There's always something about sleeping somewhere unfamiliar.
Yes, I know. Gasp, Amanda's updating. Isn't she in Basic?
Well, no, actually. Terrifically awful weather meant that we got stuck in Blue Earth overnight. For anyone outside of Minnesota, it's a two-hotel town with a giant statue of the Green Giant (because we're weird like that), so named for the clay in the soil. Or something like that. I am actually amazed at Petty Officer Wilson's ability to drive in whiteout conditions, but at some point we had to pull over and get gas. While we were in town, they closed the Interstate on us.
I won't get into the adventures that followed, but I will say that it's the second time in two days that my butt's been saved by a random farmer showing up and having the right tool for the job. I am resolved both that my future vehicles will all be trucks (unless I have more kids than sense), and I now view random helpful farmers the way everyone in the shelter seems to view me for joining.
I haven't DONE anything, and they're all thanking me. What's up with that?
Anyway, so both hotels were of course filled. There's a center downtown where they had space, pillows, and cots. I got to sleep in the library, which made me happy. In the middle of all kinds of stress, there's something very comforting about the smell of books.
So, I bed myself down on a very talkative cot amid such lasting tomes as "My First Atlas" and "Pat-a-Cake, Pat-a-Cake," and watch the shadows play from the streetlights in the swirling snow outside my window. Similar sight to another bed I used to sleep in, with a streetlight just outside my window that never turned off, and the wind blowing by there. I'm back in my dorm at Sheridan, another night when Ashley won't be back until late the next morning, and sleeping in an unfamiliar place. Not just sleeping in an unfamiliar place, but sleeping in a town where nobody knows you. This isn't crashing at a friend's house. This is that there's really no one out there who knows you well for at least a hundred miles, or in the case of Sheridan, 800. It's a delicious feeling of adventure, and it's also terrifyingly lonely. What if no one ever gets to know you? What if you're always adrift like this?
My bogeyman doesn't hide under the bed. He leaves a note telling me he'll be back in Spring, and abandons me to the night.
I'd always fall asleep, eventually, but it would be uneasy. At some point, this great guy I knew mailed me a stuffed puppy, and I proceeded to fall asleep with the fuzzball every night. Yep, I was twenty-one, and having a stuffed animal made me feel less alone. I'm afraid he got rather squashed over time.
Two houses down from mine (or a house and a hall), there was a guy who played soccer on the school team, and had way too much interest in longboarding. And somehow the two of us started hanging out all the time. And somehow, we got to know each other on a deeper level than anyone had ever known either of us. And he turned out to be a pretty cool guy. Turned out, you can sleep just fine at night, knowing you've got one good friend in town who will always be there for you.
And weirdly, even though it's a lot colder and less comfortable in the shelter than Davis House ever managed to be, the notion that the same solid friend is out there and will always be there for me made the difference in getting to sleep.
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Saturday, January 23, 2010
This Can't Be Right
This is fascinating.
There's kind of 'forgiving' someone who doesn't have their degree, or as high of a degree as you do...and then there's a kind of acceptance that doesn't care if you're there or think you're going to be worth more when you do.
There's a kind of 'forgiving' someone who isn't married, because you figure that they just haven't had the chance yet, and they'll get there eventually...and then there's being friends and just not caring and actually finding something about their single status that makes the friendship better.
Confession: This is bad. This is awful of me. But, I gotta say this.
I'm happy.
I am honestly happy working in a bookstore, and not being married, and not even being in school.
And I might honestly be happy even if I were living paycheck to paycheck, and just had my bike and my backpack and a single change of clothes.
And I'm happy without knowing what tomorrow's going to bring, or how awful it might be, or what I should have prepared for it.
So, I think I'm doing everything wrong. Because I shouldn't be able to do that, and be happy, right?
Hanging out with Faramir made something click. Because he's twenty-five, and has his degree, and he has his own apartment close enough to work to walk there, has a solid job, and is surprisingly good at guitar. And he's happy. But, cool thing about hanging out with him - he just sees me, and thinks I'm pretty. And that I'm happy. And he doesn't care about the difference in our jobs, and takes the whole living-with-the-parents thing I have better than I do (I need to move out), or the business where not only do I not have my degree, I'm not even sure anymore what I want to be doing!
It's not that I don't want to get married, ever. But, there's a lot of pressure from everyone who thinks that I'm going to be such a great mom, and really, I'm okay with how things are for the moment. And if the only way I'm going to get married is by being miserable about how things are, well, I'm probably going to be single for life.
And it's not that I don't want to be a nurse. I just wonder if I'm the right person for it. Music and kids are what I'm best with. Maybe the Navy will straighten out my brain a little
There's kind of 'forgiving' someone who doesn't have their degree, or as high of a degree as you do...and then there's a kind of acceptance that doesn't care if you're there or think you're going to be worth more when you do.
There's a kind of 'forgiving' someone who isn't married, because you figure that they just haven't had the chance yet, and they'll get there eventually...and then there's being friends and just not caring and actually finding something about their single status that makes the friendship better.
Confession: This is bad. This is awful of me. But, I gotta say this.
I'm happy.
I am honestly happy working in a bookstore, and not being married, and not even being in school.
And I might honestly be happy even if I were living paycheck to paycheck, and just had my bike and my backpack and a single change of clothes.
And I'm happy without knowing what tomorrow's going to bring, or how awful it might be, or what I should have prepared for it.
So, I think I'm doing everything wrong. Because I shouldn't be able to do that, and be happy, right?
Hanging out with Faramir made something click. Because he's twenty-five, and has his degree, and he has his own apartment close enough to work to walk there, has a solid job, and is surprisingly good at guitar. And he's happy. But, cool thing about hanging out with him - he just sees me, and thinks I'm pretty. And that I'm happy. And he doesn't care about the difference in our jobs, and takes the whole living-with-the-parents thing I have better than I do (I need to move out), or the business where not only do I not have my degree, I'm not even sure anymore what I want to be doing!
It's not that I don't want to get married, ever. But, there's a lot of pressure from everyone who thinks that I'm going to be such a great mom, and really, I'm okay with how things are for the moment. And if the only way I'm going to get married is by being miserable about how things are, well, I'm probably going to be single for life.
And it's not that I don't want to be a nurse. I just wonder if I'm the right person for it. Music and kids are what I'm best with. Maybe the Navy will straighten out my brain a little
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Listen to Lady Luck
Elizabeth is loosely regarded as a kind of Lady Luck. Any event can be improved by her presence, and a new experience is always an adventure. So, on an occasion with a few semi-intoxicated friends at the local casino, she was along for the ride.
My sister is a lovely, elegant, mildly exotic-looking young lady. She's in the minority for this (especially at the casino), and attracts a fair amount of attention. Some of her friends insisted on having her beside them as they played, and she's a quick learner. Before too long, she managed to win a bit more than they'd started with.
One gentleman, a businessman outside her acquaintance, invited her to sit with him, and he kept turning to her for advice on how he should play the next round. You are my Lady Luck, he says. With her beside him, he turns $600 into well over $3000.
He realizes this, and then asks her once again what he should do.
My sister is startled at this turn of events, because she apologized before every bit of advice before, explaining that she didn't really know what she was doing. So, at this point, her advice is to take what he's earned, he's done well, and to go home. She's thinking, sleep off some of the alcohol, but she doesn't say it at the time.
What she's failed to grasp is the translation from woman-speak into guy-hearing. Because, when woman says, "You should stop while you're ahead," the guy hears, "You are about to fail. You can't succeed. You are not man enough to pull this off." Woman thinks she's being helpful and offering sage advice to someone who's in the middle of a good thing and has a way to keep a good thing.
Man has to prove that he's going to succeed beyond anything she's ever imagined, and have her be so impressed with him that all other men are forgotten. To clarify a bit here, the businessman in question is older than our father. While Elizabeth does indeed appear sophisticated and older than she actually is, she's not THAT much older. Winning the favor of a twenty-something when you're fifty-something is quite the ego-booster, evidently.
Man proceeds to ignore Lady Luck's advice. Takes a small loss. She holds to her position - take what you've got, and go. No, no, it'll pull up, we'll come out of this, he says. Friends are attracted to the table.
Man proceeds to lose $2800, just a straight line of losses, to friends' flabbergastment. Lady Luck wouldn't dream of saying I told you so. Man tries to convince her to come up to his room, he'll make breakfast for her in the morning. Lady Luck, while sympathetic to his losses, decides that this is the time to excuse herself with said friends.
No word on whether losses continued.
My sister is a lovely, elegant, mildly exotic-looking young lady. She's in the minority for this (especially at the casino), and attracts a fair amount of attention. Some of her friends insisted on having her beside them as they played, and she's a quick learner. Before too long, she managed to win a bit more than they'd started with.
One gentleman, a businessman outside her acquaintance, invited her to sit with him, and he kept turning to her for advice on how he should play the next round. You are my Lady Luck, he says. With her beside him, he turns $600 into well over $3000.
He realizes this, and then asks her once again what he should do.
My sister is startled at this turn of events, because she apologized before every bit of advice before, explaining that she didn't really know what she was doing. So, at this point, her advice is to take what he's earned, he's done well, and to go home. She's thinking, sleep off some of the alcohol, but she doesn't say it at the time.
What she's failed to grasp is the translation from woman-speak into guy-hearing. Because, when woman says, "You should stop while you're ahead," the guy hears, "You are about to fail. You can't succeed. You are not man enough to pull this off." Woman thinks she's being helpful and offering sage advice to someone who's in the middle of a good thing and has a way to keep a good thing.
Man has to prove that he's going to succeed beyond anything she's ever imagined, and have her be so impressed with him that all other men are forgotten. To clarify a bit here, the businessman in question is older than our father. While Elizabeth does indeed appear sophisticated and older than she actually is, she's not THAT much older. Winning the favor of a twenty-something when you're fifty-something is quite the ego-booster, evidently.
Man proceeds to ignore Lady Luck's advice. Takes a small loss. She holds to her position - take what you've got, and go. No, no, it'll pull up, we'll come out of this, he says. Friends are attracted to the table.
Man proceeds to lose $2800, just a straight line of losses, to friends' flabbergastment. Lady Luck wouldn't dream of saying I told you so. Man tries to convince her to come up to his room, he'll make breakfast for her in the morning. Lady Luck, while sympathetic to his losses, decides that this is the time to excuse herself with said friends.
No word on whether losses continued.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Stay Tuned...
Life would be changing either way this month.
If I were staying in Rochester, I'd very likely be moving in with my best friend and her husband. Still be working at the bookstore. Possibly be trying to make more progress on the degree, possibly be working to save up tuition again.
As soon as the snow stopped (read: the cakes of ice broke off the streets - complete snowmelt takes too long in MN) I'd go back to biking everywhere. One of my best friends would be this cool guy I know who lives within walking distance of both the new digs and downtown, and we'd spend way too much time hanging out and proving that I really cannot play guitar at all.
Explorations would continue. I'd probably shift back to going to Autumn Ridge all the time, because I could bike there more easily than to Berean. Sleep schedule would adjust to what it's like to be sharing a house with an infant, but there'd be more light in the house. Rahni tempers my personality, and I add some kind of little fire or glow to hers, according to her husband.
Either way, I'm not the same person. Transitions have to happen, y'know? That's cool. It all works out somehow.
Basic's going to change me. I don't know how. I kind of hope that somehow it'll be a completely inverse reaction - that whatever goes down in the next eight weeks will highlight the sparkle and slapdash aspects of me. I LIKE those parts of me. I like being mostly innocent, and a little bit weird, and having fun with life. The prediction has been that I'll be very serious and dutiful after all of this, but...if you had the choice, who would you want to be?
If I were staying in Rochester, I'd very likely be moving in with my best friend and her husband. Still be working at the bookstore. Possibly be trying to make more progress on the degree, possibly be working to save up tuition again.
As soon as the snow stopped (read: the cakes of ice broke off the streets - complete snowmelt takes too long in MN) I'd go back to biking everywhere. One of my best friends would be this cool guy I know who lives within walking distance of both the new digs and downtown, and we'd spend way too much time hanging out and proving that I really cannot play guitar at all.
Explorations would continue. I'd probably shift back to going to Autumn Ridge all the time, because I could bike there more easily than to Berean. Sleep schedule would adjust to what it's like to be sharing a house with an infant, but there'd be more light in the house. Rahni tempers my personality, and I add some kind of little fire or glow to hers, according to her husband.
Either way, I'm not the same person. Transitions have to happen, y'know? That's cool. It all works out somehow.
Basic's going to change me. I don't know how. I kind of hope that somehow it'll be a completely inverse reaction - that whatever goes down in the next eight weeks will highlight the sparkle and slapdash aspects of me. I LIKE those parts of me. I like being mostly innocent, and a little bit weird, and having fun with life. The prediction has been that I'll be very serious and dutiful after all of this, but...if you had the choice, who would you want to be?
Lived at Rest
Because a piece of our webculture dictates that at such a time, you blog about it. Sure, why not?
A few years back, Christmas morning, these two adorable miscreants entered our home.
Brother and sister, dubbed Pippin (my favorite hobbit) and Chai (my favorite drink). I'm rather uncertain as to why my favorites dictated the names of the cats, since they're very much Elizabeth's pets. One of Elizabeth's aspirations in life, after everything settles down, is to become the crazy cat lady, and this may have been her starter kit.
My Dad says that in order to understand cats, you need to have at least two at the same time. Before these two romping furballs, we had a grey angora beauty who we simply knew to be neurotic. Dad explains that anyone who only has one cat will tell you, "Yes, I have a cat, and I can tell you what cats are like," but anyone with two will tell you, "I haven't got a clue." There is no hard-and-fast rule for cat nature.
Chai, the sister, in her adult years weighs half what her brother does. She's a hunter, and will occasionally disappear for days at a time, presumably prowling in the aspens back behind the house. (This is interesting, because she's a lighter color than her brother, so she stands out much better in the woods). She will accept limited amounts of attention, and while she enjoys being in the house, she's very nervous and will be watching everything.
Pippin weighs somewhere around twelve pounds, and has little interest in hunting. He's dominated by his sister, but doesn't much seem to care. She beats him up, and he goes off to some other corner of the basement and waits until she's distracted - not unlike the relationship Joe and I share, come to think of it, save that Joe chooses not to engage with me for his own motivations, and Pippin's motivations are a complete mystery. Pip is perfectly happy to spend ten hours of the day sleeping in the same bed with my sister, and will be fine and comfortable being picked up. Overall, he's largely unbothered by the world, and prefers to stay near the home.
The dynamic between the two is also something of a mystery. I don't know exactly how she's going to respond without him.
Male cats often have far more health problems than female cats. Some of this I can explain, some of it I haven't a clue. But, Pip's been having a hard time of it for the last year or more. And you know where that's going. I was out with a friend last night (ironically, part of the night involved watching some of the antics of his cats), and I missed the big event.
I'd say rest in peace, but he's already exhibited through life that he's got that one handled. Farewell, Pippin.
A few years back, Christmas morning, these two adorable miscreants entered our home.
Brother and sister, dubbed Pippin (my favorite hobbit) and Chai (my favorite drink). I'm rather uncertain as to why my favorites dictated the names of the cats, since they're very much Elizabeth's pets. One of Elizabeth's aspirations in life, after everything settles down, is to become the crazy cat lady, and this may have been her starter kit.
My Dad says that in order to understand cats, you need to have at least two at the same time. Before these two romping furballs, we had a grey angora beauty who we simply knew to be neurotic. Dad explains that anyone who only has one cat will tell you, "Yes, I have a cat, and I can tell you what cats are like," but anyone with two will tell you, "I haven't got a clue." There is no hard-and-fast rule for cat nature.
Chai, the sister, in her adult years weighs half what her brother does. She's a hunter, and will occasionally disappear for days at a time, presumably prowling in the aspens back behind the house. (This is interesting, because she's a lighter color than her brother, so she stands out much better in the woods). She will accept limited amounts of attention, and while she enjoys being in the house, she's very nervous and will be watching everything.
Pippin weighs somewhere around twelve pounds, and has little interest in hunting. He's dominated by his sister, but doesn't much seem to care. She beats him up, and he goes off to some other corner of the basement and waits until she's distracted - not unlike the relationship Joe and I share, come to think of it, save that Joe chooses not to engage with me for his own motivations, and Pippin's motivations are a complete mystery. Pip is perfectly happy to spend ten hours of the day sleeping in the same bed with my sister, and will be fine and comfortable being picked up. Overall, he's largely unbothered by the world, and prefers to stay near the home.
The dynamic between the two is also something of a mystery. I don't know exactly how she's going to respond without him.
Male cats often have far more health problems than female cats. Some of this I can explain, some of it I haven't a clue. But, Pip's been having a hard time of it for the last year or more. And you know where that's going. I was out with a friend last night (ironically, part of the night involved watching some of the antics of his cats), and I missed the big event.
I'd say rest in peace, but he's already exhibited through life that he's got that one handled. Farewell, Pippin.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Love God, Not a Fan of Church
Faramir and I were up late, talking. Fiendishly late, actually. I was pretty much a zombie for church in the morning.
Church was actually the topic of conversation. We're both frustrated with it.
See, you know God. God is big. God is wild, raw, passionate, and untamed. God is refreshing, surprising, bold, and intimate. God is sometimes secretive, and definitely playful. God's amazing. I highly recommend getting to know Him - He's more fun than anyone else you'll ever meet.
But church isn't like God. Church is calm, cool, and controlled. Church is quiet, but not a holding-your-breath-in-anticipation quiet. You don't go to Church and raise your voice (unless you're a Southern Baptist, maybe.*). Everyone cleans up, and they put away their struggles with their marriage, struggles with God, dirt in relationships that would be inappropriate to mention, doubt rests somewhere else. We all come in and play nice.
I have one friend at Berean who does not 'play nice' at all. J shows up for church with his outsize piercings, and generally looking as though he walked here and along the way went through a carwash that fired Hot Topic merchandise instead of turtle wax and pressure washers. Sometimes he doesn't bother showering. And when you talk with him, he's a kid who doesn't want to be an adult, and grips his teen years with a jagged smile that promises to get its teeth ripped out before relinquishing its hold. But J doesn't play nice-nice. He's not on any kind of pedestal, ever, even the pedestal of humility. J's a bit of a mess, and brings his mess with him everywhere he goes. I like that.
A few years back, I'd had it with church. Just gave up on it entirely. I don't remember what I did with Sunday mornings instead - maybe homework, or mowing the lawn, or riding my bike around town while traffic was slow. Probably not homework.
At Camp, I have those kind of raw relationships with a few girls. I can tell them all of the things I'm hurting over and where I have doubts. And they do the same. And we can pull one of the others aside when we're about to cry from exhaustion or the chaos some kid created. It's so far away from what happens in church, and I'm frustrated.
There's a smaller group of us, we hang out on Tuesday nights. We're a little structured, but that's okay. Play with the dog, kind of go over a concept, and free-form argue along the way. And those relationships are more solid than anything I have at church. Crazy thing, though - church is where I met all of them.
I don't feel close to God at church. We sing tame songs about how good life is, and frankly, sometimes life stinks. We sing songs about how powerful God is, but it's somehow separated from God's power. Maybe it's the lack of percussion. I like drums. People say that you can't go into church and expect God to serve you; we're there to serve Him. I might not be a teenager, but this is still something where I'm a belligerant kid. I don't understand how this is serving Him. I get it when we're taking care of people, when we listen to each other, and help each other out. I get it when we give what we've been given.
Maybe it's a love language issue. Words of Affirmation is third on my list. They mean something ot me, but it comes after time together, and any kind of tactile contact. Telling God He's great but not getting to hang out with Him doesn't work in my brain. I don't get church.
I kind of understand the learning aspect of it. I learn more about what God has done, and a lot about history and context for the Bible, and some stuff about what it would look like to live life a certain way. Understand - I'm not turning my back on God at all with this one, or at least that's not what I want. I want to be as close to God as possible, even more than what's possible if He'll let me. I love God. I love being with Him, and talking with Him, and when He shows me cool stuff He's done or tells me how much He loves me, and I love that He's okay with how nasty I can be sometimes and just lets me yell at Him when I don't know what else to do.
Yelling at God is very helpful if you're an angry person. For some reason, it brings you closer. Closer than trying to squelch the anger would, anyway. God isn't really an angry person until you start threatening the people He cares about, and that one makes sense. God just listens, and lets you know when you're being dumb. And then if you want to go on being dumb, He lets you, just as long as you know that what you're doing doesn't really make any sense. And then later it hurts a lot, and He doesn't have to say, "I told you so," because you already know it. He just reminds you how He said to do it, and are you going to do it His way now, or go whack your head on life again?
Or at least, that's how He does it with me.
You can't yell at God in church. I seem to recall a period when I would always go out AFTER church and let God know how frustrated I was to be there. I don't remember getting any answers, but I'm also pretty convinced that I wasn't listening. I think it was summer, and I'm fairly sure I'd go off in the woods. I didn't connect with God in church - I would when I was on the lake, or climbing around in the trees, or hiking a new trail. It's the smell, I think. You can smell stuff that God made, and you get to push yourself a bit and check out something cool He made, and chat with Him about the hard stuff. I'd go for long stretches, rollerblading, just talking things out with Him and singing sometimes. This is nicely embarassing when you make a turn and find a couple who's been able to hear you for the last tenth of a mile.
You can kind of serve, in church. Almost everybody has something God's given them that the church needs. I used to be on the worship team, and then I was helping in the nursery. I like little kids, and sunlight. Ideal qualifications for working in the church nursery. Sometimes I would only go to church to be in the nursery - I'd just blow off the entire service to play with the kids. I kind of felt bad about it later, but I also felt like it didn't matter, because they didn't need me to be sitting there, and I didn't need anything they had to say.
That's not really true, by the way. Anywhere that you go where there are people, they do need you to be something. Usually not obvious what it is, but it's there. Ross can figure this stuff out - it's one of his gifts. He sees through what's being projected for what's going on underneath. So, a lot of the time, there was someone who just needed to see me there in church that day, and it made their day brighter. I don't know how this works. I don't do anything special, and people will tell me later how much better they felt, seeing me. I think it's a God-thing.
So, no. I don't get to leap into two feet of filthy water and place sandbags, or help lay a floor, or hug a little kid who misses her Mommy at 2 a.m. But weirdly, all of those things started at a church. And no, I don't get to show where the skin's been ripped off my spirit and left my soul raw and oozing - but I get to make someone else's day a little brighter sometimes, and all of those cool relationships either started at church, or started at Camp. Camp started at church. And I don't get to be knocked breathless or laugh out loud with joy over how cool God is, at least not in the same way, but I learn a lot of information about Him and what He's done, and it kind of keeps me on track so that my fantasy life doesn't run away and try to redefine God for me (I'm good at that one.)
I think my problem was that I got to the top of the Church Hill, and turned around, and was disappointed with the view. I hadn't realized that there were mountains up ahead, that were indeed everything I'd expected and so much more, but that this particular hill was the best way to get to them. Church isn't the everything. It's kind of like the springboard to all the everythings I'm looking for. And maybe my problem is just that I'm lazy, and expecting all my everythings to fit in this little building and in these quick fifteen-minute interactions after the service.
Solomon did acknowledge, when he built the most splendid temple that's ever been made for God, that God was too big and too magnificent to fit in it.
*Right now, I go to two different nondenominational churches. There are a couple of other denominations that I want to check out for maybe a year or half a year at a time, and this would be one of them.
Church was actually the topic of conversation. We're both frustrated with it.
See, you know God. God is big. God is wild, raw, passionate, and untamed. God is refreshing, surprising, bold, and intimate. God is sometimes secretive, and definitely playful. God's amazing. I highly recommend getting to know Him - He's more fun than anyone else you'll ever meet.
But church isn't like God. Church is calm, cool, and controlled. Church is quiet, but not a holding-your-breath-in-anticipation quiet. You don't go to Church and raise your voice (unless you're a Southern Baptist, maybe.*). Everyone cleans up, and they put away their struggles with their marriage, struggles with God, dirt in relationships that would be inappropriate to mention, doubt rests somewhere else. We all come in and play nice.
I have one friend at Berean who does not 'play nice' at all. J shows up for church with his outsize piercings, and generally looking as though he walked here and along the way went through a carwash that fired Hot Topic merchandise instead of turtle wax and pressure washers. Sometimes he doesn't bother showering. And when you talk with him, he's a kid who doesn't want to be an adult, and grips his teen years with a jagged smile that promises to get its teeth ripped out before relinquishing its hold. But J doesn't play nice-nice. He's not on any kind of pedestal, ever, even the pedestal of humility. J's a bit of a mess, and brings his mess with him everywhere he goes. I like that.
A few years back, I'd had it with church. Just gave up on it entirely. I don't remember what I did with Sunday mornings instead - maybe homework, or mowing the lawn, or riding my bike around town while traffic was slow. Probably not homework.
At Camp, I have those kind of raw relationships with a few girls. I can tell them all of the things I'm hurting over and where I have doubts. And they do the same. And we can pull one of the others aside when we're about to cry from exhaustion or the chaos some kid created. It's so far away from what happens in church, and I'm frustrated.
There's a smaller group of us, we hang out on Tuesday nights. We're a little structured, but that's okay. Play with the dog, kind of go over a concept, and free-form argue along the way. And those relationships are more solid than anything I have at church. Crazy thing, though - church is where I met all of them.
I don't feel close to God at church. We sing tame songs about how good life is, and frankly, sometimes life stinks. We sing songs about how powerful God is, but it's somehow separated from God's power. Maybe it's the lack of percussion. I like drums. People say that you can't go into church and expect God to serve you; we're there to serve Him. I might not be a teenager, but this is still something where I'm a belligerant kid. I don't understand how this is serving Him. I get it when we're taking care of people, when we listen to each other, and help each other out. I get it when we give what we've been given.
Maybe it's a love language issue. Words of Affirmation is third on my list. They mean something ot me, but it comes after time together, and any kind of tactile contact. Telling God He's great but not getting to hang out with Him doesn't work in my brain. I don't get church.
I kind of understand the learning aspect of it. I learn more about what God has done, and a lot about history and context for the Bible, and some stuff about what it would look like to live life a certain way. Understand - I'm not turning my back on God at all with this one, or at least that's not what I want. I want to be as close to God as possible, even more than what's possible if He'll let me. I love God. I love being with Him, and talking with Him, and when He shows me cool stuff He's done or tells me how much He loves me, and I love that He's okay with how nasty I can be sometimes and just lets me yell at Him when I don't know what else to do.
Yelling at God is very helpful if you're an angry person. For some reason, it brings you closer. Closer than trying to squelch the anger would, anyway. God isn't really an angry person until you start threatening the people He cares about, and that one makes sense. God just listens, and lets you know when you're being dumb. And then if you want to go on being dumb, He lets you, just as long as you know that what you're doing doesn't really make any sense. And then later it hurts a lot, and He doesn't have to say, "I told you so," because you already know it. He just reminds you how He said to do it, and are you going to do it His way now, or go whack your head on life again?
Or at least, that's how He does it with me.
You can't yell at God in church. I seem to recall a period when I would always go out AFTER church and let God know how frustrated I was to be there. I don't remember getting any answers, but I'm also pretty convinced that I wasn't listening. I think it was summer, and I'm fairly sure I'd go off in the woods. I didn't connect with God in church - I would when I was on the lake, or climbing around in the trees, or hiking a new trail. It's the smell, I think. You can smell stuff that God made, and you get to push yourself a bit and check out something cool He made, and chat with Him about the hard stuff. I'd go for long stretches, rollerblading, just talking things out with Him and singing sometimes. This is nicely embarassing when you make a turn and find a couple who's been able to hear you for the last tenth of a mile.
You can kind of serve, in church. Almost everybody has something God's given them that the church needs. I used to be on the worship team, and then I was helping in the nursery. I like little kids, and sunlight. Ideal qualifications for working in the church nursery. Sometimes I would only go to church to be in the nursery - I'd just blow off the entire service to play with the kids. I kind of felt bad about it later, but I also felt like it didn't matter, because they didn't need me to be sitting there, and I didn't need anything they had to say.
That's not really true, by the way. Anywhere that you go where there are people, they do need you to be something. Usually not obvious what it is, but it's there. Ross can figure this stuff out - it's one of his gifts. He sees through what's being projected for what's going on underneath. So, a lot of the time, there was someone who just needed to see me there in church that day, and it made their day brighter. I don't know how this works. I don't do anything special, and people will tell me later how much better they felt, seeing me. I think it's a God-thing.
So, no. I don't get to leap into two feet of filthy water and place sandbags, or help lay a floor, or hug a little kid who misses her Mommy at 2 a.m. But weirdly, all of those things started at a church. And no, I don't get to show where the skin's been ripped off my spirit and left my soul raw and oozing - but I get to make someone else's day a little brighter sometimes, and all of those cool relationships either started at church, or started at Camp. Camp started at church. And I don't get to be knocked breathless or laugh out loud with joy over how cool God is, at least not in the same way, but I learn a lot of information about Him and what He's done, and it kind of keeps me on track so that my fantasy life doesn't run away and try to redefine God for me (I'm good at that one.)
I think my problem was that I got to the top of the Church Hill, and turned around, and was disappointed with the view. I hadn't realized that there were mountains up ahead, that were indeed everything I'd expected and so much more, but that this particular hill was the best way to get to them. Church isn't the everything. It's kind of like the springboard to all the everythings I'm looking for. And maybe my problem is just that I'm lazy, and expecting all my everythings to fit in this little building and in these quick fifteen-minute interactions after the service.
Solomon did acknowledge, when he built the most splendid temple that's ever been made for God, that God was too big and too magnificent to fit in it.
*Right now, I go to two different nondenominational churches. There are a couple of other denominations that I want to check out for maybe a year or half a year at a time, and this would be one of them.
Sunday, January 17, 2010
Community
Faramir and I were up 'til about four, and a sizeable portion of the conversation involved church.
One of the more marvelous aspects of my brain will be what it produces for conversation in the wee hours of the morning. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Faramir did not call the nice men in the white coats after encountering this phenomenon.
I'm just...mmm. I'm starting to get an idea of how much I really NEED to be with other believers. I kind of had that with the Harvesters, and I definitely have it with Camp, but what if there aren't any in where I'm headed next?
There's something about real community, too. The difference between the nice social group that gets together for the once-a-week Bible Study, and the people who are in there fighting with you or holding you together when a kid's looking at depression or going home to an abusive situation you can't do anything about. The people who live with you so much that you don't even bother trying to impress them, because they've seen you go through the worst stuff, and they know the real you. The nice social group, you feel obligated to be all nice and social with them, like they would get scared off like a flock of doves if you were real.
They're not REALLY like that. They can't be. But we've all been nice and social, and we've never been anything else, so I have no idea how deep or strong they are. I KNOW the kinds of depths in Ducky and Sport - they've had my back, cared for their friends or campers in ways I've seen, and I know from experience they can take how rough my life can be - how rough I can be.
And they can't come with me, where I'm going.
One of the more marvelous aspects of my brain will be what it produces for conversation in the wee hours of the morning. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Faramir did not call the nice men in the white coats after encountering this phenomenon.
I'm just...mmm. I'm starting to get an idea of how much I really NEED to be with other believers. I kind of had that with the Harvesters, and I definitely have it with Camp, but what if there aren't any in where I'm headed next?
There's something about real community, too. The difference between the nice social group that gets together for the once-a-week Bible Study, and the people who are in there fighting with you or holding you together when a kid's looking at depression or going home to an abusive situation you can't do anything about. The people who live with you so much that you don't even bother trying to impress them, because they've seen you go through the worst stuff, and they know the real you. The nice social group, you feel obligated to be all nice and social with them, like they would get scared off like a flock of doves if you were real.
They're not REALLY like that. They can't be. But we've all been nice and social, and we've never been anything else, so I have no idea how deep or strong they are. I KNOW the kinds of depths in Ducky and Sport - they've had my back, cared for their friends or campers in ways I've seen, and I know from experience they can take how rough my life can be - how rough I can be.
And they can't come with me, where I'm going.
Friday, January 15, 2010
One Week
Prickles and I were talking the other night. We have both been convinced by past experience that someone larger than we know had a hand in orchestrating the dizzying puzzles that our lives seem to play through, but he expressed the view that this piece didn't make sense.
"Why would I meet someone, talk with them, get to know them, and within three months they'd be gone again?" Paraphrased.
Why indeed. Prickles and I met because we were sitting in roughly the same section of the sanctuary once. At ARC, you would have to be sitting in the same section, or possibly the neighboring one, as any one of your friends in order to know that they were there. The next step up from the sanctuary size will probably be an arena. Since that first time, Prickles and I have never found ourselves sitting anywhere near each other.
He was looking rather dejected after the service, and I came up and asked if I could pray for him. He said yes, so, in typical camp-style, we did right there. And then he asked for my name - I had forgotten that he did not know me. Over the next few months, we saw each other once or twice a week.
Why did I run into Prickles? Among other things, he was one of the chief reasons that I would be at Bible Study every week - to hear what he had to say and engage with him. Not that Prickles usually talked much - he's a solid listener.
Why did he run into me? Because he'd just gotten some rather nasty news that threatened his home world, and had never encountered anyone quite so brazenly cheerful. More to it, but anyone would see that.
Two weeks ago, I met someone else in the cafe. We are close in age, he works at Mayo, and is apparently on a mission to try every dish at every cafe in the downtown area before leaving Mayo for more challenging pastures. So, we agreed to have lunch together. I told him he looked like Faramir. He found me playing piano in the Charlton. He showed me what he could do on guitar - he's self-taught, and remarkable. I told him he needed to give Dire Straits a chance.
We clicked so swiftly - the last time I clicked that easily with someone unexpected (camp staff are another matter) was four years ago. We were both saxes. But we only have a week for any time together. I do not understand this. I want to have another three months at least, so there might be a chance to build a strong enough friendship to stay in contact over the following months. Why are we given the combination of a strong bond and a short time?
In retrospect, that would be all any of our bonds have. I have this thing about making peace with my death every night. Last night, I could not sleep, because I had to apologize (such a mild term) to a friend, and make sure that he knew the truth about me. If I died without him knowing the truth, I would die as something of a hero, and the label was undeserved. Every friendship, we understand that it could end a day later; we just refuse to think about it. We hope.
If you knew that you only had a week, what would you do with it?
"Why would I meet someone, talk with them, get to know them, and within three months they'd be gone again?" Paraphrased.
Why indeed. Prickles and I met because we were sitting in roughly the same section of the sanctuary once. At ARC, you would have to be sitting in the same section, or possibly the neighboring one, as any one of your friends in order to know that they were there. The next step up from the sanctuary size will probably be an arena. Since that first time, Prickles and I have never found ourselves sitting anywhere near each other.
He was looking rather dejected after the service, and I came up and asked if I could pray for him. He said yes, so, in typical camp-style, we did right there. And then he asked for my name - I had forgotten that he did not know me. Over the next few months, we saw each other once or twice a week.
Why did I run into Prickles? Among other things, he was one of the chief reasons that I would be at Bible Study every week - to hear what he had to say and engage with him. Not that Prickles usually talked much - he's a solid listener.
Why did he run into me? Because he'd just gotten some rather nasty news that threatened his home world, and had never encountered anyone quite so brazenly cheerful. More to it, but anyone would see that.
Two weeks ago, I met someone else in the cafe. We are close in age, he works at Mayo, and is apparently on a mission to try every dish at every cafe in the downtown area before leaving Mayo for more challenging pastures. So, we agreed to have lunch together. I told him he looked like Faramir. He found me playing piano in the Charlton. He showed me what he could do on guitar - he's self-taught, and remarkable. I told him he needed to give Dire Straits a chance.
We clicked so swiftly - the last time I clicked that easily with someone unexpected (camp staff are another matter) was four years ago. We were both saxes. But we only have a week for any time together. I do not understand this. I want to have another three months at least, so there might be a chance to build a strong enough friendship to stay in contact over the following months. Why are we given the combination of a strong bond and a short time?
In retrospect, that would be all any of our bonds have. I have this thing about making peace with my death every night. Last night, I could not sleep, because I had to apologize (such a mild term) to a friend, and make sure that he knew the truth about me. If I died without him knowing the truth, I would die as something of a hero, and the label was undeserved. Every friendship, we understand that it could end a day later; we just refuse to think about it. We hope.
If you knew that you only had a week, what would you do with it?
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
John's one of the people where I can say that, if he had not been around, I would not be here today.
John and I met when we were teenagers. He dated a friend of mine, and it did not work out, but that was how he and I met. John is two years older than me, and I think he only went to church because his mom thought it was a good idea, and then at some point because he had friends there. John's family life was kind of rough, and a
I was pretty darn weird then. I am weird now, too, but it is not the same kind of weird. Back then, I was socially awkward, and very high energy, and I did not know how to properly interact with people. Now, I know how to behave; I just don't care. But for some reason, John and I became friends. Good friends, even best friends.
We would stay up late every night, talking on the phone for two or three hours. I was dealing with depression and a lot of self-hatred, and for some crazy reason, John loved me. I always refused to be his girlfriend, but that never stopped how much he loved me. Sometimes he was sure that I was the girl meant for him, and other times he saw me as a little sister, but he was always caring and protective, and had for some reason given his heart to me.
I cared about John, and about my friends, and during the day I wanted to be the best friend to everyone. At night, I was alone and couldn't be anyone's friend, so I had to face myself, and I hated myself. I looked in the mirror, and saw Chairman Mao in the form of a skinny American teenager. I was sure that I had to be destroyed, but I did not want to die. I was craving a reason to live. John was the one who talked me down from that destruction on a night when it came very close.
Later, I had just about shattered. John was the one who collected all the pieces, and carefully built them back together, just because he loved me and he thought the world would be somehow less if I was not in it. The cool thing about John was that he was brilliant, and knew so much of how the human mind worked, and how people work, and he definitely could have put the pieces back together in such a way that I would have been dependent on him. In fact, it would have been easier than the way he did it. But he chose to put them back together in the strongest way he could, with what he had to work with.
And John and I never dated. There were a lot of people who assumed that we were a couple, but it never happened. And I think he knew at the time, when he was rebuilding his shattered friend, that he had a chance to make it happen, and if he didn't take it, it might never happen. And he still did what he knew was right.
A lot of people didn't see that about John. He dressed weird, he hung out with church people without really believing what they did, and he was always doing some random stunt that would probably get him in a lot of trouble. If you got to know him, you realized that he was incredibly smart for a seventeen-year-old, but you wouldn't get the heart of John from talking to him. You'd have to watch him to see this kid who would absolutely sacrifice himself for what he believed was important, and who'd find something of value in a metaphorical trash heap and take care of it.
John told me about once every other month that he would be in my life until I did not need him anymore. I would laugh, and say that he could not make that call, that it was my call about when he could leave. I wanted him to always stay, and always be in my life. It just hit me the other day, when I was walking back across a skyway from work, looking down at the traffic on Broadway, that he had left. It was more than an absence; he read my life, and saw that I was standing again, and shining brighter than I ever had when he knew me, and he touched his cap and bowed out with a smile. I still see him every few months, and we hug and there are smiles, but he did leave, and it was his call.
Because even when it hurts him, John will sacrifice what he thinks needs to go in order to let what needs to be thrive. I doubt that his presence would have held me back in the way that he thinks it would, but he's so good at reading people, and lives, that he knows how to weave events in such a way that only a better weaver can put them back without destroying the design. I am not any kind of weaver - I frolic on the pattern, and he smiles to see it.
John and I met when we were teenagers. He dated a friend of mine, and it did not work out, but that was how he and I met. John is two years older than me, and I think he only went to church because his mom thought it was a good idea, and then at some point because he had friends there. John's family life was kind of rough, and a
I was pretty darn weird then. I am weird now, too, but it is not the same kind of weird. Back then, I was socially awkward, and very high energy, and I did not know how to properly interact with people. Now, I know how to behave; I just don't care. But for some reason, John and I became friends. Good friends, even best friends.
We would stay up late every night, talking on the phone for two or three hours. I was dealing with depression and a lot of self-hatred, and for some crazy reason, John loved me. I always refused to be his girlfriend, but that never stopped how much he loved me. Sometimes he was sure that I was the girl meant for him, and other times he saw me as a little sister, but he was always caring and protective, and had for some reason given his heart to me.
I cared about John, and about my friends, and during the day I wanted to be the best friend to everyone. At night, I was alone and couldn't be anyone's friend, so I had to face myself, and I hated myself. I looked in the mirror, and saw Chairman Mao in the form of a skinny American teenager. I was sure that I had to be destroyed, but I did not want to die. I was craving a reason to live. John was the one who talked me down from that destruction on a night when it came very close.
Later, I had just about shattered. John was the one who collected all the pieces, and carefully built them back together, just because he loved me and he thought the world would be somehow less if I was not in it. The cool thing about John was that he was brilliant, and knew so much of how the human mind worked, and how people work, and he definitely could have put the pieces back together in such a way that I would have been dependent on him. In fact, it would have been easier than the way he did it. But he chose to put them back together in the strongest way he could, with what he had to work with.
And John and I never dated. There were a lot of people who assumed that we were a couple, but it never happened. And I think he knew at the time, when he was rebuilding his shattered friend, that he had a chance to make it happen, and if he didn't take it, it might never happen. And he still did what he knew was right.
A lot of people didn't see that about John. He dressed weird, he hung out with church people without really believing what they did, and he was always doing some random stunt that would probably get him in a lot of trouble. If you got to know him, you realized that he was incredibly smart for a seventeen-year-old, but you wouldn't get the heart of John from talking to him. You'd have to watch him to see this kid who would absolutely sacrifice himself for what he believed was important, and who'd find something of value in a metaphorical trash heap and take care of it.
John told me about once every other month that he would be in my life until I did not need him anymore. I would laugh, and say that he could not make that call, that it was my call about when he could leave. I wanted him to always stay, and always be in my life. It just hit me the other day, when I was walking back across a skyway from work, looking down at the traffic on Broadway, that he had left. It was more than an absence; he read my life, and saw that I was standing again, and shining brighter than I ever had when he knew me, and he touched his cap and bowed out with a smile. I still see him every few months, and we hug and there are smiles, but he did leave, and it was his call.
Because even when it hurts him, John will sacrifice what he thinks needs to go in order to let what needs to be thrive. I doubt that his presence would have held me back in the way that he thinks it would, but he's so good at reading people, and lives, that he knows how to weave events in such a way that only a better weaver can put them back without destroying the design. I am not any kind of weaver - I frolic on the pattern, and he smiles to see it.
Truth About Thoughts About Basic
To be honest, when I think about it, I'm terrified.
Physically, I am somewhere between average and athletic. Through the growth spurt years, yeah, I was exceptionally skinny, but since then I have clearly filled out. And I do not quite believe that I can handle all of the physical exertions that Basic will require of me.
I know I can handle five minutes at a time. Sometimes a day at a time. This is what we learned from counseling. Not covered in staff training, nor in the manual - it just comes in the hardest moments. You learn from your kids, from the toughest cases, that you can get through anything in five-minute increments. Will I be able to keep that idea? I wish I knew how.
My ego is a marshmallow. And much of Basic is verbal abuse for every waking minute. I unfortunately take nearly everything personally, and I know how well past years have primed me to doubt myself and believe that I am somehow less of a person than the other people out there.
Inside, there is still the spark. That crazy sense of humor, where the name Firefly came from. The rougher things are, the quicker I can find humor, as long as I roll with it and come up on my feet. Humor is the first response to injury, and if I can manage to be in pain before I hit a point of being afraid, it has to come out okay.
This is going to hurt.
And mentally, what exactly do I think I am doing here? Since the second grade, my talents have been pulled into strong left-brain fields. Language, expression, music, creation, dance. My job is distinctly technical, solid, unchanging information. There is no expression
And even the dance needs a steady rhythm. Look at Eastern music and try to dance to it. There will be more to my life than the Navy and this career, but it may very well be that the more artistic tendencies have rendered this brain's user unbalanced.
I can see how part of the fear is because I have to go into this solo. Since I was fifteen, the longest time I spent single was a ten-month period while one person and I evaluated whether we could get back together. Even after the final breakup, I had a best friend who would help carry every problem I brought him, and I would share his struggles. Over the summer, three girls became my closest friends. There has always been someone to share the struggle. Being alone bites.
And through all of this, I am convinced that God is using this to build my dependence on Him. Knowing that I will never be strong enough, He is. Truthfully, it was not my strength that carried those kids this summer. Knowing that I'm striking out in unfamiliar territory, and that the skills and talents that I have rested on in past challenges cannot help here. Knowing that He loves me and sees value in me, and that I need to trust Him that that value exists even when not a person around me will affirm it.
And I think He also intentionally stripped the friends I was closest to, most of them in good ways. The boyfriend whose abundant strength I relied on as a kind of protection was not the person I was set aside to marry. The best friend and I found the distance too much of a hurdle for our friendship to clear. One of the girls moved to the other side of the country, and the other two were soon engaged. New friends have emerged, but not with enough time to build the kind of shared strength that these relationships knew.
I want so much to go to one of my stronger friends, and be in their hug, and cry out the fear over this. But since early May, something shifted, and I was the strong one for everyone else. Entirely unplanned on my part - it was just that since no one was able to be there for me that way, and someone still needed to be there for them, I had to brace a little more solidly. Tempered a bit. Not a bad thing, just hard. Learning to throw more of me into God, rather than into a person whose body heat I could feel.
Less than a year after the Navy, I have a different assignment, that requires me to face other demons from my past and fears that I rarely choose to wrestle, but rather sidestep. Do I think that the Navy will teach me to handle those fears? Not exactly. I do think that God traced a lot of strings to get me into a position where all I have to go on is His strength, His love, and His humor. Anyone who tells you that God doesn't laugh, or live joy, has clearly not met God. If I can learn that kind of trust and faith, that's going to be what will get me through the next four years after these six.
And if I can learn all of that, well, I think I might be able to do just about anything God wants me to do.
Physically, I am somewhere between average and athletic. Through the growth spurt years, yeah, I was exceptionally skinny, but since then I have clearly filled out. And I do not quite believe that I can handle all of the physical exertions that Basic will require of me.
I know I can handle five minutes at a time. Sometimes a day at a time. This is what we learned from counseling. Not covered in staff training, nor in the manual - it just comes in the hardest moments. You learn from your kids, from the toughest cases, that you can get through anything in five-minute increments. Will I be able to keep that idea? I wish I knew how.
My ego is a marshmallow. And much of Basic is verbal abuse for every waking minute. I unfortunately take nearly everything personally, and I know how well past years have primed me to doubt myself and believe that I am somehow less of a person than the other people out there.
Inside, there is still the spark. That crazy sense of humor, where the name Firefly came from. The rougher things are, the quicker I can find humor, as long as I roll with it and come up on my feet. Humor is the first response to injury, and if I can manage to be in pain before I hit a point of being afraid, it has to come out okay.
This is going to hurt.
And mentally, what exactly do I think I am doing here? Since the second grade, my talents have been pulled into strong left-brain fields. Language, expression, music, creation, dance. My job is distinctly technical, solid, unchanging information. There is no expression
And even the dance needs a steady rhythm. Look at Eastern music and try to dance to it. There will be more to my life than the Navy and this career, but it may very well be that the more artistic tendencies have rendered this brain's user unbalanced.
I can see how part of the fear is because I have to go into this solo. Since I was fifteen, the longest time I spent single was a ten-month period while one person and I evaluated whether we could get back together. Even after the final breakup, I had a best friend who would help carry every problem I brought him, and I would share his struggles. Over the summer, three girls became my closest friends. There has always been someone to share the struggle. Being alone bites.
And through all of this, I am convinced that God is using this to build my dependence on Him. Knowing that I will never be strong enough, He is. Truthfully, it was not my strength that carried those kids this summer. Knowing that I'm striking out in unfamiliar territory, and that the skills and talents that I have rested on in past challenges cannot help here. Knowing that He loves me and sees value in me, and that I need to trust Him that that value exists even when not a person around me will affirm it.
And I think He also intentionally stripped the friends I was closest to, most of them in good ways. The boyfriend whose abundant strength I relied on as a kind of protection was not the person I was set aside to marry. The best friend and I found the distance too much of a hurdle for our friendship to clear. One of the girls moved to the other side of the country, and the other two were soon engaged. New friends have emerged, but not with enough time to build the kind of shared strength that these relationships knew.
I want so much to go to one of my stronger friends, and be in their hug, and cry out the fear over this. But since early May, something shifted, and I was the strong one for everyone else. Entirely unplanned on my part - it was just that since no one was able to be there for me that way, and someone still needed to be there for them, I had to brace a little more solidly. Tempered a bit. Not a bad thing, just hard. Learning to throw more of me into God, rather than into a person whose body heat I could feel.
Less than a year after the Navy, I have a different assignment, that requires me to face other demons from my past and fears that I rarely choose to wrestle, but rather sidestep. Do I think that the Navy will teach me to handle those fears? Not exactly. I do think that God traced a lot of strings to get me into a position where all I have to go on is His strength, His love, and His humor. Anyone who tells you that God doesn't laugh, or live joy, has clearly not met God. If I can learn that kind of trust and faith, that's going to be what will get me through the next four years after these six.
And if I can learn all of that, well, I think I might be able to do just about anything God wants me to do.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Another character introduction.
Actually, this is less about her, and more what she means to me. To understand this, you need to already know: I am kind of a screw-up.
When I think about it, there has not been one area of my life that has been free from failure.
I carry this around. Sometimes, it feels as though I am trying to put on a good face over it, hoping no one will notice. I am hopeless at pretending. I would say that I am the WYSIWYG of all women, except that God made women so incredibly layered and complicated that I am pretty sure you could be married to one for ten years and still not know all of her. So, there are too many layers for me to be showing all of them at the same time, but there are only about two shades I can offer that are not entirely true, and even then they are just a diversion, not a decent cover. With a limited time to work with, I usually shrug and figure that I will not have time to offer anything but the truth.
Most of the time, it doesn't bother me. The places where I failed exist, just like the places where I like to hang around with kids, and relax by playing the piano, and come home from a run and eat peanut butter by the spoonful. And all of that comes together and shows up at different points.
It always feels as though there are two kinds of moms that I meet. Or that moms have two different responses to me. My girlfriend's moms all seem to be thinking that I am not quite good enough to be friends with their daughter, but I am bright and cheerful and helpful, so they will accept my presence in their house for a few hours. I have friends who are of a mom-age, but they usually have no daughters my age. The only time I am friends with both a mom and a daughter is when I met one or both of them at Camp. I think this is because Camp is family.
This is another matter with the guys' moms. They all seem to see me as a potential girlfriend for their son, but the split is over whether they are happy about this idea. Half of the guys I know have absolutely terrible taste in women, and their moms are always evaluating me in comparison to the last relationship disaster. These moms like me, and hope that the son in question will soon express a romantic interest in me.
The other moms are rather guarded. They are kind and polite and pretending. Or so it feels. They seem to be in a club with the moms to my girlfriends. If these guys' moms and my girlfriends' moms all got together, the first thing that they would have in common would be finding that they all know me, and try to pinpoint what it is about me that sets them off. And then they would all make matches between their offspring.
One day I met a different mom. We'll call her Bonnie, because someday I will slip and mention her real name here and then you will all know why I think that she is the most beautiful mom I've ever met.
I was giving a friend a ride home. One of the quirks of our culture is that when you say goodbye, it has to take about half an hour. I hypothesize that this is because of how cold our weather can be - it's warm in the house, and you are with friends who love you, and you do not want to go out just yet. Outside, it is cold, and windy, and dark, and the snow is blowing, and you are suddenly alone. Your friends will not want you to leave and be cold and alone either. Minnesota.
So we are standing on the driveway, talking of all the things that you say when you know you have to go but you do not want to just yet, and he remembered that there was a book that he was planning to lend me, just as his dad came out to help carry some stuff in and give me a hug. My friend's dad is a very solid guy with a great sense of humor, and teaches me about God when we talk. I have incredible respect for him, and he likes me. So, at the mention of the book, he said to come in.
As soon as I came in, his mom assumed that I was staying for dinner. This was a surprise to me, because usually parents are kind of relieved when I finally appear to be leaving. I think I shake things up a little with the things I say, to be honest. I kind of wish I knew why. But at a moment when the rest of the offspring were scattered elsewhere, I went and asked her if she was sure it was okay if I stayed, because I hadn't been planning on it, and was this an imposition. That sort of thing.
She took my hands in hers, and made the most direct eye contact I have ever gotten from a friend's parent, and assured me that it was good, that they did want me here. This amazed me. Still amazes me. I am accustomed to people being nice and forgiving the intrusion I make on their lives, and possibly even being entertained by the intrusion.
I am very big on touch. Physical contact speaks to me on a deeper level than anything else. I sometimes think that this is why I have trouble wrestling with God - He can give the other four love languages, but I can't physically feel Him hug me. This might be why I crave it so much in the relationships with people I love. I love God so much, and want to be so close to Him, and I can't physically feel His arms around me or Him stroking my hair, so I look for it from other people.
Or it could just be a family thing. Joe speculates that this is the part of the Navy that will actually kill me. It won't be the lack of privacy, because I've learned how to thrive in that from Camp. It won't be the intense physical training, because I've gone through Camp, Track, Cross-Country, and a brief stint of cheerleading (they train harder than the football team). It won't be the loneliness, because I moved out to Sheridan and didn't know a single person. It won't be the lack of control over my life, because I gave that up a long time ago. It will be that no one touches each other in the military. And that will be what makes me break.
I don't have an answer for him. I think he might be right.
Bonnie is happy, and welcoming, and always glad to see me. If I was living in the area for the next year, I would have dinner with them every week. Last week, I sat between her and my friend, and after dinner we played a card game, and she would regularly have a hand on my shoulder.
Touch just says something to me. It could be translated as, "I love you," or, "You make me happy," but I think the simplest interpretation in my mind is an affirmation; "I'm glad you're here."
Because I know how many times I have failed. I know how many ways I fall short of what I should be. And I cheerfully deal with the idea that wherever I go, most people just kind of put up with me and my weirdness (if it's not for the failures, it's for the fact that I have a backwards approach to a lot of Christianity). The idea that someone actually wants me is like dropping water on a cactus. Carefully, cautiously, disbelievingly, start to open up a little. Cactus survives just fine and dandy, hale and hearty, but this...this is something bigger.
So, Bonnie's the most beautiful mom I know.
Actually, this is less about her, and more what she means to me. To understand this, you need to already know: I am kind of a screw-up.
When I think about it, there has not been one area of my life that has been free from failure.
I carry this around. Sometimes, it feels as though I am trying to put on a good face over it, hoping no one will notice. I am hopeless at pretending. I would say that I am the WYSIWYG of all women, except that God made women so incredibly layered and complicated that I am pretty sure you could be married to one for ten years and still not know all of her. So, there are too many layers for me to be showing all of them at the same time, but there are only about two shades I can offer that are not entirely true, and even then they are just a diversion, not a decent cover. With a limited time to work with, I usually shrug and figure that I will not have time to offer anything but the truth.
Most of the time, it doesn't bother me. The places where I failed exist, just like the places where I like to hang around with kids, and relax by playing the piano, and come home from a run and eat peanut butter by the spoonful. And all of that comes together and shows up at different points.
It always feels as though there are two kinds of moms that I meet. Or that moms have two different responses to me. My girlfriend's moms all seem to be thinking that I am not quite good enough to be friends with their daughter, but I am bright and cheerful and helpful, so they will accept my presence in their house for a few hours. I have friends who are of a mom-age, but they usually have no daughters my age. The only time I am friends with both a mom and a daughter is when I met one or both of them at Camp. I think this is because Camp is family.
This is another matter with the guys' moms. They all seem to see me as a potential girlfriend for their son, but the split is over whether they are happy about this idea. Half of the guys I know have absolutely terrible taste in women, and their moms are always evaluating me in comparison to the last relationship disaster. These moms like me, and hope that the son in question will soon express a romantic interest in me.
The other moms are rather guarded. They are kind and polite and pretending. Or so it feels. They seem to be in a club with the moms to my girlfriends. If these guys' moms and my girlfriends' moms all got together, the first thing that they would have in common would be finding that they all know me, and try to pinpoint what it is about me that sets them off. And then they would all make matches between their offspring.
One day I met a different mom. We'll call her Bonnie, because someday I will slip and mention her real name here and then you will all know why I think that she is the most beautiful mom I've ever met.
I was giving a friend a ride home. One of the quirks of our culture is that when you say goodbye, it has to take about half an hour. I hypothesize that this is because of how cold our weather can be - it's warm in the house, and you are with friends who love you, and you do not want to go out just yet. Outside, it is cold, and windy, and dark, and the snow is blowing, and you are suddenly alone. Your friends will not want you to leave and be cold and alone either. Minnesota.
So we are standing on the driveway, talking of all the things that you say when you know you have to go but you do not want to just yet, and he remembered that there was a book that he was planning to lend me, just as his dad came out to help carry some stuff in and give me a hug. My friend's dad is a very solid guy with a great sense of humor, and teaches me about God when we talk. I have incredible respect for him, and he likes me. So, at the mention of the book, he said to come in.
As soon as I came in, his mom assumed that I was staying for dinner. This was a surprise to me, because usually parents are kind of relieved when I finally appear to be leaving. I think I shake things up a little with the things I say, to be honest. I kind of wish I knew why. But at a moment when the rest of the offspring were scattered elsewhere, I went and asked her if she was sure it was okay if I stayed, because I hadn't been planning on it, and was this an imposition. That sort of thing.
She took my hands in hers, and made the most direct eye contact I have ever gotten from a friend's parent, and assured me that it was good, that they did want me here. This amazed me. Still amazes me. I am accustomed to people being nice and forgiving the intrusion I make on their lives, and possibly even being entertained by the intrusion.
I am very big on touch. Physical contact speaks to me on a deeper level than anything else. I sometimes think that this is why I have trouble wrestling with God - He can give the other four love languages, but I can't physically feel Him hug me. This might be why I crave it so much in the relationships with people I love. I love God so much, and want to be so close to Him, and I can't physically feel His arms around me or Him stroking my hair, so I look for it from other people.
Or it could just be a family thing. Joe speculates that this is the part of the Navy that will actually kill me. It won't be the lack of privacy, because I've learned how to thrive in that from Camp. It won't be the intense physical training, because I've gone through Camp, Track, Cross-Country, and a brief stint of cheerleading (they train harder than the football team). It won't be the loneliness, because I moved out to Sheridan and didn't know a single person. It won't be the lack of control over my life, because I gave that up a long time ago. It will be that no one touches each other in the military. And that will be what makes me break.
I don't have an answer for him. I think he might be right.
Bonnie is happy, and welcoming, and always glad to see me. If I was living in the area for the next year, I would have dinner with them every week. Last week, I sat between her and my friend, and after dinner we played a card game, and she would regularly have a hand on my shoulder.
Touch just says something to me. It could be translated as, "I love you," or, "You make me happy," but I think the simplest interpretation in my mind is an affirmation; "I'm glad you're here."
Because I know how many times I have failed. I know how many ways I fall short of what I should be. And I cheerfully deal with the idea that wherever I go, most people just kind of put up with me and my weirdness (if it's not for the failures, it's for the fact that I have a backwards approach to a lot of Christianity). The idea that someone actually wants me is like dropping water on a cactus. Carefully, cautiously, disbelievingly, start to open up a little. Cactus survives just fine and dandy, hale and hearty, but this...this is something bigger.
So, Bonnie's the most beautiful mom I know.
Monday, January 11, 2010
Golden Pond
Not surprisingly, my Dad's in another show.
To those who don't know my Dad so well, he ended up getting tremendously typecast all through high school for his splendid portrayal of "Doc" in West Side Story. By nature, Dad's pretty much a blending of George Bailey and Elwood P. Dowd (both portrayed by Jimmy Stewart). But he cranks out a good villain, and generally has fun with every role.
Now, he's playing Norman in Golden Pond. Norman is, simply, a curmudgeon, who bounces gaily between being insulting, morbid, and playful. He's verbally offensive, and his racist comments would get him shot today.
Me: "I'm trying to figure out how YOU got cast for this."
Dad: "I wanted it!"
Me: "..."
Unfortunately, the production doesn't open until February, so I'll miss it.
To those who don't know my Dad so well, he ended up getting tremendously typecast all through high school for his splendid portrayal of "Doc" in West Side Story. By nature, Dad's pretty much a blending of George Bailey and Elwood P. Dowd (both portrayed by Jimmy Stewart). But he cranks out a good villain, and generally has fun with every role.
Now, he's playing Norman in Golden Pond. Norman is, simply, a curmudgeon, who bounces gaily between being insulting, morbid, and playful. He's verbally offensive, and his racist comments would get him shot today.
Me: "I'm trying to figure out how YOU got cast for this."
Dad: "I wanted it!"
Me: "..."
Unfortunately, the production doesn't open until February, so I'll miss it.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
The fact that God says, "Do this!" is not a promise that He'll remove all obstacles from that path.
Said task will remain possible. But, sooner or later, you might realize that it's only possible if you're doing it with Him.
Bit of a crazy backstory. This entry will be a long one. Fall before last, I moved to Wyoming. God spent the next eight months or so teaching me about a rather-overlooked command; "Do not worry." Matthew 6. Great chapter, love the chat about giving in secret, and especially the whole "Seek first the Kingdom" segment. I've read it so many times that, by now, I should be able to recite it with an accompanying dance number. Fascinating year, it was. Through a pile of wacky life experiences, "Do not worry."
Let us note that if you're being stubborn and not getting what God's telling you, He will make life much more interesting in order to get through to you. Turns out that the only way to practice this absence of worry is for life to suddenly offer a lot of circumstances that you could worry over.
Saw this in action when a certain little almost-brother of mine took a swan dive off a fence post and gave himself a concussion. His mom's taken "Do not worry," to heart. She'd lived the lifestyle that we get fed as "the good Christian girl." The idea behind it seems to be, "If you do all of this right, you will marry a good Christian husband, and life will be good for you and happy for your children."
Note: The "Prosperity Gospel" is bunk. Deeply opinionated on that, but that's a subject for another time.
Anyway, she'd followed instructions, as they were, and had indeed married a solid Christian husband. And then, four kids later, he decided that church wasn't really his thing, and to add injury to insult, divorced her. She tells us that that was when she stopped worrying. Not stopped caring, because she cares for all of us girls like a second Mom. But she stopped worrying when stuff happened, just trusting God when He told her not to worry. So, when her firstborn had just regained consciousness, she packed him and his sister (who was freaking out) into their minivan, and drove to the hospital, sans freaking.
Seeing her, calm, capable, and solidly doing what needed to be done just grabbed me (and now that I phrase it that way, reminds me of a Ski Patroller I once knew). God took almost a year to teach me this idea, and then showed me someone who lived it. Wow.
And then, rather standard for things God teaches me, there turned out to be a "next level" to this idea. Right, "don't worry," I got it. Right, "seek the kingdom of God instead"...working on it, don't have it nailed, but at least I know that seeking's supposed to come in next. Okay.
Well...there's another command. All through the Bible. Turns up a LOT. And I'd misinterpreted it every time I'd seen it.
Rejoice. Praise God. That one. Turns up over and over - someone went through and counted how many times we're told to be glad in some way, and it comes up at over 900. And here's me, I read, "Praise God," and because of the cultural upbringings, see that as the Israelite synonym for, "Yay! Yahoo!" I'd missed that it was an imperative.
In all things, rejoice. In everything, rejoice. Always rejoice.
The same week that I was talking with Ethan about how it feels to wake up in the morning, and praise God as the very first thing you do (splendid), the same week that I randomly got asked out by a guy in the coffee shop, the same week that I promised a friend I'd be at church on Saturday (not Sunday), so I heard a different sermon (about joy), and we spent over an hour hanging out after the service laughing together - God started teaching me about joy in a new way.
You'd think, with where my name comes from, that I'd be the person to go to for joy. And yeah, I throw a lot of cheer around, and find the bits of light in a situation that seems dark, and love to laugh, and various other bit of sparkly goodness that nauseate every villainess my sister's portrayed. But I'm also remarkably selfish, vain, and mean-spirited when it comes to what I think I deserve. And, not surprisingly, this is when all the joy gets sucked out.
You can all think I'm insane for this - I'm used to it (although, if you do, you've gotta admit that I'm one of the more stable, down-to-earth, matter-of-fact lunatics you know). About a week ago, God told me to pray for something pretty specific. Unfortunately for all the information bandits out there (and yes, I'm one of them), I can't really say anything about it until someone else does something specific. Just because it has to be God leading on this. It's rather a big deal. And it requires something from a few different people.
But, the crazy thing about this - one of the key figures is going to be in the military for the next six years. And, to boot, the same person also received (yes, from God again; I'm a regular Joan of Arc) another assignment to follow those six years. So, it looks as though the earliest that anything solid might come from praying about this would be...2016. Likely early summer. So, I could pray that it'll happen then. Or I could pray that God will substitute somebody else for my role in this, so that it'll happen later (yes, I know that if it doesn't involve me, it's going to be very different, but depending on how far you back the picture up, it looks the same...who am I kidding. I know I'm supposed to be in this one). Or I could pray that it happens when the next assignment is over (could conceivably happen in the middle of that one - doesn't involve the U.S. Government owning my tail to jerk around to whatever continent they wish). Or I could just pray exactly what God told me. Every day. Until it happens.
Actually, even after it happens, because this isn't like a race you run and say, "Whew! We're done!" anymore than you say, "Whew! I'm finally in shape! Done!" As long as a few of the main people involved in this adventure are still in this world, this one's going to be going on.
But, there will be some parts that are particularly discouraging.
And there will be some events that hurt.
And there will be some parts that all seem to point the opposite direction, and indicate that it couldn't have been God telling me this, and surely there's someone much better suited to this.
There's a bit of a hint for the info-hounds. There are a few different things that I'm supposed to be doing shortly after the military. Two of them involve me moving out of state again - and yes, they're two very different states. And in the case of one, I know the location rather precisely, and I can tell you that I don't think I'm at all the best person for the job, and think that someone more local should do it. And then I get reminded, if God had a better person in mind, I wouldn't be hearing about it. I'm the person God's got in mind. Fine. Okay. Makes no sense, doesn't need to make sense. Can't see how this is going to work out, God says do it, okay.
Truthfully, you don't need to see how things are going to work out, when God says they're going to. You just have to listen, and remember that He's never lied to you, so logically, if He says it's going to happen, it's going to happen. How is up to Him. And don't even bother with "Why?" I'm pretty sure a lot of my life isn't going to make sense on the "why" scale until after I get the Heaven-view on it.
*headbonk* If God assigned me the other stuff, AND He assigned me this...why do I think that the other stuff is going to get in the way of this? For all I know, they appear to be different assignments and in fact weave together in a seriously cool fashion. Even if they don't, He's not going to tell me to do one thing that makes it impossible for the other things He's told me to do.
But, there's something right now that suggested that one or two of the other Camp girls are supposed to be filling in where God told me to be. So, me being me, I of course get jealous and feel like they're threatening MY special thing.
Rationale kicks in awhile later.
They don't know about what's going on...
...and I don't know what kind of things God's assigned to them.
(This is a rough side of being a Christian. We're made to talk to each other, to confide in each other, and these are the Camp girls. There's a deeper element of trust. But just as we're all thinking, "I can't tell them that. I'm not nearly as good as they are," and, yes, we're all thinking it about everyone else, there's also, "I shouldn't tell them that. Maybe God didn't really tell me. Maybe I'm delusional, and they really know what His voice sounds like. Or maybe their assignment is more important than mine." Ethan's pointed out that Satan'll use a lot of tactics to keep us from confiding in each other, because we're a lot easier to cut down when we're riding solo.)
They're just being good. That's not a bad thing. Chill - they're being themselves - you don't even know they want this.
Also, this isn't MY thing. It's GOD'S thing. If they get this instead of me, that's God's call.
He's got something planned for each of us. There'll still be something cool that I get to do.
And then I need to go talk to the two girls (neither one goes to my church or school, so that'll take some effort), and while I don't think I can tell them about said assignment, I think I need to tell them about said jealousy and apologize, and find some way to build the relationship a little stronger. Jealousy wreaks havoc in relationships.
Because love can't live where there is no trust. Quoth Cupid.
Said task will remain possible. But, sooner or later, you might realize that it's only possible if you're doing it with Him.
Bit of a crazy backstory. This entry will be a long one. Fall before last, I moved to Wyoming. God spent the next eight months or so teaching me about a rather-overlooked command; "Do not worry." Matthew 6. Great chapter, love the chat about giving in secret, and especially the whole "Seek first the Kingdom" segment. I've read it so many times that, by now, I should be able to recite it with an accompanying dance number. Fascinating year, it was. Through a pile of wacky life experiences, "Do not worry."
Let us note that if you're being stubborn and not getting what God's telling you, He will make life much more interesting in order to get through to you. Turns out that the only way to practice this absence of worry is for life to suddenly offer a lot of circumstances that you could worry over.
Saw this in action when a certain little almost-brother of mine took a swan dive off a fence post and gave himself a concussion. His mom's taken "Do not worry," to heart. She'd lived the lifestyle that we get fed as "the good Christian girl." The idea behind it seems to be, "If you do all of this right, you will marry a good Christian husband, and life will be good for you and happy for your children."
Note: The "Prosperity Gospel" is bunk. Deeply opinionated on that, but that's a subject for another time.
Anyway, she'd followed instructions, as they were, and had indeed married a solid Christian husband. And then, four kids later, he decided that church wasn't really his thing, and to add injury to insult, divorced her. She tells us that that was when she stopped worrying. Not stopped caring, because she cares for all of us girls like a second Mom. But she stopped worrying when stuff happened, just trusting God when He told her not to worry. So, when her firstborn had just regained consciousness, she packed him and his sister (who was freaking out) into their minivan, and drove to the hospital, sans freaking.
Seeing her, calm, capable, and solidly doing what needed to be done just grabbed me (and now that I phrase it that way, reminds me of a Ski Patroller I once knew). God took almost a year to teach me this idea, and then showed me someone who lived it. Wow.
And then, rather standard for things God teaches me, there turned out to be a "next level" to this idea. Right, "don't worry," I got it. Right, "seek the kingdom of God instead"...working on it, don't have it nailed, but at least I know that seeking's supposed to come in next. Okay.
Well...there's another command. All through the Bible. Turns up a LOT. And I'd misinterpreted it every time I'd seen it.
Rejoice. Praise God. That one. Turns up over and over - someone went through and counted how many times we're told to be glad in some way, and it comes up at over 900. And here's me, I read, "Praise God," and because of the cultural upbringings, see that as the Israelite synonym for, "Yay! Yahoo!" I'd missed that it was an imperative.
In all things, rejoice. In everything, rejoice. Always rejoice.
The same week that I was talking with Ethan about how it feels to wake up in the morning, and praise God as the very first thing you do (splendid), the same week that I randomly got asked out by a guy in the coffee shop, the same week that I promised a friend I'd be at church on Saturday (not Sunday), so I heard a different sermon (about joy), and we spent over an hour hanging out after the service laughing together - God started teaching me about joy in a new way.
You'd think, with where my name comes from, that I'd be the person to go to for joy. And yeah, I throw a lot of cheer around, and find the bits of light in a situation that seems dark, and love to laugh, and various other bit of sparkly goodness that nauseate every villainess my sister's portrayed. But I'm also remarkably selfish, vain, and mean-spirited when it comes to what I think I deserve. And, not surprisingly, this is when all the joy gets sucked out.
You can all think I'm insane for this - I'm used to it (although, if you do, you've gotta admit that I'm one of the more stable, down-to-earth, matter-of-fact lunatics you know). About a week ago, God told me to pray for something pretty specific. Unfortunately for all the information bandits out there (and yes, I'm one of them), I can't really say anything about it until someone else does something specific. Just because it has to be God leading on this. It's rather a big deal. And it requires something from a few different people.
But, the crazy thing about this - one of the key figures is going to be in the military for the next six years. And, to boot, the same person also received (yes, from God again; I'm a regular Joan of Arc) another assignment to follow those six years. So, it looks as though the earliest that anything solid might come from praying about this would be...2016. Likely early summer. So, I could pray that it'll happen then. Or I could pray that God will substitute somebody else for my role in this, so that it'll happen later (yes, I know that if it doesn't involve me, it's going to be very different, but depending on how far you back the picture up, it looks the same...who am I kidding. I know I'm supposed to be in this one). Or I could pray that it happens when the next assignment is over (could conceivably happen in the middle of that one - doesn't involve the U.S. Government owning my tail to jerk around to whatever continent they wish). Or I could just pray exactly what God told me. Every day. Until it happens.
Actually, even after it happens, because this isn't like a race you run and say, "Whew! We're done!" anymore than you say, "Whew! I'm finally in shape! Done!" As long as a few of the main people involved in this adventure are still in this world, this one's going to be going on.
But, there will be some parts that are particularly discouraging.
And there will be some events that hurt.
And there will be some parts that all seem to point the opposite direction, and indicate that it couldn't have been God telling me this, and surely there's someone much better suited to this.
There's a bit of a hint for the info-hounds. There are a few different things that I'm supposed to be doing shortly after the military. Two of them involve me moving out of state again - and yes, they're two very different states. And in the case of one, I know the location rather precisely, and I can tell you that I don't think I'm at all the best person for the job, and think that someone more local should do it. And then I get reminded, if God had a better person in mind, I wouldn't be hearing about it. I'm the person God's got in mind. Fine. Okay. Makes no sense, doesn't need to make sense. Can't see how this is going to work out, God says do it, okay.
Truthfully, you don't need to see how things are going to work out, when God says they're going to. You just have to listen, and remember that He's never lied to you, so logically, if He says it's going to happen, it's going to happen. How is up to Him. And don't even bother with "Why?" I'm pretty sure a lot of my life isn't going to make sense on the "why" scale until after I get the Heaven-view on it.
*headbonk* If God assigned me the other stuff, AND He assigned me this...why do I think that the other stuff is going to get in the way of this? For all I know, they appear to be different assignments and in fact weave together in a seriously cool fashion. Even if they don't, He's not going to tell me to do one thing that makes it impossible for the other things He's told me to do.
But, there's something right now that suggested that one or two of the other Camp girls are supposed to be filling in where God told me to be. So, me being me, I of course get jealous and feel like they're threatening MY special thing.
Rationale kicks in awhile later.
They don't know about what's going on...
...and I don't know what kind of things God's assigned to them.
(This is a rough side of being a Christian. We're made to talk to each other, to confide in each other, and these are the Camp girls. There's a deeper element of trust. But just as we're all thinking, "I can't tell them that. I'm not nearly as good as they are," and, yes, we're all thinking it about everyone else, there's also, "I shouldn't tell them that. Maybe God didn't really tell me. Maybe I'm delusional, and they really know what His voice sounds like. Or maybe their assignment is more important than mine." Ethan's pointed out that Satan'll use a lot of tactics to keep us from confiding in each other, because we're a lot easier to cut down when we're riding solo.)
They're just being good. That's not a bad thing. Chill - they're being themselves - you don't even know they want this.
Also, this isn't MY thing. It's GOD'S thing. If they get this instead of me, that's God's call.
He's got something planned for each of us. There'll still be something cool that I get to do.
And then I need to go talk to the two girls (neither one goes to my church or school, so that'll take some effort), and while I don't think I can tell them about said assignment, I think I need to tell them about said jealousy and apologize, and find some way to build the relationship a little stronger. Jealousy wreaks havoc in relationships.
Because love can't live where there is no trust. Quoth Cupid.
Friday, January 8, 2010
"Somehow I'll Find My Way Home."
Took about forty minutes to get home from Stewie last night. Completely forgot that the friend whose house I'd left had asked that I call when I get home. So tired, struggling to make the last two miles awake. Crashed nearly the minute I got in.
Next morning, I remember, "Ooops. S'posed to call Ethan." Pick up my phone. Observe that I have no reception (not uncommon in this house), but that I do have...nine missed calls. Yep. From Ethan. Oops.
I'm really not used to having anyone worry about me. This has become apparent over the last semester. I groan when I have to break from what's expected because something came up, but unless it's work-related, I forget to let anyone know. The fact that people notice when I'm missing is so weird. I'm used to being the resident spook around the music department - if you can't find her, no big, you know she's around someplace.
I also suffer from a delusion that says that, as long as you go slowly enough, you can get through ANY snowstorm. Probably not an absolute white-out, but quarter-mile visibility? No problem! Admittedly, sometimes "going slowly enough" means that you're breaking a trail by foot instead of driving, but I still remain convinced that you should be able to cover the distance without property damage.
This would likely not be the case if I still lived among the Rockies. Here, everything is very close to level, unless you're near a river. If I took the back roads, yes, it would be a frightening experience. Highways, eh, there's some traffic, there's plows, we'll take it slow, no problem.
There WAS a problem with staying awake, but I made it home without banging into anything, so I'm not concerned about that, either. Filing it away for future reference, though.
My relatively cavalier attitude about awful weather reassures some people, and completely freaks out the rest. But, I live in the Midwest. Minnesotans, by stereotype, are very calm people, who keep their opinions under wraps. If you disagree with a person, you don't SAY that you disagree, you simply state your opinion once and move on to something else. So, the worriers go unnoticed.
Until you wake up and find nine missed calls on your cell phone in the morning.
Next morning, I remember, "Ooops. S'posed to call Ethan." Pick up my phone. Observe that I have no reception (not uncommon in this house), but that I do have...nine missed calls. Yep. From Ethan. Oops.
I'm really not used to having anyone worry about me. This has become apparent over the last semester. I groan when I have to break from what's expected because something came up, but unless it's work-related, I forget to let anyone know. The fact that people notice when I'm missing is so weird. I'm used to being the resident spook around the music department - if you can't find her, no big, you know she's around someplace.
I also suffer from a delusion that says that, as long as you go slowly enough, you can get through ANY snowstorm. Probably not an absolute white-out, but quarter-mile visibility? No problem! Admittedly, sometimes "going slowly enough" means that you're breaking a trail by foot instead of driving, but I still remain convinced that you should be able to cover the distance without property damage.
This would likely not be the case if I still lived among the Rockies. Here, everything is very close to level, unless you're near a river. If I took the back roads, yes, it would be a frightening experience. Highways, eh, there's some traffic, there's plows, we'll take it slow, no problem.
There WAS a problem with staying awake, but I made it home without banging into anything, so I'm not concerned about that, either. Filing it away for future reference, though.
My relatively cavalier attitude about awful weather reassures some people, and completely freaks out the rest. But, I live in the Midwest. Minnesotans, by stereotype, are very calm people, who keep their opinions under wraps. If you disagree with a person, you don't SAY that you disagree, you simply state your opinion once and move on to something else. So, the worriers go unnoticed.
Until you wake up and find nine missed calls on your cell phone in the morning.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Because WE'RE not morbid or anything...
Petroglyph.
Whatever I said I wanted done with my body before, still stands. But there raises the issue of the memorial.
I'm not all that keen on having a headstone that, 200 years from now, will take up space. I have come to accept the notion that I barely remember my great-grandfather, and haven't any idea what he did with his life, so my great-grandkids will probably have a similar view of me.
But, enough people have suggested that they'd like some solid spot to go to in order to have the traditional one-sided chat with me and discuss such deep and weighty matters as, "What's with all the rice?" So, let's go with the petroglyph. Doesn't need to have my name (especially if you know the sign for "Firefly" to go with it), just something fairly cool that I'd be doing.
We don't have a family plot out here. There's probably a couple back on the East coast, but when my Dad got transferred and moved out here, we moved nearly a thousand miles away from ANYBODY that we're related to. I'd be rather irritated if my remains did get buried in one of those steel safes that we now use as coffins. Can you say overkill?
All right, I'll probably be too distracted at that point to care much what they do with my body. But, seriously, if it's too complicated to be biodegradable, you're doin' it wrong.
But yeah. Just for the sake of random. Find some hideously out-of-the-way spot on Camp property (you've got 200 acres to work with - I'm thinking something about six inches tall), draw something fun, cheerful, spirited, whatever, and as permanent as you like, let it be the Remembering Spot that everyone seems to want for this generation and possibly the next, and in later generations it'll be this random cool pic on a rock that kids find. And, no, I don't particularly care if they deface it, because that's what kids do.
Whatever I said I wanted done with my body before, still stands. But there raises the issue of the memorial.
I'm not all that keen on having a headstone that, 200 years from now, will take up space. I have come to accept the notion that I barely remember my great-grandfather, and haven't any idea what he did with his life, so my great-grandkids will probably have a similar view of me.
But, enough people have suggested that they'd like some solid spot to go to in order to have the traditional one-sided chat with me and discuss such deep and weighty matters as, "What's with all the rice?" So, let's go with the petroglyph. Doesn't need to have my name (especially if you know the sign for "Firefly" to go with it), just something fairly cool that I'd be doing.
We don't have a family plot out here. There's probably a couple back on the East coast, but when my Dad got transferred and moved out here, we moved nearly a thousand miles away from ANYBODY that we're related to. I'd be rather irritated if my remains did get buried in one of those steel safes that we now use as coffins. Can you say overkill?
All right, I'll probably be too distracted at that point to care much what they do with my body. But, seriously, if it's too complicated to be biodegradable, you're doin' it wrong.
But yeah. Just for the sake of random. Find some hideously out-of-the-way spot on Camp property (you've got 200 acres to work with - I'm thinking something about six inches tall), draw something fun, cheerful, spirited, whatever, and as permanent as you like, let it be the Remembering Spot that everyone seems to want for this generation and possibly the next, and in later generations it'll be this random cool pic on a rock that kids find. And, no, I don't particularly care if they deface it, because that's what kids do.
Monday, January 4, 2010
Got a question today.
One of those quirky Internet questions, that you just answer so people can see your answer.
What's the Best and Worst thing about being single?
Best is easy. There've been all kinds of cool things that've happened in the past ten months. There's a crazy kind of freedom in being able to move anywhere, or tackle any kind of new adventure. It's also supercool to be on the new adventures together - I'm not arguing that at all. But I'm doing things now that practically depend on me being single, otherwise half my brain (not to mention my heart) would be back here.
Worst, you could say is being lonely.
But, actually, what really bites is when you're in a committed relationship, and you're lonely.
Worst, you could say is when all of your friends are dating. Actually, that's actually okay. It's when everyone starts getting married, and suddenly not only do you not fit so well because you're not married, you don't even have a shot at getting married in the next year. There are three girls from Camp that were my close friends - two are getting married this year, and the third moved to the other side of the country. Very happy for all three of them, hoping to go to both their weddings, but we'll just be such different places in life now, except we won't - it's just getting married, right? That shouldn't change anything between us.
But you know on some level it's going to. And that's the worst. It's not that being single is bad. It's just missing your friends, and trying to explain that you're happy for them while still wishing they were here. "Well, you can't want BOTH." Why not? I want both. I want them to be happy, and I want us all to be friends. What's so hard about that?
And I know *I* don't want to be married for a good while yet. Say, oh, thirty years. That might work.
What's the Best and Worst thing about being single?
Best is easy. There've been all kinds of cool things that've happened in the past ten months. There's a crazy kind of freedom in being able to move anywhere, or tackle any kind of new adventure. It's also supercool to be on the new adventures together - I'm not arguing that at all. But I'm doing things now that practically depend on me being single, otherwise half my brain (not to mention my heart) would be back here.
Worst, you could say is being lonely.
But, actually, what really bites is when you're in a committed relationship, and you're lonely.
Worst, you could say is when all of your friends are dating. Actually, that's actually okay. It's when everyone starts getting married, and suddenly not only do you not fit so well because you're not married, you don't even have a shot at getting married in the next year. There are three girls from Camp that were my close friends - two are getting married this year, and the third moved to the other side of the country. Very happy for all three of them, hoping to go to both their weddings, but we'll just be such different places in life now, except we won't - it's just getting married, right? That shouldn't change anything between us.
But you know on some level it's going to. And that's the worst. It's not that being single is bad. It's just missing your friends, and trying to explain that you're happy for them while still wishing they were here. "Well, you can't want BOTH." Why not? I want both. I want them to be happy, and I want us all to be friends. What's so hard about that?
And I know *I* don't want to be married for a good while yet. Say, oh, thirty years. That might work.
Friday, January 1, 2010
This year, the notion of making any new resolutions seems amusing at best, and a little frightening at worst.
In less than a month, I'll be leaving, and my world's going to change. I can't resolve to be in better shape or show up on time more often, because I don't have a choice on either one. I want to be less critical and more joyful, and find the humor in far more situations, but I know that February's going to lead to quite the personality overhaul (I know it doesn't for everybody, but I also know it's going to here. Don't ask; I'm not being fatalistic, I'm being weird.)
Resolutions are another celebration of liberty, but a more sideways one. I can resolve to eat healthier, because I have a lot of variety in my choices. I can resolve to listen to my students more, because they actually want to talk to me. I can resolve to dress more (or less!) professionally, because, sheesh, I can actually afford more than three pairs of pants!
...there's a part of my brain that doesn't quite grasp why anyone needs more than three pairs of pants, but I'm working on kicking it under the table. "What? Two for work, two for school, one to kick around in in the woods!" "That's five." "Oh! I get it!"
So, if everything WASN'T changing a month from now, given events and information from the past few weeks...
1) I resolve to spend more time actually PLAYING with my sisters, and not just talking to them.
2) Also, listening to them more than I talk. But none of us play enough.
3) I resolve to quit shutting out the possibility of getting back in the dating saddle.
4) I resolve to quit being weird around the ex (or, more accurately, I wish)
5) I resolve to practice my sax daily, work through this piece that's been kicking my butt, join an ensemble and cease regarding this talent with regret
6) I resolve to spend more time with my friends than my computer
7) I resolve to chase after my wilder dreams, and quit telling people about all of them because they're starting to get that men-with-the-white-coats expression when they see me.
8) I resolve to laugh more, play more, and pursue the things that I'm really passionate about.
9) I will not only finish one of the books I'm in the process of writing, but also have the courage to actually let someone else read it
10) I will either stop being surprised when people think I'm twenty-five, or nineteen, or I will stop acting like it.
Standard stuff.
In less than a month, I'll be leaving, and my world's going to change. I can't resolve to be in better shape or show up on time more often, because I don't have a choice on either one. I want to be less critical and more joyful, and find the humor in far more situations, but I know that February's going to lead to quite the personality overhaul (I know it doesn't for everybody, but I also know it's going to here. Don't ask; I'm not being fatalistic, I'm being weird.)
Resolutions are another celebration of liberty, but a more sideways one. I can resolve to eat healthier, because I have a lot of variety in my choices. I can resolve to listen to my students more, because they actually want to talk to me. I can resolve to dress more (or less!) professionally, because, sheesh, I can actually afford more than three pairs of pants!
...there's a part of my brain that doesn't quite grasp why anyone needs more than three pairs of pants, but I'm working on kicking it under the table. "What? Two for work, two for school, one to kick around in in the woods!" "That's five." "Oh! I get it!"
So, if everything WASN'T changing a month from now, given events and information from the past few weeks...
1) I resolve to spend more time actually PLAYING with my sisters, and not just talking to them.
2) Also, listening to them more than I talk. But none of us play enough.
3) I resolve to quit shutting out the possibility of getting back in the dating saddle.
4) I resolve to quit being weird around the ex (or, more accurately, I wish)
5) I resolve to practice my sax daily, work through this piece that's been kicking my butt, join an ensemble and cease regarding this talent with regret
6) I resolve to spend more time with my friends than my computer
7) I resolve to chase after my wilder dreams, and quit telling people about all of them because they're starting to get that men-with-the-white-coats expression when they see me.
8) I resolve to laugh more, play more, and pursue the things that I'm really passionate about.
9) I will not only finish one of the books I'm in the process of writing, but also have the courage to actually let someone else read it
10) I will either stop being surprised when people think I'm twenty-five, or nineteen, or I will stop acting like it.
Standard stuff.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
