second chances

cover me with a red sky tonight
promise of a better day to come.

need it, sure do.

God provides!!!!

I am in awe of God's faithfulness right now, and I am also humbled to the bones.

Why does He lavish blessings on me even though I doubt, I cry, I kick and scream and don't believe???? I am yet again reminded, powerfully, that it is not my "perfect faith" or "perfect attitude" that causes God to bless me; He is God and CHOOSES to bless me. I certainly don't deserve it! Erin reminded me that God tests us so as to expose our heart's true desires (which are cloudy and imperfect and often downright sinful). He causes us to feel the depths of our hearts, to push us almost to the point of despair, just so He can lift us up out of it and bring greater glory to His name!

The Lord just met my financial needs to the last penny. For the last two months I have been fretting something AWFUL about summer plans and lack thereof, joblessness, and a recent bankruptcy that was the result of my loan money getting screwed up. I spent the last two weeks being forced to examine how I spend my money, thinking that i just spent all the loan money (not knowing it was a fluke), and this was not a pretty thing. My heart is exposed in my bankbook...so much money was spent on my Baals and Asherahs, contest fees for my pride, hard drives for my visual identity (bah), Starbucks and Weaver Street breakfasts for my appetite and pleasures. God started to teach me that I do not give back to Him what He gives me financially, and that I hoard my money and rarely use it for others!!!! This is an area of my life that I'd rather not touch; my default with money is to just not think about how i'm spending it (because it's such a soft spot).

Anyways, He brought me down pretty low. His discipline was good, and it got me praying. God knows my heart; He sees all aspects of me, naked and exposed, and the crazy thing is that He loves ALL OF ME! Even though I am bad with money, He loves me! And He wants me to meditate on His mountains of mercy...to steep in His everlasting waters. He's not screaming down at me from heaven's throne, his brow furrowed, shouting, "Courtney why can't you get your act together, you covetous rebel? Why can't you be perfect? I won't love you until you are." NO! The church is God's whore, but He loves her fiercly. And He is changing me NOW! He is transforming my desires NOW and turning me into the Pure Bride that He already sees me as.

And just now he gave me all of my rent money back. He also gave me two grants for the summer...two grants to go to the Galapagos Islands and Ecuador to do multimedia journalism. Two grants that I had given up on because of "the bad economy" and because of my "sinful heart" and countless other things. And he gave me the EXACT amount I need to fund this! I am amazed, blown away right now at His generosity and kindness and patience, because am certainly not any of those things and in NO WAY deserve these grants. My roommies could testify to that...they've seen the panic attacks, they've heard the whining and complaining.

So now, here I am, amazed that God opened a door that looked shut to me. And I am excited about the possibilities...I am SO excited to see what stories He leads me to in South America and how He grows up the body of Christ...how I get to be an active part of that!!!! (Pat said that at least half of the people going to the Galapagos were Christians!) I praise His name right now. I praise Him for the hardship and struggle of waiting, I praise him for the testing that I did NOT perform well in, and I praises Him for His blessings. But even if He were to close this door, He would have provided for me.

Increase my faith, sweet Jesus. Make me more like you.

caffeinated ramblings

just drank coffee out of a to-go mug my photo story subjects lent me, and now i'm sitting in my empty apartment listening to Jai Ho on youtube and feeling potential. I'm about to sit down and do my Visual Culture readings, which has been the hardest thing to do these days...just sit in the present and be a student. hopefully spring break cured my restlessness for a bit. i want to learn Paul's secret of being content in any and every situation!

anyways, here are the highlights of this month:

-finally delved into my j481 photo story, on the Sexton family. It's really nice taking pictures again, and this is one of the first stories I have done where I feel more like a friend and less like a strange photographer (though I still retain that strangeness, as Tim so kindly reminds me with each opening and closing of the shutter). :) Hospitality isn't just something done on the side with this family, it's a lifestyle...and natural one that seems to just flow and spill and spread out all over the place. I've really enjoyed picking Tim and Amie's brains...they have a heart for Jesus, a heart for kids, a heart for community-building and living "not safely." It's such a contrast to the way I was raised, and they retain an attractive selflessness that convicts and challenges and encourages me. I fell asleep on their couch last night after talking about parenting and growing up and how God will gut out your/my/our selfishness and provide for you/me/us and countless other things, like starting Christian communes (and that commune in Philly started by Shane something-or-other, a pastor with dreads. oh and they fed me pancakes this morning. :) below are some photos...trying to string together a storyline:















-had refreshing time with Jesus at the beach in South Carolina, which included a solo bike exploration across Hilton Head island and my Bible. I had several "gospel" moments, where He reminded me so firmly and gently that He loves me even though i don't have my act together! Ever since I started dating Mike, and even before (think: last spring) I've been wandering from the folds of God, and it's okay! Colossians 2 invokes us to remember how we received our salvation and continue in Christ in this same way. If I received Christ (rather, Christ reached me) when I was a loveless, angry, rebellious and clinically depressed teenager, I do not need to wait until I'm "healthy" or cured of all current restlessness, anxiety, and lovelessness in order to remain in Christ! He expects me to be a wanderer! He expects me to forget Him and to sin! And He loves me anyways! He loves me fiercely...do you know how loved I am???!!!! And He IS changing me; He has already begun the process of gutting out my heart and filling it with Christ. I am no longer defined by my lovelessness and my rebellion, even though I still struggle with sin, because Christ has adopted me and defined my by His family. Repent and believe, repent and believe. Jesus is my atoning sacrifice; there is therefore now no condemnation in Christ Jesus.

-watched Slumdog Millionaire. Go see it. Sponsor a kid from Mumbai. Then go dance to Jai Ho.

-started a new painting!!!!! I haven't painted since before I broke up with Mike, and for awhile I was scared that I let all of my artistic inspiration spring from and for him. Oh and I sold my first painting!

-crossed paths with old friends who were once very dear to my heart, and then we just sort of fell out of sync for a bit. I'm excited to see what God will do with these intersections.

-By God's grace, am starting to give up some of my desires to the Lord. As much as I want a photo job and to grow/utilize my gifts, I want to want Jesus more. The gift is not greater than the Giver; the photo job is not going to give me the satisfaction or security that only Jesus can give. God has been showing me how much I'm trying to make my home in this world; the truth is, though, that all of the deepest desires of my heart WILL be met in Heaven, and Jesus is already beginning to woo me! I may not ever feel "utilized" on earth, and God could very well cause me to lose my sight or to lose my hands, but He has a specific job for me and a specific role for me and a specific place for me in His House in the New Heavens!

-started wearing random second-hand clothing again. My mom bought me a bunch of nice clothes for Christmas, which I appreciate, but I missed throwing on headscarves and hole-y leggings and painted-smeared dresses. I know it's just clothes, but God made us visual people and He wants for us to express ourselves!

-read Water for Elephants and most of Travels with Charley in Search for America.

-slept outside under the stars and went in some rich person's backyard to watch a magnificent sunset in South Carolina that reminded me of Patagonia...gave me the same stirring in my heart that I forgot was there!

-ran out of rent money for may. God is putting lots of stumbling blocks in my place, for my good. He is disciplining me in my finances because he loves me...pray for patience and good stewardship...pray that I could look to Him to provide and do what I need to do to be faithful to His calling to love Him and love others (with my money). It's definitely an area of my life I need lots of growth in...managing time, money, gifts, etc., in a wise way that isn't selfish. At any rate, I think this means a closed door for the Galapagos...which is good! God is closing one door to open a better one, and to make me more like Jesus.

okay so this was kind of random. School starts again on Monday. It's my last six weeks as a student...ever. Holy Cow.

dear words, my old friends:

I don't understand how people who make pictures for a living can update their blogs with images, images images. all the time. don't get me wrong, I love pictures (and I love the people who have legit photo blogs--they are some of the most talented, beautiful and inspiring people I know), but I can't eat, breathe and sleep photos they way I ought* to. There's so much naked experience to be embraced, without sewing fig leaves for myself out of my digital SLR.

isn't it funny that this is photo blog, but all I want to do is write? Admittedly, I've felt trapped by photojournalism and its academic demands. I know I'm not experiencing the real thing, because I was happy as a clam this summer while adventuring in naples with my camera and new visual friends. but i just don't want to make pictures right now. I would rather make pictures with words--old friends, neglected by the courtney on the right for a time. I have not forgotten you! In fact, I need you!

what I love about writing in this instant is I don't care much about its quality. I'm not writing for personal gain, I'm not writing to prove, strive, achieve, compare, beat, smother, conquer. I'm just writing because I haven't exercised verbal muscle in quite some time, and it's delightful rediscovering this pleasure. In the worn texture of the keys beneath my fingers, in the way my mind is simultaneously soothed and stimulated. It's like revisiting the backyard of my childhood home, with the three oak trees and tire swing. I haven't pumped, back and forth, back and forth, beneath those autumny branches in some time.

not that I don't love photography. I just need a sabbatical from images for a bit; enough of media commodities and mechanical reproducibility. Expression's playground is really the Amazon, and photography is just one Pourouma. I want to frolic and be a spirit-child for a bit.

spring break is coming. shall I travel to montreal?

*I am trying to recognize negative thought patterns (see earlier blog post on Wendell Berry and expectation) in myself. I impose ridiculous requirements on myself; I must go through forty "oughts" and "shoulds" and "ought nots" and "should nots" a day! Who says I ought to have a photo blog with images? Pat? Future employers? God? No one. I think this is a still a photo blog. or expression blog or venting blog or seeking inspiration or respite blog or something. whatev.old

mediocrity

mediocrity is snapping pictures at
college parties of
half-empty bottles: their contents
billows: forts and blankets
mirages of acquaintances
their broken graffiti signatures on the living room wall.
Wonder-- asleep in red technology caves; the images
fulfilled her momentary soul
thirst

now in temporary graves
the magic was buried alive.

to be a Real Photographer and other insights into mystery

this semester has been bleak and mechanic, as I have been trapped in my preconceptions and expectations. I live in a circle of selfishness, making (not-so) calculated moves based on my desires, dreams, fears and self-affirming ambitions. But what of the world outside of that enclosure, over my white picket Fences? What of a mystery and grandeur so powerful that I am dwarfed and put in my proper place? I say I believe in the Puritan tenet that "the way down is up,"--that suffering means glorification, but I don't actually live with this conviction. I want to look beyond my idea of who God is, of what the world is, of who i am, of goodness and badness, of truth and beauty. The idea is not the reality, yet I live as if I know the answers. I want to look beyond my mind's enclosure and allow myself to be changed by what I see.

I guess the first step to doing this is being honest about the ways I have not done this. I used to pride myself on my honesty, but I learned last semester that I am not honest; the hardest thing for me to do is paint how I really feel about my family or my body. I cannot for the life of me come up with photo story ideas; I do not know what inspires me, what tickles my soul, what brings me to my knees in praise. For the past six months I have approached work with an increasingly fearful mindset, unable to avoid anxiety attacks outside of the J-school or streams of tears when alone in my apartment--the pressure of tedious deadlines and self-imposed expectations on my shoulders. And let's not even talk about job applications--I haven't approached this optimistically, realistically, or with any semblance of discipline. If I can't land the perfect photo job after school, then why try at all?

What a destructive way of thinking! In trying to escape work (for fear of it), I have robbed myself of the capacity to enjoy work and leisure. In looking for the future-placed product to fulfill me (the completed photo story, the secured post-graduation job, the changed circumstances), I have lost sight of Character and Grace. To complete the photo story, I need inspiration and discipline. In securing the post-graduation job, I need patience and courage. Instead of begging God to change my circumstances and remove the hardships, the struggles, the temptations, why don't I pray for Character? Why don't I ask for transformation that transcends my limited human abilities? I think this is a bit of what it means to share in Christ's sufferings; my dependent Savior knew only what God showed Him.

I hate how I'm using photojournalism. I hate the contests. I hate getting caught up in MY progress, MY portfolio, MY story, MY career. I am building an identity out of this work, this art, which should really be a vehicle for mercy. I have cherished my subjects or the world while using it; I have not even really done much of it because I am spending so much of my energy trying to figure out how I can use it to get what I want (i.e. a trip to the Galapagos Islands, a job that will pay me enough money to pay off loans, adventure, excitement, pleasure, security, comfort, status, importance). And I have not been happy (for good reason). In all my selfish twistings of the Gift, I have lost my capacity to feel and love others and the world. I want to do what I do, not because I am duty-bound, but because I love the world and love my family. I want my work to serve the earth I live on and from and with, meaningfully, unendingly. I want to taste the daily and seasonal rewards that come from hard work. I want spiritual and tangible connection.

But all is not lost! This blog entry would end here, in utter hopelessness, if I didn't have a Saviour. Look up, Courtney! Lift your darkened and clouded eyes to the heavens! Even though your sight if flawed, you can feel the warmth of the Sun on your face! Repent and believe! You are far more selfish than you could ever know, but this does not stop me from loving you! You will never use my gifts in the way you ought, but I will still love you. I died for thieves and swindlers; I died for people like you, who abuse people in the name of "art," who misappropriate power, who spend money unwisely on your own pleasures, who run away from responsibilities. I give life to people who have absolutely NOTHING good to account for in their own lives. Your ONLY work on earth is to believe! And since this is too big of a task for you to handle, I will give you all the grace you need to help you believe. So stop trying to fix your problems, which are really anthills--not temples--and let me infuse your life with Love and Inspiration and Awe and Meaning and Romance and Wonder and Paradox and Humility and Value. I will do it! I will lead in you the good works I have set out for you!

I want to end with this passage from Wendell Berry's "The Once Inch Journey," which I find incomprehensibly beautiful and mysterious. It fills me with a sense of hope and gratitude; God is working out the ends to which I aspire. To be a real Photographer. This work that He is doing is simple: He is clarifying my Sight.

"I turn to the figure of the photographic artist--not the tourist-photographer who goes to a place, bound by his intentions and preconceptions, to record what has already been recorded and what he therefore expects to find, but the photographer who goes into a place in search of the real news (the Good News) of it.

His search is a pilgrimage, for he goes along ways he does not fully understand, in search of what he does not expect and cannot anticipate. His work involves a profound humility, for he has effaced himself; he has done away with his expectations; he has ceased to make demands upon the place. He keeps only the discipline of his art that informs and sharpens his vision--he keeps, that is, the practice of observation--for before a man can be a seer he must be a looker. His camera is a dark room, and he has made a dark place in his mind, exultant and fearful, by which he accepts that he does not know what he is going to see, he does not know the next picture. He has entered into the darkness--in order to see! But for the moment the dark lens holds only a vague potency, like a seed, still one with the mystery of what will come next, which is one with the mystery of the wilderness and of creation.

And then there comes a breaking of the light--and there is another shore to step out of the dark upon, lighted by a blooming flower like a candelabra. We are invited on! We are led on as by the promise of a feast spread for us that we do not yet know. In the shadows a little stream steps down over a ledge of rock into the light. Beyond are the trees, and the darkness again...The camera is a point of reference, a bit like a compass though not nearly so predictable. It is the discipline and the opportunity of vision. In relation to the enclosure we call civilization, these pictures are not ornaments or relics, but windows and doors, enlargements of our living space, entrances into the mysterious world outside the walls, lessons in what to look for and how to see. They limit our comfort; they drain away the subtle corruption of being smug; they make us a little afraid, for they suggest always the presence of the unknown, what lies outside the picture and beyond eyesight; they suggest the possibility of the sudden accesses of delight, vision, beauty, joy that entice us to keep alive and reward us for living; they can serve as spiritual landmarks in the pilgrimage to the earth that each on of us must undertake alone.

Always in the big woods when you leave familiar ground and step off alone into a new place there will be, along with the feelings of curiosity and excitement, a little nagging of dread. It is the ancient fear of the unknown, and it is your first bond with the wilderness you are going into. You are undertaking the first experience, not of the place, but of yourself in the place. It is an experience of our essential loneliness, for nobody can discover the world for anybody else. It is only after we have discovered it for ourselves that it becomes a common ground and a common bond, and we cease to be alone."

It's a spiritually journey of learning how to see, learning how to be at home. Each inch humbling and joyful.

acrylic trees, yellow.

So I just painted a giant yellow tree on my bedroom wall/ceiling and created polaroid-foliage of sorts. Then I proceeded to take out old photos from frames (by old...i mean stuff from when I was 17. I always have tons of new pictures I want to print but then I get distracted with taking photos and forget to ever print the ones I liked. Then I just get complacent. But there are too many photos to take and too many things to do with my time and money, like make pizza from scratch and go to a steampunk dance party or tithe or something. but i do wish I made prints more often.)

it's crazy how fast new photos you like become old and boring. I just filled my frames with photos from naples- the pier, the sarasota and cambier drum circles, other things/people that inspired me this summer/december. But I feel as though that season of my life has come to a close, and soon I'll be wanting new inspiration up on my walls.

I regret not having tangible evidence of the last four years. I've taken thousands upon thousands of photos, but I've only printed about a hundred of those photos...and not even the good ones. When I die, and when my back-up CD's and external hard drives become useless, there will be no evidence that a woman named courtney ann potter walked on this earth and breathed inspiration and made pretty pictures. maybe that's why the Teacher declares "everything under the sun is vanity!" Oh, but I do hope my pictures are in heaven! I do hope I can take pictures in heaven!

I'm having one of those rare days where I feel like there is SO much I want to create and i just don't have enough time to do it. I actually have LOADS of time right now, since classes haven't started yet, but that loads feels like nothing. which is why i'm blogging at 2:30 in the morning. creativejuiceswontstopgushingoutofmybrain

i just rearranged my room, prior to painting a giant yellow tree on the wall. it's not square at all. i put my bed in my closet and a mirror in the corner my chair in the off-center and it's lovely and wonderful. if i was all about math or econ, rearranging my room would be a waste of energy, but i'm not all about math or econ, am I? "and it was good."

don't know if i'm ever gonna be able to put photos on this blog. i know how to do it, but i'd much rather rearrange my room. although there are some wonderful steampunk photos that i would love to make public.