Stuff in my head at the moment

Fruits of the spirit

Are they evident in my life right now? It struck me that I'm not entirely sure they do. In all honesty I think that makes sense because I'm not really feeling particularly holy and haven't really (if I'm honest with myself) made any efforts to change this.

I think this realisation came to me while I was listening to David Hoarth speak last week at OG. It seems stuck me that we talk alot about gifts of the spirit alot more in church than we do the fruits. Like we put more importance on the gifts. It seems to me like trying to run before we can walk. In my head it seems that the gifts should come after the fruits. How do I explain this? Like the fruits are the results, the produce of living a life that is open to the Holy Spirit. Gifts are such that come after that.

Maybe like life is a garden, holy spirit is the rain. Veggies then grow. Gifts are like being given a fork to help harvest the veggies. I dunno, that's my head anyway.

We were watching The Darjeeling Limited this evening, I really enjoyed it. Very good film. Something about it though made me think alot about faith church stuff. I can't put my finger on exactly what t was about the film, or maybe it was just my brain processing conversations from earlier in the afternoon, but it struck me, we need to stop talking in small groups. If we are a family and are to move forward as a family we need to be discussing things openly with each other.

It's so easy to have well meaning conversations, we may try our hardest not to be bitching, but even with the best of intentions if we are not praying about the things we discuss we are infact just talking. That doesn't getting anything done. If we're not talking openly and we're not praying about it, we're not moving and we're not getting (or asking for that matter) God's help and guidance in what to do.

Come, come, come, let us worship God with our hands held high and our hearts bowed down. When was the last time we sought to do that as a family. We need to do this, as a family, we must do this. Going back for a sec, thinking about the fruits

• love (agape);
• joy (chara);
• peace (eirene);
• patience (makrothumia);
• kindness (chrestotes);
• goodness (agathosune);
• faithfulness (pistis);
• gentleness (prautes);
• self-control (egkrateia).

As a family do we demonstrate them? Are we actually joyful? Forget having self control for a moment, do we have have joy? Simple question.

Peace. Are we peaceful? I don't mean not arguing with each other I mean do we have peace?

You see I feel as a small group within the family, we need to be focusing on these things. I feel we're getting too wrapped up in the finishing touches when I feel God is saying we need to be looking at ourselves first. I feel God is saying we need to be turning back to him to solves problems rather and meeting after meeting, talking about talking.

Dude, I think we need to repent and start doing things different.

Poor timing (or '84 hours earlier')

Last friday, before I round out when he was leaving the country, I was round Mel's.

At some point towards the end of the evening, after a moments (it felt like forever) thinking I finally said "Mel, do you think there will ever be 'us' again?"

and so began a conversation I didn't really plan on having. Once I said it I felt a sense relief and nerves. J had been restless in his sleep that night, I said as he coughed some more "I want to be a part of this", pointing to his room. Later I said "you wrote on that painting 'place me like a seal over your heart' and so I did."

The conversation, while fragmented in my head, was actually quite honest. I said how I wasn't entirely sure how I felt sometimes.

(When we got back in contact, while I was trying not to think about what would happen next, what it would lead to, I recognised that not thinking about it was irresponsible. You see there are three people in this situation, Josh, Mel and Me. How I conducted myself would potentially affect him and so I had to force myself to think about my actions, texts, emails, conversations.)

She said something along the lines the same thing but wouldn't (and I felt rightly so) say exactly what she felt. We arranged to meet up this evening to talk about it, however due to this week being the way it has, we're going to just watch a dvd (comedy preferably) and eat "pretty good popcorn".

It hasn't caused any sort of tension (that I've picked up on) this week. We actually went to the pub on monday evening and talked for a bit about my conversation with him earlier on in the day. That was helpful.

I appologised to her last night if I have put her in an awkward position. It's not easy to have a relationship type conversation when you're falling apart. We'll see how it goes, but it kinda was poor timing on my part.

what happened next

He flatly denied ever being violent to my mum, only admitting to being aggressive once.

He said how he only ever wanted to have two children and was in the operating room about to vasectomy when my mum rushed into the room and demanded the operation was stopped.

He said he wishes he stood up for himself that day.

My brother Pete and I are "mistakes" that my mum planned.

He didn't apologise for anything, not even when I explained why I choose not to speak to him.

The reason why he worked 60 weeks and was never around wasn't because he had to, he just wanted to be able to say he never borrowed money from anyone. He was quite proud of the fact he was about to buy his our first house in cash. I admit that's a pretty big achievement.

Does it stop the fact I'm have no grasp what so ever what is true anymore? No.

Heart broken. Head a mess. Looking for distractions. If you want to hang out and talk about anything but me, let me know.

The oddest 7 minutes of your life (or 'I'm trying to distract myself')

30 minutes til take off

Jorge, dad, him whatever, he's going back to ecuador on wednesday. On tuesday I am working in the OG office so today is pretty much my only chance to talk to him.
The worst case senario realist (pessemist) in me would believe this could potentially be my last chance to talk to him. Who knows what's over there, he could come back in a body bag.
It's not a nice thought. I don't want to be stuck with these questions without anwsers. I don't think I could forgive myself for not having the bottle to ask them when I had the chance.

so this is it.

Here's what I think I might ask.

I'm thinking of them as I write in no partiular order.

• When is it ok to use violence in a relationship?
• Does he admit he was violent towards mum and sometimes my brothers?
  
• Did he ever love my mum? (he once said he didn't)
• If he did love her, how is using violence an expression of love?
• If he didn't, why did he marry her? (what does my existance mean then? Am I part of a plan to get to a better country or something?)
  
• When he moved out, why did he lie about where he was living? (He said he was staying at his friend Mick's house. However everytime you called Mick's house you got the usual "he's just walked out the door". He was infact stay at his now wife's flat.
• Why has he never made any attempt to discuss what happened?
• Why had he never made any attempt at reconcilation?
• Why did he once say "never trust women, all of them are liars" but then marry his new wife?
• Does he love her?
• Has he ever been agressive or used violence against her?

I can't help but imagine you'd ask why am I asking these things. Quite frankly I feel it is my right and his responsiblity. What am I trying to achieve? I want to see if he shows any remorse.

... (or 'Another lazy post')

'Love' (or 'another lazy post')

I was just listening to Mae and looked up the lyrics for their song Suspension. Some guy had commented on the lyrics and in his signature wrote "Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other..."

I have this thing where I assume most things I see on the internet are quote from somewhere else so I googled it and came up with a list of people's thoughts about love. On this fine day when Love is pretty much the theme everyone is thinking about (due to Becca and Joe's beautiful wedding) I thought it fitting to share what I found.

"When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn't
bend over and paint her toenails anymore. So my
grandfather does it for her all the time, even when
his hands got arthritis too. That's love."

"When someone loves you, the way they say your
name is different. You know that your name is
safe in their mouth."

"Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy
puts on shaving cologne and they go out and
smell each other."

"Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody
most of your French fries without making them give
you any of theirs."

"Love is what makes you smile when you're tired."

"Love is when my mommy makes coffee for my
daddy and she takes a sip before giving it to him,
to make sure the taste is OK."

"Love is what's in the room with you at Christmas if
you stop opening presents and listen,"

"If you want to learn to love better, you should
start with a friend whom you hate."

"There are two kinds of love. Our love. God's love.
But God makes both kinds of them."

"Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt,
then he wears it everyday."

"Love is like a little old woman and a little old
man who are still friends even after they know
each other so well."

"My mommy loves me more than anybody. You don't see
anyone else kissing me to sleep at night."

"Love is when mommy gives daddy the best piece of
chicken."

"Love is when mommy sees daddy smelly and sweaty and
still says he is handsomer than Robert Redford."

"Love is when your puppy licks your face even after
you left him alone all day."

"I know my older sister loves me because she gives
me all her old clothes and has to go out and buy
new ones."

"I let my big sister pick on me because my Mom says
she only picks on me because she loves me. So I pick
on my baby sister because I love her."

"When you love somebody, your eyelashes go up and
down and little stars come out of you."

"Love is when mommy sees daddy on the toilet and she
doesn't think it's gross."

"You really shouldn't say 'I love you' unless you
mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it
a lot. People forget."