Day 25: A photo history of the last 5 years.

The highs of the last 5 years--through pictures.  Pretty cool idea actually.

2006: In college at U of O, lived in a Christian house called "Trinity."

2007: One of my best friends (Brit) got married.

2007: I studied abroad in Mexico for 3 months.  And made some great friends in the process.

2008: I graduated from college!!!

2009: I had two part-time jobs.  One at my church and one at a hotel.  Made some fantastic friends at both.

2009: I ran my first race.  A 5-miler at the Portland Marathon.  I was hooked.

2010: My brother got married (to a fantastic woman).  I couldn't be happier for him.

2010: I ran the Portland Marathon after training for it for a year.

2010: I bought a house.

2010: Working with high school kids.  LOVING every minute of it.

Day 24: Most embarrassing moment.

While I'm sure I have plenty of embarrassing moments, I could never think of a specific one when asked "what's your embarrassing moment?"  So I spent some time coming up with one and it's my automatic go-to story.  It even has a picture.  Guess I just got lucky.

When I was a sophomore or junior in high school our baseball team made it to the playoffs.  Their first game happened to be at our school.  I guess it was a big deal because we needed an official national anthem with a big flag. They were sure proud.  Anyway, I happened to be at the game, so the A.D. asked me to hold the flag.  I thought, "no problem, this'll be easy".  Unfortunately it wasn't quite as easy as I thought it was going to be.  I got out in front of everyone there and attempted to unroll the flag.  But it had tassels!  The tassels wrapped themselves around the flag while I unrolled it and it was too big to hold differently without dropping it.  I kept trying desperately, but it wasn't going well--and everyone was watching.  On top of that, a friend of mine was going to play the national anthem on his trumpet.  He was waiting for the flag to be unrolled before he started.  Not a great combination.  Regardless, I was mortified.  Picture proof.  Don't be confused, the flag looks practically unrolled in this picture, but it's not.

Day 23: A picture of your pet(s).

This is Toby.  He's a West Highland White Terrier, or Westie for short.  I got him from the Oregon Humane Society a couple months ago.  He came from a breeder in Medford and lived in a cage most of his life.  Poor guy.

This is Max.  He's my parent's pug.  They got him when I was a sophomore in college.  He has so much personality and spunk.  Not to mention that he'll eat anything, dog food, small rocks, ya know.  He's quite overweight, but we love him anyway.

This is Whiskers.  She's no longer with us, but she was my cat growing up.  Whiskers was slightly crazy, laying in the middle of the road until cars came, climbing into the engine of our car, and getting stuck under the garage door one night.  We had to put her down when I was in college because she developed a skin cancer that started to eat away at her nose.  I loved this cat.

Decay

I turned on the news this morning during breakfast to see tsunami warnings for the Oregon coast.  I immediately texted my parents to see what was going on (they've been at the beach house all week), and to make sure they were okay.  I think that's the point when I started seeing the videos and images out of Japan of the 8.9 magnitude earthquake and ensuing tsunami.  Horrific, devastating videos of rushing water carrying cars and debris through farmlands was all over CNN.  People trapped on the roofs of buildings waiting for help.  Fires blazing from an oil refinery.  Mass chaos.  My day was irrevocably changed.

And as I continued to follow the news in Japan I kept hearing about the nuclear power plant that was struggling to cool down and possible going to let out radioactive air out to prevent a breakdown.  Then another 6.6 magnitude earthquake hit the other side of the country hours later. 

Sort of like being kicked while you're already down.  Japan has been through a lot in the last 24 hours.

The enormity of the situation in Japan, coupled with all of the other major natural disasters we've been seeing recently (Christchurch, Australia just weeks ago) is overwhelming.  In fact, I even found this list of the Three Most Devastating Earthquakes in 2011 while searching online.  It's amazing is that we've already had three major earthquakes this year and it's only the beginning of March!

It makes me think of the end times.  The decay of the world and it's morals.  It's hard to imagine the world continuing like this, it's actually scary to think about--especially thinking about having a family and kids someday.

On the positive side, for how terrible the world is today, heaven will be so much better.  Sort of the idea that you can't experience true happiness without deep sadness.  With all of the sadness coming out of Japan today, that's what I'm clinging to.

Day 22: A childhood memory that stands out to you.

Almost all of my memorable moments from childhood involve my brother.

The times we fought over nothing (who would flip the light switch), the times we play-acted Donkey Kong (or X-Men) in the backyard, our late-night conversations in high school about life and drama, or the numerous times we were asked if we were dating (which was promptly answered with an "eww! He's my brother!" sort of response).

My parents were really big into "driving vacations".  One particular vacation we flew to Boston and then proceeded to drive up and down the Eastern seaboard.  We also visited a lot of museums.  Thankfully I can look back fondly, but at the time, it was infuriating.  Not only did my parents insist on driving everywhere, but we drove one of the smallest 4-door cars: a Toyota Tercel.  It looked just like this, except the front bumper was blue like the rest of the car.

Now, Brad is a knick-knacky kind of person (got it from my mom), and I am a minimalist (got it from my dad)--not a stellar combination.  So Brad would get a bunch of kitschy souvenirs and then place them all over the center console in the backseat.  Nothing could be on top of something else, so his souvenirs looked like an army awaiting battle.  Then, we'd make a sharp turn and guess what, yep, all of his little trinkets fell all over me and my side of the car.  I, of course, would get angry and sweep all the remaining trinkets to his side of the car in a huff.  I think that might have been the moment when the center seat was banned from use by anyone.  Although I'm certain other battles over it ensued in future years.

Never a dull moment with my brother and I.  Such a vivid childhood.

Delays

Patience and flexibility are what I strive for.  Sometimes I fail (e.g. when people drive slower than the speed limit in the fast lane), but fortunately most of the time I do okay.  It's my attempt to "go with the flow", something that seems to come easily to my more outgoing friends.

Unfortunately, after a few weeks of meetings either being blown off, forgotten about, or canceled on repeatedly, I became frustrated.  Was I being a push over in my "easy-going-ness"?  Was life just so busy that I was an afterthought to people?  Or, was I holding my friends to unrealistically high standards given the frantic "go go go!" culture we live in? 

I drifted through my thoughts about it until it occurred to me.  What if the meetings kept getting canceled because I wasn't ready (mentally, emotionally, or spiritually) to have those meetings?  Almost like a light bulb went off, I feel like God is saying "you have some work to do Megan, I want you fully prepared before you're in that situation because those conversations are important, and not just for you."

So, as I push through another delayed meeting, I'm going to look at the situation differently.  Instead of being angry I'm going to be encouraged and value the extra time I have to prepare my heart, my mind, and my thoughts.  So that when the time comes my words and my actions will shadow God's heart and plan for that particular situation/conversation.

Brokenness

Sometimes I just feel broken.  Beaten down and exhausted.  Daily life wears me thin, and my constant struggles find the threadbare holes.

 Sometimes I wonder how long it'll be until the Promised Land.  Until I'm "ready" to leave the dessert.

Sometimes I question my sanity.  My ability to stay realistic and practical.  It fights against my urge to daydream in the irrational.

But even in my brokenness, there's a sense of calm.  Of peaceful rest.  That surrounds me loosely.  Not always overwhelming in its presence, but peaceful regardless.

Some day I'll transition out of the dessert.  I won't always feel broken.  And that's what keeps me going.