myfootprints

fly

2011-10-13T20:03:00.004Z

little bird

little bird

spread your wings

take flight

be brave

look

perspective

beauty

you are loved

fly little bird

flying

you are strong enough

stretch

the view from here is amazing

flap little bird

wow

look at you go

it's ok

there you go

keep going little bird

lift your head

it's time

it's your time

fly.

9/11

2011-09-11T15:33:00.001Z

Wondering if this will always feel like the weirdest day of the year.

It hits like unexpected bad news although we've heard it a thousand times already.

Longing to forget it, but desperate to remember.

Fire engines covered in ash and dust. Central park- our guess at the safest place to be- an absence of tall buildings, but even there every unfamiliar noise being terrifying. Humming planes vigilently patrolling the sky, but glared at by everyone below, to be feared as the enemy. Emails and 20c phone calls to the people I loved the most. Hotel lobbies, confused people and bags. Screaming to my mum in the hotel corridor, knowing that the sound wouldn't travel four-thousand miles to her ears, but incapable of doing anything else. Thinking 'this is it'. Lost. Being too afraid to sleep where I was, but helpless to get anywhere else. Stuck in a New York that was afraid, grieving, confused, angry, hurting, numb. The most heartfelt prayer I'd ever said until that point. The significant change in how I thought about life. The horrendous number that flashed accross TV screens and increased every minute, telling of the number of people missing. Every single one having a story, a home and a family. Stars and stripes and posters of lost faces on doors and walls and windows. Sirens, almost a constant background noise but one that was never habituated to. Running one afternoon because that's what everyone else was doing, but none of us knowing where we were running to or what we were running from. A greyhound bus being the ticket away from it all a few days later. The relief of being away and alive, but the strange feeling of being with people who hadn't been there. The man at the check-in deskwondering what it had been like, but unsure if there was a seat for me on the plane. Flying being the only way home, but the last thing anyone felt like doing.

The plan which had been to wake up early on the 11th, to leave my sleeping roomate and to go to the top of the world trade centre. Sleeping in that morning. Still not grasping what that means.

The photo of us grinning infront of the towers with the date Sept 10 2001 stamped in the corner.

The following summer, meeting and loving some beautiful children, mothers, wives and husbands who cried over the people they didn't see after that day. Watching them let go of balloons beside a lake in Maine. Messages carefully felt-tipped onto fifty white balloons. Staring upwards, hoping that the tiny white dots they were shrinking into wouldn't disappear.

9/11/2006

New beginnings.

2011-06-30T11:24:00.024Z

Photographs from a walk along the Water of Leith with David yesterday and some of my thoughts over the last few weeks.

Green leaves, new beginnings, anticipation, looking forwards and looking upwards.
The realisation that to let this happen there has to be a letting go of old things, letting them fall to the ground, allowing them to die.
Taking space to recognise that there was beauty in them, and there still can be, even in their death. Their goodness isn't lost, but is passed on as they replenish the ground, feeding the growth of new leaves.
An antithesis of loss and gain, the old and new, a beginning and an ending. The struggle to let go.
Their time has come to an end and there is sadness in that.
There is space there too, for thankfulness. A gratitude for what has been and for what will become.
Hope in the new growth. Beauty in the life that can flourish.

Thirty.

2011-04-01T16:06:00.006Z

Next month I turn 30. Maybe it's making me reflective. Maybe it's just today.

Ten years ago this September was 9/11, a day I can't forget and seem to be remembering more lately. It feels right to do something to recognise it this year. Something that will help me to look back, but to let go and look forwards too. I haven't quite figured that out yet, but it's going to happen.

Since that day, and maybe partly because of it, life has changed in many ways. I started to grow up. I started to figured out who I was.

God is real and I know that now because I know Him. Life has a whole lot more meaning.

There have been enormous ups and downs. I have walked through the bleak days of an eating disorder, depression and self-harm. I have come out the other end knowing myself infinitely more, beginning to learn how to love and to care about myself. Above all, I am increasingly aware of God's almighty grace to catch me in his loving arms, usually when I least expect it.

Seven months in South Africa changed me. A strange mixture of tough, but incredible and sweet, fond memories. The last two and a half years working as a nurse in the neonatal unit in Edinburgh has made me acutely aware of how precious life is and has shown me the meaning of compassion.

In the last two years I fell in love with and married a man who knows me, loves me and makes my life richer and fuller than I ever realised it could be.

There are times where darkness and fear linger. There are definitely moments when I feel like I'm walking backwards and wonder if there still is a way forward. In all of this though, I know that the Light can break through even the bleakest moments of life. There is Hope and there always will be.

Thank God for the last ten years. I'm now looking forward.

2008-12-08T14:17:00.002Z

I wonder why I stopped using this as a place to write, and I wonder whether I might start again...

2007-08-20T11:05:00.000Z

"Up till then he had been looking at the Lion's great feet and the huge claws on them; now, in his despair, he looked up at its face. What he saw surprised him as much as anything in his whole life. For the tawny face was bent down near his own and (wonder of wonders) great shining tears stood in the Lion's eyes. They were such big, bright tears compared with Digory's own that for a moment he felt as if the Lion must really be sorrier than he was himself".

From the Magician's Nephew. C.S.Lewis.

Someone read this to me yesterday and I haven't been able to get it out of my head since. So beautiful.

Monday Morning

2007-01-15T14:30:00.000Z

Up high

2006-12-15T22:28:00.000Z

I guess like any small kid, it's nice to be higher up than usual.

I've got tired arms from holding a 3-year old for longer than my muscles are used to today. The view from a couple of feet higher than her eyes was what she wanted. Better perspective and my arms inbetween her and the rest of the world. She's got it right.

2006-12-15T22:12:00.000Z

Little girl letting go

2006-11-27T14:03:00.000Z

One little girl.
Swinging her way along a (quite exciting) set of climbing frame bars (feels good).
Gets a bit stuck. Gets very stuck.
Gripping the bars with both hands, white nuckles, looking downwards. (panic).

Sees arms underneath, just out of reach.
'Catch me!'

'Let go'. (gentle, calm, knowingly)

'CATCH ME!' (urgency)

'I will. Let go.' (assurance)

Slowly, uncurls one finger, then another (uncertainty)
One hand left on the bar (doubt)
The last five fingers unwrapped (gasp)

Falling (breath held)

Caught

Safe (sigh)

Hello again.

2006-11-27T13:56:00.000Z

'When you come to the end of everything you know
And are faced with the darkness of the unknown,
Faith is knowing one of two things will happen.
Either there will be something solid for you to stand on,
Or you will be taught how to fly'.

Edward Teller

2006-10-27T13:46:00.000Z

Close to the top of my 'Why I love Edinburgh' list is the fact that every so often I get suprised by a view of the sea at the end of a street. Very good for perspective.

As was.... making it to the top of my first Munro! Amazing. Worth the hard work, without a doubt (top picture).

9/11

2006-09-11T16:39:00.001Z

The photo of us grinning infront of the towers with the date Sept 10 2001 stamped in the corner.

2006-08-02T14:31:00.000Z

I spent the last while working with children with profound disabilities. I think that’s a politically correct way of saying it at the moment. I’m so moved to write about this experience, but hesitant too because I don't want to make generlisations and these words maybe won't come close to expressing what I want them to.

My own insecurity, judgement and incapability stared me in the face as I walked into the house. Clueless as to how to communicate with a person who can't speak and doesn't seem to respond at all. Shocked by it all and afraid.

Time accomplishes a lot so as days and weeks passed I learned the ins and outs of the children. I realised how much personality lay under the distorted or damaged outside shells. Through the barrier of a voiceless silence emerged precious individuals. The response of a smile or hand gripping my own back seemed to communicate deeper than words would have done anyway.

I cried over their stories. Whether damaged by human intent, an unexpected tragedy or even just a random chromosome, what remained was a heartbreaking sadness over the bittersweet potential that every life brought with it.

Inside, though, there was beauty and there was life. There was something intensely loveable about these human beings, perhaps in their unique, but very pure and authentic nature. I saw something awoken and brought to life in the people that cared for them. My own heart has grown and I am positive I'm the richer for knowing them.

2006-05-31T14:59:00.000Z

'Inside the heart of each and every one of us there is a longing to be understood by someone who really cares. When a person is understood, he or she can put up with almost anything in the world'.
Ed Hird.

2006-05-12T13:21:00.000Z

Soph on Nursing #1

"You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you stop to look fear in the face... Do the thing you think you cannot do".

Well said, Eleanor Roosevelt. The hardest, most uncomfortable and terrifying days have definitely been those that have made me more fully alive and stretched me for the better. I'm sure of that, but it doesn't stop me want to run from these ones.

Scribbled this quote down the other day and re-read it today as, '...every experience in which you stop to look deer in the face'. An interesting alternative, I thought.

Soph on Nursing #2

The most meaningful moments of the last few months have been with two tiny babies, both just a few weeks old, each with uncertain and sad stories. Looking at them, the word precious had brand new meaning to me. I thought about it over and over again. I wanted them to know it. And I wanted to find hope for them in a God who holds on to them when I couldn't.

Soph on Nursing #3

The task of making beds. Tricky corners. It's a two-man job. Choose your partner wisely. A professional will lead you through every step to a fast and flawless Florence Nightingale-style finish. Try it with an equally hesitant novice and it's a dance with four left feet. Creases and uncertainty abound!

2006-04-18T20:49:00.000Z

I'm sure people are wondering why my wide eyes are fixed on this sky. The colour is greyish, but something about it has me captivated. It looks as though there are brush strokes in the clouds and the incredible light behind displays them perfectly. Beautiful.

Something within me wakes up. If eternity is set in our hearts then I'm so aware of it now, in this moment. Alive. Everything rests. Longings are still. There is more, but I'm engrossed even in this first taste. I want to absorb this, to drown in it. To be changed by it instead of walking away as other things spill over and crowd it. Falling back into craving and striving. Walls, barriers and distractions. What if, instead, this reality could flood into the rest of life? It would change everything.

2006-03-29T14:27:00.000Z

"Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear". Ambrose Redmoon.

I heard an amazing Martin Luther King quote yesterday which is similar to this one, but I can't find it.

2006-03-22T20:21:00.000Z

"Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage." Anais Nin.

2006-02-10T13:09:00.000Z

2006-02-08T13:49:00.000Z

One fine day. A vey cold, but amazing January morning in the Meadows that I couldn't walk away from. The photos definitely don't do it justice.

2006-01-29T19:46:00.000Z

I knew what to do. You had told me everything that I needed to know. You said that you believed in me. You said to trust you.

I stepped. Within moments I'm gasping. My head is under. I'm disorientated. Confused. Afraid. Panic. The water is everywhere. I'm going to sink. I don't know how deep this goes, but I'm struggling to keep above it all. Arms and legs desperately reaching and kicking. My mind is blank. I can't remember a thing you told me. Doubt. Despair. What was I thinking stepping from there? I'm shouting out, but in all the wrong directions. Helplessness. Fear. Where are you? Why can't I remember?

After panic is defeat. Overwhelmed and exhausted. There's no more effort. Sinking. I'm not awake anymore. Losing what it means to feel alive.

There are no cries left. Just heaviness. Could you even reach this deep? Hidden. Unseen? Would I be worth retrieving? I got it all so wrong.

He reached down from on high and took hold of me
He drew me out of deep waters
He brought me out into a spacious place
He rescued me because he delighted in me
He shows unfailing kindness.
Psalm 18.

2006-01-26T13:19:00.000Z

"Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming. What do we do? We swim, swim, swim. Oh ho ho, how I love to swim"...

Insipring words from Dory the Fish.

2006-01-25T14:33:00.000Z

Hope based on anything else would be in pieces by now.

'Constant, enduring, steadfast, equable, consistent, unfailing, fixed, imperishable, enduring, invariable, lasting, permanent, perpetual, unchanging, rigid, same, permanentstabile, static, unchanged, unfading, unfluctuating, continuing, uniform, unvarying, even, continuing, durable, everlasting, fast, indestructible, lasting, abiding, persistent, persisting, steady, changeless, immutable, eternal'...

2006-01-23T10:01:00.000Z

"I can do everything. That's because I'm three.
(But I can't reach the flowers on the window sill)."

One of my favourite small people said that.

Brilliantly uncomplicated and honest. I like her attitude!
There's no stopping some people. (Except for the occasional window sill).

2006-01-21T20:51:00.000Z

I think laughter is one of my favourite things in the world. It feels so healthy.

Apparently there is such a thing as 'laughter therapy'. According to teehee.com (seriously) there are three reasons to laugh...

1. It strengthens your immune system.
2. It makes your cheeks sore.
3. It increases your intellectual performance and boosts information retention.

I think that number two is a little dubious, but I was already convinced anyway.

Bring on the sore cheeks, I say!

2006-01-14T11:37:00.000Z

Depending entirely on what they're reflecting, even puddles can be beautiful.

If the sun is out, there are some amazing things inside puddles and bouncing off them.

A lot of potential in a pool of muddy rain water on the pavement.

I like that thought.

2006-01-11T09:13:00.000Z

I know he's just a log, but I liked him. We became friends over Christmas. I brought him into the house one day because I felt sad about the snow on his nose. He made muddy footprints on the carpet.

2006-01-07T13:18:00.000Z

'We need to maintain our internal stability in the face of ever changing external influences'.

I found that in my physiology notes yetserday.

Anchor: A rigid point of support. A source of security or stability.

2006-01-03T19:41:00.000Z

Sometimes the world seems too beautiful to ever begin to express. Moments of seeing something far beyond what could be captured in a photograph, a painting or words. It's about being there, being in it. And it's the contrast of those precious moments to everything else that surrounds it. The absolute peace of it. I had one of those moments last week.

The sky was an enormous blanket covering me, and the most beautiful thing I could imagine. The colours looked brand new. And the clouds seemeed to have been placed delicately and perfectly in incredible lines and shapes and patterns that went beyond where my eyes could reach and seemed to hint at something bigger and wider, more all-encompassing and timeless.

And then, in a moment that made me draw in a breath, birds appeared from somewhere, I couldn't even guess how many, and they were forming v-shapes, moving together as entire shapes, changing and dancing until the perfect formations were made.

This needed to be taken in, not glanced at. I longed to take it in, and then to be able to express it. There was frustration at knowing that if I had time and stillness and the openness to let it fully be absorbed then I would be overwhelmed by it's awsomeness. By His awsomeness.

But there is peace and delight at being able to glimpse just a piece of it. At being taken in and held for a moment by the beauty. At hearing a voice in it all, a reminder of what is always there and is forgotten and ignored.

The moment isn't meant to be the end. It's not meant to be stayed in. It's to be taken into the everyday and the ordinary. To be internalised. To allow myself to be changed by it and then to move on. To come back down, but to remember how things looked from the peak. I longed to remember. To stay with that perspective.

To begin with.

2006-01-03T13:24:00.001Z

I'd like to be one of those people who can remember quotes. I've been struggling to remember one recently. I wouldn't even attempt a paraphrase of it. I think it was from a novel. It was a piece of advice given to somebody, the gist of which was to stop holding back from doing whatever it is that makes you feel alive. One of those things for me is writing. That's where this page came from. I was going to try to justify writing in this space, but I have decided that no further explaination is needed!

I hope that quote pops up again somewhere. I'll write it down this time.