Hooked

Today I stumbled upon the perfect phrase to describe the way people can make me feel sometimes.
Grass on a fish hook.
There's a man fishing in the big blue. He's more than ready to catch him the biggest, prettiest fish he's ever seen. He'll be glowing when he brings her home. So he's out there with his line in the water and he gives it a routine little flick of the wrist. There's a tension on the line! Something has bit! He's more than excited as he quickly winds up the line, closing the deal. He pulls it out of the water with a huge smile on his face.
And in an instant, it fades. It is just a clump of grass that grabbed hold of his hook. He spends the following 2 minutes pulling off the grass and throwing it back in the water. Angry because of the wasted excitement and time. Once he cleans the hook, he casts it back into the blue. More attentive to the slack in the line as to avoid another run-in with the grass.
Grass isn't useless. You can easily list at least a dozen different ways grass is wonderful! Some people love it and think its beautiful, others like it but don't care. Nobody hates grass, though. But some how, even the most useful, nice, commonplace thing can be regarded as nothing but a burden. Nothing but trash. It just takes that one person.
Even if you're not a beautiful fish that everyone seems to be fishing for, don't let anyone let you think that you're worthless because you're a clump of grass.
You'll find someone who looks at you and appreciates what you are. Weather it be a friend, a family member, or a future spouse. They will see the beauty in the common place.
Stand tall little grass clump.

The First

I had to share this because it is probably the best written, most humorous bit of liturature I've ever written. This is an un-dramitized re-telling, believe it or not, of my actual first day of public school. Sophomore year. Lol. Enjoy!
I have to say I'm relatively confident, but every ounce of me was nervous and self-conscious that day. I was shaking and having troubles swallowing as I walked into the office and muttered in a half-dead voice, "There's a blue Ford pick-up with their lights on." The office lady was so kind, "What was that, dear? Oh! A car! Write it down here and we'll announce it later." I nodded, assuming trying to use my vocal chords was more trouble than a "yes, ma'am" is worth. I ducked my head as I entered the hallway.
If you ask me today, what my experience was then, I'll use the phrase "like a Disney movie". One thing they always show in Disney movies is the girl getting books knocked out of her hands by the love of her life in the hallways. One thing they fail to portray is the rules of the road, high school hallway edition. You'd think I would pick up on the rules pretty quick; they're basically the same as a highway. But within 2 minutes I seemed to have broken every untold law of the infamous senior hallway.
People were begining to stare. I was flustered and forgot where I was going so I shuffled to the side of the hallway and pulled out my schedule. A teacher noticed my struggles and helped me out. Turns out he was my art teacher! Easy enough. He hooked a thumb to the door and I walked in. High school students are a very different breed. All the girls look different in the same ways. As though there were only 3-5 hairstyles and colors that were acceptable and you could wear whatever clothes you wanted as long as they looked a certain way. The boys are easy to group too. One thing I can say high-schoolers are good at is following stereotypes. The categories were sporty, overdressed, dorky (normal), artsy, and I-don't-give-a-sh** the last of which normally involved a lot of black and skulls and/or cowboy boots.
In my first hour there were mostly sporty and dorky kids. I actually knew a couple of them from soccer and swim team. All I could think was I had to make a good imppression. I officially represented every homeschooler and christian in the entire metro area. The teacher, Mr. Harvey, came in and introdused himself. He was not only the art teacher but also the boys' varsity basketball coach and a darn good one at that. I made it through most of class without talking. But by the time class was over, I hated my teacher. He had rules like "You can only use wood, #2 pencils". I had been drawing with the same mechanical pencil for the past 5 years. There ain't no way some art teacher was gunna make me change that.
I left, worried and stressed as I tried to get to my next class. Geometry extended. I didn't do very well in my algebra 1 class so the counseler placed me in a 'slower paced' class. Oh how little he knew...
I was the first in class. The teacher was a young, kind of round man. Welcoming smile. He knew my name and shook my hand and returned to typing on his computer. I sat down at what has become my signature seat: second isle from the middle, second row from the front. I pulled out my notebook pretending to doodle. In all honesty I was shaking and trying not to show how nervous I was.
The first boy came in. He was tall but you couldn't tell because he was hunched over and wringing his hands. He looked around the room and seemed to be muttering to himself. "How you doin' John!" The teacher, Mr. Worthington, called out. John looked around, "I-I-I don't know..." John sat down two seats away from me and started scratching his desk. In that moment he was dubbed "Creepy John" in my head and I referred to him as such in all my stories.
Next came a girl in a wheel chair and her friend pushing it. The girl in the wheel chair you could hear from the other end of school. Her voice was the kind that made your ears bleed. Her friend was quiet and just laughed politely. They both had more piercings than I've ever seen on anyone in person, straitened gothic style hair and a whole stick of eyeliner. John suddenly growled and stood hunched in his seat as he screamed at the top of his lungs ( and please excuse the language), "CHLOE STORM, YOU BITCH! What are you doing here!?" I shook in my seat. Just then John charged for Chloe and she laughed! "Oh, John, it's good to see you too." He growled again and went for her throat till Mr. Worthington called him off. John dropped his arms and darkly slunk back to his seat. The others came one by one. Chris, a tall, ugly kid with a mole the size of a dinner plate on his neck. Becky, the druggy gone christian-ish. Lexi, bleach blond, cute as a button, brainless sweetheart. And two others, one dropped out of school and the other changed schools because she broke her hand on someone's face.
Then there was me...

The Open Door

As I finish the book "Paper Towns" by John Green, I've come to realize I don't much like reading because... I love it so much.
I thought the only reason I stopped reading for fun was because I started college, but no. That's not it at all. I stopped reading books because I can't stand the feeling once I've finished it. It's too similar to the daily aches and pains of growing older. The sense of "I can never go back." It's the feeling of "it's over." But worst of all it feels like saying Good-bye.

Over the years this has been my bigest fear and heart ache; saying good bye. I can't quite put it to words. You'll never be the same after this good bye. There's the possibility of never seeing that person again or sitting in your favorite spot in that house again. It's leaving the things you've learned to love hoping you'll learn to love like that again.

Good-bye opens the door to never-again. Never have I been so afraid of an open door.

I Have a Dream

I have this crazy dream of being a woman people respect because she respects people. Some one whom everyone knows because she's gotten to know everyone. A woman who takes time for the important things but always makes time for the little things. A woman that invests in dreams and the people chasing after them. Someone whose happiness rings through the streets and echos off hearts like the sound of a street player's saxophone.

Can I be who I want to be without having to prove it to everyone?

I just recently returned to Facebook after deleting my account over a year ago. My purpose for returning was to simply reconnect with friends in other states and countries but also to hopefully get plugged in more with the people I'm around on a regular basis. You'd be amazed at how left out one can be if you're the only one out of 50 people that requires a text invitation to a party.

But, as I just spent the last hour doing, all I desire is for people to see me the way I want to be seen. The girl who reads Sherlock Holmes and has a dog she loves. I literally think to myself, "How much of myself can I convey without making a list"? I sit here even now thinking of how I could re-post all my old pictures with my 4-h projects and friends and all the animals I worked with. All my favorite quotes but only the ones that are legitimately funny or from a book that I take pride in reading.

What kind of person does that make me?
Repeatedly checking for a 'like' or a re-pin or a comment. It makes me a busy-body and not the good kind. It's hovering all over everything with the intent for the best out come for me. Everyone has to see me for who I want to be, not who I am. Or maybe who I am but only the entertaining parts. What is with that?! That's no life! That's self-centered-ness topped with a huge dollop of people-pleaser! If you're living a life worth much, your Facebook status won't be the first thing to show it in all its splendor. Your LIFE will speak for itself, don't you think?

On a very small scale, say you have on your profile that you love dogs. Well, if you honestly love dogs, it won't be news to anyone. People who know you would be able to say, "Oh, Erika LOVES dogs! She plays with Rover every time she comes over." To my knowledge, most people wouldn't refer to your "interests" tab as a character reference.

I have big dreams of being a woman. A real woman. One who doesn't need to tweet to show her humor and wit.

I'm a Monster

When I think of him my heart aches. Not because of what was or wasn't said.

No, But because I let my habits and opinions go to my head.

I wish our fights were just a mere matter of words!

Because at least then we’d have something to work towards.

But no, it’s me, with my pride parading through our lives like angry King Kong.

I climb to the top of my voice and refuse to let him say I’m wrong.

Why, when he gets closer, do I give him a shove?

 Real monsters only hurt the ones they truly love.

Obadiah 1:3

The pride of your heart has deceived you, you who live in the clefts of the rocks and make your home on the heights, you who say to yourself, 'Who can bring me down to the ground?'

Past

The scariest thing about moving forward in life is all that you have ever known will become set. The past is beyond the reach of any man or machine. Nothing is more permanent than what has already been done. So many times you wish you could un-say or re-do but once done, you can never go back. You can go back to being single, or go back to your old job, but the past stays the same.

Staying the same means it affects us, even when we forget, we still had those hard times we still feel connected to that dear friend. But the best part about moving forward, is that you get a chance to make more pasts, more experiences that can form you into the being that God intended you to be.

One of my favorite words of God is "Go." Go out into the world and create more disciples, more experiences, go and make more examples of who God is and more examples of what the world he made can look like.

If you hold on too long to your past, or even your current situation, you'll grow tired and weak and soon fall. You don't do the monkey bars by hanging on the first bar as long as possible! You swing for the next! If you miss, you try again.

Don't be so focused on the past, on where you are today that you forget that

.we are made to go.

The Murder of Media

How many times a week do you watch someone get killed? Most of you will say "I've never seen someone get murdered! That's awful!" but here's another question: how many times a week do you watch a murder as entertainment? Your initial response is probably something like "That's sick! Who could watch a murder for FUN?!" But the truth is, we do it all the time.

 NCIS, CSI, Cold Case Files, SVU, Bones, the list goes on. These tv shows are what? You tell me! They're fascinating, right? But what are the consequences to watching these TV shows? You do realize they are specifically based on death. There would be no Special Agent Gibbs if there weren’t any dead Naval Officers. There’d be no Horatio if there weren’t raped, stabbed, dead women in a ditch somewhere. There’d be no “king of the lab” or Sealy Booth if there weren’t some defaced man whose identity was taken from him, down to erasing his fingerprints and attempting to burn his body.

Is that fun? Is it entertaining to watch people get killed? Is it interesting to seeing a body chopped up into an innumerable amount of tiny bits? Sounds sick when I put like that, doesn’t it? But Erika, I mean really, I watch because they solve the murders and serve justice! Oh really? What if they didn’t tell you who the victim was, or how the person was killed? Would you still be interested in finishing the show? No, because everything about the show rides on that single moment when a life is taken. The more details in the murder the better the plot, right? Sick. Horrific. Ghastly. Awful. Putrid. Disgusting. How can we sit by and not only watch, but enjoy watching MURDER! But it’s just a TV show. No. These types of things happen every day and watching these shows is numbing us against the horrifying horrendousness of a life being ripped out of the earth.

Do you still ache inside when you hear someone’s been killed? I don’t. I’ve become numb to death. When you read the story of Cain and Able in Genesis, do you see the wickedness of Cain? Do you see him murdering his own brother? My pastor showed a video of the comedian Tim Hawkins talking about The Flood and other huge, horrible events in the bible that “Aren’t in the Precious Moments Bible.” When you think of the flood you think of water and a boat with giraffes sticking their heads out and birds flying around. You don’t think of screaming, drowning, dying people and animals all over the earth.

What’s this say about how we view Christ’s sacrifice? How often do you say “Jesus died for me”? He D.I.E.D!!! Hello!!!!
 No more life,

 he stopped breathing,

his blood was flowing no more,

 his brain was not processing,

 he was dead.

A corps on a stick.

 But he didn’t just die. He was killed. If we become numb to death, to murder, we become numb to the great sacrifice God made. We become numb to how precious God sees a life. We become numb to the consequences of sin: “For the wages of sin is death”. If we undermine the horribleness of death, we undermine God’s power and the grace he’s given us. The life he gives to us.

As you watch your stories, think of what death means to you. Is it how you get your kicks? Or is it a beacon for the greatness of sin in our fallen world?