atx

living in austin, texas is my new thing

i've lived in 4 cities, moved 4 times, and have lived in 3 different states in the past 14 months.

love it.

my best attribute - not getting TOO attached to anything.

mine

i'm moving 629 miles away from my home to Wichita, Kansas (the largest city in Kansas of about 300,000 people...in comparison to the 3rd largest city in the US: Houston at 2.5 million people, give or take a few)
i'll be the new Resident Manager of Green Hall AND Director of the Falcon Leadership Scholarship Program at Friends University.
i'll be living on campus in my own apartment, getting paid salary and doing exactly what i love doing: giving all of me to relationships.
i'm scared.

my highschool girls bible study/small group that i lead discussed what it means to have the kingdom of God in our life. what would their school look if God reigned over it? what would our home look like? what would it look like driving around Houston if Houston was in the Kingdom of God? hard question because the Kingdom of God is where the Lord's will is. 3 of my friends discussed what it means to be a Christian in this time, place and especially America. what does it mean? that you mentally understand who Jesus is and emotionally 'commit' to Christ at some time? hardly.

there was a huge area of my life that i've held onto, kept in control of, and everytime i prayed about guidance and discernment, my head spun and got extremely sick knowing that what i wanted was not what i was asking for. so i continually said yes to me and no to the Kingdom of God. the instant this area of my life was over, i knew that i had given it to the King, allowing that part of my life (once again, and like i've always wanted) to be ruled by the Alpha. my dreams, my wants and desires, my happiness all came back to me at the immediate time of that large change. and it was because i had made the decision to not allow God to be the King of that area of my life.

now i'm moving. in 14 days actually. this probably wouldn't have happened if i didn't make that change. i probably wouldnt have the incredible, life strengthing, developing and progressive conversations and relationships that i've had over the past 3 weeks if i hadn't made that change. i would have a set future, one that i never wanted.
and now: i want simplicity.

i was challenged in words and challenged by other's actions on living simply. as i get ready to pack up and move i've got some things to think about.

what does it mean when i say it's 'mine'. all the stuff i'm taking with me...is it mine? is it mine when i decide it has no worth and give it away to someone else? is it sentimental or material value that keeps me holding on so tightly?

leslie gave me her perfume and table. i'm extremely excited. and thankful. and what's mine is yours

a good number

13
a number regarded as unlucky in many cultures: simply because when a group of 13 objects of people is divided into two, three, four, or six equal groups, there is always one leftover (the unlucky one)
*some tall buildings have resorted to skipping the 13th floor
*Microsoft plans to skip Office 13, going directly from Office 12 to Office 14
*Apollo 13 space shuttle malfunctioned on April 13th, causing the ship to return to Earth

a number also regarded as lucky: Dan Marino is known for passing more yards than anyother quaterback in NFL history, and he worn the number 13

*many Anglophones, 13 is the point when someone becomes a 'teenager' or older than a child
*number of original colonies in the United States
*the Great Seal of the United States has 13 olive leafs (with 13 olives), 13 arrows, and 13 stars, forming a star over the eagle with the number 13 on each point.
*there is a Mexican gang named MS-13

but beyond that: it's how many days i have left until i fly home. it's always been a good number for me. it's given me good love and good times.

love 13

i'm thankful for spinach

we are full. turkey, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, green beans, corn, bisquits and stuffing (that i made!) it was good and mama Molli started cooking at 7 am. i got to sleep in and take a nice jog in the FREEZING cold weather then cook a LOT of stuffing in the boys house. it was good. we've got food to last us until the middle of next week (like always). it's definitely weird having thanksgiving on FRIDAY,...but i'll deal. my friend Brit (www.ypguybrit.wordpress.com) showed me this blog by this Christian guy who makes these cartoons. they are amazing. one of my favorite ones:



it's good. so all's to say: thanksgiving was good. now we are watching "310 to Yuma" in the guys house, gettin all relaxed from the Turkey. I got to skype with my whole family last night while they were having TG meal...it was great. not much longer and i'll be doing some travelling then headed on home.

21st of november means?

thanksgiving? no, i'll wait until November 22nd.
Friday.
just doesn't fit right.
There is a reason why it's on the third thursday of November...which reminds me: 23 days until i land in the great state of Texas
We will be cooking a "Thanksgiving" meal on friday, which will consist of turkey and mash potatoes, but i'm not sure what else. no pecans (no pecan pies), no pumpkin pies (they dont have pumpkin stuff over here) we might have yams...we'll see, and for my family: creamed spinach. 
Today we are going to Belfast (for the 'last time') all day long...staying until around 9 pm, so that'll be fun. I'll be doing interviews all day. WOO HOO

Mom comes over in like 14 days! OH i'm so excited! i'll be getting a LOVIN' momma hug in 14 days! those are just needed every once in a while

4 weeks to go

we've sure been busy over the past few weeks.
it seems that all of a sudden our teachers (both here and in the states) realize that we really didn't do MUCH the first 2/3 of the time we were here so they are going to plan something literally every day for the next two weeks. that's pretty awesome and everything ... considering we were just tourists ... but we are not. we are students. the end of the semester is creeping up, tons of little things to do (write letters, read books, make things, update my blog...:)), lots of places to see, and people to meet...AND finals and research paperS are due in a few weeks.
so i've got a big research paper over Irish tourism, a 2000 word paper due on William Wilberforce, travel to Dublin (in the Republic...OH over to 'the other side'), 10-14 pages on Sir William Orpen (an Irish artist), lots of interviewing of Northern Irish people, a trip to London and lots of other things that i wont bore you with.
all to say: i'm busy, but have a hard time DOING the work ha ha...i'm best at procrastinating.

we went to where C.S. Lewis went to church and got baptized and lived...that was amazing.  ross wilson made this statue of the wardrobe and one of his characters "diggory" walking into it.
we also went to the coast and could see Scotland from across the water. wow awesome.

we've had a few interesting people visit us lately.
Eamonn Mallie: the head journalist for Northern Ireland and a lot of the UK. he came and talked to us about....poetry? what? it was weird. and he made us feel like complete idiots cause we didn't know as much about America as he does...and he put down our education system. good start Eamonn (it's pronounced: E-mun) he's written lots of books. he's been involved intensively with the IRA and Shinn Fein (terrorist groups of Ireland) for years. he's like the Cooper Anderson of the UK.
David Park: wrote "oranges in spain" which we've been reading came and talked to us about it. that was pretty awesome. he's written a lot of short stories and novels and he's also a teacher....fascinating, i know
we just got home from Eamonn Mallie's house. we were invited to see all of his art
O WOW...
he's got to have over 15 million dollars worth of paintings in his large house. and he told us about every single one of them. all of them have a story. it was amazing, beautiful, intense, and long :)

a few days ago Vivo: the 'corner store' of Northern Ireland was having an anniversary. "one year of being open"
they had food, beverages and a drawing for prizes. well of course we went. party in dundrum!
we hung out, ate little smokies, drank tea (of course) and waited for them to cut the cake...as we were waiting one of the girls who worked there asked if i wanted to add my name to the raffle before they drew. SURE! i say. why not? i never win anything anyway.
"meg smith"...OH! that's me. i win.


gotta love Dundrum.

home sweet...Dundrum?

A sense of relief and of actually how tired i really am swept over me as i stepped off the bus in Dundrum around 3 pm this afternoon. It has been a LONG and fast 6 days.
I can't believe i went to Italy (i've said that like...89 times)



so this is me on the way to Belfast, to catch at 3 hour bus to Dublin, to wait 3 hours in the airport, to get a on a 3 hour plane flight to Pisa.  very excited.
  HI PISA!!! This is our traveling group (Carrie split off after Pisa (top left). Luke, Elizabeth, Emily and me.
So we fly into Pisa at...ah around 12:30 am and have directions to where our 'couchsurfing' guy (Steffano) is playing chess (where he usually plays chess until about 1:30 in some dark alley in the middle of Pisa). So we find him. YAY! After finding him (it's about 1 am) he gives us directions (to walk) to the LEANING TOWER OF PISA! so we walk all through this beautiful city of Pisa to the tower.
we're walking and talking and OHP there it is! it really is leaning...a lot more than i thought it would be. and of course since it's 1 am we are the only ones around. 
  that's us going 'mwah' to Italy. it was cold and a bit rainy, we had been travelling since 1 pm that day (so about 12 hours) and the first thing we do when we get to Italy was hold up the tower...good day.
so Steffano comes and picks us up and brings us to his new house, where he has one bed and one couch and there are 5 of us and him...AND it's 2 in the morning. so we managed and it was fun getting like 2 hours of sleep (none of us could actually sleep well) and we woke up and caught a bus to the train station to Rome!
AH Roma...amazing place. We got to Rome after a long train ride around 1:30 and had to find our hostel (which was SO awesome and fun) and find the Colosseum to meet up for our 3 hour walking tour. we have not eaten since we left Belfast mind you, so we decided to drop our stuff off at the hostel and grab something to eat on our way to the Colosseum.
I found this place called "Euro Pizza"
O...M...G...the best cheap Italian pizza in all of Rome AND right around the corner from our hostel.
So we take this amazing tour led by Valentina, a TRUE Roman (as she said many times). we walked ALL over Rome, told us amazing information about everything we saw AND she also really liked us 4 ;)
  us and Valentina...our wonderful tour guide of Ancient Rome
 i'm goin back to Rome cause i threw a coin into the Trevie Fountain.
We had a great time in Rome...WALKED probably about 25 miles those two days...literally.
I met some great friends at the hostel
  
ate some amazing pizza
went to Saint Peter's Basilica and climbed to the top...like about 743 stairs

 us on step 534 thinking...did we really just pay 5 euros to do this at 8 in the morning?
saw St. Peter's Basilica where Peter was the first head of the Church and his name was on the main list of Pope's...it was pretty sureal
  spanish steps

Rome was amazing and i couldn't love it more.
We hoped a train to Florence


Florence was calm and beautiful and a place i'd love to visit again. It was chilled and SO much fun!


i'm completely exhuasted and have a few more stories: so i'll give you a break and upload some more tomorrow! yay for Fall Break 2007