If I Stay Lucky...

We try so hard not to take anything for granted. We manage to instead live the majority of our lives in greedy selfishness. We celebrate holidays like Thanksgiving and Remembrance Day where we remember to sit back and realize how lucky we are to live in a certain country, with food on our tables and loving families surrounding us. Yet even still, we manage to wish we were somewhere else, waste what we do have, and treat those we love without the utmost love.

I for one, try so desperately to not take relationships for granted - be it family, friends, or significant others. I have learned the hard way that taking someone for granted merely takes away from the full joy in their relationship. But even when we try so hard not to, we fail and fail again.

Other times, we are blessed to have someone serve us a reminder...

It amazes me how I can believe that I don't take someone for granted and then still be shocked when someone reminds me how lucky I am to be loved by someone incredible. I am lucky to have found someone who thinks I am perfect for him, someone who supports me and who encourages me and who treats me like a precious jewel.

And then, even more surprising, a chain reaction happens. I find myself realizing how lucky I am on even more aspects, the most important is that I realize how much my Father loves me. You can't experience a developing love and not see how beautiful my God's love is. I believe that we learn true love from the example of Christ, and we understand this love more by experiencing beautiful, earthen love.

But that's all theory. That is all knowledge. It is the understanding which strikes a chord. That realization that I get after I realize how much He loves me for giving this to me. I realize how this Spiritual Being is not so far away as the outer distances of our universe, but instead, he wants me to be happy, and to learn, and to feel this special kind of love.

And I thank You for Loving me this much.

Home, Jeeves!

I was walking home from my class on prose fiction today. The leaves on the underlying branches of the magnificent trees lining the sidewalk brushed my head as meandered by. (I really wish I knew anything about dendrology, and could tell you what kind of trees are scattered over campus. Calling an oak a tree does it very little justice. Even the title oak connotates much more than any description I could render.) The leaves on these trees were still monotonously green, all the coloured leaves presumadely blown off and drenched on the sidewalk during the weekend rain. The anesthetic aura no doubt originated from the overcast sky above me. I scuffed my Converse Chuck Taylors along the damp sidewalk as I disregarded the rust coloured leaf fragments adhered to the path ahead of me despite the fact that I was staring downward. The air was cool and crisp foreshadowing a resurgence of my jacket.

We all want to do something with our lives. I believe that is why we find ourselves at institutions like Mount Allison which allow us to specialize in an area to prepare us for the world which we sooner or later must find ourselves entering. But what happens when we (or namely, I) find ourselves stuck? Instead of growing up into these young adults with endless possibilities, we just realize that we're stuck inside this box which despite our growing, seems to be remaining static. It is a realization that can make one feel as if suddenly walls are closing in. Can we ever find something and be the best at it? I have no doubt in my mind that some people can. I am lucky to have great friends who will, or already have begun to excel at whatever they chose do in life, and I read about real people on the internet who are doing fantastic things. Good on you! Yet, where do I fit into the equation? What does one do when they feel like they missed that day in heaven where God handed out the talents? Maybe I was sick or something.

When we were little, we were told we could be whatever we wanted to be; a teacher, a pilot, an astronaut, the Prime Minister of Canada, or heck, even a fire truck. And now I find myself looking over an empty landscape. Instead of broadening, my opportunities have narrowed and I feel as if I have already failed. I try to shape shift to fit countless moulds, but no matter what, none seem quite right.

And yet, on I trudge.

As I walked up the street and approached my own, I looked up from the sidewalk, and saw the most incredible blue before me. It was such a vivid contrast between the dull grey around it. I turned the corner onto my street and felt a warmth upon my shoulder and my arm. The sun was taking every opportunity to shine through this cloudbreak. The sidewalk stopped looking so bleak, the trees started coming back to life, and as I walked into my room, the fragrance of lilies filled my senses.

Divine

Coincidences and so-it-seems

Fail to approach the magic

The art in the sky and the love that we share

And somehow we fail

The thanksgiving, the love

All failed

Returning again and again

Finding once more the cross

Again the grace

Again the love

Summer has Come and Gone

The scene was set perfectly; the blue sky lightly speckled with cloud-dust, the sun bright and warm yet seasoned with the crisp breath carried by the beginning of fall. Students walked on sidewalks beneath large mighty trees, their dignified arms outstretched to reveal elegant green dressing, sewn together one leaf at a time to form the most beautiful cloak to shame even the likes of Vera Wang. Haughty stone buildings towered above, creating a atmosphere of prestige and enlightenment and superiority.

I felt like I was back in grade two. My new backpack was still crisp and placed on my back, complete with all the accessories needed to complete a day at school; one binder with paper, two Papermate Comfortmate clicky pens, one mechanical pencil, a list of my classes' times and locations, one sweater, my house and mailbox keys, and my bank card to buy five hundred dollars worth of books later in the day. I was in new States-bought clothes, which mom forbid me to wear until school and I was feeling armed and ready for a day of beginnings which lay ahead of me, like a picnic blanket awaiting two picnic-ing lovers. I walked into the sun, into the fall school day, into the courtyards complete with picture perfect students, sitting under trees and reading text books. I wish I had brought the book I've been reading, or even better a laptop so that I could fade into the green grassy backdrop as well. The grassy hill in front of the pond was beckoning me to dive deep into the world of someone else, or too get lost in the sound of clicking as my fingers dance to create a gentle flow of magical words which somehow come from me.

The football field is the pinnacle of the fall atmosphere. I often wish I owned a working camera because I feel like I could completely capture the feeling surrounding my attitude towards this new year. I would capture it all, I would show you the maroon and gold painted uprights against a sky at dusk, an empty bench on the field with large bold "MOUNTIES" painted upon the aged wood. Just imagine a world of silence filled with the steady melody of football. I wish I could capture the players, wet and rained on against the dreary sky, solemnly looking towards the field, or the helmet left lost, sitting in the grass, next to the white yard markers. It is not the same feeling felt when watching Varsity Blues or Remember the Titans, but more real, more hopeful, more bold and beautiful and determined to look foreword and press on and stand upright.