[H] Truth Thursdays 21: All Things New

I love the sunrise. Sunrises are magical. I love the way the sunbeams spill over the horizon like the moon did a canonball into the sun so all the light splashed out. Sunrises are hope. The night and its dark shadows have left us and the playful warmth of the daylight has come back. We wait for the sun in the despair of the night. When the sun comes, we look around and realize that nothing has changed and everything has changed. The sunrise doesn't change my surroundings, but illuminates it. The ominous forms in the dark suddenly take shape into recognized objects in the light of day. What once seemed foreboding, now becomes familiar. That is the magic of the sunrise.

2013 has come and gone and yet I am still here. I slept through the new year and when I woke up, I didn't feel any different. The scars and smiles and heartbreak, tears, and laughter won and lost in the year hadn't left me. The marks in my heart stayed the same. Every year I change. Every year brings new lives, growth, vegetation in the forest of my mind. A new year doesn't flatten a forest. Years of germination, growing, blooming, dying, pruning, weeding cannot be undone with the countdown of seconds or a moment.

But a new year can be a sunrise. I can see my life in the light of day. I can be unafraid of the things I am unsure of. I am still the same person in the same place, with the same properties. But I can be full of hope. Nothing has changed. But everything is brighter.

Prompt

-H

[D] Truth Thursdays 21: All Things New

Here we go. I've been avoiding writing a New Years post because I'm not quite sure what to write and in the past, I've just never been a FAN of New Years. I used to think of myself as the Grinch of New Years. I just never understood why it was so important to celebrate. Like, it's a new year and the last number of the date changes. But days change... daily. Time changes constantly. Why not celebrate every New Day? or New Hour? Bored in class one time, a classmate and I used to stare at her watch and greet everyone a "Happy New Minute!" but it got boring after the Fifth minute. Anyway, when my siblings and I grew up and realized that being with each others company at home on special occasions proved to be more of a duty than "fun," I suddenly felt the pressure of making New Years a big deal, even if I didn't know why. I'm blaming it on too much TV/movies. As I do about most of my issues. 

I still don't fully understand the whole idea about this holiday, but let me tell you that last year and the past three years have been insane and I'm quite excited to leave it all behind and start All Things New. This is the first time in three years that everything really does feel new, like I'm starting over. Except I'm not starting over, because starting over kinda sounds like I'm about to do everything all over again. I don't want to do the same things over again. It's like the book metaphor that everyone uses: It's like the past three years was a book that just finished, and now I'm starting a whole new book. A lot of new things started last year, but it really didn't feel like a new book. More like a final chapter to a horribly depressing book. So now, 2014 I'm not starting over, I'm starting. 

One of my favorite movies is Disney's Tangled, I just related so much to Rapunzel. Her song, "When will my life begin?" was my theme song up until last year when I realized that my life is now and it's starting. I need to stop waiting for a Prince Charming, a revelation that I am the lost princess. I spent so much of my life WAITING. Waiting to finish High School, waiting to leave for the States, waiting to get my residency, waiting to go to college, waiting to meet friends, waiting to fit in, SO MUCH WAITING. In all that waiting, I was so afraid to open up because everything felt so temporary and unsure. 

But everything that's temporary and uncertain in my life right now is everything that's making me excited about 2014. For so long I had been waiting to finally just find something permanent and stable so I can settle down and make roots. But now my heart is yearning for adventure and I can't imagine staying in one place for too long. I literally have no idea what this year is going to bring and in the past that would have scared me to death, but now I am ready for anything. I'm ready to go anywhere. This world is so huge and I used to be so angry that I was moved from my corner in South East Asia all the way to the other side, but now all I can see are all the places I skipped on my way here. 

In the past years, I entered every new year as a battle to be won. A battle for joy, for Jesus, for myself, for people. And looking back, that's exactly how it felt. I've been through some crazy battles to get to where I am. Now I'm sure I'm still going to have some few battles this year and for years more to come, but this new year is an adventure to be explored. I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN THIS YEAR. But I know I want to travel, I want to see new things, do new things, love new people. 

"I have no idea what my future holds, but I know who holds my future." 

"Forget the former things;
do not dwell on the past.
See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
and streams in the wasteland."  

- Isaiah 43:18-19

- D

[D] Thoughts on The Fault In Our Stars by a Healthy, Not-In-Love, Twenty-Two Year-Old Girl

[Warning: Spoilers]

Just a few months after the book came out in 2012, a friend from back home recommended John Green's The Fault In Our Stars to me. I was twenty; not exactly a teenager anymore, but also not exactly not a teenager either. It was my 1st year anniversary in The United States, and 2011 was most depressing; not having friends or siblings around. So I read the book, the beginning of Summer of 2012, I was neither sick, nor in love. But I read the book in a day, it was so easy. Like reading a diary; my diary. After I had read the book, my friend told me that he recommended me the book because he thought Hazel talked a lot like me. Which kind of scared me, that a grown man (John Green) was so good at talking like me. Except like, Hazel was a lot smarter and deeper than me. So I read the book and cried the ugly cry. I hated the book for making me feel unnecessarily sad. I was just getting over the end of Harry Potter, now this book? I HATE SAD THINGS THAT MAKE ME SAD. Life is sad enough, I read and watch to escape sadness. I had to keep reminding myself, "I am not Hazel Grace Lancaster. I have healthy, liquid-free lungs. I am not in love. Augustus Waters is not real. This is fiction." It took me a long time to get over that. So when I heard they were coming out with a movie, I was highly reluctant. Because A. I don't think I can go through all that again. B. Augustus Waters. But I bought the book recently to give to a friend, and I ended up reading through it all night with an upset stomach from a stupid post-Thanksgiving non-vegetarian dinner. I really wasn't intending to read through the entire book again, which helped me distance myself from becoming Hazel Grace Lancaster. I have this problem, hopefully other people can relate. Because so far, none of the people I've talked to, have said they are the same way. Empathy is one my strongest suits, when I read a book, watch a movie, I get too into it and I become the character. I would be a horrible actor because I'd be one of those people who would confuse real life with their on screen/stage lives. When movies are too real, I have to stop watching. I feel too much, is that possible? I've never read The Hunger Games because I don't want to be Katniss.

Thoughts and Feelings:
1. "I'm like. Like. I'm like a grenade."
I have never been in a real romantic relationship. I have never had anyone call me their girlfriend, and I've never had anyone to call my boyfriend. There have been guys, prospective guys who I liked and some who liked me back. I've never kissed a guy. I'm healthy, unlike Hazel. I am not that socially inept - actually, I'm really good at pretending to be socially 'ept'-. But Hazel's words. When read them the first time, it was like entire life summed up in one sentence. Which leads to

2. Augustus Waters
I don't even. I can't even. First of all, where can I find hot intellectual and charming non douchey pants men like him? Second of all, it occurs to my mind often that it seems like my entire life story is about this never ending journey to that moment where I fall in love. I thought I was in love once. This time last year. I thought I found him, he was perfect. Tortured, intellectual, good-looking. But I had to move to Seattle and he hooked up with my best friend. --

3. Caroline Mathers
- I don't want to be Caroline Mathers. I don't want that heart break to be my story. I don't want my disease to unlove be who I am.

4. "Pain demands to be felt."
Agh gah ugh. Ugh. ""But something in their iron robot hearts will yearn to have lived and died as we did: on a hero's errand." I wrote this song, when I thought I was in love. It was about how I wish I was a robot because I didn't want to be in love with a man who was 900 miles away. Because I knew I had to let go somehow. I never told him how I felt, because I was a grenade that didn't deserve to be loved. http://youtu.be/9qL3gSrdc4c

5. "On a hero's errand"
Augustus Waters wanted his life to matter. He wanted to be remembered. I'm sorry to get all Christian on you, but gosh darn I'm happy I live for a capital S- Someone. That my purpose is so much bigger than who I am and what I could ever imagine. That yes this world will be forgotten, all of it. But I'm glad to be part of an infinity that is greater than all infinities. Because if I lived my life for a capital M-Me, I'd never be satisfied. I'd keep complaining that life is unfair, that my infinity is too small. That I'm never going to fall in love because I'm incapable of letting myself fall in love. But my infinity is NOT small. I live for a big infinity. I am loved first. So I can love others. And hurts. But that matters. Pain helps us define joy. Our lives are short yes, but they all matter.  Augustus Waters' life mattered. I hope he knew that. It mattered.

"In all my 900 years of traveling through time and space, I have never met anyone that is not important." - Doctor Who

-D

[H] Truth Thursday 20: Versus

So first, the prompt.

I want to stay.
I want to leave.

Should I stay?
Should I leave?

Can I stay?
Can I leave?

There's amazing possibilities if I stay.
There's an incredible opportunity if I leave.

I'm stuck on a pendulum.

Going back and forth.
Back and forth.

Some moments I'm so sure,

Until the momentum drops,
And I'm swinging back to the other side.

I'm not so sure.

I'm a free spirit:
A wild bird, soaring with the wind.

And yet I long for home.
Is this home?

Will I ever know for sure?

Shall I build a nest?
Or shall I fly away?

Will I ever know for sure?

[H] Truth Thursdays 19: Within a Room Somewhere

If there is one thing I learned from my dad, it's how to grow within - how to shrink into oneself to protect oneself from a world that's always growing, always changing, always asserting itself upon new territories. Be like a rock. Run deeper within yourself where nobody else can follow. Nurture that sacred place within yourself - that wellspring of the heart, the soul, the id, the depths of your being. Let that be your hiding place, your safe spot, your recovery space. Grow within to grow without.

Within a room somewhere, lies a collection of elephant memorabilia. There is a box of old notes and letters full of inside jokes and the usual high school silliness. On the walls are little pieces of the places I've been, the people I've met, and the memories I never want to leave behind. There are lights, candles, curtains, bows, and incense to nurture calm and comfort. But this is not where I feel alone.

I feel alone on my rooftop, underneath the silent, watching sky. I feel alone as I watch the breeze lift the clouds as they tumble into each other, forming shapes like a pair of polished acrobats pulling against each other to hold the perfect pose, then plungeing into each other to do it again. I feel alone as the stars tease the moon in twinkling winks and choruses of shaking giggles. And even at night, when the stars can't make it past the pollution of the city cars beeping and honking in the distance, or through the dark clouds of an approaching storm; even in the daytime when the rain falls in roaring torrents like angry voices in a rally demanding change, or when it sprinkles in soft, shy, droplets like the whisper of a timid lover - I feel alone.

I feel alone but not lonely. Under the majestic vastness of the heavens, I can feel myself unwind. Clarity comes as I unravel in the security of my alone-ness. It is where I cry, laugh, pray, and celebrate. It's where I make my commitments and resolutions. It's where I learn to forgive and let go. I can release myself, alone, to the sky that has borne witness to every single event in history since the beginning of time - the same sky that has watched me grow through 11 houses, 3 home countries, and a million goodbyes. See, to me, the sky is the physical representation of the presence of God. So it is under the sky where I find myself, build myself, grow myself. Where I heal myself. With all my cares and worries left behind. Forgotten. Within a room somewhere.

[D] Horrible Poems Written Watching The Sunset

This was that poem I wrote the day after I found out. 

That day I sat down at the Kirkland Marina watching the sunset,

All I had was a crumpled McDonald's receipt and a pen 

And it was too perfect not to write something

So I wrote a horrible poem

Freedom can hurt sometimes

You're so comfortable in bondage that being transplanted into freedom hurts like hell

But then you open your eyes

You start to accept that

This is here.

This rain is actually not a metaphor of your tears

But an outpouring,

A cleansing of the dirt, 

The mud that was weighing you down

The sunsets are more beautiful after the rain

The skies are clearer

The city lights twinkle brighter

Now time(?) doesn't feel like you should feel alone

Now adventure is your own

----

The choice was made

Find your own voice

Find your own song

(?) Sometimes I can't read my own handwriting

- D

[D] Truth Thursdays | To Answer Your Question...

How are you really? 

I am actually doing really good, and for the first time in a long time I actually mean it. For the first time in a long time, I'm actually truly happy; and not because of my circumstances. I'm just happy. I finally accepted that where I am is where I am, and it's where I'm supposed to be. It's a little sad that certain things had to happen, hearts had to be broken, for me to finally come to this conclusion. My worst fear happened; It hurt like hell but I realize I've been subjecting myself to worse pain for the past 10 months trying to hold on to something that I knew wasn't good for me. Now that it happened, I'm no longer bound by that fear and I've never felt free-er and happier. I have a new sense of adventure that I haven't had in a very long time. 

I've been transplanted to way different places in the past 2.5 years and it was painful. The moment that I thought I was finally laying down roots, I get pulled back out and moved to a different place. After High School, I knew that God wanted me to move to the States and I spent 2 years waiting for that to happen. I didn't know when it was going to happen, and there were times when I started to doubt if it was ever going to happen, but we waited. I was out of school so I spent most of my time at church and with people from church. I made so many good friends in those 2 years that it made leaving even harder, but my prayer from the very beginning of this journey across the Pacific was: "Lord, use me until you can't use me anymore." My time in California was done, but it felt like it had just begun. These past 10 months I had made plans for my future that I was so set on following. They were a little different from the original plan of being a missionary and teaching children, but I figured I would be able to find a way around it. Anyone could be a teacher and a missionary anywhere right? 

"Many are the plans in a person's heart, but it is the LORD's purpose that prevails." - Proverbs 19:21

"The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?" - Jeremiah 17:9

I knew full well that I was following my heart, my deceitful, foolish, and sick heart but I wanted it so bad to be right. So certain things had to happen, my rotten heart had to be broken so that it could get fixed the right way. 

I recently got a tattoo when I was down in California the other weekend. It's a design I've kept in my pocket for over 3 years now. It's Greek for "Joy". When people ask me why I got it, sometimes I get too lazy to explain so I just tell them it's because my first name, Felice, means "joyful". Which it does, but it's not the whole reason why I got this permanently inked on my skin. 

There's this song that we used to sing in Sunday School that goes, "I've got the joy joy joy joy down in my heart, WHERE? Down in my heart, WHERE? Down in my heart to stay! And I'm so happy so very happy, I've got the love of Jesus in my heart!" that one of my favorite bands, Page CXVI, remade. They sing it slowly and in a minor key and the first time I ever heard it, I thought it was hilarious that they were singing about having joy in such a melancholy way. But after listening to it over and over, I realize that it did make sense. At the end of their version of their song, they added the words to "It Is Well With My Soul" that goes, "When Peace like a river attendeth my way, when sorrows like sea billows roll; whatever my lot, thou has taught me to say. It is well, it is well, with my soul." Joy is not about being cheerful all the time, joy is having peace, knowing love, in the midst of the minor keys and melancholy. 

Researching, I found that the Greek translation for joy had plenty of meanings, and my favorite one is, "Grace recognized." 

Now my rotten heart is still mending, but I'm truly, honestly, and I'm not saying this hopefully, because I'm really currently, happy. :)

Photograph by: Riva Ramos

For Truth Thursdays

- D