a novel

one day, about twenty years ago to the day, two people i love very much carried a lively bundle of pink flesh (one that, i have on good authority, cried to echo the scream of the seagull)home to a house full of boxes and a slightly jealous, almost two year old, blond headed tyrant of a brother. they loved her, challenged her, prayed for her, inspired her, and even provided her with another, this time brown haired and female, sibling to torment her, shower her with blessings, and prevent her, by portraying a visage always more beautiful than the one in the mirror, from ever becoming too vain. they dragged her around the country (with her and her rambunctious siblings' consent of course), watched her grow and change, embracing the world with all its beauty and heartache. and now, twenty years later, i sit and eat left over birthday cake. i want to reflect on the meaning of my particular yesterday, contemplate the complexity of moving from teens to twenties, give a somewhat anecdotal ...

as part of my role as senior counselor at day camp, i am commissioned to write skits for each morning's devotional. i just finished writing one about unmet and exceeded expectations. so today i'm thinking about expectations and how god always seems to challenge mine. in april, when people asked me what i was excited about this summer, i couldn't give them a reasonable answer. because, honestly, i wasn't excited about very much. i came to winnipeg expecting to have a so-so summer full of missing community and waiting for the fall. i was ready to be patient for life to start up again in august and simply work in the mean time. i was here to pass the 4 months and to earn enough to enjoy my real life at school. funny how god shakes things up. since being back in winnipeg, lots of unexpected things have occurred. not all of them good, but all of them stand collectively as a challenge to the way i visioned my summer back in april. here, i have worked a physical job which i re...