bathtime.

i'm back.

nova sort of back and blogging sort of back. i think.

i'm back, and i am discovering that i love everyday life. i really do. the sort of life that involves trips to the bank and checks in the mail and church on sundays with no homework afterward and movies and sleeping in late on saturday mornings and working during daytime, knowing i get to relax after the clock gets to six. it's a good feeling.

i've done lots of nothing, lately. really. nothing at all at all at all. and i read my bible every morning, from romans and psalms. every night, from proverbs or isaiah or whatever strikes my fancy. and i relax. deeply.

read a verse.

inhale.

wash, rinse, repeat.

i'm in a comfortable place. and it is good.

another autumn song

so i wrote a lovely post intended to announce my re-introduction to the blogging scene, but it got erased.

suffice it to say that i am back and my life is pretty dang good right now.

in current naomi-news, i'm buying a car, i'm going home for thanksgiving, i'm freaking out about moot court, and i'm still amazing at procrastination.

so. that shall be all for the moment. i have other things to do. but yes. hello, world.

and goodnight moon.

picking paths

so i haven't written in a while mostly because i've been so busy living. my family is WAY louder than i remembered, way more insane, and very awesome. sometimes, though, it gets to be a bit much. in the words of my friend steve, "they should make a movie of your family. i would pay to see that movie, but it wouldn't be the kind of movie i would want to OWN."

i haven't updated in a long time, so this post will be a jumble of random scraps from my life, all tossed together in hopes of reacquainting everyone with something of naomi.

i took this picture ^^^ a few days ago, and it's a significant one. it's symbolic of a lot of questions i've been turning over in my mind. the paths i have before me are completely different, and i want to go both ways at once. i've been discovering the truth of my younger brother's frustrated and grammatically disturbed verdict of yesterday: "there just isn't enough me's!"

God was so faithful this last semester. it was the hardest semester for me so far, pesonally, academically, emotionally... it was so. difficult. but God is so good, more good than i deserve, and grades came back, and i won! 3.55 is mostly a gpa i am not ashamed to own. and i am happy.

i leave for costa rica on sunday, and i've been reading up on the country. one of the things i've learned is that costa rica is the central american country with the worst child prostitution problem. about three thousand kids between the ages of 9 and 17 are on the streets of san jose on any given day. my first response was, "oh, that's sick and twisted and terrible; what a great story!" i am properly chagrined. the journalist is coming out. but it really is a terribly wonderful story, and samantha and i mean to get it. and not just for the sake of "getting a good story." it's not a well-known fact. all the information i found was from united nations reports and human rights watch bulletins. it makes me upset that i didn't find this information sooner. all the glossy advertisements for the country merely serve to emphasize the anaesthetized view of reality held by most americans.

that's pretty much all i have to say right now. just a little to tell you all what is on my mind.

and of course, i've been picture-taking with abandon. a few from the last week or so:
my little sister amy: barney meets texas chainsaw massacre
amy and i: the nice thing about shadow pictures is that you don't have to worry about blinking.cheating the nose/spoon relationshipa new favorite picture. i've gotten really into doing portrait-type photos lately.another.

yay for people who live on the coast. that up there is the pier, last night.
and yay for palm trees. i miss these when i'm in virginia.


and especially yay for naomis who irritate their friends because they live their lives from photo to photo.

scraps of truth

i love packing.

so many random bits and pieces of my life fall into all the cracks between the places i'm paying any attention to at any given moment, and they all come out to play whenever i am packing.

*
i have the bizarre tendency to scribble random scraps of thoughts on used envelopes that always seem to fall between the cracks when i'm not looking.... and then i find them at the oddest times and have something to think about or laugh at or wonder what on earth i was thinking when i wrote them. like the one i found that simply said, "god in the blender."

yeah.

but today i found another bit of envelope truth from about two years ago that made me surprised that i had written it. especially because i can't remember writing it. it made me stop and think.

"i am able to forgive myself for being human. knowing that life is hard and virtue rare, i keep the ancient faith, believing it is better to love than to hate, and to live fully, even if imperfectly."

cheers, darlin's

it's 8.30 on the night before the midterm that i really [really really really really] need to do well on. so here i am. blogging, of course. what could be more natural?

i can't believe that i'm going home in a week. i really can't fathom it. there's so awfully much to do in the in-bewteen time that i'm going almost-but-not-quite insane.

i've been re-discovering people, of late. last night, leila told me that god has been showing her things through her solitude. well, god has been showing me things through my unsolitude. my friends are amazing. really, they are. don't laugh. they've taught me how to love more.

kimbell's poem to me
["when a riot of sunlight caresses our faces, we grow onward and upward, toward heaven" and there's something in your eyes... "it tickles me joyous"]

my poem to kimbell
["to be wrapped in the words and the thoughts and the flavors-
foreverness, sweet on our lips"]

coffee from abram, just because.
["double-shot espresso?"]
["you got it."]

georgetown with sarah, wet to the skin, and laughing and dancing and dreaming and
["we're wet. let's buy clothes."
"no. let's buy MORE PIZZA!"]

chinese take-out that wasn't really take-out, with adrienne
["i know, i know, i'm a biotch."
"nah. satan just talks to you a lot.]

charity and angelise and i in the hottest room on campus, and laughing crazily at three in the morning when that's all the energy that we have left .

[can i have an eeentsy weentsy tiny little backrub? again!]

jules and hannah and sarah in the dark in hannah's room

[i have money to give you!"]

-a long pause-

["NOOOOOOOOOO!"]


i am a quite firm believer in reciprocal affections.




so thank you, to all the ones who have helped me over rough patches. you've been a godsend. literally. here's to us. and if you ever need someone to keep up on an especially bad night... well, you have my number.

paradox

take me prisoner, father. bind me with your chains that cannot break, for in so doing, you will sanctify me to yourself and make me free.

with i- bound with thy bonds, yet flying.

caged in thy cage, yet singing.

shackled with thy fetters, yet running.

imprisoned; held fast, yet truly free.

a thousand drops

today we had rain.

it came down in bucketsful like it was the deluge again. the sky was totally clear and all of a sudden an impossible wind was blasting from out of nowhere, and then even more all of a suddenly, it started to rain. within two minutes, everyone outside was completely wet. it threatened to swallow me.

i stood there, with my arms raised up to the skies, my whole body dripping there in the downpour. my hair clung to my face in curls of sorts, and it felt as though i was being cleansed of my sins again, in a thousand drops of the Christ.