a poem of seasons

The seasons of me [?]
like the seasons in nature
I go through changes
Winters
   mild & harsh ones
    seemingly never ending ones
      will it ever be warm again?
         Will there be safety again? anywhere?
Summers
  cool ones
    nostalgic ones, with their memories & stories
      hot, sweaty, uncomfortable ones
        yet... i am alive, full of possibilities, 
          drinking it all in
Springs
  with their "violent" mood/temp changes 
    ups & downs 
      sliding from feeling like summer one day
        to feeling like winter hasn't left the next day 
         [hour?]
Falls
  where the truth
     is revealed in deaths
       color changes
         long walks through 
           real life fantasy landscapes
sometimes I like these seasons
each & every one
sometimes 
I just want it to be
any season 
but this one
which 
I guess 
is simply me
being human
sometimes I like that
and
sometimes
I don't like that
either.
by b.e. noll

part journal entry, part poem to the inner critic

So this didn't turn out the way I expected. [I never really do what I expect. And even if I do, it doesn't turn out the way I think it will. Yep, welcome to being human. We knew you'd come.]
I did have a nice day today. My Babe & I hung out. Saw SON OF GOD together, with some friends [brothers & sisters] from LW. I liked it. I think I want to blog about some of it. Though it will be a bit different than anything I would have tried before on lent. Which requires more than a little bit of bravery on my part. We'll see.
Today I wanted to post more on self-injury. I just don't like what I've written. It's missing something...not sure what, I just know my writing does NOT have it. So somehow, after taking a walk this morning I wrote a poem [poem-ish thing] that is a bit unusual. So I think I'll post it. And maybe link to a few things on self-injury.
[a warning on the poem... I didn't really have my "filter" on. So, yes, there is sarcasm in here. You might not be used to me writing/ speaking this way. Wrote this listening to Bearcat.]

dear inner voice [inner critic]
I've decided to be like you today.
I'm not going to ask to talk to you
or wait for the "right time" for you
or even ask if you want to hear what I say
if it offends you
         -then I'm saying it right.
you seem to want perfection
pick a different universe
[this one's not for you.
and the biggest thing wrong with me
        -is you]
you tell me everything about me is wrong
funny
I don't recall asking for your opinion
also,
You don't need to repeat yourself
I heard you the first 1,000 times
so,
let's switch places for a sec
I don't like your attitude
I don't like the way you form sentences
your in my head
so no, you don't need to talk that loud
I'm     right     here
your a bully
know how I know?
you create 1 or 2 clever sentences
and then say them to death
and YOU think I'M boring? [/annoying/1 dimensional]
you act like you are the greatest intellect you have ever met
you should get out more.
So
this is me
wanting a divorce
you can keep your attitude & self rightiousness
you don't have room
for me AND your ego
that's ok
I'll go
I'll even go quietly
[everyone knows I do stealth amazingly well]
I also know your friends
hate my friends
[so you & your friends
and me & my friends agree on something, wonderful]
take your friends with you
I'll help you pack
I don't mind
A  N  D
I'm going to help others
send your friends packing, too
if misery loves company
you & your friends will be in heaven
so
in closing
buh-bye,
"don't let the door hit you, where the good Lord split you"
miss you... like a cold sore
"have a NICE day"
[just, please, do it somewhere else]
B

[& now I hear "Already Gone" by The Eagles in my head.]

Ok. So I have held onto one last trailer for the movie: "Day One" Here it is. a "Behind the Scenes" one.
Day One is also about To Write Love On Her Arms. I haven't quite found "my way" of telling you about them. You can check out their website though. They are really cool. What community is all about.

and, as I am a music lover, I thought instead of doing what I first thought of for today. I thought I'd do a more... I don't know, you'll get it....
JJ Heller - Control
Krystal Meyers - Beauty of Grace
Carrie Underwood - Wasted
Dream Theater - Hollow Years
King's X - Dream in My Life
Lee Ann Womack - I hope you dance
JJ Heller - Loved

Hope you had a great day. And, whether it snows bad or not, have a great one tomorrow also.
May His grace drip from your fingers,
B

a poem

Just breathe

Don’t worry

About the sky

That might be falling soon

Don’t let

What others think

Ruin

Or hide

Who you are

Don’t let

The stress of the day

Ruin the night

Too

Just

Breathe

Find

Whatever it is

That unwinds you

Find things

That cause you to be

Swallowed up in

Peace

Grace

Love

Make sure

You have time

At least weekly

To do those things

So they can help your

 Body

Mind

Spirit

To

Just

Breathe

You don’t have to

Become what others want

You need to be around

Those who will love you

For you

As you

Those who only need you

To

Be

And breathe

By b.e. noll

[thanks Mom]

an unusual use of band aides

I’m not sure how to say this.

Where to begin, how much to share.

Or perhaps what flack I’ll get for this. [flack, disbelief, pick an adjective]

Sat. March 1^st, is Self Injury Awareness Day.

I got an idea, about 4 to 6 months ago. The idea will probably sound really stupid to at least some of you. I’m going to wear a homemade bracelet. Made of band aides. Real band aides. I’ve been practicing an old drawing I did a few years ago. 147:3 drawn in the shape of a heart. Why?

“He heals the broken hearted,

and binds up their wounds”

-Psalm 147:3

It can pretty much be said that there is broken hearted-ness at the core of self-injury. I first heard of self-injury through To Write LoveOn Her Arms [twloha]. I’m not sure if I can “come up with some cool way of putting them on this” or not. I’m hoping to. Some “unique font” that is “all me”. I’m not raising money, or asking for anything. I just know a few people who self injure. I know that you know [/know of] at least one person who has self-injured. I know, because you’ve heard of me. You’re reading this. So, if no one else comes to mind… I have. I didn’t really know that’s what it’s called. I called it “one of the bizarre things about myself that, if you knew it, you would think I’m stranger than you already thought I was”. When I heard of twloha, I thought they were awesome [I STILL think they’re awesome, btw]. I just couldn’t imagine that someone would cut themselves on purpose. Do you have ANY idea how many times I’ve had cuts on me? All I can say is, if I had all the stitches here in front of me, I could probably make a regulation baseball out of them. I decided to read a book on self-injury…I didn’t get very far into the book when I came to a frightening discovery. Cutting is the most common form of self-injury. As in. Not. The. Only. One. Some other forms of self-injury include: biting, wound interference, hair pulling, banging self against walls [sometimes to the point of breaking bones]… So there it was. My strangeness in print. I bite my lip. Sometimes I pick at it. I pick at my skin. [summer usually isn’t as bad as winter] I pick at [interfere with the healing of] my wounds. I began to write 147:3 on the band aides. [after reading Psalm 147:3 one day] I’d leave them on longer. So I would have something “non self destructive” to pick at. This seemed to help. I don’t do too bad anymore.

Though in all honesty, the band aides were the starting point. I journal, write poetry, take hikes [of varying lengths], & I’m never very far from my camera. These also have helped. This blog began as a chance to bleed out my sorrows healthily. A lot of my writing seems to be like going to confession. Or perhaps an AA meeting. [not that I’ve been. So keep that in mind. For those who have & think I’m wrong] I feel bad that it seems like I have these deep, sharing ugliness with you blog posts. Somehow sandwiched in between poems & lighter posts. I just wanted to say this. For those who might see me wearing it, it’s easier to state why here. Than to have someone come up to me & ask “out of the blue” what it’s for. So this is my answer.

I need to wrap this up for now. Even though I feel like I’m leaving you hanging. I have an earlier than usual day tomorrow. [my long drive day for work]

May His grace drip from your fingers,

B

This is the book by the way. Inside a Cutter's Mind By Jerusha Clark

so many directions

Lets see if I can post briefly here. I'm really being pulled in many directions. I think I slept 2 whole hrs last night. [though part of that was Jimmy Fallon's fault. SO loved watching U2 on The Tonight Show last night. Loved the slow build of Ordinary love live acoustic, & then Jimmy singing behind Bono & Bono inviting Roots to join them at the end.]
I just have too much good stuff going on here. A class I'm taking. Book I'm reading. I've been drawing a bit more lately. Still writing poems like mad. I can barely contain them. Some are branching out from my usual form. I'm really liking this. It's like tapping into a new well. And suddenly I hear a therapist friend telling me again: "you should get together with one of your musician friends & turn one of your poems into a song." Perhaps I will. Just...not this minute.
So here's a new poem.
[untitled]
Sometimes

we have to fight
to feel love
as though
there is an ocean
of stars
between us
there is...
I know [now]
because...
I put them there
but
they
are nothing like
the sky
they fakely hide
I shouted
"I have no one"
and the real hurt is
behind
my makeshift veil
a crowd stood
and I can't help
but hear Bono sing:
"...you don't see [us]
BUT
YOU
WILL..."
you aren't invisible
we see you
please see us
please come on over
join us
be with us
let us be with you
We can't make you
we can only wait
for you
to realize we are not
 a "them"
we can be
an us.
you can be part
of us
[there is no them]
by b.e. noll

May His grace drip from your fingers,
B

p.s. I'm hoping I can get some of these posts I've been working on finished so I can post them.

to "flesh out" a tweet

I'm not sure how to preface this. It's maybe a bit too "stream of consciousness" in comparison with my usual "fair". I hope you can gain something out of it. [at the least a good laugh] Maybe it'll seem more like a journal entry.

I thought I’d share a bit about something I tweeted to Michael Gungor. I realize that some of my friends may check me out on there. Knowing that my story has some dark parts to it, they may read into what I said. Sometimes I can field questions about this easily. Sometimes I just give a knee-jerk reaction, or brush it off. Partly because a lot can happen between my online writing & the next time you see me. So I thought I’d take a moment to really share about it.

First let me open making sure all of you are on the same page. Michael Gungor tweeted:

Not a great night of sleep. Probably ought to change out of my suit next time I sleep in my car..

to which I responded: [@bought_as_is] don't know bout that one [suit part]. avoid the drivers seat. I hated that. no choice at the time, but hated it. #sore

For some reason I thought about this today. A lot. Wondering if someone would think that I had been homeless for a time. Or that I ran away when I was young. At the very least wondering what age I was when I did this.

This isn’t a sad story. Or part of that. This is one small story in the first community I was in outside of my family. [That is: Mom & Dad, & “The Nolls”, etc.] They/we were called YAF Fishnet. I don’t know how many times Fishnet went to Wyoming for a “summer camp”. I know I didn’t go along every time. I did go twice. I also don’t remember the two times separately anymore. It plays in my mind as if it was one trip, somehow. Except for maybe the discrepancies within them.  So, I wasn’t really made to sleep in the drivers seat of the van. I just knew [have always felt] that I can handle un-comfortable situations more than some can. I don’t mean this to sound: tough/poor me/ no one loves me, or anything. I guess I just feel like: as long as I’m not being shot, set on fire, cut up, or beaten it can’t be that bad, really. I’ll live. [whether I like it or not is up to me] So I volunteered to sleep there. Mostly because SOMEONE would have to. Now you cannot recline in most rental vans really well. [this was a rental] So I woke up kind of “out of sorts”. Stiff. I joked about it. I remember hoping I wouldn’t have to explain to a cop why it was that a 15 or 16 year old kid was sleeping in the drivers seat of an “out of state” rental van, at a rest stop on the interstate. Thankfully, I didn’t have to. I also remember feeling very awkward when we drove a little down the road to a Hardee’s. We got to use their rest room, to clean up for the day. You cannot imagine the looks you get when you go into the rest room. Proceed to try to wet your hair into some fashion that no longer resembles “the mad scientist” look, then wash your “pits” [you haven’t LIVED till you dry your armpits with rest room paper towels.] & then brush your teeth there. To make matters worse, I have always looked younger than I actually am. [a trait I have generously received from my Dad. He looks about 5 years older than me, no, seriously. It’s funny…& it’s not so much.] So I actually AM about 15 or 16…but don’t look a day over, what 8? 9? MAYBE 10? [why is it: “you don’t look a day over___”? Why a day? Why not 14 hours & 7 min.? just curious.] Now that you have hopefully laughed at least a little. …I gotta say I thought a bit about how it might feel to be homeless. NOT that this little moment would really give me much of an understanding, mind you. You don’t know what any negative experience is like, until you’ve lived it long enough to want to turn it off or change the channel. Only to realize… that you can’t, because you’re not ON TV. People look at you differently. Or try not to look at you. You can imagine the looks our leader got. Being seen as “the Dad” for us, by some. There was an unspoken look at times of: “can’t take care of all these kids? You should be ashamed.” He took it in stride. Looking back, the hardest part of dealing with us was after U2’s The Joshua Tree came out. 2 ½ to 3 days of the whole …tape on repeat. Poor John [aka: “Yanni” Don’t ask…no, seriously, don’t ask] Between my buddy Scott & I we bought, what? 4 copies of it the year it came out. Stupid hungry tape deck. [for my high school friends who remember… That was Scott also called “Spot, the finely groomed mutt” I still miss his drawings. And his/our “lingo”. Freshie. Stylin’. No race. Sexy chick. Konnichiwa. Yes I loved having our own little language. And I do know that Konnichiwa is Japanese. Which I had with several of my friends. You know who you are. And I have the surveillance recordings. Safely tucked away in a vault in the side of a mountain in the Swiss Alps. You can only get there by helicopter, in the summer months. I could go on, I won’t.]

Sorry this is a rather silly post. I do like making people laugh. However, please do not come up to me & say: “be funny”. Because…well… that’s not funny. Also, I’m not a vending machine.

There is something serious in there, somewhere.

I’ve only ever had a feeling similar [to the homeless feeling] when I went to see Gimme Shelter. I went by myself. Due largely to the circumstances around the evening. As well as some of the subject matter in the film. Sometimes it’s just better to go to a film by myself. So no one tries to “comfort” me while I watch it. I still have certain times when touching me doesn’t “translate” like you might wish for it to. I’m not one for soft touches, anyway. Gives. Me. The. Creeps. It was a bit tough & “reminiscent” for me to watch the abuse scenes. These I can watch & remember my own at the same time. If someone was with me, they might have wanted to comfort me during those. When I remember these times… someone touching me is like putting your lips to my ears & screaming as loud as you can. I’m just…”on”. [you might better understand it as feeling very “bring it”] Anyway, I saw this with only two other people in the theater. As I watched it I became self conscious. The main character is in a gray hoodie. I wasn’t quite back to health yet so I had worn one in. I was fine for the hour I sat in the theater before the movie started. Ravenously reading Purpose for the Pain by Renee Yohe. And remembering meeting her the night before. [I think it was during this. That I realized that she was the first person, outside of my family, that has hugged me & I didn’t “jump” or defend myself from it without thinking.] I forgot about my “unknown companions” in the theater during much of the film, till the end. Then I’m wondering what they think. Do they think I’m like her? Alone with no one to care about me. [I have felt that way at times.] Part of me wanted to tell them that though I’m alone tonight, I really do have people in my life. My own “twloha” community. Who, if I called, would ask roughly 3 questions: Where are you? Maybe, how do I get there? What do you need? How can I help? And then give an “ETA” so I know when to look for them/ how long I have to wait for their arrival. It’s nice to know I have a lot of people who will be with me. No matter what I have to live through. Family. Families. It’s nice to be chosen…rather than tolerated.

take care. Hopefully you are thinking of your "people". The one's who will drop everything & come running if you need someone. The one's you have "inside jokes" with that no one else would understand. Those people are the best.

May His grace drip from your fingers,

B

Valentine’s day [reboot?]

I’m thankful for this morning. [No, guys, not for the reason that probably first comes to mind.]

Along with some friends, I got to show love to people. People I only met today. They needed help. We could give that help. To borrow from Jamie Tworkoski [& his story, To Write Love On Her Arms] We got “to play the rescuers. To move for things that matter.” To be the ones to answer the t-shirts:

People need other people.

Wake up, you’re alive. We’re on your side.

LOVE IS THE MOVEMENT.

I’ve met so many people who say: “Why do you care? Why do you [guys] do this? Why are you still my friend?” The saddest: “I don’t deserve to be loved.” [or “I don’t deserve your love”] None among us deserves to be loved. The details of why are different. I’ve said it before: “we’re all broken. The pattern of the cracks is different for each of us. Yet the depth of the cracks are the same.”

Love wouldn’t be powerful at all… if you deserved it. You don’t. Why else would it mean so very much to us? We really feel loved…& it really knocks us over, speechless. When the one who loves us, knows all the reasons we can think of, why they shouldn’t love us. …and they love us anyway. THAT is the love that makes us reach for the tissues.

We all need help. Sooner or later. Often there is nothing we can really do for those who help us. “Can’t we PAY you?” That would cheapen it, ruin it completely. Love isn’t bought. It costs too much. You can’t afford love…& you’ll die without it.

YOU

ARE

LOVED.

More than you know…by someone closer than you think. No matter WHO you are. It’s nice…after being on the receiving end, to be on the giving end. The giving end of a beautiful circle. A loving circle.

Being a part of a community of love, is so amazing. If only there were words. It’s nice to be who we were made to be. “…to be the body of Christ coming alive to meet their needs…” [again, from Jamie Tworkoski’s story]

So thankful for LWCC, for my growth group, for my family, for friends [new ones & those who’ve been with me for quite a while].

So…I find it more than a little ironic that we got to do this today. The day after Valentine’s Day. Love cannot be confined to a day, an act, one moment. Love is defined by one day, one act, one moment. It cannot really be measured. We don’t deserve it. It’s so very nice to get what we don’t deserve.

Plumb – Don’t Deserve You [thanks for making this a single, I really like it]

JJ Heller – What Love Really Means, If You Fall

“…there were scars, before my scars. Love written on the hands, that hung the stars. Hope living in the blood, that was spilled, for me…” – from Control, by JJ Heller

 
Hope you could enjoy Valentine’s Day

May His grace drip from your fingers,
B