Ways and Whirlwinds

Who knew you could alliterate so wildly wonderfully with W’s?  Well…now you do I guess.  You’re welcome!  Enjoy your status among the educated.

Well friends.  This has been a very up and down sort of week, but rather than be my usual organized self and categorize the experience by downs and ups, I believe I will take you for the ride with me.  so here we go:

Down: As you know, I found out my temporary job, which I thought was going to last until May and my graduation, is now going to be finished in December, which means I for sure have to keep my second job, which I don’t like much, and I will have barely any income.

Up: The next day after discovering this, I get a call asking me to come in for an interview with a different company.  I get placed on-call, with definite potential for moving to a part-time position.

Down: I get a call to take a part-time position, only to discover that because of my haphazard schedule it will be nearly impossible to place me.  If I want a placement I need to change my present schedule.

Up: I get offered yet another job, in the marketing department at my current company.  It would fit my schedule, and offer me equal pay to the job I don’t like.  I could finally leave it.

Down: I email for more details and, two days later, have yet to hear anything.  I’m currently working on Thanksgiving for the job I don’t like and was hoping to submit my change to on-call before then…but it’s getting pretty darn close.

Up: At my retreat I learned about a program which sends students into cities where faith is forbidden and helps them reach out, undercover, to other students.  I feel a tug and want very much to get involved with this.  I promptly email them.

Down: I still haven’t heard back from them.  Added to that, my professor talked to me after class and informed me that he thinks I used to have so much direction and now I don’t seem to have any and he just wants to smack me and get me in motion.  While I know that this is because he really cares about his students and wants them to achieve as much as they can, I still cried while I was driving home.  I hate to feel I’ve disappointed someone.

Up: I’ve decided I will move forward with applying to grad school, taking community practice focus classes with the goal of completing an advanced standing master’s degree in one year.  This gives me a focus, and the training I need to either go overseas with an organization, as I would wish to do, or possibly even start my own nonprofit one day.

Down: The application requires me to write a research sample.  On a policy something or other.  ew.  Meanwhile, I’m still a couple pages away from finishing my lit review, let alone my methods chapter.  double ew.

Down-er: I have to work this weekend at the job I don’t like.  because of this, I’m missing an awesome concert saturday night, and a babysitting op sunday night. lame.

Up: I’ve finished the final assignment for senior seminar, and we’re not having a final in that class anymore!  yay!  so my main concern now is my paper and my application to grad school.  much easier.

Up-er: my Professor believes that everyone involved will be amenable to my adjusting my schedule in whatever way is needed to benefit my thesis and to be able to take the jobs I want to take and I need to pay my bills.  Her support was my main hurdle!

Up-est-of-all: My fellow intern told me today that she sees the aura of Christ around me and can feel it within me.  a guy that came to the foodshelf told me I was pretty — and then apologized! (I think it’s probably not something we should encourage, but since people don’t generally have that opinion of me I couldn’t discourage him ;)) And my little sissy is celebrating her 11th birthday today with a gazillion girls from her class.  fun times!

Well.  That’s been my existence these last few days: hence the lack of postings!  Tonight will be laundry, probably trying to write one more agonizing page of the THESIS, and watching Psych with ma sista.  I hope life is treating you well my dear friends.  Drop me a line when you’ve got a moment 🙂

Hypocrites, Liars,and Other Just Like Me

Well friends I’m still trying to formulate my thoughts so they aren’t quite ready to post just yet. I do, however, have a few observations.
This morning I told one of the littles to quit having a bad attitude about something I told her to do — that she was only going to make herself more miserable. And then it came: don’t I do that pretty frequently myself? Pouting, whining, being crabby over things that won’t change and I must go through either way. Don’t all things come to an end, sometime? And yet I still find it my bounden duty to let others know when I am not pleased with a particular circumstance.
Later this same morning, I told one of the other littles that the work she did was not done well enough and she needed to do it over again, that doing the least amount of work possible was not acceptable and she should take pride in her work and the results. And then I realized again. I’ve been dismissing several of my assignments as being worthless and so I’ve hurried through them and not bothered much about it. But my name is still on that page: I write my name, claiming authorship and ownership of that work. But what do I want my name to stand for? Have I worked this hard to fall apart now, to give up, to be mediocre? Not so. If I can speak the words then I must find it within myself to live with the integrity they imply. I encourage you friends: Listen the next few days to the things you say. Ask yourself who you are.

Surprising Encounters

Today, I had a several interesting moments where I ran smack into a very good thought. The first one occurred as I sat in the tattoo parlor, and I realized once again how little you can see by someone’s exterior. Their outside may be pristine and their heart a cesspool of nasty, or perhaps their outside is scrawled with tattoos and poked and diveted with piercings, but their souls are whole and hearty, and running over with goodness.
The second, which has posed quite a mystery to me is this: can you describe the flavor of milk?
Slow down today. Think about what you do — what you smell, what you see, what you feel and hear and taste. Can you name it? Could you express it to someone who had never known such a thing? See if you can pay attention long enough to marshal your whole being into awareness.