wild melody

Kyev, 2013 if i could bottle it up  found a video tonight from 2012 of driving through Kyev in the middle of the night on a 10 hour trip to camp. lizzy & i were the only Americans at the time...background of mingled Russian & Ukrainian, the city lights blurring past, stupid american pop songs on the radio ("call me maybe"--we looked at each other & died laughing at what they would say if they understood it). lily & lizzy were talking about some deep philosophy: how people's souls have depths-- some are lakes, others oceans; i zoned away to absorb the moment. i have so many precious moments stored up in my heart. swimming in the river with abi & lily in the early morning, lizzy & lily & i singing on the dock by the old house, kolya & his guitar on a blanket with julia under the stars on the soccer field, watching the faces of children explode as they're praised. i wish i could share those moments with others. share the polaroi...

"...they were all very well meaning, but [...] they'd say was 'whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger.' the problem with that was [...] I felt like I was actually broken. That things could happen in your life that would just break a man, that not only you wouldn't be stronger--but that you would never again have what you had before. And I felt that things had slipped in such a way that I would never be able to recover." i was moved to the point of aching throat from tears unshed by this story. i found it after listening to the Ted talk "A Story of Knots & Surgeons" which was moving; but this version of the story was far more powerful. because it was relatable. It enabled me to identify my own pain, to remember that ( i am not alone ) & ( you are far from the only one walking through this ) are not empty words i tell myself. they're real. oh & btw, i too want to punch people in the face when they say "everything ha...

" Come in and trade your tears All worry and ease your fears Your burden is not unknown Don't run friend you're not alone For all confined come be set free For all the blind that long to see Come and receive the perfect relief  Come and believe He bore your grief Rise up as the war has ceased No bondage you have been released Come all you weak and contrite He'll strengthen and clothe you in white" Relief--Wolves at the Gate [ I am not the first ] whispered it's way into my mind along with the pressure to let go, to rest. I'm not the first to be here, in this seemingly never ending winter-desert.   I was crushed under the weight of all the people i have lost. as if memory were a blanket made of steel wool suffocating my heart. it's been a long time since I've felt so desperate for my grandmothers' prayers & laughter. my grandfather's steady safety, great-grandma's delighted treasuring, Aunt ...

struggling with a heavy heart today, knowing that the battle is usually won with song but unable to get there.  unable = pretty much sums me up today, actually.  opening my bible with little faith, because usually I need to worship myself out of my funks before I read. but desperate I open my heart and whisper "oh God where is your hope in this book?" this never happens, so I'm not offering this as a healthy method of studying the word... but I flip through and haphazardly stop at Zechariah 10, bc "restoration" caught my eye.  what. I've read this book cover to cover many times, and it's new. I can't remember the last time the Word felt fresh or new to me. here, amidst chapters of bizarre visions & judgment & wrath on Isreal's enemies; is a psalm of restoration.  “My anger is hot against the shepherds, and I will punish the leaders; for the Lord of hosts cares for his flock, the house of Judah, and will make them like his majestic steed i...

I wrote this shortly after my 27 birthday; and while I'm in a different place I wanted to post it here so I don't lose it.  I'm sitting here reading a memoir from a Jewish boy who escaped the Soviet Union with his family in the late 1980s. I thought it would expand my mind, & my heart; put myself in another's very different shoes for a while. Maybe gain a little more insight into the history of the Ukraine I know & love so fiercely.  I didn't think I could possibly relate. I didn't expect to find myself reflected. I didn't foresee having to  move the book so the pages don't wrinkle--not from tears of empathy for his pain, but of familiarity.  I didn't expect to hear I wasn't alone from such a vastly different experience.  as he explains his self-loathing, his need to run from who he is. the journey of realizing the communist hatred for his ethnicity has become his own. as he talks about trying to run from himsel...

The Lone Bellow - "Watch Over Us" Unplugged from Michael Leiato on Vimeo . ^^this band for me embodies things that i doubt they have any idea of: that beauty can be born from struggle. the truth that hard fighting doesn't leave a pretty face behind it, that some sorrows scar & forever alter our hearts. something powerful happens when they sing. it's as if the songs are crafted no longer with words & notes but instead with honesty, blood, sweat, pain. a weakness refusing to shatter; hope refusing to surrender. it bleeds into the music and creates a great exchange: what overflows onto the listeners is a beautiful courage, a fierce grace, a real and messy hope. it breathes the gospel without one bible verse ever being stated. maybe it's just what deep souls sound like when they allow themselves to spill over with the rawness of everything they have. maybe it's so rare because few people engage their sufferings and let it deepen them. or maybe so man...

 what I really want is just to sail around the world & live at sea. to be a drifter, to have stories, to be free & strange & content. I want to delve a little deeper into the cultures of the world with each stop. I want to become familiar with/able to converse in many languages. not from textbooks, from necessity. from meeting like-hearted people, from learning to read the soul reflected in their eyes and thus connect meanings to language. I want to know my capabilities thoroughly--when to jerry-rig, when to let a pro fix it. I long for weeks on end alone with myself and God. until my desperation is so fierce I finally let go of all my pride & fragility & fears. to regain the ease of speaking with Him, to feel again that His love & approval--securely mine already--are the rock of my joy. I want to be sure of myself again, & the sea always gives me that. I want to be a student of nature, reading the sky & sea as if my life depended on it. keeping me c...