Your Dash: sharing a thought-provoking poem

I'm in the "real world" now.

I get up early and grocery shop and even was lucky enough to find a job.

Though my job may not pay a lot and it will only last the summer, it is going to be the best foundation I could hope for to begin the rest of my career. I'm starting out in the real world as the Mission Team Coordinator for Lowcountry Ministries.

Aka: my job is to go out in the community, serve, and love on people - and help others to do the same.

See? I told ya. It is a great first step into the real world.

It is helping me keep things in perspective as I figure out what to pursue in my future profession.

Thanks to my job and my great boss, Larry Leming,  I was recently reminded of The Dash Poem by Linda Ellis which also helps me keep things in perspective.

So, regardless of where you are in your profession or the real world, "would you be proud of the things they say about how you spent your dash?"

Speak Out Before There is No One Left: Stop Bullying Now

Watch this powerful 41 seconds from MTV's fabulous campaign: A Thin Line.

It is so well done and so accurate. Words are etched into our memories if not literally etched with ink into our skin.

And watch this sweet anti-bullying ad.

Just one person standing up for another is incredibly powerful. And we all should; here is a reason why:

First They Came 

by Pastor Martin Niemoller

In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. 

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. 

Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. 

Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up.

This past September alone, there were four very public deaths of gay students who commited suicide - because. of. bullying. 

We cannot be silent as those around us are relentlessly bullied. 

We have to speak up... for the red heads, for the LGBT community, for the "uncool" kids... ANYONE facing this daily torture. 


Stop Bullying Now.
 

The Voice You Hear When You Read Silently - an awesome poem

The Voice You Hear When You Read Silently

- Thomas Lux

is not silent, it is a speaking-
out-loud voice in your head: is it spoken,
a voice is saying it
as you read. It's the writer's words,
of course, in a literary sense
his or her voice, but the sound
of that voice is the sound of your voice.
Not the sound your friends know
or the sound of a tape played back
but your voice
caught in the dark cathedral
of your skull, your voice heard
by an internal ear informed by internal abstracts
and what you know by feeling,
having felt. It is your voice
saying, for example, the word barn
that the writer wrote
but the barn you say
is a barn you know or knew. The voice
in your head, speaking as you read,
never says anything neutrally — some people
hated the barn they knew,
some people love the barn they know
so you hear the word loaded
and a sensory constellation
is lit: horse-gnawed stalls,
hayloft, black heat tape wrapping
a water pipe, a slippery
spilled chirr of oats from a split sack,
the bony, filthy haunches of cows. . . .
And barn is only a noun — no verb
or subject has entered into the sentence yet!
The voice you hear when you read to yourself
is the clearest voice: you speak it
speaking to you.