Letters to July #2

Dear July,

I want to be honest with you. You scare me. Your reputation hides behind the umbrella of summer magic, but I think you're secretly in cahoots with August. I've got issues with August. Who do you want me to be, July? One part carefree, summer haze - twelve parts impending decisions and unsettling changes. How can you fit all those tricks up your sleeve? I wish your days would pass slower. Or maybe I wish that I could just wander more slowly through what you have to offer. I like you best when I'm still enough to notice how goofy you can be; the thunderstorm, tan line, melting Popsicle nonsense that bubbles up when I least expect it. That's why we love you, July. Because despite your sneaky, imminent doom, you always manage to remind me how to play, how to adventure, how to hope. Sometimes you manage to ruin every semblance of a plan that I can muster, but I've yet to be entirely disappointed by the outcome. So we beat on, July - you and I - two crazy peas in a pod. Keep teaching me how to make mistakes and mud pies; how to be messy and whole and ok all at the same time. I can't do it with out you. 

As always x

In the Key of Midnight

After they had been severely flogged, they were thrown into prison, and the jailer was commanded to guard them carefully. When he received these orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks. About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everyone’s chains came loose.
-- Acts 16:23-26


Let us sing in the key of midnight. Let us loosen the chains and find a steadfast hope. Let our lives be Unusual.