Kenya Excitement

Posted on April 2, 2016 by Eirians under life, travel

In some groups I feel like I have to sit orderly in my seat, but in some I can just collapse on the floor without caring. My outreach team is that sort of group. The guys I go with on a missions trip to Kenya in a month, we hang out and prepare and feel like a family. And I feel like I haven’t been a good speaker lately, but I was gonna do a short preaching for them, for practice, and I could just relax and share my thoughts and I think I got some confidence back. It’s funny, like God knows that Kenya was not my first choice for outreach location so he surprises me by giving me the best people to go with instead.

And I started thinking about the backpack I will carry. I wrote a blog post about it more than a year ago, Here, where I said that it stands in the corner of my cabin like a promise. It’s here now, in the house I share with eight other girls in Florida, USA. I will carry it all over Kenya. And then somewhere else. And I can’t believe that this is my now now, but that backpack will also remain my promise.

Florida mornings and full moon.

2016.03.06

Posted on March 13, 2016 by Eirians under life

The first time I saw you guys, one of you wore these really short shorts and cowboy boots, and that’s not why I noticed you (it’s really not, shut up), but because who I’d guess is your girlfriend was sitting a few metres away from me, overlooking the sea, and you were making these weird poses trying to get the perfect photo of her. You were some of those real life tumblr persons in a city in Florida where everyone is over 60.

The next time I saw you, we were waiting for the bus by a famous beach, and you told us it’s okay, the bus here is always late. We thought we’d missed it and planned to walk back to the base. Thank you. My friend spoke to you, about how we always move in groups, the students from my DTS, and how everything looks like a cute field trip. You seemed nice, funny and sweet in that sort of self conscious way that’s relatable. And you seem happy together. I like your clothes. You were the center of different universes standing next to us, I hope you have good passions and places and people.

I hurt myself in the weirdest of ways

Posted on March 1, 2016 by Eirians under life

The headline sounds like this could be a poem, but it’s the story of how I walked into a wall. I found it in my old notes and thought I’d share it. So, sometime during the summer of 2015:

I woke up yesterday morning with a horrible pain in my back. I twisted and turned under the covers, but noticed that it was impossible to make it feel better, so I decided to stand up and go inside. Now, if you’ve read my blog for a while you know that I sort of live in a cabin in our garden, so this meant putting shoes on and crossing the lawn. And suddenly, while doing this, my vision started getting blurry along the edges. More and more of it turned black, you know the way it does when you stand up too fast, but then it didn’t stop and I realised that I had my eyes open and still couldn’t see anything. Delirious as I was my first thought was that then I simply had to feel my way inside, so I put my arms out to try and find the house wall. In my mind this was completely graceful. I tried to take a few steps forward. In reality I ran/stumbled a few steps and then crashed right into our porch.

I just imagine how this must have looked if any of the neighbours were watching. The girl next door wearing a huge white t shirt and clogs while stumbling across the grass and walking straight into the house before collapsing onto the grass, and then just sort of staying there even though it was quite a cold summer morning and had rained during the night. Wow. After a while I managed to stand up again and make my way inside, laying on the floor until everything stopped spinning. And that’s probably the most interesting thing that’s happened in my life lately.

(Fascinating)

All Good Things Are Wild and Free

Posted on February 21, 2016 by Eirians under life

I stayed behind yesterday. We went downtown to have a photoshoot and I stayed when my friends went back. I walked around in that detached-from-reality kind of way and looked at how the city I stay in looks like a postcard. Clear skies and shiny metal buildings and palms and palms and palms, sun that makes your face melt off.

Then I sat down on the rocks and was happy.

And this might sound sad, but I loved going to a sea that wasn’t full of memories. In Sweden it’s tiny towns and cozy houses and driftwood, people with wrinkles too deep, an ocean that slowly breaks everything. Here everything just is. No childhood memories. Just sturdy rocks and people dancing.

The bridge before I ran over it.

The bridge after I ran over it, resting on a bench in the shade. My face was so red people gave me worried glances when they saw me.

My postcard wish is that you don’t send me home.

(Also, backstage from the photoshoot..:

unspecified

wow)

Beach Day

Posted on February 1, 2016 by Eirians under life

Befriend artists, they’ll spend half an hour creating Instagram aesthetics with you

And then you’ll dance together on the beach

I could get used to this kind of January.

What is a DTS? (So Far)

Posted on January 28, 2016 by Eirians under life

A DTS – Discipleship Training School – with the organisation YWAM (Youth With A Mission) is 6 months that you set apart for God. 3 months of lectures and then almost 3 months of outreach, a missionary trip. I left Sweden a week ago and it feels like I’ve spent a lifetime here. My particular DTS in Florida has about 30 students and is also focused on the arts, so you can choose an art track to focus on during lecture phase. And it’s already my home. These people are my people. We prayed for the nations this morning, prayed for each other this afternoon. Ride our bikes through the city under Florida sun and rain and moonlight. They’ve got nothing left now either, we all left to come here and this is where we are, we are the ones who need to be each others’ home. What God does is good. I never want to leave.

So I’m Moving to the US..

Posted on January 14, 2016 by Eirians under life, travel

Or maybe not moving, but I’m going away for almost 6 months! On this DTS, Discipleship Training School with YWAM (This thing: http://mission-live.com/mota/ http://www.ywamsarasota.com ) and the first 3 months I’m going to be in Florida. The next 3 months I don’t know.

Also, I’m leaving in a week.