A Friend Is More Precious Than Gold

Today, I was with friends. Saw Avatar, went to get food. Got caught up on a few moments in our years apart. It felt... Good. Right. It was a great feeling, one I wish I had more often. Kind of like the feeling you get from a loving romantic relationship, but without the romance. Do you know this feeling? Can you feel it now? If you cannot feel it, try. If you are unfamiliar, familarize yourself. And then will you know the greatness that is friendship. Man was not meant to be alone... And in his wait, he has... Allies... Comrades... Friends. Find them out, and feel this feeling. Roses are #FF0000, but friendship is worth more than gold.

Who Gets The Rose?

I was praying today for my future wife, whoever it may be. It feels kind of odd praying for someone that I may not even know yet, but I guess it kind of makes sense. I want to be ready when she comes by. I want to be set up, prepared, stuff like that. Even though that's in the future, thinking of then reminds me of the past. Brings back memories of me praying for that girl I was dating, or the one I wanted to be dating, or even the one I didn't want to date. For their wellbeing, their endeavours, their general life. Then it never felt odd, so why does it feel odd now? I guess then I knew personally the person I was praying for. Knew them by their full name. And now I'm not sure what their name is. Only that they're out there, somewhere, maybe praying for me as well. And that's a nice thought to a lover-boy like me.

Well, I said I might have a word to say on me and my cliffhanger ending on the 4th, and I do. And the word is that I'm not sure what I should say. Really, if we were to make a list there could be many. A list for girls I find attractive, for ones I think I have a great personality, for ones I'd like to know better, and on and on and on it could go. So I'm just not sure what to put here. One of those lists? Girls I used to like but am not sure if I still do? Girls I'd like to like me? Or maybe a detailed list on why I think that wondering about all this stuff is useless, and yet I do it anyways? I don't know. Do you?

Roses are #FF0000,
And I wonder;
Who to give mine to?

Ink drops on plain parchment

Because I promised that I would, here is my blog post for today: life has been going well. Got my headphones, my quill, AC2, stuff like that. Learned some new songs on guitar, transposing songs for my ocarina, looking at new (actually, old, but more on that later) instruments. Reading, writing, re-writing, gaming, training, caring, getting emotional, taking trips into my past and praying for my future. An average procession of stuff going on in my life. But again, more on that later.

First off, my stuff. Hoping to get the new skillet Alive CD. It's good stuff, and I had a great time at their concert at the House of Blues in November. My quill is great, and finally holds ink like it should. Or maybe I just finally started writing at the correct angle. Meh. It builds patience, and I just love the antiquated feel of my quill scratching its way across acid-free moleskine paper, after being dipped into a jar of a fine dark Italian ink. It's almost poetic. Then there's my new headphones, which are over-ear models. Not only do they have great sound quality, but they keep my ears warm in the cold! Sweet. For Christmas I'm gonna try and convince my whole family to pitch in for one gift for me as opposed to many: and that would be an acoustic-electric violin. Great tone, with all the perks of being able to plug in. The mid range model I want is like $500 though. But it's a steal compared to the one I really want, which is a ZETA that costs around $1,300. But yeah, I don't have my hopes too high. And, like I said earlier, while it would be a new instrument, it wouldn't be too terribly new to me. You see, the violin was my first instrument. I started at around 7, and then had to give it back when I transfered schools because my violin was on loan to me. So I would really like to pick it up again.

Anywho, off of stuff and onto me, which is what blogging is mostly about, right? Right now I'm kind of working through some simple and complex emotions, mostly of the variety that I regularly blog about. I guess you could say I'm in love with all aspects of love, and that makes being single annoying as all heck. But I'm used to that feeling, so I just gotta wait around for a bit I guess. It's rather hard waiting though. Anywho, because I know you'll be wondering, yes, I do darn near always like someone, and yes, right now is included in that time frame. But I can leave that for a later post. Aside from that, I can't think of anything else to write about today. So, in standard fashion, Roses are #FF0000, and so is my heart.

A drop of ink and flick of the pen leads to lies

Haven't posted in a while. So it's time for an update. I'm sure you know, but I've started writing a book. It's taking a bit more effort than I anticipated. I keep inadvertently changing tenses, past to present. It's getting annoying reading over what I've written and changing things back. But it's still nice. I need my test readers though because while I can clearly see what I mean when I write, I need to know that others can see it too. So they're important to me, and I am ever thankful. And, also, I should have a couple pages done by the month ending.

On another note, I finally got my PS3 Saturday. PS3 slim, 120GB model. It's nice. Got MGS4 for it, and just finished. That was an emotional ride. Most people don't see it this way, but it's really just like an interactive movie, and because of this you really start to care about characters and stuff. Anywho, that game is insane. A dual-layered Blue Ray disk and it still needs to install some of itself to the hard drive. Amazing. And it looks good. Very good. I'm gonna play through again and see if I can't beat it on every difficulty like I have for the other games. That's part of the reason I'm even good at games. Practice. Funny, most people don't think you have to practice for video games. But you do.

As always, I currently have people issues. I wonder, sometimes, that maybe if I stopped trying to make others happy, I'd finally succeed in doing just that. But then I realize that if I stop trying I'd just end up being selfish and rude. Not something I wanna be.

Got a new deck of cards. Been practicing my tricks, and I dare say that I've got enough for a short show. They're cool as all heck.

Maybe why I never have enough time is because I have too many hobbies. Writing, gaming, reading, coding, music, climbing, camping, paintballing, and all that other stuff. I wonder sometimes if I'm an outgoing Techie or just an outdoorsman that doesn't get enough opportunities to go out. That's why I started gaming and reading in the first place. Never got out much with friends and was uninterested with my families stuff, so I started drawing within, spending a lot of time lost in thought or in a world fabricated by some writer or game developer. Maybe that's why I even like the spread of things that I do. Most can be done alone, and almost all of them provide an escape from others, from the world. Even writing like this. My words paint the world that I currently choose to hide in. A blank landscape becoming lush green forests or claustrophobic urban environments, all with a flick of the pen and a few drops of ink. I wonder if it's bad that I can think this way about my life. Totally removed, as if I were just another character in a story. Which I am, we all are, but still. I wonder if I'll ever find someone who shares my opinions that I can be with. Most people don't understand this, but I crave friendship. People think I'd rather stay home and play games or read or something. While that's true of family activities, it's not for anything else. I'd rather go to the park with some friends and hang out than stay at home and read, write, or play. Oh well.

Speaking of writing, I think I'm gonna start another blog. Do some running commentaries on my friend Chris' blog, backing up his stories with verses and my own concepts. Throwing up a few of my own just for fun. Maybe. I'll get around to it.

So my friend Lexa is nervous about going to college today. I wish her the best, and also hope things go well with her parents and her current relational stress. I send you my best.

I've decided to change my gamer tag. Sb521 is dead. I'm changing to Swift. Don't ask why, it just is. Which leads me to another point, which is that with some small close inspection, I'm actually a very transparent person. What I wear and what I do are both extremely representative of how I feel. Besides the staple chain and watch, everything else represents something important to me. Almost nothing that I do is without purpose. I just hope someone I see often notices, because I really want someone to understand me. It's hard, being what people see as a "difficult" person to understand, when in all reality I'm probably the easiest. Maybe people just understand the random better than the systematic. Which is a shame. But I guess is also good for them. Take, for example, one of my friends. Be careful to note I'm not talking about myself. Really. Like, I'm not being sly or anything, I really am talking about someone besides me. So, anywho, this guy likes a girl. She knows. Because of this, when she walks into a room she expects him to flock to her like none other and hang off her every word. This never happens. No, first he goes and does something says hi to everyone else, and acts like he didn't see her. He finally gets around to saying hello to her. Now, I've heard that this doesn't make sense. If he likes her, he should make her a priority. Right? Wrong. Because he likes her, she'll almost never be first. Why? Because he doesn't want it to look like he likes her. Doesn't want people to take notice. Because of this, he pretends like his heart doesn't leap when they're in the same room, like his pulse doesn't rise from their short, friendly embrace. It makes perfect sense that if he likes her, and they're not a couple, he'll try his best to pretend like there's nothing happening to him. Maybe I can see it because I'm the same way. Trying not to let my emotions crowd out my logic and rule my life. But hey, maybe it's just the two of us. I'll never know.

Well, wasn't this a wide-spread post? I guess this is what I get for not posting in a while. Good thing I wrote this during my commute. Otherwise I'd probably have something else to occupy my time with. Well, I'll be writing, and hopefully become so immersed in my fabricated world that when I finally pull myself out of it that I'll leave a perfect place for my reader, and that they too can enjoy my fabrication. Roses are #FF000, and I've realized most of the world is a lie.

7/19 - This isn't home, it's just a place to be aggrivated.

This doesn't feel like home. Aside from the places where I can see the ocean and trees, this place feels like any other place. It's not special, it's not home. My home is with those I care about, and they're in Chicago. It's a shame. Well, it's only my first official day here and I've already been dragged about the whole section of old San Juan Puerto Rico. I walked the whole thing, can't stand to be here, and yet I'm expected to be happy. Yeah, I'd rather not be here. I would rather have gotten a new laptop, or a bass, or guitar, or even give the whole thing to some charity than be here right now. And that may sound horrible, it may not, but that's how I feel. I wanna spend my whole day shut up inside the hotel room studying and reading all the time, everyday. But instead, I'm being forced to go sightseeing. And yeah, that may be what they brought me here for, and I may have a totally bad attitude about this whole trip, but I told them I didn't wanna come and that they didn't have to spend their money. But they forced me to come along anyways. So yeah, forced to come along on a trip I didn't wanna be on I was planning to just swim and study. Well, they won't let me study and there's no time to swim what with them dragging me along on these little stupid outings. I hate it. On the bright side? I've bought souveniers for Jason, Chris, Bethanne, Ted, James, and Allie. So I hope they'll enjoy them.

Roses are #FF0000, and I wanna be home.

My reactions and comments to the concepts of Harris

Ok. So here they are! My thoughts on part one of the book I kissed dating goodbye. The first one comes from chapter three, under the heading of bullet point three. It outlines the idea that dating oftentimes isolates the two people involved from their other friendships. While I strove not to allow this to happen, I think this is still a very important point. People in a romantic relationship often compromise their good activities such as studying, building good friendships, maybe even worship or things like that, just so that they can be together. That temptaition is real, and one would be a fool to not acknowledge that this effect is there. Joshua goes on to expand upon this and answer a few questions you may have about this, but for that you'll have to read the book. That's right: I like it enough to shamelessly plug it in my blog posts.

The next point is one that follows right after this one, also in chapter three but under point four. Here, Harris nails me right on the head in an illustration. He begins to expound upon the idea that, typically, dating distracts from preparation for life. Now while this may actually motivate you to do better and excel to give the best to your date when you're finally ready to marry, it can still suck away precious time that could've been used even better for those future preparations. The illustration Harris gave? I'll quote it here: "Christopher and Stephanie spent countless hours talking, writing, thinking, and often worrying about their relationship. The energy they exerted stole from other pursuits. For Christopher, the relationship drained his enthusiasm for his hobby computer programming and [thank goodness this part didn't happen to me] his involvement with the church's worship band." Talk about weird. Now, once again, there's a bit more to this than I say here, but that's for you to read.

Ok. Now the next point that struck me is from chapter four, under the third point. It's the idea that although you may truly love someone, the idea that you'll "someday" be getting married is bad, because realistically, in our young relationships (I'm talking the idea that we're [collectively as readers] not out of our first two years of college yet), we just aren't prepared enough to make that step. Am I saying dating is bad or that we shouldn't have relationships at this age? No. That's not what I'm saying, and not what I think Joshua Harris is advocating, but I do think that, as Harris believes (he's good at changing your ideas, if you're honest with yourself), unless you're ready to consider marriage or you're interested in marrying the person you're dating, it's selfish to ask them to fill your emotional or physical needs. Again, there is more expansion and there is that small bit of wiggle room in the idea that we all will probably have a few close relationships before we find the right person, but let's not use that as an excuse to just date anyone for any reason.

The final idea from section one that I find is a particularly good one is the idea that choosing to quit this detrimental dating style doesn't mean you remain single and lonely all your life. We can still pursue friendship, romance, and marriage, but in God's time and terms, not ours. And, as a segway, this also means that if we do things in his terms, not ours, we better give it our all, and not just part of what we could give.

Well, that's that post over with. For reference, I will try and post a lot next week because I still have that writing bug mentioned in my previous post. So be on the lookout. Well, in the meantime, Roses are #FF0000 (most of the time), and I'm excited.

The night is always darkest before the dawn

And I seem to have finally hit dawn

I wanna write. Maybe a novel. An informative non-fiction. Who knows. I just wanna write. A bunch.

Well, I've hit some very Very good points in the book, and I've (I know, it was this important) actually dog-eared the pages. In case you don't know, that's close to pure evil in my book. But it was so necessary. I adore the words on those pages. But, you'll have to wait just a bit longer to hear what I have to say on those points. I'm saving it up for one big blog post, that will be here either tomorrow or Friday, so be on the lookout for it!

I purchased my KenKen book. Great little puzzles, you should check them out. I also just saw hp6. It was fair, but they left things out and put things in, just as I expected. But they left out bits I most defenitely wanted to see too, so I was dissapointed. Ah well. Well, I guess that's all for now. Until tomorrow (or Friday)!

I've got news for you

Ok. I've been searching for a song to describe exactly what I want to say to girls out there, and I think I've found it. So here goes, song by Andrew Peterson:

"So you think I’m something special, like I know a thing or two; like my eyes don’t ever wander, like my aim is always true. So you think I’m not a dirty rotten scoundrel through and through? Lady, I’ve got news for you.

So you think that you’re the only one to cry yourself to sleep? That you’re the only one who’s scared they all forget you when you leave? So you think that you’re the only one whose heart is black and blue? Listen, I’ve got news for you, for you. I might as well just tell you that it’s true, it’s true: listen, I’ve got news for you.

So you think you don’t need anyone to love you? So you think you don’t need anyone to love?
But you do.
So you say there is no hope. Maybe God is dead and gone. So you think that he can’t break a heart that’s harder than a stone. So you feel so wrecked and dirty he could never make you new. Man, have I got news for you, for you. I’m so compelled to tell you that it’s true, so true: listen, I’ve got news for you. I tell you I’ve got news for you.
I’ve got good news for you."

I think people need to realize that this is me. I'm imperfect. So when I stumble, don't be surprised, and don't resent me for it, and don't think I'm a hipocrite (I don't think anyone does think any of these things about me, but might as well be safe). I'm human. I'm not perfect.

Now, onto the book. I've read through the first two chapters, and although I already knew all of what was in there, I did rethink what was stated in those chapters. I'll elaborate on that in a later post though, when I have more time and have read more chapters. But suffice it to say that they do a lot to outline the current relational status of our nation, which is an attempt to have intimacy without commitment, which is why these relationship things in America fail for most people. According to the book, it rings hollow. And although I've never gone through these kinds of relationships, I know many people that have and it got me to thinking, this is so true. People just want the good feelings of a relationship, not bothering with trying to make the other person happy in a Godly manner.

The colors hit the fan, and spread like my emotions.

Cornerstone was good. I picked up a bunch of cd's, a new shirt, played some buckbuck, and just had a great time. But I'm happy to be back. So, as I believe this post will be a lenghty one, I'll give a short prelude. Feel free to read only the prelude if you're pressed for time. Here goes: Cornerstone good, got some cd's, new bands, learned a riff, still have feelings (I know, I just can't seem to let go of them. Guess they really were real after all, despite what I've been telling myself), miss my friends, need a new EQ pedal for my guitar, and yeah, roses are #FF0000.

So, on to the actual blog post, eh? I got two cd's from a new artist that I like, and I wanted to share with you one line as really profound from one of his songs. He said "just know that when you lay me down to die, you lay me down to live". That hit me so hard, I had to stop and think about it. Because it's true. As a Christian, when I die I don't go to hell, I go on to live my true purpose in my real home. This is just a place of holding, so to speak. We are just here to worship God and pass on the news of his saving grace, until our souls are required of us. It just set me to thinking is all. Finally got my new guitar riffs down pact by the way. It was amazing. I feel accomplished. Oh, random interjection, I'm very glad Hawai'i wasn't nuked. Very very happy. Ok, back on topic. (I know, I just lost a bunch of continuity. So sue me.) You know, some of the best times of my life, looking back, aren't the concerts I went to or my playing music, they aren't even (contrary to popular belief) the times I've spent playing video games. The best times of my life were the times that I spent with (I know, I just can't decide on my feelings, but alas) Allie, the time I was saved from my sins and eternal death, and the times where I felt the presence of God (trust me, you can feel it), and my time with my friends. When I was just hugging, holding hands, and things like that. I really do still care about her. And I don't think that will ever change. Which really really sucks. Anywho, I've been missing my friends as of late, namely mike, lexa, colleen (did I spell that right? Eh.), and a few others. I just wanna hang out. As I said, I need a new equalizer pedal for my guitar because it sounds like MUD through the sound system, and I've been putting it off for a long time. Well, that's it. Roses are #FF0000, and this blog was written with my new iTouch blogging app, blogpress.

Hindsight

So, I've been sitting at home with not much to do. Reading, learning a new language, watching tv, playing video games. But right now, all that feels hollow, empty. Will I look back on this in hindsight and wish I had spent my summer better? Or will I look back and think this was a summer well spent? Idk. I'm not sure about much at all anymore, except that I wish I was around my friends, and that God is always with me. And it's times that I feel like this when I'm brought back to the thought of how fragile life is. I'm not guaranteed another ten years, not a day, not an hour, not even my next breath. All that can be taken from me in an instant, like my life, my love, my time, my friends, they all are so important to me, and in not,.. acting, I guess, I'm throwing it all away willingly. Do you get that? It's like I'm dead already, because I'm not with my friends, had to let go of love because of love, killing time until the next thing I'm looking forward to (Cornerstone) instead of spending time. So the conclusion I've just reached here is that I'm dead. Maybe I need a new defenition of life, because right now, I'm dead.

Well, now that that's done with, I want to say I miss my friends, I can't wait for Cornerstone, and I just wanna do something with my summer. Let's go backpacking, camping, hiking, go to Dicks and climb, just come to my house and play video games or something, but at least let me be with my friends now, before that last breath is required of me, because if I were to die tomorrow, I'd wanna look back on today and think to myself "that was time well spent", not "that time was wasted."

So, as customary, Roses are #FF0000, an I'm feeling #000000.