Pets: dogscatsturtlesfishiesandmore!

Pets made the list, so I must write. I love these animals. They are scoundrels and killers, but I just love them. This is Gracie Full Leacox and Luke Studguts Leacox. In my lifetime there has also been a Sammy, a Sophie, a Jack, and nameless kittens, and the Regulator cat who still visits every once and again, and Harvey Wallsucker (fish), and tens of other fish that were once named but I have now forgotten. How about Burnt Marshmallow--who was one of around thirty baby turtles we have temporarily owned, rescued baby owls, a crushed baby snapping turtle named Snappy, three baby opossums, around twenty quail, bright blue robin eggs, and at my old house we had chickens and roosters galore. When I was younger, after it had rained on a summer afternoon similar to the one today, I would pick out a worm friend for a play mate that day, I think the typical name for my female worms was Amy and for the male ones it was Max (don't ask me how I decided the sex of the worm, I have NO idea, just a strange imagination).

Yesterday, a mayfly was stuck in a pool of gathered water on the kitchen counter, I named him Tucker, picked up one of his stick legs, and led him to his safety outdoors with the other bugs. My family mocks me for this. I am aware that the average lifespan of a mayfly is not very long, but some part of my heart hurts a little bit when someone crushes the little guy for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I know I am ridiculous, but it's just a quirk I guess.

Anyways, I have grown up with many non-human companions in my lifetime and have lost all but two of them now. That is a strange thought. Maybe this is morbid but I say this in complete sincerity, having small doses of grief as a child opens up a thousand different lessons on growing up. Realizing that we do not live forever on this earth is a big one, and that when we do die something far greater is in store for us. And I do not care what theologians theologize about, there are animals in MY heaven, and they'll be worshiping right along next to me to the most high king. Even my little Snappy who I only knew for three seconds, I hope he is there.

My sister was telling me she didn't know if she ever wanted a dog again just because she feels slightly traumatized from all the loss, but I disagree. Not that pet to owner relationships are THAT strong of a real love, but it is still a giving and a receiving of comfort and affection. So LOVE is a dangerous dance. So much extreme joy or extreme hurt can result in this crazy back and forth. And especially if you give out your heart to a thousand different people, mathematically, the opportunity for you to get hurt is at least a thousand times. But let's say you only love a hundred different pets or people, then lucky you, only have the chance of being hurt a hundred ways. YET!!! Let's say the first person is only hurt by half, that means they are LOVED BY 400 more people if the second person is loved by 100% of their pets or people or whatever-beings. That was confusing, but the point is: It's a gamble. Everyone can admit it is a gamble. Whoever said loving is easy, was lying to you (hopefully nobody ever said this, but just in case). It may be easy in a sense that at times it is beautiful, and breathtaking -- yet, when was the last time you were gasping for your life-giving breath, whilst simultaneosuly thinking: "This is a piece of cake!" -- sorry bad joke.

I don't know if any of this had a point, except my mother once told me something I will never forget. She was saying that after she had my oldest sister Lindsey, and then found out she was pregnant with my other sister, Kelsea, she was so nervous because she thought she could never love anyone as much as she loved her beautiful daughter, Lindsey; she was terrified of not having enough love for two children and a husband. But then she said as soon as she had Kelsea, her heart grew double the size and she was overwhelmed with love for her second child. And she never had that same fear again.

One of my favorite quotes by one of my favorite authors speaks on this matter as well: "To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possible be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket--safe, dark, motionless, airless--it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside of Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell." -- C.S. Lewis

The point is, Love Expands the heart. It stretches and grows. Love does not shrivel your soul into an 880-year-old dead skeleton, in fact, the lack of love can accomplish that one. Ask God for more of His love to give for yourself and for others and perhaps a pet or two in there, he has unlimited supply, I promise. Ask God for more compassion. Ask God for strength to handle this new love and compassion. Ask God for wisdom. Jesus, our Savior, said ask and you shall receive. Let go of the fear of pain, and give and receive a little from Him and hopefully me and hopefully a spouse and hopefully a puppy or a kitty can fit in your life quite pleasantly as well.

When I asked God to speak to me last night He told me something about this acceptance of our questions. He first told me the verse that says come to me all who are weary and I will give you rest. Well, he said to me: come to me all who are lost, happy, defiant, peaceful, here, loud, quiet, working, sleeping, smiling, stressed, bored, faithful, tired, and ten other adjectives, and kept saying every possible character trait of a person, and then he just completely stopped and said: Come to Me All.

Come to me all, He says. This is the good news.

What to say about this day.

This summer, I am starting a photowritingartproject. It will be HealingHealthyandHappy. It will be called PieceOfAmani. It is a pun (I love puns). Amani means peace in Swahili. So it is a piece of peace.

Even now I am chuckling at myself chuckling at the alternative spelling and definition. Chuckling is not the right verb -- what is a word for a half-turned up mouth exuding sporadic chuckle-puffs?Now I am actually quietly laughing about the new created phrase chuckle-puff. But you have all heard the chuckle-puff. It is the laugh which occurs when something isn't funny, but only slightly entertaining. Chuckle-puff. Say it out loud, use it before the week ends, I don't mind.

I am off course; I must return! A while back I started making a list of things of this earth, or not of this earth which I love. Some are things everyone loves like hand-holding or the ocean, but others are uniquely gifts from God, like my love of dirty feet. The list is about 140+ long and I want to photograph or write about each one before 2011. I originally was only going to photo the project but then I started adding things like "the blood of Jesus" and "the Spirit" and "Doing crossword puzzle with my mother" and I realized some things are better written about. The reason behind all these "wild and whirling words": I want to use my blog as a vessel for some of pieceofamani. This will hopefully keep me accountable to keep practicing photography and writing.

But,

I must say this evening has been all together...(looking-for-the-right-word-pause)...strange. Off. Atypical. I am going to tell a story and emphasize the unconventionality of this night's events. The strangeness all began weeks ago when I told my mother I would be the photographer for my brother's eighth grade formal dance (she told me there would be some sort of small monetary compensation, because after all, they ARE eighth graders). I wore khaki pants and a button up dress shirt, and I kept putting my hands in my pockets like my father does when he is listening to someone drone on for a long time, you know the guy who over-explains the same thing in seven different ways, kind of like what I am doing now. Bless my dad's soul, he always nods his head upwards and keeps it there, all while his fingers feel around for keys or a wallet in his pockets--I kept doing that, but I only had lint to play with. Anyways, after my mother and I had entered the nostalgic arena, complete with my ex-leprechaun-principal not recognizing me--I think I misplaced those hyphens--she is my former principal, but she is still a leprechaun--I realized that it was going to be a very strange night. And it was. I was called bitch by an eighth grade boy who did not know the reason behind muttering something under your breath is so no one else can hear it. Despite my adult-attempting-to-look-professionally-legit-apparel, I was asked by countless teens if I was the photographer. I think they get confused with the contradiction of my young baby face and the fact that NO ONE ELSE AROUND WAS CARRYING A CAMERA, they kept asking me "are you the photographer?"

Alas, I am portraying them in a poor light and that is unfair to the unripened bunch of squaggly hormone-hyped gaggle. There were many well-behaved kids there -- but honestly, who wants to read about them in a story? The naughty ones are 10x more entertaining. Yes.

Something else weird: the stark contrast I felt between myself and the little chitlins. (I am using the term 'little' here referring to young, NOT their actual size because most were heads taller than me.) I didn't necessarily want there to be a line between myself and them, because last week I jumped off the swing while going too fast and high and scraped my elbows and hands. And two weeks ago, I tried to fit my entire body in trunk which could probably only hold a five year old. And just a few days ago, I cried and cried after a truck ran over a baby snapping turtle on the road near my house. My point is, there WAS no distinction between me and them, and yet, the separating line was broad as daylight in the dimly lit cafeteria. Of course, I could blame this on my mother (like most human daughters do) who was close in proximity and kept telling the chalk-full of energydrink jumping boys to "Settle down, please." Okay, now I am actually laughing; I wish everyone in the entire world could one day meet my mother. I know NO ONE like her. No one. Each time I posed a different couple or group to photograph, there were two boys who were entertained by jumping in the picture right before I snapped it. After this behavior was repeated , my mother physically removed them from the picture (pun intended). Neither one of them repeated their action after my mother laced all ten of her fingers around the smaller boy's forearm and drug his back across the tile flooring.

Anyways, the truth is, I think I was much worse than them in 8th grade. I didn't know the Lord and I hated myself a little bit, so I was cruel, and I cheated, and I faked, and I lied, and I, and I, and I, the list is endless. It is strange to return to the place where you were once someone else entirely. It was like I could still see the skinny thirteen-year-old Livi running amuck, being disrespectful and blindly selfish and peer-pressured to kiss amidst all the other junior-highers.

But that Livi is very separate from myself today. And that, my fellow friends and brethren, despite all the absurdities, is a damn good feeling.

fiction.

Broken Sink

The knobs on my mother’s bathroom sink

spray and spurt squirting water when twisted on.

Hot or cold--the pure porcelain, worn silver-trimmed, farmhouse handles--

spew cloudy well water on their nearest user.

In my last encounter, I swung open the door to shout toward the kitchen,

Mom, when are you going to get these fixed?

She did not respond,

but a faint whir of bubbles popped in her boiling water

as I smear my shirt with a blue hand towel.

She then said, there’s a sweet spot, honey, you just have to find it.

Back to the sink, I spun the four-pronged knob with force,

only to be puked upon again.

Frustrated,

I grasped the sink and looked up at the mirror

to see my father’s frustrated

eyes staring back at me.

Their watery blue hue reminding me of the loss and his absence,

and her loss, and why the broken sink handles stayed broken.

I left the bathroom and responded,

you claim there is, but I have yet to find it.