IrishOboe

It’s midnight, I have a scratchy throat and I’m sneezing.  I’ve just finished packing for my trip to Texas tomorrow and that probably means no bloging for a week.  I’ve not been doing anything too terrible exciting my few days at home but I received a few requests to continue writing when I returned to the states so here goes.

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Thanks for your prayers.  I made it home safely and the only hitch was an hour delay on my last leg.  It really was no trouble to switch airports in NYC and the welcome to America was much friendlier than the last time, though the immegration guy didn't understand why I studied German in Switzerland.  Now it is time for bed!

Now that I know I’m coming back, I’m getting terribly excited about going home to see everyone, watch my friend get married, chill out at the Maggie, talk late into the night with my mommy, eat dinner as a family, etc. etc.  I don’t think I’ll be thinking about it much this last week, however.  It’s my day of rest and I still feel the weight of decisions and planning and preparation that must be done for my return before I leave.  Maybe I just like being in a perpetual state of worry.  It’s a habit at least, and no sooner does God prove himself faithful in one thing than I turn and start to worry that I’ll mess up the next thing.  On my barefoot run today I was surprised that I could go over two miles with nothing hurting (feet, muscles, knee) and realized that I’ve not been doing much but a little here and there is the perfect formula for growth.  Is there anything in nature that doesn’t build up slowly over time?  Sure, destruction can happen quite suddenly, but something constructive?  It all takes the tiniest bit by bit over time.  So, if that’s how God designed nature, then why should he not work the same way with us?  The point is I can’t expect wild leaps of permanent progress but should simply be faithful in the daily, seemingly insignificant trials and trust that God will use them to build up a true daughter of God.

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This essay is an attempt to speak calmly about an experience that I just want to rant about.  The subject is important to me, but I’ve challenged myself not to indulge in another rant that will only make my allies feel good and alienate anyone who disagrees.  Feel free to rate my attempt (1-10, 10 best) and leave a comment.

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So just what goes through the mind the day before an audition that will determine the course of your life?  Lucky for me I have no idea.  God determines the course of my life and he has given me a great peace today.  Even before I played a great run-through for CY I envisioned what would happen if I was not accepted and I went home with no immediate plans to come back to Basel, and I was fine with it.  My imagination still works well and I really thought about the details and I pictured returning home and waiting for the next direction from God.  I could imagine a few situations that would be exciting and fulfilling and I know God has even better plans in store.  I’m writing this not to tell you that I no longer want to come back, but mostly so that if I am not accepted, rereading it will remind me of the peace and trust I had in God today.  I have to admit I didn’t really picture the goodbye part, but could imagine pressing onward to a new work.

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I admit it.  I like to read the comics online every morning.  There are better habits to keep, I know.  Today I felt like sharing two even though they don't get it 100%, it's close enough.

In case you're like me and didn't get the Chuck Palahniuk reference (don't you just love Frazz?) here's some more info.  I'm guessing Jef Mallet (Frazz author) is reffering to the "hidden gun" in many of Palahniuk's books.

This week I’ve had a hard time keeping an eternal perspective.  Everything rests on my audition Friday and there on the work I do up to that point, right?  What a way to kill motivation to practice.  Every time I pick up an instrument that evil voice said “It must be impressive!”  Darn it, I’ve only been playing fiddle for two months and two weeks won’t change my playing significantly enough to hide that.  That’s the way it is.  Still, it’s hard to shake everything I absorbed at music conservatory, and I made myself rather miserable.  Thanks to our good Lord for Sabbaths and yesterday really helped me come away from my myopia and rest again in the palm of God’s hand.  I’ve had some enjoyable practice sessions as well.  Unfortunately, Randy could tell in my lesson Friday that I was uptight and said so, but I guess it’s good for me to know that being uptight does not help my playing!  So I’ll try harder not to be so uptight . . . right.

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Growing up I'd often be working and just shout out a question to mommy.  If she didn't have the answer she'd look it up and get back to me.  In hind sight I see she could have encouraged and helped me more to look up stuff on my own, but I also see how giving me the information was better than letting me not bother to look it up.  Homeschooling (and parenting for that matter) is just one big balancing act, which happens to be a ton of fun.

Taking the time to listen to a child's question, opening your mind to understand it, and putting the energy into answering it just as much or little as the child is ready for is the crux of unschooling.  It's lovely to be taken seriously.  I asked the pastor of BCF yesterday about his sermon at the inconvenient time of his eating at the church picnic.  I didn't get a short quip, I got a 30 minute conversation that included a diagram on real paper (not just a napkin).  Enough people like that in a child's life and there's no fear he'll grow up ignorant, stupid, or incompetent no matter what kind schooling he has.  Who heard of a kid that wasn't full of questions before he learned that most adults don't take them seriously enough to be bothered to answer them?

Believe it or not, I’m not much of a blogger.  My mother set me up with a blog when I heartlessly decided to abandon her to live in Japan for a year.  I blog for family and a few loyal friends and I read family blogs and check a few friend’s blogs now and then, but that’s because I don’t write many letters and it’s easier for everything to be in the same place.  My mother is more aware of the fads that run within the ‘hip’ blog crowd, like such things are mims or whatnot.  Yet I do follow a few blogs that I randomly came across (okay, so my mother sent them to me).  One (If God is Love) had a post today that I appreciated.  It happens to be a blatant rip from another blog.  I feel a bit of a cheat doing the same thing, but I like it, so I’ll reference a reference to a blog.  At least I’m not filling your inboxes with ten-year-old myths that just won’t die.

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I see by the comments on my Forgiveness post that I haven’t been relating as many fascinating details of life here in Switzerland of late.  That’s partly because I’ve been living in a music and English bubble of practice and church activities.  Hopefully that will be justified by my return to Basel for more adventures, but in any case, I have a few gems to share with you that have happened of late.

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Praise the Lord my life is in His hands.  Praise the Lord he never gives up on me!  No sooner do I learn about and begin to focus on a new and wonderful teaching of God that I forget something important.  In my recent attempts to release my burdens and abide in the Lord it’s been so lovely to rely on Him in the day-to-day and to watch Him prove so faithful.  My spirit was light and my days were joy to walk yoked with Jesus.  Alas, I turned away and what was left was the knowledge that I’m not walking fully with him and the remembrance of when I did and the guilt that I couldn’t and didn’t want to come back!  My prayers were empty and God was far.  Every task in the day loomed large an ominous before me.  What is wrong with me?

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year ago I picked up Mom’s copy of The Heart of George MacDonald to read during our trip up north for vacation with family.  I’ve never been the same.  Snuggled in the bottom bunk of the Maggie P. God spoke to me through MacDonald’s words and opened a channel for the Holy Spirit to work in me.  I’ve been sometimes more and often times less responsive to God ever since.  I decided it was time to reread and remember since I end up quoting his ideas frequently and I can never quite say it the way I mean it.  Where to begin?  I think I might just post quotes here and there as comments to this blog subject when something strikes me, but I don’t have much to add.  I’ll start with a poem.  I think it speaks for itself.

 

Lord, I have fallen again – a human clod!

Selfish I was, and heedless to offend;

Stood on my rights.  Thy own child would not send

Away his shreds of nothing for the whole God!

Wretched, to thee who savest, low I bend:

Give me the power to let my rag-rights go

In the great wind that from thy gulf doth blow.

I'm currently reading too many books.  Maybe I'm just avoiding practicing.  In any case I came across this idea in Subversive Orthodoxy by Robert Inchausti.

 "For [William] Blake, a person who is not an artist cannot be a Christian, for the creative imagination is the only vehicle through which love of one's fellow man can be grasped."

I'm not sure what to think of it.  I think imagination is very important for a Christian.  We must be able to imagine alternatives to that which we see around us, but is imagination a vehicle for grasping love?  I'm not even sure what that means.  Unfortunately I can't find the original quote, so it's hard to tell.

I am thrilled that my blog has become a lively center for discussion.  Andy’s comment this post which includes thoughts on the words of “Be Thou My Vision” and the ensuing discussion deserves a separate post.  Now I feel like a real blogger!

I wrote here how I’d been singing “thy victory won” the whole time and not “my victory” and shared my thoughts on the theology of both.  The mention of that verse again in my last update was a continuation of my thoughts on the subject.

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For those of you on the edge of your seats as to whether the first reeds I’ve made in half a year turned out or not, I got a 50% success rate, which was all that was necessary: one good new read to play on and one old one to back me up.  It’s good to know I still have it in me.  The real reason I’m writing a short update is so that the bit of slander I smeared on BCF can be righted.  I said we don’t pray much in church, but apparently, there’s been an unusual trend of less corporate prayer and I’ve managed to miss those Sundays where it was done.  In any case, we prayed as a body yesterday and I think Mary was the only one who noticed I can’t shake the Episcopalian from me: I knelt.  Stephan (who led) also did the Episcopalian in me good by giving a blessing and a sending into the world at the end rather than the typical “you are dismissed” or “have a good afternoon.”  Thanks Stephan!

Indian food and interesting discussions; Frisbee and lying in the grass.  Sunday’s are good!  We missed Jimmy, though.