Saturday, May 31, 2008
Saturday, January 05, 2008
Well, I Did it again, didn't I?
Yeah, so i didn't keep up with this blog like I'd planned.
anyway.
Go to My website if you like. i'm still working on it, and trying to learn html, xhtml, and css to make it better.
colin
anyway.
Go to My website if you like. i'm still working on it, and trying to learn html, xhtml, and css to make it better.
colin
Saturday, September 08, 2007
As always, time passes
I should try and be a bit more up to date with this thing. but really, it annoys me to no end because i end up writing stupid stuff that no one cares about. i only ever write skin deep things here because i don't know who might stumble upon this little slice of my thoughts.
well screw that.
I also wont go into the details of what has happened since my last post because i dont remember everything that happened. I went to Kenya and it was incredible. I went home to Kentucky (thats still a little weird to say, but its true. My home is now in Kentucky. I've got a drivers license to prove it.) and then some other stuff happened, some of which was cool, some of which might have been less cool. oh yeah. one of the less cool things was the death of my beloved '96 trooper that served me oh so well for close to 6 years. it ran out of oil on June 5th and i was carless (not necessarily CAREless, but maybe.) until July 31st, at which point i entered a new relationship with an '06 Honda Civic Hybrid. Well folks, i think i'm in love.
But enough of that, thats the stuff that always made me sick of this thing. so much explanation, so little introspection. Well now is the era of fewer facts and more heart. I'm putting all of me in this thing, so watch out. Truth is, i may not write again for a good long time. i'm aware of that. i'm just telling you what my intentions and desires are.
Fast forwarding to September 24 - 25th, which i realize is now a bit of rewinding still, but its fast forwarding from where.. or when... or whatever i was talking about before.
September 24 - 25th i went on the Leadership retreat with my church, Quest Community Church. I didn't go in expecting all that much until i actually got there. Now for a bit more preface, my summer was amazing, and i had a lot of fun. but in the middle of it i lost my ties to the community i'm part of at Quest and started to try and do things on my own. I was kindof in a bit of a funk for a bit and was getting sick of it. I talked to my small group leader after i'd been back a while and laid out what all was going on. He told me that i dont need to worry because the God who created life, and the universe, and everything (props if you caught the reference there) is ridiculously in love with me. I knew that, but i didn't KNOW it. I didn't feel it. Now back to leadership retreat.
In the first talk Pete, our pastor, gave, he put forth and image of us being able to curl up in the lap of God anytime and just be loved by him. Bam. That hit home for me. I took it from my head to my heart. now i KNOW it, i really KNOW it.
Then God gave me this word.
"The time for timidity is over."
That might need a little bit of prefacing also. I accepted Jesus into my life February 26, 2006. Despite growing up in the church and in a christian family, i had never made the relationship real. For me it was based on appearance and tasks and head knowledge instead of a real heart connect. And since then i have felt closer to him than ever before, because i was. But i was still a bit distanced from the idea of telling people. sure i would tell people if it came up in conversation, but i wouldn't seek out conversations with people about it.
Right, i forgot an important part. I said that i wasn't expecting anything until the day of the retreat. Well, right before we all went to the first session on friday evening we had a chance to get in to groups and pray. I prayed that God would change me in a instant. I mostly forgot about that prayer until a little later. Dont worry, i'll get back to where i was.
So they did this thing where that had bits of wood with words written on them. Each person gets a word and the idea is that it will have a word for you from God on it. I thought that we were getting a blank piece of wood and would write a word we heard from God on it. Well i was wrong, but didn't see the word I had until the morning of the 25th, after getting it the evening of the 24th.
Want to guess what my word was?
Transformed.
so, i asked him to changed me in an instant, to transform me. He gave me that word to let me know that he had and will. And he did, and is. He's giving me his heart for people. He's taking away the fears i have of sharing with other people. The fact that this is being written is one proof of that, and there are many others that i could tell you about as well, i'm just not going to at the moment because i should be asleep 4 hours ago.
One last thing though. One of the things i heard from God was that i need to surrender my relationship with Rhea up to him because when i'm in control things dont go so well. this is something that i am still grappling with because its hard for me to do. i know that sometimes when you give something to him he'll give it back. Take Abraham for example. God asked him to sacrifice his only son, his son that was miraculously conceived. Abraham was willing to do so and because of his faith, God provided a Ram. Now i'm not exactly looking for an actual ram, but you, same principle. The scary side is that sometimes he asks you to give something up and doesn't give it back.
the thing is, i dont want to lose what i have, but i know that i know that i know that i want what he has for me. it scares me beyond words because i'm in love with her... and thats kind of scary too. Not that Rhea is scary, but... oh you know. All i can do is pray that he'll show me what he has for me and keep climbing with him.
I love you all, and i love you Rhea,
Slightly astonished and unimaginably tired,
Colin
well screw that.
I also wont go into the details of what has happened since my last post because i dont remember everything that happened. I went to Kenya and it was incredible. I went home to Kentucky (thats still a little weird to say, but its true. My home is now in Kentucky. I've got a drivers license to prove it.) and then some other stuff happened, some of which was cool, some of which might have been less cool. oh yeah. one of the less cool things was the death of my beloved '96 trooper that served me oh so well for close to 6 years. it ran out of oil on June 5th and i was carless (not necessarily CAREless, but maybe.) until July 31st, at which point i entered a new relationship with an '06 Honda Civic Hybrid. Well folks, i think i'm in love.
But enough of that, thats the stuff that always made me sick of this thing. so much explanation, so little introspection. Well now is the era of fewer facts and more heart. I'm putting all of me in this thing, so watch out. Truth is, i may not write again for a good long time. i'm aware of that. i'm just telling you what my intentions and desires are.
Fast forwarding to September 24 - 25th, which i realize is now a bit of rewinding still, but its fast forwarding from where.. or when... or whatever i was talking about before.
September 24 - 25th i went on the Leadership retreat with my church, Quest Community Church. I didn't go in expecting all that much until i actually got there. Now for a bit more preface, my summer was amazing, and i had a lot of fun. but in the middle of it i lost my ties to the community i'm part of at Quest and started to try and do things on my own. I was kindof in a bit of a funk for a bit and was getting sick of it. I talked to my small group leader after i'd been back a while and laid out what all was going on. He told me that i dont need to worry because the God who created life, and the universe, and everything (props if you caught the reference there) is ridiculously in love with me. I knew that, but i didn't KNOW it. I didn't feel it. Now back to leadership retreat.
In the first talk Pete, our pastor, gave, he put forth and image of us being able to curl up in the lap of God anytime and just be loved by him. Bam. That hit home for me. I took it from my head to my heart. now i KNOW it, i really KNOW it.
Then God gave me this word.
"The time for timidity is over."
That might need a little bit of prefacing also. I accepted Jesus into my life February 26, 2006. Despite growing up in the church and in a christian family, i had never made the relationship real. For me it was based on appearance and tasks and head knowledge instead of a real heart connect. And since then i have felt closer to him than ever before, because i was. But i was still a bit distanced from the idea of telling people. sure i would tell people if it came up in conversation, but i wouldn't seek out conversations with people about it.
Right, i forgot an important part. I said that i wasn't expecting anything until the day of the retreat. Well, right before we all went to the first session on friday evening we had a chance to get in to groups and pray. I prayed that God would change me in a instant. I mostly forgot about that prayer until a little later. Dont worry, i'll get back to where i was.
So they did this thing where that had bits of wood with words written on them. Each person gets a word and the idea is that it will have a word for you from God on it. I thought that we were getting a blank piece of wood and would write a word we heard from God on it. Well i was wrong, but didn't see the word I had until the morning of the 25th, after getting it the evening of the 24th.
Want to guess what my word was?
Transformed.
so, i asked him to changed me in an instant, to transform me. He gave me that word to let me know that he had and will. And he did, and is. He's giving me his heart for people. He's taking away the fears i have of sharing with other people. The fact that this is being written is one proof of that, and there are many others that i could tell you about as well, i'm just not going to at the moment because i should be asleep 4 hours ago.
One last thing though. One of the things i heard from God was that i need to surrender my relationship with Rhea up to him because when i'm in control things dont go so well. this is something that i am still grappling with because its hard for me to do. i know that sometimes when you give something to him he'll give it back. Take Abraham for example. God asked him to sacrifice his only son, his son that was miraculously conceived. Abraham was willing to do so and because of his faith, God provided a Ram. Now i'm not exactly looking for an actual ram, but you, same principle. The scary side is that sometimes he asks you to give something up and doesn't give it back.
the thing is, i dont want to lose what i have, but i know that i know that i know that i want what he has for me. it scares me beyond words because i'm in love with her... and thats kind of scary too. Not that Rhea is scary, but... oh you know. All i can do is pray that he'll show me what he has for me and keep climbing with him.
I love you all, and i love you Rhea,
Slightly astonished and unimaginably tired,
Colin
Wednesday, April 25, 2007
They're after me!
But really, this country is so easily prone to paranoia. and do you want to know why? the media. our news organizations focus on all the bad news, the murders and shootings, the car chases and the psychos. do you know why they focus on those things? It makes for good television. it sells. We watch it. We eat it all up. and what does it do to us? Let me ask you a question. do you know your neighbor? maybe you know a few of your neighbors, but are you suspicious of all the rest? Do you lock your door at night? if you didn't suspect your neighbors you wouldn't lock your door would you? The media is one of the main reasons you might have that view. in the past few years murders have been down 20%. media coverage of murders has since gone down as well. no wait, it went up 300%. They have turned fear and paranoia into an industry, forcing you into a state of terror and suspicion of everyone so you will go out and buy locks and buy security systems for your house and buy gas masks and guns so you can be comfortable and safe, voluntarily caged in in your own home, watching television that is furthering your views. turn off the tv people, really, its just scaring you into submission. get outside and enjoy nature, go plant some trees or something. geez.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
Movin' On Up!
No i'm not talking about the Jeffersons. I'm talking about me. I'm moving on up. Well really its moving down since i'm on the third floor now and i'll be on the ground floor soon. and not the ground floor of the dorm. more like the ground floor of a duplex aparement. uh huh. i'm getting an apartment. No more community hours (read: curfew), no more crappy kitchen, no more filtered internet, no more very few tv channels (maybe). mmhmmmm.
granted, we dont have said apartment yet, but we should tomorrow, hopefully. its avaliable and all, so i dont see why it wont work out.
the prospect of having more room to keep all my schtuff is very very appealing. this whole two-people-in-one-small-room deal is getting to me. not that i dont like sam. i like you sam, its not that. i like sam. but the amount of things i have (which i'm working on narrowing down) doesn't mix well with the amount of things he has when combined in this little space.
and in the middle of getting this apartment i also have to finish this semester as strong as possible. not a fun undertaking, but a necessary one. and to top it all off, i leave on may 6th, just before finals week. so i have to take my finals early. and finish off all the other work. and move in to my new apartment. and remember to breath and eat and all.
if anyone reads this and wants to buy me appliances for my new apartment, feel free. though no repeats. i only need one of each necessary appliance please. and thank you.
granted, we dont have said apartment yet, but we should tomorrow, hopefully. its avaliable and all, so i dont see why it wont work out.
the prospect of having more room to keep all my schtuff is very very appealing. this whole two-people-in-one-small-room deal is getting to me. not that i dont like sam. i like you sam, its not that. i like sam. but the amount of things i have (which i'm working on narrowing down) doesn't mix well with the amount of things he has when combined in this little space.
and in the middle of getting this apartment i also have to finish this semester as strong as possible. not a fun undertaking, but a necessary one. and to top it all off, i leave on may 6th, just before finals week. so i have to take my finals early. and finish off all the other work. and move in to my new apartment. and remember to breath and eat and all.
if anyone reads this and wants to buy me appliances for my new apartment, feel free. though no repeats. i only need one of each necessary appliance please. and thank you.
Tuesday, March 06, 2007
sometimes one must flee
do you ever get restless and feel like you have to just run away?
i do.
i just re-arranged my room here in the dorm. it took several hours to complete, but the outcome is quite quite nice. its so very open compared to what it was before. and now i'm sitting at my desk wanting to go somewhere else. sometimes i feel this way when i just want to veg out and play a video game. but i was just doing that and i still feel like going away. its just that point in the semester when i start to lose focus and long to wander about without any responsibilities. but that wont happen. even as i'm writing this i'm growing weary of writing it because it still involves me sitting at my desk.
and thats all i have for now
i do.
i just re-arranged my room here in the dorm. it took several hours to complete, but the outcome is quite quite nice. its so very open compared to what it was before. and now i'm sitting at my desk wanting to go somewhere else. sometimes i feel this way when i just want to veg out and play a video game. but i was just doing that and i still feel like going away. its just that point in the semester when i start to lose focus and long to wander about without any responsibilities. but that wont happen. even as i'm writing this i'm growing weary of writing it because it still involves me sitting at my desk.
and thats all i have for now
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
Let Me Dust Things off a bit
you might notice that not everything is capitalized in the title. i dont care. i also missed an apostrophe in dont (there i did it again) and i didn't capitalize i at all. ever.
thats not what i was wanting to say. what i was going to say is that i've been meaning to update this place but haven't gotten around to it lately. i've had some thoughts and read some things that i thought would be fun to share with you, oh devoted reader of mine. or casual reader, whoever you may be.
it has just dawned on me that in two to four days i should be getting word of whether or not i won the 27th Annual College Photography Contest. i am currently a finalist in the contest. its exciting for me.
speaking of things photographic in nature, i'm having bad luck with cameras. my nice little nikon fm-10 bit the dust a few weeks back and just a few days ago my wonderful Tamron 28-70 f2.8 nikor lens went the way of the buffalo. it has since been shipped off to the manufacturer for repairs leaving me with a much lower quality 28-90 f3.5 lens to use in the mean time.
i've been thinking a lot about the environment. not only about how i long to be in it more, but also about how i long to do things with preservation in mind. we had a chapel speaker some weeks ago who spoke on his integration of environmentalist thought into the christian faith. while he was not the best public speaker i have ever heard, his point was well taken. as followers of christ we are to be good stewards of everything he entrusts to us, be it our money, children, time, but especially the environment. some of his point were a bit simplistic and reductive, say things like," My lord died on a tree," and many other references to jesus liking trees. thats not to say that these points are not valid, but they seemed to me to be a weak and repetitive argument for his cause.
in order to do my part for this cause i will soon be getting a hybrid vehicle. now, i know it still uses fossil fuels but it is easily converted to pure electric and is at least a good interim solution. I am considering the Mercury Mariner Hybrid and the Toyota Highlander Hybrid, leaning more towards the Mercury for its better visual styling and lower base price. These vehicles get roughly 33 miles per gallon, easily trouncing my old, but beloved, blue isuzu trooper, which gets 15 to 20. 20 more on interstate driving. generally highway driving ends up being closer 15 mpg.
you might notice that it is 2:55 am. i just did. goodnight. morning. peace
thats not what i was wanting to say. what i was going to say is that i've been meaning to update this place but haven't gotten around to it lately. i've had some thoughts and read some things that i thought would be fun to share with you, oh devoted reader of mine. or casual reader, whoever you may be.
it has just dawned on me that in two to four days i should be getting word of whether or not i won the 27th Annual College Photography Contest. i am currently a finalist in the contest. its exciting for me.
speaking of things photographic in nature, i'm having bad luck with cameras. my nice little nikon fm-10 bit the dust a few weeks back and just a few days ago my wonderful Tamron 28-70 f2.8 nikor lens went the way of the buffalo. it has since been shipped off to the manufacturer for repairs leaving me with a much lower quality 28-90 f3.5 lens to use in the mean time.
i've been thinking a lot about the environment. not only about how i long to be in it more, but also about how i long to do things with preservation in mind. we had a chapel speaker some weeks ago who spoke on his integration of environmentalist thought into the christian faith. while he was not the best public speaker i have ever heard, his point was well taken. as followers of christ we are to be good stewards of everything he entrusts to us, be it our money, children, time, but especially the environment. some of his point were a bit simplistic and reductive, say things like," My lord died on a tree," and many other references to jesus liking trees. thats not to say that these points are not valid, but they seemed to me to be a weak and repetitive argument for his cause.
in order to do my part for this cause i will soon be getting a hybrid vehicle. now, i know it still uses fossil fuels but it is easily converted to pure electric and is at least a good interim solution. I am considering the Mercury Mariner Hybrid and the Toyota Highlander Hybrid, leaning more towards the Mercury for its better visual styling and lower base price. These vehicles get roughly 33 miles per gallon, easily trouncing my old, but beloved, blue isuzu trooper, which gets 15 to 20. 20 more on interstate driving. generally highway driving ends up being closer 15 mpg.
you might notice that it is 2:55 am. i just did. goodnight. morning. peace
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