Serenity.

Take my love, take my land,

Take me where I cannot stand.

Now and again I find myself in a place where the very fibers of my being stand the risk of being taken from me. The thoughts and feelings that make me “Justin-esque” are somehow rendered invalid and I can no longer keep on being myself. My actions are paralyzed, and there’s nothing I can do, no matter how hard I try.

I don’t care, I’m still free!

You can’t take the sky from me.

Yet somehow in the midst of it all, I find those very fibers and actions solid and useful. Somehow the claws that rip at the fibers don’t quite penetrate and the movement and growth, though stunted, continue on their course.

Take me out to the black,

tell them all I ain’t coming back

Time and again I find myself peering into something unknown. Questions about God, the future…places yet unseen and people yet unmet. I’ve come to look forward to such events, and I wouldn’t trade them for anything else. I love adventure.

Burn the land, boil the sea,

You can’t take the sky from me!

I suppose that somewhere along the way of chasing the unknown I’ve gained a reputation. It’s a reputation that doesn’t offer me too many opportunities to plant something worthwhile into the minds and hearts I meet. The ground I can cover is limited, snatched away from me by whisperers and scoffers. But even so, there are some few people that I can get a hold of and teach to fly—and how they do soar!

There’s no place that I could be

Now that I’ve found Serenity.

Ultimately, despite the attack on my being, despite my limited movement within the realm of ideas and convictions, I find myself at peace and at home with what I am. I’ve discovered that, like those I have grown closest to, the life I lead is not one that I would ask too many people to walk with me. In fact, it seems like we all choose to walk together, more than we follow any one person. It’s in this net of symbiotic affection that we sharpen one another and find ourselves at home in a world that generally doesn’t like us.

You can’t take the sky from me!

--Lyrics taken from the Firefly opening theme.