"my independence is only skin deep."--Seymour Glass.

well, i am sick. i never used to get sick when i was a little kid. i only remember getting the flu once, and that was when my mom and older sister were away for a week at a worship conference and it was just me, my little sister, and my dad. we lived in wyoming, and it was very windy. my dad fed us a straight-up diet of tv. dinners and matinee movies. we loved it, until we got the flu. the poor man didn't know what to do, and brought in a succession of older, matronly "baby-sitters". i only remember the sprite that they made us drink. they never rubbed my back when i was throwing up. i think i got better just as my mom got back.
well, i have a fever for the first time since i can remember. my eyes feel yellow, and liquidy, and the exact same temperature as my face. which is pretty hot.
so, i can't sleep. my nose is dripping, my mouth has to stay open in order to breath, and i feel like my cheeks are on fire (although my toes feel very chilled). but, who wants to read a blog about sick danielle?
i think it is time for me to count my blessings.
things i am thankful for. here we go:
1. lost salinger short-stories that are found by new friends who feel older.
2. co-workers who are delightfully pagan.
3. married friends who fight and make-up in front of me in wonderful ways.
4. married friends who cook me lentil soup and discuss how to reverse the degenerative effect that christian missionaries brought to millions of people worldwide.
5. the book of hosea.
5. cake. a good piece of yellow cake. i haven't had any yet (nor do i feel like eating at the exact moment), but god is teaching me to thank him in advance for things that i don't even really believe are going to happen. so i thank him for the cake.

that's all. thanks for listening.

a stream of conciousness blog.

i just looked in a mirror and noticed that my face turns red very easily. like when i am stressed, or excited, or passionate, or when i laugh at funny people. which seems to happen all the time these days. and you know what? i hate being in charge of things--anything, really--and this seems to bring no end of amusement to god the father. i have gotten back into the habit of watching movies by myself again, and i always laugh out loud and then look around for someone to nudge with my elbow, but no one is ever there. i am usually only mildly dissapointed. i really like the concept and practice of missions in general. however, i don't really like the missions conference at my school, because the speakers are disjointed and don't know who they are speaking to or what they are supposed to be saying. they rely a little too much on emotional manipulation. thank you, i've had my fill. somali refugee children are mysteries to me, and i don't understand what makes them sit quietly and do homework and what makes them act like children of satan himself. this week, they erred on the angelic side. i count my blessings one day at a time, just like my momma taught me. i never knew that any of this would happen. i realized today that i am not a patient person at all. i want to rush everything, including this life.

the antithesis of the american dream

i know it's bad form to post this many blogs so close together but hang the etiquette, i feel a rant forming within me.
i had my 3rd somali bantu homework club today and it was awful. there were like 50 kids running around like banshees . . . and supposedly i am in charge. i hate being put in positions like this. if i had my way, i would sit on a porch and fan myself lazily while i laughed with the fellow women folk as we weaved straw baskets together. or talked theology. or something like that.
instead, i have to become bad cop danielle . . . and i hate it. all the kids who actually want to do their homework and who are good and quiet and who get all the one on one attention are the kids who come from relatively good families. the kids i love are the brats, the scallywags, the incorrigibles, the hellions. they are the kids who are beaten with sticks at home, who are screamed at constantly, and who are generally expected to fail in every aspect of life. these are the kids i want to smother in love, to hold and protect and cherish. but i can't. they are the disruptive ones and i have to send them out into the cold. they stand at the glass doors and shiver and look at me with disbelieving eyes. how do you love someone who has had so little of it in their lives?
these are refugees. these are children of refugees. they are scared, angry, spiteful, disrespectful, and abusive. they are lonely, loving, warm, amusing, and hopeful in spite of it all. most of all, they are all homesick as hell.
i love these kids so much that i physically feel ill right now. i hold it all in my shoulders.
but it shouldn't be on my shoulders, and i know that. how to i give it to christ? this is where i need help.
i never wanted to do this. i just wanted to be like christ, and this is the path it has taken. i think it will get better. honestly, it has to.

please disregard everything you just read.
actually, could you do me a favor and pray for me? don't say you will unless you will actually do it. i don't like liars.

my bloody you-know-what.

i am tired of being the poor man's valentine.
meaning, that i tired of being the reliably single friend who is a girl that boys turn to when they feel emotionally needy. bleah. i can't stomache it anymore. i had two calls today from such boys. it makes me feel sadder than ever.
but then i remembered this:
there is much more to love than all these pink and gray thoughts floating around.
i just finished the book "the great divorce" by c.s. lewis, and one of the passages said everything that i had been trying to say for a long time. it has to do with a girl who is in heaven trying to explain the way love works to her lover. she is in heaven, and he has the choice to join her or not. here it is:

"You mean, said the Tragedian, "you mean--you did not love me truly in the old days?"
"Only in a poor sort of way," she answered. "I have asked you to forgive me. There was a little real love in it. But what we called love down there was mostly the craving to be loved. In the main I loved you for my own sake: because I needed you."

"And now!" said the Tragedian with a hackneyed gesture of dispair. "Now, you need me no more?"
"But of course not!" said the Lady; and her smile made me wonder how both the phantoms could refrain from crying out with joy.
"What needs could I have," she said, "now that I have all? I am full now, not empty. I am in Love Himself, not lonely. Strong, not weak. You shall be the same. Come and see. We shall have no need for one another now: we can begin to love truly."

i just find that all so shockingly beautiful.
well, my skittish cat vladimir has decided to sleep on my bed with me tonight, and i just finished painting my nails a fiery red.
i think i am just about ready to face the day tomorrow.

you can waste countless hours in the day just by clicking this title.

sometimes i am like an excitable little cloud.

superbowl xxxx

tonight i went to imago by myself and i didn't want to. everything i have done lately has been by myself, and not voluntarily so. i don't understand this, and i feel terrified that god wants to teach me some sort of lesson. i feel like telling him that i don't think i will ever get it.
tonight i went to imago by myself and christ ministered to me. the pastor read and spoke from romans 7-8, and i was like a person dying of thirst, drinking in the words and the message. usually, my heart is too callused to respond in this way. i felt the love of god, and it wasn't emotional at all.
tonight i went to a movie by myself, and i made it an adventure. it was at this little house off of division and 43 called the artistry and i walked inside and there was nobody there and i wandered through all these corridors and finally stumbled apon the room where they were showing the (free) movie. there was a man in a squeaky yellow recliner and he had really big, curly hair. i could barely read the subtitles of the film. the film was called "turtles can fly" and it was from iran/iraq (yes, both places). it wrecked me. in the best sense possible.
tonight i was grateful to experience the love of christ for myself and for people halfway around the world.