Here's to gratitude.

Lately I have been thankful for warm summer afternoon where I can fall asleep in the sun. Where I can eat fresh, ripe peaches and let the juices run down my chin and stain my top. Where I can drink traditional ginger ale from a glass bottle.

Here's to my husband who looks after me when I'm sick. For being excited. For taking me for Thai food instead of packing. There are few things I find more attractive than watching you sleep.

Here's to 6pm classic Simpson's and 24 hours in a&e for making me laugh and making me cry.

Here's to a sister who shows me how she raises a beautiful daughter. For giving me a niece who makes me laugh and kisses me when I ask (and sometimes doesn't). For learning to use Skype so when I leave in a week I can watch your babies grow without me.

Here's to phone calls from old colleagues. Here to reminiscing about a great friend we both lost. Here to plans for chips on the beach.

Here's to moving to Romania.

Here's to a God who always turns everything into enough.

16 seconds to change my mind.

Something is hurting inside of me. A few weeks ago I was lied to by a person sat dead opposite me and said something against me that just wasn't true. It hurt me and I was angry and I'm still angry. The reason it's hurting though is because I just can't let it go and the problem is that the person I know will be hurting to.

I watched this video

It made me sad. It made me so sad that I even cried. Real fat, tidal waves tears down my cheeks. What is happening inside of me that makes me so sad about something so minor (in the grand scheme of things).

The video made me think about how I would feel if I turned around no one was behind me. No one in my team was cheering my corner. What my hurt would look like if someone filmed it and played it back in slow motion.

Those words had cut me and as I walked around I realised I was leaving bloody footsteps behind me and what was left growing was an ugly snub, worthless and proud. Anger lingers like the winter winds. I wouldn't allow God to heal me but in 16 seconds when I got to witness someone else's pain a moment that screamed silently 'why is no one coming?'. It made me wonder about what if no one else is cheering her?

Remember that Grace that saved you. That had to run around after your crazy, and fought against your lies and 'oh my God' painful words. Do you remember the Grace that saved you and continues to cheer your corner?

It's time then to change. Let's run shamelessly after thoses who hurt and lie about us. Let's forgive relentlessly so that whenever someone turns there is always someone there to welcome them with open arms.

There are reasons why we are told to love everyone.

Hands open to promise.

I looked out tonight from the dark place into the sky that turned from blue to grey and grey into night.

I looked at hands opened to a promise as a cup to be filled.

Surely these are the mountains moved.

We will rise up one day and call these sharp edges our salvation.

With forgivness that taste likes cupcakes.

Hallelujah we will declare.

So isn't there hope in the fighting?

And isn't there grace where we cant see it?

For surely there is love.

Goodbyes are hard.

Mike

It all started about 15 years ago. I had been kicked out of another school and moved to yours and into your class. Boys and girls at that age are never really great friends because, well, it's just not cool. But I would always say we were friends. There was a short gap when we didn't see much of each other but then I came back and then I just happened to marry your best friend securing my place in your life forever and vise versa.

You left for London today and the truth is I'm just sad about it and happy. Excited, but sad all the same.

Time just keeps moving on. The days pass by like a blurr and suddenly it's Monday again and it's almost September which means almost my birthday, which means (sit down for this one as it's not for the faint hearted) it's almost Christmas and the start of another year. Your leaving has been a long time coming. We have know for months that you would be going but it was always a long way off, but you left today anyway. 

Time just keeps going.

The thing about it is that we will miss having you around. We are blessed to have so many friends that sometimes we forget to remind you that we love you. Now you have gone things just wont be the same. The conversations will be different, the feelings, truths will be different. We will never be what we were to each other. Eveything but nothing will be changed. You have left a hole that we will fill with other things, and everything will go on the way it always has done. Like it did when Bobbie left and when Amy left.

I'm not worried we have made it through 15 years of comings and goings, joys and sadness. You will fly through your late 20's and make new friends who will make you laugh and change you. We will watch as you develop new skills in a new town and have new experiences away from us. And we will do the same.

Everything changes eventually.

I'm not worried.

So my plan is to miss you, encourage you, pray for you often, wait patiently for my new house and love you always, because what else are friends for? 

What a girl's worth.

Last week I spent time with a young twenty-something girl who worked as a prostitute. She was smart and clever and beautiful. We started a friendship a few months ago and that night we sat talking about life, love and past painful memories. I was hurt lots by falling into the arms and beds of men who never really wanted anything else from me. She has a very similar story. Mine ended well, her hasn't ended yet. As we finished our conversation she looked at me and smiled. In the end I thought, 'whatever why not charge them now I call it a job. I am a paid whore instead of being a whore '. She puts a price on herself because in her mind she was worthless. I wish I could tell you more of her story but it's not mine to tell and one day I hope women will hear it and be challenged and changed like I am being. This is a small bit of mine.

He said things 15 year old girls should never hear. And I listened because he was talking to me because women with dark tinted glasses (who should have known better) told me it was good. He taught me to be everything he wanted and I, desperate to keep my older boyfriend, was all too willing. He spent time teaching me and moulding me and inevitably lost interest. What was I, now that he had gone? I had spend my growing teenage years learning from a man who would never love me forever.

He said things 17 year old girls with broken hearts long to hear and I listened because you were just like him. He who ruined me. Every night I would wait hoping you would want me and when you didn't I would find someone else. When there was no one, there were things I could take that would make it ok to be alone. The hurtful, angry voices he had grown in me would get further and further away and the screaming 'you are worthless, you are just something to screw;' would fade into the darkness.

He said things 18 year old girls stopped being able to hear but I knew what you wanted because I had already known men like you. I dared not seek comfort where it had not met me before and I struggled under a hating weight that I couldn't escape from. Men came, none tried, none fought, none stayed and I was a broken.

You said things to me every girl longs to hear but I didn't listen because your kind words cut me like a knife. You said things to me that every girl longs to hear and I pushed you because they just weren't true.

You showed me the Word every girl should hear and I listen because God whispered 'this is what you are worth'.

You showed me love that wasn't based on sex or lies. You showed me love based on truth and faith

and He loved me unconditionally. It was hard and it was painful. I didn't think we would make it through with our hearts intact, but grace showed up and saved the day. Now I know that the statement of my worth should come from the lips of He who made me. Even though it is sometimes hard to hear through the din, I know to look to my Father when I need reminding what a girl is worth.

Gentle Soul, you will fly

Gentle soul, you will fly

you will open like an orange and leave a sweet fragrance in the air

gentle soul, you will fly

and pretend that no one saw you fall.

Gently soul, you will fly

and hide between trees and leaves and clouds and stars.

And glide with dragonfly over the waters.

Gently soul, you will fly

and erase all the hurt that sits within and raise praising hands,

and you will say

'I have everything'

Gentle soul, you will fly

and laugh at the past who sits behind glum-faced.

Gentle soul, you will fly

and make everyday into a fairytale

Take me to where love is needed.

Gentle soul, you will fly and when you are tired,

rest with eagles high above the judging world,

with eagles who like clumsy hands and tired eyes.

Gentle soul, you will fly.

because that's who I am today.

I was so sure my heart would stop from missing life so much. Sometimes thinking about it is the salt taste in my mouth making all sweet things taste bitter.

I've started working now, I sit behind a desk and my heart flies away to you (maybe that's why I do so many things wrong). I waited for someone to tell me it's ok, that what I'm doing now is ok, that at some point this waiting game would be worth it.

My head is so full of rushing and wondering I'm not sure of who I am at the moment. It's a different someone to who I was last Tuesday .

Last Tuesday I was strong and mindfull. I spoke correctly and didn't swear as much.

Today I am ready to run away and leave this place behind. Today I make too many mistakes in the attempt to correct myself. Today I upset people for no reason other than make myself look better. Today I cry. Today I want to tell you that not everything is fairy dust, that some things are just dust.

I'm trying so hard to be what you want me to be. Even when it doesn't look like it I care, because here, in this place, today! I have to.

Maybe tomorrow I will be she who doesn't care what anybody thinks. Maybe tomorrow it will be ok for things to be wonderful.