sufjan bandwagon (a christmas trilogy)

A friend of ours sent us this link for free christmas music downloads. There are three volumes, all are good, and its free. I have been listening to them for the past three days. the guy's name is sufjan stevens. enjoy.

sufjan stevens christmas vol 1, 2, 3

so she wasn't so thrilled with my picture taking...

blue christmas welsie

words from a funeral

"some people collect stamps. some people collect baseball cards. clarence collected friends"

wit

I have had to watch the film "Wit" on two occasions as an assignment for classes in seminary. This is such a well done film, and yet brutal to watch. It is an important film, though, on many levels. Emma Thompson plays an academic whose has given her life to the study of John Donne's Holy Sonnets. The short of it....She gets cancer. Weaved throughout the film is John Donne's poem, "Death be not proud, though have called thee mighty and dreadfull"....It is beautiful and harsh and poetic and sad. i digress. You should watch this movie, but this is not why I write.

Josh and I stopped by Griffin, Ga on our way home from the thanksgiving holiday. It was early in the morning and a stop I didn't want to make. My great uncle Clarence is dying, quite literally, of cancer. Clarence is quite legendary in our family, a surrogate grandfather to many, including myself. Such an interesting man, so broad in knowledge, and smart...really smart. He blows the small town southern sterotype to peices. His mind was always bigger than the South. As a man in his late 80's, he was taken with the internet. He said he could fly around the world with the touch of a finger. He loves to know.

When I walked into his room this past Saturday morning, it was as i had imagined. "Wit" prepared me for this. No hair, thin, pain, absence. He looked at me once, I told him that I loved him, that he was brave. I kept thinking of John Donne and the end of that great poem...
"One short sleepe past, we wake eternally, And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die."

We are taught in this world that death is normal. And I suppose on the surface it is. that is, normative to human life as we know it. We die. But, anyone who has seen death, or seen my uncle can see how ugly death really is. It is broken and unnatural, this is why we hate it so much.

I think John Donne gets this. He knows the reality of death...but our death is not final. one short sleep past, we wake eternally, and death shall be no more; death thou shalt die

This past Sunday was the first Sunday of advent. The season of waiting in the church. waiting for Jesus. Josh once said to me that advent is the season when you are able to admit that some tears don't get wiped away until heaven....and i add, where death shall be no more.

all my love to uncle clarence and mary jean (his wife of 65 years)

r.s. thomas: priest and poet

In Church

Often I try
To analyse the quality
Of its silences. Is this where God hides
from my searching? I have stopped to listen,
After the few people have gone,
To the air recomposing itself
For vigil. It has waited like this
Since the stones grouped themselves about it.
These are the hard ribs
Of a body that our prayers have failed
To animate. Shadows advance
From their corners to take possession
Of places the light held
Their business. The uneasiness of the pews
Ceases. There is no other sound
In the darkness but the sound of a man
Breathing, testing his faith
On emptiness, nailing his questions
One by one to an untenanted cross.

family photo

josh's mom recently came for a visit. here is a pic from the weekend....

writers block

my updates have been few and far between, i know. many times i have opened up this blog, pressed the little button that says "compose" and then sit. and sit. and well, sit. this, time, though crap it might be, i will write....something. fall is finally here. josh and i have gone on some hikes the past couple of weekends. I always realize how different we are when we take walks. i seem to take in the whole scene, you know, enjoy all of the things that are beautiful. josh is all about the particular beauties. the little acorns that are the color of pumpkins. the bird, that is singing a fall song in some distant tree. I wish I could see like him. i miss so much.it is such a mystery, knowing people, even your husband. people wait and wait to make sure they get it right, finding that perfect someone. if we are honest, we can't know these things. we are made more creatively than that. we are prone to surprise and inconsistancy. I think this is beautiful.

Meanwhile, post-seminary life has had its ups and downs. I still don't know if I am democrat or republican. I don't know how I feel about cuss words. I use them, but am annoyed when they are used without caution. I am troubled about healthcare and minimum wage, and I am scared of living a suburbian life in the city. i am entertaining the idea of moving to the country. you see, i am not sure of many things.

until next time...

that guy

Kudos for this past Sunday's radio program"This American Life". You can listen online for free. Just click the link to the right. I have only actually listened to the last half hour, so if you want to fast foward to about minute 30 or 35, you can listen to the segment of the "that guy" phenomenon. It was pretty funny. I love radio shows. Does that make me cool or weird? I don't really care.

life is good 

close call

me and welsie

We had a bit of a scare tonite. Our neighbor was dog sitting for a friend and thought it would be a good idea to bring him out and play with Welsie. Josh held her on her leash and our neighbor held his friend's dog by the collar so they could meet first, because this is what you do. Well, the neighbor's dog went postal on our dog and basically attacked her, jaws on neck, welsie crying, me screaming. Josh had the sense to let go of the leash so Welsie could run, and thankfully she was able to get back on her feet. Our neighbor somehow got a hold of his dog and carried him inside. thankfully, she was ok. Josh and I are still a bit freaked out. Anyways, we showered Welsie with lots of love tonite...but honestly, I think it helped us more than her. Isn't she the cutest?

drunkard's prayer

I bought Over the Rhine's new album on itune's last night, "Drunkard's prayer". It is very good. It is thick with personal story. The title track, of course, made me cry this morning as I was mopping the floor.

"Your my water, your my wine, your my whisky..from time to time"

our prayers are like this aren't they? Sometime's I crave it like water. Sometimes I indulge in it like wine, and then sometimes I drown in it, like whisky, all wasted from the brokeness of trying to live my life in a meaningful way. I think Karin (singer) knows this, too. It is a really beautiful song. Buy it off itune's for 99 cents. it's worth it....or the whole album for 9.99, it's also worth it.

pilgrim days

It's hot as you know what here, and the journey towards a cooler day seems almost unknowable. I am weary of this southern summer, I knew I would be. I miss the rhythms of my old life. I miss Delmar and my hidden path to the loop.I miss the things I knew and the things that knew me. I miss my friends and the church and the jewish people that walked on Saturday. I miss dominos. I think I am allowed to be sad about these things, and it is important for me to say that I am, in fact, sad about leaving St Louis. I do have a dog though, and a very cute husband, who makes me laugh all the time.

Some of Josh's observations of the South.

Josh says...."People here put the prefix 're' in the wrong places"

I say..." What to you mean?"

Josh says "For example...I took Welsie(dog) out to pee an hour ago, but I think I need to re-take her out again"

I laugh. It does sound dumb.

salsa, homemade

I am making homemade salsa like crazy these days...so easy.

For a small bowl (enough to feed fourish)

2 tomatoes chopped
1/2 onion chopped
cilantro ( almost a whole bundle, but not all of it)
lime juice, a good amount
a little bit of olive oil
salt and pepper
a touch of cayenne pepper

put everything in a blender until pureed.

adjust to your liking.

A Day Off

I am breathing easier this morning because I have a day off. I have spent the last three years working at most three days a week. Being a nurse has its perks, and days off is one of them. However, since I have been here in Birmingham, I have been working everyday... mostly to "facilitate" my orientation process. I hate being the "trainee", especially in a field in which I have 7 years of experience. I was venting my frustration to a friend to which she replied..."think about how Jesus felt...he created the whole place". Ummm...she had a point.

Not much on the docket today. I plan on bathing the dog, she smells just ever so doggish. I also plan on going to Barnes and Noble and reading whatever I want. I don't have any places yet to call my own. No Meshugga and the community I would surely see on any given day. But this is ok, I will find new loafing graduate students to mingle with on weekday mornings(these are the only kind who get to do such things), unless you are a cool mom like tirzah.

more later, brooke

more welsie 

our new little girl

Well, in a moment of something..only time will tell, Josh and I bought our first dog. She is Welsie the Mastiff. She is really adorable and she is going to get really really big. (she already weighs 60 lbs...) We love her already and we hope she learns to trust and love us. As of right now, she is pretty timid...or she just gets so excited that she pees everywhere. I will post some more pictures tommorrow.

I'm all done 

meet welsie... 

poem

Poetry has a way of coming in and out of my life. Last June, Josh and I hiked around the Great Blasket Island in Ireland. It was a ghost island, once inhabited by the strongest kind of human. A beautiful and severe place. You can see it just beyond Josh's head in the picture.


I stood out on the limb of a ghost island
There was a path before me to keep
me steady(though I am a unleveled soul)

All blue and thick was the way around me
All blue, as I face due North(this island undoes me)

I walked this soil with the one I love
My knees split and the wind cut
my heart

And I wondered if the past was speaking to me
O Ireland, so tough skinned.
you melt me

tonite's dinner

Baked Ziti

I cooked this tonite and it was really good. It feeds a lot of people, too!

what you need:

1 box of ziti pasta
2 jars of spaghetti sauce...whatever you like
1 lb ground beef or turkey (or substitute meat with veggies that you like)
1 onion
1 six ounce package of provolone cheese sliced
1 six ounce package of mozzarella cheese (cut into cubes)
1 1/2 cups of sour cream(I used light)

Directions

Cook noodles until they are a little tougher than al dente; drain

Brown onion and meat; drain fat

Mix both sauces with the meat and onion; simmer 15 mintues

slice your provolone if not already bought that way

cube your mozzarella

preheat oven to 350

lightly butter baking dish

Place half of the ziti on bottom of dish

lay slices of provolone across ziti

spread sour cream over cheese

Pour half of sauce mixture

pour remaining ziti

spread cubed mozzarella evenly

pour rest of sauce

Sprinkle Parmasean cheese on top (as much as you want)

Bake for 30 minutes until cheese is bubbly.

some house pics

some have asked to see some pictures of the house...here you go:)

kitchen cabinet and flowers from josh 

porch view 

big room 

living room 

when it hits the fan

i suppose we should have seen this coming. our first house, and the sewage pipes go bust. josh and I would agree that we are fortunate. we have good friends and family. we have nice things. we eat well and drink clean water. we even go to movies and have many winter coats. however, sometimes, enough "difficult" things happen in a short amount of time to make you question things. things like, are we crazy? were we supposed to move here? Our first weekend here, a tree fell down in our driveway, blocking our cars..of course, the night before my first day of work. drama. then our sewage goes bust. then, we for some reason are not getting our paychecks in the mail...and then when the sewage is "fixed"...water starts coming out of the toilet overflowing onto our beautful hardwood floors. so here I am, sitting on my recently soiled floors, waiting on a plumber to fix what he just supposedly fixed three hours ago. did I mention he ripped down our neighbors tree in the process...the big one that shades his nice front porch. Oh dear....this is our little life these days.

And I am not dealing well with this. I am irritated(your house smelling like poo can do this to you). We also just had to cancel our fancy dinner reservations with my dad that were for 6....that's one minute from now.

this will all be funny one day...but now, not so much.

talk to you soon....

"I've had better days" Brooksie:)

mad, hot ballroom

the strangest thing.....four summers ago, I went to NYC and worked at a summer day camp in Washington Heights. I helped tutor these kids, played in the fountains with them, and taught them a dance class...the cotton eyed joe was the dance du jour. I laughed my head off as these kids, who were from the Dominican Republic, danced a little jig with me. I had a favorite, her name was jatna....well, josh and I went to see a documentary yesterday (see poster)...and ALL those kids I was with in NYC were in this documentary...and jatna, she's the little girl on the poster. Can you believe that? I cried the entire film. so the documentary is about public schools in NYC who are doing this ball room dancing program. it is just hilarious and adorable, moving, etc.... they documented only three of the schools, one of which was Wahington Heights. It was so great to see these little kids have their moment of glory..so many of them come from such difficult circumstances. So many times we do things, like a short term mission trip, and wonder what good we did or we wonder what ever happens to these precious people. well, sometimes they become famous little ball room dancers!.....mad, hot ballroom, go see these wonderful kids!

home

we made it to birmingham, tired and cranky, but we made it. we were presently surprised by the cooler temperatures here. a small, but welcomed blessing. gladys and ted made us a picnic lunch, so we ate chicken salad sandwiches cut in the shape of hearts as we sipped on cokes in McDonalds somewhere in Kentucky. My sister came in my room last nite with tears in her eyes. She needed to be sad for us, she said. It was sweet. I am sad for us, too. But, I find some comfort in all of this... when I moved to St Louis three years ago, I knew hardly a soul. Yesterday, as I drove down hwy 40, I left behind people that I loved. Thanks be to God.

brooke

Leslie, Tirzah, Maria, and Me

I am really not obsessed with posting wedding pictures. I just got this new computer, so I am finally getting the chance to play around with them. All that to say, these are my best friends in St Louis. I will miss you, miss you, miss you. please don't forget me:)

wedding day 

st louis 

the road home

the road home starts with packing, in our case, many, many books. I packed almost 13 boxes of books last night. we still have more. I am always eager to reinvent myself when I start packing. "This time, I will be so organized". My first box was perfect. I traveled from room to room gathering poetry books. I filled it to the top with beautiful poetry. R. S. Thomas, Wendell Berry, Shakespeare, e.e. cummings, and so on. Next I proceeded to apply the tape ever so taughtly, and then I wrote with my big fat marker, POETRY. As the the English say....brilliant. I wish the other boxes were so perfect, but instead, they were merely a source of entertainment to my husband. Examples of other boxes: 'Seminary books and field guides", "english men who talk about God" (Lewis, Tolkein, McDonald..this is obvious, right?:) . My last box was simply labeled "random". So, I am not the best at categories. This is because so few things fit into one, at least in my take of things. Take, for example, Bonhoeffer's "Letters from Prison". Well, this is both memoir-ish, biography-ish, and spirituality-ish. I am not sure where it ended up. Probably not where a normal person would have put it.

all this to say, I have begun the process. the process of leaving one home to go to another. I have tried to write an entry several times, but cannot bring myself to write the goodbye blog. I cannot bring myself to recollect my favorite this and my favorite that. I cannot bring myself to wish my friends well, to let go of them. This I cannot do just yet.

Back to the boxes.

brooke

our new old house 

baby blue salad

this is sooo good. my friend jackie gave this to me. I love it, love it, love it!

Baby Blue Salad ¾ pound mixed salad greens
Balsamic Vinaigrette
4 ounces blue cheese, crumbled2 oranges, peeled and cut into thin slices
1 pint strawberries, quartered
Sweet-and-Spicy Pecans

Toss greens with Balsamic Vinaigrette and crumbled blue cheese. Place on 6 individual plates. Arrange orange slices evenly over greens; sprinkle evenly with strawberries and top evenly with Sweet-and-Spicy Pecans.

Balsamic Vinaigrette
½ cup balsamic vinegar
3 tablespoons Dijon mustard
3 tablespoons honey
2 large garlic cloves, minced
2 small shallots, minced
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon pepper
1 cup olive oil

Whisk together first 7 ingredients until blended. Gradually whisk in olive oil.

Sweet-and-Spicy Pecans
¼ cup sugar1 cup warm water
1 cup pecan halves
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon chili powder
1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper

Stir together ¼ cup sugar and warm water until sugar dissolves. Add pecans, and soak 10 minutes. Drain, discarding syrup. Combine 2 tablespoons sugar, chili powder, and red pepper. Add pecans, tossing to coat. Place pecans on a lightly greased baking sheet. Bake at 350° for 10 minutes or until golden brown, stirring once.


yum yum!!!

the chorus

Leslie recommended this movie and I loved it. A beautiful French film. Here is the trailer if you would like to see a preview. les choristes.

also, Josh and put a contract on a house today. we feel very grown up:)

and... my very sweet parents gave us a lap top for our (my eventual) graduation. So I hope to do more with this site soon!

brooke

josh and mom

josh and mom
Originally uploaded by brookejared.

josh and me

josh and me
Originally uploaded by brookejared.

graduation day

graduation day
Originally uploaded by brookejared.

we have been super busy,but wanted to poat some pictures of life, graduation. etc.... updates to come.
brooke

still here.

it is the end of the semester crunch. three papers in three weeks. this is my goal...it has to be, seeing classes end in just three weeks. gotta love deadlines. the weather isn't helping either. it is so beautiful here. spring. ah, the serenity! my jacks (jackie, jackie bug) just moved in with me and josh, her husband to follow suit next week. They are taking the old seminary plunge, so as they search for a new home, we have new roomates:) we are glad to have them. meanwhile josh and i prepare to take some sort of plunge, somewhere. this, of course, makes me feel moody, because i like to know things. what can you do? wait. trust God. oh the cliches, why do they have to be so true?

really good music for those who listen to internet radio......folkalley.com

toodles.

unafraid

There is this man at my church who sings in our little choir. He sings loud and he throws his hands in the air. His mood always suits the music. No one could ever accuse this man of being unenthusiastic. He participates in his singing with all of his being. He looks strange, and sometimes I even get the church laughs, but mostly I am just jealous of his raw inhibitions. If I could only be so brave.
Of course, there is the issue of chaos in worship. I went to a revival once where a very loud man ran around the church placing his hand on willing (and unwilling) attendees yelling out the word “fire”. People were falling down all around me. I was scared. This man eventually came to me, forcing his palm against my forehead, yelling those same words to me. I just stood there- and I was the only one standing for rows and rows. There were a few nearby swatting something, I found my way to a chair near them, but it did not take me long to realize that they too had been taken by the holy spirit. They were swatting it away, dodging it like a big bumble bee. I eventually told my friends I would be outside. I walked across the street and ate a Subway, and I would have smoked a cigarette if I had one.
But this man is not chaotic. He is just strange and unafraid to show it. I, too, am strange. My husband says so all the time, and anyone who knows me well would say so as well. But, I go to church and sit in my pew. I sing quietly. I never pray out loud. I hide my weirdness with quietness.
I suppose this brings me to the issue of identity. So much of the way I act in worship is motivated by fear. Fear of someone hearing my weak prayers. Fear of someone seeing my raw acts of worship. So much fear. I don’t know why I get so afraid, but I am sure it has something to with not getting who I am to God.
I still think that revival was weird, and I have never seem someone swat the holy spirit since that night. But this man, though his worship at times might resemble a holy spirit swatter, seems to know and love God unabashedly. This is something I look forward to on Sunday. The community of worship, this man, who helps me be less afraid.

my sister

my sister now has a blog It is titled midnight runs. I, like my sister have an infatuation with Mcdonalds coke. I am not sure what their little secret is, but the fizz to coke taste ratio is nothing less than perfect. Not to syrupy. not to gassy. just right. another thing my sister and I love, (that she has yet to admit to on her blog) is our love for fish filet sandwiches from Mcdonalds. Yes, that greasy little fish sandwich with a lump of tarter sauce all wrapped up in the baby blue wrapper. This is our little secret, and we will gladly drive late at night to indulge in this nasty little habit. Hence, the title of Whitney's blog. Whitney is a lot of fun and has seemingly inherited the perpetual youth gene for our family. Her fun-ness is important to me and helps me walk a little lighter. It is good that God puts us in families. He must know how incomplete we would be without each other. families remind us of seasons, the "time for's" of our life. and whit and I would both agree there is a time for coke, at mcdonalds, preferably midnight, any day of the week.

green for spring

It is sunny here today in the STL and almost 70 degrees. In light of this glimpse into spring, I have updated my "colors" to suit the mood. Green it is. For a good laugh, click....hilarious.
http://www.whiteboydj.com/babygotbook/

a long pause

Sorry for the silence during the holidays. We have been gone alot- and then recovering from being gone. It is also so rainy up here this winter. and cold. yuck. I need a beach. Josh and I saw a good movie over the holiday- Spainglish. Perhaps most enjoyed after a week with family- a way to "process" the dysfunction that is us. This movie, with its sad realities, also allows for a few laughs. You just have to laugh at times at your life. A bundle of giggles we all are. I think Annie Dillard writes somewhere that day after day God watches "our dancing bear act" without blowing us to peices, that believe it or not, it's ok to be people. I suppose she means thats its ok to be a mess, that Jesus loves us-still. Happy new year folks.