So...what to do with the rest of my life?

Sometimes, I wish we could just pick a single spot we love and then stick with it.

Heck--I'd even take the ability to pick a particular kind of spot, say suburbia or The Big City or the plains states or coastal dwellings.

But instead, we have to move around a lot, liking bits and pieces of the places we live, longing for bits and pieces of the places where we used to live, never quite entirely content.

At times, I find myself feeling that there could be nothing better in the world than to live by myself in Boston for the rest of my days, perched in some apartment or other, dashing in to collect the mail from the boxes in the entrance, hastening up the stairs and collapsing in front of the TV with a microwave meal heating up while I indolently flip channels.

At other times, I think there could be nothing better than to buy a small house in Utah County somewhere near where my parents live and use my time off during weekends and holidays to drive so far up into the canyons that the sound of coin-leafed aspens murmuring to themselves almost makes me forget civilization even exists.

I find myself thoroughly enjoying myself here and wondering what life would (or will) be like once my program's finished and I'm left to my own devices as a young professional. I can feel the appeal of this place: the sometimes frenetic vitality that surges through the city, imbuing all its inhabitants with a sense of friendly urgency.

But I miss the quiet nights looking up at the milky way as it swings over mountain peaks and valleys; I long for the sight of the horizon, the rising and falling of the land.

Why is there always something in us that keeps itself aloof from full happiness, as though our full measure of contentedness is something we simply can't attain here? I wonder if it's simply that there are so many places on Earth to love, but they're always off; they never quite mirror the home we knew before; they're always just imperfect copies of a perfect standard.

And we, after all, are imperfect folks who try to love these imperfect copies.

All in all, I think it's a pretty fair accomplishment to love any corner of this world as it is. And I have to confess: I'm learning to love it here.

Puntificating

I feel both flattered and strangely debased.

Read here.

I hope all of you are taking full advantage of the best of the 'Beth' puns you can imagine. (Haha! Or, "The Beth of the Beth puns!" Wait. No. That doesn't even make sense.)

Badgering the witness

Isn't it true that I'm only really interested in myself?

Isn't it true that my head is currently presiding over a body whose stomach is roiling with anxiety about things which are too numerous and nebulous to list?

Isn't it true that I hate to socialize in the same way that a brilliant chess player hates football? Or a really burly football player hates playing chess? Or...a really inept analogy-maker hates making analogies?

Isn't it true that I just watched Mystery on PBS and thus am trying to ask a bunch of questions to which I already know the answer sort of kind of maybe?

YOU decide.

Space is cool.

In other news, I like my current desktop wallpaper. It's an artist's rendition of a very-asphyxiated-bird's-eye-view of the tallest mountain in the Solar System:


Cool, eh? Nothing like having a little Mars on your desktop. (If you like this, you should check out more at space.com. It's pretty cool. Yeppers.)

And what a difference a year makes.

I've thought a bit about what I wanted to write about in commemoration of my 29th birthday.

But, I don't know... How do you summarize the experience of 29 years into a succinct, relatively readable online mashing of thoughts?

I guess the truth is that I don't remember much about what I've learned over the past 29 years. I don't remember much about what I've learned during the last 5.

I think that what you learn in life begins to diffuse down into your soul, so that the lessons there aren't something you can easily separate out into their own separate entities; they've meshed and mingled together, forming new insights, new layers of meaning, making up who we've become.

I'm an accumulation of experiences from the time I was a slightly annoyed, reddish-haired, 5lb 12oz baby (many thanks to Mom for particulars) to now, where I sit with toes tucked into the creases at the back of my knees, hair unbrushed, glasses slightly smudged, eyes dark with too much reading in too little light, fingers poised over my keyboard, wondering what to type next.

And what does that make me?

What person am I now because of what I've experienced, what I've done?

I'm not sure. I'm asking myself those things even as I type them here.

I wonder, often, if I'm the kind of person God wants me to be right now, if His forming of me has taken hold, if His moulding hasn't melted by my indignant straining against Him. I can feel that in some ways, I'm very much the person I need to be right now. And in other ways I fall far short of the mark. If sculptures could shift their shoulders to throw off the Master's blow, would they? Just to prove they were the ones forming themselves?

I don't even know what I'm saying.

I sat down to type a bit about the changes that I've had in my life this past year, changes which have not been insignificant, mind you. I've moved to Boston from Utah (a loooong ways, lemme tell you), I've lost oh-so-close-and-yet-not-close-enough to 100lbs, I've had crushes and new friendships and I've stared at the ceiling and the mountains and the stars, wondering how I can possibly fit, how I can possibly matter, and then realized half-wonderingly that I do after all.

I don't know.

That this year has been eventful, I am sure. That I've learned things, I'm certain. That I'm still as much of a pretentious fool as ever, I am convinced. But what it all means? Ah. Now that is the thing that leaves me flummoxed.

I think that, in the end, when our separate experiences distill themselves before God when we account for our life, that we'll see how each bit of our life here shaped us into the being we have become. As a being-in-process, I don't know how I'll end up. But I have faith in the hand that holds the chisel. And I'll try not to wiggle too much while He's working.

The For Real Deal

Okay, folks.

I just want to get this right out of the way:

It's my birthday today! For real this time!

So, for all of you who have already wished me a happy birthday on my pre-birthday-celebration post, thank you.

For all of those who have not done so, you have until the end of today.

That is all.

(Ohyeah. And extra points if you know what the title of this post is from.)

Oh, don't stop talking on my account.

So...this confession may make me seem a little bit more like a scary-stalker-like person than I actually am, but...

I really like eavesdropping.

I've realized this before (and usually blushed after said realization, most becomingly) but I was reminded of this little taste of mine today while riding the shuttle bus up to work.

During the ride, I noticed two twenty-something women talking to each other on the bench opposite the aisle to where I sat, purse in lap, hands clasped securely over said purse, eyes staring politely (i.e. vacantly) ahead, ears (obviously) wandering freely. As we passed one of the many schools in the area, one of the women commented to the other that she was thinking about a grad program there, but it was kind of expensive. They talked about other programs and I discovered that they were interested in pursuing vocations as early childhood educators, that they were both either married or in semi-permanent relationships with men, that they were both pretty well informed about the costs of private schools and that one at least was pro-private school and decidedly against living in the city.

(I know I gleaned other bits of information from the conversation, but that's all I can remember at the moment.)

I realized a couple of things from this encounter: firstly, that it's easy to pass along information to those around you even when you're not engaged in direct conversation with them. And that it's definitely best to be cautious. (You never know when a stalker-like blogger like me is sitting supposedly innocuously in a seat next to yours, mentally taking note of your semi-private conversation.)

Secondly, that it is (as I mentioned before) fun to eavesdrop. And a little wistful. I will (most likely) never see these two young women again. And yet, during a span of about 25 minutes I was able to learn things about them enough to tell that I'd probably enjoy getting to know them, that I'd probably have things in common with them, that we could (in short) become friends if the circumstances were right.

And that's probably the oddest thing of all. Most of the encounters we have with people during the course of a day are brief one-time deals: you see someone, you may say a word or two (or not) and then the moment is over. For good. And yet the possibility always exists that with each person you encounter you could build a potentially lifelong relationship. That man in a business suit jogging past you could have been your best friend; the elderly woman with a poodle might have given you art lessons; the smoking man in a ballcap sitting on the curb could have been the first man ever to tell you you're beautiful. And yet they're not.

I feel amazed at all the relationships we do develop with people, and sometimes at how chancy and random the circumstances that create those relationships seem to be. And yet, for my part, the people I've had in my life seem to have been just the people I needed at just the time I needed them. And that, more than anything, seems to indicate to me that the people we know when we know them are not accidental. Not in the least.

And that when eavesdropping on conversations really does (as unlikely as it may seem) lead to friendship, there's a reason for that too.

And libraries just got a whole lot steamier:

Ohoho! (LAST post today, folks, I promise.)

I just stumbled upon this poster while browsing the Library of Congress online gift shop for things I would like to buy if only I had the money.

And, oh my, how I wish this were hanging on my wall at this very moment.

Can't quite seem to stop talking today...

Just finished Nicholas Nickleby at last. It took me so long to get through it, but believe me: I love those books which, when you finally finish the last setence, leave you with a sense of having encountered something moving and wonderful, something that alters you permanently.

I loved this novel. Hurrah for the classics!

Move along, lil' Bostonian

While walking back from the grocery store this afternoon, I saw a feller (yes, you read correctly: feller) on the other side of the street wearing a large (and I mean large) cowboy hat, tight jeans and those little zip-up fleeced jackets cowpokes wear when they're out for days on the range.

It took me a second (after smiling at the familiarity of the scene) to realize that I'm not in Utah anymore. I'm in Boston. Huh.

And seeing a cowboy out here is a rare sight indeed.

Made me wonder how long he'll be wearing that outfit of his before he gives it up for polos from Abercrombie & Fitch. (Which. Oh, my. Erm. Don't bring up their main page unless you like seeing exquisitely sculpted male torsos.)

That feeling that you feel when you feel that... Wait, what?

I'm in one of those indefinable moods again, those moods that seem to be made up mostly of sitting by myself all day in my room, reading or checking the internet, listening to the sounds of traffic and the occasional siren outside my window, glad of the cool breeze, sad that there's a heat wave coming, full of the remnants of my breakfast and lunch, tired from having done mainly nothing all day.

It's in such moods as this that I especially begin to feel a need to be connected to people, and I find that I turn to this source as the means for such connection. Because it's here that I can say things that I feel, things I know you'll read and feel yourselves, so that somehow, for a moment or two, I'll be on your minds, and you on mine, and none of us will be quite alone.

And that, my dears, is more than comforting. Thanks for being there.

In which my concept of self is put sorely to the test

I've realized something about myself, and it's a something I don't like very much.

I don't really write much.

And that stinks.

I mean, I write on my blog, I guess, and I sometimes write in my journal. I write emails, I write little notes in little little notebooks, I write grad school application essays...

But I don't write stories. I don't. And that's...

That's just not acceptable, people. And it doesn't jive with what I imagine myself to be.

I once told a good friend of mine that I felt that writing was my real calling in life, that I had stories I wanted to tell.

But since then, I've spent much more time reading than writing, or watching movies or checking blogs or filing my fingernails or eating sandwiches or doing pretty much anything but writing.

So my question to myself is this: "Self, are you ever going to get down to it? Are you ever going to seriously sit down and make yourself write every blasted day so that you will eventually become an Author? (With a capital 'A?') Will you finish those novels you have lurking in the dusty corners of your computer's hard drive? Will you?"

And my answer to myself is still pending. I just don't know if I have the perseverance.

(But I hope I do.)

And one really teeny headache later...

Today I trained at my new job.

Now, job training is something that is peculiar to itself; I don't think there are many other instances when you're inundated with quite as much information in as short a span a time.

Fortunately, the people I'll be working with are patient and friendly and repeatedly assured me that I won't be required to have everything down pat right away.

Thank goodness.

However, despite feeling overwhelmed and a little short-circuited, I'm also feeling excited (really excited) about getting started in this job. Just being able to work in a library again is giving me a huge sense of coming-home-ed-ness, returning to what I really want to do with my life. And I'm sure starting classes in a couple of weeks will be just as overwhelming/enjoyable.

Joyeux anniversaire, un peu tôt.

(Translation: Happy Birthday, a little early.)

Happy Birthday to ME! Early!

Today was a wonderful, marvelous, very good day. I went down to see my Uncle & Aunt down a ways southwest of Boston. I spent most of the time sitting in the kitchen, talking with my aunt and two girl cousins and enjoying the antics of the toddler daughters of said cousins. But I also spent some time outside, enjoying my Aunt & Uncle's beautiful yard, which you can see here:


And here:


(By the way, can I just confess that I find it amazing and wonderful that here in the east the un-landscaped bits of your yard turn into FOREST? How cool is that? You have to WEED freaking TREES. Haha! So cool!)


And also, I found a pansy growing in a crack between some stone steps. Yeah. So. Here's a picture of it.

Aaaaaand, speaking of flowers, here's my happy early birthday present:


But the best (early) birthday present of all? Knowing you all are here, reading my blog, being my friends. Awwwww.

No, not really. Really it was the Black Forest Chocolate Cake with Fresh Raspberries. (It was so good, I HAD to capitalize it.) And I have one piece left over. And to save my pancreas, I'm not going to eat it tonight. No, no. That pleasure will wait until after church tomorrow. Oh, the joy of anticipation!

Little discoveries

Today I realized that licking batter from electric beaters (after unplugging, necessarily) is still as sublime an experience as it was when I was 7.

And about 30 seconds ago I realized that eating the cooked results of said batter (sugar-free, whole wheat cookies with REAL chocolate chips) is pretty darn sublime too.

Edit: And also, there's nothing quite like burning one's tongue in the pursuit of deliciousness.

You really ought to give singlehood a try.

It's really not so bad.

No, really.

Once you get past the point where you want someone to hold hands with, someone who thinks you're beautiful (even when you're not wearing makeup), someone who somehow shares all your hopes and aspirations and is so like you and yet so marvelously different, and once you decide that being an aunt is so much easier than being a mom so why not just stick with it, you're pretty much set.

Because really, there are all these things about being single that are great! For instance, you don't have to work on a difficult and perplexing marital relationship. You don't have to try to form a family unit with someone who has differing (and sometimes opposing) views of what it means to be the heads of a family and raise children. You don't have to put up with someone else stealing the covers or wanting to turn the air conditioner in the bedroom up or down. You don't have to try to sleep next to someone who snores. Or grinds his teeth. Or has chilly feet.

And all the heaps and scads of money you're making right now? Yeah. It's all yours! You don't have to spend it on diapers and formula and multiple car payments (well...not usually). And, if you're pretty careful, you may manage to save just enough to travel a bit to those places you've always wanted to visit. Like England. Or South Dakota.

So really, in the face of all these great things about being single, wouldn't it be the most intelligent thing to just kind of let go of any desire to get out of the singlehood state? To interact with young men in a friendly but unconcerned fashion? Because you don't really care whether they'll like you or not, since you're perfectly happy with staying single for the rest of your life?

I keep wondering when exactly it's going to sink in, when I'll finally say to myself, "Okay, I guess it's never going to happen for me," so I can finally get rid of this 20% hopeful 80% despairing feeling every time I meet and/or interact with young men? Will it be after I turn 30 (in a week and one year)? 35? 40? 50? How long will I wait before I give up all my internal hope of marriage?

I search all these blogs of single women, looking for some sort of answer about how to be content right now, even when I'm alone, but I haven't found it yet.

Maybe there isn't really an answer for it. Maybe it's one of those things in life that you just have to bear, the way some people have highly allergic reactions to nuts, or children with congenital health problems, or really bad relationships with family members. It's just something that will always give you a small ache, no matter what else you may do with your life. And that's okay. Everyone has small aches they live with, and as mentioned previously, there are a lot of really great aspects to being single: even just the ability to retreat into my room and shut the door so that I can have complete peaceful solitude, something that would be impossible if I had children.

I just wish I could feel more actual contentment with this state, wouldn't feel lonely or long for someone to rub my shoulders after a difficult day or someone to kiss me in the early hours of the morning when the as-yet unseen sun is just starting to lighten the sky, wouldn't long for children who are my own, my very own, for the incomparable joy of being a mother. But I do have these feelings. And while part of me wishes I could just turn them off, another part tells me that doing so would somehow lessen me.

So with that, I will take the sorrow and loneliness that are part of being single in a married culture and I will continue to hope for a chance to marry if possible. And in the midst of the sorrow and loneliness I will enjoy the freedom to go where I please when I please, to spend all day reading if I like and to make a peanut butter sandwich without a husband carelessly asking me to make him one too.

Ahahahaha!

Okay. I just had to share with you my favorite line so far from Walking with Prehistoric Beasts (which I checked out from the library yesterday):

Imagine this sentence uttered dramatically low and slowly in a British accent: "This is a world...where birds eat horses."

Wow. Awesome.

Diddly doggerel doo

I love the way I sometimes just sit and write stuff as if the things I have to say are rather remarkable bits of something. When really, they're just kind of. You know. Ramblings.

But I still like sharing them:

I sit here and look up: just past the horizon made by the roof of the building towering above me, a cloud, its languid white arms reaching and reforming, moves overhead in piercing contrast to the overarching blue. To my right a lawn stretches, grass cropped low enough to look like carpeting, edges merging together in the distance as though the whole world is conspiring to give me an art lesson in perspective. The breeze intermittently brushes over my shoulders, lingering briefly to finger the very ends of my hair; I feel as though all nature is in love with me, so how could I not reciprocate?

I find myself feeling, out here in the open, on this perfect day, a kind of peace I experience only rarely. I can’t even describe it. It’s something like longing for home and something like having just finished a delicious peanut butter sandwich. It’s satiation and desire all rolled together, liberally mixed with quiet joy.

I love this world so much sometimes, this semi-temporary home for our mortal selves to grow up in. And even in this little pocket of city, both the cars going past and the bird flying overhead are part of some great whole I can only sense a part of.

But I’m grateful for the sensing. Grateful to be, myself, a part of the whole after all.

In other news, I've neglected to share the following with you:


This was from when my roommate (and a bunch of her work friends) and I went to go see A Midsummer Night's Dream for free at Boston Common. The gazebo you see ahead is not, in fact, the stage. Which...I mean, I thought it was at first, so don't feel bad or anything. Yeah. The stage is actually off the picture to the right. So. Cool. Shakespeare for free. Not a bad thing.


The above was taken just before another rommate and I went to the New England Aquarium. We both thought the sight of fog obscuring the skyscrapers (not to mention that cool building with the turret) was pretty dang awesome.

And here I am at the aquarium itself feeling uneasy about being approached by a friendly little penguin. Statue. A penguin statue. Not a real one. Alas. Because a real one made of gold would have been infinitely awesome.


And speaking of gold penguins, here's a completely unrelated picture of the subway. (I thought that archway was kind of cool.)


Here's a view from the back of the New England Aquarium (I love the grove of masts here):


And finally, here's a shot of the Fenway area. In the area to the right, past the road and where you can see lots of trees, there's a narrow park that runs alongside a stream. I love that there's this touch of green right in the middle of all these colleges. They call it (and connected parks) The Emerald Necklace. And it really is that lovely.


So, until next time. As it were. You know. And all that. You guys are cool.

The end.

Jubilations

I got the job!

I just thought you all ought to know.

(OhBlastedHUZZAH!)

And also?

Definitely feeling even more attracted to this guy. Oh. My goodness.

Seriously. Shoot.

No... No, wait. I've gotten it wrong.

It wasn't them. It was me.

I never opened up.

So you see, it wasn't that they weren't interested; it was that I was unwilling or unable to communicate my deepest self to them.

I hate realizing that I've been wrong. But somehow it's liberating too.

More about me (but then, what isn't?)

I miss people today.

I just thought I'd give you all a head's up, in case I suddenly decide to call you out of the blue and ask, "How's that family history coming?" or "Did you ever take those pictures of pinecones like you wanted?" or "How many fingers am I holding up?"

Or maybe I won't.

Maybe I'll just continue to lie here on my bed, curled into a comma, book propped up just beyond my throw pillow while my eyes move to and fro, scanning the text.

And missing you all the while.

Addendum

I feel really guilty. Really. I feel that I have been hopelessly and insufferably rude in recent posts.

So, I'm sorry.

I do feel terrible.

But I won't delete the posts. Because I also need them to be here.

Sorry again.

(And also, Superman Returns is pretty much my new favorite movie. I saw it for the first time today and. Wow.)

(And also, I saw a guy solve a Rubik's Cube on the T the other night. I was impressed.)

(And also, I am sad that President Faust passed away. And also glad for him. And also feeling that feeling both at the same time is both kind of difficult and kind of right.)

A little about me:

In the past 24 hours, I've learned two significant things about myself: I use this blog as an emotional outlet and I tend to fall for the wrong sort of person.

These realizations came about because of visiting teaching, or rather because of the way a visiting teaching appointment turned into a sitting-around-singing, personality-test-taking visit. (It was good times, my friends. Good times.)

The gal we (my roommate and I) were visiting just adores the Myers-Briggs personality test and asked if either of us had taken it. I had recently taken the test myself, so my roommate answered a questionnaire online (based on said test) and we pored over her score and personality profile.

Then, oddly enough, the focus turned to me. I explained that I'd recently been classified as an ISFJ personality type so my companion and our visiting teachee read over the profile and would occasionally burst out with exclamations such as, "That's so you!"

One part of the conversation struck me particularly: in reading over the profile, our visiting teachee asked, "Do you use anything as an emotional outlet?" and my roommate explained about this blog. I'd never really thought of my blog as an emotional outlet, but I could suddenly see it as such. My blog is a way for me to express emotions that I would otherwise normally keep hidden. In fact, when events of emotional import happen to me, I find that I usually want to post about it. I've wondered since then why that is.

I wonder if it's partly that you, my blog readers, are mostly people to whom I'd feel okay about opening up emotionally. I know most of you pretty well, and even those of you I've never met are somehow so similar that I could see myself confiding in you without much concern.

I wonder too if it's that a blog is a way of expressing one's emotions in a slightly detached way. I tell you about all these feelings and frustrations that I have, but I do it in such a way that I'm able to sit down and think about the manner I want to express things before I actually interact with any of you. I've always found it easier to express my emotions in writing; it just seems safer somehow. And I have doubts that the habit is entirely healthy.

Anyway.

Naturally, being girls, we then decided to explore which personalities would be the best matches for each of us. To my surprise, I would apparently be best paired with either ESTP or ESFP, both extroverted personality types. Now, personally, I have a tendency to fall for introverted men; the high social energy levels of extroverted individuals have always left me feeling baffled and (frankly) inadequate. To be honest, I've always discounted such people in the past, mainly because I felt they could not possibly find me interesting. I always liked getting to know the quieter individuals, believing that they would at least understand me and not automatically assume I was boring if I didn't speak up much.

I was actually rather resistant to the idea of either one of these personality types until the visiting teachee told me that I needed someone who would be vitally interested in me; that he would find me fascinating enough to try to draw me out.

And I realized in this flash of insight with myself that I really did have that need, and that it was something that was lacking in all of the previous relationships I'd had with guys. Not that the guys I've known (or even dated) have been boorish; I don't want to give that impression. But I never felt that sense of real, genuine interest in me. I've never felt that they've tried to really delve down into the deepest inmost parts of me. Or rather, I guess I may have felt that intellectually, but never emotionally.

I'm such a private person, really. I don't feel comfortable talking about myself and if I feel the slightest decline of interest in what I'm saying I will immediately stop talking about me and try to focus the conversation on the other person. I'm always in terror that the person I'm with will become bored. And I'm always convinced that I am boring.

So. Long story short: I think that the only way I will ever fully open up to someone is if I have someone who is open and warm with me and who persistently finds me fascinating. And who persistently tries to draw me out. And is good at it.

Unfortunately, I kind of can't help thinking that I'm kind of unlikely to find that.

'Cheetos' is the code word.

So.

I totally got chatted up by a guy at institute tonight.

The only problem is that I think he needs to be on some kind of medication. And isn't.

And I feel a strange mixture of guilt and relief at telling you about this. Because I feel terrible talking about him like this. But I also want to share with you this experience of almost being asked out by a guy who really. Really. Is out there. And how I tried to get away after about a fifteen-minute conversation by indicating that I needed to talk to my roommate. But it didn't work. Because he just kept on going.

And then how this tall, dark-haired guy with an awesome accent asked me to open the gym door for him so he could roll a round table into the little storage closet. And how this new nice (and not-crazy) guy started asking me questions about myself. And how I wanted to talk to him more. Because he seemed awesome. And nice. And good-looking. And not crazy. But how my encounter with not-all-there boy had kind of made me want to retreat very quickly into the kitchen and away from any possibility of encountering said not-all-there boy so I kind of had to cut the conversation with nice non-crazy boy short.

Which just makes me grit my teeth.

So. While discussing above experience with my roommate, we realized that we had no plan in place to help one another out of situations like this. My roommate, in her wisdom, decided on A Plan.

And The Plan is that 'Cheetos' is the code word for: 'Get me out of here now because there is no way I can gracefully extricate myself from this situation and I need to be extricated so desperately that my toes are about to curl into my ankles.'

So now we know. And will be prepared.

And let me tell you: I think being prepared is more than half the battle.

And not choking seems pretty good to me

Well, folks.

The interview went pretty well.

And by "pretty well," I mean that I managed not to make a babbling idiot of myself. I asked intelligent questions (or so I believed at the time) about the library and the position and answered the more difficult questions without getting horribly tongue-tied (although I did notice that my answers tended to be unfortunately rather vague).

And, thank goodness, the interviewer was possibly the most friendly and personable person I've interviewed with. Ever.

Which also means that I'm not sure if the interview went really well or if it just went well. Because she could have just been friendly and nice yet at the same time thinking: This gal is pretty much lame-o. Or, she might have been friendly and nice and thinking: This gal is pretty friendly and nice herself. I think we'll hire her.

Time will tell.

I'll find out for sure which it was at the end of this week or possibly early next week. And I'll let you know as soon as I can.

Because I'm pretty sure you're all rooting for me.

So thanks.

TONS.

Gotta stay calm.

I'm feeling a rising sense of panic.

But I'm trying to exorcise it.

I'll be fine. I just gotta remember to stay calm. And remember that I can do this. Really. No joke. I. Am. Capable.

(Wish me luck too though, just in case.)

My bit of Austen

I also just found out which Austen heroine I would be:

Take the Quiz here!

Here's the description: You are Elinor Dashwood of Sense & Sensibility! You are practical, circumspect, and discreet. Though you are tremendously sensible and allow your head to rule, you have a deep, emotional side that few people often see. (How accurate do you think that is?)

(Many thanks to Heidi for including this on her blog!)

Hey! That's my school!

I was just at the Simmons main page meandering around, trying to find information about my course schedule. And as I brought up the main page, I suddenly realized: holy heck. I am going to that school in less than a month.

I was swept with a feeling of utter and complete awesomeness.

I can't believe how lucky I am.

The joy of (finally) being able to be nervous about something

I just got a call this morning for someone in a library very close to my school. She wanted to schedule me for an interview this Wednesday!

Huzzah!

And hooray!

And galdaleelooooooks!

I'm so happy, because this means I can bring to bear all my powerful charms such as speaking distinctly and smiling warmly and shaking hands firmly.

Which, really, is a huge step up from just being a piece of paper listing work accomplishments.

Wish me luck! (And pray hard.)

Instead of what I should be doing

Right now, I should be reading Numbers 3. I should be reading it because I am currently trying to work my way through the Old Testament. Straight through.

I have never accomplished this before.

And guess where I've always gotten stuck! Oh. You're so good. Yeah.

Numbers.

So. Instead of reading Numbers 3 (which I will do before going to bed, thankyouverymuch) I am currently communicating with all y'all.

Cause I know you just love that.

And I'm trying to think of more interesting things to write about. But seeing as how it is now past 11 o'clock at night and seeing as how I've been up since about 7:15 and seeing as how it was fast Sunday and seeing as how I wanted a nap and didn't take one because I was too busy filling up my empty stomach after church, I think I may sleep soon.

So you'll have to wait for revelatory writings till the morrow.

Adieu. And good night.

Y'know. All that jazz.

What the...

I love that those who create those internet banner ads feel that a trio of dancing aliens is the best way to let you know that housing payments have fallen.

I am left utterly bemused.

Apocalyptics anyone?

Oh, and also? It's just nice to know that T-Rex totally agrees with me: post-apocalypticism is cool.

Outstretching

I must confess: I've been having a bit of a hard time.

I feel really bad admitting that, as though in confessing my problems I'm causing nothing but distress to pretty much everybody, including myself.

I hadn't even been thinking clearly about the reasons why I've been feeling a bit low until I talked to my mom this afternoon. Somehow, the conversation with her was a bit of a catalyst, pointing me to what I needed to realize about myself.

I'm unhappy. I'm disappointed in myself. I feel like I've come out here expecting things to just kind of fall into my lap, unwilling to get off my bed and do the things that really need doing.

And it's not even that I haven't been trying; it's just that I haven't been trying in the right ways, I guess, or trying as hard as I should have. Because, surely, if I had been working hard enough things would have worked out by now? Maybe?

I'm anxious. I need work. I need to feel that I'm doing all I can to support myself out here. And I need to be able to not worry about money so much all the time.

But suddenly, typing this, it occurs to me that there's something to learn from this too. Maybe there's a purpose in waiting.

I don't think I'll ever know really what it's like to live in poverty. And I'm so grateful for that. But...

But isn't it important now and then to catch a glimpse of how people who are in devastating financial trouble live? To sense a little bit the kind of anxiety they experience all the time? Doesn't this just increase our compassion for them?

It makes me want to make a difference for them. And maybe, once I've figured out a way to get through the next couple of years out here and I've gotten my degree, maybe I can start with the kids in difficult circumstances, be one of the people who try to help them love learning through the books they read. Because I think that knowledge may be the only way to lift people out of circumstances like that.

Just the way serving others is the only way to lift you out of anxiety for yourself.

Personal Daemons

As mentioned before, I've been getting into Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass in preparation for the movie coming out this December. So, as part of said getting-into-it-edness, I've decided to create my own personal daemon, with the help of the movie's website.

Let me introduce you:



(On my first try, I got a spider. So I'm much happier about having on osprey, lemme tell you.)

If you'd like, go ahead & create your own daemon. It's rather revealing. And oh, so much fun.

Revelation

It's all suddenly become clear to me:

Well.

Actually, no.

No, it hasn't.

But I've always wanted to say it had, so.

There ya go.