Midterms... Over?

Are midterms over yet?

Tuesday

I couldn't think of a better title for today, so I suppose the something obvious like the day of the week will have to suffice. It's been a rough day. Our Hebrew midterm is on Thursday and I should be studying, but I don't have the will to study right now which probably indicates that anything I did study would go in one ear and out the other. The obvious second choice of activities would be to journal/blog/write. There isn't really anything that interesting enough to write about, but at least I'll feel more productive.

The underlying problem is that I just don't feel motivated to do anything at the moment. It isn't a "wow I'm tired of school" or "I'm so overwhelmed" demotivation, I just don't want to do anything other than go home and curl up in my bed and sleep. Which is ridiculous because for once I've gotten enough sleep several nights in a row. The feeling is more of a sad tired, and I don't know why, but it's not being helpful when I logically know that I need to get stuff done.

Maybe I'll feel better tomorrow. Regardless, I have to learn my Hebrew paradigms. Thankfully Friday is a no-school, fall break day. Part of me wants to go home for homecoming but I don't think that I will. There's a strong enough part that doesn't want to go home that I think I won't. If I hadn't gone to Houston last weekend, and if I hadn't seen everyone at Laura's wedding, and if I thought there would be anything eventful other than a football game that Rice will lose then maybe I would go home. But all of those things are true.

Obligatory Update

I wish I wasn't in class right now. Monday night classes are no fun, and this class is particularly draining because it's not something I'm interested in. And the professor is older and talks slowly and tries to carry on discussion but no one wants to discuss. I'm here for another 2 hours at least. Then it's off to the grocery store to buy some food for lunches this week and home for dinner and Hebrew homework. Oh what an interesting life I lead.

This weekend was fun. Laura and Daniel's wedding was Saturday and I got to see a lot of people that I don't normally see since we are all in different locations. Seeing everyone makes me wish that I was back in college when I could see people all the time. It's funny that the only people I really ever hang-out with from that time period are couples. Even Heather- she and Kyle just don't know it at the moment. But yeah, the wedding was Saturday proper and then we met up with Laura and Daniel and various people from the Netherlands in Kemah. Going to Kemah was another trip back in time. Clear Lake has changed so much in the past six years that parts of it aren't really recognizable anymore. The people from the Netherlands were fun, although I didn't get to talk to many of them. Pretty much, it was just really nice to see Laura and Daniel. They seem so happy together and it was wonderful to be a witness to that happiness.

Yesterday was pretty blah because it was basically nothing but homework- particularly working on the stupid paper for this class that I'm in right now. Beside the blahness of the rest of today, the exciting part is that Lauren and Jeff are engaged! They are possibly one of the sweetest couples I know and I'm very happy they are getting married (not that I think anyone was surprised). What is surprising is the rapid decline of friends that aren't married/engaged. Then again, I shouldn't be surprised. It's that point in life when everyone starts getting married and settling down, and most the people I know have been in relationships for pretty long periods of time.

But yay upcoming weddings and yay more reasons for hats and crafts.

Daytime Television

This entry is going to be rather random as my thoughts are jumbled together in my cold-medicine ridden, fevered mind.

Anyway, the point is, daytime television is a lot less predictable than I remember it being. When I was younger the day could easily be marked by what was on television. Not so anymore it seems. Yesterday at 9 am and 10 am "A Haunting" was on Discovery Channel. Today, after dragging my sick self back home from school, I turn on Discovery Channel expecting to see "A Haunting" because it is 10 am. No bueno. Some show about termites was on. And not the entertaining exterminator show either, but some educational show about termites. Or ants. I don't remember.

Where is the continuity? Even the commercials are less predictable. Except the Snuggie-Macarena commercial. That thing is on pretty regularly. But yeah, daytime television is no longer a valid reason to want to stay home during the day unless you purposefully figure out what is going to be on and when.

I bought a whistle today. Did you know that the current war in the DR of the Congo is the deadliest war in history? And that the child soldiers that are too small to carry guns are given whistles and sent to the front line? There's a non-profit that sells whistles and 100% of the profit or whatever go to help rehabilitate child soldiers and other children in war-torn areas. I'm pretty excited about getting a whistle.

Glee tonight is about God. I like it so far, especially since Puck sang a Billy Joel song (about time someone sung a Billy Joel song). Now I really wish that I had the Glee Season 1 DVD- and more money to buy Glee songs.

Bridezillas

I love this little slice on completely crazy reality TV. Can we say crazy? And yet, I am continually drawn in. Sometimes I wish my life was more like a reality TV show (not this one in particular, but a reality show in general). On one level, things always turn out for the good even though it's reality. But my reality doesn't always turn out that way.

Where is the happy ending? Why can't life have a storyboard editor that cuts out everything else and makes the ending happy. Against all logic I still think that the happy ending exists. I'm just tired of waiting for it.

Must.Sleep.Need.Sleep.

...and yet I'm still vaguely awake and posting to my blog instead going to bed.

I'm not sure what I was thinking when I thought that 16 hours + work + SRT + TJCM + YMT = good idea, but it doesn't. All I do is work and then as soon as my last Friday class is over, I immediately have to start on everything for next week just to stay afloat. With this course load it definitely feels more like graduate school. Thankfully I will only have to take 12 hours for the rest of my time (pending, of course, me taking a Maymester class).

I talked to Deborah this week. She's still alive and in her final year at Harvard Law School. Not much else happened. I had a really nice, long IM conversation with Megan last Friday and I don't think I've posted since then. Maybe I have- this week has been super long. I will relate just how fried my brain is below:

In my modern theology class we were discussing plenary verbal inspiration v. dictation. I was trying to point out that God foreordaining people to write specific words really isn't different than dictation. My professor, Dr. Sands, was trying to play a game with me to show that there is a way to elicit a certain response from someone without telling them to say that response. The idea is that at the end of this series of math questions he asks you to name a vegetable and like 70% of the people will answer carrot.

Sands: Okay, what is 5+5
Me: 10
Sands: 10+5
Me: 15
Sands: 15+5
Me: 20
Sands: 20 +5
Me: 25
Sands: 25+5
Me: 30
Sands: 5x5
Me: 25
Sands: 25-5
Me: 20
Sands: 20-5
Me: 15
Sands: 15-5
Me: 10
Sands: 10-5
Me: 5
Sands: Name a vegetable
Me: ...uh
Sands: You hesitated, what were you going to say?
Me: Granola
Sands: Granola isn't a vegetable
Me: I know

Yes, in response to "name a vegetable" not only did I not think of a vegetable immediately, I answered granola- which isn't even close to a vegetable. At least my class had a good laugh.

Waco

I am sick of Waco. I am sick of school. I am sick of never getting enough sleep and still never being able to sleep at night. I am sick of feeling like if I don't get out of here I'm going to lose my mind.

All I can think about is moving on and moving out. I don't know why this feeling is suddenly surging through my veins, but it's driving me crazy. At the same time, I don't want to just go back to Houston because I have no job there and I've already invested this much in this degree and I'd have to live with my parents and I know that I'll just end up back in Waco and I don't want to have to come back here. Does that make any sense at all? I feel stuck in this semester. Ready to move on but with nothing to move on too.

This is all overly melodramatic and I'm pretty sure I have some kind of personality disorder and that's why I both dislike myself and want everyone else to like me. I think that's narcissism. And probably talking about it is an example of that. And I know how stupid it is to complain because there are so many other problems in the world- legitimate problems and I shouldn't have a right to complain but I'm so stuck in my head and I can't get out.
Edit: Gillian says that I don't have a personality disorder.

Oh and Mim vomited tonight and I almost did cleaning it up. Grump.

Why I Won't Ever be Elected to Office

There are a variety of reasons for which I will never be elected to political office. The most obvious being that I am not popular. Yes, it does matter as elections are (at their core) popularity contests. I accepted my lack of popularity at an early age and while I think I'm no longer at the very bottom of the social ladder, I'm still not at the top. Secondly, I realize that my political leanings aren't exactly "mainline" or "electable." Socialism is pretty alright with me, although I subscribe to a more Marxist take on it. Capitalism, eh. Gun-rights: no f***ing way (to be blunt). When it comes to international relations let's get on board with Sweden and Switzerland.

But let's look beyond the two glaring reasons from above and look at the little decision that would get me noosed at a Tea Party Rally for treason: I have made the choice not to say the Pledge of Allegiance anymore. I honestly cannot look at the American flag and in all good conscience give my allegiance to the country. The recent victories of Tea Party candidates hammered the last nail into a long developing coffin.

Now, it's not that I don't like living in America. Compared to a lot of places in the world, we have it really good. No oppressive religious regime (pretty much), basically freedom of the press and right to congregate, good standard of living, etc. Those ideals were fan-freaking-tastic back in the 18th century. Everyone else was all monarchical and here comes this young thing being all "pish you monarchies, we're going to get all democratic-bill of rights on you, wut?" So much potential. I kinda see America as the high school student destined for greatness. The one that was in leadership positions, valedictorian, did volunteer services, full ride to college- the one that had so much potential in front of him. Then, ten years later, you find out that he is working as a fry cook at Jack-in-the-Box and you just have to stop and wonder what happened. Sadly, it was probably drugs and now his mind is scrambled and he has nothing better to do than waste his life away getting high on daily basis. That's America.

What happened American? You had so much potential. Now you're economy is in shambles, your international policy seems to be based more on military policy than anything else, you have a health system that is electing to do away with child only coverage because, heaven forbid, a child might have a preexisting condition and need health care. And the worst part is that the loudest political voice right now is that of what I would deem insane, except that might be an insult to the insane. Seriously, the Tea Party? Let's take an already failing political system and instead of trying to elect people that will actually attempt to work together and start backing the radicals that won't even try. Or the ones that somehow think that bringing Christian values back into the government will fix things. Even the earliest political leaders didn't think so. Even I, as a seminary student, think this is a problem.

So no, I will not say the Pledge. I will not give allegiance to a failed country. Like with the drug addict, the best way to help is to stop enabling it. At the same time, barring certain changes, I won't be fleeing to Canada because running away isn't the solution.

Flash in a Pan

We had a conversation at dinner earlier tonight and it got me thinking about how quickly things fade in and out of our lives. Of course that particular idiom typically refers to fads and whatnot, I'm thinking of it more in terms of those periods in our lives that just come and go in a nanosecond. Tonight I'm waxing on college.

Six years ago people that I barely knew gathered after a very memorable basketball tournament trip and made a video for the Yale Precision Marching Band. And to be perfectly honest, it isn't the greatest video. The dialog, the video quality, the pyrotechnics are still hilarious, but I think they are funny because of the memories associated with them more than their lasting contribution to cinema. The video encapsulates a period of intense joy associated with the memories of a trip that is memorable because everything that could go wrong did go wrong in a way so incredulous that it was, and still is, comedic.

The most stunning thing about the video, though, is how important the people credited with the video have been in my life and how I couldn't have even begun to fathom that at that time. I barely knew Patrick, Kris, Kyle, Mickey,and Jake,or really even Lauren at that time. Lauren became my roommate my following year and a year after that married Mickey- my first really good friends to get married, and now Lauren has graduated law school and Mickey is heading toward the end of a PhD in Bioengineering. I had really only begun to know Jake and he became a great source of support and a great foe in the theology over the next few years. He knew Annie at that point and five years later they are happily married and he's in the last year of law school. Kris I never knew as well but he and Megan have some of the most beautiful wedding pictures I've ever seen. Kyle, at that time, existed only as the odd person that wore a shark suit. He too became one of the biggest sources of support for me. I love thinking that at that point Kyle and Jamie had no idea that each other existed but that the universe was moving in a way that their paths would intersect two years later. And then there is Patrick. I still think that we were the best ECs that the MOB had (I'm allowed to be biased). I didn't know at that time that his then girlfriend, now wife, Gillian would be at Rice not 6 months later and that Gillian would become one of my best friends and the person that I probably talk to the most (maybe even more than Jack).

It's just strange to think of how unknown everything was 6 years ago and as a freshman how many possibilities there were in front of me that I couldn't have imagined. So much joy existed in that time that I almost hate to remember it and somehow tarnish the memory. I know that I'm projecting my feeling backwards and at the time we probably weren't as happy as I thought and the possibilities weren't as limitless, but isn't hindsight slightly more than 20/20?

And now we're grown up. We've moved away from Rice and the band hall (or mostly so). People are scattered from Houston and the lines of communication are harder and less persistent. We all have jobs (even those in graduate school) and life is infinitely more complicated. I hate to admit, but watching that video makes me think of the Vitamin C song "Graduation" from 2000. I still get a weird, knotted feeling in my stomach when I hear that song. What do we know of the future? How do we know who we will become friends with, who we will work to maintain relationships with? I suppose that we just try to spread love in every moment and hope that that shared connection won't be a flash in the pan.

On Babies and Hats

Saturday Gillian, Heather, and Jamie visited and we made hats. I'm actually pretty proud of my hat. It is a light blue/aqua pill box hat with a black flower and a peacock feather. The pattern is super simple and even though it took my 5 hours to make by hand, I don't think it is terrible. I wore it to church today and got a few compliments on it.

More than anything else, it was really, really nice to have people visit me in Waco. No one ever comes to Waco, which if I'm perfectly honest makes sense because Waco isn't that awesome, but it's nice to see them. We had a good time. Lots of laughing and crafting and whatnot. Every time I see people it makes me realize how much I miss Rice people. No one here is quite nerdy enough (although Chris and Travis are pretty decent fill-ins for most things). I made a fantastic Star Trek remark in Hebrew this week and only the teacher and I got it.

This week has been a very sentimental week. I talked to Sarah on GChat which is always fun. We talked about her upcoming wedding. I'm so excited about her wedding this summer. And super excited that we are talking regularly now. I also talked to Megan and Laura on speaker phone. I forget how much I miss them when I don't talk to them. Basically, I've been in away from everyone too long and I need a person fix. If I could have one totally non-practical but also not completely ridiculous wish it would be that I had 100 million frequent flyer miles and could just fly around seeing everyone.

Today Calvary called and asked me to do child care and they let me play with a two and a half month old baby. Awesomeness.

Journaling 2.0

It's a new year and a new attempt at journaling/blogging. This is probably attempt 700 at journaling over the course of my life, but I'm more determined this time. And with the advent of a new spiritual formation director, someone may actually read this and decide if I can graduate or not. It's not that I don't love Waco and Truett (so maybe only half of that is true), but I do want to graduate and move back to Houston. I miss Houston and I'm too broke to drive back there on a regular basis.

Oh yeah, I'm also trying to stay on a budget. And an exercise schedule. And a legitimate combination of healthy foods (including carrots- I know, what?). And keeping my room clean. Basically trying to be a better adult and all that. Maybe 25 will actually be the year that I start being an adult. I had to replace my car battery last week and that's kinda grown-up like. So there universe. So there. This semester is also ridiculous because I'm working 20 hours and taking 16 hours and doing the Journal and probably YMT and oh yeah, 4 hours of Hebrew. Good. Freaking. Grief. I hate Hebrew. I had an a-ha moment today when I dissected my middle name and found 3 Hebrew words in it, but yeah Claire + Language = Epic Terribleness of Larger Proportions and probably fire-shooting raptors that also spit spiders.

My looming suspicion that I have ADD is also being confirmed by the number of stimulants I take to keep me awake in the morning (read: copious amounts of energy drinks) actually make me concentrate better and stuff. I feel like energy drinks shouldn't make me concentrate but actually just stay awake. I didn't take a nap today so I may simply be loopy. This is the 2nd morning in a row that I've woken to my alarm going off. The sound is jarring. That may be because my alarm is Tik Tok and Ke$ha at 7 am is really ACK!

I suppose that's all. No one reads this blog anyway.

Gothic Mormons

So it has been quite awhile since I've posted anything. Not that life hasn't been interesting. Or that I haven't had time to post anything. I just haven't.

Summer is fast approaching. It's nice to be back in school and be on the school calendar system. It just makes more sense than the traditional calendar. I'm looking forward to only having to worry about one class for awhile (Texts and Traditions 2- Reformation literature) in June. I'm not taking a class in July and my job is effectively over at the end of June, so July should be either really boring or really awesome. I'm guessing boring because I'm not going anywhere and I'm too broke to go anywhere even if I had a plan.

I'm feeling a bit stuck at the moment. It's hard to believe that a year is almost up for grad school. I think I have a better idea about what I am going to do with my life, but I'm already ready for the next thing to happen. Don't worry, I don't plan on jumping ship and leaving Waco after only one year (though I'd be thrilled if the program moved to Houston!). There is just something missing that I can't wrap my head around. To quote Ingrid Michaleson "I want to change the world, instead I sleep." I've been sleeping a lot lately, trying to fill in the hours of my day that aren't bounded by class and work and homework. In some ways I think I sleep because it speeds life up.

As for the title of this post, I've been watching Big Love a lot and listening to Laura music. Strangely I find comfort in two ways of life that I will never subscribe to. I guess I have reached the realization that I will never be interestingly different. I will always be plain and boring, like white bread.

Adventures in Wonderland

So it has been a good and solid month since I've posted anything. Honestly I've just been to scattered. Journal entries written on scraps of paper in between the chaos that is the end of winter and beginning of spring. I'm not sure anything that I could have written would have been coherent and even if it was the ramblings have a madwoman are best left to herself. But here I find myself, stepping into a new spring and in the sake of spring cleaning, it's time to clear out some of my thoughts.

School is progressing nicely. Overall I enjoy my classes and although they might not seem overly stimulating at times, I'm busy. Work is busy too. It's remarkable how you can hold down 2 part time jobs and still be broke. Someday I hope to have enough of an income where I can put money into long term investments and retirement and savings and all that good stuff. My big accomplishment for this year is going to be paying off my credit card. It's small enough that it feels manageable without being overwhelming. Tax refunds are good things.

For the first time ever in school, I'm not looking forward to summer. Largely because I'm planning on taking Greek the entire time (ick) as well as working. And unlike last summer, I have nothing fun planned to look forward too. Just the summer heat and translating the NT.

But more than anything else, this past season I've been thinking about what it will mean to be a quarter of a century. How my life is measuring up. And you know what? I hate measuring. Everyone around me suddenly seems to be in an all fire hurry to get on with their lives. Too often I let that discourage me. But you know what also? Maybe it secretly means that I'm actually just more confident in the now than they are. Here's my logic: We are all so scared of losing what we have in this moment that is good that we jump for ways to hold on to it. We compromise ourselves and others for a quick fix without really assessing the long-term consequences. But I think it's more likely that we rush in and then set ourselves up for regrets and disappointments. I know that I've lived my life this way and it's exhausting. I become manipulative with myself and the people around me.

Dr. Creech likes to remind us that the only correct response to "what time is it and where am I?" is "right now and right here." How often do I actually respond with that? I'm always on the way to something without ever being present in my life. So to clean for spring I'm trying to clear away the idea that I need to be on someone else's pace, or that my pace is wrong. I don't want to get to where I'm in a hurry to go to and realize that I've burned bridges and taken a wrong turn to save time.

And a Picture Means I Miss You

I'm going home for Valentine's Day. Jack was going to come to Waco, but I'm going to Houston instead. It all started with a picture that our band director posted on facebook from Friday celebration. I miss those Fridays. I miss the Friday night dinners afterward.

So I'm going home. I'm going home to see people that I don't really talk to anymore but spent 5 years of my life seeing every Friday. Houston and Rice keep drawing me back. I'll have been in Waco for over a month and had thought I was slowly breaking the spell. But I'm not. I'm slowly being called back.

True Life

By far my favorite show on MTV (and from the golden age when reality tv wasn't a complete cesspool of humanity), and yet I'm consistently disappointed with the disproportionate number of episodes about the "Jersey Shore." Is it really the preeminent place to find love during the summer? Is it really that magical? Not that I have much room to talk. Galveston beach is about as disgusting as it comes short of well, beaches near sewage plants, perhaps. I have no desire to be on the beach. No desire to be near the ocean. I'm really not a girl that likes the water too much. There are bugs and fishes that bite your toes and dirt and mud and animals drink out of it, ick, not my ideal place for relaxation. I also don't get that "small" feeling when I'm near water.

I'm a girl that should be living in Colorado. In the concreteness that the mountains offer I feel small. Something about they're physicality speaks to my soul. And out in the mountains civilization is dotted enough to see the stars. Oh the stars! Growing up literally 7 minutes from NASA, I would have expected to have had an early appreciation for them. An idea of how much we can't see with our eyes, the hiddenness of the infinite. Senior year of high school is when I first remember becoming cognizant of the vastness of the universe. I was at Mo Ranch in Hunt, Texas (a small, basically non-existent town in the Texas Hill Country) in February and on the first clear night of our leadership conference we held a bonfire beneath the stars.

In Houston, there are maybe 100 visible stars on a good night. In Galveston, maybe 300. In Hunt, there were more visible stars and more faint echoes of starlight than my mind can process. I think that was the first moment where I really understood how big the universe is, how small our existence is, and how miraculous it is that a God that infinite could possibly love and care for something that small. This past September I went to a wedding in Aspen and in the clear beauty of the mountain night the stars rendered me breathless again. I have no doubt that it is somehow Divine Providence that I met and fell in love with a boy that has the ability to take me to the two places that can reawaken my light-polluted soul.

So I sit in the overcast, rainy Waco basking in the artificial light of my apartment and watching a documentary on people my age looking for love in the artificial nature of the Jersey Shore, thinking about my next chance to run under the stars.

Deep Breathing

It's funny how you don't appreciate things until you can't have them anymore. For me this has been taking deep breathes and sleeping through the night without waking up coughing violently. We tell ourselves in times of stress and turbulence to center and take deep breaths, but what if you can't? Instead you take a shallow breath and panic. Another and another and another until you're hyperventilating. If only you can calm yourself down. Slow down the breathing. Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale.

I find my life is in a constant mode of almost hyperventilating. I keep feeling like I'm being put on other people's timetable and scurrying around trying to catch up or slow down. We've been talking for the past few weeks in my Life and Work of the Pastor class about how being an effective pastor basically means that you have to figure out your own time table first. If you don't, you allow others to set that. How true is that of life in general?

I feel this tug in so many directions- people waiting expectantly for that next big leap be it a job, a move, marriage, insurance, a vocation and every time someone else hits that its a stark reminder that I'm still lost in someone's time table for me. And I find myself resentful. I'm sympathetic, but it's not like I haven't felt the same worry and anxiety. I see friends getting careers and getting engaged and moving into the quintessential adulthood and wondering why my bus hasn't bored yet. Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. I should be reasonably happy for where I'm at but I've spent so much time letting those timetables envelope me that I can't see when I'm supposed to board.

So it's always catch-up to nothing. And I'm always two breaths away from hyperventilating. Deep breath. Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale.

Spikes

It's amazing how life is marked by the valleys and the peaks. Spikes- both good and negative. Today, for example, was marked by a spike. We had a FEMA training for Psychological First Aid. I can't say that I really learned anything. It was interesting at points. I met the person in charge of the evacuation plan in Houston during Hurricane Rita. Or should I say the "non-evacuation" plan. Eighteen hours from downtown to the Woodlands. It's amazing what the human body can do under stress. I'm not sure how I drove that much for that long of a period of time, but I did.

But speaking of the human body- my spike today happened after lunch. I wasn't hungry during lunch and was feeling shaky. Assuming that I was just apprehensive about our simulation I returned. I didn't feel great during the simulation, but again I was assuming I'd feel better afterward. No such luck.

We finished and I felt horrific. Freezing and a headache and I felt like my head was burning up. We went through the debriefing and in the break I had Stephanie feel my forehead. Needless to say, I ended up having to go home early. Fever-yes. Fever of 102.5. And there was the spike. It's scary to think that my fever came on almost instantly. Or what would have happened if I hadn't gone home and the fever increased?

And as soon as it came on, it was gone.

Here we go again....

Another semester of covenant group has begun, which means that I am returning to a more consistent pattern of journaling. As usual, life is a beautiful mess. I'm trying to learn to live into that mess, though. Too much time and energy has been spent resisting that mess- trying to put things into compartmentsl

I will strive for organization, but I will not obsess about it. For the first time in a long time I'm honestly trying to use a date book. I'm pretty sure that it is the only way that I will get through the semester. I've over committed- again. Big surprise (right)? Between everything I have going on I will be a more beautiful mess by the end of the semester.

The book that I've just finished for my Life and Work of the Pastor class had the brilliant insight that mess precedes creativity. And that ministry is a mess: a mess of people and people are inherently messy. I am inherently messy. I am embracing this messiness for the first time.

Kitties and Bugs

There is nothing cuter than kitties watching and chasing a bug. I suppose there are many other cute things, but right now it's the cutest thing in the world. Both are looking at some bug that has crawled under bag and they are staring at it and watching. I'm not sure what they are going to do, but they remind me of me right now.

I feel like I'm looking for something and waiting for something that is vaguely hidden. This week starts a new semester and a new round of "so what are you going to do after seminary?" I've thought long and hard about this over the past semester. I think I know where I want to go with this thing, but I really am only 2% sure, which is at least better than 1% sure. I hate that question. It's like "what are you going to do with your life?" I don't know what that is going to look like either. Something.

It just remains elusively hidden under a bag and I'm crouched down waiting for it to come back into the light and snatch it up.

Hitting the Ground Running

So today was a beginning of firsts for the semester. My first class (Baptist Identity), my first visit to Jessica's new home, my first invite for a social work get together. I am most excited because today was the first day of my attempts to cook. On the plate tonight was baked chicken with tikka marsala sauce, cous cous, and peas. To be fair, I already knew how to cook peas (well microwave peas). The chicken turned out okay. It was a bit salty, but I'm hoping that is indicative of the sauce and not my cooking. The cous cous was also pretty decent.

Today was also the first day of my ProX 9 workout. It will also be the last for awhile, until my chest cold clears up and I can actually take deep breathes without wheezing. Seriously. I ended up having a coughing fit while watching How I Met Your Mother and laughing too hard.

Now I am sitting and watching Sense and Sensibility, decompressing from a day of relatively little.