i love all of you..

...hurt by the cold
so dark and lonely too
when you don't know yourself... -RHCP

and now, i give you... the nearness of you. take it for a listen and tell me what you think.

jessica joined the facebook yesterday. my week's mission was complete. i think i can die happy now. looking at my relationship status as "married to jessica nowlin"... which i AM, damn it... there are no words.

i've been doing a lot of thinking mattie style this week... as in evaluating why i do the things i do and why i feel the things i feel (see matt's blog for example). most of this has been brought on by this book i sincerely feel like every Christian and most non-Christians should read, blue like jazz by donald miller. never-and i mean never-have i read an entire book on spirituality and found so many moments where i breathed a mental sigh of relief and thought yes. that's exactly how i've always felt. and just to know that these things were okay, to be reaffirmed that i don't have to side with the right-wing religious right or be bound by legalism or live wallowing in guilt to call myself a true Christian. i think i knew these things all along, but somehow, finding a published author that believes these things too makes me feel like those ideas are really and truly worth thinking.

some of my most earth-shaking quotes from this book...
"the most difficult lie i have ever contended with is this: life is a story about me."

"the heart desires wonder and magic... technology is what man uses to supplant the desire for wonder... but what the heart is really longing to do is worship, to stand in awe of a God we don't understand and can't explain."

"you cannot be a Christian without being a mystic." <--this is my favorite :-)

"it was clear that i was to love everybody, be delighted at everybody's presence... if a person senses that you do not like them, that you do not approve of their existence, then your religion and your political ideas will seem all wrong to them. if they sense that you like them, they will be open to what you have to say."

hm.

so i'm done volunteering at the center now. it was pretty sad leaving yesterday, but not too sad, because i know i'll go back because hope and kathryn said to come back anytime, and they were smiling, and i knew they meant it. this is the thing i love about every music therapist i've ever met: they have this fountain of joy in them that's obvious from even talking to them for a few minutes. they don't lead perfect lives, but they generate this positive energy that touches everyone around them and does wonderful, wonderful things to people. i want to be like that. i think i can do it. but i've been looking at grad school stuff and things i ought to do to get ready while i'm at UT and freaking out (again) because, really, if this is what i really want, i shouldn't be here. but i'm going into my third year. i'm so afraid that if i transfer, i'd be miserable wherever i went at this point. so here i am, doing the very best with what i have and having a blast. i think this year is going to rock.

so i'm dating this guy and every time i look at him, every time i think about him, all the puzzle pieces seem to fit, and though he's not perfect and neither am i, we seem perfect together. i hestitate to call that love just yet, but it feels like something greater is moving within each of us... and i love that feeling. i truly, truly love that feeling.