The Most Beautiful Flower

~This is a beautiful story, it made me cry. Enjoy ~

The park bench was deserted as I sat down to read Beneath the long, straggly branches of an old willow tree. Disillusioned by life with good reason to frown, For the world was intent on dragging me down.

And if that weren't enough to ruin my day, A young boy out of breath approached me, all tired from play. He stood right before me with his head tilted down And said with great excitement, "Look what I found!"

In his hand was a flower, and what a pitiful sight, With its petals all worn - not enough rain, or too little light. Wanting him to take his dead flower and go off to play, I faked a small smile and then shifted away.

But instead of retreating he sat next to my side And placed the flower to his nose and declared with surprise, "It sure smells pretty and it's beautiful, too. That's why I picked it; here, it's for you."

The weed before me was dying or dead. Not vibrant of colors, orange, yellow or red. But I knew I must take it, or he might never leave. So I reached for the flower, and replied, "Just what I need."

But instead of him placing the flower in my hand, He held it mid-air without reason or plan. It was then that I noticed for the very first time That weed-toting boy could not see: he was blind.

I heard my voice quiver, tears shone like the sun As I thanked him for picking the very best one. "You're welcome," he smiled, and then ran off to play, Unaware of the impact he'd had on my day.

I sat there and wondered how he managed to see A self-pitying woman beneath an old willow tree. How did he know of my self-indulged plight? Perhaps from his heart, he'd been blessed with true sight.

Through the eyes of a blind child, at last I could see The problem was not with the world; the problem was me. And for all of those times I myself had been blind, I vowed to see beauty, and appreciate every second that's mine.

And then I held that wilted flower up to my nose And breathed in the fragrance of a beautiful rose And smiled as that young boy, another weed in his hand About to change the life of an unsuspecting old man.

I'm Hooked On A Feeling.

I don't know quite where to begin. I know exactly what I want to talk about; but it's so real for me and it's something I've never told anyone before. This post tonight is about a love I have found and I have realized it not just now, but long ago and it has taken me until now to say anything in fear that someone would say I'm wrong.

Love some people say isn't a feeling. But a chemical reaction that we have for another person and people have played love to be these feelings that no one really has. These people I feel sorry for because they will never experience the love that few us of ever find. No one can describe love because it's different for everyone. By they're definition of love has similar words. Ones like loyalty, trust, dependency, friendship, passion and so on. Everytime I find someone new I say oh this is what love is. Maybe everytime you love someone it's different. Right now, I have the greatest love of my life with me. He makes me want to be a better person a more caring and giving person. I get butterflies everytime he looks at me and I can feel my heart beating slowly faster and faster when I dial his phone number. It's the simple things about him that I love the most. The way he interacts with his mom, the way he smiles, the way he laughs, and that look he gives me that actually did make me weak in the knees.
Adults will say that teenagers can't feel real love, they don't know what it is. I'm going to be that arrogant teenager that says I know what it's about. Love's about caring more about that one person than you do yourself. It's about letting yourself be vulnerable to another person; to let them know what you think and feel about things. To wake up in the morning saying softly " I can't wait to see you " . You live for the words " I love you ".
I think the set back I feel to having someone I just can never get enough of is, the fear that somewhere, for what ever reason, something will go wrong and it will end. They can assure you it won't but you can't guarantee these things. I know that we will love eachother for the rest of our lives. I also have faith that we will end up together with many memories and continue making them forever.
This post is for you, the best thing to have happened to me; I love you.

Re- developing

Well There's going to be a lot of changes on the website today. I'm attempting at re designing the template, maybe changing the name etc... Let me know what you think when it's done at the end of the day.
Some more news; I'm sick..Again. Chest infection. Woo!....Or not

The Simple Life

What is it about life that makes it all so complicated. We could say everything, and that nothing is easy. Work is hard, relationships are even harder and that's basically what our world is made up of. Work and relationships. What we need to do is take a step back from the modern world of all the high tech gadgets and look around and the beautiful, simple things in life. Take a walk, not on the streets but maybe a park or a trail away from the sound of cars all that city noise. Something that I wonder on occasion:Why is it that we watch TV? It's not real, except maybe for the news which has a 90% chance of always being depressing. Why not instead turn off the TV and interact with the people around you say that life is so short; so why aren't majority of us making the most out of life. Life could be simple. You could wake up on a cloudy day and say to yourself "Today is going to be a beautiful day". Every day is a beautiful day, mother nature is revealing all the supernatural powers of the world and showing us what she can do.

What is it with our possessions, ideas, and beliefs - that causes us to hang on so tightly to them? If we hold on too tightly to these things, we get rope burn.
The wisdom of letting go comes into play. Surya Das; a Buddhist scholar once said; "Rather than the way many of us are brought up to hold on, gather riches, stuff, and information ' as if more is always better ' there is the middle way that means not throwing it all away, but also not falling into the fallacy that more is always better, bigger, faster. We start instead to live in a more moderate, balanced, harmonious, simple kind of life." I think we have to look at what happens if we hold on to things. I feel like its totally irrational, but when I clean out my closets, the clothes I haven't worn in three to five years, or my basement, attic or even my locker,I feel like I can breathe better. We need to learn once again to be with the people, the nature and just ourselves, rather than the objects that we've become so dependent on. We need to get back to the simplicity and pure joy of getting a letter from someone in the mail, smelling flowers, hearing an "I love you" or laughter. We need to get back to the simple life.

He Will Never Leave You

Helen closed her troubled green eyes and ran her fingers through her tousled hair. She was so scared. She tried to pray,

"Oh Lord, help me deal with this. Help me to be strong." Tears ran freely down her cheeks.

Helen was having a mastectomy today. Both of her breasts had to be removed. Could she handle that? Could her husband handle that? Would he still love her? Her mind was running in every direction. The devil was playing havoc with her and she was letting him. As a Christian she knew that God would never give her more than she could handle. This was close, very close, to more than she could handle. The whole scene terrified her. Nurses coming in and checking her temperature and pulse. The anesthetist telling her how long the surgery would take and what she should expect. Helen knew what to expect: after the surgery she would have no breasts. She prayed once more.

"Oh Lord, you know me better than I know myself. Help me! Grant me your peace.

If only they would let Steve in there. If only there were someone, anyone, to pray with her. She felt so alone. Not only alone, but so scared. Was she being weak? Was she lacking faith? It seemed as if she had been in this holding room for hours. Helen closed her eyes and tried to calm herself down. She was close to panic. Even the shot they had given her did not relax her. Why was this happening to her? She didn’t want to question the Lord, but she was. Helen heard the curtain open again and she opened her eyes. An elderly lady with gray-brown hair approached her. She had a sweet smile and her eyes seemed to twinkle. With a soft voice she asked,

"Would you like me to pray with you?" Helen could only nod. The lady took her hand and started to pray. Immediately a peace came over Helen. The fear was replaced with the peace of God. The lady asked the Lord to wrap His arms around Helen and to comfort her. She asked Him to grant her His peace. Helen could feel the presence of the Lord. She could feel His peace. She had never felt a peace like this before. She just let the peace envelop her. She was not even aware that the lady had left. The nurses then came to transport her to the operating room. Helen quickly thanked the nurses for letting the lady come to pray with her. The head nurse looked at her strangely.

"What lady?" she asked. "There is no one allowed back here but hospital staff. Was she a nurse?" Helen shook her head.

"No, she was not a nurse. She was a sweet lady who came to pray with me." The nurse smiled and said,

"That is impossible, dear. Only staff is allowed back here." Helen lay back and said no more. She closed her eyes and whispered,

"Thank You, Lord. Thank you for sending someone to pray with me. Thank you for my peace." After several hours in surgery, Helen woke up in recovery. When the nurses asked how she felt, she just smiled. She felt fine. She knew that the Lord was with her. She knew that she would make it through this with Him by her side. He had promised never to leave her nor forsake her--and He had kept that promise.

Curse Of Being A Woman

Today could have been better. It started out with not having enough time to even have a shower since I woke up too late. I walked into school and as soon as I did I was praying for it to end as quickly as possible. I went through first block; gym and that didn't make my day any better; running around in circles getting a cramp and then the teacher saying "you can do it, I believe in you".....Sure you do, let's see you run for 10 minutes non stop after 4 days off, not doing anything cardio-vascular. Thinking that wasn't fair but it was the theme of my mood for today. Anything someone said annoyed me in some way, and even if I wasn't I used a tone with people that was rude and harsh it was as if I was watching myself saying these things saying to myself what are you doing?!? , the tone I was giving set it into a totally different approach of what I was trying to say.
Women blame their bad moods on "that time of the month" I've always hated doing that because it's not an excuse, people are in bad moods all the time. Today however I feel is an exception. I don't know what it was but with the "time of the month" ( sorry guys ) coming just around the corner maybe it would explain my behavior. It was as if I didn't want anyone to look at me I just wanted to be alone because I was just feeling like...crap inside and out. Hopefully tomorrow's better or else I'll have to continue hiding out in the library at lunch to avoid lashing out at any innocent people.

A Commited Atheist

This is a true story of something that happened just a few years ago at USC.

There was a professor of philosophy there who was a deeply committed atheist. His primary goal for one required class was to spend the entire semester attempting to prove that God couldn't exist.

His students were always afraid to argue with him because of his impeccable logic.

For twenty years he had taught this class and no one had ever had the courage to go against him. Sure, some had argued in class at times, but no one had ever *really gone against him* (you will see what I mean later). Noboby would go against him because he had a reputation.

At the end of every semester, on the last day he would say to the class of 300 students, "If there is anyone here who still believes in God, stand up !"

In twenty years, nobody ever stood up. They knew what he was going to do next.

He would say, "Because anyone who believes in God is a fool. If God existed, he could stop this piece of chalk from hitting the ground and breaking. Such a simple task to prove he is God, and yet he can't do it."

And every year he would drop the chalk onto the tile floor of the classroom and it would shatter into a hundred pieces. All the students were convinced that God couldn't exist. Certainly a number of Christians had slipped through, but for 20 years they had been too afraid to stand up.

Well, a few years ago there was a freshman who happened to get enrolled in the class. He was a Christian, and had heard the stories about this professor. He had to take the class because it was one of the required classes for his major. And he was afraid. But for three months that semester he prayed that he would have the courage to stand up no matter what the professor said or what the class thought. Nothing they said or did could ever shatter his faith, he hoped.

Finally, the day came. The professor said, "If there is anyone here who still believes in God, stand up!" The professor, and the class of 300 people looked at him, shocked, as he stood up at the back of the room.

The professor shouted, "YOU FOOL! If nothing I have said all semester has convinced you that God doesn't exist, then you are a fool! If God existed, he could keep this piece of chalk from breaking when it hit the ground!"

He proceeded to drop the chalk, but as he did it slipped out of his fingers, off his shirt cuff, onto the pleats of his pants, down his leg, and off his shoe. And as it hit the ground it simply rolled away, unbroken. The professor's jaw dropped as he stared at the chalk. He looked up at the young man and then ran out of the lecture hall.

The young man who stood up proceeded to walk to the front of the room and shared his faith in Jesus for the next half hour. 300 students stayed and listened as he told of God's love for them and of his power through Jesus.

Respect

I woke up this morning to hear my dad talking on the phone. It wouldn't have bothered me if I was not extremely tired and that he feels he needs to make sure the entire house can hear him.This is followed by my sister watching TV on a volume of 30. And of course the micro wave is being used every 10 minutes because my mom has forgotten about her coffee and it is now cold. Later today I took a nap before dinner.... And my mom wakes me up angry that I'm going to be up all night now that I've slept. Well that's what she thinks I did since they were watching a war flick on a volume of what is now 40. I suppose the theme of this blog is respect. I give them respect when they are sleeping and I'm up before them, I don't turn the TV on, I don't use the micro wave and most of the time I just stay in my room until I hear their foot steps going down the hall to start their day. I can't tell them this of course because I would be punished for talking to them that way, even in a calm and mature manner. So I will continue what I do, out of respect and hope that one day they do the same for me.

Belonging

Belonging: the state of being comfortable and accepted in a place or community.

Why do we strive to belong? It's like being in the mountains and calling out just to hear the sound come back to you. Landscape and nature knows us, and it's returning echo seems to confirm that we belong here .Hunger to belong is human nature. Being cut off from others, we would turn in on ourselves. We don't make an issue about belonging. But when we belong, we take it for granted. Every one if us walks alone in this world, and it's in our nature to seek out belonging. Each of us carries a unique world in our hearts. Every soul is a different shape. No one feels your life like you do, no one will experience things the way you do. Only you know your own story. The world is surrounded with beauty. Landscapes, oceans art, and music. Although there is no where that we feel so deeply encountered as we do in the presence of another human being. The human body is temple of sensuous spirit. Every moment, in one way or another our senses reach out in longing to be with the world. Color shape and movement meets the affections of the eyes; tone sound and silence call continually to our hearing. Touch fragrance and taste brings us closer with the intimacy of the world. As long as we can live in this temple of the senses, longing will forever call to us.

In Greek mythology the theme of longing and belonging are expressed in the story of Echo. The nymph called Echo could only use her voice in repetition of another. Echo one day fell in love with the beautiful Narcissus. She follows him as he goes hunting with friends and although she longs to call for him she cannot do so, for she cannot speak first. Her chance comes, when Narcissus is separated from his friends, he calls and Echo takes this opportunity to speak by repeating his words back to him. This is when he calls for his friends " Let us come together here" Echo misunderstands and rushes to embrace him, revealing herself. Narcissus brutally rejects her and she is doomed to spend the rest of her life anxious in longing for him.
Narcissus, finally sees his beauty in his reflection in a pool and falls in love with himself. This love is torture for him, to fall in love with himself he is caught in the unbearable contradiction. He is both the lover and the beloved in a single body. Unable to endure the torment that is its own object and can never posses its self, breaks the circle by killing himself.
In the wisdom of Greek mythology, it is no accident that Narcissus and Echo were paired. Its as if she knows the deathly symmetry of Narcissus's self obession The irony is that he will have to reject himself as well. It tells us that because of Echo's nature her fate is twined to his. She's vulnerable because she cannot speak first. Her name and nature are the same. She longs for him and is doomed to a life of demented longing and she becomes, a little more that a lonely desperate voice.
It has taken me some time to put my words in their rightful place. I can only hope my words have made sense and you can take some of what I have said with you on your journeys

The Missing

I'm about to ask a question that many of us have pondered for some time.... Where do those missing clothes go?
This morning I spent a fair amount of time looking for one shirt in particular. Under the bed, on top of the bed, in the closet on the floor...The list goes on and on but still no shirt. I know I never wore it to school so no worries over there. Laundry couldn't help me, it had seen it's way through the color cycle and off somewhere else. So where is it I ask you? I honestly have no clue.
Same story with the missing socks. They both go into the washer and into the dryer.. But shockingly only one comes out. Were they fighting for space and somewhere along the way they devoured the poor sock? Or are there really leprechauns that come in to steal them just to spite us.

The Smell Of Rain

A cold March wind danced around the dead of night in Dallas as the Doctor walked into the small hospital room of Diana Blessing. Still groggy from surgery, her husband David held her hand as they braced themselves for the latest news.

That afternoon of March 10, 1991, complications had forced Diana, only 24-weeks pregnant, to undergo an emergency cesarean to deliver the couple's new daughter, Danae Lu Blessing. At 12 inches long and weighing only one pound and nine ounces, they already knew she was perilously premature. Still, the doctor's soft words dropped like bombs. 'I don't think she's going to make it,' he said, as kindly as he could. "There's only a 10-percent chance she will live through the night, and even then, if by some slim chance she does make it, her future could be a very cruel one."

Numb with disbelief, David and Diana listened as the doctor described the devastating problems Danae would likely face if she survived. She would never walk, she would never talk, she would probably be blind, and she would certainly be prone to other catastrophic conditions from cerebral palsy to complete mental retardation, and on and on. "No! No!"was all Diana could say. She and David, with their 5-year-old son Dustin, had long dreamed of the day they would have a daughter to become a family of four. Now, within a matter of hours, that dream was slipping away.

Through the dark hours of morning as Danae held onto life by the thinnest thread, Diana slipped in and out of sleep, growing more and more determined that their tiny daughter would live-and live to be a healthy, happy young girl.

But David, fully awake and listening to additional dire details of their daughter's chances of ever leaving the hospital alive, much less healthy, knew he must confront his wife with the inevitable. David walked in and said that we needed to talk about making funeral arrangements.

Diana remembers 'I felt so bad for him because he was doing everything, trying to include me in what was going on, but I just wouldn't listen, I couldn't listen.' I said, "No, that is not going to happen, no way! I don't care what the doctors say; Danae is not going to die! One day she will be just fine, and she will be coming home with us!"

As if willed to live by Diana's determination, Danae clung to life hour after hour, with the help of every medical machine and marvel her miniature body could endure.

But as those first days passed, a new agony set in for David and Diana. Because Danae's under developed nervous system was essentially 'raw,' the lightest kiss or caress only intensified her discomfort, so they couldn't even cradle their tiny baby girl against their chests to offer the strength of their love.

All they could do, as Danae struggled alone beneath the ultraviolet light in the tangle of tubes and wires, was to pray that God would stay close to their precious little girl. There was never a moment when Danae suddenly grew stronger. But as the weeks went by, she did slowly gain an ounce of weight here and an ounce of strength there.

At last, when Danae turned two months old, her parents were able to hold her in their arms for the very first time. And two months later-though doctors continued to gently but grimly warn that her chances of surviving, much less living any kind of normal life, were next to zero. Danae went home from the hospital, just as her mother had predicted.

Today, five years later, Danae is a petite but feisty young girl with glittering gray eyes and an unquenchable zest for life. She shows no signs, what so ever, of any mental or physical impairment. Simply, she is everything a little girl can be and more-but that happy ending is far from the end of her story.

One blistering afternoon in the summer of 1996 near her home in Irving, Texas, Danae was sitting in her mother's lap in the bleachers of a local ballpark where her brother Dustin's baseball team was practicing. As always, Danae was chattering non-stop with her mother and several other adults sitting nearby when she suddenly fell silent. Hugging her arms across her chest, Danae asked, "Do you smell that?" Smelling the air and detecting the approach of a thunderstorm, Diana replied, "Yes, it smells like rain."

Danae closed her eyes and again asked, "Do you smell that?" Onceagain, her mother replied, "Yes, I think we're about to get wet, it smells like rain." Still caught in the moment, Danae shook her head, patted her thin shoulders with her small hands and loudly announced, "No, it smells like Him. It smells like God when you lay your head on His chest."

Tears blurred Diana's eyes as Danae then happily hopped down to play with the other children. Before the rains came, her daughter's words confirmed what Diana and all the members of the extended Blessing family had known, at least in their hearts, all along. During those long days and nights of her first two months of her life, when her nerves were too sensitive for them to touch her, God was holding Danae on His chest and it is His loving scent that she remembered so well.

Powerful

It's amazing how much you can love someone. It's early in the morning and looking at Noah ( new puppy ) you can't help but think he's the most adorable creature in the entire world. My sister; Shelby has said before; " I miss him right now " when he's laying down 5 feet away. Love is a powerful feeling, something you can't describe. Once you love someone it's forever. Maybe later on it becomes a different kind of love, but that person will always mean something to you... During the day when he is awake you must take care of him; feeding him, taking him outside every 45.3 minutes, and making sure he's as happy as possible. There are times when you can't be that patient and you get upset that he doesn't know what to do. This is when you have to realize that he, like every person to have ever lived is just a baby and needs the guidance from others to transform fully into an adult.
It's official that Shelby is growing up. She has successfully spent almost all of her free time on the phone/internet and like most girls her age; is always dancing to music way too loud and obsessing over that hot celebrity from that new movie. Everyone grows up, and to me it's just amazing to see her go from playing make-believe to wearing make-up over-night.

Life..In A Nutshell

How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life you will have been all of these. ~George Washington Carver

Prayer

I've always felt stupid praying. Why bother God with the mediocre problems that I was having that day when there's so many more people in greater need than I. People say I'm good at understanding them and helping with their problems. When it comes to me however, I keep my problems to myself. If I'm so good with helping people I should be able to figure out these problems of mine on my own.
It's easy to forgot how blessed we are. Everyone has the same problems; about money, friendships, love and family. What it comes down to is how we handle these complications. But when you think about others, like the people in Asia, and the tsunami suddenly what you were struggling with doesn't seem as terrible.
On Monday we had youth and Greg quoted Luke 11 1-15 after our drama performance about kicking someone's dog, and it stuck with me: "For everyone who asks; receives;and he who seeks, finds, and to him who knocks, it shall be opened"
To me this means that if you want something to happen you need to ask, you can't just sit around waiting for it to happen.
This reminds me that I really need to start working out. Not in the way to loose weight but in the sense of being stronger and having more energy. I don't think anyone would pass up a little extra energy now and again. My uncle, whom to me is a spiritual person and in touch with his beliefs and has a good way of looking at life, he said to me that yoga was always a good idea. I've tried it a few times and it has worked, it's just a matter of finding the time and a quiet place to practice the art....

Be Kind

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.

-Plato

Snow day

Had our first snow day of the year. I thanked God for it since I had many pressing homework assignments due today and was grateful I had 3 more days to work on it.

Today's been slow. I usually find myself not wanting to be in the house much but today is different. For some unexplainable reason I have the urge to go home almost 2 hours before I am supposed too. My sister's making dinner tonight, with what little we can find in the fridge, cupboards and freezer. Sounds like salmon to me.
Woke up at 6 this morning to finish the project I should have started many days ago, probably even weeks ago but decided to leave it until the last minute. I got up in tears, I was extremely stressed out and was upset that I had put my faith in God to grant me one day of snow so I wouldn't have to return to the prison. ( School ) About 2 hours later my faith had never left that he would come through for me, and that he did. My dad had gotten into the bus disguised as a car, and driven down to the school to see if anyone was there. After getting into almost 4 accidents he came home to tell my mom it wasn't worth it to drive us. That was when I knew God had come through for me, as I knew he would. Praying last night to him, I had also said that I would do my best to finish all the homework I had not yet completed. So after going back to bed for 3 hours I got myself up and worked on my math and my science. Two of my favorite subjects.
Sitting here now, at Ben's waiting for it to be time to go home. It isn't that I don't want to be here. I think it's one of those days where you just want to be with family, and with me that doesn't happen very often. So I had better take this feeling into consideration and take a look at my life, figure out if I'm at least somewhat justified with where I'm going. A thought has just come to mind as I watch Nathan playing poker( probably losing too ). Why is it that so many people, and when I say people I mean teenagers, want material things all the time. Let's say you go to someone's house. What do you do? Play on the computer, watch T.V. You don't actually sit down talk hang out and ask eachother how there life is and get a serious response. I've always thought I was a bit different than everyone else, well no one is just like another but that's besides the point. The point is that I'm happier hanging out with people with no pressure of wearing the right combination of color and not too much jewelry. Having up to date clothing, because apparently without that I'm lost in the social circle.
I was walking down here this afternoon and I walked by an eldery woman, in bright neon snow suit making her way carefully across the street. There are people know that would walk by her and laugh at what she was wearing. But what went through my mind was: should I be helping her cross this snow covered road, for she could loose her balance. Often there are times when I walk by a person and wonder what it is they're thinking.
Now what people think of me I wonder sometimes also. But you have to think; what does it matter what other people think? Its just they're thoughts and even if they think something negative about you, you have to carry on and keep going, being the person that you were destined to be. Having someone say something about you doesn't change anything about your personality or what you believe in. It could make you more insecure about yourself. Damage that precious self-esteem and turn you into something your not for the sake of your peers;but your still the same person you always were on the inside. And that's what's important.