"Broken Hallelujah"

You know the things that have brought me here

You know the story of every tear

'cause You've been here from the very start

and even though i don't know what Your plan is

i know You make beauty from these ashes

i've seen joy and i've seen pain

and on my knees i call Your name

here's my broken hallelujah

with nothing left to hold on to

i raise these empty hands to You

here's my broken hallelujah 

--broken hallelujah, the afters

Sometimes when I'm going through something, I try to find some Christian music to listen to because that always cheers me up. I wanted to share it, but I had trouble deciding between a few songs. But when things get tough and I remember this song, I always fall back on Broken Hallelujah by The Afters. But that's not why I'm writing this up.

Our days on this earth are numbered and only God knows exactly how much time we have to spend here. We don't know how long we have, or how long someone we love has. We'll never know how much time we'll have to tell someone we love them, but sometimes we think we have all the time in the world, and then, one day, they're gone. Just like that, they're gone. It's unexpected. We never saw it coming, and everything was normal, until suddenly, they're gone.

And then other times, someone we love has an illness, something that can't be treated. And we know there's a day coming when they won't be here any more. Time is running out and there's nothing that can be done to stop it, no way to go back and change it. You just have to keep going forward, not trying to think about it.

But it doesn't have to be like that. There's no reason to pretend to be happy even in these trials, because there is hope, and that hope is God. He sent His son to die on the cross for our sins, so if we accept Jesus Christ as our Savior, we can see our loved ones again in heaven, and that's the greatest hope we have. My mom's parents passed away some time before I was born, and she always told me that she was at peace with it, because she said there's no sadness in heaven, so her parents don't miss her. Saying it like that might make it sound even worse, but they're not sad that they were separated. They're in heaven, worshiping God and being happy. They don't have to put up with the sorrows and pains of this world.

It's a hard concept to grasp, not missing someone because they're in heaven not missing you. I still miss my mom. I think about her and cry because I miss her. She isn't here, she's in heaven where she isn't in pain anymore. She's overjoyed and ecstatic. She doesn't have to put up with the things she put up with here. She doesn't have the limitations that she had here. She's happy.

And the most wonderful thing about heaven is, that, if we've accepted Jesus Christ as our Savior, we'll go to heaven and have eternal life, and the loved ones we lost here and had to try to find a way to live without--well, we'll see them again. That hope is the best hope that there is. The people we lose here will be waiting for us in heaven.

God truly is the greatest hope, because He sent His son to die on the cross for our sins, and without Jesus Christ in our hearts, we wouldn't be able to have the hope of seeing our loved ones in heaven again. And for me, that's the greatest thing, seeing them again.

The Little Things

It's the little things that matter. Like when someone smiles at you with one of those big smiles that makes you feel like you're old friends or they're excited to see you, even if you haven't talked in a while. It's moments like that, that can cheer you up when you're having a tough time with whatever you're going through, and those little moments can cheer you up and put a smile on your face when you otherwise wouldn't be smiling, those are really special things that are easily overlooked. I actually had one of those moments this morning.

I lost someone I was really close to earlier this year. She was my best friend and we did everything together. She was really cool and encouraged me in whatever I was struggling with and she was interested in and enjoyed all of the stuff I was interested in. I'm talking about my mom. I miss her, a lot. But I think about her a lot, and I think about all of those little moments we shared. I think about all of our inside jokes and the nicknames we had for characters in our favorite TV shows (that I think she came up with most of them, which makes the nicknames even better).

I think about all of the things we did together and how we would travel to the homeschool conventions with the art curriculum company she worked for and how I didn't enjoy them as much as I should have. She enjoyed them because she had a passion for art, but also because they were the only "vacation" we could get at the time and it was however many days of an adventure that we were able to have together.

I think often about how, if I was discouraged over something, my mom would go and find Bible verses for me to encourage me. I didn't really think much of it at the time, but now one of my favorite verses is one of the ones she found and gave to me to encourage me, and it's my favorite because she read it and thought of me. But now no one does that, and I miss that. And I love that about her.

And it's these little moments that we don't really think about much when they happen, these little moments that we don't cherish, but then something bad happens, something like this, and we look back and regret that we didn't appreciate them more. I know I do. Those homeschool conventions I mentioned? I had a bad attitude about them. But she loved them. And I was stupid, not realizing that it was the only vacation I would've gotten. And I went to so many places that I wouldn't have gone to otherwise. I did that all with my mom, and that's all that really matters.

Sometimes, of course, the little things aren't as happy of thoughts as thinking about how much fun we had with our favorite TV show characters or how much fun time we spent together. It's been hitting me a lot lately that she...she isn't here. You're probably thinking duh but she isn't here, she isn't going to see me get baptized in September, she isn't going to see me graduate high school, she isn't going to help me move in for my first day of college, she isn't going to read the books I've written. And the worst thing I ever did with my writing was keeping it to myself and not sharing it with her.

Now, as things are hard and getting harder, continuously getting harder and never easier, the greatest comfort I have is knowing that she's in heaven, and by the blood of Jesus Christ I'll be able to see her again. And that's truly the most beautiful thought I can have. She may be gone, but this pain and this loss is only temporary, because someday I'll be with her again.

Honestly it wasn't supposed to end up being such a sad post, and I could go on and on and on and probably keep going until it's time for me to leave for church, but this was hard to write and I almost want to delete it. I pretty much poured my heart out and that can be either good or bad, but I spent this much time writing this, I might as well let someone read it.

New Projects

Wow, I'm actually writing up another blog post. Usually there's a gap between blog posts that can go anywhere from a few months to a few weeks, but here I am with a new blog post a day after posting the last one.
Woohoo!

Anyway, besides taking on another novel in the near future, I have two other creative projects that I'm going to work on. The first is called The Sketchbook Project. That's a link to the website to find information in better words, but to put it simply, you get a sketchbook from them, fill it up, and send it back and not only will it be a permanent edition to The Brooklyn Art Library, but it will also go on a three city tour of the United States. I'm not a very artistic person when it comes to drawing (unless stick people and Christmas trees count) but I'm going to try my hand at it. It'll be interesting.

The next project is something I thought about on my way to homeschool classes this morning. This week was "technically" the first day of school (even though I'm not starting "officially" until September 3rd because that's when my mom always had me start), so I had this brilliant idea of keeping a log of every school day. But it'll be in the form of  mywritingbuddiesecnouragedthisandthoughtitwasbrilliantAprisonloGmydadgavemepermissionandsaiditwasn'tabadidea. Not that school is like that. I actually really do enjoy school. Except for algebra. Geometry isn't too bad, but probably because I'm doing it wrong. Science isn't so bad. Go marine biology! It's just that the thought seemed kind of funny. So it's really not that brilliant. BUT it'll be a fun way of keeping track of everything that happens between now and May 2014. After all, it is Senior Year, so I might as well have fun and have something to do that doesn't involve stressing out about graduating and SATs and ACTs and blah blah blah.

So, I'll be starting a new blog for that project and you can expect it to be rather...interesting in a boring kind of way. I'm sure there aren't very many people who actually want to read about my boring school days, but I'm going to do it anyway because it'll be fun. For me. It'll probably end up being very sarcastic with a lot of references to my favorite TV shows and movies and books, or maybe it'll just end up being a few paragraphs about how my school subjects went and what I had for lunch. You never know.

The "What Next?" Of Writing

I finally finished The Prince and The Lionheart, the second novel in my trilogy. This novel was very problematic and it's going to take a lot of work when I finally get around to editing, but writing a book isn't supposed to be easy. The book was finished at 210 pages with 132,262 words and seventeen chapters, which isn't anywhere near the length of the first one when I finished it, but that's okay. It gives me more room to fix everything and not have to worry about it being too long, because the first book in the trilogy, The Daughter of Robin Hood, is turning into a monster with all of the editing that needs to be done.

---

Before I go on, let me tell you what these two books are about. It starts with the first one, The Daughter of Robin Hood. The title may say it all, but it's about Lenora Hood, but she's known as Lee by her close friends and family. She ran away from her father when she was sixteen. She formed her own band of thieves and three years later, she's nineteen and tired of running, but before she goes into a permanent hiding, she tells her band of thieves that she wants to pull off one last heist. She wants to steal the prince's fortune. But not just any prince, Prince Nikola of Hoods Windsor.
When Robin Hood and his Merry Men succeeded in overthrowing the Sheriff of Nottingham, Richard the Lionhearted returned and to prevent the crimes of the Sheriff ever happening again, they formed twelve new kingdoms to ease taxes and make it fairer for the people. Hoods Windsor was named after Robin Hood himself, and Locksley rests at it's borders. Lee thinks that if she can steal Prince Nikola's fortune, it will prove to everyone that she's greater than her father, because she not only stole from the place she had come from, but because she had done something he never would have done.
However, things don't go according to plan. Not only is her father there, but she ends up falling in love with the prince, something she promised she wouldn't do. She needs to decide whether she wants to continue being the wanted thief or if she wants to be the good guy from now on and do the right thing for once.

By explaining the next book, I'm probably going to give away the ending of The Daughter of Robin Hood. Oops.
The Prince and The Lionheart follows Lee and her band of thieves, but she's made amends with her father and he's brought his Merry Men into the mix too. Besides that, Nikola denounced his crown and ran off with them. They're outlaws now, and they need to figure out how to stop King Matthew, Nikola's father, from being a tyrant. They discover that the kingdoms are splitting and people are taking sides, but they're not sure why. They also discover that Nikola's eight year old brother is being abused so Lee sends him, one of her thieves and Nikola's best friend off to Hoods Windsor to save them. Getting his little brother out of the castle isn't as easy as he thought it would be, because of this guy named Crevan Delaney. He's the Sheriff of Nottingham's son and he has it it out for Lee because he's seeking revenge for his late father.
As for Lee, Robin, her band of thieves and the Merry Men, King Leon, Richard the Lionhearted's son, invites them to join a council that's trying to figure out just the same things as Lee: how to stop the tyranny and save the people. It's a council of kings and thieves. Lee quickly realizes that no one trusts her and her thieves because of their bad reputations, so she decides to take action against this and vanish so they can operate quietly and earn everyone's trust.

After typing that out, I can't tell whether that paragraph is shorter because the book is shorter or if there just isn't as much to say about this novel. Huh.

---

Just like the first one, I reached the last line and saved the document and felt like it wasn't quite finished yet, but there was nothing left to write. The ending wasn't emotional enough and the timeline needs fixed, among other things that need fixed, but that was left for another day because I was so excited. And then I was wondering, "what now?" There was nothing left to write in The Prince and The Lionheart. No more scenes, no more chapters, no more information that the reader needs to know. There's just one unrelated scene that I want to write for my own pleasure, and it has no place in the novel. But after I write that little scene? I could go back to editing the first book, but I'm a little stuck and I'm making it longer than it needs to be and I don't have very much confidence in that book. I could edit book two, but after I just finished that pain in the neck of a book, I want to take a break from Lee's world.

My plan is to hopefully write a modern day novel called The Faultless Stars. I almost wrote this novel for Camp NaNoWriMo in July (50,000 words in 31 days), but I had already started The Prince and The Lionheart and didn't want to stop. The Faultless Stars (or code name, Space: The Final Frontier) was something that happened when I was hanging out with my friend and just randomly said "it would be cool to write a novel like Doctor Who about the wonder of the universe except it would be hard to keep it from being too much like Doctor Who." So it resulted in a Pinterest board called Space: The Final Frontier (the pinterest board), and it was just a collection of pictures concerning space.
Was. It was.
It became an idea with a real title. The main character is Corrie Parvin. She had a crappy high school experience. Her parents are millionaires with a million dollar business, so Corrie was Miss Popular in high school and was more concerned about popularity and friends and appearances. It didn't help that her parents were more concerned about their business and crumbling relationship than their daughter. Corrie thought she needed the attention, but her parents started fighting and Corrie was losing friends and fast. When she graduated, her parents split up and gave her the choice between staying in Chicago or going to L.A., but Corrie ran off to NYC instead. She met some good friends there and become a Christian. It was a completely fresh start for her.
A few years later, and she's lost her best friend because he made a mistake. it's Christmastime and she's alone once again, but then she meets this guy. To everyone else he's a crazed man that belongs in a mental hospital, but to Corrie, he's the escape she needs. Everyone he's met in New York City calls him The Star Man, and he doesn't know what else to call himself so he takes up the nickname, but Corrie decides he looks more like a Finn. He tells her all of these stories of how he traveled space and went farther than anyone ever should have, and also how he left who he used to be out there. Corrie wants to get away so she doesn't have to be alone, so they go to outer space to find what Finn left behind in the stars.
But it is't even about them. I thought their story was about the stars, but in the end, it isn't really that either. I'm drawn to this novel because it's finally something that heavily involves Christianity and God. Corrie relies heavily on her faith in God and she knows she would be a train wreck without Him. It makes me really happy to finally bring that into my writing. I'm excited to start writing this. It's waited long enough.

p.s. in case you're wondering, the third book in the trilogy is going to be called The Sins of Their Fathers and I plan on writing it in November for Nation Novel Writing Month (50,000 words in 30 days) so my goal is to hopefully start and finish The Faultless Stars by then.

Being a Christian

Recently I was asked "what does being a Christian mean to you?" and I replied with something along the lines of "it means being different and having something to stand up for." But it's so much more than that. Now that I've had more time to think about the question, I've had more time to think about all of the things that I wish I had said. 

Like I said, being a Christian is more than just being different and having something to stand up for. It's being saved by the blood of Jesus Christ and being washed clean of your sins by His blood. It's never being alone because God is always with you. That in itself is a real comfort to me because I've known what it feels like to be alone, but God is always with me, so I never have to feel alone.

 It's also having someone to go to that knows more than we could possibly imagine. Because we're just humans. We don't know everything, no matter how much we'd like to believe so. But God knows everything. He created the heavens and the earth and the depths of the sea and the stars in the sky and the far off galaxies that we can't even see from where we stand, but He breathed us to life. He knew us before we were even in the womb. Without God, we're nothing. Our days on earth are numbered and after we're gone, we'll be forgotten, but if we have Jesus in our hearts and we've accepted Him as Savior, admitting that we've sinned and asking for forgiveness from those sins, we can have something so much better after death than being forgotten by the people of earth that will just move on. We get to go to heaven, to see God face to face. 

But there's still so much more than that. God is great. He's amazing and awesome and powerful enough to have created the heavens and the earth in the beginning (Genesis 1:1 - "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth"). All of the beauty that we see in this world was all created by His hands. All of these complicated science things with atoms and microscopic particles that we can't see but the biology books tell us exist and they're always active--all of those tiny little things that make up this world, they were all created by God. Everything is far too complex to have simply happened. Everything from the tiny caterpillar that turns into the beautiful butterfly to the galaxies ten million light years away that we'll never get to was all created by God. And then He created us, all of us. We were created by God. We didn't just happen. We weren't thrown out into the world to be just the next person to make the population clock go up a number. We were created for something so much more than this.

God loved us enough to create us. He even loved us enough to send His son Jesus Christ to die on the cross to save us from our sins. God loves us and it's the greatest love in the world. Another thing that I wish I had said was that being a Christian means to me that I get to have a close and personal relationship with God, and that's irreplaceable. No matter what stupid crap I do, God won't ever leave me. But I can't say that about people. Everyone makes mistakes and messes up, and people don't stay and some relationships don't last forever and it doesn't take much to end them, but no matter how far I go astray, God will always be faithful and will always be loyal. If I go too far out, God will always be waiting for me to come back. And you can't say that about everyone. 

I get to have a relationship with God, who created everything I know and love, and placed me here for a reason only He knows. But besides that, I have someone I can always go to. I can go to Him for comfort and healing and just help, because I've needed a lot of it in the past year. But because I've needed help that only God can give, I've become so much closer to Him. Before the year started, I took everything for granted and just kind of ignored everything. But something happened that brought me closer to God, and now I wonder why I even tried to get along by myself. There's a greater comfort knowing that I always have God to run to when something's wrong, and when it's late at night and no one's awake and I need someone, God is there. Now I thank God for everything, because without Him, I would have nothing. Through thick and thin, He has provided all of my needs and He's kept a roof over my head and clothes on my back when we could barely afford it.

So being a Christian. I accepted Jesus Christ as my Savior and now I can call myself a Christian. To me, it means having a relationship with God and knowing He'll take care of me and comfort me and always be there for me, because He loves me, and His love is something more than I could even ask for. The last thought I have is on baptism. I never understood it, but I went to summer camp and they were the best five days that made my summer go from kinda boring to super amazing. I learned so much at camp, and it was amazing to have five days of nothing but worshiping God, learning more about Him, spending time with other high school seniors and making new friends from church. But one thing I learned about was baptism, and one of things we do through baptism is declare our faith in Jesus Christ, so I'm going to do just that on 9/15/13. 
I think it's about time too.