you were the gift that i had always wanted, how did you know?

the other day, while cleaning my room (which hadn't been touched in over a week, and i was running out of matching socks), i happened to actually listen to the lyrics of a certain denison witmer song that i had heard over and over again without grasping what it was about.
i have been listening to christmas music for three weeks now, because i fear that i am not going to be able to wallow in the season as i normally do. i am in love with christmas time, because it is the only time that stores combine the colors red and teal, and eggnog smells so good, and because songs about christ actually play on the radio and i can't help but think that subconsciously the world starts to get an idea of the liberation that is found in him.

anyways, the song talked about how jesus was the gift that he (the singer) had always wanted. and it physically stopped me for, and i had to sit on the floor for half and hour, because it was so true. i always think i want so many things, all the time. ask anyone, especially krispin. i want food, or coffee, or sleep, or danielle time or avocados or assertiveness or a better shaped nose or shoes that help define my arch or. . . .

but when i stopped to think about it, christ really is the gift that i have always wanted. and he is already here.

how did he know?

earthquakes and snakes and killer bees

what a week.
my cat died, in front of my own eyes on my bed. it was extremely traumatic and i starting sobbing right away. clifford was my wonderful cat for 12 years, the longest we strannigans have ever kept a pet around. i hear him meowing at night now. he wasn't even sick, and i didn't see it coming.
and then there is the weather, so monsoon-y and crazy. a tree got knocked into our yard. and then, last night, there was a waterfall inside of our house.
my parents had to redo our roof (it was ancient) but the roofers didn't cover up well enough during a rainstorm and as a result ruined a bunch of the ceilings in our house. they tore down a bunch of dry wall the other day and inbetween our living room and the kitchen you can see right into the attic, wood beams and everything. well, i guess they didn't put the roof on so well again because last night, while krispin, candyce and i were watching monsoon wedding and eating chinese food, we heard the sound of rushing water inside our house. we looked over and there was a huge stream of water pouring onto the floor. we desperately grabbed pots and towels, and eventually the water stopped. this happened twice last night. my poor parents. they are on a cruise right now, and i had to call and tell them the bad news.
i think i found a hobo spider in our house.
and then there was work today, full of early hours and new people to train and mean mean ladies who yelled at me on the phone for things that were not my fault.
thanks for reading this. i just sortof needed to complain for a little bit.

socialista

so i got this eye crud and it randomly makes different parts of my eyelid swell up and hurt really bad and itch like crazy and i look like a deranged pirate, especially when i put the medicine on, which causes krispin to call me "ol' greazy eye".
school started and i am busy busy busy not yet actually doing schoolwork but realizing the enormity of my bible and theology classes, and how little i understand social life at multnomah. i realized the other day that i am not a socialite, and that is ok.
because there are bigger things in my life right now, co-workers going through crisis and moving away, a fiance with a new house with walls to paint, a mom who i already missed although i've not moved out yet, sisters just back from africa with insane stories to tell (i love new sudan!), and last but not least, my somali family is learning to grieve in america.
hassan died a week ago today, in his sleep at the hospital. i am grateful to god because he allowed me one last great interaction with hassan, which involved him sitting on the bed in his hospital gown, reading me the first story he had ever written (he was learning to read and write in somali for the first time at age 50), gesturing wildly and peering intently at the large, childlike letters that he himself had written.
the story was about jenny and i, and how we asked hassan questions about his life. the questions were simple, like: "what is africa?" and "how you come [to america]?". and the rest of the story was him answering us.
i was so honored to be a part of his first story. and honored that i got to have that experience with him
now majuma has to find a job in the next couple of weeks because they lived off of hassan's ssi checks, which they were forced to return for the month of september.
the girls started school two days after their father had died.
i am now so busy between school and working full time that i now have to schedule in my visits with the somali's, which makes them feel sad.

no wonder i don't have time to be a socialite.

but today i have a real day off, and i think i am going to go to the zoo. oh, and run a lot of errands.
and be grateful for the time that we have.

a bit of silliness, really.

and the world keeps turnin' round and round

well, it has been over two months since i've blogged, and there are many reasons for that:
1. this blog is no longer mysterious
2. i haven't had a lot of free time available
3. i haven't felt emotionally isolated in a long time.

so, that's that.
and then i woke up today in a large, nicely furnished house in the suburbs, cold and all alone. the air is thick with moisture, and makes you feel groggy when you wake up. it reminds me of being on family vacations in seattle when i was a kid. the fog of the northwest was amazing to me, something special to look forward to. now, it just makes me feel wistful, and reminds me when i had long blonde braids and i was so utterly self-confident in who i was. i knew that i was a child of god, just like i knew that there was nothing better then reading a good story or sitting quietly and getting lost in the conversation of the adults.

august is here, with school bills and pressing deadlines (oh man, i am getting married, which requires a wedding to take place).

the summer went by like juneandjuly, all close together and seamless, one day after the next. busy, rewarding, strangely relaxing. last summer was the pirate summer, me and my younger sister at war with ourselves and the comfortableness of clackamas. this summer is the mayfield summer, where i learned that when you love somebody, you get a whole second family in the bargain. i told krispin yesterday that i felt like i had grown leaps and bounds. i used to be that little braided blonde girl, so content to be alone, happy and undisturbed. and then i met krispin, and my world expanded into the 30 plus mayfield relatives and the whole town of roseburg, and i realized that i am not alone any more. its highly uncomfortable, but worth every awkward encounter.

today part of me wishes that i was eleven again, and that i really had woken up at my cousins house in seattle, where i would drink orange juice, go wherever my family went, and be content to stare out the window, listening to my sisters chatter. but i know that i here now, and i will be heading downtown soon, ready to engage and keep my eyes wide open. i have had to learn to that the world is so much bigger than myself.

huckleberry merriweather strannigan-mayfield, aged 6 weeks and 1 day.

tell me more, tell me more

well, i did it.
i think i was prophetic in my last post. i had planned on rescuing a kitten from a garage sale when my parents went to alaska for 3 weeks this summer, but the plan was put into place much earlier. two nights ago i had a dream that i got two kittens and a mother cat who was white with black and brown spots and who turned into a sailboat and sailed away. when i woke up, my mom called me and told me that she was at a garage sale and that there was one kitten left that needed a good home. i woke up krispin and we went and got our new gray-striped love kitten, Huckleberry.
she is my new favorite.

in other news, summer is here, complete with too many hours spent at starbucks and the ability to read and devour literature.

here are some lists.

books i have read thus far (summer 2007)
Persuasion --Jane Austen
O Pioneers!--Willa Cather

books i am in the midst of (and aim to finish)
One Hundred Years of Solitude--Gabriel Garcia Marquez
East of Eden--John Steinbeck
The Fortress of Solitude--Jonatham Lethem
Everything is Illuminated--Jonathon Safron Foer
The Book of Exodus

books i have every intention of reading
The Heavenly Man--Brother Yun
Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Galatians, Ephesians, Colossions
Something by somebody russian.

that's it. it's summer time, i am in a brightly lit room with a bundle of fuzz and my sister is on her way over. we are going to see pirates of the caribbean. booyah.