with them we praise & curse

Remember that part in Hamlet where Hamlet is reading a book, and some dude (I don't remember who it was) asks him what he's reading? Hamlet replies, "Words, words, words." He's such a smarty pants. Or, I guess, back then it would've been smarty tights. Smarty leggings?

When I was in youth group, my youth pastor, Josh, told us all to stop being so sarcastic and negative to one another, and instead to tell each other what we appreciated about one another. Of course, obviously, we then made fun of him. I distinctly remember turning to my friend Erin and saying with an overly-genuine lilt in my voice, "You're a bright young woman, Erin. I appreciate you."

Once on a retreat, Josh had us all sit in a circle. Then he gave one of us a ball, and told us to, without saying a name, describe what we appreciated about another person in the room. When we were done, we threw the ball to that person, often surprising them that the kind words that were just spoken were directed at them.

I've been pondering the power of words. A young lady I worked with in the food pantry in Salt Lake City a couple of summers ago was volunteering there to fulfill court-appointed hours. She had a daughter and lived with her mom. Sometimes she just made poor decisions.

One day I told her how much I enjoyed her company; how genuine and thoughtful she was; how much I liked her. A few weeks later I'd forgotten I'd even said anything to her. To me, I was just speaking my opinion. (I do this a lot.) But she came in to work and told me she'd been having a horrible day the day before, but she remembered my words to her, and they changed her entire day.

WORDS have POWER.

And not just the words we speak to others. I've also been thinking about the words I think about others.

During my spring break trip to Atlanta last spring, our group of twelve college students sat in a circle in a small attic room that we couldn't even stand upright in. One group member sat in the middle, and sporadically people spoke words of encouragement to that person. Good things we saw in that person. What impact that person has had on our week/team/lives. We were supposed to be in there for an hour and a half; we finally emerged three hours later. And after sitting in a room where nothing but encouragement, good, and positive was spoken, my entire thought processes were changed as to what I thought about my teammates. We were all different, and some of us had more in common than others. But either way, when we focused on the good, we saw more good.

WORDS can be LIFE.

Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. - Ephesians 4:29

This is a challenge to me. Let it be a challenge to you, too!

pardon me while I chug a gallon of orange juice

I'm sick. It's the last week of camp, and I'm sick. The doctor today asked me what my symptoms were, and I was expecting her to coddle me and maybe coo a little, or at least put her arm around me and rub my arm. Instead she shoved a swab down my throat to check for strep. I miss my mom.

"Are you congested?"
"Yes."
"All right, let me take a look." Looking. "Yes, it sounds like you're a little stuffy."

Well, yes, I wouldn't have lied.

"Um, yes, a swordfish severed my spine and is stuck between my third and fourth vertebrae."
"Are you lying?"
"Yes. But do you believe that I'm congested?"

On year ago today, I was here:


Dear Utah,
I miss your luscious green hiking trails, blue-faced mountainsides, cool breezes, icy snow-melted water, fields of wildflowers, Presbyterian churches, frozen yogurt shops, symmetrical street numbering system, and best friend:


This afternoon I ventured out of my bed to dinner after a 2-hour nap (my third one of the day). Someone asked me, "Heather, what does this fall bring for you?" I thought that was probably the most adventuresome, expectant, optimistic question I've ever been asked. I like it a lot better than, "What are you doing after this?" What does this fall bring for you? Who knows? I like adventures.

This is me trying to feel optimistic, while feeling very sore-throated, light-headed, homesick, and a little like Huckleberry Finn might've felt when he discovered he was on a boat with a bunch of murderers. I'd rather be with the Widow Douglas, if I had a choice.

I also had a creepy dream the other night that all my campers were sitting in my room waiting to have devotions, and I thought that I had napped through the whole thing. I think it's time for a break now.

2 Corinthians 3:17

Tonight as I was jogging (I swallowed two bugs - scratch that: two bugs flew to the back of my mouth and army crawled down my throat fluttering their wings and singing "Just You Wait 'enry 'iggins" from My Fair Lady) fireworks went off all around me. I could see them across Lake Erie lighting up the sky above Cedar Point. I could see them down the street where they are illegal. (My 8-year-old first cousin once removed: "Grandpa Jim's coming tomorrow with fireworks." My 8-year-old first cousin once removed's mom: "Grandpa Jim's going to prison.") I could hear them above and to the side and in every direction...much like the soldiers at Bastogne must've felt in 1944, only with a lot more pressing on their minds than the cramp I was getting in my side, shinsplints, and those two bugs hanging draperies in my stomach.

I distinctly remember my Fourth of July last year as if it were not an entire year ago. I was dog-sitting some pretty wealthy people's Siberian husky (named Tucker, but he was a girl) in a canyon of the Wasatch Mountains in Salt Lake City. I spent the day in my pajamas, watching the History Channel's all-day documentary on the Revolutionary War, eating cream cheese icing right out of the container, and journaling. When it got dark I could see fireworks going off in four different parts of the city from my front window. I don't remember Tucker being involved very much.

A certain sadness hung over me as I jogged around a large loop and watched the fireworks reflect in the water tonight. There was a lot ahead of me a year ago that is now behind me, but that looks a lot different now looking back than I thought it would. Like if you're in a boat and you're about to glide into this incredible clear water with lily pads (which are endangered, and you're not allowed to pluck them, because we need to save the lily pads for our unborn children) that have beautiful yellow and purple blossoms, and you just know they're going to smell beautiful...but once you get there the roots of the lily pads get tangled in the blades of your propeller and your boat breaks down, and you discover you're allergic to the scent of lily pad blossoms, and there are mosquitoes. When you finally make it out and on your way you look back, and the sight of the incredible clear water is now tainted by what you experienced, and you wonder if anything you come across in the future will ever be as clear and beautiful as the few moments before the lily pad blossoms turned into mosquitoes.

I don't know where I'll be next July 4th. I don't know what will happen in a year. I realized, though, as I watched fireworks from Ohio that I could've been watching in Utah a year ago, or Wisconsin two years ago, that I can't put my hope in circumstances anymore. I seem to learn this lesson over and over again. Circumstances change, shift, alter, break, or simply turn out different than you thought they would. But Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever (Hebrews 13:8). Who better to fix our eyes on instead of the uncertainty of "clear" water?

"It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man. Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God, the Maker of heaven and earth, the sea, and everything in them--the Lord, who remains faithful forever" (Psalm 118:8; 146:5-6).

oh, how He loves us so

Now that the weather's warmer, I've been thinking a lot about last summer. I miss the mountains of Utah. I miss their grandness, their beauty, and most of all, the way I felt God so near while I was surrounded by them. While I pined for the mountains, I realized I was really pining for the Lord.

A couple of days ago as I drove down the street, billowing white clouds sat on a perfectly blue sky. The sun shot beams through the cracks of the clouds all the way to the horizon. It was beautiful. I felt I could be swallowed by the light; I felt completely surrounded. And I felt like God was telling me, "I am near you, no matter where you are."

I love that He hears the cries of our hearts, even when we don't know what we're crying. I love that He provides in the most creative, unexpected ways. He promises and proves His provision over and over again. For example....

"Your unfailing love, O Lord, is as vast as the heavens;
your faithfulness reaches beyond the clouds." - Psalm 36:5

hair, and the people who cut it

I got my hair cut today. It was not exciting. I played with a 4-year-old girl named Kaylee who wanted me to try her can of Minute Maid orange juice. "You'll like it," she said, nodding coercively. (This is the most peer pressure to drink something I've experienced since high school.) I told her I wasn't thirsty, even though an hour beforehand I had just consumed a plate of sweet potato fries and was, in fact, thirsty. We put together a puzzle of the United States, and, try as I might, I could not get her to understand that the Atlantic Ocean did not fit between Texas and Colorado. We looked high and low for Montana until I gave up and told her that Montana had gone on vacation. Then she got up to get something and I realized she'd been sitting on Montana the whole time.

While the hairdresser was dressing my hair, I thought about my past haircuts. My favorite, by far, was done by none other than my roommate's mother, in my laundry room, one night when I told her, "Just do whatever," and her "whatever" turned out better than any selectively styled, celebrity-mock-ups I'd ever attempted in the past. She lives in Virginia, however, and I can't afford a 1oo-dollar haircut in gas money to drive there and back again (a Haircutt's Tale, by Heather Kraussins).

Over the summer I got my hair cut at a salon in Salt Lake City where everyone wears black and looks chic. They played oldies music and my hairdresser and I chatted about Doris Day most of the time. I didn't particularly love the haircut, but not only did my hairdresser message my neck and scalp as she washed my hair, but she gave me hand messages with lemon oil while the conditioner conditioned my hair. You might guess by this description and the salon's wooden flooring, and that even their light looked like it cost more than regular light (and that everyone wore black), that it would've been an establishment for those rich people who live in a canyon and have heated driveways and waterfalls in the middle of their living rooms. In fact, it was $19. I would definitely go there again, if it didn't cost me a round-trip ticket + $19.