Here's to my current Relient K kick

And this week the trend
was to not wake up till 3pm
I picked the few conscious hours that I chose to spend
and slept away the rest of them

and this week the trend
was to crash and burn and then return again
to practice the life that I pretend
provides enough to get me through the weekend

so I say
get me a solution
and watch me run with it
and then you gave
you gave me a solution
what have I done with it
cause I was absolutely sure I had it all figured out
way back then
and now it's this minute, this hour, this day

And this week the trend
was to backstab every single one of my friends
and leave a voicemail message trying to make amends
all the while hoping things work out in the end

and this week the trend
was to borrow all the strength that you could lend
to keep my head above the water and not descend
back to where I said I'd never go again

So I say
give me a solution
and watch me run with it
and then you gave
you gave me a solution
what have I done with it
cause I was absolutely sure I had it all figured out
way back then
but after this day it's this week all over again

And I just want to get mugged at knifepoint
to get cut enough to wake me up
cause I know that I don't want to die
sitting around watching my life go by
and what we take from this is what we'll get and we haven't quite figured it out just yet
because all of us are all too stuck
strapped to a chair watching our lives blow up
stuck watching our lives blow up

- "This Week the Trend," by Relient K

This is not fair.

Just promise you won't close your eyes

Yesterday is a wrinkle on your forehead
Yesterday is a promise that you’ve broken
Don’t close your eyes, don’t close your eyes
This is your life and today is all you’ve got now
Yeah, and today is all you’ll ever have
Don’t close your eyes
Don’t close your eyes

This is your life, are you who you want to be
This is your life, are you who you want to be
This is your life, is it everything you dreamed that it would be
When the world was younger and you had everything to lose

Yesterday is a kid in the corner
Yesterday is dead and over

This is your life, are you who you want to be
This is your life, are you who you want to be
This is your life, is it everything you dreamed that it would be
When the world was younger and you had everything to lose

Don’t close your eyes
Don’t close your eyes
Don’t close your eyes
Don’t close your eyes

This is your life are you who you want to be
This is your life are you who you want to be

This is your life, are you who you want to be
This is your life, are you who you want to be
This is your life, is it everything you dreamed it would be
When the world was younger and you had everything to lose

And you had everything to lose

"This is your Life," by Switchfoot

I experienced my own personal version of hell today.

Hell is not made up, as some theologians might think, of darkness, hellfire, and flesh eating worms. Oh no. It's much worse than that. I had a revelation today that really, hell is made up of thousands upon thousands of wet lawns that "must" be cut. Torture worthy of Greek and Roman gods.

I had five cups of tea yesterday. Five. I am officially coming back from England a tea drinker.

Speaking of coming back from England... Elodie and Nadine came over today and we mapped out the next couple of weeks, where we were going and when and my good bye dinner party. My what? I'm leaving? I didn't have a good bye party when I was in America, so it's going to be really sad, I think. There's not enough time. There's too much time.

Once a month on the second Thursday, a church in Emsworth throws a kids event called Messy Church. It just started up again for school time, and we've gone the past couple of months with the children. Yesterday, the fantastic simplicity of a children's praise song struck me, for the second time in a row. We should sing kid's songs more often.

If I were a butterfly, I'd thank you, Lord, for giving me wings;
And if I were a robin in a tree, I'd thank you Lord, that I could sing;
And if I were a fish in the sea, I'd wiggle my tail and I'd giggle
with glee;
But I just Thank You Father, for making me - ME!

Chorus
'Cause you gave me a heart and
You gave me a smile
You gave me Jesus, and
You made me His Child
And I just Thank You, Father
Foe making me - ME!

If I were an elephant, I'd thank you, Lord, by raising my trunk;
And if I were a kangaroo, I'd hop, hop, hop, right up to you;
And if I were an octopus, I'd thank you, Lord, for my good looks;
But I just Thank You, Father, for making me - ME!

If I were a wiggly worm, I'd thank you, Lord, that I could squirm;
And if I were a crocodile, I'd thank you, Lord, for my big smile;
And if I were a fuzzy wuzzy bear, I'd thank you, Lord, for my
fuzzy, wuzzy hair;
But I just Thank You, Father, for making me - ME!

'Cause you gave me a heart and
You gave me a smile
You gave me Jesus, and
You made me His Child
And I just Thank You, Father
Foe making me - ME!

Sometimes, I wish my nickname was Turtle. But Leila's cool too.

I am so hyper right now. Too bad it's 10:30.

Today I sat down and wrote about 7 pages of a treatment for a script that's been bouncing around in my head for the past couple of months. It's a great feeling when everything works together. I'm about halfway through the treatment, then I'm going to send it to my best friends and see what they think. And I'm totally conning them into helping me by naming characters after them. Well, technically, it's because they ARE them. Art, life, one of them is supposed to imitate the other, I think. I'm slightly worried about my writing right now, though, because NaNo is coming up, and the other day I realized that for the past several months, I haven't written any fiction. It's been strictly scriptwriting. They are completely different, and I'm a little worried I won't be able to sustain a piece of fiction of length. And being in England and trying to write a NaNo that's good and working out my future and trying to work on my scripts at the same time... we'll see.

I'm coming home in four and a half weeks!

The sunsets in England are amazing. Three nights in a row they've been breath taking. I don't remember seeing sunsets like this in America. Maybe I just haven't been looking. Dusk is my new favourite time of day, especially to go for walks and think.

Hmmm, thinking.

Please pray for my upcoming decisions. I'm totally procrastinating on getting a job (or jobs) for when I get back. I should start hearing from colleges and some scholarships soon. Just pray that God makes it really really really obvious what He wants me to do. I know what I want to do and I know what will probably end up happening, but I want to make sure that I do what He wants. I'm scared that I'll just have to make a blind choice, and that God will show me *afterwards* that I made the one He wanted. I want to know before I do it. And I hate this waiting.

I wish I had more Dave Matthews music.

My new favourite song. Cause it's the Killers and they rock.

You sit there in your heartache
Waiting on some beautiful boy to
To save you from your old ways
You play forgiveness
Watch it now ... here he comes!

He doesn't look a thing like Jesus
But he talks like a gentleman
Like you imagined when you were young

Can we climb this mountain
I don't know
Higher now than ever before
I know we can make it if we take it slow
Let's take it easy
Easy now, watch it go

We're burning down the highway skyline
On the back of a hurricane that started turning
When you were young
When you were young

And sometimes you close your eyes
and see the place where you used to live
When you were young

They say the devil's water, it ain't so sweet
You don't have to drink right now
But you can dip your feet
Every once in a little while

You sit there in your heartache
Waiting on some beautiful boy to
To save you from your old ways
You play forgiveness
Watch it now here he comes

He doesn't look a thing like Jesus
But he talks like a gentleman
Like you imagined when you were young
(He talks like a gentlemen, like you imagined when)
When you were young

I said he doesn't look a thing like Jesus
He doesn't look a thing like Jesus
But more than you'll ever know

- "When You Were Young," by the Killers

I am a completely and utterly broken down and messed up person. I, strangely, almost do not want to try to be any "better." I just want to learn to accept God's grace.

"Man is born broken. He lives by mending. The grace of God is glue." - Eugene O'Neill

For the past several weeks, I haven't had anyone to talk to about spiritual things, and it's been a little frustrating. (All I want for Christmas is an email on 1 John) When I wrote about love and grace and Philip Yancey's book, I was just hashing out my thoughts, and I wasn't expecting any response. I'm glad I got some. :)

I was doing the dishes the other day, and thinking, and I thought to myself, Amy, you need someone who can look you in the face and tell you every day that you need God. Which was slight hyperbole, but I'm waiting for that person. Someone to help me, push and pull me, talk with me, help me work things out, someone who knows who I want to be. The trip is twice as much fun when you don't go alone. And I can't wait until I get back home or go to my university and have people I can share everything I'm thinking about and struggling against with. I love all my friends, but I really want some family.

So if I ever ponder on heavenly things here, feel free to tell me what you think.

Every day I get sadder and sadder that my iPod is broken.

Legalism of Love?

so i'm reading this book "what's so amazing about grace?" by philip yancy, and i'm really enjoying it. i'm learning a lot and thinking about a lot and doing some refocusing (or trying to) etc. etc. etc. so throughout the whole book he talks about grace (obviously), and he brings up the question 'why be good if i know God will forgive me?" which is a reasonable question if you want to ask it. he went on to say that when we understand God's grace and love, we will be "good" in response to that.

'if we truly grasped the wonder of God's love for us, the devious question that prompted romans 6 and 7 - what can i get away with - would never even occur to us. we would spend our days trying to fathom, not exploit, God's grace.'

ok, that makes sense. i'm starting to worry about a cycle, though. because of God's grace, we don't need to prove ourselves or earn His love or follow the rules or anything. there's nothing we can do to gain His love and acceptance. so in one sense, we are free from rules. but when we realize this, we will supposedly start obeying Him voluntarily. how long will it be before we lose focus again, before we become intent on proving our love for God, before faith becomes a religion of works again? i'm trying to love people the best i can, because that's what God wants. your actions become tied to God's grace. seems to me like there are different motives, but we come again to the same problem.

i suppose it comes from pursing a life of love for God and people, which doesn't at all sound dangerous. why am i so disconcerted then?

doesn't matter, dear heart maker

I think there was one thing I learned in calculus my senior year of high school. I spent much more time trying to distract myself than learning (which was, quite frankly, much more practical). One thing I do remember, though, is the law of mutual exclusivity. If two things are mutual exclusive, it means they cannot both be true about an equation or a problem or whatever, not at the same time. If P is true then Q cannot also be true. It's an either/or principle.

Who said math is not applicable to real life? (Oh, me, right) If Americans landed on the moon first, it means that the Russians can no longer win the space race. You can't be both a Red Sox and a Yankees fan. If you're an insomniac, you can't be a heavy sleeper. There a lots of examples of this law of mutual exclusivity. And sometimes, it happens to people as well. You can't be in a relationship with one person, and friends with another. People swear by this law. I don't particularly like it myself, but I definitely understand why its useful. It's nothing bad; it's just life.

However, if doesn't mean that Russians can't still be interested in space exploration. It doesn't mean that insomniacs never get rest. And it doesn't mean that people can't care about each other even when they're not talking. There's no hope for the Red Sox and Yankees one. And the law is breakable. It just means that you have to make a different choice.

If you want to stick with the choice you've made, that's ok too. "I've mastered the art of dealing." I will look forward to Christmas.

Nothing would be better right now than a dance party with my friends to the "Numa Numa Numa" song. Yeah, that's right. The polish kid dance song. Nothing could be better.

Like Sunshine

I stubbed my toe today. Man, I forgot how much that hurts.

Today was an interesting day in the Wilson household. I was dead tired this morning, as I have ever right to be, not getting enough sleep over the weekend, due to me trying to save all my emails from AOL on Friday night (and then dad not cancelling the account this month after all) and Oxford night life on Saturday. I'm still tired, but the afternoon was better.

Today I've been in a good mood, and I don't even know why. In fact, it makes me a little suspicious. The positive outlook would be to say, Yes, God's giving me a break! Or, woo hoo, I've learned something *and* managed to put it into practice to improve my life. Or something of the more upbeat nature. However, I wonder if this is some false sense of security. Am I really finding happiness or am I just sliding back into a state of oblivion? I guess, the thing is, I feel like everything's going to be ok. No matter what happens. I guess that's why I want it to be the peace of God. Because it will be fine. It will all be fine. It doesn't matter what choices other people make, it doesn't matter where I go to school next, it doesn't matter if I barely manage to scrape by these next six weeks with shreds of my sanity left.

Regardless of what happens next, everything will be fine.

William Blake

What is it about best friends that makes them so irreplacable and miss-able?

‘And throughout all Eternity
I forgive you, you forgive me.
As our dear Redeemer said:
“This the Wine, and this the Bread.”’


Thank you.

Oxford

Freaking amazing.