let me kiss Your feet...

i'm already on the floor.
with my alabaster jar.















i love You.

no matter how i feel inside

i keep having this wonderful vision. i'm sitting at an upright piano writing a song. i don't know where it is, but i know the house i'm in is mine. i have a cat on my lap. i'm wearing a red shirt that buttons down the back. the room looks like something i would put together and there is a small jar full of hand picked flowers on top of the piano. i did not pick them. i am keenly aware of the fact that i am loved by someone special. i don't know who that person is, but his presence in my life is something i feel very sure of sitting there.

i have moments lately where i am very lonely. not the kind of lonely that friends can fix. i drove to my grandparents last week, because family and that town are the sweetest rest my bones can ever find. it felt so good to be out on the road again. at one point i glanced at the passenger seat and wished i was in it. the tears that followed caught me off guard. i felt angry for a moment. abandoned. very tired of putting on the brave face and saying i'm ok with "doing my own thing." and then i heard Him say, "i'm sitting here. reach out your hand." so i did. it landed on the arm rest, but did not hit fabric. my hand was on top of His hand. my tiny hand on His. my tears gave way to laughter and i was reassured. on the switch backs of the 49, He told me that if i would just trust the truth that has been spoken and seek the truth that will be, the rest will come. even the upright. the button down. the cat on my lap. the flowers in a jar. and a love to be sure of.

gold mine gutted

i want to write it on a piece of paper and stuff it in a bottle. i want to record myself saying it over and over and over again. and do God knows what with the bottle or the tape when i'm finished. i want to get in a car and yell it out the window at random strangers. i want to spray paint it in what is left of the snow. i want to write a song about it and sing it until everyone around me plugs their ears. i want to pay a plane to spell it out on a banner and drag it through the sky over a crowded beach. i want to stick my fingers in paint and spell it out all over my body. or canvas. whichever is more readily available. i want to call everyone i know and tell them too. i want to write it in a book. i want to make up a code so i can hide it in mundane messages. i want to spell it out in invisible ink on everything you own. i want to be able to stare at a picture and make you feel it. but i wouldn't need to do any of this if you'd give me space to say it to your face.

here's the question

what does it mean to stand still?

to stay in one place even when it itches?

i think i realized through a series of events (and by series i do mean one. right. after. the other.) that i am not comfortable staying in one place longer than i have to. i know i've moved around my entire life and perhaps this has a lot to do with it, but i am constantly looking to the next thing. where will i be in the fall? Da made it very clear where i will NOT be in the fall and now it is my turn to rest in that. why not here? why not? what makes me think i have to go anywhere? or prove anything? to anyone? what about seeing something through? what about listening until it is made clear? what about taking time to recognize and then draw out my passions and my giftings? what about surrounding myself with beauty and actually looking up every once in a while? i crave freedom, but sometimes fail to recognize that the only thing the standards of this world or other people offer is bondage. please keep reminding me of that.

i think that was more to God than anyone else.

also. i still love you.

so it appears

my hands lost their cool this morning. i splashed my entire cup of coffee all over the floor and things i prefer to keep dry. i dropped a water bottle on my frozen toes. walk it off. i don't think it coincidence that when i am taking the neccessary steps to total surrender that the little frustrations creep up and have their fun. i had an unread message in my inbox last night. it was from a friend of mine. she'd sent it sometime last summer. somehow i'd never read it. it said "i miss you." that friend died almost four months ago. apparently Da wasn't kidding when He said He was going to make me face things. apparently we're having it out. apparently there is going to be some heart searching. wretching. healing. apparently.

kerosene

a girl can only say she's sorry so many times and then she just has to show you, but if you never give her the chance, you'll miss out on seeing how much she means it and just how beautiful forgiveness can be.
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the fog comes in as a whispy white blanket atop the trees and lingers for days. if i stand on the back porch looking out for long enough i can remember nights when the voices of friends would bubble up behind me and the boards would creak beneath our feet and heavy laughter. our smoke trails lingering or mixing with the mist if we exhaled hard enough. sometimes forming the shapes of animals or insects in our imaginations and causing the younger of us to giggle, her eyes always sparkling, especially when we made them just for her. a butterfly from you, she'd say. a catipillar. an elephant. a moose if you dare. she'd clap and say she saw it even if the wind made it impossible. i can say i miss those nights, but i do not miss those days. the pain i carried was so deep and disheartening. unnessecary and overpowering. the night, the moon, the porch, the mist, the friends, they were my solace. my comforter. God revealing Himself in the mundane, offereing me a place of rest. a more consistant back porch experience, if you will. a way of taking those nights into the days ahead and not bearing my self-imposed baggage alone, but handing it over and not wallowing in the what's or where's or who's or how's, but enjoying the moments when what makes sense is that nothing make sense and without Him it would be impossible to bear the uncertainity that any given day may bring.

this is she

i'm in the mood for a little self-actualization and honesty.

caitlin meadow mccarthy. age 22. 5 feet 7 inches tall. non-smoker. (the last one is still weird to say out loud). i have an extreme distaste for gummy bears. i had a bad experience once. i drink my coffee black. i've started calling God "da" because calling Him God seems far too impersonal compared to the very personal nature of our relationship as of late. i'm "this close" to being "educated." He tells me i'll be able to finish that degree someday. ever since i was little i've had a place i go to in my head. people who know me well or love me differently can tell when i go there. when i was younger Jesus would meet me there. i tried to push Him out for a while and sometimes for a split second i still try to hide. things get messy and dark during those times. He always comes back or finds me in the corner. not that He ever actually leaves or forgets where i am, but true love never forces the other person to reciprocate. the beauty is in the choosing. i can't eat taco bell without drinking mountain dew. but i think yellow number five and fast food are terrible terrible things. i often secretly want dread locks and a tattoo. or two. i move around a lot because it is all i've ever known, but it means i'm always missing someone. i don't hold on to jobs or boyfriends for longer than three years. i've never been fired, but i tend to get antsy and disenchanted with the work. and the boys. well i guess they get antsy and disenchanted with me. i have a small scar on my right wrist nobody every notices. it's from a kook of a rabbit i was holding when i was ten or so. it got scared by a donkey and scratched the living daylights out of me. i just remember laughing. and bleeding. "silly rabbit. stupid ass." is all my brother offered. it takes me a while to let people in. it takes an even longer while for me to fall in love. but i'm loyal. often to a fault. i used to have quite the temper. i'm painfully prideful. although i'm getting better. it is really more of a daily "bend my will to Yours Lord......ahhh go ahead and break it really. its the only way we're going to get around it anyhow." i talk about my tummy (and its relations) a lot, because its on the fritz 98% of my waking life. i'm secretly quite romantic and by the grace of God have remained so inspite of heartbreak and evidence contrary to romance's exsistence. however dismal, my favorite colour is grey. and i enjoy spelling both of those words that way. when i don't have time to wash my hair, i wear a hat. i genuinely enjoy each member of my family. immediate and extended. i've learned not everyone can say that. i like pillows. i want a room full of them someday. the idea of being a wife excites me. as does being a mother (both naturally and through adoption). but only when i am ready. only when He says i am ready. i stopped watching t.v. and am a better person for it. i use to not be able to peel oranges because of the way it made my fingers smell. i can now. i know how to be manipulative and i use to use it to my advantage. i feel sorry about that. i'm letting my hair go wild.

i think the thing that shocks me about all the things i just wrote down and all the things i didn't, is that the girl i was not long ago would have let them define her. or allowed others to define her because of them. i don't anymore. i'm in the proccess of embracing my quirks and recognizing my faults, because Jesus told me He loves me for (or inspite of) them. He is in me. and His glory is man fully alive.

i want to bring Him glory. i want to be fully alive.