the bucket list

why hello there.
it's been a long time since we've spoken. allow me to update you on my life and thoughtlife.
i booked a ticket to the grand canyon. i am so excited i almost peed my pants while i looked over my itinerary today. i have a lot of goals in life, but started to wonder what i truly want to do and see before i die. like if i died in my sleep tonight what would i be pissed that i wasn't yet able to accomplish. a bucket list, if you will. some deep. some shallow. all equally urgent. hiking the grand canyon has been on there for awhile, so here we go. 1st week in december. get ready.

God has been stretching me a lot lately. being home, dealing with the end of a long and meaningful relationship. i'm learning patience and endurance. at the same time, i've been filled with an unspeakable joy. it's different than before. a sound "knowing" that my life is in God's hands, and it always will be. a real love of my job at the golf course. a massage job in the making. snowboarding just around the corner. an amazing network of friends. old and new and near and far and all very different. but all wonderful. i have a lot to be thankful for right now. i have done and seen so much in my life already, and i have so much more to do and see. i am a young life leader now too, which has opened a lot of doors for ministry here for me here.

so heres a tentative bucket list:

-explore my heritage and homeland of norway
-speak FLUENT spanish
-become one who climbs rocks
-ride an elephant through the jungle
-obtain my private pilot's license
-trek to everest base camp
-milk a cow
-break 80 (golf)
-live in alaska
-deliver flowers for a day
-learn an instrument-well
-check out the pyramids from the back of a camel
-learn some mma
-adopt a child
-cambodia/thailand
-have NO possessions besides what i can fit in a backpack (for awhile)
-hang glide and not die
-have some chickens and some goats
-meet chuna's family in ethiopia
-fall & stay madly in love with the man i marry
-make a documentary (this is new and i'm really serious about it)
-become a potter and make all my own plates, mugs, etc.

more to come...

there's a new song i keep hearing on the radio that i love. it talks about the MYSTERY of God. which is something i feel like we've lost along the way a bit. we praise him, talk about him, preach him, but there is still so much we have to LEARN about him. to wonder, attempt to comprehend, and stand in awe of. i heard a saying once about a God that we can fit inside our minds being no God at all. i think it's good to ask questions about his character and learn as we grow and change. some of the lyrics are as follows:

"what do i know of you
who spoke me into motion?
where have i even stood
but the shore along your ocean?
are you fire? are you fury? are you sacred? are you beautiful?
what do i know? what do i know of holy?

i guess i thought that i had figured you out
i knew all the stories and i learned to talk about
how you were mighty to save
those were only empty words on a page
then i caught a glimpse of who you might be
the slightest hint of you brought me down to my knees"

-anyway. premiere time. lateskis!