"The first heaven we experience is when we realize int he depths of our heart that we live under the eye of God. The question we must ask the heart is, 'Am I comfortable under the eye of God? Or is God getting too close?' We are strange and lovely creatures. We can ache for God tremendously yet find ourselves getting nervous if God gets too close. After all, the closer God gets, the more we hear the call to be divinized [sanctified?]. It is both exciting and frightening to hear that call. Being divinized is still part of the unknown even though it is our baptismal invitation. We prefer to keep the comfortable masks that we know rather than go through the purifying process of becoming like unto God."

- Macrina Wiederkehr in A Tree Full of Angels: seeing the holy in the ordinary

Macrina is a Benedictine monastic at St. Scholastica monastary in Fort Smith, Arkansas. (read more about her here)

I think that this same sensation occurs when entering into any kind of deeper relationship. This squirming feeling when someone is looking at only you. We are relational creatures and react in similar ways to similar stimuli.

squibnocket

these are some of my favorite cards ever. they sold them in the store Cool Stuff in columbia, mo. a couple years ago i bought lane walker foard's collection of postcards "my basic needs: food clothing shelter you" and it was awesome. but i think i lost it. the card above is a perfect (yet small fonted) example of how awesome his writing is.

here's another card that i own. i meant to send it to my friend nina years and years ago but couldn't let it go. or i couldn't write something inside that could possibly rival what was on the cover.

"of all the things i'm not very good at one is missing you. i mean, you know how a waterbed will undulate for a while after the other person gets up? that's sort of how i feel now that you've gone. so while you're off in your place being consequential, doing your thing, know that i am here pining for your return. and when you do, be warned. for you will be greeted with the kind of frantic, tearful, emotional zeal usually reserved for a daytime talk show's "reuniting siblings" episode."

how wonderful.

one other place to buy them: (here)

Sophia

"My older self, glancing back over simple chords and hazardous poetry, likes to think I’m older, wiser, more mature, more eloquent, more artful, more poignant, more contemporary. But that’s unfair. The concept has changed but the approach has always been the same: to become so completely entrenched in something that it becomes a great big clumsy mummy outfit wrapped around all arms and legs: a metaphysical form of suffocation. Sure, back then, I was young, naïve, unenlightened, untraveled, virtuous, good-natured, and always on time. But the world of youth was where I tried on new ideas, new outfits, new names, and new rhyme schemes—-a world where the banjo was my journal, where Sofia Coppola was my imaginary confidant, and where singing out of tune was perfectly OK!"

- "What's in a Name?" by Sufjan Stevens

sufjan

photo by mary (who got us tickets, yay!!!)

isn't he adorable and fratty? kinda like asher roth's broseph. so matt and i drove up 3.5 hours to champaign, IL, (way cute college town) to see sufjan and cryptacize on saturday. it was one of the best shows i've ever seen. very enjoyable. because there's no new album for this tour, it was the greatest hits ("transfiguration," "that dress looks nice on you," "chicago," others...) plus some new stuff. this is one of them, very pretty:

Majesty Snowbird - Sufjan Stevens

If It Kills Me - Jason Mraz

from the so you think you can dance tryouts - also courtesy of allie who found the song

this is almost too intimate to look at

from le love

ooooh girl...