Refractions and Reflections

The other night one of the children at the residential facility I work at got up in the middle of the night and tried everything under the...moon...to keep from going back to bed. At one point she was reading to my work partner from a children's story Bible. My coworker said to the child, "You're really good at reading. What is your favorite part of that story?" The child replied, "The part where Adam and Eve get kicked out for no reason." We laughed at this (not in front of the child). My first thought was, "Someone didn't listen very well when this passage was explained...she missed the whole point!" My second was more along the lines of...it probably does  seem to her that they were kicked out (of the Garden of Eden) for no reason. All they did was eat an apple. They disobeyed God in eating the forbidden fruit, yes; but from this child's perspective, disobedience is part of everyday life - especially this child, one who is in resid...

I am excited to join with the link-up this week, but I don't think I'm far enough in my worldbuilding to think about transportation yet. So I'm beginning here by submitting the work-in-progress creation story for my world. One of the larger difficulties I've run into is coming up with good names (for people AND places). Where do you get your inspiration for names? Are the names I've chosen here too complicated? (Other thoughts on the following submission are welcome, too.)  Here, too, is a rough, incomplete, and likely-to-be-changed map of my world: [Beginning still needs fleshed out, but: gods overcome with plague – last to survive are the Sebestri siblings. Dying grandfather gives them each a handful of seeds to plant so another race will grow and take over where the gods left off. Sebestris put the seeds in their pockets and run as fast as they can, thinking they can escape the plague and continue living as they always had. Maybe they could even pla...

This is not a writing/fiction blog. However, it is my personal blog, and one thing I am doing right now is attempting to write a fantasy novel. One blogger I follow is beginning a biweekly hop: There will be a prompt for each submission, but it is not necessary to follow it; more information for those interested here . I'm not sure I will participate every Wednesday, but I do plan to participate some. For example, the first week's theme is Transportation. I don't think I'm far enough in my planning to consider that just yet, but I may enter with another subject. (However, I may not participate at all this first week because there is a submission deadline and I just found out about the hop.)  Thought I'd let anyone interested know about the hop, and let any of my readers know that it's possible they'll be reading some fiction here biweekly. But no, my blog as a whole has not switched genres.  Hope some of you participate! I'm really looking...

Seems like I haven't had much to say for a while, but all of a sudden the last day or two I've felt like posting several times. And not bad/stressful stuff, either! Yay!! :) So...my last post. Yes, I know it may have been a little volatile. But I'm leaving it, because it's where I'm at. And the initial purpose of this blog was to be a place to discuss my theological thoughts, because I had MANY. All the time. I'm changing a lot. Discovering truth is a large part of who I am, and the lifetime JOURNEY to discovering that truth is something I treasure, even though at times I find it difficult being in an "in-between," less-certain place. So, I noticed I lost a follower. That's okay (though it just goes to prove the point of my last post). It's hard to face difficult questions or very opposing views to what we believe - it causes a very uncomfortable condition called cognitive dissonance. I've been there. It IS very uncomfortable, and that...

Through a friend's social media post this week I came into contact with this article on how atheists find meaning and purpose in life. This was actually always one of the questions I could never wrap my mind around when I thought Christian evangelism was the highest purpose/call one could pursue. And I didn't see how everyone else couldn't come to the same conclusion and seek that higher meaning which, in my opinion, was to love, serve, and recruit more lovers and servers for Jesus. (Side note: I highly recommend giving this article a read if you are a Christian.) But you know what isn't fair (besides pretty much most things)...? The hipster-culture, materialistic jump-up-and-down-in-the-smoke-and-lights, first-world Christians of today who think the rest of the world to be arrogant rejecters of Christ, and poor Christians to be lacking in faith and not living in the full potential of the "abundant life" available to them, and poor "unreached" pe...

It has been quite a while since I've posted! I wanted to stop in here and chat you up with something kind-of light, so I thought I'd join this link-up for the first time when two of the blogs in my feed reader featured the same title today! So... WHAT I'M INTO: JULY 2015 EDITION Music All things 70s. I, as the last person on the planet, bought two new albums via iTunes yesterday: Elton John's Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and Fleetwood Mac's Rumours . A friend and I went and saw Elton at the end of March, and I read a biography of him after that, and this is far-and-wide purported to be his best album ever. To think, six months ago I barely had any clue who the rocker was. I knew some of his songs, but had no idea he was the artist behind them. Even the Lion King , people!! My favorite songs on this album are "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" (of course), and also "Sweet Painted Lady" and "Roy Rogers" (not necessarily in that or...

Ahh! My life is just completely stupidness right now. I don't think I'm going to do the challenge after all. Thank you for the support, though! And who knows, maybe I'll pop in from time to time and do something with it anyway....