Happy Thanksgiving

Thou Great and Only Potentate,
Thou hast made summer and winter,
day and night;
each of these revolutions serves our welfare
and is full of Thy care and kindness.
Thy bounty is seen
in the relations that train us,
the laws that defend us,
the homes that shelter us,
the food that builds us,
the raiment that comforts us,
the continuance of our health, members, senses, understanding, memory, affection, will.
But as the stars fade before the rising sun,
Thou hast eclipsed all these benefits
in the wisdom and grace that purposed
redemption by Jesus Thy son.
Blessed be Thy mercy that laid help on
one that is mighty and willing,
one that is able to save to the uttermost.
Make us deeply sensible of our need of His saving grace,
of the blood that cleanses,
of the rest He has promised.
And impute to us that righteousness which
justifies the guilty,
gives them a title to eternal life,
and possession of the Spirit.
May we love the freeness of salvation,
and joy in its holiness;
Give us faith to grasp Thy promises,
that are our hope,
provide for every exigency,
and prevent every evil;
Keep our hearts from straying after forbidden pleasures;
May Thy will bind all our wishes;
Let us live out of the world as to its spirit, maxim, manners,
but live in it as the sphere of our action and usefulness;
May we be alive to every call of duty,
accepting without question
Thy determination of our circumstances and our service. 

The Valley of Vision - "Bounty"

Brilliant

Shakespearean Insults

Happy Reformation Day!

Post Tenebras Lux

2 things (photo edition)

1. Oh, America. No comment necessary.

2. I was at the library, and discovered they have Rob Bell's Love Wins. After reading for a while, I came across this:

Whoever thought to put a Ray Comfort tract in there is brilliant! hahahaha!

Going insane is busy work

It's been a while, and I miss this little forgotten blog. Here are my excuses for not writing on here -

• I got a job at my library. It is the best job ever. God is good to me.
• My usual load of self-inflicted, insanity-producing schoolwork. Somewhere along the road I decided to shake things up this year and do 2 history courses simultaneously, one being AP. Why, you ask? Why not? I answer. 
  
• I'm officially taking over the library at my church, now that I'm a hotshot working at a real library and all. The colleges are going to think I'M SO COOL!!!!
  
• Applying to college and every club in sight
  
• Cramming homework for our homeschool co-op the day it's due and then hijacking class conversations with rhapsodies of the Duke & Duchess of Cambridge. No, I'm not obsessed. (blinking eyes and twitching head)

But leaving such bleak business aside, guess what? I have found a new beloved author to adore! And who might that be?

P.G. Wodehouse!

I never gave the short story genre a second glance because it seemed impossible to weave a satisfying story together in 25 pages. And maybe that's true when it comes to the drama department, but not so with comedy. The plot of each story is hilariously brilliant, and from a historical standpoint, all the British slang from the late teens and early 20's is fun to read. After reading just one of these stories, you will forever live in awe of Jeeves the Butler.

Somehow Autumn snuck up and surprised me. Are those trees really changing? Reader, the best time of the year is upon us. Enter cornmazes, bonfires and mums. And Reformation Day. And Thanksgiving. And discounted Halloween candy.

Obsession

So today I discovered how to write a sonnet, and, being me, I wanted to try it out myself (mistake #1). After about a minute's deliberation of what to write about, it hit me - of course I was destined to start my poetic career by turning my favorite novel into a sonnet! (mistake # 2) After hours of grueling work trying find words that rhyme with "gallAHNT" and cursing iambic pentameter, I got so cracked up by what I created that I have decided to post it here for my your entertainment. (undoubtedly mistake # 3) So without further ado, I give you,

Sense and Sensibility Condensed into 14 Lines

To Devon came two sisters father-lost
   The first, of in-law's modest brother fond,
   Was wise and kind; the second, passion-toss'd,
   To be a true Romantic daily long'd.
The younger girl a pair of suitors gain'd:
   Laconic Col'nel and urbane gallant.
   The elder sister by a tale was pain'd -
   Her beau an ill engagement long had got.
The suave hero was found to be a rake -
   It nearly killed the jilted girl; meanwhile
   Shy Edward lost, for revok'd birthright's sake,
   His vain fiance to his brother's pile.
He wed Elinor at last - happy man -
   And Colonel Brandon won his Marianne.

Hahahahhahahaha!

Well howbout that...

Today, back in 79 AD, Mt. Vesuvius erupted. (Today must have been a dreadfully unlucky day for the Romans, because later, in 410, the city got sacked.) You know you're fascinated.

Acting up again in 1858

AAAND, in 1456, Gutenberg finished printing the first printed Bible. How cool is that?

On the importance of possessing a homeschooler in your neighborhood

With the school year just around the corner, a certain school-related story keeps emerging in my memory.

Several years ago, when I must have been in 6th or 7th grade, an unusual thing happened on an ordinary school day. (Assuming there are ordinary homeschooling days.) My mom was on the phone with my uncle while my sister and I were doing schoolwork in the living room. Important nota bene - "doing schoolwork" in the authoress's world - especially back then - involves equal parts of working on assignment and staring out window. I tell myself that the latter facilitates thinking, therefore improving the former.

Keep working? Look out window?

In one of my reveries, I noticed a guy walk up a side street and turn down ours. The first thing I noticed about him was that he seemed to appear out of nowhere. No mode of transportation - not even the bus which stops on the corner. He just appeared. Also unusual was his general mien. His clothes had seen better days and maybe could have used a spin in the washing machine. The one item he carried was a soda, presumably from McDonalds and huge enough to make Abby Sciuto proud. And then there was this odd bounce in his step which was slightly comic but also unsettling to watch. Overall, this mysterious character seemed out of place in my neighborhood, and naturally, I was fascinated.

I had pretty much forgotten about my schoolwork as soon as I saw this guy, and at that moment the sole purpose of my existence was to see where he would go. Imagine my surprise when he walked up to one of our neighbor's driveways. This particular neighbor - we'll call them the Smiths because I don't know how to spell their last name - is a very kind couple; the husband, for example, is always plowing out our driveway in the winter. Really nice people. What was this random guy doing at their house? I think this is where I told Mary to come look. As we watched him go up the driveway, we realized to our horror that he was going for their car. Just like that, he got it open, started it, and drove off. He didn't even seem to notice that the alarm was going off.

Disturbingly similar to our reaction

When it hit us what just happened, we started screaming bloody murder. SCREAMING. Mary ran off to the office to get my mom, who frantically got off the phone with our uncle. For a moment we sat there in confusion until we remembered that calling 911 is the standard procedure in these cases. After that was done, we went across the street to see what the Smith's neighbor had seen. Apparently she hadn't noticed anything, because she was rather shocked when we told her. Then she told us that the Smiths were on vacation that week. The nerve of this guy! 

After our minds began to clear, Faye, the neighbor, decided to call and tell the Smiths what happened. When it came to describing the perpetrator, she relied on my mom, who relied on Mary & I, for the description. It went something like this: "Patty's here and she says he looked sorta rough like a wanderer......kind of shabby......like a homeless guy. A....derelict. What? Really? Ohhh." As soon as she got off the phone, she explained the last part of the conversation.

This unscrupulous, creepy, homeless guy turned out to be Mrs. Smith's brother who had come for their car so he could pick them up at the airport. And my mom had just called him a derelict to his sister's face.

You'd better believe it

When we were walking home in shame, the cops finally pulled up. Great response time. Later that week, Mr. Smith, apparently in gratitude for our nosiness, gave us $10 in Culvers coupons. He had discovered the moral of the story: It pays to have homeschoolers living in your neighborhood.

I love this guy

Being a bit of an art history aficionado, I'll occasionally find myself staring at random pictures for extended amounts of time. It's almost never to admire the composition or the brilliance of the symbolism like someone who just called herself an "art history aficionado" ought to be doing. No, I'm usually just fascinated by what the people inside it are up to.

Marriage a la Mode is a series of paintings by the English artist William Hogarth ridiculing standard aristocratic marriages of the day. The second painting in the series shows a married couple the morning after an all-night party:

Notice that guy in the left-hand corner?

Is his facial expression not awesome? One look at him and you know exactly what he's thinking. How many times have we all felt the same way? You can't not sympathize with him. I just love it.

On the myth called 'Summer Vacation'

They say that long ago, in the mists of ancient history, a certain practice was widely observed in early western culture. The story goes that in the summer months, children would lay aside their school books and devote their summers to climbing trees, chasing the ice cream man, swimming in the lake (or if they were lucky, the pool), capturing fireflies, and reading the occasional adventure story when it rained. Of course, as in all myths, the long-established order had its adversaries and a hallmark of the time was the Olympian-v-Titan-esque battles between the children and their parents. These parents, armed with chores and schedules, were part of the school of philosophy that taught that "The unstructured life is not worth living." To this day, it isn't certain exactly who won, as archaeologists constantly unearth evidence  that supports both sides.

When I was little, I was one of the many who believed in this legend. Similar to the story of Santa Claus, it is taught by parents and teachers to children everywhere. And, like the Santa legend, when a child reaches a certain age he is subjected to the rude awakening that the story he has been told all his life by everyone he trusted was, in fact, a lie. Delaying this revelation until high school only makes it more painful.

Such has been my fate. My days are filled with extra studying, college visiting, transcript making, library organizing, and blog-neglecting. Hopefully the craziness will die down soon and I can start blogging a little more regularly again. I miss writing and the way it stretches my brain. However, I have started reading Knowing God and love it. There will probably be a related post forthcoming. :-)