Humble Pie

Just a little reminder now that rush is over that there are far greater concerns in the world than sororities and swaps.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/10/23/1888703/earthquake-survivors-are-being.html#storylink=fbuser

- Allie

Food for Thought

Back when I was a youngster I hated oatmeal. I’m pretty sure I never actually ate oatmeal to validate this, but the same goes for ketchup. Once I hit my quarter life crisis and turned 20 I realized the valuable lesson that comes from eating oatmeal: instant gratification. I can make my favorite instant oatmeal in a 1:15 minute. It even has flax in it!

But let me be slightly vulnerable for a moment and tell you I am one of the least patient people I know. Sure, I don’t mind standing behind the old lady in the check out line who is looking for a lost coupon that will save her ten cents, but I also consider myself a cheapster who loves a good coupon. It’s kind of an adrenaline rush, using a coupon. I’m adventurous, I know.

Anyway, why am I writing about oatmeal? It’s not just about oatmeal. The love of instant gratification transcends into almost every aspect of my life. I enjoy studying for a test and the next day getting results. I enjoy drinking coffee because I can feel the caffeine spreading out from my stomach like a plague. I even sometimes enjoy going on a run and having a little soreness for the rest of the afternoon. I however do NOT like planting a seed and waiting weeks for a flower to bloom. I do not like ordering J. Crew and waiting 5-6 business days for it to come in. I don’t like living in the gray zone. I think Sweden should have picked a side. (Kidding, but you get the point.)

This semester I’ve come to learn that sometimes the things I value the most are the things I have to work for, pray for, and be patient with. This is probably a no brainer for some of you but it’s been a tough lesson for me this semester. Fall semester is always tough for me anyway because I just had an amazing summer at camp in one of my favorite states (NORTH CAROLINA, I’ll probably write about it soon) and I always look forward to spring because March/April are the cardigan/scarf months. So I challenge you, and myself, to “be here now.” (Ray LaMontagne reference, sorry I had to…) I enjoy Rowan Oak because it is a place where time seems to stand still but if I stayed there forever I would never appreciate it for the beauty it is so lets go to the places that challenge us. Talk to the people who are sometimes hard to love. And love. LOVE LOVE LOVE. If rush has taught me anything this year it has taught me how important it is to just love on people. Take every opportunity given to you and find gratification and designate glory to the one place it is to be directed. But also have patience with the things, the people that take a while to bloom. And if none of that gratifies you then at least try Nature’s Path Organic Hot Oatmeal (Flax Plus) and I promise warm results in your belly.

Sorry this turned into a rant. It’s rush week, don’t blame me.

- Allie

black cabs and good music

i’m kind of obsessed with this website:

http://www.blackcabsessions.com/

and i could waste a WHOLE lot of time watching WAY too many videos… in fact, that’s exactly what i’m doing right now. they’re just all SO good. i think i’m going to have to limit myself to one a day. here’s to good music.

Lets just stop pretending

I am an incredibly self-aware person; except when it comes to being underwater. For those of you who have accompanied me on a beach trip or spent considerable amount of time in a pool with me you might have observed or heard me talking about my alter ego: Star*. Star* is/was my mermaid until I experienced a cognitive epiphany this summer in which my mermaid name is now Lilly. Star*, as I had to correctly recall from the chaos in my brain, is in fact not my mermaid name but the name of my childhood imaginary unicorn that lives within the fences of the Memphis International Airport. I digress, and for blog purposes I will not use the word blogress for when I ramble in cyber world. Digress = real world. Blogress = cyber world. Glad we covered the basics.
To be honest, Lilly (should I make this a double name in true southern fashion and be called Star* Lilly? Lilly Star*?) is an ego that can only be experienced through observation. Therefore, you must invite me on any beach trips you take from now on because Lilly loves to frolic in the ocean waves and emerge looking as if the salt water and crashing waves phase her none. Mind you, Lilly is not someone I created to sound cool in one of those “I like really uncool things like watching Telly Tubbies alone or wearing Nike shorts and Uggs in Septemeber because they make me look cooler” ways. Lilly has been with me ever since I can remember living on the lake in the summers of my youth. Although at that time she was mostly confined to our hot tub because mermaids (at least my species) cannot live in lake water.
Anyway, Lilly is a real deal to me and there’s no pretending like I don’t pretend to be a mermaid when I’m in the water. That brings me to the purpose of this titular entry into the blogosphere.
Let’s just stop pretending…freshman year was as fun as our album quotes make it out to be, that we haven’t been burned by friends and relationships, that random hookups are edifying, that going out and “making bad decisions” brings you the joy it falsely promises, that we all try to act like we have it all together when everything is crashing around us, that a boyfriend or girlfriend will bring you that sense of security you long for, that no one else struggles with what you struggle with. Let’s stop pretending and see what happens.
The intention of this blog is not to look carefree, granola, hippie, Christian, or complete. The purpose is to say I am human. I make mistakes. I daily forget who I am and where I want to be. I have good days and I have terrible days. I make F’s on Brit Lit papers. I choose not to love others well because loving myself is easier. I am indecisive, hard headed, and I despise ketchup. I daily cover up my flaws and hope you, my friends, don’t see me for the emptiness that I can be. But I also love sleeping in late on a Saturday morning and watching cartoons. I love conversations over coffee and a great sales room. I like simple joys like napping in Rowan Oak and holding my hand out the window like an airplane taking off in the sky. I am 21 and I still play like a mermaid in the ocean.
- Star* Lilly
(Allie)

on living c o l o r f u l l y.

[allie and i decided a long time ago to tag team this blog and of course, just like with everything else, we sat around and talked about it for ages before finally doing it. so thanks for pulling the trigger on that one, allie. to the countless (more like 3) people out there that are reading this blog, you’ll be hearing from allie and me both now. i’m sure no one will object to this, because she’s cooler, wittier, and way more granola than me anyway.]

this summer i spent a weekend in boulder, colorado, and it took everything in me not to drop everything and move out there. let me start by reminding you that i love going places i’ve never been. i’m not sure what it is, but there’s an irresistible pull that emerges whenever anything new, fresh, different, exciting, out-of-the-ordinary is involved. maybe that’s why i love to travel so much, and maybe that’s why i’m constantly looking forward to the next big thing i have planned. but that’s a whole different story…

anyway, back to boulder. it was brimming with street musicians, barefoot hippies with dreds dancing in the middle of the street, cool shops, cute walking streets, breathtaking stars, and the dark outline of the rocky mountains on the western border of the sky. so beautiful & so fascinating. mostly, i loved looking at the people the best. they were all just so colorful, which is the only word i can think of to describe these people, but i think it’s the very word i’m looking for regardless. i saw a man who had the most intricate tattoo that covered his entire face & neck, starting in the center of his face & spreading to his temples, over his jawline, across his cheekbones like tree roots. there were homeless people asking for spare change, people in long skirts & bare feet, a man carrying a banjo across his back like a cross. basically, almost every person that passed me was someone who i would love to sit down with and hear the story of who they are, where they come from, and what they’re all about.

but i guess i’m just really drawn to colorful people, and there a part of me that just really wants to be a barefoot hippie & be a street musician in boulder, colorado. i’m not sure that my parents would go for that, and the whole not showering thing would probably start to get to me. but i think my desire to be a hippie is really the same thing as a desire to be a colorful person. and i think i can live colorfully without having to renounce showers and shaving.

the more i’ve thought about this concept of living colorfully, the more i’ve come to believe that as christians, we are all called to live colorfully, or to live in a way that is slightly off-center from what the world accepts as the norm. it reminds me of flannery o’connor’s definition of the word “eccentric” and how she argues that every christian should be eccentric in the sense that we are all, by the very definition of who we are, “not-centered.” the very core of who we are is so completely different than the center of the world that we have no choice but to stand out and be labeled as mildly (or no-so-mildly) “eccentric.” all that being said, i want my life to be slightly off-center from the norm. really, i just want to live colorfully. i’m not entirely sure what this looks like, but i’m certain that it includes loving extravagantly, delighting in the beauty that surrounds me, seeing the redemption that has affected every aspect of life, looking for ways that i can be a part of redemption in the world and rejoicing in the redemption that has taken place/is still taking place in me.

-katy

Number 25

Almost two years ago I started a folder on my Mac entitled “Personal Journals.” It was my intention at that time to one day share the documents encased inside. It’s taken me a year and a half to come to this point and as I watch the documents rise in number (I’m now in the twenties, fast approaching thirty) I find myself like a mother holding on to her child as she walks to her first day of kindergarten. Then, just as I’m sure your mother has before, I freeze and remember we left the paper sack lunch on the kitchen counter. What is more important in that moment? To turn the minivan around as fast as possible to provide your loved one a meal or watch as your first born takes their first steps into academia? Not to say either is a bad option, but there will always be the kid whose mom packed an extra snack pack just in case. So you trust in the good of mankind, of childkind, to accept what was made out of your own flesh, out of your own brokenness, and have some hope that it will be well received and shared. My words are the offspring of my life right now. I realize people some will look at this blog and immediately write me off as one of “those types.” Trust me, you can’t give me any more judgment than I have given myself before. Against all insecurities and fears I am choosing to stay in this moment and watch my words leave my heart and take their first steps into the real world trusting that it will bear some kind of fruit in the future.

So I must begin this blog by giving credit to the two kids who have encouraged me to not just write but to finally press submit: Marianna and Katy. You can’t have a conversation with me without my mentioning one of these two wonderful women. Marianna and I became friends freshman year through Stewart dorms and fast approached best friend status. When Marianna and I decided to go different sororities I had no fear in knowing it would not change our friendship. It’s cheesy, but an unbreakable sisterhood already bound us. We’ve spent nearly every football game in her parent’s tent and we may go weeks without having intentional conversation but we always start right where we left off with no ill feelings. Marianna and I tell each other like it is and I love her for not-so-subtly telling me to start writing for real this time. We’ve laughed and we’ve cried and we’ve loved all along. She’s the kind of friend that knows when you need caramel cake and knows when you need an apple, her encouragement always comes at the right time in the right amount.

Katy and I start our story a little later but that has never made me doubt the genuineness of our friendship. I accredit a conversation over coffee with Katy as part of the turning point in my life last semester. It was the first time in a while that I sat down with someone who I thought had it all together and realized, “Oh my, she is just as broken as I am.” I say that with all love and sincerity in my heart, and she knows this, because our friendship revolves around redemption. We get excited about it and seek it in every scenario. We are the “Kate and Allie” show. We are those annoying friends who finish each other’s sentences and think the same absurd thoughts then giggle uncontrollable at how silly we are. So to make a long story short, I love these girls and I wanted my first blog to be about them because they implored the confidence in me to finally stop saving documents and instead submit them.

So here is to friends who not only laugh with you and tell you the things you want to hear but also cry with you and tell it to you like it is…

And to friends who share their blogspot with you.

- Allie