spain, january, spring...what a time.

I found myself in my home in California...wanting something else. Wanting to be in Grand Rapids, Michigan. At that moment I had realized that I had fallen in love with the place. I didn't know that a single semester could change my experience there. I always kind of dreaded going to Grand Rapids when I was home. It was a place that just seemed so foreign to me, I felt so out of place there. My clothes were different and how I felt about certain topics were different as well.

This year Spain changed me into an entirely different person...and then Spring semester at Calvin changed me again. I met amazing people and I also developed better relationships with former friends. My mind and my body were busy with school, work, and people. I was distracted by chaos back home and things that surrounded me. The distraction made it possible for me to deal with things far better than I ever have. It amazed me how I felt pain differently. I felt it in bits instead of all at once like I usually do.

I look at my grades from this past semester. I have done far better. I know I have done better. Though I don't see bad grades. I see lessons that I learned that semester. I see relationships that I needed to nurture. I see myself dealing with things. I know that teachers don't see that and grad schools also don't see that. But I do and so do my friends. I'm not huge on the way grading functions. I don't agree with it and it really only works for certain kinds of people. I can study my brains out or at least try and I can never get more than an B. You know I'm fine with that because I know I do better verbally then on paper.

I try my best to wake up with a happy face because I see nothing for me here right now. I'm eager to get back because I found this love between friends that rare. I hold on to that. Life has thrown me so many curves and pushes. When you find something so great after feeling alone for so long...its as if you struck oil. Worrying about bills of every kind isn't an issue. I had some tough days during the past year...but as I look back...I had far more better days then bad.

I owe it to God...as much as I don't want to. I've never been mad at Him before. When my mom died I was upset with Him, not mad. When issues came up with my brother...I was again upset not mad. This semester I became silent with God. I didn't know how to talk to him anymore. The more I became silent the more I realized how angry I have been at Him. As I distanced myself from Him...he started moving in ways that I can only see now.

He opened my best friends heart when I needed her to just be her. He moved into my friend Marie's heart and showed me things that were incredible. As newer and former people started to move into my group of friends...I realized that were my mirrors. I finally saw qualities in myself that I didn't know I had. I grew a confidence in myself that I have never had. Life really evolved for me in a way that I wasn't expecting.

This year I felt like I added a few years to my age. I feel so much older now. I may not act like sometimes but when it comes to something serious...I feel older.

From my mistakes to my friend's mistakes...I have grown. I have grown with them and by myself. I have sought out what I want from life for now. My relationship with God is different now as well. I see him different then I have ever seen him before. I might be a bit distant from him...but I haven't found a way to get closer again.

lets see what this summer holds, shall we?

I Will Never Forget Your Faces

For a few days now my heart has been full. I'm not saying it has been entirely content but it has been full with mixed emotions. I saw my friends graduate Yesterday and I have never been so proud of them. I looked at them and saw growth in their eyes. I saw the overwhelming feeling of life in their expressions...I saw hard work and endurance. From that day I see them as older or maybe even more mature. They completed something that only a select few get to complete.
And then I realized that I may not see some of them again...My heart was mixed with feelings of congratulations and wanting to hold on to the past. Never have I felt the wanting to be in Grand Rapids until this past month.
I'm not sure what to do with that.

As graduation week happened and families came in and out of our house...I suddenly missed my family. Not for what it is but for what it was. When it was dysfunctional but my mom was still breathing. My housemates' moms where cleaning and living in our home for a bit. I enjoyed so much but it also ached my heart. That when I graduate from college it will only be my family with out my mom. The one who is suppose to do my hair and go dress shopping with me. The one who is suppose to come into my home in Grand Rapids and clean because she is bored.

Life has changed and life will continue on changing. I will continue to grow into my new life and the people that surround me. I will stop and listen to the pain in my heart when I meet a close friend's mom...then I will move on and smile. Smile for all the times I had my mom and smile because they still have their mom.

In a weeks time I will head home to a place where people know me differently and see me as someone else. There I will try to grow again before coming back to Grand Rapids. I will miss my friends here so much. This year has been something. I was in Spain for 4 months...and then I was here for another 5 months. For some reason my heart this year is so attached to them. I never feel the need to be silent around them or to push away distraught feelings. They have never made me feel like a failure or an incomplete thought.

God has been distant this year or maybe I have been distant this year from Him. This year I have saw Him in a different light. I saw God work through other's pain. I saw where He put me and where He needed me to be. Though through it all I didn't quite call upon His name...I flowed with the directions that opened up. This past year it has been hard for me to attend church. For one reason I work mostly on Sundays...for another I feel as though the community isn't fulfilling. I have been in more secular places lately that have been way more accepting and friendly.  I have seen more caring hearts this year...

I think it was very important for me to distance myself from church for a bit. To see what problems exist inside of it. To know that just because it is trying to teach something that is holy and perfect, doesn't mean that the church inside and out is holy and perfect. Flaws are in the people and in the human endeavors.

This year has taught me more than I thought it would. This year I felt lonely but I felt comforted more than any other time in the last 4 or so years. I met people that I never want to forget and I came so close to people that I have been wanting to for so long. I may long for my Mom more than I even know and I may feel discomfort around other moms but I know where my comfort lies.

I will never forget your faces.

When all seems like shit...remember simplicity.

Today or actually right now, will most likely be my only time to write. So I will. I will write even if I already wrote two blogs not so long ago.

Right now I live in a world that tries to be everything. It strives to be interesting, exciting, simplistic, cutting edge, calm, relaxing, "in", and everything in between. Then when the individual is looked at...it changes to some extent. The in between really isn't fun. It is the days where you are lonely, depressed, longing for something, and then you proceed to wait as you hang on. It is the time in the day where you look around and see that it is just you. No one can hear your thoughts and some of the thoughts are even terrifying to yourself. 

The thing is, when moments arise where you actually feel comfortable to express yourself...you seize it. You grab hold of the moment where all your emotions are on the table and you know no one will judge you. Tears stream down your face for several reasons. Its been so long since you have expressed this. It actually feels good to cry. Even if you tried not to cry...you are going to cry. Holding it back is like holding the water back when it was rushing in the Titanic. The water couldn't of been stopped. It was simply inevitable that it was going to sink. 

We live in a day as college students that everything is simply terrifying. We must do good once we get into college. After college it is a blood bath of getting the job. Trying so hard to just have your gifts appreciated. There isn't a day that goes by that isn't stressful once you get to the end. 

Though as the tears fall and it seems hopeless to move on...remember this. Remember that the people around you are going through something similar. That we are all screwed up. The idea of looking at someone as if they have everything put together is wrong. You aren't in their head. Your worst enemy is yourself. You're thoughts can control you to any extreme. When they excel, they can't be stopped. 

Today I went into my school's coffee shop. I was looking for a friend. I saw another one of my friends cleaning the expresso machines. I walked up to her and just looked at her awhile before she saw me. She has been through so much this semester. I wanted to just hug her so bad. I saw her face and their was light. I haven't seen the light in her face for months. I remembered everything that she has been going through for the past few months. My heart was filled. 

We act as though the world is crashing and the floor beneath our feet is crumbling. And sometimes it really is. We feel has though we have failed completely. Our hearts are forever alone because of how many other hearts we have failed...including our own. But and yes there is a 'but'. As complex and distorted life can get...simplicity is all we have at the end of the day. A friend making us a meal, a smile from a once broken heart, a hand that gently reaches over and holds your's, your favorite song that just keeps on replaying, an embrace that seems too good to pass up, a joke that is too crude for your parents to see, and the list goes on. The list is far bigger than the list you can come with...that is full of bad things. 

When all seems like shit...remember simplicity. God is in simplicity...believe it or not. When my mom passed away, all I held onto was the simplistic things in life. 

What is Life but a ramble of events.

Life...what it brings and what it takes away. The end is near. I can almost maybe see the light at the end of the tunnel. We all crowd around our little or big computers, typing away or I mean trying to. Pinterest and classic sites like Facebook haunt us with procrastination as our papers or tests await us.

I'm entirely sad about leaving my family in the midwest. I made a home in people's hearts and I have to step away for 3 months. Though some I will never see again. I write so much about friends or my family. I know this but I can't seem to tear away from love, hatred, fears, excitements, and etc. Its hard to pull away from something that is at a constant thought...it is as if it brews in my head until I rest in my bed. It is entirely consuming and almost daunting. I'm very much an introvert...I find rest in being by myself or sitting in a room with a very close friend and not talking for hours. I thrive on this because it drives me through the rest of my day.

There are moments in my day where a thought of my mom pops in my head. Mother's day is approaching and it made me think; I have changed so much in the past 8 months. I have been to another country and rested my head in another family's home. I turned 21. I figured out a flexible plan for myself as senior year is coming faster than ever. I have had relationships with people that came and went. I thought I met my next boyfriend but was left broken hearted. I fought for justice in my family and also left things alone. I became an adult...I suppose.

I have heard the name mom so many times in the past 3 days...I don't think I have enough fingers and toes to count.

When I go home...I'm afraid I will be too different for everyone. I think I have changed in being more honest and up front with my feelings...I feel I have changed from being less innocent in my maturity.

As I try and imagine my friends in different areas of the world or US, I get angry. But with whom? Them? Never. God? no...Then what? I get angry with life and the cycle of it. The on going pulls and pushes. the pulls with friends and pushes...the embraces that seem to not last long enough. The way I wish I could bask in the sun when it is hot...I wish I could bask in energy of my friends. I'm starting to just ramble but what is life but a ramble of events.