Killing me softly...

I'm sitting at a coffee shop with less than three week left in the semester and a thesis proposal due at the end of next week with nothing to write. I have no inspiration or motivation to create a thesis that gives voice to any of my passions or convictions. I'm numb. spent. overworked from academia and I find no desire to continue...to write...to process...to argue

but yet I have been preparing for The Academy my whole life. since I was a kid I found myself immersed in books instead of barbie dolls and found comfort in libraries rather than among the cool kids in high school. learning and knowledge have always been my companions.

so why all this feeling of apathy? why this depression? Why can't I figure out a thesis topic? why don't I care? the once desire to fervently pursue a Ph.D has slowly faded in the heaviness of the everyday.

honestly... if I can be truly transparent I kinda just wanna disappear...join a traveling circus or something. perhaps this is the start of my mid-life crisis - or mid age crisis - or maybe the results of someone who has always done the respectable thing and has grown tired...maybe I'm just tired...and maybe these are just the rants of an overworked exhausted grad students--typically feelings at the end of the semester...i don't know...

although these aren't the typical confessions of an overachiever, academically driven, respectable, professional, grad student but they are real, honest, raw -- soy yo

I kinda wanna say forget it - and walk away...from everything....

Venting is good for the soul...it helps empty the load...but what if the load is too much...what if the load won't empty and the feelings linger...what if they are killing me softly

Death: She Interrupts Without Permission

It has been about 3 weeks since my last post both because A) blogging takes discipline and B) life has interfered. I was anxious to begin this blog with stories of my summer adventures in Guatemala and Chicago but was kindly reminded by life that she has her own plans. My angst to post about my summer was quickly halted by a sudden interruption, a death. Thus in this post I take a moment to share, process, and reflected upon this sudden interruption that cause some dolor.

I am a theologian. I study all things God (or something like that). And within such study there are some things I am certain of about concerning God. I generally do not question the mystery or sovereignty of God. Growing up Roman Catholic I learned early on what it meant to have a reverence or fear God. And typically I will debate and questions folk's theology when it comes to matters such as Christology, atonement, and or some other church doctrine but rarely if ever God's mystery or sovereignty. But there are these moments in life when your theology gets shaken and my moment was July 10.

When I heard the news that a friend and fellow theologian had died in a motorcycle accident, I was dumbfounded. All my theological education and understanding went out the window. My immediate reaction was to regress to middle school when a fellow classmate died and I had asked God why people had to die. I recall the memory so vividly and suddenly I found myself a 12 year old again pleading with God to change the circumstance. Why did he have to die? Was there a higher purpose for death? A good God could not create us just to die in an accident? Is his death meant to teach us something? What kind of God teaches this way?  What about his wife & young children? What are they to make of this? I recall grasping for air to breath after receiving the news of my friend, searching for words to help my extroverted soul make meaning of this sudden interruption in my life. At that same moment I was reminded of the verse in James which says: "Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes (James 4:14, NRSV)." Vanishes!? Does that mean we should embrace YOLO? Does that prompt us to seize the day for Jesus and be all that we can be? My cynicism prompted me to immediately reacted against that line of thinking. As I processed it more deeply I became more frustrated with it. What sense could I if any make of this death?

I'm not certain I have come to a conclusion on what sense if any this death makes but only to remind myself to live fully, to love others, and to remember that God is sovereign. To let go of cynicism and doubt recalling that God allows us to live freely on "borrowed time." Is this just part of God's mystery? quizas?

No se but what I do know is that Noe was an amazing human and theologian. He lived a joyful life. He was loved by many and touched many people's lives. His memorial service was filled beyond capacity. I am thankful to have met him and I look forward to seeing him again one day. I think Noe led a life with echoed James sentiment well. He lived life even with all of its obstacles and pains...he lived it. So this post is dedicated to Noe. May we live before we vanish and if we vanish before our time may we have lived to to the fullest without regrets! Amen!

Birthday Eve: Last Day of 27!

Good bye 27...28 here I come!

On the eve of my 28 birthday I begin a new blog journey. This blog has been in the making for the last couple of years but I finally had the energy, courage, strength to actually follow through. Thus here I sit in Guatemala City listening to John Legend's "Ordinary People" on the last evening of my 27th year of birth to write my first post. Typically this kind of reflective activity is reserved for the eve of one's 30th birthday but I have survived quite a bit over the last couple of years and have much to reflect on. That being said this first post shall be an introductory post of who and what I am all about or at least what I've discovered about myself so far. Hop on board and join me as I discover more fully who I am, reflect on where I have been, and dialogue about what it means to be UN-BOXED!

Bio (More or Less)
Soy Latina!
Although I have an anglo first name I am fully Mexican-American. My abuelita named me after a english speaking soap opera that she use to watch.

Mis padres son de Mexico y soy muy orgullosa de ser su hija! I speak three languages (Spanish, English, y Spanglish) and I live in Nepantla (Náhuatl term which means "in the middle"). I live in the borderlands of not fully belonging to my country of birth (USA) or my parents' homeland yet beginning to feel fully comfortable in this "in between space." I am also coming to terms with what it means to call myself Chicana. It has taken me years to be comfortable with such a term and so my journey continues. I am beginning to NAME myself!

I am a middle child but never experienced the "middle child" syndrome because I grew up the oldest of the last three. At one point I was an only child raised by my aunt, uncle, and grandmother. I learned my language from my abuelita watching novelas. My abuela is a hard woman to love but she has endured much.

I am studying theology at a seminary and hope to pursue post-graduate studies. I have recently become interested in Feminist Liberation Theologies. Thus some of my post will be my reflections on the many ideas that I am discovering, processing, and working through. #HSP2014

Estoy trabajando con college students who allow me to walk with them through life. That is my greatest joy--to journey through life with students in their pain, joy, doubt, questions, and whatever else they allow me to participate in.

Tambien estoy en una relación nueva. I've been dating someone for about 6 months and its been good, scary, fun, and amazing. I mention this new relationship because I hope to be authentic about my life on my blog and because he may come up in a post. Not only might I blog about this new adventure but about the path that I had to travel to get to this place (divorced--story for a different day).

My blog is entitle Un-boxed because I refuse to allow myself to be categorized as one thing or the other--I am all of these things and more. We like to limit people and place them in various categories that make it comfortable for others but I refuse. As my professor once said in Old Testament theology, "Moses didn't want to know Yahweh's name so he could say who sent him but instead he wanted to control God." Well I refused to be controlled...yo soy quien yo soy...creada en la imagen de la divine.
Amen.

**Since this is my blog and my space I will write in the way in which is most comfortable to me --sometimes english, spanish, spanglish--- and that's just the way it is. **