Change

It’s weird how it’s the little things that make you realized you have changed.

Those of you who knew me as a child and as a young teenager know that I had my head constantly in the clouds. I hated anything to do with real life and preferred to immerse myself in books like The Lord of Rings than pay attention to what was going on around me. If book didn’t remove me from humanity with a mostly happy ending, it wasn’t worth my time. My favorite places to be were those that were crowded with people and yet unreal in a sense, Walt Disney World, beaches surrounded by fancy condos and packed to the rafters, etc. I couldn’t bear to be alone in the real, natural world without some means of escape.

When I was in Ireland this summer, I began to notice something was different. I didn’t enjoy the famously touristy places like the Cliffs of Moher and Dublin nearly as much as the quieter places we went. In fact, my favorite place we went, a small set of cliffs on the ring of Skellig, didn’t even have a name and was not found in any guide book. Sure, you still had to pay 3 euros to get there, but it was a quiet, wild sort of place. I felt like I was genuinely a part of Ireland and not just a goofy American like I did in those more popular places.

However, what made me really realize my tastes had changed was read Suzanne Collins’s fantastic trilogy, The Hunger Games and Stephanie Meyer’s series Twilight.

I read Twilight for the first and only time in February. I loathed it. I thought it was the most ridiculous, misleading I’d ever had the misfortune to read. Bella was a whiney lame-o that seriously needed a life and Edward was absurdly unrealistic. I finished Breaking Dawn, (the last book) and could not figure out why on earth anyone thought I would like this series. I gave them back to the person who loaned them to me, and never gave it a second thought.

This past week I read The Hunger Games. All three books, as fast as I could get my hands on them. For those of you who don’t know, this series is about a futuristic, brutal United States, renamed Panem. The main character, Katniss, is forced to participate in the Hunger Games, a battle to death between teenagers of the twelve districts of Panem to remind them they are under the capital’s thumb. The books are horribly violent, but far more realistic than a certain vampire love story. Katniss has to choose between the lesser of two evils many times throughout the books. The ending is somewhat happy, but it’s not all sunshine and butterflies. It is real. She has horrible scars from horrible events that will never truly heal.

Twilight left me wanting to vomit. The Hunger Games blew me away. I got to thinking, my thirteen year old self would have loved Twilight. It has a happy ending for all. It pulls you into a fantasy world you never want to leave. In short, exactly what I desired at that age. I would have been horrified by the other series and probably would have had nightmares about it. Whereas now, at age eighteen. I’ve changed completely. I want the real world now. God led me gently into this world of sin. I’m so thankful for that. I know now that life is not sunshine and butterflies, and I do not appreciate people who paint it that way. There is sin in this world! Do not pretend it is not there and lead people astray. The painted, done-up places like Disney World are all well and good, and I still love them, but I would rather be surrounded by God’s creation, drinking in His wonderful works. God used the little things to make me realize something that will affect me and my ministry for my entire life.

Pretty cool huh?