it seems like I did it more a long time ago.  Anyways....whatever the occasion, other relatives would often stop by.  They would talk, and I would listen (I wouldn't look like I was listening, but I was, indeed).  I picked up on a lot of stuff, but one thing remains most prominent.  It was some celebration in the summer, 4th of July or thereabouts, and I was probably five or six.  Some guy-cousin or uncle, I can't remember, was explaining some long story to my Grammy as I had come inside the kitchen to cool off for a bit.  I can't remember what the story was, exactly, but I remember it being interesting.  After he finished telling the story, what my Grammy said next, while I filled up a glass of water at the refrigerator, was what has stuck for the past 13 or 14 years: "Wow...isn't it amazing how God always has a plan to eventually work out even the bad stuff for good?"  I meditated on this as I trumped back outside.  What if God really did?  I might have to wait a long time to find out!

It was a year or two later that I found out that this was a Bible verse (Thanks to Hide Him in Your Heart!), and like I said, it stuck with me.  I began noticing little child-like/childish things after a while.  Nothing huge, of course.  But I was always of the opinion that it was the coolest thing ever! (besides Beanie Babies and Juicy Juice, of course).  

I appeared to abandon the idea, however, as I took the rough ride into teenager-hood.  From ages 11 1/2 to almost 16, hormones started off on a bad nerve with me.  And if life seemed full of despair and desperation for me, I am a thousand percent sure that I made life complete hell for my parents.  At about age 14, I distinctly remember taking great pride in my decisive pessimism.  I was a pessimist!  I got angry about everything!  I really did, I am sure of it.  After all, I had to walk and talk the talk of my half punk/half grunge-goth "identity."  I thought I liked who I was, but in all honesty I have no memories of ever being truly happy and joyful at that time.  Every journal entry was mad at somebody because I wasn't allowed to do something, and contained many schemes for rebelling and plans for all I would "accomplish" once I turned 18.  

All of that to say firstly that I was horribly discontent and pessimistic, and secondly to apologize to everyone who was close to me during that stage.  I am surprised you all stuck it through, and commend you for it!  

But I suppose that, by the time I entered my Junior year, I had worn out most all of any pessimism I had been programmed with, besides the little healthy dosage left to make sure my life became dramatic at some points here and there so it remained "interesting."  I was far from through being resurrected from the depths of despair, but it was at that time that I joined my current improv group, and made some really good friends on swim team (before that, everyone I knew on the team was just a casual friend).  These two amazing groups of Godly people, along with the people I was already friends with at that time (those who stuck it through or stayed anyways, despite my entire existence being flawed at the time), and my wonderful family, dug me out of the hole I was in - by hand - and held me up to towards the Light; towards my heavenly Father.  Slowly, but surely, I have been changing for the better, with the help of them.  MOST importantly my parents, who never gave up on me and NEVER let me stray off completely to sell my soul to the world.  

Now I can see, though, that even as I completely and utterly regret those cursed year, wishing they had never happened, I can see that there are so many things that would not have happened and so many mistakes made later, were my wish to come true.  The consequences might be something as horrible as death or causing great shame to my family.  I may have gone off to college and fallen too far, without the desire for the help of godly friends or parental influence.  I might have never had the amazing opportunity of joining the Unintentionals.  Had I not been SO depressed at one point that my mother insist I join the homeschool swim team and swim all my frustrations out, I would not have the greatest group of friends on the entire planet.  And so much more!  

In other words, where would I be???  The outcome is unimaginable, even for me.  

So that, my dear friends (old friends, swim team friends, improv friends, and new friends....I love you all!), is one grand reason I am so entirely optimist all the time.  Even though something looks hopeless, I can almost guarantee it is NOT.  I wasn't hopeless, was I?  I might as well have seemed very much so; the 13-year-old  kid who dresses as grungily as she can and looks as angry as possible for her first therapy session in order to attempt to scare the psychologist off?  Yup, that is bad.  But now I am pretty sure my happiness level is consistently at about 98.5%, nearly all the time.  If I am not a miracle (not to sound full of it or anything) then I don't know what is.  Thanks so much, everyone, for everything!

~Jessica          

The Finch Family

Once upon a time there was a family whose name was Finch.

Mrs. Finch was exceedingly fond of large hats, particularly the kinds with extravagant plumes in them. The bigger the hat and the bigger the plume was all the better for her. She was always on the lookout for hats, plumes, and hats with plumes which surpassed the ones she already owned in size. Her biggest fear was that someone in the world owned a hat and plume bigger than her biggest one, and that she would be put to terrible shame by this person, whoever it might be.

Mr. Finch appreciated bow ties, but only white ones with black polka dots, or black ones with white polka dots. You may think that there is not much variety in only liking bowties of those natures, which would make Mr. Finch rather boring in his like of bowties; but in fact there are many, many different types of black bowties with white polka dots and white bow ties with black polka dots.

Greta Finch was the eldest girl and the eldest child in the immediate Finch family. She had straight dark brown hair down to her thighs and light green eyes which always seemed to be focused elsewhere from the present. She appreciated two things: books, and reading them. If she was not reading, she was arranging her immense book collection or else deeply considering matters of books rather than paying attention to any sort of reality, except how reality pertained to books. That said, she was not the dreamy sort at all: to the contrary she was much more mournful of her situation in life and how it was not much like princess so-and-so who lived in such-and-such large castle and was married by prince whoever to carry on a life of bliss.

Edward Finch was very tall and was not much more than skin and bones. He possessed an affinity for being up and on top of things, and was frequently worrying whatever females were about by climbing all climbable anythings. He was a quiet lad who mostly kept to himself, though ate everything in sight and when he was not he was always wishing there was something in sight to be eaten.

Evelyn Finch had long, blonde, wavy hair and big dark brown eyes. She was always dressed all in black or very dark grey with a simple bow or two in her hair. She was an asker of accusing questions as well as a desirer of all she set her deep eyes on. Evelyn collected many, many different things. In fact, she had a collection of what must have been everything except for hats, plumes, bowties, and books. Her favorite collection was her sixteen jars of bacteria cultures, which she kept and fed as if they were her own pets.

Victor Finch wore very big, round glasses and liked to believe he was the number one most reliable source of all that there was to know in the world. If someone instructed him, he would rebuke the instructor and tell him otherwise, though what he assumed to be the truth was often a quite absurdly drawn conclusion. However, if he was able to find that the encyclopedia said otherwise (which he only consulted once a conversation had been had where he was not sure of something which he had just stated as fact, particularly if the person he stated it to disagreed), then he would slowly but surely wrap his head around the new idea and adopt it as his own and soon declare that he never thought otherwise.

The Finch family lived in a modest home right in the very middle of Fanghorn Avenue. The downstairs consisted of a parlor, kitchen, dining room, powder room, and a small cupboard for the placement of articles of warmth from the cold in the winter, which was located in the passage. Upstairs (the steps leading to and from which located next-door to the aforementioned cupboard), were four bedrooms. One for Mr. and Mrs. Finch, one for Greta and Evelyn, one for Edward and Victor, and one for guests when guests came, but otherwise for collection overflow on behalf of Mr. Finch, Mrs. Finch, Greta, and Evelyn (all of whom would have rather kept all of each collection in his or her room, but ran out of space). Edward and Victor, wanting to share in the equal subdivision of the spare room, collected odds and ends precisely for the purpose of storing when no guests were around. Edward, without giving much thought to it, collected many ounces of dust lying around the house (causing Mrs. Finch to keep her sanity in check in the most mundane respects of furniture dusting), and Victor had the clever idea of cutting out encyclopedia articles which he thought he might read in the future when he got around to it, (of course, Mr. Finch was not of the knowledge of this defacement) and putting them in spare jars which Evelyn discarded when any particular culture grew too big for it. This resulted in Victor not wanting to actually read the articles because to pull them back out again would render the entire time reading a time spent smelling nothing short of the most awful stench in the world, which was impossible to wash out of the jars. There was also a bathroom up stairs which everyone shared, though everyone complained considerably of everyone else taking much too long in the bathroom doing various and sundry preparations and primpings which were necessary to the party concerned with doing preparations and primpings, but were absolutely ridiculous to all who were affected by not being able to use the bathroom at the time they wished to.

All in all the Finch family lived their lives in the same way as you might live yours or I might live mine: with the sense that they are just simply living day by day as is best known to them, without giving much thought over to any sort of comparison with other families or other ways of life which may or may not be considered more normal or more abnormal. Did not the Finch family have friends? Surely. Did they spend time outside their home? Almost certainly. But those are other stories for other times.

Out of Control Feminism

There are a lot of things that bother me. I try not to lose my temper over them...well, at least not in public. But this is a blog, and my blog at that. I will now express my views of feminism. Bear with me here.

Feminism, to me, is a pretty stupid idea. All this "women's rights" stuff probably had good intentions in the beginning, but has gotten out of hand. Women are not equal to men--it's that simple! It is impossible for them to be so, unless they become men. And even after an operation and many steroids and testosterone pills, I have this feeling that a woman's brain would still work like a woman's brain. Men and women are very, very different. Sure, some women are more "tomboyish", and some men exhibit "feminine" qualities, though these days it is sad that sensitive, gentlemanly, chivalrous men are often confusedly perceived by our perverted society as being gay, when in fact they are far from it. Psychologically androgynous folks such as myself and a few of my friends are probably about as "gender-neutral" as you will find. But I still have my distinctly feminine personality traits, interests, talents, and thought patterns, besides being aware that I am a lady and sticking to that concept (have I ever mentioned how much I love dressing up and getting very pretty for a nice occasion?). And, though I am very athletic, I have a woman's body, which is genetically much weaker than a man's. The same thing with a guy friend of mine...androgynous, but distinctly masculine (the good kind of masculine), psychologically and physically.

No feminist movement is going to change these giant genetic differences between men and women. Still, some things are changing, and it is very upsetting. Women are becoming aggressive, and men are becoming passive. I never understood why, when I was younger, I would mention that found a guy attractive, and my public schooled girl friends asked whether I had asked him out, and if I hadn't, they suggested that I should. Why? If he isn't interested in me enough to ask me out, why should I ask him out? And the reason I get is that "it really puts a lot of pressure on the guy to ask the girl out", this from both guys and girls.  Well, you know what? BE A MAN and get over the pressure! Women are becoming the men because they seem to get over that pressure pretty quickly. And dating is just one scenario (which, for the record, I would not have considered anyways, no matter who did the askings-out).

Another situation: in a household which would be considered "sexist", typically a woman is not demeaned to some object which the man won like a trophy and can do what he likes to with. Yes, maybe back a few hundred years ago it was common. But since....oh, when was it, King Arthur's day?...the treatment of women has gotten steadily better. Of course, there have always been insecure, power-hungry "men" who like to lord over their wives and abuse them in a variety of different ways. But I have grown up in a household where my father is the man of the house and my mother willingly submits. She is not in any way his slave. She has not lost any of her identity. I don't know why feminists think that this is what happens when a woman submits to her husband, as if submission has a terribly negative connotation. Our house is extremely well-balanced, compared to many unbalanced egalitarian households where there is a constant struggle to maintain equality in every little area. My mother is a housewife and a home school teacher; my father owns several different enterprises, big and small, and he is the breadwinner of the family. My mother, siblings, and I help out with some of the businesses from time to time, but the majority is done by my dad. He does not mind this, and works hard so that my mom does not have to go work outside the home. My parents make decisions together, but my dad has the final say. My mom is in charge of necessity shopping, so she handles most of that money. Never has there been an argument about who is supposed to be wearing the pants or about whose right it is to have something or to not do something. Almost all of my friends have families exactly like mine, and I intend to submit to my husband when I marry him and prevail to be "A Woman of Valor."  (for those of you know are scratching your heads, that is a reference to Proverbs 31:10-31. <<--Click on it.) 

I am not very well read-up on the history of feminism, that is true. I have never really wanted to be; "girl power" is a highly unattractive concept to me. Basically what I mean is that I do not like how feminism has evolved. Sure, it has good points and I am glad for many of the opportunities I have today. (However, voting is a silly, unimportant little game which I do not care to take part in ever again.) But I personally feel that feminism has gotten way out of hand since the '60s or so. From my limited understanding of Feminism, I believe I recall the cause of it starting more in the '40s, when men went off to war and women ended up having to go to work in order to earn enough for themselves and usually their children. Then somewhere down the line after a bit of a battle for better worker compensation, women realized that they did not need men in order to make a living. That was what sparked the line of feminism which I don't appreciate--the putting-down and hatred of being a housewife and of accepting one's actual femininity. It has gotten very out of hand, and gender roles are getting knocked around as if they are of no importance. 

I am not very fond of the idea of women in the military. I mean, obviously those women can do what they want to and I am not stopping them. But when the idea that women must have equal rights in serving in the military goes so far as to cause the next draft to draft women as well, I am greatly opposed to it. I guess, though, that in some areas I am not as anti-feminist as I like to think I am. I agree that if a woman holds the same job as a man, she should get paid the same as that man. I'm not going to go parading this view up and down the streets with big signs or go sending petitions to congress or anything like that, though. I am not a passionate feminist...more like an extremely passive one, and only on a few areas.

Still, I am not feminist in a lot of things I believe. In my sociology and psychology classes I have had conversations (sparked by the material) with both guys and girls who seem to have a great misunderstanding of men and women's places in a household. The girls believed that for a woman to be a housewife was meaningless and was squashing her identity as a person into oblivion. They believed it was pointless, old-fashioned, and absurd that I want to be one should I get married and have children rather than pursuing a career. The guys expressed that they wouldn't want their wife lounging around the house all day while they as the male worked their butts off to bring home money. I think both views are extremely short-sighted, but nobody wanted to listen to me very much. But I turn around to my friends I have known for my entire life or nearly so, and they all agree with me. My girl friends want to be housewives, mothers, and teachers, and my guy friends want to have the careers and bring home the bacon (turkey bacon, that is). And that has been the natural order since the beginning of time, really. There has to be balance in the household. Someone needs to be the head, the breadwinner, the stable rock, and the man of the relationship; someone needs to be the cleaner, the nurturer, the caretaker, and the woman of the relationship. Equality, in my opinion, is overrated and misunderstood in this sense. Also, as long as I didn't have children to care for I would be working outside the home to contribute to the income, though I would want to have time for cooking and cleaning so that my husband has a comfortable place to come home to and just let go and relax after a hard day at work. I wouldn't want, especially after kids, my husband to come home to TV dinners or takeout once again, kids running around wild all over the place because they learn no manners at school, and the house being a wreck all the time. And after I have kids, I imagine I will still keep myself busy in my spare time writing or composing, and/or perhaps I will have created some sort of passive income. Whatever I end up doing, my identity is going to be far from gone (yes…even *gasp* if I take his last name! What a surprise!). What I do isn’t who I am. I am what I am. I believe that I am what I think. I find my identity in that. Oh, and I would love to be known as the wife of my husband who is a mother to his children. I don’t know why anyone has a problem with that.  

~Jessica

Wait....what do you mean by "family"?

My siblings and I are staying at my grandparent's for a few days, and tonight my great-grandmother took Marck, Robert, Grammy, Papa, Aunt Eleanor, and I out to eat pizza.  While we were eating another family walked in.  At least, I guess it was a family.

It was a mom, a dad, and two boys.  One of the boys looked to be about five, and the other one may have been eleven or so.  The eleven-year-old was playing a game on his cell phone, and the five-year-old was playing one of those Nintendo DS carry-around things as they walked in.  The parents ordered and the kids were still playing their games.  I could hear the music from the games halfway across the restaurant. 

This playing continued as the older boy and the parents went to the salad bar and got salads.  Eating and playing, playing and eating.  There was barely any talking from the table at all.  Finally the older boy put his phone away, and a while later, the mom told the younger boy that it was time for the game to go bye-bye for now since the pizza was almost there.  The younger boy was on the verge of a fit, and got a little talking-to from his mother.  The rest of the time he was squirmy (more than a typical five-year-old), moving all around his chair and looking very bored as he too sporadic bites of his pizza.  The older boy brought out his cell phone again about halfway through their meal.  I couldn't hear or see the family talking at all.  It was just sad.

Now, maybe this family goes out to dinner all the time and this was just another meal for them.  But when our family sits down all together for a meal (which isn't too common) we like to actually spend time with each other while doing so.  Going out to eat is something we don't do that often (because of the cost and because of the non-health-benefits associated with it), but when we do, it is a fun family activity.  I like my family and I like being with them.  Sure, I went through a phase when I was on the younger side of the teen years when I would bring a book whenever we went out to eat because I guess I wanted to read more than I wanted to be with my family or something like that.  Hey, at least books are better for your than portable video games.  

I just wonder what the point of having a family is if you go through life like that....ignoring each other.  "Who are those big people again?  Yeah, those embarrassing ones who wake me up at five in the morning to get on the bus, and who magically place food in front of me at dinner time and remind me to brush my teeth at night.  Who are those little people I keep tripping over?  I don't know, but when I come into contact with them it is incredibly annoying.  And that semi-big person?  I don't know who he is either, but he doesn't seem to like me very much."

Siblings grow up and don't even know each other, even though they should be best friends.  Parents don't know their children and aren't involved in their lives enough to recognize if the kids are getting into stuff they shouldn't.  The kids who suck their brains out playing video games all day become ADHD, and the only solution seems to be to medicate them and/or let them play more video games.  The kids also become very wonderful at developing surface relationships and terrible at developing deep ones.

It is just so sad.  I feel sorry for that family and every single one like it.  It must be awful to go through life like that.  And so what if both your parents work and they provide a big house for you to live in, millions of toys (excuse me, video games and movies), drive you around in nice cars, can afford for you a brand new car when you turn 16, and you can eat at nice restaurants every night?  What is the point of all that if you all hate each other because you hardly know one another?  If I had to give up my relationships with my mom, dad, and brothers just so I could have the life of luxury that everyone wishes they had at some point(s) or another, I wouldn't even think twice about doing it.  As long as I have my family I wouldn't mind a dumpster.  Okay, yes I would.  Maybe I should have used a different analogy.  A really bad looking lean-to shelter thing.  NOT a dumpster.  And not a port-a-potty.  

My parents have said that I can live with them forever if I want to.  Of course, not in the loser-who-lives-in-his-parent's-basement-and-plays-online-all-the-time kind of way.  In the way where I (eventually) will have a job/career around here someplace, so I can contribute to the house expenses, and I will help my mom keep the house as I do now.  Even if my brothers marry and move out (which I don't want them to till I get married, but in case that doesn't work out), I will stay with my parents, more than likely.  I guess if I get a job somewhere not close by I will have to move out, but I really don't want to live by myself, or with a bunch of girls.  I would want to live with a man, because otherwise I wouldn't feel safe.  So the only solutions are to live with a family wherever I move to, or get married.  Or just bloody stay here ;).  I don't know.  God will light my path when I get to that point.  Really, I want to only have two families in my life - the one I am living in now, and the one I start in the future when I get married.  

And I never, ever, ever, ever, EVER want to lose contact with my friends.  You guys are the greatest!!!  

~Jessica   

Hungry

This always happens.  I tell myself that I just need to get things done in the day and so I stay off anything related to internet communities until later in the evening after I feel like I have gotten everything useful done and I am too brain dead to accomplish anything else except sitting and typing random stuff.  However, during the day I get ideas for blog entries.  I had this great one today.  But as I sat down to write, I forgot why I was going to do a blog entry.  

Oh, right.  Brain dead.  

Something is coming to mind now that I was going to say something about the post Lizzie made before her flower arranging post about love.  But my last post was titled......well, you can just scroll down and see.  Yeah.  So I don't know.  

The problem with everything right now is that I did not eat enough for breakfast this morning.  I usually have my heaping bowl of cheerios and granola (actually, Joe's Os, and not Cheerios.  They are so much better.  Cheerios are yucky).  But I was trying very hard to stay on schedule this morning.  I got the last of the cheerios (I am just calling them that because it is easier), which did not fill up the bowl all the way exactly how I like it.  Now, I am always getting the bottom of the box.  I don't know why it always happens to me, but it does.  And I usually walk back to my parent's room and get another box.  (Don't look at me too strangely...we are just one of those weird families; we keep food everywhere.)  However, like I said I was kind of in a time crunch, so I just accepted my amount (also still feeling a little burned from Saturday's incident where everybody ate all the strawberries and I did not get any to put on my cereal simply because I did not eat breakfast till 1:30 pm and everybody thought I would have eaten it by then.  Injustice!!!!!), put my normal portion of granola on top of that, and sat down to eat.  By lunch, I was quite hungry.  I ate one piece of leftover pizza, since that was all I was allowed  to have, even though last night I only ate three when Marck got five pieces, and Marck got another piece today.  

Then, while cleaning the bathrooms, I got the munchies several times.  The first time, I tried desperately to eat the grape tomatoes that my mother had said when she bought them that I could have as many as I liked.  But then Robert said I had to stop eating them because we were going to have kabobs tonight and mom wanted to save the tomatoes for the kabobs.  My hopes and dreams blew out the window once again.  So I ate an apple next, and then a mozzerella cheese stick.  I still was feeling empty, so I resorted to a frozen biscuit, after eating a little tiny piece of steak my mom brought home from Outback on Saturday.  

Finally it was dinner time.  The kabobs were very tasty, but I don't know why nobody thought to purchase a pineapple to use for them.  

But now I am hungry again.  I think it's just that digestion-at-night kind of hungry, actually (the kind you usually get when you drink something fizzy), but I can't tell.  In whatever case, I should stop thinking about food and just go to bed.

~Jessica  

Prerequisites

These are some thoughts of mine that also happen to answer Rebecca's question in my "Reflections on 2008" entry....

I do not mean to seem like I am thinking and planning way ahead of myself, but at this moment as well as for some time I have felt as if there is a disticnt possibility that I will be married in what is now less than three years.  As I mentioned in the previous entry which was written too long ago (I am sorry about my absence as I have been going to too many sleepovers and then trying to get my life back on track, which, I have discovered, is a pretty hard thing to do), three years really is not a long time.  My life seems to go by in episodes of three years.  These next three, I feel as if God is telling me that they are specifically for marriage preperation.  

Unless my life's course drastically changes, in less than three years I shall become Mrs. Somebody.  In this alloted time, therefore, I need to prepare to take on that role.  There are, obviously, several "requirements" of being my Someone's wife.  No, I have not been sent a letter from any Somebodies detailing what these things must be in a "I won't marry you if you are not like this" kind of way.  No, there are just several things that God has put on my heart as being what I must have in place before the wedding day.  This is not to say that I am a terrible person now and I must do a complete 180 and become somebody else.  No, these are things which I desire to add on to my present self and to enhance what is already there.  These past 18 years have not been for nothing, but that certainly does not mean that I am done growing and developing.  I won't ever be, but I have to take it one step at a time.  

These things must be completed, but as we can all see I have a limited amount of time which must not be wasted.  I shall now detail the things I consider (or, rather, God considers) the "prerequisites" of a holy union with my Someone, the things which I must do to "study deserving," as Edward says in King Lear:

A Caring, Compasionate, Selfless Heart:  I shall waste no more time on anger or selfish deeds.  A woman of valor is not of those.  She is a servant, and I will now forever be.   

A Knowledge of Health and Healing:  I need to know how to properly care for myself, my husband, and our children.  If access to a doctor is limited or impossible, I must be the caretaker and healer.  Also, if we live in a rural area, possibly an area which harbors other refugees, I need to know how to heal and help them as well.

Pregnancy and Childbirth:  For the same reasons as above...for my own good and possibly the good of those around me.  One does not have to go through a 3-year Midwifery degree program to know what one is doing when a baby is coming out.  Still, I will strive to know as much as possible.

Faith:  Seeking God is important, no doubt, but it goes deeper than that.  I need to know everything he commands; everything he desires of me.  That means staying in his word daily and keeping myself from getting too caught up in life that I cannot take the time to listen to him.  And if the end times are coming, I need to not be blind about anything concerning them so that I will not be afraid.  Fear comes from a lack of knowledge.  

Occupation:  I need to make as much money as I can in this time so that I can buy waht I need for survival and to assist my husband in his endeavors to do the same.  It is of utmost importance that we create a safe life for ourselves and our future children as soon as we can, so money will be needed to go towards that somehow...in the form of a car, of books, perhaps seeds to grow our own food, building materials, livestock....whatever the Lord desires we do.  I guess it may sound a little "out there" to be assuming rural farming like this, but it is a possibility.  If it turns out that I do not live this lifestyle I already have what I need to live in a life like the one I have grown up in, that is all.  Anyways, I shall save for the future, whatever the future may be and however I might save for it.  It is probably better to put paper money back into the economy and get out of it real things of value anyways.  

So what about music and writing?  I feel as if those need to be put on the back burner now.  But saying that makes my heart ache....music and writing are the two things I have had the most passion for for my entire life, and now I am putting them off?  I guess it is because I am wondering if they are a waste of time.  Is creating a waste of time?  Maybe I am looking at it from the perspective that, if the economy breaks down, people are not going to have the money to invest in entertainment, they are going to need to invest everything in merely surviving.  So, it would be a waste of time to assume that I could write music and sell it or write a novel and sell it.  And why spend my time attempting to produce something that goes into what is already a market of uncertainty?  I could end up more broke than I am now.  

Am I completely giving up learning new instruments (after all, I did get a violin for Christmas...though somehow it is not as easy as I wanted it to be), composing, fiction reading, or writing stories?  No!  My mind just doesn't work like that.  It would just blow up eventually from deprivation of creativity.  I guess, looking back on this entry, this is already starting  to sound like you are reading Thesselonians or something practical like that, rather than witty Charles Dickens or something.  Sadness abounds.  :(  But I guess when all you have been reading is practical literature, all that comes out is practical.  *sigh*  

I guess it will not hurt to allow time for diversion.  After all....*lightbulb* my Someone is not going to want to marry a boring person, now is he?!?!  No, no, no, not at all.  Quite to the contrary, dear Watson.  ;)  Nevertheless, I shall proceed to abort this entry as my breakfast as thus far remained uneated and I am quite famished.

~Jessica      

Practicalities

A friend recently asked whether I liked this guy that I have been hanging out with a lot and if liked me or not.  "Well, it's not really like that," I said.  "What do you mean by that?"  she asked.  I then wondered how I had gotten so good at being vague.  "It's kind of a long story," I said, as we happened to be texting and I happened to be cleaning the house while we were doing so.  "I'll e-mail you later with an explanation."

So I took a very long time carefully thinking out how to explain it, only to find out that she skimmed over it to find the juicy parts (juicy?  No.  And they would have made more sense if she had read the whole e-mail!).  So I decided to post it on here for all ye "we already know about this...no big news or anything" people, in the hopes that you will tell me whether I explained myself well enough and in a way that doesn't sound TOO practical, dull, or rules-ish.  So, here it is:

Okay, here's the deal (like I said, it's a long story, so brace yourself). This is a natural thing for me because I've been brought up on the concept, and so has practically everyone else I know (we, the strange homeschoolers....). But, to put it as simply as I feel I possibly can while still making sense, we (me, this guy-friend, and our friends) see dating as kind of a frivolous thing. Some people do it for fun, other people do it because they like each other, other people do it because they love each other. But rarely is it ever for the purpose of getting married. Sure, you could turn that around and say, "well, you date to see if that person is the right person to marry." But there are problems with that. First of all, why use that particular format of spending time together and therefore get so emotionally attached to someone when it may not last? To have your heart broken? We all know that is absolutely no fun and it hurts just as much, if not more, every time it happens. Second of all, dating is even more pointless when the two people involved are not even close to being prepared for marriage. Referring back to item number one, you become attached to someone, and then what? You can't do anything about it. You can't get married. On top of that, throw in teenage hormones and an underdeveloped cerebral cortex (which, if you haven't taken any psychology courses yet, is the part of the brain which houses impulse control and moral judgment) and you have a GIANT potential mistake waiting to happen. The cerebral cortex is not fully developed usually until around 22 or 23.

 

Of course, a person, can learn to control his or herself in situations like that, which usually requires what I think of as "complete abstinence." That means not just not giving in to temptation, but avoiding anything tempting altogether so that the mind does not even feel an urge of any sort. Physical temptation, emotional temptation....it's all the same really. But a person can control his or her own mind. This means saying "no" to certain things. Things like being in any sort of romantic relationship before one is ready to do something. If you give yourself over emotionally, then what? If you give yourself over physically, then what? Of course, this doesn't make sense to a lot of people, most of whom just live for the moment. But I am thinking of my future husband. Is he going to want to hear of all the guys I gave my heart to? Who I gave any part of my body to? No, because I would not want to hear the same story from him. I want to give my heart only to my husband, and I want him to give his heart only to me. If you think about it, emotional/physical relationships before engagement and marriage are essentially adultery to my future husband. They will sit on my conscience forever, even if I tell him (which I will--I can't lie to my husband).

So you are probably wondering, "how on earth am I supposed to get married if I can't be in a relationship?" and perhaps, "if I were to be in a relationship, I guess I would have to sit there like a cold, heartless statue or something, wouldn't I?" That is where "courtship" comes in. Yeah, it's an old-fashioned term. And the way that this is a lot like arranged marriages may be a turn-off. But here is the concept: A guy and a girl are friends. Maybe just friends who exchange a little conversation here and there during or after church, work, school, or something else like that. Maybe they have a big group of mutual friends and they all hang out together often. Maybe their families are good friends with each other. Or any other situation you can think of. The girl may like the guy, maybe not. Maybe she has never thought about it, but she really likes him as a friend. He more than likely likes her. And it's not for shallow things like looks, but it is really about personality. He has been observing her in her natural habitat(s); observing her interactions with girls, other guys, little kids, older people, and her family. Chances are, she has been observing him in the same areas. In their conversations they have surely found, like any friends do, that they have many things in common, and that they like being around each other. Now, depending both on the age of the two parties involved, as well as the readiness they feel, it may be months or it may be years. In my case I know it will be at least two more years (but that is really beside the point). But one day, when they guy has prayed about it and sought others' opinions on the matter (not just his friends, but also his parents and probably other people who know the girl in mind), he will call up the father and ask to meet him for breakfast somewhere. I mean, it doesn't have to be breakfast, it doesn't have to be a phone call...just minor details. :D But somehow or another, he will get into a conversation with the father, and, once he musters up the courage, he will finally ask to court the daughter. It took my friend's older sister's now-husband three breakfasts with her dad to come out with the question.  Hey, I mean, it's a test of manly courage and things like that.  :) 

Anyways, next comes the courtship part. Firstly, it is important that both his and your families are involved. Secondly, courting is not dating. Courting is spending time together, but not investing in each other emotionally anywhere near as much as you would in a typical dating situation. Let's just say that that is very hard to do. The point of the courtship would be to get to know if the other is really right for a spouse or not. Well, there is no denying that emotion is going to get invested. After all, how are you supposed to hang out with someone (and, often times, that someone's family) with the hopes of getting married soon and be expected to not fall madly in love with each other in that process? That's why emotion and passion are not the main focus, no matter how present they happen to be. What courtship focuses on is practicality and logic about the situation, as well as making sure that God is the center of everything (if you are religious, that is). You probably know from experience that, in love, our first inclinations are to...well, feel love for that person. And feelings are very strong...you should never underestimate them. Thus, a feeling of passion can easily get carried away with itself. If no rules, boundaries, or limitations are set (like Cesar Millan says :P), then of course passion is going to be the center focus. But before the courtship begins, plans are laid out. And guess who gets to be in charge of it and who keeps an eye on the two as the courtship progresses? The parents and siblings! Yes, that sounds like a nightmare to most people, but really....the people who care about you the most and know you best, AND who are NOT emotionally invested in the relationship (or, at least, not nearly as much as you are) are going to be there for you the whole way! And if something doesn't seem right, they will let you know. The reality is that courtships don't always end up in marriage, though it is pretty rare. The reason is that courtship is meant to get to see if that person is right for you to get married to. And sometimes they are not. But most of the time they are, and once the courtship has been going smoothly and you both feel like you are called to marry each other at that time (it could be weeks, months, or years...), then the guy will (with the permission of her dad again, of course) ask the girl to marry him. Once engagement starts, then romance can really step into the picture, emotionally speaking, anyways. But proceeding with caution is necessary, as nothing is final till he and you have been pronounced husband and wife. And once THAT happens, it is officially time to invest in each other emotionally and physically and everythingelseically!!! I hope all this has made sense to you. Please, berate me with questions if it so pleases you. I don't want to leave you scratching your head and wondering when the homeschoolers went mad, if that wasn't what you assumed us to be anyways.  :D

So, yeah....like I've said before, my guy friend is a most amazing friend.  If something happens between us, then that is wonderful.  Now is just not the right time, and if the right time does come, the relationship will not go down like your typical guy-girl relationship you see most often in this culture.  I hope I have explained myself well enough and given you a different perspective that may even be inspirational!

Your friend,

Jessica

 

    

Video of the Week

I really thing this guy has a good approach to things...he's obviously a Libertarian...I like the way he confronts the issue. Good grief...Americans can be so shallow sometimes, and I'm glad I'm not the only one who notices!