I bleed scarlet and grey

Ouch, Canada.... that almost hurt. :p I'm not so senseless in my great love and affection for The Ohio State that I would pretend that our entire campus of 65K operates at an Ivy school level of academic competence.

It's been a while since I've blogged, so I'll update on where I'm at.

I am officially back at the Ohio State University and just finished my first full week of classes. I'm PSYCHed to be back in the dorms, on the campus I love, and listening to intoxicated students scream O-H! I-O! outside my window at 3AM in the morning. I'm also completely exhausted from IV, school, and myself.

I love being on this campus. I love the students. I love the culture. I'm loving the pioneering work that our IV chapter is doing and my ministry. I'm taking a Soc of Religion class, a class on Social Movements, Racquetball, and loving it. I'm doing my thesis on multiethnic christian spaces with my field work focusing on my chapter and both really excited and grateful for the opportunity to conveniently combine two of my favorite things.

But its all a bit much right now and I've been struggling a lot with stress and anger these past few weeks. I'm stressed to the point that I'm feeling stomach and back pains and possibly having anxiety attacks. I've never experienced stress like this before. I've become angry at everything from God and my past to white culture to my own friends for their materialism and consumer culture mentality. I've started praying the liturgy at least twice a day, which has really been helping my prayer life and the stress level.. (My staff has decided that our leadership team should learn to grow in prayer this year so we're all praying the liturgy and psalms on a 3 month cycle. Can I say, the liturgy is hot.) I'm interpreting the anger as real signs that race, my past and future, and consumerism(?) are specific areas that God wants to redeem in me and is doing a work already. Being angry is okay for this reason; it just takes a lot of energy out of me.

My class on social movements is a graduate level course so we aren't tested on the incredible amount of reading we're assigned but asked to apply concepts and write lots of papers. For the class, each student selects a social movement to study and write on and I'm considering choosing the liberation theology movement in Latin America (for obvious reasons). That or something on community/neighborhood organization. Part of this week's reading was on the IWW (Industrial Workers of the World) movement (a labor movement, mostly pre-Depression). I was sitting in Caribou Coffee reading about the persecution that IWW members incurred and was getting really worked up. I was really surprised by my reaction, but very grateful for it. I've been asking God to grow in me a heart more like His, where poverty and the poor are concerned, and I think He really is working on softening my heart. I had been wondering whether God had really heard that prayer this summer and so nearly crying into my textbook in the middle of a coffeeshop was really encouraging to me.

Lastly, props to Mr. Sean Prorak. I thank God whenever I read your updates on your struggle to discern God's path for you among the poor...... and I am remembering you in my prayers when I pray for the poor and oppressed. (every Saturday morning, according to the Book of Common Prayer.) Be blessed.

I got myself an ivy that has grown so out of control that my mother has started to amputate its legs.




Oh yeah, I'm going to Urbana. :)