i should be packing but i'm sitting on my floor in the middle of packing mess and crying. i'm sad to leave. i was sad to say bye to young life girls tonight. i was sad to say bye to sayer last night. i'm listening to the curve by avett brothers. my friend kacie the other day told me i was different and the things i said made her sad and i wasn't the same person i used to be. i know i'm not but i didn't think it was in a bad way. i don't love the lord any less. i don't love people any less. i think i know the lord better from living in colorado. seeing his faithfulness, even just by reading old blog posts that were full of fear and tears and misery, is so cool. his promises are true and good. he does want to love me. i have felt loved here because for a long time i wasn't loved by anyone else. i wasn't known or loved or cared for at all for a long time in colorado. but i knew the lord knew me and loved me and i felt it real big all the time. all the lonely nights i sat at the counter after work wasting away my time i knew i was loved. i knew i was loved when i messed up with marques. immediately i knew i was loved. and have grown and learned and been forgiven and loved since then.

my last real blog post was about loving people. i don't feel like i don't love people. i just asked mary if i loved her any less or less well than before and she said no. i think i love people better from being around so many new kinds of people. i like that.

i think it's okay that christians kinda freak me out now. i think its okay that i have a desire for people to be real not just put on christian skin and say things. i want christians to love people well. i want to be loved well inspite of the things i do. i want to love others well. my friend chelsea tweeted the other day something about how if something worked out it doesn't always mean god wanted it to happen it just means his grace is inescapable. i want my grace to be inescapable. i want to be approachable and i want my life to be a legacy of love. sayer told me last night i was approachable and honest and that it was good for her to see that. i appreciated that. i don't want to hide or pretend that i don't screw up because romans says we all have fallen short of the glory of god. i don't want to live in those mistakes and don't want others to either but i think confessing them to the lord and talking about them is good. we all need grace and all don't deserve it but get it anyway. so i want people to be authentic in their love. justin, adam, and ashley were probably my best friends here (and sayer) and they are all real people. real screw ups. but they deserve real love too. i learned how to be real from them. chelsea taught me a lot in college about honesty and how good it is but these boys and ashley were just real. and i know you may be like but they aren't living real life because they don't know jesus. i understand that. but i think i was more comfortable here in aspen than maybe i ever have been. ashley always was the first person on the dance floor at shows and would pull me out there. i learned to dance in aspen. i was free and who i was created to be and that was cool. i never shied away from talking about the lord. ashley would always be like ugh you know how i feel about religion and i'd be like ugh me too but i love jesus. i've said before that the boys and i have had many conversations about the lord. and i hope that they all saw jesus a little different. a little less the church version or the jesus that they think judges them and a little more love. because that's what jesus is all about.

so maybe i have changed. maybe i am a hippie. maybe i want to live radically like shane claibourne. i don't know. i want my faith to be real. i want my love to be real. there is an avett song that goes

Lord I just want my life to be true
And I just want my heart to be true
And I just want my words to be true
I want my soul to feel brand new


and i do. i want my life and heart and words and soul to be true and new because of the lord. 


(also- this is real cool and freeing. dig it. 

Psalm 33:15

New Living Translation (NLT)

¹⁵ He made their hearts,
    so he understands everything they do. )