a stream of words. [three]

/one./
//two.//

there have been so many thoughts and words and memories running through my heart and mind lately that sometimes the best thing to is just to get them out somewhere. onto a screen. into the void. these will probably make sense only to myself. but i think that the act of writing itself is an act of creation. and perhaps out of unorganized material, thoughts, and grey matter, something can be created. or at least discovered.

october has always been my month. i have a connection with it. of course it has something to do with my birthday. but there is something more than that, i think. i think that would love october even if i were born in july or march. there is just something autumnal in my core. and i know that it sounds like "things white girls say/things white girls love." well. i am a white girl. and i do love fall. so. there's me falling into that stereotype. but there is something in the way that october comes alive with color, in the way that she gracefully transitions from summer to winter, in the way that she is full of passion and yet gentleness that just resonates with me. i truly am glad that we live in a world where there are octobers. and i'm glad that i get to have october in utah again.

purpose and direction are interesting things. they can be so elusive. they have a way of hiding just when you want them most. and so. you search. and that can make you feel even more lost than when you started. other times purpose and direction are buried in to-do lists. but those to-do lists are important, too. "you are concerned about many things. she hath chosen the better part." but what if it's all the Lord's work? how do we prioritize? i am learning gratitude for small glimpses of light. of course i would like everything to be unfolded in front of me right away. but we'd miss the growth, wouldn't we? and i might not like the way that things are going to turn out. or maybe i wouldn't believe them. and for that reason, i work through the messy middle. i crawl through the raspberry bramble, get cut up a bit, bruised, and dirty. but i am prone to believe that the growth and messiness help prepare me to meet the future, no matter what it holds. courage and tenacity are gifts from God. we don't have power on our own.

for some reason i've been thinking a lot about moses lately. about that red sea in front of him. how did he know what to do? i don't think he necessarily did. and did that prompting to split the sea--was it subtle? a shout? we read in doctrine and covenants that it was told to him through his heart and mind. that is both beautiful and unsettling to me. like, how do you know for sure that a prompting is from God? i know that they tell you to just "be a good boy and be a good girl" and things will work out, and i know that you work to align your will with God's so that "his thoughts and ways" do become your ways. but i guess i just don't trust myself enough. i remember a bible as literature course i took at uni, years and years ago. we talked about abraham and isaac. [which is just a really hard story, btw. it makes me so sad everytime. for so many reasons. one of which is that it just makes me wonder what abraham and isaac's relationship was like afterwards. also, was sarah aware that this was going on?] but we talked about how abraham might have received that impression to sacrifice isaac. was it a vision? an audible voice? or just a subtle impression that wouldn't leave him alone? i hope, for abraham's sake, that it was something big. but it might have been something a lot more quiet. and that scares me.

i've been thinking about quotes recently. quotes that stick with me. do you know the kind? the ones where you either hear it from someone or read it in a book and they stick to your bones. i remember things that people told me. those words that mean something. tonight i remember simply this phrase. "you don't have to prove yourself to anyone." i've also been thinking of this c.s. lewis quote. "meanwhile, little people like you and me, if our prayers are sometimes granted beyond all hope and probability, had better not draw hasty conclusions to our own advantage. if we were stronger, we might be less tenderly treated. if we were braver, we might be sent, with far less help, to defend far more desperate posts in the great battle." i know that you know that i didn't quote that from memory, so perhaps it's not stream of consciousness? but it's been on my brain. and i've thought about that quote recently.

i found out the other day at work that apparently i was one of the other intern's nemesis because she had written an essay for the brimhall memorial essay contest and didn't win . . . and then on the email list for writing fellows in all caps it was announced that i had won instead. she didn't even know me. but she decided to hate me forever. apparently when she heard my name at the church office building, she was like, "it's HERRRRRRRR!" but i guess i'm endearing enough that she can't hate me tooooo badly. but hearing that story made me laugh for three days straight.

going home from salt lake to utah county. my home town's silence surprises me at times. i went running on its streets yesterday morning. it was so quiet. it was so familiar. the smell of sagebrush and horses reminded me of teenagehood. of insecurities and of feeling whole. i know those streets in a way that i don't quite yet know salt lake's. and i probably never will know salt lake's in the same way. i haven't found my groove yet. haven't found my running paths. i get lost on those suburban streets. perhaps there is something to read in that. but this i do know. there truly is something so sublimely serene and wonderful about getting into my car, leaving home, ready to literally drive off into the sunset to get back to my new place, and having a three-year-old decidedly and excitedly announce that she is going to sit on the grass and watch you drive off. all of us have such a vital need to love and to be loved. and children's love is healing. just like driving through the canyon on a perfectly crisp fall day is good for the soul. i need those moments which heal and fill the soul. all of us do. God be thanked that there are people like that in my life. who heal and bless and comfort. may i be that person in more people's lives. that is my sabbath prayer.