i am a poster girl with no poster

i had a birthday last week. birthdays are not very much fun as a grown up, i've decided. i did much the same thing on "my day" as any other day: spent some time checking someone into the emergency room, meeting someone on the psych floor and telling someone to stop eating out of the trash and here is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. i did go to house church, which ended up being a wonderful end to a very normal day. our group has "birthday prayers," where we pray silently for the birthday individual for a while, and then we come back together to share what we prayed, thought, pictured in that time. and those things are written in a card to remember.

one of the most significant prayers/pictures that a friend shared began with this verse:
"Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known to everyone. The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
-Phil. 4:4-7
and then she said she pictured me running hard after something... what she wasn't sure.
i hope that that is true of this next year, that i run hard after the Lord and that i rejoice and am reasonable and that i am not anxious but prayerful. doesn't that sound nice? :)

i also had a pre-birthday dinner with my family and a post-birthday dinner with friends. overall, combined with well wishes and prayers for another year of life, my birthday was quite lovely, and i felt so thankful for the relationships i've been given.


i also went to lake cumberland for the weekend. my friend meredith's parents have a condo there. meredith left for heaven in april, and we haven't seen her family since her memorial service. so the weekend was a good chance to love and encourage her parents and husband and to enjoy one another. the weather's been amazing lately, and i was with three of my dearest friends, so it was a delightful time. it was hard to be somewhere and physically feel mere's absence- since she'd lived in south carolina and indiana since we've graduated, i didn't see her frequently. but to be among people who naturally were associated with her, it was a very clear void. we were able to remember a lot, and grieve and share together, and hopefully to heal and grow.

so, on with another year of lessons and growing pains and sorrows and joys. let it be so.