of scars and meaning; a treatise on stories

"I like the scars because I like the stories.  Bravery, stupidity, pain-- none of them come easy." -Julie Martinez.

There's an idea that runs around certain circles that "Christian stories" ought to to be clean and neat, wrapped up little boxes of suburbanized ideas, white picket fences, and August barbecues while you tell someone you're praying for them (though you'll probably forget.)

I've fallen in love with quite a different kind of story, the kind that I hope to write about and read about and live for the rest of my pinprick of a life.

In the stories I love, there are monsters;

they are dragons, grand and steaming fire.
they are aliens with strange faces and brazen violence.
they are bureaucrats with plastic pens.
they are demons who look like angels and speak with an orangey- grey tinge.
they are men who have run from pain and into drunkenness.
they are wrapped in barbed wire, estranged from hope.

I don't believe that sharp edged darkness is stronger than light, and I believe that though the hero's hands may waver, the best stories are the kinds that march through a kind of soul blackness, the kinds that cross swords in the valley of the shadow of death-- that feature the kinds of heroes that emerge only because they had something stronger than death and hell pushing them forward and giving them strength (and peace.)

In the stories I love, the heroes are human;

some of them brave and cursed and still fighting.
some of them forgiven, clad in white.
some of them burdened by the stars.
some of them craving escape and crying out for home.
some of them curled up in little balls because of their pain.
some of them numb, broken by their own sins.
some of them tragedies with hearts of gold.

In these stories, the heroes are not perfect, they are not stain-free, and they are usually scarred.   They are fighters, believers and unbelievers, hopeful and depressed, struggling to pursue the light.   Finding it does not come free or easy, but I would argue that the stories are better for it.

"Why do we look for truth in books?"  -Daniel Schwabauer

We're storied creatures, bathed in the echoes of humanity, thirsting for our lives to be more than a blip on the radar, a pinprick on the tackboard.   We pretend we're searching for security, for safety and happiness, but it's not true.  We want what we've wanted since childhood-  a good story.  But we've grown up being told that stories are insignificant, that they're entertainment; something to come home to after a long day; nothing more.

But stories, grand stories, terrifying stories, the kind that make children quake and shake comfortable adults from suburban lives onto great adventures, the kind that are about darkness and light and the invasion of hope into a bleak world, the kind that feature terrible monsters and noir heroes and conflict that points to glorious, universe shaking Truth--

those stories are the kind we're running from, and the kind that some of us are desperate enough to sell everything to find.

I'm here, I'm not going to leave you.

source: http://tristemorte.com/post/51434984370

There's a saying that I've heard tossed around when hard times come, or bad days happen.

"Sometimes God calms the storm, and sometimes He calms His child."

But I don't agree, not today.  It was going to be a good day.   I was going to do some good things, love my family, maybe write a bit more of that novel and feel satisfied with life.  But there were clouds on the horizon when I woke up, and then the first wave slapped my face.   I came upstairs from my bedroom, saw a look on the face of someone I love who is tired, exhausted.

I can't make myself ask why.  My lips go dry and parched and my heart seizes up.   I'm afraid, afraid of what she'll say, because I know that it won't be something I can fix.  I won't be able to pray it away or hug it away or sit there and honestly tell her that it's going to get better in this life, because what if it never, ever does?

Swirl, shake, rain in torrents down from the sky.  God isn't calming the storm.

Clenched teeth, a gut fear, I'm hiding behind my bedroom door, blasting my music.  God isn't calming my soul.

So I wait, and I listen, and I tell Him that I need Him to help, because I can't.  It's the storm kicking it's heels at me again, splashing rough waves into my home.

Sometimes He calms the storm, and sometimes He calms His child?
I know the sentiment meant well.

I refuse to believe He is silent in this storm.  I hear him, stronger than the waves, deeper than the rushing waters, bigger than this fear.  Battered, bruised, more coursing water, and a Voice.

"I'm here, I'm not going to leave you."

Sometimes He calms the storm, sometimes He calms His child.  

And sometimes He stands in the middle of the roaring water and holds me and tells me I'll never be alone.

We, the creatives

 (OYAN Summer Workshop 2013)

We, the creatives.
Writers, artists, musicians, filmmakers, costumers, actors, storytellers.

Gathered together by a curriculum that promised to teach us how to write a novel.  We couldn't have imagined this, that it would do so much more than teach us craft.  No one could have plotted out the story of OYAN, detailed the way it would explode like fireworks and become so much more than a couple of DVDs and a workbook.

No one could have anticipated Rivendell; Bigger on the Inside; Ordinary Heroes.

We learned, through OYAN, to tell good stories, deep stories, truth-and-reality stories, honest stories.  We learned to open our hearts onto pages, let the complex beauty and tragedy of human souls rush like a waterfall into our work.  We learned to treat our stories with respect, and we learned to love them.  We learned that our stories mattered.

And we learned this together.  We're still learning

So when we gathered in Olathe, Kansas this past week to fuel our creativity, it made sense that all of the things we learned were heightened.   One flame alone in a dark room is still bright, but bring a hundred other candles nearby, and the room will glow.

"Though the embers are new/ whatever you do/ Please don't let the fire die."  -Owl City, "Embers"

I hope that everyone at the Workshop felt as I did when they went home.  Burdened by passion but also excited by it.  Eager to create and to have faith in our calling.   Soul-excited for the fire that is burning, even though it's new and sometimes it sputters.

We, the creatives.

It's easy to forget that our work is worth it when we're hunched over laptops in our respective homes, fighting with unruly characters and praying over gritty themes.   Creating, regardless of what you create, is an act that doesn't come easily and isn't often glamorous.  Between the glory moments of a perfect sentence or a finished project there are dozens of days when you'd prefer to be a plumber than a creative.

Admit it, it's true. Sometimes you think your work isn't worth the effort. Sometimes you need a spark outside of yourself to remind you of the validity of your art.

So when two hundred + candles come together, the sparks start flying, swirling, and the energy makes each ember brighter, stronger, hotter.

That's the OYAN Workshop.  That's why I came home excited about creating.  My novel, poetry, visual arts, blog posts, personality studies.  I've felt my creative soul more alive in the past week than it has been in the past six months.

But regardless of whether you were at the Workshop, if you are a creator in any sense, know these two things;

One, creating is worth it, because God is a creator, and in creating, you have the opportunity to reflect Him.

Two, create in community.  Find the place where your passions intersect with someone else's, whether that be a single friend or an internet community or a drama society or a writing curriculum. Find the people who make you want to create.  Find the people you can stay up till three am talking about theme with, or the people who will read your entire first draft and not tell you your writing stinks.  Find a place where your creativeness is valued.  Find a place that nurses your embers till they become red hot flames that won't die.

I've found my place.  It's an internet forum, and a Facebook group, and conversations about personality type and plot vs character and monkey stroodles.  It's a week in Olathe, and it's full of fresh embers, and it's my Rivendell, and it's home.

"So go out there, and make a world!" -John Green.

glory in souls

I think the mark of spiritual maturity isn’t that you have a safe life where you follow all the rules and look respectable and have a clean house and don’t cuss.  I think the mark of spiritual maturity should be looked for in the soul, because it starts in the soul.  Of course, it comes out in how you live. It should. That’s one of its proofs.  But we are foolish if we believe that because someone is clean on the outside, that they are alive on the inside.  It is easy to pretend on the outside. It is impossible to fake a dead soul.  

I think the mark of spiritual maturity is how much your soul yearns for God, and what it does with that yearning. I think spiritual maturity is how you talk to the God who made the Big Dipper and the inchworm and your one of a kind face.  I think spiritual maturity is measured in your relationship with the one who couldn’t just let you die without hope, who chose to bear everything on your sake, who forsook glory so He could awaken your soul.

Spiritual maturity isn’t about what you don’t do or the rules you keep or the verses you have memorized or the tv shows you don’t watch or the car you drive or your bank book or the hymns you sing.  Spiritual maturity usually involves some throwing out of the book, because it isn’t sufficient.  A soul who has been captivated by a God big enough to create a universe and loving enough to redeem it will not simply be ‘clean and orderly.’   That soul will overflow with glory.  Even if life sucks.  Even if sorrow and despair and sin and darkness characterizes its situation more than spiritual ‘cleanliness’.  

The soul who has been given glory will keep rambling on.  That soul will not be simple.  Life isn’t simple.  Even the cleanest of circumstances is still messy, because our souls are dark and complex and afraid and longing.  But for the soul that is known by God, there will be a glory big enough to overcome the pits.  There will be a rope that it clings on to even when the glory seems to fade into cracked lips and cracking relationships and cracking hearts.

Because that soul, that spiritually mature soul, it knows that glory does not die.
God will not be overcome, and neither will His children. 

Souls that overflow with glory, that spill it out in big ways and little, that eek with the beauty and depth and love that comes from the source of glory, those souls are spiritually mature.  And they are beautiful, despite their pain. Maybe even because of it.  God makes vessels of glory out of earthen pots.  And he likes to shine through their cracks.  

I am not the hero.

I've talked with Micah quite a bit lately about living and dying and extraordinary faith, about how when you're in love with God, everything precious and insignificant about your life fades in comparison.  We sat in the van outside of her house after I drove her home from Bible study, and we talked about how we'd rather die like a French Revolutionist on the barricades then rust out in lukewarm mediocrity.   Christ is worth everything, we reminded each other, and I think we both felt that hole in our hearts bursting because it couldn't contain the majesty that is God and His plan.

(Micah wrote a beautiful blog post about some of those thoughts here. Seriously, go read it.)

But tonight, and the last few nights, I'm not sure exactly what it means to let my heart burst and my life burn like a torch- to die, namely.

I'm still doing things like homework and university applications and dishes and family quarrels and Bible studies and television and staying up past my bedtime.

Then there is this, which I've read several times over the last few weeks:

"We are afflicted in ever way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, 

so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.  

For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus' sake."

Life right now doesn't feel like dying, and I don't feel like someone who is carrying that particular kind of death or life around.

Of course, following Christ in His death, being overcome by the majesty of God, isn't something that demands actual death in our North American culture.  There are no barricades for me to die on today.  Instead there is law homework and serving my family and prayer and speaking with love.  And God is no less present, and He is no less central to my existence, and He is no less glorious, but my eyes were captured by a fire and I feel like there's more smoke then fire here.

If I'm being completely honest, that's what makes me angst the most.  Dying isn't a path of actual thorns, and I'm not on the mission field or raising money for the needy or fighting abortion or evangelizing on street corners.

I watch my favourite characters on the screen, and they fight monsters.  They stare at death, they flame and burn and choose death and sacrifice and passion, and I come out of that with this ache, because how do I die like that?

Maybe that's the thing I have to give up in order to die.  I want to be the hero.  I want to fight the glorious battles that cost the most and hurt the most and I want to be victorious.   I want to die and get it over with, to be presented with an adventure and set off on it.  I want to die on the barricade, not in the green field of normal life.

We sang at church this Sunday that "our God is greater, and stronger, and higher than any other".   I had come from a week of mediocrity.  I had come from a week where the death of the barricades, of the gunshot wound, of the monster-fighting was more appealing to me then the death of Jesus.  My death more precious than his.

Our pastor reminded us, gently, from the pulpit that all the blood of the martyrs was not worth one drop of Christ's blood.  My pride want to fight that idea.   I want to believe that I'm the penultimate hero in the narrative of my life, that I am the focal point, that something I have done will make my life worthwhile.

"I'm not the hero of my story, am I Lord?" I asked, and it hurt to realize how I had valued myself over Him.

I am not the hero.  I have never been.  I can never be.

Instead, the man on the tree, the ransom, the passionately sacrificial son of God is the hero of my story. He is my worth, and my glory, and my joy, and my reason for dying.

How do I carry that kind of death in my body?  I don't feel like I know what that looks like.  And the burden of heroism and sacrifice and the battlefield is still an ember in my soul.  But how to die right here?  That may not be glorious in the way that I imagine, but that's not really the point.

Jesus is a better hero then me.

And I want to be His.

And what that looks like in the writing of the story, I want Him to decide.

On "Stars", Les Mis and the Elder Brother

"Stars/ In their multitudes/ Scarce to be counted/ Filling the darkness"

I saw Les Miserables three times in the theatre last month. It blew me away for many reasons (which may become the subject of multiple blog posts), but there is one character in particular that gave me a lot to think about.

Javert.

Javert is one of my favourite characters in Les Mis.  He is an officer of the law with a flawed view of God, a man with the law in one hand and a inability to see grace as he dispenses what he really believes is just in the eyes of God.

Literally all that Javert can see is the Law.  This is why the contrast between Javert and Valjean is so strong.  The highest good, in Javert's mind, is that the Law is maintained.  That Justice is served.

Whether or not you agree with how he goes about fulfilling these things, you can't deny that Justice is good.  So Javert's intentions aren't evil.  They're based on a desire that God has- that justice would be throughout the land.

The problem with Javert is that he can't see the relationship between Law and Grace. 

As I was thinking about Javert, I really started seeing him as the elder brother in the story of the prodigal son.  It's not a perfect parallel, but I saw some striking similarities.  

So at the beginning of the story, Valjean becomes a thief.  His motives are good, but he ends up in jail for his actions.  When he is released, Valjean is wretched, lost and poor, ruined in the finest sense of the word.  He steals a set of silver.  He's caught. 

And then he's shown mercy.  Valjean is welcomed into both the arms of the priest and into the arms of God.  Forgiven for his crimes. Welcomed back into grace. This mercy begins to transforms the way Valjean sees his entire life.

Javert doesn't know these things about Valjean.  But Javert has lived a life of law-keeping and law-enforcing.  Javert has obeyed the law to the letter.  And all he can see in Valjean is a man who stole bread and broke parole.  All he can see in Valjean is a thief deserving punishment. 

But Valjean has experienced mercy, a mercy that has coloured his future and made him into a man of mercy.

To Javert, Valjean is the one who didn't deserve anything yet was given everything.  He sees the prisoner who has slipped through the grasp of the Law again and again.

In the song "Stars," Javert sings this verse:

"And so it has been and so it is written

On the doorway to paradise

That those who falter and those who fall

Must pay the price!"

What Javert doesn't understand is that grace (and paradise), unlike law, cannot be earned. 

That is also what makes Javert tragic, in my mind.  He is so captivated by fulfilling the Law that he has closed his eyes to seeing grace.  He can't imagine a world where mercy could overcome law.  So when Valjean doesn't kill him, granting him life, it cracks the whole way that Javert has seen the world. 

In his last scene, Javert sings these words:

"Damned if I'll live in the debt of a thief!

Damned if I'll yield at the end of the chase.

I am the Law and the Law is not mocked

I'll spit his pity right back in his face

There is nothing on earth that we share

It is either Valjean or Javert!

And must I now begin to doubt,

Who never doubted all these years?

My heart is stone and still it trembles

The world I have known is lost in shadow.

Is he from heaven or from hell?

And does he know

That granting me my life today

This man has killed me even so?"

We would do well to think of Javert more complexly, I think.  Because there is more of the Javert in us than we may realize.  He has the heart of the elder brother who was more concerned with keeping the law then celebrating with a redeemed brother.  Javert is a drastically painted picture of law without grace, justice without mercy, and perfection without a changed heart.

I've seen a lot of Javert in myself.  And I think we all can act like little Javerts, valuing perfection and law-keeping over the grace that is given in the Gospel.  We make our lists- believe me, I've done this- and we try to live a perfect life in the hopes that we will receive favour.  In the hopes that we will earn paradise and that God will think well of us.

In our Javert-like hearts, we value outward perfection over a heart that has been transformed by grace.

That's been one of the biggest struggles of my Christian journey.  Does God's favour come through living rightly or through being granted mercy in my sinful state?   Do I earn grace?  Once I have been given mercy, do I have to keep on doing good things in order to keep that mercy?

Valjean had a heart that had been broken by sin and mended by grace, a heart that was washed and given grace.  That grace spilled out of Valjean, making him into the man that rescued Cosette, pulled Marius through a sewer.  It made im into the man who even forgave Javert.

And Javert, ruined by the knowledge that his law keeping didn't buy him grace, jumped off a bridge.

In the end, it is "either Valjean or Javert."   Because these two men- Javert and Valjean- are two ways of seeing the world- two ways of seeing the Gospel, Christ, and what it means to be forgiven.

Hobbits with Swords {2013 Winter Workshop}

 So I started writing this post a few weeks ago, but it seems even more fitting to finish it now as I sit in the airport on my way home from the 2013 OYAN Winter Workshop.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Hobbits with swords.

That sounds like a brilliant idea.  Put the destruction of the Ring of Power in the hands of three foot high, peace loving, mushroom eating farmers.  They're extremely capable of stealing produce, but the chances of them staying alive against a Nazgul?

Highly unlikely, as they'd barely be able to reach his knee.

I’ve felt like a Hobbit quite a lot recently.

‘There is no way’, I think.  Absolutely no way that I could go up against the evil and suffering and sorrow and tragedy in the world and come out triumphant.  My strengths are about three feet high and my talents- I'm good at stealing produce and keeping my Hobbit-hole clean, but I've barely ever even held a sword, and the prospect of battle scares me back to my hole, my tea and my books and the refuge of the internet.

Sorry God. You'd better find an Aragorn, because I'm a Hobbit.

I'm not particularly strong, and my failings are much greater than my strengths.  I love Jesus. But I still stumble, fumbling in the darkness as I fight loneliness and fear and my own unfaithfulness.  More often then not, I don't come out very triumphant.

This week, we've heard about Warriors.  We've heard about how the best stories may be yet to be written. We've heard about the God who wants us to imagine and create. We've heard about writing with honesty and writing for Truth.

I was struck over and over this week of how much I felt at home with all of you.  You give me a glimpse of what Heaven will look like.  Your love and care are a gift that comes from God through you and I can't imagine how much I would be different if it were not from you.

I would have loved to stay in Kansas forever with you.  Telling stories, laughing, being together.  Writing, learning, growing. Being safe.

  

But the sense I got at the worship and prayer service on Sunday morning was something quite different.  It's easy to love the Workshop. It's easy to want to stay there, to dread going home and leaving all the people who have made your heart more alive.  Now that we're home, it's easy to curl up and mourn the fact that we're apart again. 

But we can't. OYAN is just the beginning.  It's the launch pad to send us back into the world and to prepare us for loving Jesus in our individual lives.  OYAN is the battle cry.  It's the swords placed in our hands, the story written to enflame our hearts and call us anew.  The Workshop was our Rivendell.  We were healed.  We made friends. We chose to take up our weapons and to live for Christ.

Now we go home to begin the real battle.  I'll admit, my own battles scare me more than a little.  My sword had gotten dull.  I need Christ to be fuller in my life and my writing.  But I'm His and you are His, and He moves mountains and changes hearts and creates things like OYAN. 

So go home. You may be a hobbit, but the war's already won. 

We're ordinary heroes belonging to Christ.

I pray that that's true for each of you for the rest of your lives.

Much love, Abby.

Life Abundant (the wonders of people, enthusiasm, and long talks about heaven)

This photo has really no relevance to this post except that it's nearly Christmas. And I love snow.

“...the sun looks down on nothing half so good as a household laughing together over a meal, or two friends talking over a pint of beer, or a man alone reading a book that interests him..." -C. S. Lewis

Trying to sum up exactly what I'm wanting to convey in this post may be rather difficult.  I'm afraid it's one of those subjects that is hard to bring up and harder to do justice.

I'm talking about Thankfulness For Being Alive and the Many Wonders of People and Relationships and Long Talks about Heaven and Literature and Unashamed Excitement about Many Things.

I've got some pretty crazy awesome people in my life.  It's easy in the middle of the messy, uncomfortable, dirty parts of my life to forget how I've been blessed, in small ways and in large.

For some small ones, take snow. It tried to snow a couple times this past week and though it didn't stick around, I wondered (again) at the beauty of it, arriving in waves from the sky and giving the air that crisp, vibrant wintery smell.

Another small thing: Meals with friends. I got to eat a meal with my Bible study group this week, and then another meal with a friend's family the next day.   There is something very simple and beautiful about eating together.  Especially when you pay attention to all the little details, the way people laugh, the jokes they laugh at, the little looks they give each other as sarcastic (but loving) comments make their way around the table along with the casserole and the cookies.

On to some of the larger things.  I had Bible study small group with two girls on Thursday night.  We ended up talking about emotions and fears and Psalm 25 and then we got to pray together.  I got a fresh appreciation for the way they loved Jesus and, by consequence, loved me.

Then on Friday night I went to a "nerd Christmas party" with my literature group.  We talked about everything from science fiction to music, but the part of the conversation that engaged me the most was when we talked about Heaven.  

C.S. Lewis talked about Sehnsuct in a few of his writings; the uncanny longing in every human soul for joy, true joy, and for something just beyond our grasp and not found on earth.  

"That unnameable something, desire for which pierces us like a rapier at the smell of bonfire, the sound of wild ducks flying overhead, the title of The Well at the World's End, the opening lines of "Kubla Khan", the morning cobwebs in late summer, or the noise of falling waves."

The conversation on Friday night gave me a fresh dose of Sehnsuct.   We have this promise that God has gone to prepare a "place for us."

Don't all humans want a place for us?  We seek it out in so many ways, but I would venture to say that many of our endeavors come back to this longing for a place.   What amazed me was contemplating afresh this.   We have this hope beyond worlds, this hope and faith that there will be a Place for Us, and that Christ himself, the chief Person we were created to glorify and love has designed it.

He painted our name on the door with His blood.

Doesn't that just drive you speechless?  It doesn't often enough to me, but it should, and when I feel Sehnsuct most deeply and realize that it's fulfillment is in Jesus, then the silence and the peace fill the rivers of my soul again.

“There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal.” -Lewis, again (and I shall never stop quoting him, never)

Being with people that share this longing for a Place and a Person is one of the best things for my soul.  

These people are excited about Life and about Miracles.  They are unironically enthusiastic about stories and music and Truth in Literature.  They appreciate mysteries and mountains and the place above the tree line where the silence is deep.    They talk about Heaven and their eyes light up.

You can see in their smile that they are not talking about a place they are mildly interested in.  

No, in these people, I see the fire blazing because their souls are alive, and they are seeking after the Person and the Place they were made for.

I am ridiculously blessed by God in the gift of knowing them.

Tagged!

I will say that this has absolutely no relevance to the rest of this post.

So, I was tagged a few weeks (months?) ago by Micah at http://snippetsandslicesandscenes.blogspot.ca/.

Eleven Facts 
1. I am Canadian, which probably most of my followers already know.
2. I am an INTJ (Introverted Intuitive Thinker Judger) in the Meyer's Briggs personality type system.
3. My favourite TV show is Doctor Who for many, many reasons; one of the largest being that the Doctor gives me a fresh excitement for life, for adventure, and for living with meaning.
4. I love dystopian fiction and its ability to communicate Truth.
5. I began writing because I loved Narnia and wanted to write stories about it (2006-2008).  That grew into the writing of my own original fiction a couple of years later (2008-onwards)
6. My favourite book series is The Chronicles of Narnia, though Harry Potter is putting up a fight.
7. My favourite movie series is The Lord of the Rings.
8. I love the rain.  Where I live we get a lot of rain.
9. The first book that made me flat out cry was Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
10. I own 8+ nerd shirts, including 4 Doctor Who themed shirts. 
11. I play unashamedly with my sonic screwdriver and my fez and I enjoy fish fingers and custard.


My answers to Micah's questions:

1. If you met a Boggart/found your room at the God Complex/were marched towards room 101 in the Ministry of Love, what would await you? If it's a too personal of a question, just tell us your favourite ice cream flavour. Unless, of course, your worst fear is ice cream. Then you can just leave this blank.
hardy har har.  I'll go with room in the God Complex-oh, but that is a hard question.
My Boggart would probably be a lot like Augustus Water's worst fear.  Oblivion.
I like chocolate chip mint ice cream.  

2. How did Sherlock survive?
Mind control.
I have no hypothesis this late at night.  I've heard the squishy ball theory, the TARDIS theory, and a bunch of others. 

3. Which do you prefer - nice eyes or a nice smile?
Nice eyes.  Eyes say so much.

4. What is the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow?
Sorry, was this supposed to be an educational question?  Cause it's past my bedtime.

5. What is the best smelling book you ever did sniff?
I'll say the box of old books that my Dad brought home one day.  They were all about 90-100 years old and smelled- oh, they smelled beautiful and ancient.

6. Are you the crying type? (The Fall, Doomsday, Toy Story 3?)
Nope.  Sometimes I wish I was, but I'm an INTJ and we don't tend to be emotional.  I can work myself up to being emotional, but crying is usually off-limits unless I'm dealing with something really personal.  Or I'm really tired.
(Or I'm reading Harry Potter or The Fault in Our Stars, to date the only two books that have made me properly cry.)

7. Which fictional villain makes you the most frightened or angry?
Loki makes me frightened, but mostly because I love him as a character and want him to be redeemed.  That's not really a fear of him so much as it is a fear for him.  Bellatrix Lestrange is pretty terrifying.  And Oblivion. Because Oblivion is really a 'villain' of The Fault in our Stars.

8. What would your dream room look like? ...Your dream house?
I'll just describe the insides because I'm not good at visualizing structures.  The inside would be crisp, cream or white walls with black or red lettered quotes scattered throughout.  There would be many bookshelves, some hidden in warm, rounded corners with large comfortable chairs.  There would be words everywhere, in the bedrooms, in the living room, tucked into the corners of the kitchen and the front entrance.   It would be like a large hobbit hole with hundreds of books, well lit rooms, and speakers to blare (or trickle) music everywhere.  Imagine "Don't Panic" blasting through an entire house and a cup of tea and jammy dodgers sitting on the kitchen counter.  Then imagine me with a Narnia book in my hand and a stack of books under my arm, guitars on the wall and the smell of cinnamon.

9. If you could only see everything in one font, from now on, what font would you pick?
Something like helvetica or times new roman.

10. Mac or PC?
Mac. 

11. You're a contestant in the Hunger Games. Detail this for us. What's your strategy? Training score? Do you win, or ... not? If you feel like it, give us even more. Outfits? Favourite thing about the Capital? District? What's the arena like this year?
Gosh, Micah, do you want me to write a book?
My strategy is to hide and trick other contestants and try to stay alive for as long as possible and defer a messy death.  I'm definitely more of the 'flight' rather than 'fight'.   I climb trees, gather food, stay away from the other contestants at all costs.   
I definitely don't win.  First of all, I don't know that I would kill.  Under those circumstances my resolve might be weakened, but I don't honestly think I can say that killing under those circumstances is any more justified than any other circumstances.  I'd prefer to die rather than have to be a part of death.  Even though there can only be one winner, even though my not-killing would not stop others from killing.   I hope that I would be able to hold that resolve. So I probably don't last long.  Also, there's the fact that I'm small and physically not very strong or agile or talented in anything that doesn't involve words and a computer. 

The Dichotomy of Stories and Reality

I live a thousand lives tonight
Locked up inside my head
I chose the song of eternity
It ravaged inside my head
I live a thousand lives tonight
All faces black and red
I chose the people who never lived
I cried, and stayed in bed.

You're probably tired about hearing about stories from me.  It seems that's most of what I talk about.  I'm not here to apologize though.  However, today I am going to delve into something that may explain why I talk about stories so much, why they affect me, why I love them.

So here goes.  Baring a little bit of my soul here.  This idea that I'm going to share today is something I've cried over and thought through.  It's very personal to me, but it may be also something for some of you, particularly those who have ever thought that escaping in a story was the only thing that kept them sane.

"in dreams we enter a world that is entirely our own"

I finished reading the Harry Potter series last weekend.  It affected me quite deeply with the adventure, love, and loyalty of the characters; how they sacrificed for each other and the  courageous choices they made in spite of death staring them down. The themes, especially those of death and life, courage and friendship, hit me hard. (I may write a full review and post it here. We'll see.)

It had been rather a rough day at home, the day after I finished reading.  There were things heavy on my heart, real life struggles that hurt and drove me to my room alone.  In that moment, I wanted escape more than anything.  Harry Potter had affected me.  Even though the story had been filled with darkness, with danger- even with death, something in me longed for it above my real life. Harry said "Hogwarts is my home."  And in my longing for my own world to be made right- I wanted Hogwarts to be my home.  It was, despite it's darkness, a beautiful place.  It was adventure, it was escape. It was certainty that their lives meant something.  

Maybe it was certainty that my life meant something too.

All my life I've looked to stories for escape, I've been realizing.  All my life I've seen glimpses of life and love and courage in stories that have provided hope to me as I'm living the pages of my own story. Those stories have given me courage.  They've given me joy.  Most of all, they've given me hope.

"It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live."

So there's the dichotomy.  I've depended on stories, to be honest.  I've placed my heart in them, let them affect me and change me.  I don't regret what stories have done for me.

Sometimes, though, I think I dwell on stories and forget to live.  I love stories. I won't ever stop loving stories.  The story of the universe goes on- and we write and live our little stories inside of it.  I fully intend to keep reading and writing stories for the rest of my life, in expectancy that they will affect me, change me, give me hope and strength.

But even in that, I have often lacked the courage to step out of the story world and live fully in my own.  I saw a post on Tumblr that said "we need fantasy to survive because reality is too difficult."

Okay, so sometimes reality is difficult. Sometimes it is horrible. But we will never get beyond the darkness and into the light unless we step out with our swords drawn.  We will never experience life  in all it's beauty- and sorrow- unless we fling ourselves fully into it.

We will never live unless we come out of the dream world.  The dream world will live inside us forever, it will continue to make us more alive then we were.  But I realized that night that these stories matter because they echo my own heart.  My desires for my own story become entangled with the fictional story.  I want to live, to have the abundant life that I was made for.  I do not want to forget that truly living is courageous.

"The stories we love do live in us forever."

Our own stories, we hope will live forever.

Writing out of your soul

I must write for me.

When I started writing seriously I was thirteen. It was a hard, amazing year, due to a lot of personal issues and a really huge season of doubt that broke into my baptism and subsequent growing Christian life.  In my eighth-grade poetry, though the rhythm is bad and the phrases are cliche, I can still feel everything that my soul was fighting with.  That writing was some of my first writing, and some of my worst.  But it was also some of my most honest.

I guess that's a defining trait of powerful writing.  It's honest.  It's honest about where it's been.  It's honest about tears and holding stuffed animals as a teenager because you can't explain that sorrow.  It's honest about how sometimes that stuffed lion that you call Aslan is more real and more alive and more comfort than anything. It's honest about those days you could rule the world, and the days you just want everything to be fixed.  It's honest about how sometimes you are weak and other times you could fight dragons.  Powerful writing tells the truth.  Even if the truth is stained and terrible along with its light and beauty.  Because the truth, the honest truth, sets free.

The truth hurts. Writing about those things was- is- so hard.  Putting it on paper is declaring it, waging war against it, admitting it to myself. When I wrote it down, I made it real in a new way.

"If he wrote it, he could get rid of it.  He had gotten rid of many things by writing them," said Ernest Hemingway.   A lot of people have pointed out how writing is like catharsis.  Writing, for me, helps me understand why I feel the way I do.  It helps me sort out truth from error.  It helps me to see in ways that I can't see when I don't write.   It helps me declare war and it helps me to fight that war. 

Words. Words on paper, black splotches on ink, changing lives. Changing ME. First and foremost, writing has changed me. I write for me. Oh, I write for others, but I write out of my own soul.  That's where the power of writing transforms.  

And hopefully, as words have healed and changed me, they might do the same for others.

I'm going to write anyways, because I have to write. For me, the most powerful urge is the one that comes from my soul.  That's the urge that calls me to understand the world, the God who made it and the strange and beautiful story that I am living.

ramble on the eve of senior year's beginning

I don't even know about this school year.

I have so far to go, so many things to do.  So many things to learn.  So many things that need to change in my life.  So many hills to climb.

So many adventures to be had.

I'm terribly excited and terribly frightened.

Isn't that wizard?

How can something bring me so much joy and make me so thrilled and exhilarated- and yet scare the dickens out of me the next moment?

Why am I unconsciously running away from the things that I love, the things that I want?

Maybe these are just the ramblings of a tired me when I should be sleeping.

Maybe these are secret things that I usually don't admit to myself.

But this year is going to be good.

Maybe even great.

If only I follow the Lion.

I don't think I want to be amazing...

...I think I want to be real.

I'm a perfectionist by nature.  Sometimes I am able to balance that fairly well, utilizing its strengths and downplaying its weaknesses.

But sometimes, it just makes me feel like a piece of perfect looking plastic with hidden scratches and a flawed structure.

Sometimes I need to be reminded how small and imperfect I am underneath everything I'm learning, underneath the success, underneath the life-that is-ever-so-wonderful.

I'm a small, weak, sinful person.

I have a strong God.

And sometimes I need the humbling reminder of that, of the fact that I can't do it all.  Of the fact that being wrong and being hurt and being vulnerable and messy isn't always a bad thing.  Of the truth that it's so much more fulfilling to be real and to be following Jesus honestly than to be putting up walls and painting pictures of a perfect person I'm not.

And it's so amazing to see God make beautiful things out of messes.

Awe. Writing. Life.

Sometimes I am nearly brought to tears and awe at this gift.  I read, I write, I love stories.  That's something that's been born in my soul.  It brings me to tears.  Over and over again it's changed my life. But sometimes I lose the love I had at first.  I forget how precious it is to feel the pages of an new book or to breathe in the smell of an old treasure.  I forget what it means to muse over a phrase that sings the song my heart cannot express.   I forget the ways that people in books can make me laugh and see the world in a new way.

But deeper than that- I forget that stories are a way for me to understand the world, understand life, and learn to enjoy life.  I forget the swelling of my soul in worship and amazement in a story of fall and redemption.  I forget the joy that comes with simply being alive and with hearing the stories of the humans on this fallen planet, where a rebellion has been launched and hope is not mere optimism.  I forget that everyone has a story, and that in the telling of stories we are changed beyond what can be described.

And then something sparks me to remember, like the cord that was wiggling out of it's socket has been plugged back in.  Then awe overwhelms me yet again.  Tonight was one of those moments.

Thanks, Father, for the awe of being alive.

Thanks, Father, for the beauty and tragedy and awe scattered like bits of blue flowers among grey plains.

Thanks, Father, for stories.

Where I've been: Snapshots

OYAN Summer Workshop 2012.  Olathe, Kansas.  Bigger on the Inside.

So...since it's been over two months since I posted on here, I thought I'd do a quick catch-up post to give my readers (if there are any, which I'm not entirely sure of) a glimpse into what I've been busy with the last two months.  I'm also writing a whole bunch of posts about things that God has been teaching me about life and writing which I'm excited to post over the summer (and that character series is really going to be rebooted, as in soon)!

Snapshot One: Broken Glass King
Currently the novel project that I'm working on is this novel called Broken Glass King.  It was born out of some of the ways that God was breaking me and healing me over the past year and it's a project I'm incredibly excited about.  I've posted about it in the past.  Probably you'll hear a lot more about it in the future months.

Snapshot Two: One more year in school
I'm realizing that this summer is my last summer of being a kid.  Come this time next year, I'll be graduated.   In some ways I'm terrified of what comes after this year, and in other ways I'm completely thrilled.   But even when I'm terrified, I am reminded that I am not alone and that any adventure, no matter how many dragons I face or fires I have to walk through, I have nothing to fear.  This year should be exciting.  God works in mysterious and beautiful ways.

Snapshot Three:  The OYAN Summer Workshop 2012
I had no idea a writing workshop could do so much more than just encourage me in my writing.  I learned so much about writing.  I learned more about life and about God and about what His family looks like.  I made some amazing friends. We did some crazy things.   The OYAN family started on an adventure of wrecking normal for the glory of God.  I'm thrilled to see what comes next.  I could go on- but that's stuff for another post.

revelation: the power of words

I had another writing revelation today.  It's something I've always known but hit me in the gut again after a conversation today.  It's profound how an old truth can become real again when it is said in a new way.  (This, by the way, is something writers need to know. There are no new Truths, just new ways to say old Truths.  Originality comes in saying an old Truth in a new, unique, coherent or powerful way.) 

I came out of the movie theatre today after watching The Hunger Games.  My uncle joked that "You're only one year away and then you can be a Career."  I said something about not wanting to be a Career.  Then someone else with us says "Your weapon can be writing."  I replied:

"Writing can't kill people."

And then it hit me.  What I said wasn't true.

Writing does kill people.

Mein Kampf. Origin of Species. Communist Manifesto.  Many, many other writings.  Writings that have led, either directly or indirectly to wars, injustices, lies, the murder of the innocent, and other evils.

Writing is always about ideas.  Whether it's a story, song, poem, essay or blog article, it's ultimately undergirded by ideas, views on the world, on life, and on right and wrong.  Ideas have consequences.  That's a cliche, but a true one.  The ideas expressed in writing may be just words, but they lead to actions.  Good ideas -and by good I mean True- lead to good actions.  Bad ideas -and by bad I mean False- lead to bad actions.   Wars start as a result of bad ideas.  Every thing we write has consequences.

"The tongue has the power of life and death." -Proverbs 18:20.  Our words- both on paper and in life- have consequences.  

I want to be sure that I know what I'm saying and to ensure that I am writing ideas that are grounded in Truth and that lead to good. 

What putting Noisemaker on hold has taught me about writing

Some writing days felt like this.

So, it's been a hard writing time lately.  For several reasons, not the least of which is my own inconsistency and procrastination.  But more than that, I've just been having a hard time making writing work.  There's been more than a few days where I've groaned and struggled and spent entire afternoons where I end up with nothing to show for it.   There's been a few days where I've nearly cried.  "Why won't this story just WORK?!"

Most of this stress came from a recent project called Noisemaker.  I loved the theme behind it.  It's based on something I'm passionate about and I delved right into plotting, creating characters, and developing the theme.  The story changed its form at least a dozen times over the course of March.  But as time went on, I was having a harder and harder time actually writing it. I could write lots about it, but the actual words on paper- the actual story- wasn't working.   It had me nearly pulling out my hair with the fact that I couldn't pin a plot down.  It had a setting and it had a theme, but connecting the plot and characters to it was the challenge.  With such a big theme, I could write reams of essays about it but as a story the hugeness of it was stumping me.

The theme behind Noisemaker was so big that fitting it into a plot was time consuming and draining.  And by draining, I mean mentally and spiritually draining.  It was a lot of plot problems and a lot of frustration.

The stress of the project was just compounded by the fact that I need to have a full novel draft ready by the end of June for a writing workshop I am going to attend.  I got to the point of despairing if I would ever even nail down a loose outline, never mind write Chapter One or "The end."

Eventually I had to realize that this project was too big.  At least for now.  It was too new, too massive in proportion.  It needed time to sit and ripen and develop in my mind.  It wasn't ready to come onto paper.  Maybe it would be soon, but forcing it before I was capable of writing it wasn't going to be good for me or the story. 

I don't mean that there isn't a time to force your way through a story.  I know that just because a story is hard doesn't mean that it's not ready.  I'm not advocating giving up when the going gets tough!  But in this case, Noisemaker was so consistently difficult and between my own stress and the helpful counsel of my mom we determined that it just wasn't the right time yet.

Now I'm working on a novel of a very different kind.  It's a novel idea that started when I was about 12.  I've written countless notes, character sketches, chapter outlines, and theme notes.  It's a much better developed story in my mind.  It's had plenty of time to ripen.  Ultimately, it's ready to become a full fledged novel.  It'll still be hard.  That's what writing is- not all sunshine and words flying onto the page.  But this story is one I feel much better equipped and ready to write.

Noisemaker is on the shelf presently. And it's a good thing, because now I'm writing a story that IS ready to be written.  This process has been a valuable one, as I've realized that I can't white knuckle writing.  Sometimes stories need to sit. Sometimes an idea is good- but not quite yet. 

Why I love Lewis

"You can never get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me."  -C.S. Lewis.   Mhmmmmm. That quote alone sums up many good things; Lewis, tea, and books.

The first C.S. Lewis book I read was The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.  My sister and I snuggled up next to our mum and heard the story of the Pevensies, the witch, betrayal, and the Love of a Lion for the first time.  I was probably seven or eight.

Now it's years later, but that story- as well as any and all of C.S. Lewis' other works- continues to have an indelible impact on my life.

Lewis had an ability- a gift- of telling the straight Truth in a way that was both beautiful, honest, and memorable. He spoke in metaphors and stories that made sense- connecting the mind and the heart by the way he described things.  A friend mentioned to me something she had been reading lately about how Truth is always beautiful. Looking at Lewis, he seemed to understand that.  God is Truth, and He made Truth, and He made beauty, so of course when it comes down to it, truth will be beautiful and that which is really beautiful will be Truth. The truth I've seen in Lewis' books is always a beautiful truth.  Sometimes it's uncomfortable too, but then isn't that often the nature of both Truth and true Beauty.

Another thing I appreciate love is that Lewis saw clearer than most the curtain of time and eternity.  His keen desire for something greater than this world (past the shadowlands) is so evident in his writing, both fiction and non-fiction.   In the Chronicles of Narnia, this shows up many times, but one that sticks out to me is the last paragraph or two of The Last Battle.

The dream is ended

"The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream is ended: this is the morning."
And as He spoke He no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot describe them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that the all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real stor. All their life in this world and all of their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before." -The Last Battle

^^ THAT ^^  Lewis is marvelous.

Wake up and get out of bed

"We read of spiritual efforts, and our imagination makes us believe that, because we enjoy the idea of doing them, we have done them.  I am appalled to see how much of the change which I thought I had undergone lately was only imaginary.  The real work seems still to be done.  It is so fatally easy to confuse an aesthetic appreciation of the spiritual life with the life itself- to dream that you have waked, washed, and dressed, & then to find yourself still in bed."  

-C.S. Lewis

I love this quote because it is something I have felt in my own life many times and something I want to fight against. It's that thing that makes me believe that I am noble and faithful and have done great things and then find myself in bed with the covers pulled over my face because I'm afraid of the shadows playing games on the floor.  The bounds of my comfort zone are merely my own fears  but actually getting up out of bed and putting my feet on the cold floor is the step hardest to take.   

Jesus is the one who takes my hand and helps me take that first step out of bed. He is the One that reminds me that being awake is infinitely better than remaining under the covers.

Good morning!

~Abby

'O! Wanderers in the shadowed land'

"O!  Wanderers in the shadowed land
despair not! For though dark they stand,
all woods there be must end at last,
and see the open sun go past:
the setting sun, the rising sun
the day's end, or the day begun
For east or west all woods must fail..."

-Frodo, The Fellowship of the Ring 

What did I say?   Beautiful.  And so very symbolic and True.   'the shadowed land' makes me think of C.S. Lewis' description of earth "the Shadowlands."  We are wanderers on this earth. But every dark wood has an end- and then the sunrise!

Right now I'm wandering on, learning as I go, feeling the wind on my cheeks and the biting cold in my bones.  Right now I'm growing thanks to the grace of God and His work in me through the Bible, situations, and people who love Jesus.   Every day I take steps forward, holding his hand, gazing at beauty and feeling the thump thump of the song of tomorrow in my heart.

A fellow wanderer in the shadowed land,
~Abby