So, its been awhile since the last blog -- which was the overexcitedness of my roommate's balloon-moving powers. Yeah, that was popular on campus for a good 2 days -- gotta love the short attention span on twentysomethings.
There's little I have to share -- partly because its all internal, and partly because I don't think there's a large swell of people who want to know all those internal struggles. So for this, I'll cleverly divert your attention to...
The trees on campus. Don't worry, I'm going somewhere with this. I just stepped outside to take a phone call, and as I did, I was struck by the amazing beauty of the Simpson campus. If there's one thing I can say, my tuition is being put to good use at least in the area of landscaping. All around, there are these wonderful blooming trees with soft and brilliant blossoms already peaking out, and every afternoon the skyline just above Mt. Shasta mimicks these beautiful shades of pink, purple and red so the blooms fade into the distance in an orchestrated mess of color and wonder.
Maybe everything is more in the red color scheme in my mind's eye anyways, because today is Valentine's Day. Ya know, not to put a downer on things, but red is not my favorite color. If I could choose, I would take the colors of St. Patrick's Day, and give them all the connotations assigned to Valentine's day, so it would be culturally defined as romantic to wear my favorite color [green], which is also the color that looks the best with my skin tone. Red makes me look red -- not flattering.
Lindsey: Today the cafe was playing Jamie Cullum's new CD. Even though it's their CD, I was the only one here who knew who he was. Sad for them, happy for me.
Moving on... I'd like to say that with all the understandable discord in my heart over my recent malady so closely preceding Valentine's Day, I'm making a concious decision to be happy for the people who can enjoy this holiday in all of it's romantic undertones. However, after reading a friend's blog earlier, I would like to point out, that this holiday has about as much relation to the authentic idea of love as it does the color green. People whom truly love each other don't wait for Valentine's Day for such professions of affection, nor do they need grand gestures of romance to convey their true feelings. Even when I did have a Valentine in the past, I always saw the holiday as something that at best is a shallow-yet-accurate representation of America's fickle flirt with romanticism rather than embracing the widths and depths of God's true and abiding love for everything it has to offer.
What's more, is that all the things that are associated with Valentine's Day don't mean the things to me, that our culture would like to think they should mean to every woman. Roses, chocolate, dinner, dancing, jewelry and love poems are all things that I can get or do for myself; and so can anyone else. These don't represent love to me.
You know the people that I really feel happy for? Those that give and recieve love and affection to each other appropriately throughout the entirety of their relationship... those I don't feel happy for, are those that build up to Valentine's Day as the one apex of romance every year -- to live in a desert for one day of rain seems awfully hopeless to me. Whenever I get into a relationship, I don't expect Valentine's Day to be anything special -- because he should already know my love and affection for him before that day, and after, as will I know of his.
That's the obligatory love rant for Valentine's Day -- no more, for the sake of my audience.
I will end with this -- I have never needed something more, than how much I need to be home right now. I hope this doesn't sound callous, but its not my house, or even so much my family, as it is the comfort of familiarity and security. Its the togetherness of community I had built around me; that rest I find in the presence of others who let me rest with them, and know me almost as much as I know myself. The end of this week will fair much better than it has begun, I'm sure, when I can take that freedom flight home, and just breathe again. Hopefully it'll still be snowing -- a Seattle girl can only take so many consecutive days of sun, especially in February.
KT
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