I'm restless. As of now, I have a good job. As of always, I have a great family and wonderful friends and a relationship with Jesus Christ. As of now, I'm bored, I'm restless...something is missing. I'd like to think that busy will cure restless...and don't get me wrong, I'm fanfreakingtastic at compartmentalizing, but I don't think I'll be able to pack this feeling away in the attic that is my mind. Until I'm content, until I'm happy with what and who is around me and happy with the experiences I encounter and the feelings that course through me daily, I will forever be restless. What will it take? I know I don't want cookie cutter, I don't want normal or even sane... ("two roads diverged..." and all that.) So what do I want? I want to travel (the ENTIRE Caribbean, eastern Europe, western Europe, Morocco, Andorra, Vatican City, Sicily, Sardinia, Greece, Bulgaria, Sydney, London, Glasgow, French mountains and American valleys, New England in the fall, Paris at night, Switzerland in the dead of winter). I want to taste exotic foods and listen to exotic languages as they roll off exotic tongues. I want a wind chapped face and a suntanned body. I want to grow up. I want to write my own love story. I want to write the great Texan novel. I want to love and be loved in return. I want to knock down walls that lead to ancient treasure and knock down the walls around my heart. I want to believe in love without fear. I want to really stand up for what I believe. I want to experience Christ in the Holy Land and God in all His creations.
I don't want good. I want amazing, I want breathtaking. I want Life.
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Breasts and Thighs and Wings
Dear Lord,
Hope the weather is nice where you are, thanks for the pretty weather here. Thanks for all my family and friends, they're pretty cool so good call there. Please take care of all the people in the world who are cold and hungry and hurting.
I wanted to talk to you about something specific tonight, if you have the time...but I'm pretty sure you do. There are some things that just don't make sense to me. I don't mean to question and I don't mean to complain...it's just a little light shed on a couple things would really help me out. Lord, I'd like you to walk me through the Garden of Eden, take me to that fateful day when you created something beautiful and soft and sweet out of something sweaty and hairy and smelly. What was the train of thought there?
You see, I'm beginning to wonder if maybe you were tired (and really, who can blame you?) or maybe you just have an odd sense of humor (in which case, there is a good laugh to be had) when you created us man and woman.
We're so different and yet so alike. Our pieces fit, but sometimes the puzzle doesn't make sense.
I think the general idea was good Lord, but somewhere on the way, things started to go wrong. We take advantage of each other's gifts and strengths and then leave one another empty and bruised. Men want many women, and many women only want one man. Men want to be free, and women desire to be tied. Women want words and songs and thoughts, men want thighs and breasts and wings.
I'm confused Lord, how do we all fit together? How did you design us? How do we get back there?
I'll let you get back to fixing things Lord, I hope the view is wonderful from where you are. See you soon.
Love,
Ang
Hope the weather is nice where you are, thanks for the pretty weather here. Thanks for all my family and friends, they're pretty cool so good call there. Please take care of all the people in the world who are cold and hungry and hurting.
I wanted to talk to you about something specific tonight, if you have the time...but I'm pretty sure you do. There are some things that just don't make sense to me. I don't mean to question and I don't mean to complain...it's just a little light shed on a couple things would really help me out. Lord, I'd like you to walk me through the Garden of Eden, take me to that fateful day when you created something beautiful and soft and sweet out of something sweaty and hairy and smelly. What was the train of thought there?
You see, I'm beginning to wonder if maybe you were tired (and really, who can blame you?) or maybe you just have an odd sense of humor (in which case, there is a good laugh to be had) when you created us man and woman.
We're so different and yet so alike. Our pieces fit, but sometimes the puzzle doesn't make sense.
I think the general idea was good Lord, but somewhere on the way, things started to go wrong. We take advantage of each other's gifts and strengths and then leave one another empty and bruised. Men want many women, and many women only want one man. Men want to be free, and women desire to be tied. Women want words and songs and thoughts, men want thighs and breasts and wings.
I'm confused Lord, how do we all fit together? How did you design us? How do we get back there?
I'll let you get back to fixing things Lord, I hope the view is wonderful from where you are. See you soon.
Love,
Ang
Maid in the Master Bedroom
Believe me, I'm no feminist, I look forward to nurseries and cookies and laundry as much as the next girl. Having said that however, I would love to know at what point my generation of women decided it was OK to ignore women's progress altogether. Since when was it OK to give up your identity for a man?? Didn't our moms teach us better than that? Over the past couple years, I've seen countless girls give up their career plans, dreams, friends and even religions for a man. Girls, no one is worth that. No amount of financial security or high powered your-kids-will-be-cute-and-smart sperm is worth that. Relationships are about partnerships and compromise, not moving to his city and conforming to his dreams. It's particularly irritating to see women giving up their closest friends because a) they must, oh must, spend every waking moment with this perfect male specimen, or b) said male specimen has decided he doesn't like one or more of your friends. If he's concerned they're doing you harm, that's one thing. If he has a personality clash or character issue, then he's the one with the set and has every capability to address the situation.
I have every intention of getting married someday and having babies, when the Lord is ready for me to. Right now however, I have a dream to follow (namely, teaching), people to meet (namely, new friends) and places to see (namely....ok this list is WAAYYY too long). I'm proud of myself for making it on my own, maybe I don't have someone buying me diamonds or flowers or electronic equipment, but I work hard and that's my own reward.
So, Ladies, before you consider a life as a homemaker (read: I didn’t say stay at home mom, that’s a whole different ballgame) ,which is cool if you're doing something productive with your time: volunteering, substituting, something else good for the community, consider life as a person, as an individual entering into a partnership and not just a maid getting to live in the master bedroom.
I have every intention of getting married someday and having babies, when the Lord is ready for me to. Right now however, I have a dream to follow (namely, teaching), people to meet (namely, new friends) and places to see (namely....ok this list is WAAYYY too long). I'm proud of myself for making it on my own, maybe I don't have someone buying me diamonds or flowers or electronic equipment, but I work hard and that's my own reward.
So, Ladies, before you consider a life as a homemaker (read: I didn’t say stay at home mom, that’s a whole different ballgame) ,which is cool if you're doing something productive with your time: volunteering, substituting, something else good for the community, consider life as a person, as an individual entering into a partnership and not just a maid getting to live in the master bedroom.
Mixing Movies
As my friends and I have gotten older and gone through our changes and hardships and good times, there are a few things that stay the same. We're always here for one another, we're always good for a joke and we're always complaining about men. Only some of us have financial woes, only some of us have a hard time at school, only some of us have crappy roommates or terrible jobs, but all of us have man problems. I was thinking today, as I saw yet another relationship circle the drain, that there has to be some cause, some reason and maybe some solution, and I came up with something. I think the primary problem is expectations and the difference in expectations that men and women have. Aside from the fact that women of my generation have TERRIBLE Disney complexes, I really think we're also struggling with a different set of thoughts and perceptions. We grew up in a world of empowered and independent women, and witnessed a lot of our mothers making on their own in a man's world, (see Trisha Yearwood's
'Ribbons and Bows', perfect example) but at the same time, grew up in communities and environments that regarded this independence as a last ditch effort: something you do when your husband leaves you. We all want white horses and prince charming, but we want it on our terms- we don't need to be rescued, we've got it figured out, but at the same time, we act like that's precisely what we want. As a generation of women, we want to act like a grown-up, proactive, independent and yet be treated like something out of ‘Leave it to Beaver.’ We want men to chase us and send us flowers and buy us jewelry and take us out and take care of us, but we want to hit on them first and pursue them first. It all looks to me like trying to mix movies from different decades.
I think we have to shift our expectations. I think we need to expect that if the decision is made to be primarily ambitious, I don't think we can expect to be treated like Cinderella in her glass slipper phase. I think if we want to be a part of a "man's world", we have to acknowledge that it might be not only intimidating, but also a cue that we don't need things women traditionally "need" (if you're the one killing all the spiders, he might start to wonder why he's even there, metaphorically). By the same token, I think if what you really want is the glass slipper, there's a path to that too.
I won't say that either way is wrong or that there isn't a middle ground, I simply believe that there are decisions to be made and paths to be chosen in order to get precisely what you want.
As for me, I'm just hoping I'm smart enough to listen when God is talking to me.
'Ribbons and Bows', perfect example) but at the same time, grew up in communities and environments that regarded this independence as a last ditch effort: something you do when your husband leaves you. We all want white horses and prince charming, but we want it on our terms- we don't need to be rescued, we've got it figured out, but at the same time, we act like that's precisely what we want. As a generation of women, we want to act like a grown-up, proactive, independent and yet be treated like something out of ‘Leave it to Beaver.’ We want men to chase us and send us flowers and buy us jewelry and take us out and take care of us, but we want to hit on them first and pursue them first. It all looks to me like trying to mix movies from different decades.
I think we have to shift our expectations. I think we need to expect that if the decision is made to be primarily ambitious, I don't think we can expect to be treated like Cinderella in her glass slipper phase. I think if we want to be a part of a "man's world", we have to acknowledge that it might be not only intimidating, but also a cue that we don't need things women traditionally "need" (if you're the one killing all the spiders, he might start to wonder why he's even there, metaphorically). By the same token, I think if what you really want is the glass slipper, there's a path to that too.
I won't say that either way is wrong or that there isn't a middle ground, I simply believe that there are decisions to be made and paths to be chosen in order to get precisely what you want.
As for me, I'm just hoping I'm smart enough to listen when God is talking to me.
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