My College Journey

I would like to take just a minute to talk about the last four years of my life. I am just slightly emotional right now so I thought "why not do some reminiscing?". My years at Lipscomb have been some of my best and some of my worst. I will never forget the way I felt hearing the Bell Tower ring on my way to class, the squirrels that think the own the campus, LU Friday kids, sodexho, etc. There are so many people I am thankful for, some I am no longer close to, some I have continued to grow closer to. Regardless of how close my relationships are with these people now, I am so glad they have been a part of my life. Lipscomb has helped me learn some really important lessons. Most of all, I think I have learned about myself. Sure, there are things I regret and there are times I wish I had made different decisions and then maybe things would be different today. But the fact of the matter is, I wouldn't change one minute of the last four years. Without the ups and the downs, I would not have many of the things I have today. I have a peace today that I know only came from the many struggles I faced over the years. I now understand responsibility and what it means to be a student and a hard worker.

My Freshman year I learned about friendship and I learned the importance of having a good time.  School is important but so is having good friends.  I learned so much from my friends Freshman year and I became heavily involved in many social activities including the spring musical, Delta Omega and Singarama. I had turned into a social butterfly!

As much as I may hate to admit it now the 'socializing' continued into Sophomore year when it should have just stopped at one year.  I thought I could continue doing all my busy activities, take harder classes and do well in school. Sophomore year was my 'valley' to use the mountain journey reference.  Yes, I had fun and continued to meet a lot of really great people, but I had yet to learn the lesson most people have to eventually learn...responsibility.  I was pretty irresponsible.  I wanted to be treated like an adult but I was not acting like one. So...by the end of Sophomore year I learned that being an adult did not mean neglecting my studies and being in plays and social clubs, it meant doing my homework and being able to do things I did not necessarily like with the knowledge that I will be a better person because of it.

And so began Junior year. I like to call this my year of sickness. Yes, my first semester of my Junior year, I had the unfortunate pleasure to experience all the misery of mono. During this time my family was moving houses so we were moving into my grandmother's house.  I experienced some of the most trying times of my life this year. This was also the year I changed my major to English.  This year, I learned how important it is to be happy with the thing you are planning to do the rest of your life. I love to write, I am happiest when I am writing. So this year, I also fell in love with school.  I finally got to experience the joy of loving to learn and I actually enjoyed school. So Junior year, I declined physically because of my health but I grew in responsibility as I learned that school isn't all that bad.

Senior year I tried to make a balance between my Freshman and Junior year.  I tried to balance social life with the love for learning and the responsibility I learned during Sophomore and Junior years.  And what a relief this year was. I had a blast! I continued to love school and love my classes and teachers, but I also tried to work on and fix some old friendships. God has been so good to me this year teaching me that being responsible and being an adult isn't as awful as I thought it was. I am actually starting to think that it is more fun and rewarding this way.

So, this has been a really long post and I promise I am almost done.  I am still scared to leave the comfort of college and school. I love learning and if I could stay in college forever just taking some of my favorite English classes, I might. But I also know that college has prepared me for the real world. I am now much more responsible than Freshman year (even though I thought I had it all figured out back then...I was wrong!). So I am excited to see what God has in store for the next phase of my life.  Because I know that he has been working on me the past four years.

And this has been college wisdom 101 with Hannah, thank you for reading! Graduation...2 days!!

God Bless!

Precious Memories

What is the correct way to process the death of a young person?  This weekend is one that I never thought I would have to experience.  Early yesterday morning, around 2:30, my cousin Isaac Gastineau went to Heaven to forever be with Jesus.  I like to think of myself as a smart person but it is during times like these that I fear what I don't know and what I can't explain. I fear exactly what Isaac was brave enough and lucky enough to push through. Isaac has taught me many things that I believe was part of God's plan for his life.  The past few months and especially the past few days, I have learned things that I think only Isaac's experience could have taught me.  Isaac taught me the value of a life.  As us cousins grew older and our lives got busier, it was not uncommon for us to only see each other but once, maybe twice a year.  But I realize now how special those times were.  Isaac brought a certain joy into my life that no other soul could fill.  He was never scared, or at least never let on to be.  Isaac taught me how important family is.  The past few days have been filled with emotions and sadness, but they have also been filled with family.  Isaac brought us together.  It is Isaac's memory that keeps us smiling and keeps us rejoicing.  So is it wrong to be sad and filled with questions directed at God's intentions?  I don't think so.  But should we let that sadness and those questions fill our hearts and minds?  Isaac's life has answered that question for me. No.  The precious memories I have of Isaac will be impossible for me to forget or hide away.  Now, it is time for myself and every other person that Issac's life has touched to store those memories away in the mind's scrapbook. It is time for us to remember the good times and the bad.  Memory is one of our greatest gifts as humans. This is another trait that sets us a part from the rest of God's creation.  God reminds us everyday that nothing is permanent. So it is with thanksgiving and gratitude that I will cherish my ability to remember.  And I will remember Isaac. And I will remember the joy he carried around with him every day of his life.  I will remember all the funny stories and the sad stories.  Because I think that is what Isaac would want.  He would want us to remember him; to remember him with smiles on our faces.  So from today on, I will fill up the empty jar Isaac left behind with the memories he would want me to carry into the future.  I will remember.

Isaiah 57:1

How do you explain tragedy? How do you make sense of something that makes no sense? We go through life everyday wondering what we will wear, what job we will get when we graduate and how we will survive finals. It is during the most tragic times in life that we finally realize how selfish we are. Life is precious. But what makes life important. It is not how much money we make or how many awards we win or how skinny we are. Life is about the people you meet and the relationships you build; because that is what you remember when a life is taken away. I can't explain death and I can't say that I do not get angry with God when a life is taken, but I do know that God always has a reason for every life that is taken. Isaiah writes in chapter 57 verse 1, "Good people pass away; the godly often die before their time. But no one seems to care or wonder why. No one seems to understand that God is protecting them from the evil to come". One thing I do know for a fact is that God sometimes takes people to Heaven to protect them from this earth. So although I cannot explain tragedy and I cannot make sense out of a young life being taken from this earth, I can rest at peace that perhaps God has a better plan in mind. After all, Heaven is a much happier place than earth.

Two, To and Too

Well, today marks the official two more weeks of school! It's hard to believe and it still hasn't completely sunk in (even though I have received an official 'graduates only' invitation to breakfast with the President (oh yeah!). Change is quickly approaching but I am beginning to understand that it is possible that I cannot actually control everything. My family always told me I was a control freak but I never believed them...I think they may have been right. But living through the ups and downs of college has made me realize that I can't control everything and that that is actually okay, believe it or not! Everything changes; sometimes things change for the good and sometimes they change for the worse. But whether the change is good or bad, there is always something to be learned. So that is pretty much where I stand as of today. My life is an emotional roller coaster at the moment so tomorrow might bring on an entirely new and different attitude.

If you are following my other blog hopeatjovenes.blogspot.com, then you already know that in less than two months I will be on a plane to El Zamorano, Honduras where the Jovenes en Camino is located. My best friend LauraBeth is going with me and we are going to spend 2 1/2 months ministering to the boys at Jovenes and becoming an intricate part of their lives. Just preparing for this journey has got me thinking about where I want to go with my future. I would love to do a lot of writing while I am there. One thing that I am increasingly becoming more and more passionate about is writing a collection of poetry about my time in Honduras and working to get it published. I haven't always been a poet, but thanks to Lipscomb university and their wonderful English program I have been introduced to a subject (poetry) that I think I am pretty good at and would like to pursue.

The final thing that I feel the need to write about is my new puppy, Belle who is just too cute! We got her two days ago and she is only 7 weeks old. She is the tiniest little thing and she will only grow to about 5 or 6 pounds. Belle is a Maltese and is already spoiled rotten. So Benji has a new sister, he would have loved her, I just know it!

Well that's all for now!

God Bless

Race of Life

Race of Life

Time is a precious gift

That seems to guide us through

Dark holes in our lives

Whizzing

Racing

Speeding through

Like the adrenaline rush we fear

Time can be malicious and ugly

And without it we would be lost

Time can be gentle and precious

Do not fear the past or the future

Live for the beautiful memories of today

Do not fear the past or the future

Time can be gentle and precious

And without it we would be lost

Time can be malicious and ugly

Like the adrenaline rush we fear

                                                Whizzing

                                   Racing               

                Speeding through

Dark holes in our lives

That seems to guide us through

Time is a precious gift

Because They Haven't Heard

Because They Haven’t Heard

Dedicated to the thousands of children living on the streets of Honduras.

“And who knows but that you have come into the kingdom for such a time as this”

Blink. She opens her eyes, despite the pain behind her eyelids.

           

            “RING! HONK! BEEP!”

These are the first sounds her fragile ears hear. Fear creeps in

            and she stifles back a tear from falling.

Where will her next meal come from?

Who will be the next person to smile at her?

She uncurls her cold, tired body from the small box she was fortunate to

            find the night before.

            “SWOOSH!”. A car goes flying by. This is her world. This is her home.

Not a friendly face in the world. The world is the enemy

and fear is the only companion she knows.

            Her name is Alexandria, but she doesn’t know that. She is

“that girl” or “that kid”.

            Alexandria is 7, but she knows nothing of a birthday or

of growing older.

She knows nothing of love, nothing of joy, nothing of peace.

She knows nothing of the security of family.

Her body is aching from a disease she has no knowledge of.

“Water” she says out loud as she makes her way down the street (wearing no shoes).

                        She hears a strange sound; it is a woman laughing but

she doesn’t know what laughter is.

            “RING! HONK! BEEP!”

It’s how she begins her day.

What will be different about today?

Is That You God?

So as Christians we all know that prayer is our way of communicating with God today.  Lately I have really been making a conscious effort to make prayer an important part of my day. As most of you know, graduation is coming up, which leaves me in a pretty sticky place. I must decide what I am going to do for the rest of my life. That seems like a pretty big decision to dump on a 21 year old. But one thing I do know, I want to write. I love writing. I can find no better way to express myself than to write it down. There is a reason why I have tons of journals dating all the way back to 1998. The past few weeks I have been asking God, how can I combine my love for writing, my love for missions and my love for you? Well this past week I think He may be answering my question. It is now looking like Laura and I will be able to go to Honduras for the summer. A couple weeks ago we had decided that since we had not heard back from anyone that we should probably start looking for backup plans for the summer. Last week we got an email and went and met with the man who is in charge of getting all the interns for Jovenes. He basically told us that he probably still needed us and that he was going to meet with the board this week and let us know very soon.  Well I had already started adjusting to the idea that I would probably try to get a job at HCA where I really don't care to work for the rest of my life. I told Emily McCarthy about my predicament and how I wanted to go to Honduras but I also wanted to continue to pursue my writing career. She gave me the idea of writing down my experiences in Honduras and forming it into an article for this Christian magazine called Think. This idea absolutely thrilled me! Not only would I be able to go to Honduras and spend time spreading the gospel through mission work, but I could also write about it and possibly get myself started in some sort of partnership with a magazine. So I just sent my proposal letter to the editor of the magazine and hopefully I will hear back from him soon.

I am still praying about his decision but something is telling me that God might just want me to do this. But I know that whatever happens, it is God's will.

God Bless!
Hannah