Taming the Tongue is like Wrestling a Python sometimes...

Have you ever wrestled a fierce animal before? Me neither. I wonder how the animals feel when geeky guys from the discovery show come and fish around in the water trying to find them. They end up waking them up only to be blinded by camera lights, and then they take them out of their comfortable homes. I'd be a little aggressive as well! In a round about way, wrestling with an exotic animal is like wrestling with our tongues. Can it be done? Can we tame them?

Have you ever wanted to talk about someone indirectly? Of course, not in a gossipy way, but you just felt the urge to share your angst with someone else or your curiosity as to someone else's behavior? Me, I have been feeling this way on and off lately. If you aren't careful - geesh! Gossip can sneak in and flog you for all you are worth - you leave a conversation feeling beaten down and worthless. Plus - think about the other side too! Gossip isn't like a back massage! When I have overheard gossip about me in the past, I've wanted to karate chop their face or something! I dunno. My thoughts are this: gossip is a far too dangerous coil to get wrapped up in - satan is too sneaky - it is too dangerous to even scratch the surface. So, until I learn to confide all my feelings totally and utterly unto His ears, my heart with possess this angst. I pray that God will help me to -completely- place my trust in his compantionship. I may not be able to wrestle my bad habits in controlling my tongue, but I know the One who can.

Night, friends.

Memories with Coffee...
I have quite a few memories tied in with the smell of coffee. Not a plethura - oo, I love that word - but some pretty amusing ones. For example, when I smell coffee, I think of mornings in our kitchen at home when I would come out in my socks and pajamas - into our sun streaked kitchen where my parents were. Or, the smell of coffee makes me think back to my high school biology teacher. He smoked cigars and to conceal the truth, would cover the smell with a thick coffee cologne. Or...upon entering our church foyer, the smell of coffee hangs in the air - invading my nostrils ever so wonderfully...ahhh...I love coffee.

Have you ever been sitting in an auditorium or classroom and someone begins to sing - the melody is so smooth - their voice so sultry - that it simply lifts you as if you were no heavier than a feather? In the midst of chords and beautiful tones, you find yourself floating above the earth - with nothing but your heart and its wings. Haha...what a dreamer I am.

Just something to chew on today...

(as fall has arrived and winter is quickly pursuing us)

Both optimists and pessimists contribute to our society.

The optimist invents the airplane and the pessimist the parachute. ~Gil Stern

A pessimist sees only the dark side of the clouds, and mopes; a philosopher sees both sides, and shrugs; an optimist doesn't see the clouds at all - he's walking on them.

~Leonard Louis Levinson

A pessimist is one who makes difficulties of his opportunities

and an optimist is one who makes opportunities of his difficulties. ~Harry Truman

This is a bit from a paper I wrote - an introduction that didn't work for the paper. I have a lot of little bits like this - things that I have written for papers that never worked. I have a hard time scrapping something that I wrote that I like, but can't use for any particular piece.

Imagine yourself on a day like this: the sky hovers lowly about the earth. It brings a heaviness that dulls the senses. A languid breeze endeavors to reach the edges of the lace woven into your mother’s curtains. In the distance, you hear the rumbling of a storm that is to come. It is a fate that you know is approaching and cannot stop. With one quick movement, you are off your toes, headed for the inn table. You search for it, grasping for its pages. Once in the deep jungles of the adventure, it’s like you glance up and see the sun about its business once again, not feeling the raindrops on your skin or seeing the lightning shred the ebony wallpaper of the sky. You then glance at the antique clock on the mantel, and realize that you have not sat there for minutes, but hours. Deep within the pages of a novel, you can have any adventure that suits your fancy, and remain protected by an invisible cloak of reality. Your mind can take you places you want to go, but are too afraid to go; it can take you on journeys that would weaken your legs, but strengthen the character of your heart. In the pages of a novel, you can finally stand up to the bully, find your voice, or take the first step. In the pages of a novel, you can find yourself - who you really are – the good, the bad, and the ugly – and you can change. Reading a novel can motivate your reality – your feet – to walk on the path less traveled. It sounds great, right? But in reality – these types of adventures are grasped only by those that are able to see, to understand, to know. For them, reading is behind the eyes – it is alive – it is of worth. Shouldn’t these adventures be for everyone?
Teaching ESL without reading is like trying to ride a bicycle without wheels. You cannot even sit on the bicycle. In fact, trying to learn any language without the four foundational disciplines, reading, writing, speaking, and listening, you will be of little success.

I am learning that there is much to be celebrated in the single life. For such a long time, I felt that there was nothing else to life - go to school, get married, and thats life. Over the past few years, the Lord has manifested in me something new and freeing. There are definitely times in between where my heart has longed for that attachment to someone. However, what a life one could live if its master was only God! How I wish to be content all the time - a simple rest. I want a restful heart. It makes me feel bad for I know that I can be as a tossed wave at times - not giving God enough time to be intimate with me - so that I can hear His voice in regards to relationships. He wants fruitfull relationships for me - not ones that are hurtful.

thoughts for now...

Without a pen I feel naked, but it's writing that is my exhibitionism. ~Carrie Latet

Writing is a way of talking without being interrupted. ~Jules Renard, Journal, 10 April 1895

Writing is both mask and unveiling. ~E.B. White

Write your first draft with your heart. Re-write with your head. ~From the movie Finding Forrester

If I'm trying to sleep, the ideas won't stop. If I'm trying to write, there appears a barren nothingness. ~Carrie Latet

You write to communicate to the hearts and minds of others what's burning inside you. And we edit to let the fire show through the smoke. ~Arthur Polotnik

Writers are not just people who sit down and write. They hazard themselves. Every time you compose a book your composition of yourself is at stake. ~E.L. Doctorow

Ink on paper is as beautiful to me as flowers on the mountains; God composes, why shouldn't we? ~Audra Foveo-Alba

Write down the thoughts of the moment. Those that come unsought for are commonly the most valuable. ~Francis Bacon

Fill your paper with the breathings of your heart. ~William Wordsworth

There is definitley one thing you should know about me. I love to write. If I had all the free time in the world and there were thesauruses at my disposal 24/7, I would be writing. I love ideas and word pictures, metaphors, analogies, and similies. I love connecting with the world in different ways. Above are some of the quotes that I have found that simply delighted my little literary heart.

Things that get me excited: well-written pieces of work, new words that I discover, and coffee.