Rainy introspection paired with Darjeeling in a mug from Vandalia, IL

Cleveland, you are beautiful in your gloomy, grey October
rain.

I am thankful. I am thankful for this day of restoration.
It is a luxury to find a few hours to indulge in introspection
and songwriting therapy, and now blogging.

I haven't posted any songs on here in a while. I haven't been
really raw on here in a while, until that last post. That was
pretty raw. I guess sometimes you just reach those moments
when your desire to be really seen and really heard, even if by
only a few sporadic blog readers, outweighs your desire to hold
back and leave an impression of having it all together.

I do not have it all together.

Most recently have discovered I do not have it all together because
I am not comfortable or adequate in this venture called love. I
am scared to death by the realization that to truly love someone,
I have to face the fact that my love is imperfect, and accept that
in return I as well will be imperfectly loved.

It's so much easier when things are new, when you're just in awe
and wonder of having someone in your life who says he loves you
and who you love so easily. It's another thing when you start
getting into the real meat of loving another flawed person, and
realizing that it isn't going to be easy for them to love you all the
time. That's so humbling to realize... it's almost unbearable at
times. I'm so vain and so selfish somewhere deep inside, and I
just want to run away rather then face glaring imperfection in
myself and in another and in our understanding of each other.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm strong enough of a person to really
follow through with this whole love thing. It seems so much safer
to just wall up inside my apartment and write in my journal, my
nice, neat speculations about the world, ordering everything into
my crisp, cursive paragraphs. I can write the world any way I
want and dream about how things might be someday, in my
safe, perfect, unrealistic dream world.

But this is a world for the weak.

The real world of love and sacrifice demands much more
internal strength and selflessness then the imagined world of
my journal pages. And I know that there's nothing wrong with
speculating, with analyzing, with dreaming about how I hope
things will someday be, but Lord, I don't want to get hung up
on my fear of imperfection that I'm too scared to really live and
love and fail and work and grow and become a more useful vessel.
Lord, make me willing to be poured out when you desire it of me.
Please, give me strength, wisdom, discernment.... and so much love.

I so do not have it all together, but I am held together in the
most wonderful, powerful hands - the hands that formed my
very soul and made big chunks of wood called trees spring up
out of the ground for our use and enjoyment... and so much
more... all the beauty and wonder we take for granted in this
gorgeous world.

And although I find myself in yet another long distance relationship
where wading through the ins and outs of love becomes a lesson
in laying down my pride, I find myself one step closer to the woman
I was created to be, here in rainy Cleveland. I'm still learning, still
growing, and still so amazingly blessed.

And I found myself in the company of new friends last night at the
20 something get together at Bay Presbyterian Church. It was
exactly what I needed and I really enjoyed those people. I made a
handful of new friends and I hope to get to know them more in my
last few months here. But who knows... someday I might be back.
I really have grown to like this area. Seriously. Lakewood and
surrounding areas really have a lot to offer.

I observed another Music Therapist at the Cleveland Music School
Settlement last week and was pretty impressed. Very nice set up
they have. I look forward to one day having a job, similar to the one
I now have, except as a board-certified MT, actually making a liveable
wage and all. Yeah, that would be nice. : ) As it stands now, K-Mart
will be helping me through these last few months. Hooray for minimum
wage.

Friend and reader, I encourage you today to reach more and more outside
of yourself and learn what it is to love and give of yourself in the strength
that is ours in Christ. I encourage this, not because I do it well, but
because I know how important it is. Let's keep trying, struggling with
all His energy. Let's trust in Him and not anything or anyone else. He
will make our paths straight.

I am so glad for the patience of our God with all of our weaknesses. Dear
Lord, help me to extend the same kind of patience to others as you extend
to me every minute of every day. Please guide me in Your truth and grow
me in Your perfect love. I am so imperfect and so in need of your perfection.