Simone Weil Said "absolutely Unmixed attention is prayer." To Pay Absolute Attention To The Injustice

Hands

What are God's hands like?

I imagine He could hold all the earth's oceans in his cupped hand.  I imagine His fist could blot out the sun.  I imagine that the whorls and ridges of His thumb could be all the world's mountains and valleys.  I imagine the rings of his fingerprints could be the age rings of trees.  I imagine His fingernail could be the moon. 

I think that those are the hands that affixed the stars in the vast expanse of the night sky.  I think those are the hands that designed the structures of space.  The hands that penned the story of time.  The hands that composed the melody of the universe. The hands that directed the dance of the planets.  The hands that plucked the strings of life itself, its chords awakening the earth.  The hands that can stop the spinning of the globe on its axis. The hands that sculpted my face.  The hands that formed my bones. The hands that knit the fibers of my DNA together.  

What do such powerful and tender hands look like?

God's hands have a pale, circular scar in the center of each palm. They're a reminder of the nails that held Him to the cross. Those scars are remnants of the torture He endured, inflicted by the people He came to save. Those scars represent the despair and desperation of Jesus when God the father turned His back on His son. The blemishes on His palm are not imperfections; they're symbolic of His perfect sacrifice. They are tokens of the blood price He paid for our freedom. The scars testify to His victory over the grave. They proclaim that Jesus Christ is Lord of Life and Death! 

Also, upon close inspection, one might notice that the intricate network of lines on His hands are note creases like on our hands, but strings of very tiny letters. His entire hands are covered in minute writing. If you could read it, you would discover that it's an overwhelmingly long list of names, inscribed indelibly on God's hands. God has written your name, and my name, and the name of every single one of His children on His hands. He will never forget us because we are eternally inked on His palm.  

Therefore, God's hands are the ultimate expression of His character. They are literally covered in the evidence of His infinite love for us, and marked with proof of His unconditional grace. 

When you kneel to pray, and fold your own hands in front of you, stop to envision your Creator's hands, emblazoned with love and grace. 

I think they must be the most beautiful hands in the world. 

Dress Codes and Modesty Culture: It’s more complicated than a few well-placed buzz words.

All across North America, from Labrador City, Newfoundland, to West Jordon, Utah, students are protesting dress codes which they deem sexist and inappropriate. There are many people camped out on the other side of the line professing that it is actually an issue of self-respect. 

Sexist? Yeah, probably. 

On the one hand, it is true that the length and width of boys’ clothes are not policed as strictly as girls’ and that the reason girls’ clothes are being policed is because they are told that the sight of their exposed skin will be “distracting” to the boys in their classes. Both of these facts support the platform that the entire dress code system was essentially created for males’ benefit, which opens up a number of other issues. For example, doesn’t this kind of system propagate the idea that women’s bodies are men’s property? If men are telling us what we can and cannot wear in order to keep them...docile....we can’t help but hear the message that our bodies exist only to please them, and what we want to wear doesn’t matter, because it’s not about us. It’s not about the way we want to express ourselves or our comfort level, it’s about keeping everybody flaccid. Right? Wait...

But what about self respect?

On the other hand, everybody wants affirmation. And depending on how much you value your own opinion of yourself, and what that opinion is, your threshold for affirmation will be lower or higher. If you have a high threshold for affirmation, you will value affirmation which is “expensive” to obtain: praise for your hard work, or someone’s appreciative insights about your soul. If you have a low threshold for affirmation, you will seek affirmation which can be more cheaply won. And the attention you get for your body is cheap: easy to obtain, freely given, and next to worthless in terms of earning respect. And we all know how to get that kind of affirmation. And for some people, that might be the reason you like showing a bit more skin. If you’re one of those people, I just want to tell you that your own opinion of yourself is the most important one, and I hope that you see yourself for who you are: smart, powerful, beautiful and above all, worthy of respect. If well-meaning modesty pushers feel the same way I do about cheap attention, I can see why they would encourage young girls to cover up, and to seek only more valuable forms of affirmation. 

Wait, THAT’s your definition of self respect?

The problem here is that I’ve read phrases like “your body is a priceless treasure, waiting to be found by the right person, and dress codes only suggest that you keep it in the chest until then.” OKAY. Once again, metaphorically referring to a girl’s body as a treasure is another form of objectification. It is literally directly comparing someone’s corporeal form to a box full of rocks and metal. Our bodies are not something that anybody can possess. It’s a physical manifestation of ourselves, it’s the vessel with which we navigate this natural world. AND THEN. It says “waiting to be found by the right person.” Okay so, not only are our bodies somebody’s possession, it’s not even ours? We are not the ones who get to take ownership of the treasure WHICH WE INHABIT? We are waiting for someone to come along and possess our bodies? What? 

It’s. Just. Not. That. Simple.

What I would like to say to both anti-dress-coders and pro-dress-coders is this: It’s just not that simple. 

It’s not enough to simply say that it is sexist to police girls’ clothes and not boys’. 

It’s not enough to simply say that it’s not about sexism, it’s about self-respect. 

And here’s why:

I will use myself as an example to explain why. I am a fiercely independent, wickedly stubborn, feminist hippie free spirit. In my personal life, I will wear tank tops and shorts and skirts as I see fit, not as any male tells me makes him comfortable. HOWEVER, I do so with this knowledge:

Biology is a thing. Psychology is a thing. Culture is a thing. It has been scientifically proven (I’m sorry, it really really has.) that individuals born with a penis and high levels of testosterone respond with arousal moreso to visual stimuli, which individuals born with vaginas and high levels of estrogen respond with arousal moreso to everything else (auditory, olfactory, touch, and emotional stimuli). Furthermore, as taught to us in most introductory University Psych courses, people can be conditioned to have a specific biological response to a specific neutral stimulus if that stimulus is always followed by a stimulus which is biologically pertinent. The dogs hear the bell then they get fed. Result: the dogs salivate when they hear the bell. Men see breasts then they have an orgasm. Result: men become aroused when they see breasts. AND WE LIVE IN A CULTURE THAT HAS DEVELOPED IN SUCH A WAY TO PORTRAY THE NUDE FEMALE FORM IN MEDIA AND ADVERTISING ONLY IN HIGHLY SEXUAL CONTEXTS WHICH CREATES AN INEXTRICABLE CONNECTION BETWEEN FEMALE NUDITY AND SEX IN OUR BRAINS THAT HAS BECOME SO DEEPLY ENTRENCHED THAT WE THINK IT’S BIOLOGICALLY HARDWIRED FOR MEN TO BE AROUSED BY BREASTS. 

So I make clothing choices with the full knowledge that I cannot stop men from looking at me. And that depending on the man and his personal preferences, there is a good possibility that my cleavage could cause some increased bloodflow. It’s up to me to decide whether I want that to happen, whether I don’t want it to happen, or whether I simply don’t care. But I am always aware, as I get dressed in the morning, that I do live in a world wherein someone could call my cleavage “distracting”.

Oversimplification ignores the real issues. 

And here’s the issue: people who protest dress codes want to pretend that we don’t live in that world, and people who promote dress codes want to pretend that the fact that we live in that world is not a problem. 

The dress codes are just the tip of the iceberg. I understand that women want to wear what they want, and do what they want, and sleep with whom they want. Part of the current liberal feminism is sexual liberation. However, the dress code is a prominent example of modesty culture. Modesty culture suggests that girls have the responsibility to prevent men from being aroused by them. This is less severe instance of victim blaming, which originates in rape culture. Rape culture suggests that girls have the responsibility to prevent men from raping them. In both of these situations, the blame is sadly misplaced. Rape Culture and victim blaming exist because we live in a Misogynist society. The means that we live in a society that discriminates against women, belittles women, objectifies women, and violates women. It’s all well and good to say that women should be allowed to do, say and wear what we want, but the fact is that we live in a society where that is unsafe for us sometimes. 

So the moral of the story: If you protest dress codes, you need to realize that the dress code is not the problem. It is a symptom of a systemic illness of society, and like a fever, this symptom might actually be manifesting itself to protect you. And if you promote dress codes, you need to realize that the fact that we even need dress codes is indicative of a much bigger problem in our society. My advice to both of you is that you’re fighting on the same side and you don’t even realize it. Instead of fighting for or against dress codes, let’s all focus on unlearning harmful philosophies and behaviours to create a safer environment for women, and then dress codes wouldn’t even be that much of an issue. 

This is a really super cool project to make awesome leggings and make the world a better place! Totally worth supporting!

New Year's Reflections

At the beginning of 2015, I was broken. Broken like something that didn’t work right. Something had gone wrong in my brain and I was glitching. I had just come out of the worse year of my life, and January 2015 followed possibly the most serious emotional/psychological crisis of my young life. I wasn’t me. My self esteem was virtually nonexistent, replaced by omnipresent self loathing. All of my relationships were in shambles, corroded by incessant deceit and self sabotage. I honestly wasn’t sure how I was even still in school based on my grades. And I had strayed so far from the moral path I wanted to be on that I didn’t even recognize myself. I was broken. My life had become nothing but a toxic cycle of lies, guilt, tears, denial, avoidance, and self destructive habits*.

 And 2015 was the year that God fixed me. I am in awe of His care for me. He had orchestrated the perfect cure for the bugs in my system, because He knows what is good for His children. He reminded me of who I am. Summer 2015 was basically like a hard reset for me. Like when your laptop freezes so you hold the power button until it restarts. That’s what God did to me this summer. He sent me to Africa where I felt more alive and more myself than anywhere else ever before. He reminded me of the purpose He placed inside me and the plan He has for my life. Then He sent me to camp where I met girls who not only understood the regrets and struggles in my past, but could relate and sympathize, and they accepted and loved me unconditionally. I learned that I’m damaged, and I’m not perfect, and I glitch sometimes, but I’m still capable and usable and worthy of love. It’s amazing to feel God’s grace in the realest form I’ve ever felt it. The grace that makes me beautiful despite my flaws. The grace that makes me usable despite my weaknesses. The grace that justifies me. The grace that makes me worthy despite my wretched unworthiness. The grace that is so much greater than my perception of my imperfection. The grace that showed me that I can’t shrink myself into something that God cannot love because His irrevocable love transforms me into something greater than human measures. 

 2015 was a good year, by the grace of God. 

 *for the record, my self destructive habits weren't substance abuse or self harm. They were just skipping school and sucking dick. harmful but not quite as bad.

Do not say to me "it's all about the fetus" with that bitterness in your tone!

Abortion is not about who we like more - the mother or the fetus! This is an issue of quality of life vs. sanctity of life. And as I've said before, no one can prove at what point between conception and birth that clump of cells becomes a human. But we all agree that once it pops out of the birth canal, it is a person, and THEN it's wrong to kill it. So here's my big issue. For me, sanctity of life ALWAYS trumps quality of life. I'm not going to justify killing an unborn person just for the comfort of someone who's ALREADY been born. IF (that's a big IF) one believes that a fetus is a person, then an abortion is a murder for the sake of sparing someone inconvenience. I know I know I know there are so many reasons why someone might get an abortion. What you're saying there is that in some circumstances the fetus is not a person. Unless you don't believe a fetus is ever a person, then whatever. But you have to take a stance. If you think abortion is only justified in some circumstances, then you have some gaps in your understanding of personhood. Because you're basically saying there that only when the mother decides she wants the baby does the baby indeed become human. I'm not asking you to agree with me. I am asking you to really think about why you believe what you believe. Don't say "it's all about he fetus" as if we were choosing the fetus over the mother because if you say that to me, I will respond "yes! In this instance, it is about the fetus for me because the fetus is the one who might die!" Think about what you say. Think about what you think. This is a brutally complicated topic and we all run the risk of oversimplifying it sometimes, which is exactly what the titular statement does.

Short Story: Beauty is a Beast

            You know that moment when you step off the schoolbus in the afternoon, or when you shut your bedroom door behind you, or lie in bed at night, and just breathe deeply, finally completely alone. You know the person you are in that moment? That’s the real you, with all your true hopes and dreams and values. Nobody can watch you or judge you, or tell you what to do or who to be. People should be that person more often.

        I see it a lot. People are always totally themselves around me. I’m your corner store cashier. I’m like a part of the wallpaper. Because honestly, what effect do I have on the rest of your life outside this miniscule window of time for your trip to buy chocolate or scotch tape? It’s amazing the things I can learn about people as a cashier just by simple observation. I’ve worked here at my tiny corner-store-attached-to-a-pharmacy on the corner of my street for two years, and we sell everything from a turnip to tweezers. In two years of working 7-11 every day of the summer and 7-11 every Saturday and Sunday during the school year, I’ve gotten to know most of the people who live in our neighborhood, through routine visits and fragments of conversation here and there.

 For example, elderly Mrs. McAllister lives all alone at the top of the hill with her four cats, whose photos she carries in her purse. Boots is the black one with white paws, Snowball is all white, Mittens is yellow with a black triangle on his forehead and Tommy is orange striped. She buys a 2L of milk and a Big Turk chocolate bar every single Saturday morning between 7:00 and 7:30 without fail.

 I expect Mr. Watkins visit around 9 every second Sunday morning. He always buys Werther’s hard caramel candies, Purity cream crackers, a bottle of ginger ale, a loaf of bread and bologna. He carries two tiny school photos in his wallet of his grandchildren, Jeffrey who is in grade five this year, and Alyssa, who is in grade two. They love the caramel candies.

 Finally, there’s a tall, dirty blonde boy around my age who seems to live on Nestea and Peppermint Lifesavers. He visits my store faithfully every day at around 10 during the summer to get his fix and still comes back every Saturday and Sunday morning during the school year. I know that he likes the Red Hot Chili Peppers, that he plays basketball and that he goes to the school on the other side of the city even though he’s not zoned for it. Name? Not a clue. I call him Lifesavers-Guy in my head.

 I’m writing all this down because I want to tell you the story of a boy and girl. Well mostly a girl, but the boy is in it a little bit. The girl’s name is Purple-Monster-Girl. Or at least, that’s what I call her.

 She appeared on the scene around the end of June, right after I had finished grade 11. That day I was teasing 13-year-old Joshua about his first date that night as I put his comic book and Sour Patch Kids into a bag. He was beet-red, right to the tips of his ears and was probably all too happy to escape when my attention was diverted. The little bell above the door tinkled and I looked up to see who it was. My first impression was that she looked really...for lack of a better word, Normal. I wish I could say she looked Mysterious, or she was gorgeous but she looked sad, but she just looked perfectly normal. She was about 5’7’’, with dark brown hair falling in loose waves to her shoulder blades, looking like she had let it dry on its own. I will say she has a really pretty face, with nice skin. She was wearing knee-length cut-off shorts, a black tshirt with a colourful graphic on the front that matched her turquoise converse. She wasn’t stick-thin but she wasn’t chubby by any means. She was just...normal. She had two earbuds stuck in her ears.

 She picked up a bag of Doritos, a purple Monster energy drink and a pack of Stride Spearmint gum. When she brought it to the counter I pointed at her ear and said

 “What are you listening to?”

 She cocked her head and looked at me for a second, as if sizing me up, then she said

 “Nothing. People are just less likely to try and make conversation with me if I have them in.”

 Something told me I should have been at least a little bit offended by that, but I wasn’t at all. I just felt like I had passed some secret character test. She left the store and I was left shaking my head.

 “Weird chick.” I thought, and that was the last I thought of it, until she became a recurring presence. She came back every now and then for her purple Monster and  Stride Spearmint, though the junk food varied, sometimes chocolate, sometimes candy, sometimes chips.

 Around mid-July when I was selling popsicles and soft serves to droves of sticky, smiling children, she started coming in at 7 in workout clothes. She stopped buying junk food then too. It was around this same time that Purple-Monster-Girl met Lifesavers-Guy. She happened to come later that day, and both of them approached my counter with their usual purchases at the exact same time. Sometimes, replaying the scene in my head, it strikes me that it’s just like a movie. He stepped back like a gentleman and gestured for her to go ahead of him. She just looked up at him, right in his eyes and almost literally glowed at him, like, her smile looked like he was a child who had just said his first word. While I rang in her purple Monster and Stride Spearmint and she gave me the exact change without me asking her, Lifesavers-Guy asked her the pivotal question:

 “What are you listening to?”

 I looked at her quizzically. Would she be as honest with him as she was with me? She wasn’t. After a glance at me so fast it was almost imperceptible, she took one earbud out, smiled and lied. This is a perfect example of how people are themselves around me. She had no trouble admitting that she wasn’t really listening to music to the corner store cashier, but to this stranger, this boy, who might judge her, she had to lie.

 “Red Hot Chili Peppers.”

 And what a lucky lie. Lifesavers-Guy’s face lit up and they chatted eagerly all through his order, in which I had to tell him his total twice because he wasn’t paying attention the first time, and out the door. I could see them standing on the sidewalk outside the store. She laughed a lot and he smiled shyly, then they switched their phones and gave them back. I just grinned.

 As the days scorched and summer wore on, I sold a cool drink to every customer who walked in the store. August was giving us a beating this year. I stood behind my counter and watched harried fathers buying a box of cereal early in the morning, little old ladies buying tea bags and muffins, and people of all ages rushing in to pick up a card for various occasions and asking to borrow my pen. And I watched Purple-Monster-Girl and Lifesavers –Guy. Not in a creepy way, I mean when they came in the store. Sometimes, if he was alone, he bought Stride Spearmint or a purple Monster with his traditional order, or she bought Nestea or Lifesavers to accompany her drink and gum. Purple-Monster-Girl’s early morning workouts seemed to be working for her too, because the soft curves of June has transformed to taut, toned lines for August. As summer died with blazing red and orange sunsets, I saw them come in together sometimes holding hands. If one or both of them were in the store when Red Hot Chili Peppers came on the radio, I saw them smile like they shared some kind of secret. It obviously wasn’t such a huge secret if I was in on it, but nobody thinks of that.

 I guess they just felt special, as only new couples can. They were like a modern day Romeo and Juliet. Actually, scratch that. Let’s say they were like a modern day Beauty and the Beast. Not that either one of them was ugly and the other one was beautiful, I just think that story is infinitely more romantic than Shakespeare’s tragedy because it’s about seeing people for who they really are and looking past outward appearances. Anyway.

 The days grew shorter, the soft serve machine went into storage, and Purple-Monster-Girl, Lifesavers-Guy and I all went back to our respective schools for our last year. My time spent behind my corner-store counter was cut from seven days to two. But I still got visits from my favourite couple on the weekends. It was around the time that Crayola crayons and loose leaf were in big clearance bins at the front of the store, and big boxes of mini chocolate bars were on display that I saw Purple-Monster-Girl’s hair straightened for the very first time ever. She wasn’t wearing her workout clothes this Sunday. She was wearing shorts that were, in my humble opinion, too short. If not for the weather, at least for propriety. And she wore the same tshirt I had first seen her in. It hung on her differently now. It slipped right past her flat, toned stomach and didn’t even catch on her hips.

 And there was trouble in paradise for our neighborhood lovers. Or at least, that’s how I interpreted it. One chilly morning early November, I was organising a magazine rack and shaking my head at celebrities exploits when the two of them approached the store, seemingly in a heated discussion, judging from their faces through the glass. They stopped talking as soon as they entered the store. The tinny radio music couldn’t quite handle the oppressive silence, and only made it awkward when Red Hot Chili Peppers came on. I pretended to be totally absorbed in perfecting the magazine display, until they had paid for their items and left, still in silence.

 Chocolate Santas, chocolate Snowmen and chocolate Reindeer were flying off the shelves and we had our first snowfall. I smiled at all my customers and wished them a Merry Christmas as they left the store. The same five annoying Christmas songs played over and over the store speakers for a month straight, and everybody was jolly. And I watched tiny changes in Purple-Monster-Girl. Dark eyeliner rimming her eyes. A lower neckline than I’d ever seen her wear. Her hair was more often straight and more seldom wavy. She was still beautiful, but she packaged it more. She looked like beauty was no longer natural, but something she put on like a mask when she got up every morning. The day after school let out for Christmas vacation, they came in together, looking happy again. He kept his arm around her waist, not possessively, just kinda chillin there, like he was supporting her, or protecting her. And I saw the way he set his jaw.

 New Year’s Day the corner store was open. It closed only Christmas Day and two other forced holidays under the labor law. Anyway, I sold a lot of Advil, Tylenol, Coffee and Gatorade that morning. I didn’t try to make conversation with those customers, I just kind of smiled gently at them. One such girl laid a box of Advil on the counter with a purple Monster energy drink and a pack of Stride Spearmint gum. She didn’t really resemble the one who came in five months ago and told me there was nothing coming through her earbuds. Her whip straight hair had been highlighted with caramel streaks. That looked great to me. What didn’t look great was the tank top that looked two sizes too small and the painted-on jeans which revealed stick arms and legs and a waist so tiny it looked like it would fit between my finger and thumb. I stared at her for a few seconds in wonderment. There were dark circles under her eyes and her cheekbones had become very defined. I passed her her plastic bag of three items and wondered who she had kissed at midnight.

 It evidently wasn’t her boyfriend. No more did they enter the store together or buy each other’s items. Red Hot Chili Peppers on the radio elicited a stony face from him and...nothing from her, no recognition whatsoever. A week after we went back to school I watched Lifesavers-Guy stalk resolutely past the Monster cooler and refuse to let his gaze wander to the gum display next to the counter. I didn’t make any eye-contact with him as I rang in his Nestea and Lifesavers.

 The following month saw weather as cold and blustery as the night the enchantress sought refuge in the Prince’s castle. Business was slow. I sold contact solution, Benadryl, Root Beer and Reese’s Pieces. At home, I did homework and I started watching Beauty and the Beast again, to relive my childhood. I only saw the beginning before I fell asleep though. I saw the Beast shut himself up in his tower, ashamed at his own appearance, despising himself and repulse any human companionship. I felt bad for him. After all, who said he was ugly? Only society’s socially constructed ideas of “beauty” made him think that. It only took the right person to see the real him, and to see how beautiful he actually was. But I digress.

 Lifesavers-Guy came to the store less, probably because Purple-Monster-Girl still visited faithfully to get her energy drink and gum. She never put food with it, but I did get a few surprises. One morning I was just listening to 10-year-old Jess tell me about the latest Nancy Drew mystery she had read, in between mouthfuls of Skittles. Purple-Monster-Girl slipped in somewhere around the falling action. After Jess left, Purple-Monster-Girl placed her traditional energy drink and gum on the counter and then plopped down beside it a box of condoms. I said nothing, just looked at her. She wouldn’t meet my gaze. I rang through her order in what was supposed to be disapproving silence but I don’t know if she got the vibe. That was Saturday. The next morning I sold her more Advil.

 Three weeks later it was uncommonly crowded in my tiny store. Purple-Monster-Girl was coming in as Lifesavers-Guy was going out. Manoeuvering around her, he placed his hand ever so lightly in the small of her back, an unconscious, tender touch, but drew it back suddenly as though stung. A moment later she turned around to get her Monster from the cooler and I could see why. Her thin, tight shirt revealed every vertebrae in her back in sharp relief, clearly visible through flesh and fabric. I looked at her with sad eyes. She wasn’t the normal girl she was in June. Seven months had transformed her into an entirely different person, one who was quite evidently underweight. One who...was buying a pregnancy test. Heaven help us. I glanced quickly at her face, but her gaze was focussed somewhere past my left ear. I could only hope that I didn’t see her back here in nine months buying baby formula. After THAT experience, I examined all the labels on our condom boxes, and concluded that she should have bought the ultra-strong ones. They were 98.2% effective, which is a whole 1.2% more effective than the normal kind, but my faith in them was shattered forever.

 The next Saturday, everbody was buying boxes of Barbie valentines and candy hearts and Hershey kisses. But not Purple-Monster-Girl. I caught myself staring at her stomach, looking for a bump. I knew it was too soon, but I did it unconsciously anyway. She just looked as shrunken as ever to me. However, to my immense relief, this shopping trip featured a box of tampons. I actually had to restrain myself from sighing in relief.

 The ides of March rolled around and a lot of green was on sale everywhere. I saw garlands of four leaf clover and plastic cut-outs of leprechauns and the young and middle-aged elementary school teachers who bought them for their classrooms. And quite suddenly, Purple-Monster-Girl disappeared. Saturday morning when the bell tinkled I didn’t even look up, until I heard a much heavier footfall than what I was used to, and beheld a strange man in a suit buying Pepsi and a muffin. I waited and waited and waited. The end of my four-hour shift came and still no sign of her. Nobody made any utterance of where she was. They didn’t need to.

 Near the end of March, I served a woman whom I had never seen before. It wouldn’t be weird to me because I do that all the time, except for a striking resemblance to a girl who used to come in here all the time, and the fact that she was buying a purple Monster energy drink and a pack of Stride Spearmint gum. And did I mention this corner store JUST HAPPENED to be just over the hill to the hospital? The woman’s hair was disheveled and she bore unmistakable signs of fatigue in the shadows under her eyes and the droop of her shoulders. She spoke in hushed tones to the woman standing next to her, whom I assumed was her sister of friend. Completely unintentionally, I caught snippets of their conversation. “ ...still refusing to eat...heartrate dangerously low...better in time for prom...” As I handed her her receipt, I smiled at her and wished her a good day as sincerely as I could.

 That night, I tried to finish watching Beauty and the Beast but I only got as far as the dance in the ballroom and Belle wearing her beautiful yellow dress. I reflected that yellow doesn’t look good on many people. In the meantime, I knew the rose in the tower of the castle was wilting. Time was running out. This Beauty felt more like the Beast and I didn’t know if she would get to dance with her prince. This story of a girl and boy is shaping up more like a Shakespearian tale than a Disney movie after all.

 A couple weeks later, I looked up to see a tall, dirty-blonde boy enter the corner store. He didn’t pick up Nestea and Lifesavers this time. He went straight to the Monster cooler and picked out a purple one, then a pack of Stride Spearmint gum, then on the counter next to them he placed a greeting card. There was a cartoon Teddy bear on the front with a bandaid on his head and big bold letters above it: “Get Well Soon!” I wanted to say something, but what would I say?

 “I’m sorry your ex-girlfriend who dumped you because she’s sick and whom you’re obviously still in love with is in the hospital”

 Yeah, no, that’s a little creepy.

 I thought for a second, then threw caution to the winds and just said

 “How is she?”

 He looked up as though mildly surprised that I was speaking to him, and took a minute to process my question.

 “She’s doing better than she was.”

 I nodded. “That’s good.”

 Then he left.

 I remember clearly Saturday, April 28th Lifesavers-Guy came in my store again. He didn’t buy a single thing, just marched straight the counter and said

 “Can I show you something?”

 I was completely taken aback and slightly apprehensive. In the past, such a question had precipitated photos of cats in various attitudes of idleness, of school portraits of grandchildren, but I didn’t know what to expect from this teenager.

 “Sure.”

 He reached into his pocket and pulled out a photo. It was of a couple under an arch decorated with swaths of white tulle and flowers. He wore dress pants, dress shirt, vest and tie and she wore a beautiful yellow dress, a perfect fairy tale dress. I recognized the dark hair with caramel highlights and the smile I had seen the day they met – the same glowing smile like a child had said their first word. She still looked skinny but I could see signs of returning curves, like back in June when I described her as “Very Normal.”

 “That was at her prom last Saturday.” He said.

 I looked up at him. “She’s beautiful.”

 He smiled. “I know.”

 That night I went home and finally finished watching Beauty and the Beast.  As Belle and her Prince kissed at the end and fireworks went off, I reflected on how thankful I am that there are people in this world who know true beauty when they see it.

 You know that moment – when you step off the schoolbus in the afternoon, or when you shut your bedroom door behind you, or lie in bed at night, and just breathe deeply, finally completely alone – you know the person you are in that moment? That’s the real you, with all your true hopes and dreams and values. Nobody can watch you or judge you, or tell you what to do or who to be. You should be that person more often. Who cares what anybody thinks? Because I can promise you there is somebody out there who will love the true you. 

Aww thanks bb! :) 

Self Respect and Slut Shaming Another one of my rants, because you know I can’t resist giving my opinion on a sensitive topic. This one is on video! Yay! *Pixelated some stuff because I’m conservative **Song in the background is Revo by Walk Off The Earth

This is the guy who, ignoring the opinions of others, bee-lined toward those whom His culture had identified as sinful. Jesus modeled it for us and He told story after story to make sure we got the message. He desperately wanted us to know that His Father seeks the lost like a shepherd looking for His scrappy sheep. He searches for us like a woman who’s lost a precious coin. He welcomes the very worst sinners with the delight of a father whose son was dead but is now alive. Before He ever suggested, “Go and sin no more,” Jesus first welcomed and received unrepentant sinners.

How many? How much?

My friend is really smart. She also happens to have anorexia. She once said to me, “Anorexics aren’t supposed to be around numbers. The’re just tools humans use to destroy themselves.” As you can tell, the latter statement had a profound impact on me. That’s why I’m writing about it. Numbers define our lives. Our age, height, weight and BMI are measured in numbers. Our academic accomplishments and athletic accomplishments are measured in numbers. Our schedules revolve around the clock - also numbers. “How many calories?” “How many hours did it take?” “How many people were there?” “How much do you make?” “How many pages?” “How many words?” “How many points?” “How many goals? How many assists?” “How many years?” How many? How many? How many? I think that so often, we fall into the trap of thinking that these numbers that measure our bodies or measure the things that we do are also measuring us. And the problem with that is that once you start measuring, you find that you will never measure up. As soon as you put a numerical value on your identity you will find that there will always be someone who has a higher number, or lower number. Here’s the thing: you’re not a number. You’re thinking, “well obviously, Katherine.” But hear me out. You are not your weight. You are not your GPA. You are not the number of points you score or how much money you make. You’re a person. There is absolutely no conceivable way in the known universe, in the limitations of time as we know it, that numbers could logically be used to express a person. We can graph the curve of your face and we can create a function for the way you walk, but mathematically we will never capture you. You’re a person. You were created by God, in the image of God. As He is beautiful, so are you. As He is spirit, so are you. And you are His masterpiece. His piece de resistance. This all-powerful deity, who always was and always will be, who mapped the stars, who knitted the fabric of the universe, who choreographed the dance of the planets, who paints every single sunset, who filled the seas with fish and the skies with birds...He thinks that you are the best thing He made. [Talking about God gets me TURNT but I’ll leave the rest for another time.] He gave you a soul. Do you even know how exciting a soul is? A soul is intangible. It is infinite. It is the part of you that recognizes God’s face and it will last forever. It remembers the beginning of the world and it will see the end. It has the entire universe in it. It has ancient empires in it. It has lost civilizations in it. It has dead languages in it. It has unborn languages in it. It has novels in it. It has symphonies in it. Let me edit that last paragraph: You are intangible. You are infinite. You recognize God’s face and you will last forever. You remember the beginning of the world and you will see the end. You have the entire universe in you. You have ancient empires in you. You have lost civilizations in you. You have dead languages in you. You have unborn languages in you. You have novels in you. You have symphonies in you. Do you honestly believe that a being so majestic, so beautiful, so wonderful, can be MEASURED? The answer is absolutely not. You are immeasurable. There’s no scale or standard or system by which you can be counted. You are invaluable. Your worth is far beyond measure. Therefore, there are only two numbers you can use to describe yourself: 1. That’s how many of you there are. You are unique. You are one of a kind. You can’t be compared to others because you’re in your own category. ∞ ← That’s the infinity symbol. Admittedly, infinity, by its nature, is not a number. It’s mathematical concept. And that’s how valuable you are. This reminder has been brought to you by your friendly neighborhood Katherine. Love y’all! Peace and love! -Katherine