She Dropped Her Bricks

Sex - One small word with some really big consequences.

It may seem like sex outside of marriage is just another act, a mistake made by someone who wasn't thinking clearly at the time. However, sex outside of marriage is often the "noise" we hear when someone has "dropped the brick".

See, along life, we tend to pick up "bricks". Some of these are the result of other people's problems: aggressive or passive behaviors, tragic accidents, abuse, or something similar. Others are the result of our own causing, for example: wearing that low-cut shirt and attending the party you know the guy you like will be at, having an abrasive and negative attitude, all kinds of things! And when the bricks get too heavy - bam! We drop them. Things like unplanned pregnancies are not the result of just randomly sleeping with someone. They're the result of months or even years of brick-collecting.

This mini-sermon has brought me to this point: My cousin is pregnant. My cousin is 6 months older than me. She just graduated high school this past month like me, and her baby boy is due in August.

A part of me is tsk-tsking her. I know from the B-i-b-l-e that sex outside of marriage is w-r-o-n-g, wrong. And I know she's made a big mistake that will cost her.

But another part of me is alarmed. That could be me. Had I picked up a few more bricks, maybe a few different bricks... That could be me, posting 4D ultrasound pictures on Facebook and thanking my Aunt for hosting my baby shower, instead of posting graduation pictures and planning summer get-togethers with my friends.

The debate is constantly waged: Nature vs. Nurture. I wonder if my cousin picked up one too many bricks because of her nature (the way she is, picking up her own bricks) or because of the nurture she's received from others (the way she was raised, being handed bricks by others). And I wonder if I was placed in her position and she in mine, would we still have turned out the way we did? Or would I have been the teen mom, 25 weeks pregnant on my graduation day, and she the upcoming college freshman with a bright future?

Never take for granted what you have in life, who you are, who's surrounding you, and where your life is headed. Take a step back and look at who you are, how far you've come, and where you're going. Be grateful!

Connecting

Ironically, the week before my first official Sunday at my new house, my old church is doing a series on connecting. The tag-line is "Life doesn't work well in isolation". Touche, church, touche.
Being alone hurts, everyone knows that. Sure, it may feel good to get away from everything once in a while, but humans were not designed to be alone all the time. That's why we have friends and family and spouses and roommates and churches.
And other than hanging with my mom and my brother all day long as we move stuff to our new house and train our dog to stay inside the new invisible fence and eat dinner with my stepdad, there hasn't been a lot of connecting going on. I haven't seen one of my best friends since the day after graduation, and the other since my mom's wedding about 3 weeks ago. Another good group of friends and I last got together on Memorial Day.
I love my friends. And while I may miss them, I have a million things to do with the move and I just haven't had time to see them yet. Although, I am get-together with a good friend tomorrow, so that's okay.

But what about church? I have this summer to deal with. Eight Sundays until I go to college.
There are many churches in my new town I could visit, and I think I will. On one hand, I feel guilty for leaving my old church. The problem is that I don't want to drive 45 minutes to church every week. So maybe it's time to move on. Moving and moving on.
There's a church at the college I'm attending that I'll visit and probably attend when I go to college.
I don't want to feel upset that I'm leaving my old church and visiting new ones. I want to be able to find connections wherever I am. And I'll be praying for God to help me establish those.

In Between

My brother and I are hanging out at my grandma's house waiting for my mom to drive from our old house to our new house (my step-dad's house). We're going to meet her there.

It's kind of an awkward feeling right now. I feel like I'm being shuffled around, like I'm in between houses.

When my grandfather died four years ago, my mom, grandma, and I had seen his body several times, including in the hospital (both of them except me) and at the funeral home after they had prepared his body. It was a means of closure for us, to experience and see his body after his soul had already risen. My younger brother, on the other hand, hadn't been with us those times. It wasn't until later, when we were eating the "family supper", that he complained of his stomach hurting and he wouldn't eat anymore. He was tired of waiting for closure.

I know it's a morbid example, but I feel a bit like that. I'm tired of waiting for the "wedding phase" to be over. I want to go ahead and move into my new house. I want to get all my stuff together and step into my new life. I want it to be over.

I don't know how it will feel to walk into my step-dad's house as his step-daughter instead of his girlfriend's daughter. I don't know how it will feel to move my things into his oldest daughter's former room. I don't know how it will feel to wake up in that room and not know the "code" for things in his house, or the way things are done in the morning or during the day or at bedtime.

But I'm ready to find out.

And I do know that when he said "I Do", he accepted not only my mom but also my brother and also me. And I know that I'm not too old to have a man call himself my "step-dad" and show me how a man should treat his children and his wife. Yes, it's scary. But I'm ready for it. I'm tired of waiting.

Ready

I was looking over a gift a friend made for me. It was collage of magazine pictures, drawings, and letters. She had used various letters from magazines to spell out words as well as cutting out certain words.

In the middle of the collage, sloping up from left to right, in white letters on a blue background, was the word "ready". It was the third largest word on the page, after "faith" and "real".

And as I looked at it, I thought, "ready"? Am I really ready? Am I ready for life, ready for these changes in my life, ready for the complications surrounding me? Life is changing very, very fast and I feel like it's rushing by me so quickly I can hear it.

Am I ready for this?

I don't know. I don't know if I could ever be ready. Even if it took a million years. On one hand, that sounds very scary, but on the other, I think it's a good thing. How can we learn if we never step outside of our safety boxes?

Yeah, I can prepare for these changes. I can talk to people who've been there, I can organize my things and pack up for the move. I can talk to people at my college, decide what I need to take, plan my schedule and hit the road. But I'll never be completely ready. I need to grow!

Marriage

My mom is getting married tomorrow!

It's pretty exciting, but it's mostly just nerve-wracking and emotional. My mom is acting like she's PMS-ing. But generally, I'm excited, and there's so much going on to get too concerned about anything.

Her dress is blue with green, purple, and white specks, paisley, and swirls and she bought it at Belk. My future step-dad is wearing a blue/green polo shirt with khaki pants. My brother, my step-brother, and my step-sister are wearing khaki bottoms and white tops as well. My mom says it will make the pictures look nice, but I don't like it. I might just make her wear something awful to my wedding as payback. Haha.

Anyway, my brother and I arranged for my mom and step-dad to get chocolate-covered strawberries while they're on their honeymoon cruise. I think they're going to enjoy it.

I hope that even though things are changing, and right now it's really stressful, things are going to be better, even awesome, in the future. I dream about my husband and our kids, and going to visit my step-dad and my mom, and my kids calling them Grandpa and Grandma. It's pretty awesome. That's what I want for my kids.