Marshmallow Hands

I forget about the mountains.

When I live in Bakersfield, or in Riverside, or in Bloomington, I forget that there's a place in the world that is not crisscrossed by streets and studded by cookie cutter houses or buildings that were cool in the seventies. I forget that it is possible to be surrounded by trees. There is a place where the sky is blue, not a gray to blue gradient.

I know that the mountains aren't a simple solution to all my problems, but they defintely feel that way. After maybe a week living here I realize that life is still just as complicated, there are still just as many choices to make, that there is still just as much drama, that people still exist, and that I am not alone. But the first day or two, hmm, those days are magic. For a minute I begin to feel like God really is into beauty, that He really does care about the world, that taking care of the earth and its inhabitants is actually very, very important to Him. For some reason it is harder to feel that those things are true while living in a city (or town, whatever). These big trees are strokes in God's visual manifesto, the river is a wash of color. The sky, whether dark gray or brilliant blue, is a part of His declaration to me, to us: "This matters. The world, the people I've created. It all matters. It matters to Me." I feel this way because the world could not be this beautiful for any other reason. I guess it could all be chance. I suppose that could be a reasonable explanation. But what gets me is that it is not a magical explanation, and personally, I like a good unexplainable mystery. But I don't want to get into science or evolution or anything like that.

The world is "going green." Or, at least, certain individuals are going green and some random companies are pretending that they're green. I think that this is a very interesting and exciting phenomenon. I wish it were more about God and less about us though. Let's handle this world more carefully because God made it and we love Him, rather than Let's handle this world more carefully because we have to live here until who knows when and it'd be nice if it weren't a pile of crap. I mean, the latter way is still good, but I do naively wish that people would get their priorities straight. But I won't complain all too much.

I want to live simply. I've been holding this idea inside of me for a long time because I don't want to explain to people why I want to do it. It's not because our cities are gross and we're eating nasty things and washing ourselves in chemicals. It's because...it's because it's not convenient to live simply. Which is an ironic statement. haha. That brings me to a hard question: Should living be convenient? Should living this life be easy? Think whatever you want, and after some time I might change my mind, but currently I don't think living life should be easy. All sources and signs point to life being hard. Nature points to life being hard, God and His Word point to life being hard, most of the third world points to life being hard. It isn't easy. And yet we, as first world citizens, have all discovered that it is much more comforting to pretend life is easy and to surround ourselves with conveniences that deceive us into believing that life is easy. I know life isn't easy, but I don't believe that life isn't easy.

Do I detest the easy life? No, but I think I might need to learn to. Because I'm pretty sure that the easy life is also a very easy path to hell. It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Well that sucks, and I'm screwed. Want to know why it's so hard to evangelize your comfortable American neighbors and friends? Because it's too easy for them to believe that life isn't hard. And if they believe that life isn't hard then they won't believe that they need someone to help them get through it. And if they don't believed that they need someone to help them get through it then they'll never even think that they'll ever need Jesus to satisfy them.

When the economy started to fall and everyone started to make predictions about horrible things and when the media started to make things worse than they really were....when all of those things happened I secretly hoped that everything would fall apart. In the depths of my heart, I still hope for this.

That's not the total reason why I'd like to live simply. Living simply involves less stuff, and I've been thinking lately about all the junk I have in the rafters of our attic. Childhood memories have been sitting in boxes for three years, untouched, unusuable; memory aids for a memory that doesn't need any help. So why keep it? I don't know, it's just so ridiculously hard to get rid of things that have sentimental value. In the end it's all meaningless anyway. In the end it will be burned with fire and will be forgotten. I'll never even miss it. I don't miss it now. But then I think, maybe I don't miss it because I know it's sitting up there in the rafters, in case I need it. But why would I ever need it? Ugh, that's such a pestering thought process and I really, really hate it. I want that stuff and I don't know why. I want it and it's mine and I want to keep it. And then I think again about living simply and I then I get upset again about keeping it all.

I can't win in my head, because there's always one side that is right and the other side that is wrong. So I'm always wrong no matter what. I guess I could flip that around and say that I'm always right, but I'm usually rooting for the side that ends up being wrong.

I can't win in this post either, so I'm just going to stop torturing myself and go to bed...er, couch. Maybe it'll all work out in my sleep and life will be better tomorrow.