"There is a false and momentary happiness in self-satisfaction, but it always leads to sorrow because it narrows and deadens our spirit. True happiness is found in unselfish love, a love which increases in proportion as it shared. There is no end to the sharing of love, and, therefore, the potential happiness of such love is without limit. Infinite sharing is the law of God's inner life. He has made the sharing of ourselves the law of our own being, so that it is in loving others that we best love ourselves." -Thomas Merton [No Man is an Island]
One of my mom's favorite stories about me regards my behavior at an airport terminal as a small child. Instead of sitting quietly, whining, or begging for food while waiting to board, I walked up to the chairs of strangers, stood in front of them, and stared for a long time. With my blonde hair and innocent expression, surely they initially felt that I was just cute and naive. But after a while, I'm sure it made them uncomfortable.
While I no longer stare noticeably at strangers, observing ordinary people and events is still a favorite pastime of mine. Sometimes I like to jot down my observations, which are sometimes quirky, and almost always verbose. This blog is an outlet for my mental ramblings in the hope that my thoughts will interest and entertain.
The more mundane details of my life are as follows: recent college grad, degree in English Education, living outside of a large city, member of a large family, daughter of a pastor, and lover of good books.
I forgot about one other thing: finding a Joseph Brodsky poem at the public library after a long and arduous search. When I pulled out the anthology, I sat down in the middle of the aisle between the shelves and read it three times. Sigh.
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