Monday, January 29, 2007

As the Ruin Falls

Ran across this CSL poem today, and it echoes thoughts I had in church yesterday; thoughts and wonderings about life and the whys and particularly the wherefores.

As the Ruin Falls
All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.
Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love --a scholar's parrot may talk Greek--
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.
Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.
For this I bless you as the ruin falls.
The pains You give me are more precious than all other gains.
- C.S. Lewis

Saturday, January 06, 2007

Grandma socks and toe jam

Last night Jen, Mustafa, Katie and Carl came over. Ben made venison spaghetti and I cleaned! We also heated some homemade applesauce that Lisa (German lady from church) had given me, stole some salad from Katie-roommate, and had homemade bread. It was a good night of just bumming around and catching up with each other. I got to break in my Christmas wine glasses. Had hoped to break in the new corkscrew too, but everybody brought wine that had already been opened, and the sparkling grape juice (of course) did not have a cork. *sigh* ah, the tragedies of life. I was wearing sparkelly black socks Ben's Grandma had given me when I visited for Christmas and they gave me black, fuzzy toe jam! We were going to watch a movie or play games, but ended up just hanging out in the living room, eating chocolate chip cookies and being our parts in this play of life. Ahhh!