the lincoln at sunset

being in an office all day has certainly been an adjustment. i miss outside! i miss the breeze, i miss warm air, i miss driving with the windows down and the tunes blaring. but my new job has been such a blessing because the latest i have worked in the past 2 weeks is 5:45 pm. normally i'm out the door at 5:30. so, i've been able to run a few days this week on the mall.



watching the sunset behind the lincoln memorial is incredible. i cannot describe how it feels to look at the statue of a man who was so criticized and who fought so hard for our country and to just take in life. it is impossible for me to not acknowledge that there is a God and that he is in charge of our lives. i take comfort in the fact that our current president prays everyday, just as lincoln, and that if he is seeking God's will as he says he is, there must be some justice in this war. there must be - there is a hope - behind all the death, american or not, in iraq. there must be some hope at the end of all these higher prices on gas and food and education and everything else.



i was on my way towards home last night, sloooowly jogging through the grass around the pond that stretches between the washington monument and the lincoln. there were so many geese out waddling around and it reminded me of being at lake LBJ.



in front of me i saw a mother duck, standing with her neck stretched out balancing on one foot. as i approached her i saw that she was guarding her seven or eight ducklings that were snuggled together. they had formed a perfect circle with each of their heads tucked into the center. i had never seen ducks do that! it was so cute - i would have died if i'd had a camera!



but immediately popped into my head: why don't humans do that? if a duck, a simple mother duck, can provide food, shelter, and protection for her children, why can't humans?? i know we are more complex and there are generations of hurt that flaw us, but WHY can't every mother or father just love their child and protect them? the statistics are frightening of how many american children are abused, physically, sexually, emotionally, and the numbers are staggering enough to wonder if anything can ever be done to stop the abuse.



i guess i should work on that in the future, volunteer, be kind, that sort of thing. but i think the image of those ducks will forever be engraved in my mind: how that mother duck was SO proud of her children, just for being alive, and how she so simply fulfilled her duty to raise them. if the ducks can do it, certainly we can too?

"its not my first time"

Well, just got back from dinner with two great friends who i would not know if it weren't for this district. LJ and HS are hilarious, insightful, and aggies, which means i love them even more. mary alice warner, my favorite aggie in all of creation (more commonly known as the northgate champion) left us a gift certificate to old ebbitts when she left for nursing school/abandoned me forever.

anywho, long story short, her money was well spent on wine and other things. we decided we would split a dessert and when i asked the waiter what his favorite was, he launched into this story about an off-the-menu creation that sounded divine. so, as he left our table to place our order for this brownie creation, i said, "you're good at this." and he said, i kid you not, in the cockiest voice ever "its not my first time."

needless to say the three of us cracked up. hilarious. i'm sure we'll be saying that for the rest of our lives.

its the beginning of a 3-day weekend here in dc, sure to be wonderful. i'm sure i'll have something to say about my new bike soon, so stay tuned.

following the trend

It's a fine line, that balance between being trendy and being uncool. I don't like to follow every fad, and i don't typically care about labels. But i don't like to be unhip. I like the latest jewelry, shoes, music. but there is this excess in our society of buying, liking, and appreciating something simply because its "cool." which is why i've steered clear of blogs. in fact, i never really read them prior to last semester when i came to dc.

but they're funny. and, if you know someone, they allow you to follow their life. landon carl kept a blog when he was in africa several years back, and i read that. tara leigh cobble, christian singer/songwriter, writes a blog that i read faithfully all summer. hanna schmidt, a new aggie friend of mine living in "this district", writes a great blog that i just discovered.

and there's the big blogs- "stuff hill people like," and "stuff white people like." (look em up. seriously. leave this page and look em up.) these blogs all got me to thinkin', why don't i blog?

primarily my answer has been, who the heck wants to read about my life? i know i don't. but i like to write about my life. (does that even make sense?) i used to think blogs were selfish, putting your thoughts on the internet thinking you were cool enough to have someone read them.

but thats not all true. certainly not true of the landon, tara leigh, or hanna. and i love love love to write, and i need to write about my life sometimes to process things, or to fully appreciate and thank God for all his blessings.
writing definitely helps me see the holiness in my troubles, to see God's hand on my heart when I'm struggling.

so here goes. i'm launching myself into the blog world. once i tell my parents i have a blog, i'm sure they'll read it. and maybe one day i'll be picked as the blog of the day by the blog inventers. but it doesn't really matter who reads this and who doesn't. it matters that i'm not going to not blog just for the sake of not blogging. that's nuts.

i've got a little less than 9 months to live in this district. and i think blogging could make that time all the better, so i'm going to blog my heart out.

dear readers, expect pictures. expect funny stories. expect rambling. the best part is, i won't expect anything of you. especially your reading. :)

thanks.