elizabeth's asian adventure, blog one

good afternoon beautiful brothers and sisters
It's July 20th. I believe a lot of you knew that I was scheduled to fly to Korea today. Well, for those of you who I haven't been talking to recently: I am not on a plane currently. I have spent the past two months (approximately) working on getting all my paperwork completed for my visa application. Yet it seemed every single time I attempted to submit something, it would come back with a tiny mistake that I needed to fix first. It was extremely frustrating, as you can imagine. Everything completely fell apart in Shawn Livingston's car on our drive up to Jesse Stevenson and Jessica Vogt's wedding (congratulations guys! you're both so beautiful) when my little brother Nick called to let me know that a document I'd been waiting on had come back blank. For the 3rd time. I guess I'd say this was when everything fell apart because I was running out of time. See, once I get all my paperwork completed, then I need to send it to Korea, where they process it and send it to the Korean consulate in New York City. Then I set up an interview with them and get my visa. THEN I get to go to Korea. Red tape, red tape. Honestly, the world would be so much easier if I could do whatever I wanted without the red tape. But the world doesn't look that way. Well, when I got home from the wedding (delightful wonderful time of seeing such beautiful Houghton friends, we even took a trip to Houghton for some beautiful hanging out and record listening and even woke up Gabe and Ginny Jacobson early the next morning to see them!) I e-mailed Troy, who is my contact in Korea, and apologetically explained the situation. He was so incredibly kind and understanding. Because their term starts soon he had to hire someone already in Korea for my position. But he did encourage me to continue with my visa application and perhaps apply for the position at the school that will be opening in November.
Well, ironically enough, as today is the day I'm suppose to be shipping out to Korea, I got my completed criminal record check in the mail, clean and stamped and beautiful looking. Would've been nice to have a couple weeks ago. Ah well.
So. In short, I am not flying to Korea right now. I might go to Korea in November. But I might not. It's very strange actually, this situation I now find myself in. I've been staying in the guest bedroom of my parents' house in CT with Nick, working hard at completing my on-line courses and anticipating my move to Korea. Well, now what? I didn't look for a job because I wasn't going to be here long. I also still don't have a driver's license and hadn't been working towards getting one, since I was suppose to be going to Korea.
I guess I'm just very much at a 'what am I doing now?' point. Which is actually great! When everything is completely taken away what do I have left? Only God. And that's all. I've been learning (for a couple months now) to realize that I can't rely on anything but God. Really. It's kind of freeing.
Also, now I get to go to Shawn and Rachel's wedding! This was actually an issue that was causing me to possibly not accept the teaching position in Korea at all. I love them both so much, and am now really looking forward to this event, full of beautiful people (hopefully I'll be seeing lots of you wonderful brothers and sisters reading this at the wedding). Also, this delay allows for another exciting possibility, suggested to me by the wonderful brother Bryan Overland: the Weiss Family Band will be going on tour next month and I'm going to do all within my power to be able to get a chance to see them in Buffalo. (If you know me, you know of my incredible passion of the beautiful words of aaron weiss and the rest of the mewithoutYou guys; I just got to see them last Thursday in Brooklyn with lovely Alex Glover and had a wonderful time breaking banana bread with aaron.) In other news, I've also been painting a music inspired mural in the guest room, I've been illustrating a children's book that my mom is writing in the Naskapi language, and I've been enjoying being stress-free from this Korean application.
Some have been asking what I'm doing with my life now. Well... I don't know. 'Never mind our plan-making, we'll start living!' (I'll make crepes for whoever tells me what that's from.) But some of my options are to stay here in CT or move somewhere else and look for a job, permanent or temporary. Maybe look for some kind of art related way to pay off my bills (hahaha! oh... right). My mom suggested I go with them up to the reservation in Quebec for a while, maybe get a job up there. I could or could not still go to Korea in November. I could move to Peru, I liked it there. I could go out to the west coast, that would be nice. Haven't been there yet. Any suggestions?
So. Now that you know I will be in the area for a while longer, I would love to see any and all of you (and by 'in the area' in mean in this continent). Take a trip out to my area if you can, we'll have a fire, do some painting, cook delicious food, go for a swim in the river, talk about beautiful life and dance in the morning dew. If you're reading this, I love you and would love to see you, no matter what. Give me a call or better yet, stop by unannounced.
In conclusion, I apologize if this letter seems a bit distracted. I was. It's tough to sit in front of a laptop while the stiffling summer sun streams through the windows on exhaling breezes and the beautiful voices of frogs, bugs and birds call out to me saying, 'child created by the merciful Most High, come and dance.'

Bawa. Bismillah ir-Rahman ir-Rahim

(in the Name of God most Merciful, most Compassionate)
The grace and peace of the LORD Jesus be with you all, and may my love be with you in Yeshua.