Nice Legs

As I was driving north on I-69 this Friday on my way to visit Chris, I heard a semi honk at me as I passed it. At first I thought he could see something that was wrong with my car that I couldn’t see, so I slowed down and got in front of him in the right lane. I turned off all of the noise in the car and could hear nothing wrong, but I saw the driver hold a sign up in his windshield, so I took it easy. Eventually, the driver passed me and I relaxed, thinking that nothing was wrong. As I passed the semi a second time, he honked again and I looked over and saw the sign: Nice Legs, and then a number to call. In that moment, I was horrified, and I drove off as quickly as I could, realizing what this man wanted from me. The more I thought about what had happened, the more disgusted I became, but also the more grateful. I had the option of driving away from that dangerous situation, and hundreds of thousands, possibly millions of women all over the world have no options when it comes to their safety and well being.

I just finished reading one of the books I received from Sister Eugenia at the counter trafficking conference I attended in Rome, and it told the story of Eastern European and Nigerian women who have been trafficked to Italy and who eventually found refuge in a safe house run by nuns in Caserta. Some of the women told stories of being taken to back rooms where modern day slave traders would look them up and down and decide if they were worth being bought, and I can just hear them saying about these girls, “Nice legs,” or “Nice ass,” or “Nice breasts,” and buying them so that they would prostitute themselves for the gain of their trader, losing their dignity, the sacred nature of sex, and themselves in the process.

These women who have been trafficked are no different from my friends, my cousins, my classmates, or me. One day, if I have daughters, they will be no different from them either. Their value in the eyes of God is great, and I believe that God’s heart is breaking in ways we cannot imagine for his daughters who are trapped in sexual slavery. I have never met a victim of trafficking personally, but ever since finding out about this issue at sixteen, my heart has been aching for them too. I may not know these women, but they are my sisters, and I long to reach out to them. I’m asking you to reach out to them too.  As people who can drive away, who can always have access to help, we need to speak on behalf of the voiceless and oppressed. We need to stop with the mentality that we are helpless against the evil of this world, or that we can ignore that evil. Trafficking is quickly and stealthily permeating the United States, and we cannot write off prostitutes as whores who should just try a little bit harder to get out of that kind of work. One thing that touched me deeply at the counter trafficking conference was the idea that there is a universe inside of everyone, and we have to treat everyone as such.

In Song of Solomon, God teaches us about sex and its sacred nature. He also speaks of protecting the defenseless against predators who would take advantage of them. The woman talks of how her brothers used to protect her from harm:

“Our little sister has no breasts.
What shall we do with our little sister
when men come asking for her?
She’s a virgin and vulnerable,
and we’ll protect her.
If they think she’s a wall, we’ll top it with barbed wire.
If they think she’s a door, we’ll barricade it.”

Song of Solomon 8:8-9

Her brothers kept out predators for her until she was ready to be married, and after marriage, her husband took on the same role. This is something we can all do for women who are unable to keep out those who think that they are doors who are open to anyone.

There are several things you can do to help in the counter-trafficking movement. Here are a few:

Support legislation that will put an end to human trafficking. United States Senate Bill 596 authorizes grant funding to address the sex trafficking of minors. It is currently in process, and you can call or email your senator to support the bill.

Get more information from trusted sources, such as the U.S. Department of State’s annual Trafficking in Persons Report, notforsalecampaign.org, and humantrafficking.org.

Educate others by talking openly about this issue and showing them tools to fight slavery worldwide and in the United States.

Donate as you are able to anti-trafficking organizations.

Challenge the glamorization of pimps in our culture.

That truck driver is still on the road, and that makes me uneasy, but not as uneasy as the fact that the trafficking of women functions as a very efficient business, and that there are people today who have been reduced to the flesh that houses their souls. Thousands of girls reduced to, “Nice legs.”

Holy Week

As most of my friends have already found out, I love Holy Week. I have a lot of fond memories surrounding the Easter season, including being rededicated in my high school’s pool on Good Friday, washing Louis Yaegar’s feet on Maundy Thursday, and being gathered around our table sharing Easter dinner in the entry way with my friends and family. We have home videos of me marching around in the yard, chanting, “Easter egg hunt, Easter egg hunt.” I have been caught on yet another home video hiding a coconut monkey in our lazy susan from my brother. When we still went to house church in Lafayette, Alan Welch laid out his shirts on Palm Sunday for us to tread on as we walked into the living room for worship.

This year, my friends humored me and celebrated alongside me in remembering the beauty and mystery that surrounds Holy Week. As we washed each others feet on Thursday, I came to realize what I love about celebrating this week (I love celebrating too). I love the remembering. Remembering how much I need Jesus, how necessary it is to serve others, how deep and wide and long and high is the love of Christ. This is something that I’m aware of all year, but I savor it during holy week.

So thanks to everyone who celebrated along with me.

Spring

This afternoon I laid on a blanket in between Dehority and Woodworth and basked in the glory of spring, even though the wind was high. Friday all of the fountains were put back into commission on campus, and this made me have a minor spasm of joy in the middle of one of my campus tours on Saturday for which I apologized profusely. One of the dads said to me, “Don’t worry about it, the fountains mean spring. We know how important that is.” After giving a tour in the snow three days previously, I could feel the importance of the fountains.

This past winter has been particularly unforgiving, and amidst the snow, ice, and wind I have been experiencing the greatest workload of my life. While taking 19 credit hours and working two jobs, I have been applying to go to Ghana and for scholarships to pay for it. After four months of work, the last month will be the greatest challenge, scheduling classes both here and abroad, getting vaccinations, meeting with department heads, establishing power of attorney, and preparing for culture shock are just a few of the things that need to happen before May first. The most difficult part of this is that come May first, I may experience the end of the study abroad road. I’ve been enrolled in a program that my scholarships don’t cover, and unless I get the Boren scholarship, it will be impossible for me to finance this trip. While I am a finalist for the scholarship, I’m trying not to get myself too excited.

I’m in the winter of this process right now, and the winter has been long, but just as quickly as the fountains were turned on Friday, my life will turn into spring. Because whether or not I’m in Ghana next year, I’ll get to go to Rome and London this summer and will hopefully be meeting Sister Eugenia, my anti-human trafficking hero. I’ll also get to participate in a fellowship and research with a professor, in addition to continuing my work with Free the Slaves. And as much as I detest the idea of applying all over again to go to Ghana, I know that there is always junior year for study abroad. So Ghana or no Ghana, spring will come, and God knows exactly where I need to be. I’m just praying for patience, and that my anxiety can be alleviated, and I’m hoping that it is part of God’s plan for my life to be in Ghana next year, and if it’s not, I pray that I can be okay with that.

Homeschool Land

Three weeks ago, Becca Jackson and I were talking about our spring break plans, which at the time consisted of, “I’m going to go home and sleep. And visit some people.” Then, because we are the same person, we both looked at each other after being struck by the same thought. Neither of us wanted to voice our idea just in case it wasn’t what the other had in mind, but Becca said, “Do you want to come to my house and visit home school land?”

There’s nothing I love more than visiting the homes of friends. Especially now that I’m in college, because I know that I’m getting to know lots of people pretty well, but I don’t know how any of them came to be who they are. My history with them goes back only seven months. So Becca and I grabbed onto this idea and expanded it to include the home of Chris, and we began planning Home School tour 2011.

Spring break has not been what Becca and I wanted, but it has been wonderful. We did not need what we wanted. There were many interesting road trip stops that never got visited, but there have been numerous kitchen tables to gather around, friends to meet, porches to swing on, couches to nap on, and quiet places to rest. I learned how to defend myself from numerous different attacks at a Karate lesson, how to properly peel a potato, tried new foods, popped popcorn on the stove, and did nothing but sit in the company of friends for hours on end.

We had so many fun “activities” planned to keep us entertained, and in the end all we needed was to be home. As we drew near Chris’s house on Sunday, every little thing he saw about home made him more and more happy, and his happiness infected Becca and I (even if we mocked him a little).  When we rolled into Terre Haute, Becca was equally as excited, her face etched with a permanent grin after we exited the interstate.

Chris, Becca, and I kept talking about how this was going to be the best spring break ever, and it has been. Not because we got to do everything we planned, but everything we did do, we did together.

photos to come 🙂

Jumping Around in my Trampoline Room

And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you’ll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.      Ephesians 3:15-19

When I was a senior in high school, my mom and I would get together and pray about where I would be going to college about once a week (at least when we remembered. Grace and peace). I had always liked these verses in Ephesians, and one particular week at school my government teacher told us a story that gave me a metaphor for the love of God that Paul is describing here. He said that in Bill and Melinda Gates’s house, there is a trampoline room.

That’s right. A trampoline room. Now I’m not talking a room that has a trampoline in it. I mean a room that is wall to wall, ceiling to floor, completely covered in trampoline. When I was praying with my mom the following Sunday, I connected Ephesians to a trampoline room. Christ’s love is just like this, only cooler.

In the trampoline room of God’s love, I am bouncing with a gentle ferocity. I am being flung in a thousand different directions. Each direction is another way that God’s love manifests itself in the world, and just when I think I understand the dimension of love that I am currently experiencing, I am suddenly hurtling away, but am in no way heading away from God’s love. I’ve just switched from experiencing the breadth to testing its length, from plumbing its depths to rising to its heights.

And the ride is wild

If you look closely at the above photo, you’ll see that all of the people are me. This is my self-portrait, made to palely imitate what I think the trampoline room is like.

Dodgeball Victory

Those of you who know me know that dodge ball is one of my least favorite things in the world, but I may be coming around to the idea that it has some positive aspects. Maybe.

I have always loved that when you catch a ball in dodge ball, you not only get out the person who threw it, you get another person on your team back in. I think I like this because I throw like a girl, but I can feel like I contribute to the team by being a full time catcher.

I think that in life when we fight to break down evil and succeed, a lightness shines in that gives an illumination that is twice as bright as before. Not only is the darkness gone from the place from which it has been banished, but light has replaced it. When I’m overwhelmed by a world that seems hopeless, I focus on this two point swing, and I rejoice.

French Toast

Right on schedule, I got my craving for french toast just as the biggest weather event in a century knocked on Muncie’s door.

Good thing I was prepared.

Did you know it only costs $200 to have a ball pit in your house?

Yeah, neither did they.

Children’s Museum

The Children’s Museum was free for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, so we went.

Thursday, January 13, 2011

It was a Thursday like any other, and then this happened…

We went to take this blog photo in Morgan and Talley’s room. Aren’t we adorable?

Cue tornado of destruction:

After this blessed event, Liz, Matt, and I continued the evening with a visit to a puppy, shenanigans in Pizza King, goodnight serenades, practical jokes, and chasing after rabbits, ending at 2:00 a.m., six hours after the carpet incident.