Christmas, Snogging, Ostriches and Pecans

first of all:

Children sleeping, snow is softly falling
Dreams are calling like bells in the distance
We were dreamers not so long ago
But one by one we all had to grow up
When it seems the magic's slipped away
We find it all again on Christmas day

Believe in what your heart is saying
Hear the melody that's playing
There's no time to waste
There's so much to celebrate
Believe in what you feel inside
And give your dreams the wings to fly
You have everything you need
If you just believe.

~Josh Groban "Believe" from the major motion picture, "The Polar Express"

I find that in the Christmas "season" (and you'll find out about the quotations later) I do find a warmpth and a bright, cheeriness that I quite enjoy. There's something about the lights glimmering on a Christmas tree, or the way the house smells like those potpouri pine cones that just warms a person from the inside. But I also find that there's a certain flaw in our general Christmas celebrations.

I'm all for getting decked out for Christmas. I love lights and decorations and trees and ornaments and all those inflatable figurines that you put in you lawn...

ok...maybe not those...but, the reality is that retail has gotten the best of all of us. How many times have I stopped, staring at some Christmas spectical and actually thought, Praise be to God...here, I fall prostrate to the Lamb who was born to be slain...???
Only like...once, honestly.
All this Christmas malarky has completly taken a 180 to a holiday I don't even recognize anymore. I don't even care if you celebrate the Santa Christmas or not, look around! Do you see this holiday? I see people stooped in tradition, so focused on shopping and meals and lights and decorations and what they have to do to get ready, that they miss the entire (excuse the cliche) reason for the "season".
This "season" should be a year-round celebration. Sure, it's wonderful to set aside a day or two to really celebrate the birth of our savior...but shouldn't we be celebrating--no rejoicing that fact every waking second of every day?
I look at myself and I'm pretty much ashamed. My spiritual dry-spell has gone on for far too long. I don't get the same chills when I hear music at church anymore. I find myself fighting fits of drousiness and boredom...I'm not paying attention to what's right in front of me. I'm such a stupid, lukewarm hotdog...

But that doesn't mean I don't still keep these wheels turning.

This Christmas, take a minute...just one or two to really ponder this fact:
Christ came in this form--not a cute, innocent baby wrapped in beautiful white cloths and smiling, but one of a cold, shivering infant, huddling to his virgin mother...a lamb. He came as a lamb to be slain. He was the ultimate sacrifice that washed every blimish from our lives before we even existed. He came, willingly as a baby...not to grow and live and teach, but to die. He came to die.
When I look in the lights of the tree this Christmas...I think of the stars that night...and what might have been going through the mind of God. His son, himelf, was being born and would be slain just a few short years later...for me.



Well, the transition from God to snogging is probably not going to be easy, so let's do it the hard way, with all caps and exlimation points!!!!

SNOGGING!!

If you don't already know, snogging is usually a British word used for kissing or making out. Recently, a lot of my friends have been writing blogs about sex and relationships. I thought I'd give the subject a whirl. (Just expressing my feelings on the matter)

Most of you know that I have horrible luck with relationships. No, I think it's better phrased that I SUCK at relationships. (make a pun out of that in your comments and I'll hunt you down) I agree with most people when they say high school is no place to find your soulmate. Like that's seriously gonna happen in the halls of Lafayette High School. Sure. No. It's most likely not.

But those of you out there that are in a relationship and are getting into more and more serious stuff...just know that this will effect your life later. I kid you not, my friends, although they're mostly insignificant, relationships taken to a serious to maybe a physical level will change you. I'm not willing to waste the heartache, or the precious time right now. I'm not interested in this deep, serious stuff.

I know you're sitting there going, "Well you're such a hypocrite, Jack, you're always talking about guys and wanting a date for prom and all that."
This is a true statement.
I do desire to have a boyfriend. But the kind of boyfriend I'm looking for doesn't exist for me right now. I'm only interested in the slowed-up, gentle, casual relationships that call for the occasional need for a hand to hold, a shoulder to sigh into and a dance partner.

Girls, don't degrade yourself and give into all this flirty, "Let's hook up" crap. You're better than that. You're worth more than that. God made you for someone and I'm sure that someone would treat you better.

Guys, don't think you have to be something amazing. You don't need to exert the energy or the valuable time. Work on making yourself better for that one girl. So what if you've hooked up with fifteen girls in the past two weeks? That has no value in the eyes of a girl. She's not thinking about now. When you and her are being intimate, you're both screwing everything up. She's thinking about your futures, while you're thinking about the moment.

(And that doesn't mean all guys think like that, I understand that there are actual exceptions)

So, I guess my point is...I'd rather wait and honor the promise ring on my finger, honor who I am, honor my God than to have "experience".

Speaking of experience. I know you'll all enjoy the story of how my dad can say he's experienced strangling an ostrich.

(that transition was nice, wasn't it?)

Okay.
Step back a few years with me.
It's winter time; Southern Lights is open at the horse park. The Rhorer family is taking their annual trip to see the lights, vendors, museam, model trains and petting zoo. This particular year, the zoo features ostriches and leemurs. The leemurs have no point to this story. I just added them in to see if anyone would tell me whether or not I spelled leemur correctly.
My dad is wearing a Kentucky jacket with pull strings on the sides of the hood. These strings have small shiny clips that keep them at the perfect postition for a person's hood to fit.

Now, it's a commonly known fact that ostriches have a liking for shiny things. They're kleptomaniacs, in other words. So, a particularly friendly ostrich decides to have a bite of my dad's cone full of animal feed....and eventually,
a bite out of my dad's jacket.
My father, being the brilliant man of strategy that he is, decides to strangle the ostrich in order to get back a clip that it had just swallowed.
Yes, this is my family.
So there is my father, in the middle of a petting zoo, face scrunched in anger, strangling an ostrich for some coat clips.
Needless to say...the ostrich wasn't there the next year.

So, that was my random story for the day. Please excuse the excessive rantings and random jumps from one point to another. It's 1:40 am and I'm tired. I hope you enjoyed hearing about my father's fights with beast. We're definatly not members of PETA


....


Goodnight, and good luck.

yes, I do realize that I forgot to mention Pecans...


ah, but now I have.

Shallow Breaths (edited)

just a few fix-er up-ers on this one:

Calming breaths soothed our silence.
Starlight illumenated the edges of your smile
and your calloused fingers caressed
the velvet curves of spotted night skies.
Your palms were raised into the black,
stretching out to catch the moon
for me.

And simple sighs were all I could return.

Morning light peered from Earth’s upturned grin;
her horizon gave birth to fresh colors.
The shine in your eyes painted the morning,
you could stop time to show me the dewdrops,
to count the gentle morning laughsthat brought in each new day
for me.

And simple sighs were all I could return.

Moon-touched fingers found a home wrapped in mine,
and gazes that coat the sunrise searched me.
How could hands and eyes that caress the heavens,
that paint every morning with such skilled ease
find the space in their spirits,
for me?

Protective Bubble

I'm fairly certain, as I waste valuable "get ready" time this morning,
that Fayette County public schools have a protective weather bubble
over them. Every county in the state could be out for bad weather and
who's still in school?
Us.
I mean I really shouldn't be complaining since we were out yesterday
and it is the last week before break....

But...

I make it my life's goal to destroy that bubble...

I'm Afraid Somone Else Will Hear Me (written originally in French)

C'est fini,
la reste de nous.
Nous avons vu
aurore aprés aurore
et le lumière ne jamais
attrapé dans tes yeux.
J'était là
mais où était toi?
Où était toi?