Monday, February 28, 2011

stream of consciousness

Earlier I went to a County Commission meeting and I got all dressed up (which was completely unnecessary but I like to dress up and mom said it'd be good if I looked nice) and went in to observe. It wasn't exactly a willful decision because it's a requirement for our youth leadership program, but it turned out to be not bad at all. Of course it only lasted 10 minutes so I can't really say this was a huge accomplishment for me, I might have been bored to tears if it had been any longer. But my favorite part was at the end when all the commissioners came over to us and shook our hands and we introduced ourselves. I love to meet people older than me. I felt so growny telling them all my name. I have a fascination with meeting adults, honestly... mostly because I can't wait to feel like I'm completely a part of their world. For a moment I felt like a professional adult, shaking hands and exchanging how-you-do's. It was a very self-satisfying feeling, although they might not have realized how exciting that was for me. I can't wait to be taken seriously. I might even go into politics one day.
Afterwards I had the sudden urge to be anywhere but home. Home is where I'd become casual again, just a teenage girl on a Monday night watching television and blogging about her melodramatic life. I wanted to go out in my khakis and dress shoes and pretty cardigan and pretend to be someone else for a while, someone unfamiliar but powerful and authoritative and respected. I place way too much emphasis on the world's opinion of me, I have to admit. I obsess over being the kind of person people will like. I want to be respected and influential to people... it seems so completely selfish when I am trying to put this into words. I suppose it is pretty selfish, to want so much to be liked... but I want it for other's benefit, too. I want someone to say in the last few minutes of their life that Shauna Baker was someone they never forgot, someone that changed their life for the better.
I want a family one day. I want to raise children and be the most caring mother they could ever know. But not too soft. I want to guide and be respected. I want to be the parent that doesn't have to punish their kids, because just the fear of disappointing me is enough to keep them out of trouble. I want a house that's always clean enough for surprise visitors, but comfty. Not rigid and fragile. I want crayon portraits on the walls, not expensive adornments that have no meaning. I want color and life. I want openness and unity in my home, connection and closeness. I want to be able to hear the music my daughter is playing in the next room. I want to gather in the living room at night because that's where the family feels most at peace, when we're all together and enjoying just being in each other's presence. I want love in my home. Maybe I'm asking for perfection, but if nothing else, there has to be love... flowing from the walls and ceiling and hardwood floors and gathered into each of our hearts.
Before I want a family, I want a husband. I want the man that God made me for, the one for whom I'm to be a helpmeet. I want lazy afternoons reading books and snuggling on the couch. I want little furniture but much planning in our small, familiar home. I want coordination but spontaneity. Colors that don't match but do. I want bible studies and youth rallies and teenagers at our home all the time. I want to be the forever hostess, always welcoming a visitor and never turns away neither a strange nor a familiar face from her home. I want to be loved because I'm godly and virtuous. I want to coordinate events with other Christian ladies... perhaps we'll start a weekly study on how to be godly wives, or how to evangelize, or how to raise faithful children. We can do anything if we have only passion. I want to write a novel and magazine articles and publish heartfelt words for teenage girls to read and grow from. I want to speak at ladies days and be known because I am godly. I want to be wanted for spiritual encouragement. I want to get phone calls in the middle of the night because a young girl needs encouragement. I want to be summoned when a sister in Christ has entered a crisis and needs support and guidance. I want to be the best I can be in everything that I'm good and learn to be good at things that I couldn't begin to do right now. I want to grow and love and be loved and be pleasing to God. I want to make change happen. I want to put a dent in worldliness, one that won't be soon forgotten when my life is over. I want to be a role model through spiritual beauty.
I have big dreams. Sometimes I get wrapped up in the world of being an average teenager but they're always there. I was not called out by God to be an average teenager... Maybe dreaming is a part of that. Or maybe that's just a part of me. But truly, there shouldn't be any distinction.















I love the sky. If someone were to ask me what I felt was God's most masterful and beautiful creation, the sky would immediately come to mind. It's like an indefinite canvas for God's painting, the colors change everyday and is beyond anything any artist could ever create. Anything beautiful that man can create... the ability came from God. I know this because of the beauty of his artwork, the sky and the mountains and the oceans and the intricate details of a tiny flower or human eye. The rivers flow into the oceans that rise into the clouds and wash the Earth again, and this cycle says that God is. The eyes receive an imagine which is then transmitted into the human brain and understood, felt, appreciated, and this process says that God is. The sun rises above the rocky mountain top creating a stream of color, and gradually crescendos into its highest point where the entire Earth is filled with life and color and vibrancy, and then the colors cool as the great light descends into its rest and the purple blue hues tell the Earth goodnight, and the stars twinkle as they awake from their rest and the swollen moonlight casts a heavenly glow on the resting world, and this work of art says that God is.

I wish I could be a bird, flying closer and closer into the warm color of day and the cool comfort of night. Departing in a twinkling and returning after seeing the entire world from a whole different view. Not tied down by any mortal force of gravity, completely free and unrestrained and fearless.

And the best part is that one day, I'll never have to be tied to Earth again. I'll soar on wings of eagles unto the place of eternal rest.

And if God's creation for only a short time is this beautiful, I can only imagine what heaven must be- His ultimate masterpiece.

Thursday, February 24, 2011

missing teeth

people are like teeth in your mouth. the more you love them, the deeper their roots go. the more it hurts when they're taken away. when they choose to pull away from you, they leave a sore spot. and even though you know you're only hurting yourself, your tongue keeps going to that sore spot where that person used to be. a missing tooth is a gap in your smile, a piece of your happiness that's missing. it's a part of yourself that you've lost.

but eventually, i guess we all have to learn to love our smile even when we have teeth missing. it's like a battle scar, a proud reminder of what we've endured to become the people we are now. 

like everything else, it takes time to heal.

Sunday, February 20, 2011

melody and harmony


this is about hannah elizabeth cooper. she is my favorite person in the whole entire world, and i'm sorry if you were shooting for that title because it's very unlikely that you could replace her. she has been my best friend for as long as i have breathed. she is compassionate and excited and humble and silly and reflective and honest and hilarious and caring and wise. she can interpret my thoughts before i can even begin to comprehend them. she helps me understand why i act the way i do. she has personal experience to help with every problem i could ever face, because we quite literally live each other's lives. we form opinions that coincide with each other's and when we find out it's like magic. she never wants me to be anything other than myself. she never makes me feel guilty. she doesn't want me to settle. she helps me dream. we can talk about our most intimate fears and laugh over them. on that note, our fears are usually congruous. we know each other and we can tell what the other is thinking. she unscrambles my thoughts. she makes me realize things that are undeniable, but I would have never accepted on my own. she makes me laugh louder and smile more confidently. she takes pleasure in little things that others might find ridiculous. chasing ducks. grocery shopping. harmonizing with our ipod. with her i can cry unashamed. with her i can be as silly as possible. i'm never uncomfortable, even if we're in public. i can be completely and entirely myself when i'm with her, no matter who else is present. i'm a better conversationist when she's around. i'm not as awkward. i'm friendlier and happier. i don't doubt myself or worry over other people's opinions. i don't try to be a crowd pleaser when i know it's an unchristian thing to do in that circumstance. i'm stronger in God. we can talk about God and Christian living and i feel closer to Him because i see Him in her. we pray together. she's a light that shines upon the truths in my life. she's the anchor that keeps me steadied. she's imperfect but perfect in God. she makes mistakes but she's always ready to push through them. she will disappoint me but i will love her more because she is human. she is unselfish. she is beautiful, beginning with her inner soul and shining out to every part of her and evident to everyone who beholds her. 
she is my best friend. i'll never let that change, as long as either of us lives. she's made her forever mark on my heart. if life is a melody, then our friendship is the harmony that makes every moment of it infinitely more beautiful. 

Friday, February 18, 2011

about love and decisions

I am starting with this but if you hate reading and despise even the word "book" then have no fear, I actually have time to express deep thoughts tonight so just skip right on down

3. If you want to know what the book is about and all that then you can go read a review because I really don't get any thrill from writing a whole synopsis but honestly just READ IT because it was adorable.
If you plan to read the book, please skip down past this paragraph because I would hate to spoil the ending for you: I love the unconventional romance, the one where boy and girl don't meet date kiss get engaged have a fight but make-up get married the end. That's very sweet and all but it isn't realistic that all love is that way in the real world. Life doesn't always let us live our ideal fairytale. It has its own story to write and you just have to settle with being the character. Love doesn't follow a pattern. I love the fantastic idea of a man who grows to love a woman unconditionally, even after she has moved away married and had eleven children. He visits her home and befriends her husband and tells her children how in love with their mother he once was (the reader knows that he most definitely still loves her deeply, but perhaps the children didn't notice this). He is never bitter, he is happy simply having her memory, having his past growing up with her and running through the cornfield and down abandoned paths together. That's wonderful to me. Magical, even.
My absolute favorite line from the book is:

"Do you know, Antonia, since I've been away, I think of you more often than of anyone else in this part of the world. I'd have liked to have you for a sweetheart, or a wife, or my mother or my sister- anything that a woman can be to a man. The idea of you is a part of my mind; you influence my likes and dislikes, all my tastes, hundreds of times when I don't realize it. You really are a part of me."


I believe at that point was when I was the closest to tears. To think of how someone can love so much, in no particular sense, as in a friend or lover or any other stereotypical relationship between people, but simply for themselves. To simply know that someone is such a part of your life, not because of who they are but because of who you are because of them. It's beautiful.

Okay, so that's book number three this year. Time for a subject chance.
I'm very indecisive. You've noticed, I'm very sure. I change my mind constantly, it's quite scary to tell you the truth. I've made it a point to wait at least one week after forming an opinion before I make any life altering decisions. I think this system will work quite nicely. If I made rash decisions based on my fleeting changes of opinion then I probably would have quit band during marching season and I'd be miserable now. I could be homeschooled and I would miss school and the people there terribly. I would either be dating someone I really didn't like or I'd have to break-up after realizing that I was completely crazy at the time of initiating that relationship, and I might lose great friends in the process. So you see that this is a very dangerous characteristic that I possess. It's powerful. I feel like I'm holding a lethal weapon and I have to handle it very carefully. But that's a bit dramatic I guess.

I'm not on the tennis team anymore. That was a very scary decision to make. But I waited a long time, I thought about it forever and ever and asked the opinion of pretty much everyone I knew. People I was close to like Matt was just like "Shauna, you need to quit" and I really appreciated that honest opinion that he gives me. I don't like "listen to your heart" or "just do what makes you happy", though I'm very thankful to those that gave me that advice. It just wasn't quite the kick in the rear that I needed.

So now I have time, and I get to do new things with it, and that excites me. I want to take pictures read books go to youth days play guitar go to soccer games and all those things I really don't have a lot of time for. It's very very exciting to have time.

I love my mom. I respect her opinion more than anyone else. She can see right through me, and I don't like it sometimes but she knows how to tell me exactly what I don't want to hear but I know is true. I really appreciate that. Tonight we went walking and talked for an hour about her high school boyfriends and I laughed until I thought I would cry, those are my favorite chats. Anytime I am feeling indecisive I talk to Mom and she always gets it right. She can give me the facts of the situation without having to give me her opinion, and that way it's all my decision but she helps things be so much clearer. I don't tell her enough that I love her.

I think my random thoughts have ceased

Monday, February 14, 2011

valentine

It has been brought to my attention that I don't have a boyfriend. Which I was aware of.
It has also been brought to my attention (by someone that I love to death) that I don't have a boyfriend because every time I meet someone I really enjoy being around, I become their best friend instead. And then I feel like we're too close of friends for it to be anything more.
Yeah... talk about a punch in the stomach. Because it's totally true.

I was going to vent. But then this would turn into some average melodramatic teen blog where the girl seems to feel that she is the only being on the planet and that she's miserable and lonely and being single is the worst curse anyone could ever have. And I'm not gonna do that, because I like to think there's a bigger picture that I can focus on. Me being single < starving children all over the world. Me being lonely sometimes < losing someone I love. Me having two guy best friends > me having no friends at all. And then being single doesn't seem so bad.

I really want to be loved one day. Get married and have four kids and a great dane with an oxymoronic name (such as Tiny) and a big front porch and a library and a husband to play guitar and sing for me. But I'm not spazzing out because I don't have that yet, nor anything close to it.
I've got a life to live, there's no need to think that every good thing has to happen all at once. I have a lot of good things now and I'll be blessed with many good things to come. God knows what plans He has for me.

Even while I'm trying to throw all these optimistic punches at my bad mood sometimes the truth leaks through. It's scary to think that maybe I push people away. Maybe I'm so afraid of the word love that I overuse it in the friend sense and that way it won't surprise me and that person will already be used to the idea, and so I'm in friend zone forever and ever. Because apparently once you become such good friends with someone, you can't be anything other than just that- best friends. That's my completely illogical way of thinking, anyway. But maybe it's not an accident. Maybe it's a subconscious defense to being hurt/being the hurter. I hate the last one most of all.

I feel completely ridiculous. But I wouldn't be an honest blogger if I didn't express these worries, and what kind of blogger does that make me? The sugar coating kind. The kind who doesn't want anyone to think she has a kink in her self-esteem.

I WORRY ABOUT NEVER GETTING MARRIED

There. But I'm a teenage girl. We're allowed. It's our privilege.
It doesn't mean I'm gonna go around and sulk all the time because I don't have a boyfriend. It means sometimes I think. I ponder things.
But I can still be a happy gal.
Letting one person control our happiness is a scary situation in and of itself. Trust me.
Maybe I should skip on to something cute.

I received one valentine present from Tyler aka best friend and he's a frog and his name is Clyde. I love both of them, a whole lot

Saturday, February 12, 2011

good reads

This blog can't be very long because I have a headache from staring into the screen for so long book shopping
I used to use weread.com and record all the books I've read and what not, but I was completely disappointed and bored with it. It recommended books that had nothing to do with the books I was reading, nor were they even popular books. And the reviews I read were very limited and the people who wrote them sounded extremely informal. Like perhaps they got the e mixed up with 3 and forgot that "you" isn't spelled like u and "yours" isn't urs and no offense if that's the boat you float on but I really just have no desire to take advice on intelligent literature when using correct grammar seems to be such a hassle.
So I found goodreads.com and now I can't stay away. I'm in love. Finding books is easy because they are separated into lists like "best books of the 20th century" and "books of the decade" and I can scroll through and see all the big titles that I've been hearing throughout the past few years but never actually knew what they were about. And people write awesome reviews. Like entire essays, but they don't spoil the book. I have like 30 new books that I'm dying to read just from reading reviews.
Some I already knew I wanted to read and others I had never heard of. Lately I've been on a classic novel kick and I'm reading My Antonia by Willa Cather and starting Jane Eyre and now I'm just ready to read every classic novel ever published.
But anyway, considering my headache I'm just going to show you some of the books I found and give a tip for those of us who honestly enjoy books- this website is pretty legit.

Also, I started this challenge thing where I state how many books I want to read in 2011 and my goal was 40, but I got started late so I've only read two so far. I'll do better though.

 1. loved. it was so cute. a journalist from london begins corresponding with a book club in Guernsey and learn about all their experiences during the holocaust. it sounds like it would be thoroughly depressing but it really wasn't at all. i love all the cute little love stories going on between the lines. i love it because her love story it isn't blunt, it grows on you. kind of like the love comes softly series. and i seriously laughed until i almost cried at the end.

 2. loved. there's no way that i'm qualified to review books, especially mark twain. but i honestly loved this book and if i ever read a book twice this would be one i would choose. i had to read it for school but i'm really glad that i did. it's one of my favorites now.

and now on to all the books I want to read...