Being a human being is hard sometimes. Don’t get me wrong, I love being human and I would much rather be a human that, say, an armadillo. But along with out humanity, we get about a billions different thoughts and emotions and perspectives that can change every second. It’s hard to know how to think about some things, and then you throw being female and emotions into the mix and forget about it. I will never apologize for being a human or acting and feeling as a human does. But there are just some times when your heart and your mind and your hormones are all flooding you with things and it is hard to decide what to do.

Something that is troubling me right now is disagreement. How can you disagree with somebody (or something) you have a HUGE, tremendous amount of respect for? I don’t mean a little, inconsequential disagreement, like he loves Queen the best and I am a Stones gal. I am talking about somebody else having opinions and doing things that affect your life in a major way that you just do not agree with. It’s hard, because it’s not just a mental differing of opinions. You get feelings and hopes tied to these things, and before you know it, a simple matter of not agreeing with somebody ends up with you (or somebody you love) getting hurt. What started out simple suddenly becomes complicated.

I hope you can relate to this. I sometimes find myself being very self-centered. I want everything to work for me. And it’s these times that I have to remind myself that it is not all about me. That sometimes, people in charge need to do what is best for the most amount of people, even if it hurts a few. It is something I struggle with, and pray about everyday, and I feel that I have come so far in that respect. Therefore, sometime I hold my opinions and feelings in. I see that what is happening may be good for some people, even if it isn’t for me. So I keep it to myself and bottle it up and hope it passes. I will never be one to blow up or get furious or go nuts. That’s not how I am. But inside, I still disagree and it ends up tearing me up. Especially if the person I disagree with is somebody I love or respect or secretly hope to be like one day.

So how is it done? How do you disagree with somebody, and still get along with them or even grow closer to them? How do you walk up to somebody you admire and say, “Hey, I respect you, and I am not asking you to change your mind at all, but I want you to know I disagree with you, and here is why…”? I don’t know. It is something I am struggling with. It has been put on my heart a lot this week. I am glad for it though. Somehow, I get the feeling that this is something that will come up a lot in life, so the sooner I figure out how to handle it gracefully and Godly, the better off I will be.

This is my family group. A few of my millions of readers may have no idea what a family group is. They are some people I meet with every Wednesday night to do Jesus studies, talk about church, pray with, eat with, and just bond with. Which may sound lame. But it’s not.

When I first joined a family group, I honestly did it to make friends. I don’t know if you know this about me or not, but I don’t really bond with people very well. It is much easier for me to find faults in them and avoid them than it is for me to just open myself up to them. So I joined a family group, and then a month or so later, the group sort of broke up, just because it was time. So we went to an event and formed another one, and now here we are. We were a group of people who sort of knew each other. Now, I consider these people to be some of my best friends. They are the second call I make something good or bad happens (the first is my husband or mother). These people ave prayed for me and with me. They have seen me laugh until I wet myself and they have seen me cry. Seriously, they know my secrets, which is incredibly scary and incredibly liberating at the same time. I want to tell you a little bit about them.

Emma is my friend. She is strong, and witty, and funny, and independent, and stubborn, and loud, and wonderful, and caring, and a host of other things I could never list. Some people may think she is scary or mean (I used to), but they would be mistaken, because she is absolutely fabulous. I think my favorite thing about her is how she can admit that she is not perfect and she has flaws, which is amazing, because I though I was the only one. She completely opens herself up, which has caused her a lot of hurt in the past, but that has never stopped her. She is great and a wonderful leader.

Scottie is Emma’s husband. The first thing most people would probably tell you about Scottie is how hilarious he is, but I will save that for later. Scottie is truly the most devoted Christ-follower I have ever met. And he shows it. He is kind, humble, honest, intelligent, and devoted to his God and his family. He is also hilarious. It’s hard not to laugh when you are around him. I couldn’t have hand picked a better leader for our family group.

Ginny is not somebody you could ever describe. She is one of those “you have to see it to believe it” kind of people. She is incredibly beautiful, and she just brightens up a room, just by walking in. This girl could do anything, she can sing, dance, cook, everything. The first time I et her, she walked into a room full of 4 people she had never met before, and started to give us advice on how to clean our house using old socks. It was awesome. She is so full of grace and spirit. I have asked her for advice many time, and she always listens with an open heart. She is truly somebody I admire.

Eric is married to Ginny. He is so hard to describe. He is sort of like a stone that sits there, and you think it is a stone, but then the sun shines on it, and it sparkles. Which sounds ridiculous, but that’s how he is. He seems quiet at first, and he can just sit there forever and not say a thing, but then he speaks, and it’s always something hilarious or brilliant that comes out of his mouth. I sort of wish I could pull that off instead of being a general loud mouth all the time, but alas, I can’t.

So this is what a family group is. We started out as a bunch of people who sort of knew each other from church, and now they are friends I hope to keep forever. We even took them on vacation with us to Georgia for the 4th of July. Hopefully, we will be getting some more people soon, and our relationships can grow even more. If you asked me why you should go to church and I could give you only one reason, it would be so that you could meet people like these.

The only true currency in this bankrupt world… is what you share with someone else when you’re uncool. -Lester Bangs

Let’s talk about my favorite movie of all time.

For years and years, when people asked me what my favorite movie was, I had no idea what to answer. I love movies, I am all about movies. I have been ever since I was a kid. I will watch just about anything. So naturally, when asked that question, I would tell whoever that there were “way too many to pick just one”. As I got older, my answer to that question would depend on the people I was with. If I was with cool kids, it would be whatever Will Ferrell movie was out at the time. If I was with arty people, it would be whatever terrible, controversial, foreign film was out at the time. You now how it goes. It is very strange how your choice in movies can define you.

When I realized that little fact above, I started thinking twice about my choice for favorite movie. If my choice defines me, don’t I want a trendy, awful movie telling people who I am. So one night, during my sophomore year of college, I sat down and really thought about it. What movie really says something to me? What movie means something to me? And it didn’t take long to settle on Almost Famous.

Almost Famous is pretty much a loose autobiography written and directed by Cameron Crowe. It’s about a 15 year old nerdy kid who grew up in an oppressive, single parent household. He is a writer, who loves rock and roll. After incessantly submitting his stories to various magazines (something I have actually done), he ends up getting hired by Rolling Stone to follow a band called Stillwater and write an article about them. He becomes friend with the band and the groupies (“We are NOT groupies! WE are Band-Aids”), one in particular named Penny Lane. Long story short, he grows up and learns a bunch of stuff. I can’t really accurately describe the wonderful nature of this movie on my lame blog. Go watch it.

This movie changed me. After watching it, it sort of changed my outlook on things. This nerdy kid grew up to be CAMERON CROWE! If he could do it, what is stopping me? I wanted to go on adventures with rock stars and write for Rolling Stone! It kind of inspired me to dream big, to break out of my small town mode, where everybody had these simple expectations of me. It made me want to do BIG things. Not really tour with rock bands and do drugs and sleep with groupies, because that is not really me, but to do something truly awesome. And even though right now I am a lame low-life and a temp. job that I hate, I still believe that maybe I could still do something great.

Have any movies ever inspired you guys?

So I am sitting here, watching the news and weather stations and whatnot. And according to the television, my house is getting pelted with rain. Except it’s not. Yes, it’s true. We have not had any rain all day long. I mean, it sort of sucks that everything had to close all day and I am sure plenty of businesses lost some money and stuff, but it was sort of nice to just have a day off. I got to stay home with my husband all day. I stayed in pajamas and caught up on cleaning and ate canned food and drank bottled water. We reveled in the electricity we still had (but not too much, because electricity is VERY expensive), I scoured the internet for a new job (not much luck, any of you wanna hire me?), and played with my dog, and watched a disturbing movie. Kyle got to sleep in, take an afternoon nap, and play Halo with Mike and Jamison. Sometimes, it is fantastic to just have an unexpected day to do nothing at all. I just hope that all the people who stocked up and panicked for this one don’t underestimate the next one, you know?

What did you guys do?

That up there stands for “Music I grew up with that taught me stuff about life”. Everybody does specific things on specific days (positive post Tuesday, etc) so this is my thing on a day.

Have you ever sat back and thought about how much music you have listened to during your life? Think about it for a second. Everyday in the car, at work, in the gym, doing housework, everywhere. Even if it is only background music. I have literally spent thousands of hours listening to music during my life time. And to tell you the truth, it has taught me more about life than I have ever realized. I think Nick Hornby said it best in his book High Fidelity (which is probably my favorite non-Harry Potter book, you all should read it):

What came first, the music or the misery? People worry about kids playing with guns, or watching violent videos, that some sort of culture of violence will take them over. Nobody worries about kids listening to thousands, literally thousands of songs about heartbreak, rejection, pain, misery and loss. Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?

Seriously! The music we listen too influences our lives more than we know. I did drugs for the first time with Eric Clapton when I was 5. I fell in love for the first time with Cheap Trick. I wanted someone to want me, even if I didn’t have any idea what it meant. I got my heart broken for the first time with poor old Meatloaf, who would probably actually do anything for love. I learned how to laugh at myself by listening to Less Than Jake and the Aquabats. I learned how to be awesome by listening to The Eagles. Music has influenced my life in a hugely profound way, and I am not even a musician.

So here is the song I want to talk about today. “Jack and Diane” by John Cougar Mellencamp (just John Cougar at that point). It’s off the album American Fool from 1982, two years before I was born. This song is an American classic. It’s a nice little tune and it’s catchy, and you wanna sing it, but if you listen harder, you get the quintessential American story buried someplace in there. Two kids in high school fall in love, mess around behind a Tastee Freeze, apparently, get married, grow up, and realize that their 16 year old dreams are probably never going to come true. Sounds terribly depressing, I know.

But how true to life is it? I have heard this story a hundred ties over, even in my own family. Aunt Whoever was going to be a great ballet dancer, but she met Uncle Distraction and got pregnant and married and now she works at Sears and hasn’t danced in 20 years. But here is the line that gets me:

Oh yeah life goes on
Long after the thrill of livin’ is gone
Oh yeah life goes on
Long after the thrill of livin’ is gone they walk on

It doesn’t matter. Life goes on. If you never got to be famous, or paint a masterpiece, or travel around the world, that sucks, but life goes on. So does your marriage. And besides, who says your can’t still do it? Wait until you are 50 and your midlife crisis comes around, and do what you never got to do. The 16 year old’s dreams can’t last forever. So what if Jackie didn’t get to be a football star and run off to the city, he could play football with his son and maybe take a vacation to the city. And really, I don’t think it is about giving up dreams, I think it is more about finding new ones. I used to dream about traveling around the world as a journalist, writing for Time and winning a Pulitzer. Now, I dream about buying a house and having a couple of kids. Some people get to live out their dreams and be actors and athletes and other fabulous things. Most don’t and just have to play the hand they are dealt. Which is fine, as long as they are playing.

Jack and Diane really are just like every one of us…two American kids doing the best that they can.