magnolia trees.

the last few weeks of life have been good. lots of thinking, for better or worse. mom is in town and we saw drew holcomb and the neighbors last night. the best. they sang magnolia and it was so good. to listen to, to remember, and to share with my mom.


the more i read and the more i look at life, the more im convinced that love and commitment are intertwined. not the same, but not mutually exclusive. commitment follows love immediately. or over a period of time. but you dont walk in love without walking in commitment too. in faithfulness.


i just came back from a night walk with a friend and we talked about the idea of reality. how a lot of it is perception and conditioning. constructing, or rather, grafting, and deconstructing and reconstructing. how counseling works because we learn to rewire. we learn to receive.


i have really amazing friends. superficial friends too. and i used to think that superficial friends werent worth having, because they werent real. thats bull. you need friends who will sit in the shallows with you and pass on a good joke when they see you, because you cant hand out deep stuff to everyone. i have deep friends who think way too much and get lost. i walked around with one of them tonight and it was sweet to my soul because the way we think is similar. and neither of us had to change anything about ourselves to hang out, we just got to laugh and share theories and ideas. ive got compassionate friends too. friends who look me in the eye when im crying at church, knowingly or not. friends who watch shark week with me and friends who LOVE titanic the way that i do. (i watched that movie on my period last week, literally cried and didnt know why.. i understood the next day. cheers) i never believed in seasonal friends, because that didnt seem like commitment to me. but ive learned differently. you need seasonal friends too, because that involves risk. and you need to risk sometimes. you may not be friends with that person later on, but you can thank God for who they were in the right season. the Lord has been good to me, giving me lots of seasonal friends, and so far, lots of forever ones too. who knows. when i think about grace in my life, i keep coming back to friends. to mercy. to love and forgiveness. and i well up with gratefulness because i can see it so easily in them. the Lord has given me so much. so many loving arms to walk through life with. willing hands to hold. people to live tenderly with me, people to be strong with.


honestly, when i pulled out my computer to type something out of the whirlwind of thoughts i had, nothing of this was there. but then i started to think of what i know to be true. the lord is good to me. he loves. im trying to be committed to him. im lousy at it. how im trying and prideful, but im trying. and im loved. and okay with who i am. nice of the lord to walk with me. intentional of him to seek me out and call me his. to graft me into his lineage and kingdom. 5 years later, it still blows my mind. the sweetness of his call.


i watched drew holcomb last night and drew talked about songs they were recording. he said they were important songs because they were with him during the night. the part of me that thinks ahead was waiting for him to explain which night. but the understanding part of me, the part that remembers life, knew exactly what he was talking about. people live in the night sometimes. ive been there. im in the sun now and loving it. laughing it all up. but the sun is sweet to me because i remember the night. and i can thank God for that too. because today i live in the light, and every day that i remember, it is a victory. maybe that is what it means to live in victory. to say that the kingdom is here and now and life. that it is freedom. 


gosh this is long. the lord is good. that is all i know right now.


http://youtu.be/52XmiSPF388

geeking out.

i might stay at the webb next year, pending on prayer and discernment. i might get to play volleyball. trying to lean on the Lord's understanding and not just mine. praying that the process works well. want to be wise. i see redemption and hope and restoration and the Lord working. and i might not be able to stay, but if i could, it would be incredible.


i am hardcore geeking out right now. this might just be amazing.

somebody that i used to know.

somebody that i used to know is such a good song, but posting the lyrics makes it seem spiteful. the lyrics are good and haunting, but the way the song moves is the best.


my current playlist is honest and good.


1. noah gundersen - moss on a rolling stone
2. connor zwetsch - the way you hurt me
3. dave barnes - little lies
4. missy higgins - scar
5. jenny & tyler - the sound of silence
6. zach williams and the bellow - teach me to know
7. josh garrels - farther along
8. noah gundersen - the ocean
9. van lady love (gaving degraw) - not over you
10. geena davis (adele) - right as rain
11. adele - hometown glory
12. anna nalick - 2am
13. the fray (yeah yeah yeahs) - maps
14. connor zwetsch (mgmt) - kids
15. the scene aesthetic - beauty in the breakdown acoustic
16. sarah golden and hoja lopez (gotye) - somebody that i used to know.


i keep looking at my life and i am thankful. ive talked with other friends who have graduated or are about to. they keep telling me to enjoy where i am and i do. im trying not to live to fast but thats not my strength. 


monday night everyone got back from break and it was so good. i got a new couch a few weekends ago and it was covered in friendship. my bed was packed and we watched horton hears a who and laughed cause no one cared whether it was on or not, we just wanted to be together. i will miss that. not enough to make me cry, but enough to be thankful cause the Lord was good to me.


i went to chattanooga over break and fell in love. i cant wait to live there. and maybe after i graduate too. its beautiful. the last night we were there, april showed me the look out point from signal mountain. i almost drooled. it was incredible. and in that moment, i knew i would come back as often as possible. so here is to possibility.


if i could tell everyone in my life one thing right now, i would tell them to love well where they are. if there was one area where i wanted to be a good steward, it would be there. i want to love well where i am, not spreading myself out where im not, when i dont have enough. wisdom is so simple. that is what makes it wise. you cant give what you dont have. you cant be where you arent. so simple. and so true.

learning to be where he has me.

3 cheers to new seasons in life. i started to write out monotonous details in my life that i didnt care about. that i would never want to read again. so i erased everything and started over. sometimes, that is an excellent metaphor for life.

here is what i know.

i am a new creation. the Lord has restored a crazy work in my life. i laugh and mean it. i am happy, usually, and thats unusual. or it was. who knows now. 

i reflect a lot cause im a senior. thats what we do. sometimes at least. when i pray, all i ever come to is thanks. a year ago was so different from here. last year was the hardest year ive ever had. i lost a lot of things in my life. some of them have been returned, but only under careful stewardship. some of them are gone forever. for better or worse. every destructive habit ive ever had fleshed itself and ripped apart my life. 

one time, at the end of last year, hannah and i walked around the webb and sat at the ropes course. i told her i was sorry, because i wanted so badly to stop running and to land. i wanted to trust and accept love and grace. but i was hurting so much and so scared that i couldnt. i literally felt myself retreat and i couldnt stop, no matter how much i wanted to. she looked me in the eye and said, chelsea, we will be here waiting for when you land. and this year i did. i landed. and not only that, but i am free. i laugh a lot and sign out loud. sometimes i dance. and if the stars are aligned just right, sometimes i can run. i live from the whole of me, not just desperate pieces. i am still building with the Lord, reconstructing where there was deconstruction. it has been a long road, but a worthy walk. 

my friend candi is wise and funny. one time she said, "this season of life has torn me to shreds. but it will make a nice quilt". shes right. i am where the Lord has me. and there is freedom there too. the tearing and mending. there is growing and grafting, and it is where the Lord has me.


i talked to nikki rice earlier and asked what the Lord has been doing in her life. she told me a story about being crazy frazzled, and then she looked up from her spot in the coffee shop and saw a homeless man being a mime for her. he made her open her bible and wouldnt leave until it was open in front of her and it "happened" to open up to psalm 138, which is all about the humble and lowly revealing God. its my favorite story so far.

what a rambly first entry. 

there is a cover of sarah golden and hoja lopez covering somebody that i used to know. it is supreme. disclaimer. my love for that song is not in correlation with any relationship in my life. all of my relationships are awesome :)