I can hear the cicadas.

Wendell Berry - 2005, X

Mowing the hillside pasture--where
the flowers of Queen Anne's lace

float above the grass, the milkweeds
flare and bee balm, cut, spices

the air; the butterflies light and fly
from bloom to bloom, the hot

sun dazes the sky, the woodthrushes
sound their flutes from the deep shade

of the woods nearby--these iron teeth
chattering along the slope astound

the vole in her low run and bring down
the field sparrow's nest cunningly hung

between two stems, the young long flown.
The mower moves between the beauty

of the half-wild growth and the beauty
of growth reduced, smooth as a lawn,

revealing again the slope shaped of old
by the wearing of water and, later, the wear

of human will, hoof and share and wheel
hastening the rain's work, so that the shape

revealed is the shape of wounds healed,
covered with grass and clover and blesséd

flowers. The mower's work too is beautiful,
granting rest and health to his mind.

He drives the long traverses of the healed
and healing slant. He sweats and gives thanks.

One Year in LA

O all wide places, far from feverous towns!
Great shining seas! pine forests! mountains wild!
Rock-bosomed shores! rough heaths! and sheep-cropt downs!
Vast pallid clouds! blue spaces undefiled!
Room! give me room! give loneliness and air!
Free things and plenteous in your regions fair.

O God of mountains, stars, and boundless spaces!
O God of freedom and of joyous hearts!
When thy face looketh forth from all men's faces,
There will be room enough in crowded marts;
Brood thou around me, and the noise is o'er;
Thy universe my closet with shut door.

Heart, heart, awake! the love that loveth all
Maketh a deeper calm than Horeb's cave.
God in thee, can his children's folly gall?
Love may be hurt, but shall not love be brave?--
Thy holy silence sinks in dews of balm;
Thou art my solitude, my mountain-calm.

~George MacDonald, from Longing

I came upon this poem shortlybefore moving out here, and it spoke to me through my fears of moving to an urban area. Fears I am still working to overcome, but who isn't a work in progress? I've been here in LA for exactly a year now. Aug 29, 2009 was my first full day in Los Angeles; and also the day I found my home church, Ecclesia, after 10 years of searching for one. I cannot fully express how good God has been to me this past year, although I've been trying to in previous posts. :)

Late Night Thots

I do not love you as if you were a salt rose, or topaz
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
So I love you because I know no other way

than this: where I do not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep.

~Pablo Neruda, Sonnet XVII

i dunno why, but this poem came to mind recently. i haven't read it since college; i always found it so beautiful, but never understood it. it used to call to mind st. john of the cross, and his work "the dark night of the soul." today, i think i understand it, because i think i've come to a place with Christ where i'm beginning to learn what love is. and that final stanza sticks out to me, because that is essentially my prayer as an actor.

[this was hard for me to post.]

File Under: Shameless Self-Promotion

I was in this! It was my first set shoot ever (besides something for YWAM)! The band is Chromeo, a French-Canadian duo who did a song for Yo Gabba Gabba. Real nice guys. My eyes are in the middle at 0:39 & 0:44, then I'm in it again at 2:25. Fun shoot, working for director Keith Schofield. My friend Matt was casting this; he's the dude w/ the golf clubs. :)

http://pitchfork.com/tv/#/musicvideo/6915-chromeo-dont-turn-the-lights-on-atlantic

Of Bike Baskets and McDonald Park

Have you ever had an experience where you’re not sure if you should laugh or cry? The crying would be joyful, of course, because there’s so much emotion welling up inside of you, that it has to spill out somewhere: might as well be tears. Then you realize that the choice itself is funny, and you start laughing like a maniac; everything that caused this is just so wonderful and beautiful that you can’t help but find it funny. You sit there laughing, and then you laugh because you’re laughing, and then you laugh because you’re afraid someone might see you, but who is going to worry about a person who is laughing?

It was one of those evenings.

I’ve been driving around scouting neighborhoods when I get the chance, hoping to find a good place where Laura and I don’t have an awful commute while still feeling relatively safe. Tonight I decided to try Pasadena. I had been there once before, but it was my first time and I was driving…and I was lost. Bad combination for me learning to like a place. From the maps, the commute seemed easy, so decided to try a commute from school to Pasadena on a Friday evening. As I’ve mentioned before I love driving and adventuring, so I find this sort of thing fun.
Took me 40 minutes, and only because I zig-zagged through traffic-light territory for 20 minutes trying to find a good route. Not bad. From google maps at home, I decided my adventure would be to visit a bike shop there, and possibly buy a pair of gloves. It was pretty hilarious to me that I passed 2 bike shops on the way there. I ended up getting lost, and ended up at another bike shop, where both gloves AND baskets were on sale! I got back on the road, and headed in the direction of a neighborhood where Craig’s List was giving a lot of affordable housing results.

I thought it would be dodgy, but it was actually pretty cute. I didn’t get to the exact spot I wanted to see, but I was pretty close. Here’s where it gets funny (to me).

After the bike shop, I was just in a really good mood. I had been driving through a beautiful section of town full of bungalows and victorian mansions. I happened upon that shop by mistake, but just felt really blessed that I had the money to buy the things I wanted to make my life easier. It made me feel happy, and at the same time a little overwhelmed. Who am I that all this comes my way? Who am I that I have all I need, and sometimes am even able to have things I want? I really wanted to have some “Jesus time” in a park (or parking lot), so I asked him if he could lead me to one. He did. A few turns I felt impressed to make even took me past Fuller, and this idea came to me that even though I let go of some passions in my life (see previous post, I had considered Fuller), that doesn’t mean they are gone forever. Not that I’m planning on going there, but it was just a hope that God sees me and knows my needs and wants, and works in my life accordingly to use them to his glory. That makes me happy. :) But I digress (I do that a lot). As I said, I came to a park. A really nice one, in fact. Reminded me of one near my grandparents’ house in Iowa, and made me happy and remembering family. I wished I had my Bible on me, but instead I took my scrap with directions on it an a pen from my purse, and sat down at a picnic table. That’s when I almost started to cry, and then started laughing like a crazy person. It felt good. Not that I haven’t laughed in a while—hanging out with Laura makes my face hurt. This was different, just a lightness and a joy that I really can’t describe. The hilarity of it all…I asked God to show me a park so I could go talk to him and praise him, and he lead me right to one!! I remembered a verse spoken over me a few years ago that I may have brought up already: Isaiah 30:21. “Your own ears will hear him. Right behind you a voice will say, ‘This is the way you should go,’ whether to the right or the left.”

WOW. I think that’s what made me laugh so much, seeing how literal he could be! I hadn’t even thought about that verse until I was sitting at the table and I just busted out. I can’t believe how much God loves me, and wants to reveal himself to me. I need to spend more time in prayer with him, I need more “face time.” For someone I love so much, I don’t seek him out so often. Sure I’m mindful of him throughout the day, but that’s like being in the same room with someone but not talking to them. When Laura’s in the room, I can’t shut up. Sometimes I wish he’d speak to me, but I guess I don’t really wait to listen. He pursues me in so many ways, but I always want more without giving back. Why do I have to be so selfish about it, so needy?

While I was at the table, I wasn't really sure what to say or what to ask for, other than to just keep thanking him for his provision and blessings over and over again. One of the best things I had heard all week was from a friend regarding my apartment, he said "Congratulations on turning a VERY small apartment into a home." That made my heart so happy. My furniture is mostly from the curb and I don't have a "real" kitchen, but I'm glad I can make it comfortable for guests even. Back to the table, I ended up just taking my pen and in the small spaces on the scrap writing the names of God and declaring who he is over my life. I wrote some of it in Greek, and it made me happy that I could draw what I thought was a dead portion of my education in order to praise him. I sucked at Greek, despite how badly I wanted to learn it. One of the many things "I'd like to do" is re-learn it. Seeing Fuller and then just having Greek randomly come out of me again after 7 years was awesome. Just lots of things coming together to speak hope over my life that God has a plan for me and this hodge-podge of education, passions, and interests he's put in me. I still feel selfish for writing that, though, because in all honesty, who AM I that he would sing over me like this!?!?!

(and i want to reiterate that i am NOT planning on going to Fuller, just the sight of it spoke something to me is all!)

I miss storms.

II

Thou on whose stream, 'mid the steep sky's commotion,
Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed,
Shook from the tangled boughs of heaven and ocean,

Angels of rain and lightning! there are spread
On the blue surface of thine airy surge,
Like the bright hair uplifted from the head

Of some fierce Mænad, even from the dim verge
Of the horizon to the zenith's height,
The locks of the approaching storm. Thou dirge

Of the dying year, to which this closing night
Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre,
Vaulted with all thy congregated might

Of vapours, from whose solid atmosphere
Black rain, and fire, and hail, will burst: O hear!

~Shelley, Ode to the West Wind

File Under: Geek

I love this. It's from Terrence Malick's The New World, one of my all-time favorite movies. I think if I get married, I would want this to be my wedding march. :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uW1kIJLzYdE