When I was very small February 28th had little significance to me. How could it? It was simply another day in my very large portion of forthcoming days. I was young and would live forever, February 28th would be there as well. After five years of coexisting alongside February 28th with no thought for it, an exciting event happened of which I have no recollection. My parents tell it like this:

I wake up and go to school, donned, I'm sure, in the same pink and green I wore the entirety of my elementary school existence. I announce to my kindergarten classroom that my mother has just given birth to a baby girl named Emily. My class is duly impressed; their parents stopped having children after the perfunctionary two. I am duly gloating; after all, I have the sister for whom I have been waiting for five years. Around lunch time we pulled out our My Little Pony and Transformers lunch boxes and trade food until most of us are satisfied. I am satisfied until an event occurs that can be the only explanation for my having no recollection of this event; embarrassment occurs. Over the loudspeaker it is announced to the entire school, which unfortunately included my kindergarten classroom, that Sean and Lore Ferguson's mother has just given birth to a boy and his name was Andrew David Ferguson. I am told that I crawled under the table. I think they were kind, though, and that in reality I must have cried under the table.

In any case, a brother was born. February 28th 1986. And thus, this date was suddenly filled with chocolate cake and red and the nickname Chub and huge blue eyes and the kindest of all my parents' offspring. We celebrated for 14 years; that's what you do, after all, celebrate the wonder of this wonder, even if he wasn't the wonder I first wanted him to be.

Shortly after that fourteenth celebration, though, a celebration we had no way of knowing would be his last (We would have taken more photos, you see, or bought him more than just model paints, but a helmet we would have made him wear at all times, to insure against the inevitability of April 19, 2000), Drew died of brain trauma. His body lay on the rainy blacktop, to the left of the yellow lines, and he breathed his last. I saw him. For the last time.

And with all the other suddenlies that are taking place in the frenzy of the moment, birthdays are the last thing on our minds. And his, being almost a year away anyway, is certainly the last thing on our minds.

For five years February 28th hurts. Because people forget. Because we're not celebrating. Because my family has four birthdays in February, but we only celebrate three. Because he would have been 15; he would have been 16; he would have been 19; no, he wouldn't have been. For five years February 28th tries to pretend it's just another day, but there are nine people to whom it isn't just another day.

But today is different. Today is the sixth year. Today I can celebrate the anniversary of a birth, 20 years, without the would have beens, might have beens, wishing he was. Today I remembered the birth of which I have no recollection but for the memories others have shared. And I remember the responsibility on me to be a sharer of memories and nothing more.

Happy Birth Day Andrew. Nothing more. Except sometimes I wish you could be here to share some of the memories too.

There are soundtracks to life, to every season. I hear strains of a particular song and am reminded of that season, the pains, the joys, and the comfortable familiarity. I am listening to one such soundtrack as I type of my history study sheet and this post. I am remembering a season spent on a living room floor of a small apartment, late into every night, while two small boys slept upstairs and their father worked the graveyard shift. A makeshift mother with none of the fruit. I cried a lot during that season, journaled even more, and spent every night on my face to this soundtrack begging the Lord to pull through and pull me through. For that season I am thankful. For this soundtrack I am thankful.

He and I walked along the river, the budding trees brushing our shoulders and the tender ground, newly unfrozen and testing its strength, beneath our feet. We meant to do homework, but it was chilly and our pages wouldn't stop turning by the mystery that is wind and not speedreading, both convenient excuses to lock our books in the car and forget responsibility. We talked about pollution and factories. He talked about hiking and scientific facts of which I have no understanding but the greatest admiration for those who do. I talked about this morning's sermon and conviction. He reprimanded me for feeling guilty; I reprimanded him for not wanting to know a little something about everything. The spring air blew around us and the sun kissed our faces. We were friends once, and young.

The prayer I have been praying with sincere and earnest desire is that discipline would rise in my life. There are those who say to me to rest, prophesy that even the warrior needs a quiet place to go, to slow down, to take time for fun and to remember that this is the best season of my life. And maybe I'm obstinate to the point of ridiculousness, but I'm also convinced that as long as I have the go ahead from the Lord that my portion is to redeem the time above all else. But I haven't been walking in that in its fullness. Which causes me to wonder if one of two things is true: Maybe I don't have the go ahead from the Lord, or maybe I am just lazy.

Within sight of my bedroom window is the clock tower. It chimes, on average, ninety-six times a day. Only twenty-four of those ninety-six times a day does the cadence fall, the other seventy-two times the last chime falls on a note which suspends for the next fifteen minutes. I would spell it out for you, but I almost failed sight reading in Music Theory and I'm afraid you wouldn't get the whole picture. But you've all heard bells chime, you know the order in which they do it. It's the same as 67,000 other bell towers in the United States and they probably all buy their chimes from the same bulk chime supplier.

I wear a watch, I keep a day-timer, I still haven't reset the clock in my car, but I know the last two digits are right and that's really what matters anyway, but none of those time-keepers are quite the master over my life that this bell tower is. And this morning, like every other morning since I've lived here, I counted out the chimes and left the last note dangling, because see, it was only 8:15 and not content with being a quarter entity.

It rushes me through my day, through my life, in a hurry to complete the necessary beats. In a hurry to bring some closure, just so it can resume its half-hearted melody in another fifteen minutes. It rushes me through life; this semester is half over and I am not the person I wanted to be at the end.

It rushes me through time, as if to say, 'we're almost there, a little bit each time'.

I've been experimenting with art and words:

Things that make me smile.
Things I underline with blue ink in my anthologies.
Things I remember because I wish I'd thought of it first.

Regardless of the fact that 66% of my real friends think I'm staggeringly observant, this entry will be little more than this past week's normalities. Nothing observed, unless you count the days of the week and the birds outside my window.

I was sick this week.
My roommate had her wisdom teeth removed last weekend. I thought she was okay until she came rushing into the bathroom this morning to tell me how she'd memorized the lineage of Christ. Suffice it to say that waffles, German Shepherds, and opening doors were all an integral part of her delineation. I had second thoughts about her wellness.
My ticket for home is booked, and so, along with my friend Kelly (who, if you read my comments, you'll know as kb), I'll be arriving in little old Potsdam on the fourth of March (not to be confused with the Fifth of March, where we all dress up like Indians and shun tea).
But I must leave on the eleventh, which means I'll be missing two of my most lovely friends' birthdays. May we celebrate early, please?
I have had my head buried in Russian Literature for the past two weeks and, frankly, have grown tired of the name Lisaveta Sergionovich Dostoevsky Karamozov Ilyich, called Pavel Lisa Petrovich Roskonvich for short. American Literature has become my relaxant.
There are so many options for this summer I can't hardly wait to see what happens. Another one arose last evening that would entail me being home for the summer--would you mind terribly? I'm am grateful, though, for the peace which passes all understanding. I'm not the least bit anxious about my summer. Usually I'm not the least bit anxious to a fault, stumbling around with no purpose, waiting for something to surprise me with its perfection. But I've dutifully sent out my feelers (also called applications) and dutifully set in to rest. I'm completely confident.

Maybe to a fault.

But I'm happy. You can't fault that.

Today, a card came in the mail. I won't tell you what it said because you most certainly would get jealous. I mean, I would if I knew she said it to anyone else. Suffice it to say I get a little happy inside when I see it sitting on my desk.

Everybody else is doing it, so why don't you?

I have a fuzzy head, stuffy nose, scratchy throat, and too-warm forehead. Thinking clearly is one of those things I have to remember how to do, like when you have a toothache and can't remember the feeling of normality. I hate being sick.

I just got home from chapel. Normally Chapel is all cliches and anecdotes; it is, I dare say, the source of the most common complaint on campus. I like it though. If only for the fact that for three hours a week we, all 4300 of us, are in one building stirring ourselves toward Christ. Tonight's Chapel, however, was an hour longer than usual and included girls in tights and boys in tights too. Yes, that's right, I said Boys In Tights Too.

Ballet Magnificat! came to perform their modern redition of Ruth. I saw them dance about ten years ago and have never forgotten that magical performance -- this encore was equally as beautiful. The gospel message, as well as the testimonies given, were transparent and honest. The dancing was excellent and the articulation of the story of Ruth and Naomi through the choreography was stunning. I loved it.

Lately I have been impressed by the stellar leadership we are blessed to have at Lee University. Perhaps it's because my background of campus leaders in the past have been not such admirable men, but the other day as I listened to one certain president of this school communicate his concern and his love for this student body in the prologue of a certain organization's impending visit, I felt nothing but respect for him. And since then I've been noticing the leadership around here a little bit more keenly.

On the same note (but still bolded for clarity's sake): Perhaps it's because last semester I registered late and didn't have the pick of the lot of professors, but this semester I have been blessed much by the quality of teaching and the quality of interest I've received from my professors. Each one has articulated clearly that their desire is for us to leave Lee University having learned more than we ever will again. I received this email from my World Literature professor yesterday:

GREAT EXPECTATIONS (like Charles Dickens): my expectations are simply these--this WILL be the BEST PAPER YOU'VE EVER WRITTEN, hands down. It WILL be one of the papers you choose to put into your Senior Writing Portfolio when you are ready to graduate. It WILL be the paper you choose to mail off to graduate schools when they ask to see a sample of your most intelligent writing. I'll be your most vocal cheerleader, and I'll be your thorn in the flesh if you start to procrastinate--ha. Thanks! See you Monday for a quiz on Tolstoy and Ivan Ilyich.

And though those expectations may seem a little too great, I cannot help but think he's right. It is better to have great expectations than to have none at all.

I'm thankful that the leadership here has chosen the great.

The clock chimes eleven and my head is no longer fuzzy, but adopting that sort of drunk haze induced by the alcohol laden Nyquil I've just swallowed. Night all.

Empty. Apartment. Quiet. All quiet. Excepting the airplace flying overhead, the swallows in the tree outside my window, and the unobtrusive sound of the refrigerator. All quiet.

I thrive. I energize. I figure through my head the thoughts which have been waiting to be thought, wonderings which have been wondering when they, too, could be wondered.

Now is a good time, I say to my reflection in the mirror as I wash my hands. Now is a quiet time.

Now is a time I can think about Amy Lowell and her poem about the Madonna and a garden, about Luigi Pirandello and his six infamous characters searching for an author. Now is a time I could process more thoroughly what it means to live in the Land of the Living. Now is a time when I could rework my budget, figuring which things must be cut out, figuring which things must be counted in. Now is a time I could just sit and close my eyes; it's only eight-thirty, after all, and hardly time for bed. Now is a time when I could search for more internships, fill out endless applications, all the while praying that the two I really want will want me just as badly. Now is a time I could process the new events of Valentine's week: five good friends, all in my immediate circle, suddenly find themselves with Valentines of their own and so, once again, I find myself on the outside of that immediate circle and back to just God and me. Now is a time I could call home and talk to people (if only I weren't out of cell phone minutes again). Now is a time I could open the Bible that is only read for twenty minutes in the peak morning through eyes still blurry from too little sleep and too much reading.

I decide against them all and decide that, save for the five minutes it took to write this, now is the time to complement the quiet. Two quiets sitting side by side on a porch swing, drinking iced tea, and staring at our toes.

Perfect.

It's Valentine's Day and I'm accutely aware of the fact that everyone who is without someone is accutely aware of it being Single Awareness Day and everyone who is with someone is filling our apartment with cherry cheesecake leftovers and roses. I went to classes as usual, went to work as usual, and am going to bed as usual--still as obviously single as I usually am. And still, amazingly, very okay with that.

Everytime I heard the SAD (excuse the poor choice of acronyms, but there are some things which cannot be avoided) expression from one single to another today I inwardly flinched, wished they could find something other than singleness to be made aware of, and gave them my best wishes for pink and red and all things on that side of the color wheel.

This is not my first, and undoubtedly won't be my last, Valentine's Day spent without a ring on any finger or a sweetheart to cook for, but I think I can confidently say that it is the first time that February 14th wasn't a complete wash of reminders that I'm glaringly single with no hope on the horizon. It just that this Valentine's Day my hope has changed a little. Okay a lot.

It's not that the love for covenant and marriage and all things on that side of the color wheel aren't still attractive and pleasant, it's just that a desire for what the Lord desires has taken presidence. My hope has changed a lot.

So Happy Valentine's Day. If you're married, kiss your honey. If you've got a special someone, tell them so. If you're not otherwise attached, wish someone else a Happy V Day and let each red or pink or polka dotted heart you see remind you of what your heart's desire is and let the Lord minister to you or through you today.

P.S. I did get a rose, though, a pretty pale pinkish one with burgandy tips, and a card that made me cry. Have I mentioned how thankful I am for my friends?

I just talked to the person who dreams for me when I'm too tired or too worn out or too discouraged or dreamless. I just talked to the sender of the clippings. I just talked to the person who speaks all kinds of life into my life. I just talked to the person who says no matter what I do this summer, I can do it with her blessing. I just talked to the person who helps me remember how to fly. I just talked to the person with whom I'd be rolling out sugar cookies and frosting them with pinks and reds if I was home. I just talked to her.

And my soul feels better.

There was a boy sitting by himself on the curb. Middle schoolers huddled in groups of three and six and five all around him. He, by himself, with a bruise on his face. I could see it clearly, as clearly as I saw the loose flannel shirt tails flapping in the cold weather. I could see the bruise on his face as clearly as I could see his solitary existence. I did not have to wonder very long how he got that bruise on his face. Cleveland may be prettily dressed, but she has her closets and pockets of secrets. He is one, a well kept one, though, since no one around gave him the attention he needed.

I wanted to stop, but I was late for work.

I am searching for an inexpensive flight. I need one from one place (here) to another place (there). There are not very many options and all of them are priced in the range which puts a lump in my throat. I find one for $213 dollars, but it is to Rome, Italy, and that is not my destination.

I long for the day, and wonder if it will ever come, when I can pay for a ticket to Rome, Italy, just because it's cheap and I've never been.

I have been looking into possible job opportunities for the summer. Should it be Boulder, Colorado? Or Chattanooga, Tennessee? Or Pheonix, Arizona? Or Potsdam, New York. I stumble across internship opportunities in Jamestown, Williamsburg, and Boston. Suddenly the world is mine and I can do whatever I want to do. Suddenly I am 25 years old and younger and more carefree than I've ever been before.

What is it, then, that holds me back?

What is it, then, that holds me back?

This will be neither creative nor inspiring. It will simply inform. By the request of one Carol Wiley, who ought to feel very special since I never use last names on this website, excepting my own, which I own the right to use any time I like. Carol Wiley has informed me that I post too many obscurities and far too little interesting tidbits of my life. Well, I reply in indignancy, there aren't very many interesting tidbits about which to post. Post them anyway, she replies.

Very well. If you must know:

Exam number three this morning; they've been tough this semester. Three down, three more to go.

Last night I went to go see Mozart's The Magic Flute with a few friends. I love theater, or, as they say in Tennessee, TheAter.

After the opera I rushed over to J's house where a surprise birthday party for our friend Justin was occuring. I was late, but friends forgive easily, especially friends like him.

Yesterday was a perfectly cold and crisp day. The horses were spry and energenic, a little too much perhaps; one of my students fell off her horse after a not so well executed jump.

I have a crush on my history professor. Don't worry, he's fifty and I'm only one in a class of two hundred, he'll never know. It's just that he's so darn smart, he knows about things like the Ash Can School and Wordsworth and Booker T. Washington and Seneca Falls and the 17th Amendment and the Robber Barons without consulting his notes and not many people can do that as eloquently as he can. I'm impressed, that's all.

I may not be so impressed once I get the midterm that I am supposed to be doing in class right now, but which I sweetly begged leave of in light of the three other exams I have today. He'll let me do it on Monday.

Our apartment is a mess, I'm embarrassed to say. But our good excuse is that between the four of us we have had a total of eighteen midterms. That and a clean apartment is a lot to expect, we'll vaccum next week.

I appreciate smiles and laughter recently. It's good to love and be loved and express it in verbal form. I love that.

How's that for some pitiful tidbits? I'm embarrassed to post this.

There are pages and clips from magazines, glossy sheets of eye candy with handwritten notes in the corners. They say things like, “You could do this” or “You should do this.” Sometimes they say “You could write this better” or “This looks like the shop you’re going to start someday.” I get an envelope in the mail once a week or so, stuffed with clippings like this and accompanied by handwritten notes on handmade paper. I’ve begun tacking these clippings beside my bed, a space for dreams.

I’m not always one to dream extraneously—my dreams have usually been in secreted boxes and scrapbooks of treasures—things I love and dare not wish for aloud; things which disappear in the spoken breath, like the wisp by which they’re accompanied. A few people know some of them, and now you might too.

I dream of Europe and the Rhine, stone bridges and the Lake District. I dream of making things and not keeping them because things take up space and I dream of space. I dream of finishing and I dream of beginning and I dream of being happy in the middling. I dream of a boutique on Main Street small town and of children in China. I dream of people and of front porches. I dream of pretty things and sturdy things and mixing the two things together. I dream of gardens, indoor and out. I dream of being published and I dream of the day when I can crumple what I’ve written and not feel like a part of me went into the garbage with it.

I dream of being unselfish. And giving. And of living without dreams and only real visions for what really can be.

But, in the meantime, I dream of next week’s envelope from home and the possibilities it will hold. Perhaps someone thinks I could quest in unknown frontiers or tea-taste in Kashmir. Perhaps she’ll be convinced of my ability to sew a full clothing line or start a book club. I’m glad for her faith to believe that someday all those clippings tacked to my wall won’t just be dreams any longer, but part of the fabric of me.

I’m sitting in a living room with friends. A few have their back to me, a few face me, a few sit on the couch reading Philippians, one plays guitar like his hero (only better because I know him), one sits in the corner, like bass players are supposed to do, one plays a loop on the keyboard, and a few are in the kitchen getting drinks of water. I catch one friend’s eye; it’s all I can see of his face, the rest of it taken up by the mouth of the trombone he plays. It’s loud and the floor shakes with people, with laughter, with an earthquake eruption of the stuff of friendship.

I was reading a book, a good book, the kind of book that inspires one to write; and so I do. This kind of setting reminds me of how much I love creativity, how much I thrive on artistry and the skill of making. This kind of setting reminds me of little I do the things I love.

It feels, sometimes, that most of life is doing and not loving. I don’t think it’s meant to be lived that way, but the moment we decided that being smarter was better than being obedient, we chose the route of striving: eating the apple instead of admiring it. And our discipline was to do, to toil, to work hard. I’m not sure that there’s an answer to all this work, or even an earthly reward. The most we can hope for of heaven here on earth is to watch artistry take form. I don’t mean to condescend to the accountants, engineers, and computer science gurus of the world; their art is just as valid as the art in this room, and perhaps even more vital. I mean to say that work is necessary, toil is essential, but art is the elective in the midst of it all.

I’m stretched thin this semester, spreading my fingers to ten areas of life and not finding enough time to give them each the creativity and passion they deserve. Sometimes that feels regrettable, sometimes I don’t have time to regret and the best I can do is to do my best. Sometimes it feels like a lot of work, but today I talked to someone I love and she said that these words can be the words I remember when time won’t let me remember that art is important too.

A man’s gift makes room for him.
Proverbs 18.16

So as I strive to make room in my life for art, I can be reminded it will make itself at home in my life simply because it exists. The honor is that is can be work at the same time. And that’s okay with me.

We have those moments, all of us (Don't you? I do.). Moments where we are so sure of where we are that we are equally as sure that our footing must be too cocky, and our lives too blessed. Those moments are followed quickly by the assurance that yes, the Lord loves to give good gifts to His children.

A moment such as that happened today. I was in my car on the way home from sharing a muffin, a cup of chai, and vulnerability. We see each other three days a week in class, sitting beside one another and whispering the kind of comments that know-it-all's whisper, only when you're the know-it-all, and you usually are, they don't seem so bad. We see each other three nights a week and one morning a week. We see each other in passing, yelling a greeting across the lawn, causing everyone within hearing distance to wonder what it is about the two of us that could possibly make us that excited about seeing one another. We smile, link arms, and say, yeah, we've really only known each for about a month. But it's been a good month.

I recently heard it said that C.S. Lewis remarked once regarding friendship, "You too? I thought I was the only one!" And perhaps it's piously individualistic of us to think so, but we all do, don't we? Think we're the only one?

So today, pulling my car into the Walgreen's parking lot, and thanking the Lord for my friend, I thought to myself, "How could it be that there was anyone down here who could know exactly what I mean when talk about (insert pious thought here)?" But there is! And she's my friend! My friend in Tennessee!

And, as if in choreographed answer, my phone vibrated to let me know she was thinking the same thing about me.

Her name is Laura. And I love her.