Encouraging Things Actually Happen

My browser has been full of tabs lately, and half of them are devoted to finals week nonsense, but the other half are full of encouraging things happening in the world. I thought I would share:

1. People are celebrating Nelson Mandela. This is to be expected. But the exciting part is that not only are people celebrating him, but many people are not watering him down in the process. I've seen a lot of people posting things like this, that remember Mandela for some of the controversial and unpopular things he spent his life fighting for. I hope those challenging and transformative kinds of things can be what we continue to remember and share. 

2. Especially lately, I've been empowered by thinking outside of the box when it comes to my own life, and so seeing other people realizing they have the power to step outside the normal ways of doing things and be creative to address a problem gives me a lot of joy. 

3. Police, as an aggregate, are really hard for me to respect sometimes, because of the way they are tied to some really corrupt systems. But these police in Thailand give me a lot of hope.

A Rare Visitor

My soul feels the soft, quiet magic today.

Its visits to my body are elusive, rare
and always unpredictable. 

It's the kind of hopeful, peaceful magic
that compels me to write poetry and that
swells in my whole being,
just making me excited
about something
I can't quite put my finger on. 

It's akin to being swaddled in God's wonder
and seeing past everything as I normally see it,
looking out at the world
as if it is on the other side of a window I am sitting at,
inside the safety and warm home of the spiritual.

It's a feeling that holds me,
bids me to dwell in this feeling,
this experience. 

Just be.
That is all I can do,
all I want to do,
all I am being asked to do. 

The world of people rushing around me
with tasks and deadlines and goals and agendas
seems foreign and irrelevant. 

Urgency is absent -- this is not a sensation that compels me to action.
It is the deepest experience of just dwelling
in peace, love, wonder, and the reality
(which, on account of how little we actually
trust in and dwell in it,
is often a surreality)
that nothing is ultimately critical
because we are not the ones holding anything.
God holds it all.

Ukranian Gymnasts Are Not Human

I love the commentator, who does not seem a bit phased or surprised.

Coziness in Discomfort

"Comfort blinds people to the goodness of God’s comfort. We don’t remember that being comfortable with God is so much more important." -Wisdom from my Megan

Russell Brand, Let's Be Friends

And then we can get pissed and start revolutions together. :)

Space Between the Logs

What makes a fire burn
is space between the logs
a breathing space.

~Judy Brown

A Love So Large

“Therefore, dear Sir, love your solitude and try to sing out with the pain it causes you. For those who are near you are far away… and this shows that the space around you is beginning to grow vast. Be happy about your growth, in which, of course, you can’t take anyone with you, and be gentle with those who stay behind; be confident and calm in front of them and don’t torment them with your doubts and don’t frighten them with your faith or joy, which they wouldn’t be able to comprehend.

Seek out some simple and true feeling of what you have in common with them, which doesn’t necessarily have to alter when you yourself change again and again; when you see them, love life in a form that is not your own and be indulgent toward those who are growing old, who are afraid of the aloneness that you trust.

And don’t expect any understanding; but believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it.”

~ RMR, Letters to a Young Poet

Happy Bartolome Day!

Clicky

Slippery

I think there’s a difference between choosing suffering and suffering choosing you. The first is beautiful and transformative, the second has the potential to be, but is not always so. It takes someone doing the former to release someone from the bonds of the latter, turning unbearable suffering into a volatile vessel for healing. But places where choosers can get the tools they need to do their work are few and far between, so sometimes even the choosers turn into the chosen. 

Hope is elusive.

A-maze-ing

Corn maze.

Corn maize.

I am astounded at the sneaky creativity.

Foreign Policy

So I'm kind of at a loss, and wonder what people think.

I'm reading an article in the New Yorker about a Syrian refugee camp in Jordan, and one of the members of the resistance says he feels betrayed by the western world.

"Srour's hatred of Bashar was matched only by his sense that the rebels were being unjustly ignored by the entire world. 'The West is cheating us,' he said. 'If they wanted to knock out the regime, it wouldn't take them more than ten days. We don't have anything. They give us promises -- but empty promises. They want the struggle to continue and ruin the country.'" 

What should be the US's role in foreign affairs? I feel like we meddle so often in the affairs of other countries, with such an attitude of nationalism, that a lot of the world has less than pleasant feelings towards us. Yet it sounds like Srour is saying that they want the West's help. Which makes sense. If I were in their position, I'd want help, too. But what is the right way to be involved in foreign affairs that isn't so colonial? How do we determine when to help and when not to? Sometimes I wonder if our country even has the capacity to help unselfishly. Not that our government is necessarily made up of greedy self-seeking people, but that generally those with corrupt interests have a louder voice at the global table, and have an easier time garnering support from other major sources of power in the world. 

Cuz He's Black

Agony

"Agony comes from the word for protest—agony is a taking issue with grief, as in no, I vehemently disagree." -Heather Sellers

(I am not in agony. I just really like this quote, because, like all people, sometimes I am in agony.)

Other people's tattoos are way more fun

Switching the Script on Masculinity, Friendship, and Drinking

Way to be, Guinness.

Burst

"In order for a seed to grow it must first burst its shell of limitations." -Peter the 1970s Essene

Visit the Sick

A short film by a professor at my school. Good stuff.

The whole website seems like it's filled with good stuff. Hoping to explore it someday.

Tripping Over Joy

What is the difference
Between your experience of Existence
And that of a saint? 

The saint knows
That the spiritual path
Is a sublime chess game with God 

And that the Beloved
Has just made such a Fantastic Move 

That the saint is now continually
Tripping over Joy
And bursting out in Laughter
And saying, “I Surrender!” 

Whereas, my dear,
I am afraid you still think
You have a thousand serious moves.”
-Hafiz

Oh, I Love Real English Classes

I read this today. And a bunch of other good stuff from the same website. You should, too.

Imagining Foxes

Dirt and Trees and Mountains and Fire

I want to live outside and get dirty and use my body and limited resources for so much of my life. Sometimes I read stuff like this, get excited, and wonder why I want to live in the inner city. It's such an odd conflicting feeling.

Then again, Camden is like an urban wilderness.

Also, I bet that kind of fire is the best and safest kind of fire to build in a 4x4 foot backyard if you don't want your neighbors to call the cops. =P

On This Day

1. I discovered page breaks in Microsoft Word. My life just got a thousand times easier.

2. The only sucky part of this semester was that I wasn't going to be able to audit a class I wanted to because I was scheduled for work. But today I went to see my boss and he told me that he had to switch around my hours and now I CAN GO TO THAT CLASS! I didn't even have to ask. So great.

3. One of my best childhood friends finished thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail. She's a beast.

Lifelong Familiar Stuff

"There are no magic answers, no miraculous methods to overcome the problems we face, just the familiar ones: search for understanding, education, organization, action ... and the kind of commitment that will persist despite the temptations of disillusionment, despite many failures and only limited successes, inspired by the hope of a brighter future." (Noam Chomsky)

Going to Weddings Alone

I'm so glad other people think like this.

Diagnosing Things is Stupid (Sometimes)

“Before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self-esteem, first make sure you are not, in fact, just surrounded by assholes.” -Siegmund Freud

Summerrrrr

It's been pretty freakin great so far.

Sweet forts:

Cool bugs:

Giant watermelons

And giant hail:

Perfect fog:

Baby deer:

New grates:

Morning expeditions:

Star maps:

Summer Breezes

They're the best. I'm not even mad that a bunch of papers just blew across my room. This is glorious.

The Politics of Rest

An interesting article on the politics of resting.

It's so hard to rest when there's so much that's not set right.

I Am a Privileged Woman

I am so excited and terrified for my future. This life is going to be such a long and powerful journey marked with suffering, joy, and faithfulness. It already has been.

I'm currently feeling overwhelmed with how many opportunities I have. I just hope I always always always give them away as much as I receive them. (Accountability always and forever welcome.) God is SO faithful. I am SO thankful.

Sociology FTW

Brain Drain

I've got this friend from Kenya who came to the US for a few years to work in Camden and attend grad school at the same place I go. She's one of the most intelligent, tender, and driven women I know. I found out she has a blog, and has recently written a series of posts about brain drain - the phenomenon where trained professionals leave developing (there has got to be a better word... developing into what?) countries in favor of more wealthy nations. If you don't know anything about it, you should educate yourself:

Brain Drain pt 1
Brain Drain pt 2
Brain Drain pt 3

And then, when you're done educating yourself, you should read her post about baboons. She must be one of the most patient women in the world, too, because I've asked her to share baboon stories an absurd amount of times, as does everyone else. They're so great:

Baboon Story

Individualism, How You Sadden Me

Some days (actually, most days), I just really long to live in a society where people notice and value their interconnectedness, viewing themselves as a collective first and individuals second.

"In earlier periods of Western history there was little demand that written books be attached to the names of single authors. Writing was not viewed as the expression of an individual mind." -Kenneth Gergen

God Speaks to Each of Us As He Makes Us

God speaks to each of us as he makes us, 
then walks with us silently out of the night.

These are words we dimly hear:
You, sent out beyond your recall, 
go to the limits of your longing. 
Embody me.

Flare up like flame
and make big shadows I can move in.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going.
No feeling is final.
Don't let yourself lose me.

Nearby is the country they call life.
You will know it by its seriousness.

Give me your hand.

-Rainer Maria Rilke

Mail

"Reading the New Testament is like reading somebody else's mail." -Peter Enns

Hurry

"Hurry ruins saints as well as artists." -Thomas Merton

Placenta Bears

Last night I hung out with a friend and looked up all of the "fun" (may be interpreted as "intensely bizarre and disgusting") things you can do with a placenta. This one takes the cake.

You're welcome. 

*Giddy Noises*

Man, I am just so thankful for the past (roughly) 24 hours. It included the following:

The kind of intense tears that come from desperately needed encouragement.

The way that encouragement enables me to encourage others so much more easily.

Friends who give their time at the drop of a hat.

Wine in a rocket ship sippy cup.

 9 hours of sleep.

Waking up to a phone call from a really fantastic niece who agreed to someday abandon her fear of foregoing recipes to experiment in the kitchen with me.

A long walk and thorough(ly good) conversation with a beautiful friend.

Tacos with lentils.

A story made up for me in which I was a super hero that reconciled the antagonism between people and trees.

Homeworky productivity.

Maté.

An especially fantastic night of stairwell music.

Division by Sociological Differences in the Church

"There is diversity within a large family - different aptitudes, different tastes, different personal characteristics. It would be a strange family, nonetheless, which would set up separate living arrangements to satisfy the particular peculiarities of each member. In a real family, the diversity is held within the unity of the family. The family lives in the same house, eats together, carries forward its group activities as a unity. In this way, the diversity enriches the whole family life, and each benefits from the other." -Donald Miller

A Birthday Quote

One of my favorite professors gave me this lyric today. I like it. :)

May you never tire of waiting
Never feel that life is cheap
May your life be filled with light
Except for when you're trying to sleep!
--'The Gift', Bruce Cockburn

This Is Where I Want to Be Right Now.

Nowhere else.

Plant Some Shit

I See the Moon and the Moon Sees Me

I was looking for a picture today and ran across some pictures from my astronomy lab last spring. I don't think I ever posted any. I lost a bunch of my favorite galaxy pictures, but I still have these three. Also, there's a nifty little binder stuffed in a cupboard back home that's got the cool galaxy pictures in it if you think this kind of stuff is super cool and want to see. Astronomy was a pain in the butt for a required lab science, but this stuff made it worth it.

This is a mosaic of the moon that I made. A mosaic, because in order to get a picture like this, you have to take lots of pictures of little sections of the moon and paste them all together. Any CCD (CCD = a telescope camera) picture you've ever seen of the moon is actually a mosaic.

Also, here's a picture I took of Saturn. It looks fake, but I promise, it's not. :)

And this is m95. We only took one color photo cuz they take a long time. You have to take 6 or 7 pictures in blue, green, red, and clear filters and then find the best version of each color filter and stack the pictures. M95 is a barred spiral galaxy located in Leo. It's 38ish million light years away.

But Really... A Real Bounce House

Goodbye, Mr. Conti - Letter from a Resigning Educator

"For the last decade or so, I have had two signs hanging above the blackboard at the front of my classroom, they read, “Words Matter” and “Ideas Matter”. While I still believe these simple statements to be true, I don’t feel that those currently driving public education have any inkling of what they mean." Read more.

All 6 Star Wars At Once

This:

Today Is a Great Day

1. I got this in the mail from the bestest friend anyone could ever ask for:

 (If you can't see, it says "Ellen's Ultimate Fort Building Kit")

*grin*

2. My English professor sent us an email saying that we were going to have a panel discussion in class on hair and how that relates to gender and post-colonial oppression and identity, and I was super skeptical, but daaaaaaamn. We had three incredible black women talk to us about their experiences with hair, and it captivated me for the whole two hours. I felt both amazed and sooo ignorantly white at the end of that class.

3. I got to hug a friend that I just really wanted to hug all break long.

Kiwi Berries!!!

So there are these little fruits that are pretty much kiwis, but in miniature and without the fuzzy skin, and to eat them, you bite a hole in them and squirt out the kiwi-ish inside stuff into your mouth. I tried one in Oregon once, and have never seen them again. They were pretty bizarre and awesome, so I have looked for them pretty much every time I am in a grocery store, and today I found them! It was so exciting. I think I built up a lot of hype in my head, and they're not actually quite as cool as they were the first time (and I just supported the total opposite of local agriculture (they're from NZ)), but I don't really care. I'm still way excited. It's like finding the chest at the end of a treasure hunt. Day made.

Jonathan Kozol Interview

Good interview, covering some of the highlights of the book (The Shame of The Nation) that I posted an excerpt from below. I definitely recommend reading the book over watching the interview, but the video is pretty great as well.

Part I
Part II
Part III

On Severely Unequal Funding in Education

“If it doesn’t matter,” said a black physician working in the Bronx about the parallel inequities in medical provision made for privileged white children on the one hand and for poor children of color on the other, “then cancel it for everybody. Don’t give it to them, deny it to us, then ask us to believe it’s not significant."

This is the persistent challenge that the advocates for children in severely underfunded districts pose to those who are disposed to hear; yet shockingly large numbers of well-educated and sophisticated people have been able to dismiss such challenges with a surprising ease. “Is the answer really to throw money into these dysfunctional and failing schools?” I’m often asked. “Don’t we have some better ways to make them ‘work’?” The question is posed in a variety of forms. “Yes, of course, it’s not a perfectly fair system as it stands. But money alone is surely not the sole response. The values of the parents and the kids themselves must have a role in this as well… Housing, health conditions, social factors” – “other factors” is a term of overall reprieve one often hears – “have got to be considered too…” These latter points are obviously true but always seem to have the odd effect of substituting things we know we cannot change in the short run for obvious things like cutting class size and constructing new school buildings or providing universal preschool that we actually could to right now if we were so inclined.

Frequently these arguments are posed as questions that do not invite an answer since the answer seems to be decided in advance. “Can you really buy your way to better education for these children?” “Do we know enough to be quite sure that we will see an actual return on the investment that we make?” “Is it even clear that this is the right starting-point to get to where we’d like to go? It doesn’t’ always seem to work, as I am sure that you already know…,” or similar questions that somehow assume I will agree with those who ask them. 

Some people who ask these questions, while they live in wealthy districts where the schools are funded at high levels, don’t send their children to these public schools but choose instead to send them to expensive private day schools. At some of the well-known private prep schools in the New York City area, tuition and associated costs are typically more than $20,000. In their children’s teenage years they sometimes send them off to boarding schools like Andover or Exeter or Groton, where tuition, boarding and additional expenses rise to more than $30,000. Often a family has two teenage children in these schools at the same time; so they may be spending over $60,000 on their children’s education every year. Yet here I am one night, a guest within their home, and dinner has been served and we are having coffee now; and this entirely likable, and generally sensible, and beautifully refined and thoughtful person looks me in the eyes and asks me whether you can really buy your way to better education for the children of the poor.

-An excerpt from The Shame of the Nation, by Jonathan Kozol

A Caz-ish Poem on Her Wedding Day

Come back.
Break the trace.
Pay attention to your breath. Your arms. Your legs.
Listen to sounds.
Notice colors.
Wake up to the riot of life around you every second.
Pearl Bailey said, "People see God every day; they just don't recognize it's God."
What if every day was a chance to see a new version of God?
-Geneen Roth

The Cure at Troy

History says, Don't hope
on this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime
the longed-for tidal wave
of justice can rise up,
and hope and history rhyme.
-Seamus Heaney

Why It's A Good Idea to Not Buy What You Want Right Away

Because then you cultivate a friendly desire for it and also a great okayness with not having it, and then when one day you are sitting in your friends' room and they say "hey, I have this extra Leatherman multitool, do you want it?" you can gape in joy at them and do a little dance of happiness in your mind because now not only do you have a Leatherman, but you have a free Leatherman that will remind you of people you love.

:)

The Danger of a Single Story

A very wonderful TED Talk: The Danger of a Single Story (is she a woman, or what?)

Followed by a very wonderful short story, written by the same woman: The Headstrong Historian

A Real Break. What?

I feel rested and completely ready to start digging into this week. It's amazing. I honestly cannot remember the last time I felt this way.

BIC: For Her

Best customer reviews ever. 

BRAIN OVERLOAD

Soooooo many things running through my head right now. So many rants. So many ideas. So many questions.

And unfortunately, so much homework to stifle them all with.

Praying for some small breaks this week that allow my brain to blow up (in really great ways).

Is Justice Worth It?

Micah Bournes, ladies and gentlemen.

Just Be

I want to learn how to cultivate more of the kind of life Eugene Peterson lives. It reeks of trust.

"Stay in your cell. Your cell will teach you everything."

From Today's Common Prayer

          Frederick Douglass wrote in his autobiography, "Between the Christianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference — ​so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt, and wicked. I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ; I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land. Indeed, I can see no reason, but the most deceitful one, for calling the religion of this land Christianity."

Texts from My Grammatically Correct Best Friend

10:49 - "Before I wish you a wonderful night friend, (blah blah other unimportant stuff)"

10:50 - "A wonderful night, friend... Not a wonderful night friend. That sounds scandalous."

Grace

"For grace to be grace, it must give us things we didn't know we needed and take us places where we didn't know we didn't want to go." --Kathleen Norris

Commercialism, Christian Theology, and Cupcake Mosaics

Aka, a great day.

1. There's this student of the month board in one of the buildings on campus that, according to the frequency with which it is usually updated, is more like a student of the semester board. Surprisingly, they updated the sociology student of the month for February, so I was reading my friend's bio, and laughed really hard at this wonderful tidbit. Because it's entirely true:

(I'm beyond the point of being able to tell if this is only funny to sociology students or not. So apologies if it's not as amusing to you.)

2. This quote from my theology class:   

' Israel worshipped a God who could grow angry, who changed his mind, a God involved in history, who cared so much about one group of people that their apostasies drove him to fits of impatience.  The greatest philosophers of Greece spoke of an unchanging divine principle, far removed from our world, without emotion, unaffected by anything beyond itself.  Improbably enough, Christian theology came to identify these two as the same God.  This may be the single most remarkable thing to have happened in Western intellectual history.' -William Placher (A History of Christian Theology, 55)

3. Senior seminar today involved cupcake mosaic making (to the sweet vocal sounds of Garrison Keillor) in celebration of our professor's birthday. We made the state of Indiana:

(I swear, this is not a reflection of everything my tuition bill has paid for.)

Love Beyond Affection

"Love is not affectionate feeling, but a steady wish for the loved person's ultimate good as far as it can be obtained." --C.S. Lewis

The Gods Must Be Crazy

I forgot how much I loved this movie! (Well, the first 30 minutes at least. I've never watched the rest. But I definitely plan on it.)

Mankind

Maybe this is actually funny. Maybe I'm just really tired. It could honestly be either one.

"Maybe in order to understand mankind, we have to look at the word itself. Mankind. Basically, it's made up of two separate words: "mank" and "ind". What do these words mean? It's a mystery, and that's why so is mankind." - Jack Handy

Pray Without Ceasing

A Long and Painful Genocide

Wow. I don't think there are many people groups throughout all of history that have been lied to and betrayed as much as the American Indians.

If anyone is interested, I have a really informative, terribly depressing 25 page article that sums up the history of exactly how we went about treating them like the scum of the earth. I would be happy to share. 

Senioritis

I'm not sure if it's a bad thing, or what's ultimately going to help me survive this semester.

The Scandal of the Evangelical Heart

A blog about really valid doubting by Rachel Held Evans.

Because Life Isn't All Serious

Les Mean Girls:

Run

I saw a dead man tonight. I was walking out of the underground train station area where I meet up with my friend Bill every week to read poetry and chat. I rounded the corner near the stairs and there were a bunch of guys and a couple cops just standing around waiting for paramedics and just staring silently. He was just laying on his side, hood up so I couldn't see his face as I passed behind. But I could see the big pool of blood right in front of where his head was.

My feet passed, maybe 4 feet from where he was laying. No one asked me to stay away. No one urged me to move on. I just kept walking. Up the stairs, out into the cold and across the street to Love Park. And then I just started running. I was parked 6 or 7 blocks away, and I just ran the whole way there. I had to. Not because I was scared of something happening to me. But because something just clicked in me. And it made me want to scream so loud. And my insides were screaming. So instead I ran.

I have no idea what happened to that man, but I can guess. And what made me scream was not necessarily just this man, but the way that he all of a sudden brought to life all 67 homicides that happened in Camden this past year. I kind of got numb to them after hearing about it so much and seeing so many RIP sorts of facebook posts from old friends and students and neighbors that live there. And that's just Camden. This stuff happens all over the place. (Please please please don't read into this and start thinking that cities are filled with evil, violent people. They're not.)

But blood belongs to people. And seeing this man's blood just made him so starkly and vulnerably real. He was a person. With gifts and opinions and friends. He is someone's son. Maybe a brother or an uncle or a father.

And all of those 67 people, those 67 children... they each had a pool of blood that belonged to them, too. That made them real. All of those pools of blood became very real in my mind. Each one intimately represents two victims in my mind - the recipient and the doer of hurt: both victims of violence and hate.

68 pools of blood is enough to make anyone run.

Okay Fine, I Can't Resist Them

It's been pointed out to me recently that I have absolutely no resistance to adorable animals. And while I would like to deny this to be true, just look at this rat. Come on. A miniature teddy bear. I can't take it.

Un-apathy

Honey Bees Are Disappearing

Help bring them back.

Saying No

I am convinced that this is the hardest thing in the whole wide world to do.

Fort Building

I read some really great stuff this weekend (go read something by Margaret Atwood. She's kind of a literary god), but having spent nearly all of it doing homework, I am ready to give up and build a fort and lay in a mess of bodies and fall asleep. Who's in?

I Love Men

Just thought I would lay that reminder out there, since feminist movement is so often (sometimes fairly, but more often unfairly) associated with man-hating. Sometimes I still hate considering myself a feminist. But then other times I think that it's doing more harm when I try to separate myself from the title. It kind of reminds me of the struggle many followers of Jesus have with claiming the title "Christian." It's complicated.

With that being said, I'm pretty sure that my blog doesn't reach any of the people that need to hear this letter the most. But I am posting it anyway. Because I think it's good.

A Letter to the Guy That Harassed Me Outside the Bar

Parents, Professors, Tomato, Tomahto.

One of my favorite things is when I'm sitting at work in my little box of an office and my sociology professors walk past the little window I sit behind on their way to lunch. Their faces light up and they wave with such dorky fury, every time without fail, like parents at their child's middle school orchestra concert who don't realize how incredibly low their child has sunk into their chair. Except I don't feel embarrassed. Just a whole crap ton of love for these two delightfully weird and jolly men I call my teachers.

And, as if to affirm what I just wrote, they just called the phone I get paid to answer (from the table they're sitting at 15 feet away) to harass me. =P

How to Talk to Little Girls

Some really great thoughts on talking to young girls in a way that encourages interest in all sorts of wonderful things about life without talking about body image, cuteness, or beauty.

A Prayer For Some Friends

Seed, you fear that nobody will see you
But if you never plant yourself, no one will
So plant yourself, plant yourself and heal

Winter tree, you're terrified that they'll all see
A disgrace in the gnarled skin that you can't love
Become naked, and come naked to me

Grow, grow
Old roots go so deep
And healing is slow
For fear has no faith
In redemption below
Don't live in a seasonless world
Dare to weep all your tears
And laugh all your laughter

Warm spring boughs, scared to let the new leaves out
Yes, they will leave you in the fall, but life gives more
Trust that they're, oh trust that they're not all.

Grow, grow
Old roots go so deep
And healing is slow
For fear has no faith
In redemption below
Don't live in a seasonless world
Dare to weep all your tears
And laugh all your laughter

Bleed into the ground with joy. 

The Power of Introverts

When I Can't Sleep...

...you get quotes about feminism. I'm not sure if this is actually a good deal for you or not, but I'm going to go with the assumption that it is. :)

“Feminist struggle to end patriarchal domination should be of primary importance to women and men globally not because it is the foundation of all other oppressive structures but because it is that form of domination we are most likely to encounter in an ongoing way in everyday life. Unlike other forms of domination, sexism directly shapes and determines relations of power in our private lives, in familiar social spaces, in that most intimate context – home – and in that most intimate sphere of relations – family. Usually, it is within the family that we witness coercive domination and learn to accept it…” -bell hooks

“It is necessary for us to remember, as we think critically about domination, that we all have the capacity to act in ways that oppress, dominate, wound. It is necessary to remember that it is first the potential oppressor within that we must resist – the potential victim within that we must rescue – otherwise we cannot hope for an end to domination, for liberation.” – bell hooks 

“Working collectively to confront difference, to expand our awareness of sex, race and class as interlocking systems of domination, of the ways we reinforce and perpetuate these structures, is the context in which we learn the true meaning of solidarity. It is this work that must be the foundation of feminist movement” -bell hooks