wait

it's astounding how many things i wait for in the course of a day.

i wait:

• in line at starbucks for my americano.
• for my computer {some days more than others}.
• for buses.
• on coworkers.
• for dinner to finish cooking.
• for a friend to call me back.

but of all the things i wait for, usually with at least a semblance of patience, i seldom remember to wait on God.

i say to myself, "the Lord is my portion; therefore i will wait for him." the Lord is good to those whose hope is in him. ~lamentations 3:24-25

nothing else is nearly so important.

one or the other? or can it be both?

i read yesterday that starbucks is doubling it's commitment to purchase fair trade certified coffee. no one would argue that this is a bad thing. according to paul rice, "it will send kids to school, bring clean water to farming communities and enable struggling farmers to put food on the table." {fairtradeusa.org}

this started me thinking about what a Christ-follower's responsibility should be in the stewardship of our world. given that we know that 'the earth is the LORD's, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it..." {psalm 24:1} should we, as followers of the owner not be immensely concerned with what he has left us as guardians over?

conversely, i've heard people say that if the world was more interested in saving people than saving the whales, it would be a better place.

what should a Christ-follower's response be? should it be one or the other... or should it be both?

and where does something like fair trade coffee come into it? it seems that purchasing fair trade coffee would be the best of both worlds for someone who is concerned with both the globe and the individual souls in it.

what do you think?

doneness

it's too easy to forget that we humans are not like cakes. yes, we may have layers, but there is no one point in our lives when we are definitively done. technically, we never actually arrive, at least not on this side of eternity.

there are moments when i cannot decide whether this is the good or the bad news...

fairy tales...

i was rereading mark batterson's wild goose chase for tonight's small group on my way to work this morning, the chapter about coming out of the cage of failure. he talks about God's ability to turn the tragedies we face into fairy tales.

and, of course, it happened to remind me of one of my favorite chesterton quotes:

"fairy tales are more than true; not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten."

add to this, mark batterson's word from WGC,

"if you feel like you're stuck in a tragedy, here's my advice: give Jesus complete editorial control over your life. you have to quit trying to write your own story. and you need to accept Jesus not only as Lord and Savior but also as Author. if you allow him to begin writing his-story through your life, it'll give the tragedy a fairy-tale ending. i'm not promising a life without heartache or pain or loss, but i am promising a different ending." {page125}

and if you really want a trip, add to this donald miller's let story guide you, and you've got enough food for thought and growth to keep you busy for at least the rest of the year!

it's been a week...

i've said it before that i am not a TGIF kind of girl, but i have to say that tonight, i am so intensely grateful that it is friday!

it has been a week. nothing horrible or great, just a whole lot of stuff has been packed into these few days.

small groups on sunday & monday nights. a million loads of laundry on tuesday. meeting at PORTICO on wednesday. a long commute home last night, and a SUPER long commute home tonight. i am tired, cold and hungry.

i cannot even think about sunday right now. sunday is filled with church and meetings and photo shoots and who knows what else, but what i can think about, is tomorrow. saturday.

ah, saturday. tomorrow, i will write {sadly, for the first time this week}. tomorrow i will clean my sad, neglected home, and put the laundry i did on tuesday night away. tomorrow i will read, and not feel guilty.

tonight? tonight i feel the extreme need to curl up on my sofa, watch a few episodes of the gilmore girls, and eat pizza, which i will make momentarily. not the most exciting of friday nights, but after this week, and especially this afternoon, it is vital.

perhaps tomorrow i will actually have something to write about!

happy birthday daddy!

today, my father turns 66. i haven't called him yet, but given the fact that it's only 4:38am in alberta, i think a birthday call now would be a bit unkind.

i love my dad. i love that i have inherited his sense of humor, and his sense of the ridiculous. i love that all of the truly funny moments in my life have had something to do with him. {"why did we have kids?" "and why four?" "hhgghggugggh?" [you had to be there, either when it originally happened, or on any of the many recreations of that moment that my brothers & i have had!]} i love that i grew up thinking that my dad knew everything, and that after a brief stint as a teenager, i am now okay to concede that he's a whole lot smarter than me.

i love the example he set as to how to love his wife. i love that together, as a team, he and i cannot win a game of pictionary to save our lives. i love that sometimes, when he gets angry, he yells in a french accent {that isn't there otherwise}. speaking of french, i love that he has endured my mother's deliberate butchering of his native language throughout the years. i love that he shared his passion to travel and experience the world with me. i love watching him with his grandchildren, who adore him. i love that he loves Jesus.

joyeux anniversaire, daddy! have a brilliant day!

love,

your favorite daughter

brilliance

my sister-in-law is a freaking genius.

the second picture shows cupcakes that she made for my dad's birthday...yes, cupcakes....not spaghetti!

loralie, once again, you amaze me!

just anyone...

we talked about grace in small group tonight, and the general consensus is that grace is not something that is easily understood or accepted...mostly because our finite, limited, human minds just don't get it.

i want to be someone who doesn't allow what i don't understand to keep me from obedience, or becoming who it is i am to become. being limited by my own understanding seems a terribly prosaic way to live... and too much like something that just anyone can do.

and i really hate the thought of being just anyone...

strange sort of envy

erynne, nichole, joash & i just finished watching the movie ratatouille.

how strange that i could envy an animated rat, simply because he lives in paris... and i do not.

sigh...

to give thanks...

...for scarves, and the weather to wear them.

...for turkey and prime rib dinners, and the friends who invited me to share them.

...for my family, who while knowing and {relatively} understanding me, still choose to love me.

...for bath & body works' sweet cinnamon pumpkin.

...for the fact that we've made it this far into a year that has been so hard.

...for books, and their authors, and the places they take me to, geographically, spiritually and emotionally.

...that even though i always want to be somewhere else, i know exactly where that somewhere else is. {11 rue des ecoles, paris, france, 75005}

...for a friend, who even though her own thanksgiving day is still two months away, wished me a 'happy thanksgiving.'

...for black & white toile.

...for coffee and creme brulee {together or separately}.

...for all that is unsettled within me, and how it reminds me that this is not my final destination, and to not get too comfortable here.

feeling the love...

i just got off of the phone with my brother derek, whose sole purpose in calling was to let me know that my michigan wolverines got beaten today by toledo. yes, toledo ohio.

ick.

pouring lemon juice in a paper cut may have been less painful.

dichotomy

it's lunchtime.

i'm sitting at my desk eating some tasteless frozen entree thing, while reading a book called paris in mind. the chapter i am reading? it's called paris' haute chocolaterie. and yes, it is about chocolate. and paris. and chocolate in paris.

does anyone else see something terribly, terribly wrong here?

a brioche doree chocolate banana tart, taken {and eaten} in paris in april. *sigh*

it's beginning to look a lot like...

i have a job that, at least to a certain extent, requires me to live in the future. case in point, here i am, a week before thanksgiving, and the thing that i have thought most about, and worked most on today, has been christmas.

while i love christmas, and thinking about the yuletide season can hardly be construed as a hardship, for a girl who struggles with contentment, this 'living in the future' can be challenging. and on the eve of {canadian} thanksgiving, i suppose it is a good thing to remind myself that as fleeting as contentment can be, it must be sought.

being thankful for what i have in this present moment. not wanting to be anywhere else {including paris, when i always want to be in paris}. trusting that God will provide all my needs, and that when my wants happen to get met, it is a great blessing.

it always bugged me when the apostle paul said, in philippians 4, "I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation..." but he never shares what that secret is! i've always thought that it would have been so much better if he could have shared his secret, laid out three steps to contentment. for years i was ticked off by this passage. i felt like paul was holding out on me, keeping the secret i so desperately needed just out of reach.

but while the three easy steps to contentment may not be a reality, a glimpse of the 'secret' is found at the end of that paragraph, when paul says, "I can do everything through him who gives me strength." which is such a good thing, because i have tried to be content in my own strength, and have failed miserably, many times over.

and because my good friend g.k. chesterton couldn't let me down, here is what he has to say on the subject:

"true contentment is a thing as active as agriculture. it is the power of getting out of any situation all that there is in it. it is arduous and it is rare."

anyone can be discontent. how i hate the though of being just anyone...

i want my mommy...

what is it about being the least bit sick that can turn a grown woman to a whining child wanting to be taken care of by her mother?

i don't know the answer, but it's where i am tonight...

happy plane friday

this morning, as i waited in streetsville for the first of the buses to bring me to work, i saw nine...yes NINE happy planes taking off from pearson airport. because the sky was so dark, i could see planes from two different runways heading off to their glorious destinations.

so, i spent the rest of my commute figuring out the nine places where i would happily board a plane right now to head off on an adventure to. these are in no particular order (except, of course, for the first one):

1. paris, france
2. new york city
3. romania (especially bucovnia & transylvania)
4. minsk, belarus
5. calgary, alberta
6. the south of france
7. wales/scotland/england
8. poland (especially gdansk, częstochowa and warsaw)
   
9. reykjavik, iceland

where do you want to go?

blank

i've sat here at my computer for almost an hour now, hoping to write something.

during the last 60 minutes i have:

• checked my email.
• thought about going to bed.
• checked out three new blogs.
• thought about cleaning my kitchen.
• looked at the two books sitting on my desk, wishing i were awake enough to read.
• checked my email again.
• thought about going to bed again.
• started writing this.
• made sure i had all the necessary ingredients for a pumpkin pie.
  
• fixed numerous spelling mistakes.

it's been an eventful although not productive hour, but when one is as tired as i seem to be, i don't think there is much hope to actually accomplish anything.

so, i will end this post with voltaire's only too true words:

"one always speaks badly when one has nothing to say."

my dream car

thanks to the good people over at the Paris Marais Newsletter, i have finally found my dream car. it is a prototype of the 1007 model by Peugeot with Louis XVI seats and toile de jouy paint. it's pretty...