Time, a creature of God - what is it?

An excerpt from The Confessions by Saint Augustine:

"There was therefore never any time when you had not made anything, because you made time itself. And no phases of time are coeternal with you, for you abide, and if they likewise were to abide, they would not be time. For what is time? Who could find any quick or easy answer to that? Who could even grasp it in his thought clearly enough to put the matter into words? Yet is there anything to which we refer in conversation with more familiarity, any matter of more common experience, than time? And we know perfectly well what we mean when we speak of it, and understand just as well when we hear someone else refer to it. What, then, is time? If no one asks me, I know; if I want to explain it to someone who asks me, I do not know. I can state with confidence, however, that this much I do know: if nothing passed away there would be no past time; if there was nothing still on its way there would be no future time; and if nothing existed, there would be no present time."

come to me jungle friends

My dad took this photo of me at Christmas feeding a squirrel near where I live. This squirrel loves peanuts. I got some really up close photos of them that I'll post later.

a mini photo shoot

photos by Fred Egan

some things i want to do

Photograph, photograph, photograph. Learn to sew. Be able to win at a game of Pick Up Stix. Ride in a hot air balloon. Backpack through South America. Publish a photography documentary. Sell my Wagoneer. Get a plant that doesn't die after a week. Pay off debt. Watch all seasons of MacGyver. Throw away or sell most of my things. Live outside the US again. Learn all the words to my favorite rap songs. Find a roommate. Get more sleep. Learn to snowboard. Feel good about wearing a bikini. Organize my life. Try consistency on for size.

the roots

Vincent Van Gogh is my favorite artist. He writes such detailed descriptions of each piece of his works. The one above is called The Roots and was painted sometime around 1860. Last night I was thinking a lot about life and direction and the way I spend my time. I have wrestled with God consistently, and I was contemplating the importance of this. When I saw this photo of Van Gogh's painting and read what he had written about it, I had to share it.

"The Roots' shows some tree roots on sandy ground...I tried to put sentiment into the landscape: the convulsive, passionate clinging to the earth, and yet being half torn up by the storm. I wanted to express something of the struggle for life...in the black, gnarled and knotty roots."
-Vincent Van Gogh, The Complete Letters, 195, I, 360

Don Postema writes, "If we believe in God, if we really belong to God, we may find ourselves struggling with God. If we listen attentively to our hearts, to the cries of our friends and our angry world, we may find ourselves in conflict with God. We believe in a God who is mercy and justice, yet we see so much injustice. We believe in a God who is wholeness and salvation, yet we see so much brokenness and suffering. We believe in a God of love, yet we see so much hatred. These conflicts raise questions. And to ask these questions not as academic riddles but as a life demand is to wrestle with God."

sufjan: a new love

If anyone wants to buy me this T-shirt, please click here. I wear a medium in the women's shirts. Thank you ahead of time.

always living more than a little

In college, my friends and I got a hold of a full bunny costume. I seemed to fit into the costume quite well. We made missions to the local donut shop to steal bags of donuts from the "goons." Note: the bags of donuts were actually day old glazed donuts that were set right by the back door to be discarded. We merely wanted to help with that. Carrots, Cadbury Eggs, riding on top of cars, The Bunny Hop, being sniffed up - it's all part of being a bunny.