Thursday, June 12, 2008

The Farm, Tea, and Katie

I apologize to the hundreds you readers who undoubtedly have been waiting for another post, and who I have been keeping waiting so long. I don’t have the internet at the house here in Leona, so I have been going to the church to use it when I need to. I guess I’ll start with an update of what I have been up to lately. For the last two weeks I have been leading worship at Leona Baptist Church, helping with vacation bible school at First Baptist Madisonville, hanging out with the youth, and studying for an insurance licensing exam. I went up to Dallas on Monday and Tuesday to take my exam and to see Katie. It was good to see her since it had been about two weeks and that is the longest we had ever gone without seeing each other. I know that doesn’t sound long, but it definitely felt long for us. We didn’t get to hang out for very long, but the time we had together was good.

The Farm:
I have really enjoyed my time here at the farm thus far. To some degree I miss people being around, but being here alone has for the most part been a nice change. I have always loved being up here. Even the smell of my great grandfather’s old house when I come in the door makes me smile. When I go on a bike ride or a run in the morning, I see the roads and the land and am reminded of all the times I have been here before. I am thankful that I have always had the farm to come to in order to get away from everything and I am thankful that it will always be here for me to come to. God seems to have a special way of speaking to me here. He shows me who I really am whether for good or bad. If any man wants to truly know his own heart, then he should go away by himself for a few days. He should take notice of what he spends his time thinking about and doing. You can hide with schedules, with work, with school, or even with other people, but when completely alone, God will show you exactly who you are.

Tea:
On a lighter note, I have recently been drinking tea quite a bit. I have a tendency to kind of go all out when I get into something new, be it a new instrument or a new random hobby. I started drinking tea mainly because of Katie. Having been raised a Brit, she drinks loads of tea, and I decided that I would give it a shot. I love coffee so I figured that tea might be alright too. The thing that really started me onto it is when I stopped having Katie put milk or sugar in it. I find that tea, like coffee, has the best flavor when it is unhindered by any additional ingredients. My favorite tea at the moment is Twinning’s Irish Breakfast Tea. It is a delicious black tea that will change your morning. I also enjoy Bigelow Green Jasmine Tea which reminds me of Chinese food restaurants. I could name more, but I have no doubt that no one really cares about my tea drinking too much, so I will stop.

Meeting Katie:
Changing subjects again, Katie recently blogged about how we first met a year ago. It was very interesting to hear from her point of view, as I have before, how she and her sister Carolyn thought I was a creepy Corps guy who was just trying to hit on them. I will try and extend to you my view of how things went and if you would like the more complete and detailed side from her, you can go to her blog listed to the right, and check out the post yourself. First let me start with the day we met. I went into Coffee Station, as was my general custom, to study some Geology. I saw that my usual couch was unoccupied so naturally I got a cup of coffee and had a seat. There were two girls sitting in the same section, but I didn’t really think anything of it. Somehow I started talking with the girls and found out that both of them had taken the class I was studying for. I had a question about something in my book and Carolyn helped me with it. They eventually left and I didn’t really think anything of it. In fact, I didn’t even learn their names until the next time we met. I will admit that I noticed that they were both attractive girls who were very nice, but what guy wouldn’t notice that? Anyways, I saw them again when they were in Coffee Station another time and I actually learned their names this time. From there, we started hanging out more and I invited them to come if my buddies and I were seeing a movie or cooking out or something. The more I saw them, the more I liked hanging out with them and eventually I got the idea that I wanted to have some people come out to the farm one weekend. I invited my buddies, friends, and the Hill sisters, and we all went off to the farm. It wasn’t until we were all sitting around the dinner table one night, talking about what we were passionate about, that I realized that I really liked her. She was talking about how she loved serving others and talking to people to get to know more about their lives. I saw so much of Christ in her at that table. I enjoyed every minute of that trip. After that I went through a period of denying that I liked her, but my feelings grew. I loved each conversation we had and how it always pointed toward the Lord. We would meet at Coffee Station and learn about each other’s lives and ideas we had about different issues in life. Those two months were a sweet time of friendship and learning and I would not have had it any other way. It took me a long time to feel that I was ready to start another relationship since Margaret and I had dated for so long, but eventually I felt like it was time. I asked Katie to come to Houston with me for my birthday and she did. She says that at the time, she didn’t realize I really liked her at this point. We had a great time in Houston and ended up actually starting to date a short time after the trip. For what it I worth, that is my recollection of what happened last summer and how Katie and I came to be “in a relationship” as they say.
While I would love to continue writing about how marvelous the days since we started dating have been, I’m afraid I must go to sleep now so that I can be rested for vacation bible school tomorrow. If you actually read this, it must mean that you have a good deal of free time, so you should check out Katie’s blog. She has an amazing heart for people and a great deal of wisdom for someone our age. I really like to read her thoughts, and you might as well. This plug is likely in vain since if you are reading this it is probably because of a link from her site, but I figured what the heck?

Good night,

-Austin-
(2340 hours 6-11-08)

2 comments:

Katie said...

I really love how you put the date and the time in 24-hr clock at the bottom of your post. :)

I don't care if I know everything that you just wrote about - there is something special in reading your thoughts. Good grief, I miss you!

Haha, I loved your version of how we started dating. I think I might do a "part 2" and write about the stuff that you wrote about, since I didn't include the moment I realized I liked you, our first date, etc. etc. in my first post. Sweet times. I really can't believe that was almost a year ago!

My favorite quote from this post is: "It is a delicious black tea that will change your morning." I literally laughed out loud when I read that! Maybe I need to go change my morning... I think I have two of those tea bags left.

I'm so glad you wrote again. It makes my day!

Leda Diane said...

Oh Austin! You and Katie are like the cutest couple I have ever seen. YOur story is so incredibly sweet it almost makes me sick.