Seven unrelated points in no particular order.

-1-

It has been SO COLD here. And snowy.

My mother’s poor daffodils. Daffodils usually are the brave flowers–sprouting first in the spring. “Spring” so far, though, has been a cruel joke. It snowed all last week/ weekend. Brrrr!

I keep hoping that I can bust out my pumps…and, day after day, there go my boots. Again.

-2-

I gave a talk at a conference this weekend. It was a chastity talk. To a bunch of middle schoolers.

I actually have a lot of opinions about chastity talks, but I’m not necessarily going to share those feels today.

Here’s the thing about giving speeches/ writing a blog/ communicating in general–a good presenter communicates with the audience in mind. That’s key, really.

That’s hard, though, when giving a middle school chastity talk. Why, you ask? Because, the thing about middle school is that the kids are all over the map, information-wise. By the time you get to high school, most kids have a general concept of sexuality. In middle school, though? In middle school, on one hand, you have kids who haven’t even hit puberty and, on the other hand, kids who are already addicted to pornography. And those are two super different ends of a spectrum. And, in the case of each, their little hearts need to be treated with care and meaningful honesty and appropriate levels of information.

So, it’s a tough crowd, to say the least.

How did I do, you ask? I don’t know. I never know. I really don’t know how to assess myself in those situations. And going into the presentation usually takes a bunch of exciting adrenaline and then, afterwards (honestly) I usually can’t remember the experience.

But! I do remember that, at one point, a bunch of people were nodding their heads.

Also, my mom told me that I did a good job so, OBVIOUSLY, I did. Moms are objective judges, right? Right?!?! 😉

-3-

So the conference was a pro-life youth conference. Actually, back in the high school days, I helped plan those, too. It was kind of a surreal throwback, in many ways. (“Were we ever this young??” my sister asked.)

It was beautiful, though. <3 It reminded me why I love planning things so much. Well, planning good, helpful, holy things, that is.

There was a quote, provided by a woman who had an abortion and then underwent all of the hardship that often accompanies a post-abortive woman– depression, suicidal tendencies, alcohol abuse, etc…

I can’t find the exact quote but it was something like: the validity of our faith and morals can be found in the wounds of the people who don’t follow them.

Hot wow. I thought about this a lot. Here’s what I realized: oftentimes, when people are hurt…it’s the church who picks up the pieces.

At the end of the day, in culture that promotes this “carefree” youthful experience that’s all sex/ drugs/ rock ‘n’ roll…who picks up the pieces of broken hearts and dreams and people? It’s not the clubs. It’s not the TV stations. It’s the priests who sit in confessionals and offer Kleenex and kind words. It’s the non-profits staffed by old ladies in dated cardigans. It’s a bunch of mismatched people who are doing their best to love, and I saw that this past weekend and it was lovely.

Also, I’m at a different place now, you know? And my family is full of adults who are making pretty beautiful pro-life decisions, and I thought about that, and it was excellent.

-4-

You can be jealous of this new picture that my mom bought.

My mom bought this image from a photographer at a local market. Those are Mother Teresa’s feet, ya’ll.

Take a good, long look.

Cool stuff.

-5-

I’ve been meaning to tell you this, but, my friend, LT, showed me a great way to store my earrings.

Like so. Precariously balanced on a window ledge.

But, in all seriousness, this is a great thing. That’s an old ice cream bowl, and LT showed me that I could link my old earrings over the ledge and the post earrings stay in the center and it is 100% the best earring system I have ever had.

Not that the other system was any good. It was literally a bunch of earrings on a sandwich dish. Period. So, yeah, this is not only an improvement but also a great improvement! Yay!

UPDATE: IT WAS ACTUALLY LT’S SISTER WHO HAD THIS IDEA. Go, MT! MT taught LT who, in turn, taught me.

-6-

For reasons there is a toddler at my house this week. I just put her to bed. I should put myself to bed, too, only…I still have stuff to get done around here.

She has a Pope doll. She loves him. She gives him these big, wet, sloppy kisses.

Kids ROCK, man. I love her leetle noises. And her dance moves. And her six teeth.

-7-

I was published. You can see my words in a different spot: http://aleteia.org/2016/04/10/taming-my-inner-martha-when-i-long-to-be-a-mary/

TA DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.