It is an April-November.

Yesterday there was fog over the lake, and I couldn't tell where the water ended and the sky began.
Today all is clear, and the air carries the scent of spring.
I cannot understand this, when winter is so very near.
Where is the bitter wind?
Where is the biting cold?
It is November, not April.
These months mirror each other in some ways.
April anticipates hot sunshine summer.
November anticipates cold snowy winter.
Yet they both seem unable to decide on their weather!

I think I am ready for Old Man Winter to come and blanket the earth in white.
But I can be thankful for the strange breath of spring that comes late in this April-November.

"Far over the misty mountains cold..."

There are some stories that stick with you forever. Lord of the Rings is one of those for me. I can never divorce myself from anything that Tolkien has written, nor could I want to. His tales of Bilbo and the Ring, of Frodo and the Ring, of all the peoples of Middle-Earth, of each Age, of the Elves, dwarves, Hobbits...all these are as much a part of me now as breathing. Lately, I have been coming back to Lord of the Rings as a place I can take refuge from this world. I do not have my books with me here at school, but I can think about them, I can read the poems and songs online, I can listen to the movie soundtracks.

It is a world I can identify with, where the struggle between good and evil is clearly defined. I cannot understand the vulgarity of this world, especially at a Christian college. Conversations become utterly vulgar and and I sometimes wonder where people actually see the line between amusement and sin. We're all sinful human beings, of course, and I will not place myself above fault. However, it sickens me.

This is one of the reasons I reach for a story like Lord of the Rings. I can read these books and they are clean, they are wholesome. I am satisfied when I read them, because I have improved my mind and my spirit, rather than blotted them with darkness.

So I ask these questions: Whatever happened to wholesome entertainment? Wholesome conversations? Do people even make an effort to be wholesome anymore?

Does all this make any sense? It has been weighing on my heart for a long time now, but I am not good at articulating my personal feelings.

I suppose this post is about two different things, but this Bible verse will tie them both together:

"Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things." ~Philippians 4:8 NIV.

Current Obsession

My current obsession is tea. I just bought a lot of it. Adding to the collection that I already had, I think I now have ten different kinds of tea to choose from. More will be added, of course. Tea is my drink of choice in the colder months.

The book in the pictures is awesome, by the way. You should read it. The tea I'm drinking is called Winter Spice, and it is sold by Twinings of London. It is an extremely soothing chamomile blend. Good on a cold night after a difficult day (like I had today...good gracious!), or even after a day that went well. 

My favorite Bible verse

"For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will

        be their shepherd,

and he will guide them to springs of living

        water,

and God will wipe away every tear from their

       eyes."

Revelation 7:17

musings no. 3

Salvete!
If you spend your "free" time memorizing Latin declensions, you're either a student or crazy. Or both.
I am most certainly both.
The end.

It is getting to that time of year when I have an extremely difficult time playing the organ -- or doing anything that involves moving my finger, for that matter. Darn cold hands! I can't type, write, play music...oh, and texting is almost out of the question!

The wind we had over the last few days was insane.
I was kind of scared when I realized I could feel the building I live in moving.

Here I am complaining about the cold, yet I have my window open because there is no other way to get my room to not smell stuffy and blehh. Yep. Blehh, that's it.

I am indeed already listening to Christmas music.
Yes, yes I am quite aware that Halloween hasn't happened yet, thank you very much.

The pipe organ is a bit of heaven on earth.

Last night at Concordia, there was a hymn festival. The theme was "Gifts of the Reformation" and we had a wonderful man by the name of David Cherwien playing the Steiner-Reck. I'm pretty sure he was not using music. The man was AMAZING. His talent is off the charts. He made that organ do things I didn't even know it could do! It was pure heaven, if only for the short space of time of an hour and a half. The chapel was filled with voices raised in praise to our Lord and I could feel the very air vibrating with the power. It was probably the greatest musical experience of my life.

Now, as most of you know, I am taking pipe organ lessons. After last night's festival, I was intimidated and hardly wanted to take my place on the bench at the Steiner-Reck for my afternoon lesson today. Yet I did. Why? Because I love playing, and nothing is going to stop me. I want to glorify the Lord with my song. And I won't let anything stop me from tackling pieces by the greatest composers in the history of music, either. I've been working on a piece by J.S. Bach. Admittedly, this one is taking a LONG time. Today, though, I chose a new piece that is by Dietrich Buxtehude. He was a contemporary of Bach, and his compositions are no less powerful. Here is a recording of the piece that I have just begun learning. High expectations? Of course not. this one will take a long time to perfect. But God gave me the talent of music, and by golly I'm going to use it!




If the video does not work here, this is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CloCDuKBis

Is it possible? I daresay it is!

I apologize for the long stretch between updates! There has been a lot going on. Mostly homework, but I have also been enjoying the last days of warm weather for the year. The autumn colors in Wisconsin are too gorgeous to not be outside.

Currently, I am sitting at my desk attempting to find some motivation for homework. Not working so well. The good news is that I don't have much that needs to get done tonight; the bad news is that there is definitely plenty I could be doing. Blahhhh.

Exactly.

So I was on Facebook (that's nothing new!) and I glimpsed an ad on the sidebar that was actually relevant to me. Shocking? I think so. It was an ad for aspiring writers. Naturally, I clicked on it.

http://www.onepageperday.com/

I will give my raving review in one word: EPIC!

Seriously, this website is perfect for people who want to be writing but need help remembering to actually do some writing. You sign up with your Google or Twitter account and then begin writing. As it says, you only have to write ONE PAGE. And it does truly mean one page. The page length is about what you would have on Microsoft Word, or a physical sheet of 8 1/2 x 11 printer paper. And then it will tell you that a page is completed and inquire if you wish to continue. I was quite enthralled immediately.

BUT.

What to write???????

I stared at the blank page in front of me, considering all the story ideas I've had crammed in my head for years now. (No joke, I think some of the characters are getting dusty....) None of them jumped out at me. Okay, so was there a new idea? Something I hadn't considered in the past?

Turns out there was. I love those novels that are written entirely in poetry, usually free verse form (or the lack thereof!). I began writing in this format, and suddenly realized it had turned into something that was befitting the genre of science fiction. Hmm. This is a new development. Are there any sci-fi free verse novels? Probably, but I haven't ever run across them. So I'm going to continue writing this story and see where it takes me. After all, I am a writer. And writing of any sort is my stress reliever.

Perhaps I will post an excerpt from the story on here once I have ten pages or so.