THE SONS

i love them...i just found this song thanks to pandora!!

time will tell

my last summer is fading just about as fast as my summer tan. i still cannot believe that i have one more year of school left! i know that i should've been saying those words two years ago, but life never does seem to work out the way that you want it too. i mean if it did, i'd be living on some cattle ranch in texas, married to my jimmy stewart and have a horse named muley. ha i guess i'm glad things didn't work out that way because i just recently spend 10 hours in the state an wasn't too impressed. i'd say colorado is looking pretty good these days though... oh that's the question that people love to ask me: what are you going to do after you graduate?????

good question. well i since the one of the things that i'm naturally good at is being a nomad, i'd say somewhere other then here! ha honestly i haven't got a clue. i know that i love mountains, farmland, lakes, and i secretly want to be a kayak instructor on my days off. ha that would be awesome. i guess only time will tell.

dream machine part 2

ok so back to the adventure with the dream machine. my mother and i decided to set sail the next day after we got the boat out of retirement. i use to know things about sailing, but i myself had been in retirement, seeing that it had been 10 years since i'd been on a sailboat. so i watched my mother get the boat ready, i jump on board and she soon follows my lead. wow were we sailing!!! we managed to sail 5 feet and then the boat tipped over! ok so that should've been a warning sign. i mean, that isn't normal and there wasn't some catastrophic wind that would have caused that to happen. but my mother was determined. so my cousins helped us flip the boat upright and gave us a sand bucket and said see ya!

so we sail a ways and the boat flips. we're laughing because it is a bit humorous. i stand on the center board and flip the boat back. 2 feet later the boat flips, hahaha it's still fun, then it flips again and again. basically i couldn't keep track of the number of times that the stupid 1970's sailboat flipped. all i knew was that it wasn't funny anymore and now we were in a predicament. how in the world are we going to make it home??? sure we were a mile off shore, but all the adults were out for the morning, which meant that no one was going to rescue us anytime soon. i'm standing on the flipped boat at this point, watching these people boating near us just having the time of their lives! ha i guess we were invisible or something because if i was on a motor boat and i saw two women on a capsized boat i'd probably we see if they need help. but nooo, we were all alone in the middle of silver lake with a sailboat that had since it's last sail and a sand bucket. fun basically. while at this point we felt that the only thing left to do was swim to the shore....therefore my mother made the executive decision that i'd man the boat as she swam to shore. yeah i don't know how she decided that seeing that i know zero about sailing and i still have my youth, or at least i like to think i do. so my mom starts swimming toward shore. i'm left standing on the boat, just chilling. so as she is swimming away i have this sudden burst of energy and i decide that i'm going to make this boat sail back, even if it meant risking my life....ok so i got a little carried away right there....anyway i failed miserably and this fail resulted in 12 bruises on my arms ha. so after trying to sail the boat like 4 more times i surrender and just stand on the boat. then all of a sudden i hear a boat!! finally someone is here to save me!! the boat gets closer and i'm like wonder what the name of this boat is??? oh that's nice marine patrol!! i think that i'd rather be saved by pirates then the marine patrol of north conway. it was this old man that looked like he was straight out of an andy griffith episode. i'm like great! i was expecting johnny depp and i get barney fife! he's like you need some help?? me thinking to myself "what do you think?? i'm in the middle of silver lake with a vintage sailboat that has died in the water! i'm just ya know, dandy!" but i refrain and laugh and am like yeah!! so his like okay well put the sail down and i'll tie her to my boat. sure, i know how to do that ha. i'm glad that i watched my mom put the sail up or i'd be clueless. i manage to get the sail down and climb into the patrol boat. the guy is all smiles. creepy. he calls into the station and reports "female on board with capsized boat in silver lake...." i'm like great! he starts asking me questions and has me fill out paper work. oh and i'm like "oh i think that's my mom???" my mom is on some jet ski with a stranger, she waves and then disappears towards shore. maybe it's because i live in memphis now, but i don't trust people enough to think that they are "safe." like barney fife totally a creeper in my book. after i filled out the paper work he looked down at my writing and goes.."Katie Waitt...." i'm thinking "yeah it's a perfect common name...and why are you saying my name?" ugh. well after what feels like an eternity i make it back to shore. we tie up the boat and barney lectures my mom about always staying with the boat and to use the universal distress signal...which i guess is waving your arms up in the air, as if a capsized boat isn't enough of a distress signal. and he informs us that we should always carry a whistle, then processed to tell us that we need to have the boat registered. oh what a day! and what an adventure. so after we retell the events to the family and all have a good laugh. later that day we investigate the dream machine and come to find out that it had a leak in it!!!! a massive leak. so it wasn't the sailor's fault at all. it had been 20 or so years since the boat had sailed, basically meaning that it was well pass it's glory days.

i guess this boat wasn't really meant to sail that day and maybe the only thing that keep the little blue boat a float was the determination that my mother had to relive her youth. which is always good in theory, but honesty when was the last time that you went back to something that left such a mark on your heart from the past and you tried to bring it back to the present, that it ended up being a good thing? like i remember i loved sloppie joe's as a kid and a couple years back i decided to relive that favorite meal...so i made manwich and about vomited because it was so gross haha. i guess my point things are best left in the past because as time moves on we change, things change, and what we felt was so perfect then doesn't fit in the present. life's all about timing and sure the dream machine was the queen of silver lake 30 years ago, but that was then and this is now. well that's all i have for now. i do have to say that i'm glad that i had the opportunity to sail on that boat, even if it left me with my share of scars.

still beating

so i'm in love with josh ritter!! thanks to a long car drive through alabama the beautiful this past weekend. ok so here's the song that is on my mind right now. i just love it because it's so honest and pure. nothing special, just a voice and a guitar.

Learning to be Miserable...

Part 2 of the Dream Machine will be coming to you soon. I just had to share this message that my dad sent me the other day. It is by Jason Bryson of Memphis Fellowship. It's calling Learning to be Miserable....

In Stephen Pressfield’s classic “War of Art”, he mentions that the high
performers, the creatives, those who produce, those who are effective, etc.
eventually have to learn to “be miserable”.
“The artist must be like that marine. He has to know how to be miserable. He has
to love being miserable. He has to take pride in being more miserable than any
soldier…because this is war, baby. And war is hell.” (68)

I believe this is a powerful idea and one every man, every leader and every
change agent must learn in order to perform and push through tough seasons of
life and leadership.

Navy Seals teach this...one of my friends at dinner mentioned how two-a-days
football practices taught him this...another friend added how Medical school
Residency taught him this...I threw in how that was my greatest lesson in
training for and running a marathon…you can be miserable, and still move
forward, produce and thrive. God teaches this…see Abraham, Moses, Joseph,
David, Paul…take your pick.

What a powerful lesson we should all live! Could there be a greater gift, on a
practical level, to invest in our kids? How can we train emerging leaders or
church planters with this reality?

In our age of spoiled kids, privileged kids, over-indulgence, helicopter
parenting, and the lies we tell kids and young men and women that they “can be
and do anything they want to be and do”…many are launching “soft” young adults
into the world who have no idea how to struggle well or thrive through misery…so
they pout and quit and remain a taker, not a giver.

Couple that with ridiculous expectations that a perfect job is waiting on them
along with a perfect boss in exactly the city they want to live in along with a
paycheck that is more than they’ll need and you have a recipe for a
disaster…check most 20-somethings.

The few truly understand, theologically, that we live in a fallen world, this is
not heaven (thank God), life is hard, there is much pain, disappointment and
misery…but in the midst of that, by God’s grace, we can learn to cultivate and
create in the midst of circumstances that will rarely, if ever, be ideal.

A friend once told me to pinch Gen 1 and 2 in one hand and Rev 19 and 20 in the
other. Those 4 chapters are perfection. The other 1,185 chapters in the Bible
teach us to contend in the midst of a fallen world.

Don’t be a whiner, quitter, or baby and quit pouting or being surprised about
“how hard” it is to do what you are doing. Of course it is. You are limited as
a fallen human in a fallen world. Learn to cultivate and create…all the while,
being miserable. If you can thrive and stay on mission, especially through the
worst of circumstances, you are preparing to be a game changer, a true leader,
who can adapt, adjust, and endure.

Jesus is still our perfect rescuer and our relentless pursuit of Him is still
our greatest joy.

Whoa, that was deep, but yet so refreshing to hear! So often I get stuck in my own world of thinking. The world where I'm in control and everything is going to happen according to my plans. Ha in my dreams right? It's so hard being a Christian in this broken world because nothing, I mine nothing in this world is going to satisfy us! We make idols out of things and worship earthly relationships, when the fact is that we need to turn to God. If everything always worked out according to the plans that we have constructed we would not need God! Ugh, there is so much a don't know and want to know! And I don't understand God's plans and why he brings us to the places he does. But no matter where we are, God is with us and is trying to make us cling to Him. Here are some verses that made me think of this whole topic of trusting God, His plans, etc....

"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for wholeness and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope." Jeremiah 29:11

"The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases, his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. "The LORD is my portion," says my soul, "therefore I will hope in HIM." The LORD is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him. It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD....For the Lord will NOT cast off forever, but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love." Lamentation 3:22-31

"Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the LORD is a GOd of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him." Isaiah 30: 18

"The Lord has discipline me severely, but he has not given me over to death." Psalm 118:18

this is deep.... "that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith-that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us." Ephesians 3:16-20