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[barrenjars]

4.9

I'm so sorry mom and dad. I'm sorry that I can't be whoever you were hoping your daughter would one day grow up to be. I am trying so hard and I know I am failing. I’m sorry I’m not stable enough, responsible enough, serious enough, cautious enough, reformed enough, obedient enough. I wish I was. 

I’m sorry I was born. I don’t see a point in pursuing a psychiatrist, another therapist, an IOP.....I’m loosing faith and interest in healing myself. I keep trying to want to stay, to be kind to myself, for the sake of my friends, or my church, or for Ross, but I just don’t want to be here. Everything feels like a tunnel closing in on itself. I can’t see a way out anymore. I once had hope, and maybe I will wake up and see it again, but I don’t know what to trust anymore. 

I don’t know who to trust anymore.

You tell me you love me and I wish I could believe that. I think you did at one point, I don’t know if you still do.

You tell me you’re always there to listen, and I just hear the words of Dean and JoeGo and a bunch of other authority figures who I can’t trust anymore. 

[barrenjars]

I am broken,

I do not want healing,

I do not want the sovereignty of God,

I do not want to be here.

[barrenjars]

This week, I feel sorrow too heavy for words, 

I tell my childhood Nisei friend that the majority of victims have been female,

She says: we should have been smarter, better prepared to fend off attacks; 

We must prevail, not let this weigh us down.

I weep, and strive to understand.

[barrenjars]

3/9/21

things i am feeling whilst high

bluurrrrrrry vision and movements and computer mouse

sit down and stand up are great

funny need to burp, throat feeling

eating is louder than talking

ears feel full and great

munchie

ears feel great

what is time

things I am doing whilst high

my glossier paper

[barrenjars]

9/29/19

McDuffee words

-Is reverence what happens to the hairs on my arm, listening to a song?

-Steal a little, they call you thief; steal a lot, they call you king.

-Live life to show how beautiful Jesus is.

-Everything groans, waiting.

Everything is unto the moment of our adoption.

If you are not immersed in the word of God, you will not feel the earth tremble beneath your feet in anticipation!

-Everything exists in order to demonstrate that He, and He alone, is good.

-The only thing that stops us from leaving this world is the compunction to live this life.

-We live a life of madness, because we believe the gospel.

Coptic bishop to the Islamic State, after a shooting: we thank you. We live every day on our journey to be one with the Lord, and on this day you made the journey for some quicker.

-On Prayer: it is not what we know, but what we do not know, that we should pray most over.

-On Identity: you are not any “I” unless you are first someone’s ‘You’. We are His, regardless of tradition. Confession of the one true God is preserved, and the gospel is carried intact within the community.

-Everything, even that which torments and tempts, yearns to glorify God—for it is all created.

-Quoting Lana Del Rey: “I’ve got a war in my mind”…(and this is how we trust Jesus)

-We wake up saints, and enter into the day servants.

-On the past: To what should I remain loyal to from the past, and to what should I uproot that I have received from my father and mother?

-Evangelicals are gadflies of grace—we aren’t in charge of anything! We are the loincloth blowing in the wind.

-Oh Saint! Everything is a summons…

-The Last Fight: repent your sin, resist evil, remember baptism!

-We are all limping home. This reminds us that we are one anothers’.

-I don’t want to listen to my inner voice—I want to talk to it!

-History is the art of learning how to live out the life God has given us. Not one damn fact after another. History is the ongoing creation of new streams of speech.

-We think too much as lawyers and as politicians, not as poets. We are shoddy as Christians, we are not creatively exercising our gifts.

-If we could smell the stench of death instead of the cologne of consumerism, we could not take another breath of this culture.

-On what he looks forward to the most about eternity: I can’t wait to hear Jesus sing. And in all eternity, we will never hear him repeat himself.

-Lord, let me live the faith of Rahab the harlot and not die the death of Ahab the king.

-Everything is a jumbled soup yearning to be straightened out because the purpose of speech is to bring glory to God.

-Live the gospel, saints; and live to give it to others.

-Do not be deceived—sparrows are thieves and they travel in packs.

[barrenjars]

6/19/18

All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23)

The hatred which divides nation from nation, race from race, class from class,

Father, forgive.

The covetous desires of people and nations to possess what is not their own,

Father, forgive.

The greed which exploits the work of human hands and lays waste the earth,

Father, forgive.

Our envy of the welfare and happiness of others,

Father, forgive.

Our indifference to the plight of the imprisoned, the homeless, the refugee,

Father, forgive.

The lust which dishonors the bodies of men, women, and children,

Father, forgive.

The pride which leads us to trust in ourselves and not in God,

Father, forgive.

Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you. (Ephesians 4:32).

Dachau, Bavaria, Germany

[barrenjars]

Real Women I want to be like

Tavi Gevinson 

Janelle Monae

Beyonce

Malala Yousafzai

Sarah Shin

Emily Weiss 

AOC

Amanda Gorman

Amal Clooney 

Jackie Hill Perry

Mary Surridge

Yara Shahidi

Friends:

Lauren Tscheu 

Brielle Lisa

Elena Trueba

Tabitha McDuffee

Rachel Becker

Here’s the thing; I don’t feel like I’m in a place where I can afford to idolize fictional strong female characters. I need them to be real, more than ever. 

[barrenjars]

3/9/21

high and waiting for lizzy to finish her phone call so I can go to sleeeeeeeep 

[barrenjars]

1/5/21

black day.

[barrenjars]

the last monday.

You have done hard things before, and today is no different. You’ll get through it. you’ll muster the courage. This is the last monday, and then the last tuesday, and then the last wednesday, and then you’re done.

[barrenjars]

I think a large part of me is scared.

I’m scared that the next girl will bear what I did, and call it love. I’m scared that she’ll have another toxic relationship to add to her past, and I’m scared she’ll come out wounded and traumatized like I did. Or worse, still loving him, still wanting to marry him, not realizing the unhealthy signs that are so obvious.

He could change. I want to believe that is possible. But I am just so scared that he hasn’t, that he doesn’t know he hasn’t, and I don’t want anyone to go through what I did. It’s making me stalk all of Lizzy’s friends on instagram and facebook to make sure they’re not connected with him. It’s making me crazy.

[barrenjars]

a very long thought

Dear Ross, It's been a while since I've sent you an email. Life has been moving fast this week. In my impatience to leave NM, the days can't pass swiftly enough, but on the other side of things it's become increasingly difficult to savor well the season of advent. Much like lent, I am finding this season is revealing of my ineptitude at grasping and practicing regular observance; and simultaneously, there is this begrudging realization that this season still bears a great capacity for grace towards others and ourselves. I had a wonderful call with a former NM colleague of mine, who left NM several months ago in a rather dramatic way, and has served as an invaluable sounding board as I process the systemic misogyny, racism, and ethical dilemmas that NM is fraught with. I am coming to see that: the type of woman who lasts the longest at a firm like this is submissive, a follower, steady and reliable, patient, and a professional who doesn't have idealistic career aspirations. I don't fit, and I never did, and that's more than okay.  I've noticed that my voice has become quieter in this last year and a half, I've stopped speaking up and interrupting as much, I've been more hesitant to take initiative on projects because I know they'll get assigned entirely to me if I show the least amount of interest, I've begun to automatically defer to the men in the room, to adopt a submissive posture. It's taken my involvement with the endowment project and the leadership cohorts to realize that I've been cloaking my true self in favor of a more palatable, amiable version of my working self. It's what I did at moody to survive, and what I felt I had to do in this space in order to not be labeled as an emotional or immature millennial.  With these realizations have come bitterness, that I've become complacent in letting myself stagnate in my professional development in these ways. But then I am reminded that no work experience is wasted, and that I've learned so many things of what not to do when I finally achieve a management position, or end up in a hiring role, or lead a team. So in that sense, my education here at NM has been constructively helpful. Even as I have limited myself, I've also grown in my understanding of how corporate systems work, and how my ethical framework ought impact the spaces I exist in.  I deeply respect the co-workers who comprise my team, who have been supportive and encouraging and who have trained me from the ground up. But I also know that my existing in this space long-term was never going to be worth it. Justifying my staying by highlighting my role on the team as needful was just a construct to make getting through the week a little easier. But no job is worth a psychiatrist, four anxiety and anti-depression medications, aggravated PTSD, and the suicidal hole I existed in for most of this year. It took a long time to realize this.  I know that at one point, somewhere on the future trajectory, there exists a reality where work will be fulfilling and good, as I believe God has created work to be. And I am daring to hope in that direction.  The last two years have been a halting lament of losing parts of myself along the way, but I'm coming to realize those parts were never really who I was, they were just facades I created to fit the environment I was in. Assimilation is deadly and subtle, and I wrestle with the reality that this is most often my default posture.  _ I've begun mentoring a girl at her request, did I tell you that? She's from Moody, and is currently in an intensive agricultural internship in Florida learning how to sustainably grow food with hopes of teaching students in CPS as a community organizer when she returns back to Chicago. Anyway, it's been a good exercise in deconstructing the stays of purity culture with her and identifying casual gnosticism and discussing a more holistic theology of body which contains a framework of how we ought consider the purpose of our beauty. The whole relationship dynamic has been challenging in the best way and I feel unqualified and incredibly blessed.  One of my former roommates used to ask often, what is the purpose of beauty for the single person? And I always felt that question was inherently flawed, because I don't think whatever purpose of beauty exists or stewardship thereof then changes functionally when the individual becomes married. I want to hear your thoughts on this. You know I obviously have a very complicated relationship with beauty, and I tend to reject more easily its influence on self-image than make myself wrestle with the implications of if it were to hold a role.  _  There is a good chance that Fancy the Sqrl will become a book, though I have no idea what the premise would be. Emily is out of town again so we roasted a bunch of fish and vegetables last night and it was delightful, and today we're making poppyseed chicken with gluten free breadcrumb topping. Our friend Rachel Naffziger from moody will be staying with us this week, so you may see her on Thursday and Saturday. Lizzy bought a new velvet chair for our living room, and it is velvet, and solidifies everyone's opinion that we can absolutely take NO MORE FURNITURE in this tiny apartment, but the chair is loved by all and I'm really enjoying lounging on it upside down.  Right now, the goal is to army crawl my way to Friday, and gain a few days of reprieve before launching into another grueling week of training next week. That sounds dramatic, because it is.  I am going to go buy my brother a japanese kitchen knife for Christmas now. I hope your Wednesday is going swimmingly.  Yrs, S

[barrenjars]

20: You won't marry the first person you fall in love with. 21: Things that are a big deal to you probably aren't to other people. 22: You are not going to be an actor. 23: You were a privileged kid. 24: You can take pride in your heritage. 25: You are a leader. 26: Even when life stays black for a really long time, it's still worth staying. 

[barrenjars]

Ashish, Maelyn, Junethea

the names of my future children

[barrenjars]

10.30.20

A lot has happened this week. Saturday, I was sitting in my room listening to the membership class and a realization popped into my head...that I had not treated Ross fairly in our relationship the last time we dated. So I talked it out with Lizzy. On Sunday, we had a call, and I explained that I tentatively wanted to move forward with things. We set a date for wednesday. Monday I was working from home, and submitting an application to be an Art Teacher at an organization out in Oak Park (I haven't heard back yet). Monday night I pulled an all nighter and took my accounting midterm, which I failed (but thankfully the midterm grades are being curved so I may not actually have an F after all.) Tuesday was the most productive day I've had in months, despite being so internally tired. Wednesday I went into work, and Varma sent me the most beautiful email about whiteness, and then he texted Ross and called him M'Boy. And then we went on the date. And it was good. We talked through all the hard things, the tensions, the insecurities, the vices, all of it. I had a stomach ache and did not eat much food, but that's okay. On thursday I went shopping at block 37 to say goodbye to all my favorite stores before they close friday night, and on friday I got a giant watercolor pad of paper to work on during inside stuck at home times.  It's weird talking to Ross every day now. It's weird to think that we could get together again. I'm fixated on what the wedding will be like, which is jumping far, far, ahead with no good reason. I just want to be married, and for the first time in my life I feel confident to say that out loud and unabashedly.  There are still a lot of uncertainties right now. Where will I get a job? Will I have to work from home this winter (I pray not)? Will I be able to quit my job and do school at home and in class in the spring? Will Ross and I work out? Will Varma invite us over to his house? Will I ever get into a job that I enjoy, that I feel needed in?  There are questions I ask of God. Will you keep depression at bay for once this winter? How am I supposed to read the bible again? What is my life's purpose? Being reflective for a whole half hour is a bit tricky because I am running out of observations. Okay, check-in time. I feel energetic, antsy, ready to get out of the office and go home already so I can cook dinner and clean the house. 

[barrenjars]

10.24.20

In these last ten days, even more has happened. I didn’t get the HR or non profit jobs. I am applying to be an art teacher. Reimi bought me a snuggie. She also left for California. Liz is still helping me with accounting homework. I don’t feel great about the midterm. I am taking the membership class at Bridgeport Cornerstone. Joy gets married this week!!! I realized during the membership class that I haven’t been fair with Ross. I called him tonight to apologize, and to see if there’s potential to move forward. There is. We’re going on a date on wednesday. I’m pretty excited. 

[barrenjars]

10.14.20

So much has happened. Hannah, then Emily, and now Lizzy all have COVID. Reimi and I are doing all the cooking and cleaning and trying to stay well. My birthday came and went, and so did two moody job interviews. The third is today and on friday I interview with Pursue Scholars. We shall see.