For my love

...you are the love of my life.

Hunger

I am hungry for you

Your touch always fills me

Yet - I am not fulfilled

But hungry for more

I sit… for just a minute,

Inhaling the nearness of you

The heat from your body rises to meet mine

And I am fully satisfied

...more old poetry

from the other secret drawer.

Like two birds.

My heart has stopped beating

–      not just for the moment, but for the time

it takes a life to flash before ones eyes.

For a lifetime.

It hurts, this dead end of emotion, and

I am left with one single question – why?

Who can answer this for me?

No one… not even myself.

Trapped, like a bird in a cage,

the two of us sit, looking at each other.

You have the courage to fly out as soon

as the door to your cage is opened,

but I sit still,

afraid of the unknown,

the vast expanse that I have never tested my wings in.

At first my heart pounded so fast

that it hurt my ribs.

Now it doesn’t beat at all,

and I feel strangled

–      the pressure of missing air torturing my mind.

I sometimes feel confined,

locked up,

forced into a

mold that doesn’t quite fit me.

Dislodged

Lost somewhere in time

Expanded in space that is not mine

I float in time

Dislodged, displaced

Confused, homeless

This is not my skin

My life, my time

Old poetry...

straight from my secret drawer...

I am defective.

Someone vandalized my life

Or was it myself?

Afraid

                     Dull and numb – extremely boring.

Falling asleep, drifting, floating,

disappearing into a fog, a mist, an endless cloud of unconsciousness. Noises drowning softly, a voice humming in the distance,

reaching out but never hitting target.

Wishing to touch, but forbidden to do so.

Wishing to see, but blinded and blurred and not capable of seeing. Wishing to hear, but unable to discern meaning form sound,

unable to detect form from matter.

Breathing slowly, deeply, letting the blood run through the tired blue veins.

Pale faced, rosy cheeked, cold, smooth, almost a dead feeling.

Alone, wanting company, but afraid to reach out,

afraid to call out,

afraid to seek out companions,

afraid to open up, to show, to tell, to ask.

Afraid of rejection, of being turned down, out, left behind.

Afraid of not being wanted, not being seen, not being heard, not being asked.

Afraid of knowing and seeing, of confrontation,

of conformity, of solitude and hermitage. 

So it's sunday evening, and I am so tired after a wonderful weekend. Yesterday was spent in the quiet confines of my own home, after a long morning run with the hubby and the oldest. The two youngest kept each other company, and after a late breakfast, we all kinda did our own thing. It was wonderful.

I love quite days that allow me to slow down, enjoy a sunbeam and stroke my children's hair. Days that allow me to shop at snailpace with whatever kid desired to tag along. Days that let me tend to small tasks in the garden - especially those that combine dirt and herbs...
At 3 in the afternoon, the sky was blue and the sun was warm, so I opened the door to our terrace, and sat down with a snack and soaked in the sun for half an hour. Johanna sat on my lap and played quietely.

Saturdat evening brought friends we hadn't seen in a while, and that sent me to the kitchen, both baking and cooking. And it reminded me of how much I really enjoy spending time in my kitchen, how I love cooking and in general, preparing food. This is my creativity - though I always use recipes, but usually end up confirming them to my own ways anyway.

I cannot paint, draw, sew or knit, and I certainly could never write a song or a play for the theater. But putting together a good, home cooked meal, is right up my alley. I would have posted pictures, but I am afraid we ate it all!

I hope you all had a great weekend too...

Collecting people

It just recently dawned on me that I perhaps have one of the weirdest hobbies ever... except from the woman I heard of, whose hobby was collecting hobbies.
My hobby is simply collecting people!

Sometimes, when I am in good company and feeling strangely safe and comfortable, I find myself itching to tell my company about people who in some way or another move me, touch me, awe me etc. Often, I find it next to impossible to convey my fascination with these people. How on earth do you explain to someone how fantastic you perceive someone they don't know? Adjectives such as good, awesome, funny, sweet and amazing just don't really come alive the way I want them to.

So why do I collect people? I think it's because I continue to marvel at the creativity of our Lord. He has succeeded in creating an amazing mass of different individuals, none identical to any. People are put together with a multitude of colors, talents, tastes, shapes and languages. I enjoy being surrounded by unique individuals, and I feel blessed by having these people in my life.

There is no way that I could make a list to share with you - I would not be able to mention all those in my collection, and frankly, I don't know how to categorize or even set up criteria for being a part of my collection. I have no idea how many people have found their way into my collection. All I know is that they all add color to this tapestry of life that I hope to weave.

But I will share one person with you:

Mikael is a creative musician, cook and husband/father. He has a great sense of humor and usually, a good sense of style. This particular picture is from his wife's 30th birthday party, for which he helped cook and serve and survived being the only male in the company. What a great (or something) apron....

Two Namibian women

Oh yes, you shaped med first inside, then out; you formed me in my mother's womb. I thank you, High God - you're breathtaking! Body and soul, I am marvelously made! I worship in adoration - what a creation! You know me inside and out, you know every bone in my body; You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit, how I was sculpted from nothing into something. Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth; all the stages of my life were spread out before you, the days of my life all prepared before I'd even lived one day.
Psalm 139:13-16 (The Message)

I'm back from Helsinki again. What a wonderful trip! We woke up Sunday morning to beautiful white snow and took a good run in it.
Saturday night I went to the sauna with a group of wonderful women, and after that, we ate together and I got to speak to them. We ended the evening praying in small groups, and I was immensely blessed by this.
My group had 2 Namibian women in it, and as we prayed our first prayer, they were very quiet, but suddenly, it was like courage took hold of them and they prayed up a storm! I asked them to pray for my menstrual cycle and the mood swings I so badly want to live without, and the first woman to pray was beautiful Bertha. Studying to be a nurse, I suspect she felt this was just her thing - praying for the physical body to line up and behave itself! But I was stunned. She prayed out of 2 Timothy 1:7: For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline. She prayed for self-discipline in my life, and then continued to pray that I would be able to give thanks for my body, as the Bible tells us that we are wonderfully made.

I have been so upset about my body and my hormones and all the mood swings. I have been so frustrated and quite frankly, so deeply affected by this that I have literally cried out to God.

But I have never thought to thank Him for my body and all of its functions.

Perhaps I ought to. Perhaps I ought to be more grateful, more focused on all the good things that my body is capable off. Perhaps I ought to show a little more respect for this wonderful thing that God has designed and created. Will it remove all less desirable aspects? Probably not. But as I ask Him to heal me and make my body more harmonious, I will be grateful for it. Grateful that I don't suffer from anything worse.

What a weekend. I went to Finland and met prayer warriors from Namibia. And I also realized that a Finnish childhood friend of mine, now living in Japan, is married to the sister of the woman whose house I slept in. What a small world this is.

Pray for me, I'm off to Helsinki.

Seriously, I am off to Helsinki tomorrow morning. I'll be visiting the Helsinki Vineyard and teaching at a women's gathering. I will also be trying out a Finnish sauna.

Going to Helsinki has got me thinking about some of the Finnish people I knew growing up. I remember a very young, blonde boy I went to grade school with. My friend Rebecca and I both had a crush on him, but she mentioned it first, so he was hers. In our dreams.
In high school I knew 3 other Finnish boys and the sister of one of them. Her name was Outi.

Outi probably doesn't know this, but she has a very special place in my heart. One evening at Rift Valley Academy (boarding school in Kenya), I went to the chapel to have a good cry and pour out my troubled teenage heart to God. I was so desperate for some kind of sign that He cared about me, that I had value and that I wasn't invisible and unimportant to the people around me. I felt so small and insignificant that night. I remember begging God to send somebody to the chapel, because I was growing more and more upset and afraid of being alone.

On my knees at the alter, I suddenly heard the door open slowly, and in stepped Outi. She walked straight up to me and sat down, putting her arms around me, letting me cry on her shoulder. Outi, who probably had difficult days of her own, being a missionary kid just like me, miles away from home and family. I don't remember all she said, but I do remember her saying this: "God told me to go to the chapel. Someone would be there who needed me."

I have never forgotten Outi for that. She was a messenger from God that night, stating loud and clear that He heard me, that He knew me and cared for me. She was a drop of grace from heaven, bringing relief to a dry soul that night. She was so obedient that it changed something in me.

In Helsinki I will be teaching on how obeying can save lives. I will look at Esther from the Old Testament, hoping to show my listeners what an ordinary, but obedient, woman can accomplish, if she listens to the Lord and obeys him.

So please pray for me, at I take all my ordinary character traits with me. Please pray that I will be obedient, and that God will fill my mouth with the words he wants to share.