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Last Monday, I led a study on Hosea at 18-30s, and it went fairly well. Not many people attended that night, but it doesn’t matter that much, I guess. I really like Hosea, actually. I just did a surface sort of discussion, really, but I’m thinking I’m going to study it much more in-depth during my time off. Amos and Hosea were the prophets of Israel at the same time, and Amos is super focused on social injustice, but Hosea’s focused on spiritual straying, which is interesting, that God was speaking through two people both about returning to Him and also to stop treating each other like crap and to look out for each other.

I’m feeling burdened by the desire to care for people lately – burdened in the good way, I want to be more caring about other people, I’m just not sure how to do it. I spent such a long time talking to Mel the other day about her situation with Oliver’s father, and when I was telling Nickoli some of what we were saying, he got all huggy and stuff and I know one of things he loves about me is the way I care about people. I just feel like lately I’ve not been very caring, like I’ve been really wrapped up in myself, I guess.

Although I was talking to Mary awhile ago and saying that I felt really down about how bad I am at housework, and she said to me that with depression, it was honestly an accomplishment that I got out of bed and don’t spend all day, every day crying. That doesn’t feel like enough, though, really.

In Hosea, there’s a verse (7v14) where God chastises the Israelites by saying “They do not cry out to me from their hearts, but wail upon their beds…” and that verse struck me, as well as one of the others (I can’t remember the reference, but I think it’s in chapter six?) about God longing to redeem them. I know God waits for us to ask, a lot of the time, and I guess I wonder if maybe lately I haven’t actually been relying on God to make this easier to deal with – if I’ve just been feeling sorry for myself, instead. I know that no amount of spiritualness will cure depression, but at the same time, if God’s supposed to be the centre of my life, then I don’t think I’ve really done that in this situation. I think I should probably step back and evaluate this. Failure isn’t really an option, so I might as well try to make getting through this a little easier on myself.

Anyway, I’m studying Hosea pretty hardcore, and loving it. He was such an amazing guy.

Yesterday I went to Chatsworth House with Leanne – where they filmed Pride and Prejudice with Keira Knightley and The Duchess – also with Keira Knightley. It was incredible. Derbyshire is a beautiful county. The gardens went out for miles, into just woodlands, and you could sit in the middle of the main Italian garden and listen and only hear birds.

The older I get, the more I understand why people choose to live in the country.

So this friend of ours has moved in on the next road over, right? A single mom, and she mentioned recently how lonely she’d been, so Nickoli and I have decided that unless I specifically want to be alone, I’m going to start popping over sometimes, just to keep her company. We’ve started watching Gilmore Girls together, which is really fun. Although not as fun as watching it with Mom and Leslie. sadface

ANYWAY, but the other night Nickoli and I and one of our other friends went over to Mel’s and we all watched Princess Diaries (and NICKOLI said that he liked the books better, but the movie’s really cute, AHAHAHAHA, he’s so gay for a straight guy) and had tea together and it was lovely. We all just sat around and talked for hours, and then realized that it was eleven and Mel’s baby was going to be awake at five in the morning, so we ducked out. But it was really good.

ALSO. I was listening to this one song, and I’m going to see if I can upload it and host the song on my site so nothing illegal’s going on and so you can listen to it, BUT OMG, I was listening to it and totally imagining Voldemort listening to it in his convertible with the top down, and I was trying to describe this scene to Nickoli and he was all boring and I was like WHY AREN’T LESLIE AND WILL HERE, THEY WOULD GET IT. AUGH.

So I’m going to try to host it up here so you can listen to it and be like OMG YES.

Also, why is it that babies wail at the sight of me? Even normally well-behaved babies… sad

So yesterday, Nickoli phoned me as he was leaving work to let me know that he was stopping at Aldi on the way home to pick up milk and pasta. “That sounds fine!” I replied, and we hung up. After a second, though, I phoned him back and said, “Actually, how long will it take you to get to Aldi from where you are?”

“Ten or fifteen minutes,” he replied.

“Oh. What about me? How long will it take for me to get to Aldi from where I am?” I’d never been to the Aldi before then.

“Probably ten or fifteen minutes.”

“Shall I meet you there, then?” I offered. He took me up on it, sounding pleased, and I threw on my coat and began walking towards Vicky Road.

I don’t mind walking, exactly – but I prefer it during the summer and definitely during the day. I hate walking very far at night – not sure why. Going for a quiet, thoughtful stroll at night is okay – but having to go somewhere for whatever reason is different. Somehow.

But it was Valentine’s Day, and Nickoli had recently casually mentioned that one thing he missed about some other girl he liked before he met me was how outdoorsy she was. So, although I had nothing to fear as far as her stealing him away from me, I still thought that it would be nice for me to try to make the effort to do something he would have liked me to do, even though I have never been, and probably never will be, an outdoorsy sort of person.

So I was walking, and not thinking about anything in particular, just noticing all the lovely houses on Manor Road, and he phoned me, asking where I was. I described my surroundings, and he said he’d meet me and walk back toward Aldi together. So he did, and when he saw me, he gave me a big hug and a kiss on the forehead, and had a big grin on his face. We walked back, chatting, and came to Aldi, which was very nearly completely empty.

We just sort of walked around for awhile, looking at random stuff and talking – kind of a lame Valentine’s Day date, but we’ve never really celebrated Valentine’s Day anyway, and the best dates we’ve had have been the simple ones – going to Aldi or Starbucks or Costa, sitting and talking.

We picked up a few things, including some caramel chocolates and some red grape juice (which I was really excited about, as I have never found just plain grape juice here before), and walked back home together, Nickoli saying over and over again how pleased he was that I made the effort to meet him when he was going to be coming home anyway.

So I’m going to try to make a better effort to go on walks with him.

Today I had the urge to speak Spanish, for some reason. Nickoli, unfortunately, does not speak Spanish at all, and I’ve forgotten so much of the rules of grammar that I get all self-conscious because I know I’m not saying it right, whatever it is.

So I’ve been studying it online, and I dug out my 501 Spanish Verbs and my Spanish-English dictionary, and then decided to work on translating some of my children’s books into Spanish. I have no idea who I’ll go to in order to get them checked, but I’m doing it, and that’s something, anyway.

Actually, a lot of it’s started coming back to me, and I’ve found with the past tense stuff, I usually use the right tense when I’m really just guessing because it sounds right, which pleases me. I watched Aladdin in Spanish, as well.

I was actually planning on having a Spanish language track marathon, but surprisingly, almost none of the PAL DVDs have Spanish as a language option – the standard languages are French, Dutch, Norsk, and Hindi. It surprised me, anyway.

I found all of my old Hindi flashcards a few months ago, which brought back memories. I told Nickoli about when I was trying to teach myself Hindi from Bollywood movies and actually made a pretty decent job of it, and he was so impressed with me, which I thought was funny – I figured anybody would do that, if they really wanted to. But no, Nickoli assured me that I was a freak in the highest degree.

Lovely.