Absent in writing; Purposeful Praying

I left the confines of my blog in March for many reasons. Mainly to work out why I blog, to work out why I get frustrated with my blog, and to work out what I want my blog to be.

Its so lovely to read blogs who have frequent visitors - comments of hillarious-ness or of support, and although having visitors is nice, I had to determine if it really mattered if people write or not? I think for a long time, it mattered to me. I am an energised soul; I get energised from many interactions - mostly with friends: old friends, new friends, fellowship time with a bunch of random people. I get energised by inspirational people in art groups, music groups, and novelists. It took me a long time to discern that what my mind was hoping this blog would become was: famous. An unrealistic vision.

And if I really think about it, I am actually not as good at writing on other peoples blogs when they post as some often are to me. Looks like I had a bit of "big fish in a little pond" moment - and wanted to be in the spotlight without the need to put effort in for others. How rude of me.

What I actually want this blog to really be is a snippet of journey of life with me. A real life of ups and downs. And if people I know [or even some people I don't know] want to read along, then this makes this journey just that bit more special.

So when I realised that, I stepped away. I need to work through the things that were frustrating me and occupying my mind, and there have been SO many. I didn't want this to become my 'other facebook' where I could fill a space with random statements and with un-meaningful words. I didn't want this to be a place I would come to whinge and talk about only the interesting things that happen in my life, and only when they happened.

So when I stepped away, I turned passive attention to God into a priority to get right in my life. I turned reading the Word of God primarily on Sunday's and at bible study [yep, unfortunately its true] into purposeful searching and directed attention to seek the guidance I need from the Bible. I turned a weakening faith into a growing seed again. I turned all my thoughts, concerns, prayers and cares unto the Lord, trusting in Him and in His good timing and planning, and I stopped being bothered by the things that shouldn't be my focal points of thinking. I turned my lack of accountability with anyone into having accountability to God.

Many of my long term friendships have changed as their lives have filled with blessings of marriage and/or children, which I recognised actually challenged me to tears too often. But God has shown me that though they are different and no longer as full of fellowship as they used to be, they are still there and to not lose heart. God has also blessed me with new friends who have [as a whole] more in common with me, which has allowed us to fellowship often together to support and encourage one another. This has been one of the greatest gifts I have felt I had this year.

I also had to recognise that I am busy right now in this stage of life. I have just weeks to go before my schooling is finished [and I'll be waiting my parchment for my Diploma in Enrolled Nursing from mid October], I still have two placements to go [both in a Surgical/Medical/Orthopaedic/Plastics and Breast Surgery ward], I have assignments to do and I have those I have yet to be given to do. And I had to recognise that because when I hit a brick wall of ultimate frustration in June, [kindly brought on by two evil wisdom teeth which required urgent surgical removal], I had a chance to really think about why I was frustrated, I put action into place, and I began the process to no longer feeling overwhelmed with EVERYTHING [not dramatising the feelings at the time], prioritised what was important and needing my attention and focus, and what could be amended or put on hold to allow me to fit what I needed in.

One song that is capturing my heart right now that I heard awesomely played last weekend by Stuart Townsend [et al] called "O Church Arise" and the opening verse is powerful:
O church, arise and put your armor on;
Hear the call of Christ our captain;
For now the weak can say that they are strong
In the strength that God has given.
With shield of faith and belt of truth
We’ll stand against the devil’s lies;
An army bold whose battle cry is “Love!”
Reaching out to those in darkness.

Go and be energised by Christ. Life is different when you do!

March 6-14 Photo-A-Day

March 6 - "5pm"
Glenelg Beach

March 7 - "Something you wore"
And wore it I did.

March 8 - "Window"
My "Schwepperevescence" window-scape.

March 9 - "Red"
Doona.

March 10 - "Loud"
My "Mevans brought this from London" bag. Yeah.

March 11 - "Someone you [wish you had] talked to today" - adlibbed this one. 
My Nephew - who I wish I had spoken to.

March 12 - "Fork"

March 13 - "A sign"
The Wingfield Fuel Storage Fire that blackened Adelaide. Cough.


March 14 - "Clouds"
South Australia experiences the Melbourne 4-Seasons in one day weather.
Now I'm also singing Crowded House songs. Anyone?

March 5's Photo-A-Day

"smile"


Well that's an easy one.

March 4's Photo-a-Day

"random"


This was actually meant to be "bedside", but as I've been sick the past few days, I didn't think snotty tissues would be impressive.

So here is a picture of me MC'ing the "DOULYMPICS" in - Asia. Somewhere. I actually for the life of me struggle to remember which port we had our Doulympics in. Well back to it. I was the host of hosts, and I'm pretty sure I was exhausted after the whole day. Its funny, the days literally blend together onboard. I have this memory that we had a variety of feasting tables with a variety of food, and then we moved down the the Doulympic Arena and commenced the fun games. It was department against department. It was hillarious. There were SO many people who cheated. I'm one of those game players who 'like the rules' unless you are playing "Cheat" - when there's actually no rules.

March 3's Photo-A-Day

"your neighbourhood"


A sneek-peek of my 'hood.

March Photo A Day - Day 2

"Down"


Yesterday was normally my 2nd and last day of the week at school.
Our class had the week off because a new class had begun on Tuesday.
Some of my classmates and I caught up and had coffee at Whipped Bar Cafe, Semaphore.
I was more than feeling under the weather, but knew that it would be a good time to share things about class.
I took this on my way back to my car because the grate next to where i was parked looked cool.
Pretty much was in bed the rest of the day feeling unwell once I got home, but after a restless night, I seem to be coming out the other side of it. Huzzah!

March Photo a Day

"Up"


Walking around town with some pals, we came upon a car that works for the railway company - one of those vehicles that have adjustments to them so they can drive on the tracks.
Wedged up in the grill support was this guy.
Awesome hood ornament.
Thought that the thrusting upward hand would be a grand start to a month of images.

The Unspoken...

I haven't written about this because... well I didn't know how to process it. Sometimes, when something BIG happens to me, all I need to do is just --- blaaarghgajlsfjasklfjaskfja --- or basically, dribble about whatever and to whomever and I sort it out better and feel good. Sometimes, that seems so insignificant. But reading about this happening to Reagan - a blog I stalk juuuuust a smidge - brought it all back... and I think I'm ready

It was just seems like one month ago yesterday that my secure, happy-go-lucky, free life drastically changed... I still remember walking up to the front door, and being aware that the big rubbish bin was propped up against the gate. I innocently thought "Perhaps there's a parcel" and the Postie was being clever... and after I dumped my stuff inside I would come back out and check.

Now, walking into our house you are greeted with stairs that go up on your right, and a room that bends round to your left, and you don't see much of the rest of the living area till you walk futher in. At first I saw a bag emptied on ground and thought rational things, like... "Why would my housemate accidentally empty a bag of stuff onto the ground and leave it? She must've been in a real hurry... perhaps the wind blew it over - but the window isn't open..."

It really was only when I turned the corner and saw the shattered glass that reached the front of the house from the smashed back door, and I saw that every drawer downstairs was opened and emptied onto the floor - even the pantry door was wide open - that I felt that bottomless pit of sickly feeling open up in my stomach... my housemate and I weren't the only ones who were in our house this day.

The shock of seeing it and knowing what you are looking at but not believing it is unreal. I really had to hold myself back from touching things knowing that the police would probably have to pay our house a visit. And its really strange what you look for first... and its strange what you see and believe that its normally there. And this was just downstairs...

I had to muster up alot of courage just to even call out upstairs - fearing that the new 'house guests' were still inside. But I grabbed --- something --- [a shoe I think?]--- and made my way up. I felt sick but my adrenaline rush was insanely strong and I'm sure even if someone was there, I would've shown them a thing or two with that shoe that a shoe probably couldn't normally do. Or I felt like I could. The first room I come to at the top of the stairs is my housemate's master bedroom. She'd had her room totally trashed, all her stuff was everywhere, all her containers where thrown around the room and all her precious jewellery was gone [which I only discovered after she got home later in the evening]...

My room looked relatively normal - in that the person going through my room seemed less aggressive and a bit more thoughtful - like they were looking for something specific. Infact, had I not just cleaned my room a few days before, I would've struggled to even recognise things were even out of place. They just seemed to empty a few things onto my bed and took a few pieces of jewellery. They also took my Mac and its charger... but thankfully left my external hard-drive - which had my backups on it from my Mac - but what was a huge blessing was it also had all of my school assignments on it too...

I was never the girl who got freaked by any noises or got spooked by anything. Having spent many moments being 'surprised' by my Dad and brother, I grew up tough. I was the girl who was strutted around thinking no-one would harm anyone who lived with me - like I was some beefy jillaroo or WWF pro wrestler. Got a spider? I'll fix it. Got a funny noise outside? I'll inspect it. Got a weirdo who keeps stalking you professing his love? I'll get rid of it [him].

I have just survived three weeks on my own, as my housemate was staying at a friends place after she broke her leg and couldn't master the stairs too easily. I had many moments of being spooked while in bed and I would set about checking the house 2 or 3 times a night just to make sure I was really home alone in the house and all the doors and windows locked. If i couldn't handle it, I would turn my fan on and hope that if I was broken into while I was asleep, that they would be quick and leave me alone. There were a few nights when it felt like hours before I found some comfort in sleep... waking up the next day feeling sleep-drunk and exhausted but with no real other place to go to get away from the lack of sleep, I just simply had to be brave and take each day as it came. I got to the point of needing to drink some form of alcohol on a nightly basis just to help me sleep.

The absolute worst thing for me, is - they know what I look like. Sure, stuff is gone, and thanks be to God that no one was home or hurt. But they know what I look like...

Thankfully, my housemate is home now, and I think I've finally had the best nights sleep knowing someone else is here. It makes me mad I feel so vulnerable in my own home, and that I despise coming home to this place now that its been broken into. But I persevere through each day trusting that God has my back and I don't have to fear because He will protect me.

NB: I just discovered its 2 months today that the big break in happened. It really feels like it was just yesterday...