A subway ride down memory lane

I took my family on a tour of Cambridge and downtown Boston today and it brought back many found memories of this summer and the city of Boston. Last summer was so simple: I get up, go to work, come home, rest, work out, and talk on the phone until I can't stay awake anymore and get up to do the same thing the next day. It was so easy, and so sure, and so relaxing. Now as 2006 approaches, life seems anything but easy, sure, and relaxing. I feel like I have a world of opportunity before me, but none of which is really what I want.
But that's a thought for another time and another place, back to Boston. There is something about public transportation that resounds so well in my soul. I love the feeling of being unseen in a sea of people. And rubbing shoulder to shoulder with another person on the street isn't bad either, it makes you feel like you are a part of something bigger than yourself. (Here I must soapboax for a moment: I feel like I really don't know a whole of people, myself included, that are living life for something bigger than themselves. Now, I'm not saying that people today are ignoring God or that we do not find God important, but that we get stuck in the little battles of life and forget that there is life and existence outside of our little battles. Why am I not married? How am I going to afford rent next month? What is my purpose in life? All these are significant questions and deserve seeking, but what happened to the bigger picture? What happened to living life for a bigger Something? I feel like we get so caught up in the little battles that we mistake them for the bigger Somethings) Anyways, I really like the subway system in Boston and I really wish Minnesota had a subway system. The lightrail is pretty sweet but it needs to have more intricacy and more jumbleness before I can love it the way I do the Boston T system.
Being back in Boston has reminded me how much the city had grown on me in the three months I was there. A friend from the summer was telling me how he kind of missed Boston and I knew exactly what he meant. There is something comforting about being in a city that you are familiar with, it's like a partial home no matter how far removed you get from the place. Certain sights, smells, and sounds bring up sweet memories and you wish for just a moment that those sweetnesses could be relived or stay for moments longer. When I lived in Boston I was the total anti-tourist. I never bothered to buy any souvenirs except a t-shirt and I totally regret it. Today I was a total tourist. My family and I purchased all the necessary tourist crap: a mug, keychains, magnets...the only thing I missed was the baseball cap, which will have to purchased later this week. I really wish I could rewind the last part of this year. Aside from the winter thing and the "my life seems like a big mess of gray" thing, Boston was fun. I had family here, friends here, and even visitors. AND I HAD THE SUBWAY. All I'm saying is, God speaks through machines and crowds and emptiness. And I swear He does his best talking when I'm on a subway.

Vanilla

Work today is very slow. Already I have submitted an application for a conference in Chicago and updated my resume, and I still have two more hours to go.
I thought today I'd share of my wisdom and insights on dating. These are not really wisdom or insights, rather they are just thoughts or snipits of conversations that I have had with people. The reason I'm choosing to do this is because I had a long talk with a really good friend of mine about this topic and so I thought I'd share my advice with everyone. My friend is going back out with her exboyfriend, this in and of itself does not bother me. What I find rather peculiar is that she does not really seem to like her ex all that much. My conclusion of the matter is that she is settling. (There was a lot more to this conversation that led me to this conclusion.) Settling isn't so bad if its for a brief period in time, but not for the rest of your life. My friend's ex is like vanilla to her. Everyone likes vanilla and is willing to eat it, but no one wants vanilla for the rest of their life.
And this has been my conclusion. Everyone has a back-up or back-burner person, someone who is their vanilla. That person is comfortable, fun, and you can even be attracted to that person- but there is just no chemistry. And the hardest thing for girls (and guys) in their 20s to do is to not date their vanilla.
(*Just a note, I understand some people actually love vanilla. I use the vanilla as an example, you may replace vanilla with any flavor that you chose)

Minnesota Nice does not apply to driving

Here's my rant on driving. Every morning I have to take 94W to 394. The problem with this route is that only the right-most lane allows you to merge onto 394. This really doesn't bother me too much and I usually stay on the right-most lane as soon as I get onto 94 or when it looks like traffic is starting to backup. But I have repeatedly noticed that people will zip by me in the left lane only to come to a complete stop and merge into my lane right before the 394 exit. Now here's my problem with this. You are the reason why traffic always moves so slow. The people who are in the right lane have to stop for you because you are a moron and want to save the extra 30 seconds by cutting in at the last minute. Also, who do you think you are? Are you too good to wait in the right lane? After a month of this, I have decided to no longer let any car in ahead of me. You do not deserve it. You KNOW well in advance that you need to be in the right-most lane, so don't take advantage of my Minnesota-nice by trying to cut infront of me. Also, people who do this are the most rude people in the world. Get in line and wait like like the rest of us; I don't care if you drive a BMW, don't mess with me!
Also, every afternoon I have to take the 55 and Cedar Ave exit. This is the most ridiculous exit in the world! When I get off of 55 I need to make a left turn onto Cedar and somedays I have waited at the stoplight for over 10 minutes! Most lights have some type of sensor thing with it so that it knows when a car has approached an intersection. This stupid light NEVER recognizes cars in the left lane. The light only changes color when there are cars waiting in the right lane, which is the stupidest logic in the world! Cars in the right lane can turn at anytime, they don't need to turn on green, but I do! This light has frustrated me so much that I have actually disobeyed the law and turned on red as well as made illegal U-turns. One night I was coming home on this road at like 1am and waited at the light for over 1o minutes, with the light taunting me. A car would get in the right lane and the little pedestrian signal would turn to "Don't Walk," but then the car would turn and the pedestrian light goes back to "Walk." For 10 minutes I sat in my car watching the light tease me- it was a roller coaster of emotions, one minute there's hope, the next anger, and then hope again. My beef is that I don't even know who to call about this problem. It's not like there's a magical stoplight notification number. So instead I am left fuming every afternoon.

Moments

I love my friends. I love my friends very much.

My friend Laura last night gave me a picture of the two of us and it was so sweet. I loved the picture because sometimes its easier to not do something than it is to do something, so it means a lot when a person takes time to do something.

Tonight I went to dinner with three people from school that I met when I was in Denmark. We hang out about twice a semester, once in the beginning and once in the end, and always at Chipotle. It's nice because you get to catch up on other people's lives and see how even though it seems like we are so disconnected, we share so much in common.

Last Saturday I had a final that I did not feel very good coming out of it. I wound up going out to lunch with two of my friends and it was so much fun to just talk about nothing and spend time together in the company of good friends. By the time the three hour lunch was over, I had forgotten all about the stress of my test and felt very blessed by God. On Saturday night I also got to see my friend Laura Morgan who I haven't seen since before she got married. It was so nice to hang out in the company of old friends and catch up on everybody's lives. I haven't sat down and really talked with many of the people from Saturday night in probably four years!

On Thursday night I talked to an old friend from Freshman year. We haven't spoken in at least three years and just randomly started talking online. It was really neat because even though we haven't connected in over 3 years we still had a very good conversation. And it was such a good reminder that friendships and relationships really do stand the test of time.

On Wednesday night I'm going sledding with some friends from Target. I've known these people since I was 16 and all through work. Although jobs change and people change, its beautiful to know that you can always go back and connect with people. I haven't gone sledding in a couple of years and am thinking about investing $3 on a tube.

All this is a reminder that God loves us and loves for us to be in relationships. Relationships that challenges us, that grows us, and makes us a better person. I wish I could spend more time with each of my friends and I have not been proud of all the relationships and friendships that I have been in, but each one has led me closer to God. Like Donald Miller says in his book Through Painted Deserts, "Life is a dance towards God." So far my dance has been very sweet.

Random learnings from today

I went to my friend's graduation ceremony today and had to sit through a really awful commencement speech by a former Mankato State Prez. Her entire speech was on tools. And at one point she actually said (and I quote), "A wrench is a wrench is a wrench, [pregnant pause]expect sometimes it's not." I also learned through the speech that we are all tools and can all use tools. As my friend pointed out during the speech, she is a psycho post-modernism woman. So as of today I have decided to become a wrench, except somedays I may chose to use my wrenchy-ness as a hammer and mix it up a little. Now everyone remember...you are all tools and can all use tools for the betterment of society.

I hate going on roadtrips with my friends. They claim I have this "thing" where I need to go to the bathroom every 2 hours. I find this to be a bit of an exaggeration. I think they just don't pay attention to their body's as well. I remember once over spring break in HS my friend Laura M and I had to use the bathroom REALLY bad, but because our friends were lost we had to wait almost an hour before we were allowed to stop and get out...I thought that was going to be the end of me and my bladder. All I'm saying is, I'm a pint sized person, pint sized people have pint sized organs...you do the math.

I think I might develop carpal tunnel syndrome. I had to look the definition up, but I think there is a good chance that I will have it in my index finger on my left hand. I have been using this fingure repetitvely for hours at a time this last week and now the finger is sore that it feels like a seperate entity on my hands. Yep, I believe workman comp is in order soon.

Reflections

Today was the last day of classes and for all intensive purposes the last day of my college career. Next semester I will only have 2 classes and they are only 2 credits a piece. Snowy days always put me in a reflective mood and today is no different. I thought I would take the time to reflect on this past semester and hopefully come up with more highlights than lowlights.

Highlight: Bible study with Pioneer freshmen. Going into the semester I was NOT planning on leading Bible study nor had the desire to. Yet God has a funny way of working things for the good of those who love Him. Over and over again this semester I have been encouraged by the people in my study- by their faith, by their dedication, and by their desire to know God more.

Lowlight: Group projects. This semester's projects have been horrible, all the projects that I undertook turned out to be very different from my expectations. My nonprofit project sponsor turned out to be very lame and my IDSc project made me feel unethical at times. It's funny because prior to this semester I have always had wonderful group project experiences and relished our group's accomplishments. Yet this semester, I feel the work that I have done is mediocre at best. Often times, group meetings seemed to have more frustrations than accomplishments.

Highlight: Meeting new people from classes and getting reacquainted with old ones. I went out yesterday with my management class to the Corner Bar and it was super fun relaxing and getting to know some of the people in my class better. I also went to Holidazzle for the first time in a few years and was a whiteboard for Halloween.

Lowlight: My schedule. This semester I only took 14 credits yet I felt more busy this semester than in previous years.

Highlight: Chinese Politics and Strategic management. I learned a lot from both classes and both classes challenged me in very different ways. I got to see life through the other side of the world (literally and metaphorically) and learned how to analyze and strategize better.

Lowlight: I went through a break up during a really busy part of the semester, which is not so good for the stress level.

Highlight: My increased stress level has made me loose 5 pounds this semester.

Highlight: I started an internship at General Mills and got to meet some really great people, work at a company that I would like to have a career with, and made some extra cash. I also accepted an offer to work in Chanhassen next summer and am looking forward to meeting more people and building relationships with my coworkers.

Lowlight: I will probably gain the weight back and then some when at Chanhassen. Also, I am often very bored at work, although hopefully not for long.

Highlight: I learned more about myself- from my selfishness to my need for a purpose in life.

I think this semester was a success. I give it a 7 out of 10.

Is He safe? No. But He is good.

Work in the mornings have become super busy these last couple of days. I have at least four projects on my plate right now and have no idea what I'm suppose to do for at least 2 of them. But I still prefer to be busy over being bored. I also moved cubes today...an exciting change up and a good way to get me to clean my cube.

An update on my China trip, I'm now about 80% sure that the trip will not be happening this spring/summer. I'm going to try and find time to talk to a field rep in China sometime next week, but I'm pretty sure that there are no long term projects available this spring that I would be interested in, which now leaves me the question of what to do. I'm a little scared and overwhelmed about my plans for this spring. I went for a drive last night and realized that I am a very planned out person. I like to know where I am going and what I am doing, I think its because I feel like then I will be safe. So this is a chance for me to be unsafe with my life. No one ever said God is safe. It's a very daunting feeling not knowing what I am going to be doing three months from now. I know I don't want to work for a little bit. And I'm pretty sure I would like to leave Minnesota for a while also. I can't stand the vast unknown but I know that God is good and will show me what it means to have no plans of my own and lean fully on Him and His plans for my life.

Wow, I'm deep.

I've had a rather interesting weekend, after a week filled with work I pretty much just shlopped my weekend away. I did however learn a few interesting things about myself. The first thing I learned about myself is how much I get discouraged by challenges and oppositions. This Saturday I went to go visit with a missionary couple about possible options for the summer and I just get so overwhelmed at the thought of having to figure out the next four months of my life. Sometimes, like right now, I get so overwhelmed that I really don't even want to go anywhere.

Saturday, I returned to middle school and helped my friend clean her classroom. I don't remember much from middle school but all I know is that those places are really, really dirty. I'm kind of surprised that I made it through those years alive and healthy. Perhaps this is why I no longer get the flu or other horrible diseases, my body has trained itself from years of public education to scorn and scoff at these diseases.

Sunday, I had an interesting conversation with a friend about the issue of forgiveness. To me, forgiveness means letting go of all resentment and bitterness that comes with the reasons that needed the forgiveness. For example, sophmore year I had very selfishly ruined a friendship but towards the end of the year and into next year we were able to talk our problems through and forgive each other. They hold no resentment against me and I hold none against them. I wish things would have worked out differently during our sophmore year, but I love this person today nonetheless, and I know they love me too ;-). Anyways, I was talking to my friend about the matter and they were telling me how they can forgive people but still hold resentment or be bitter against them. I found that to be a rather strange idea. I think the whole point of forgiveness, and what makes it so difficult, is that after you tell someone you forgive them you no longer let those things count against them. Your relationship with the person may have suffered from the tresspasses but your feelings for the person should no longer be hostile or bitter. I'm one of those people where alot of things bother me, but I forgive and forget them about a week after it happens and I just assume most people are like that too. Maybe this is why I like people so much, even if they were to tick me off or annoy me, I forget about those quirks a couple days later and am like, "yeah, we can hang out."

I'd like to raise a big class of Guinness to Os Guinness

I feel like this entry should be dedicated to Joe as it is very long and full of obersevational thoughts, although I did not preview this in Word like a good observation's would have.


I find Os Guinness to be a genius. This is at least the third time that I've gone through his book
The Call, yet I never get tired of what he has to say. Today I read one of my favorite chapters which focuses on something he calls the Protestant distortion. This is the elevation of the secular at the expense of the spiritual. It's a reminder for people like me that work, career, and life in general is not fulfilling unless there is Someone calling me. Often times I have a tendency to act like this life is it. That I need a good job. I need to be significant. But more than that, I think we all have a need to prove that we are significant, that our lives are worth something. It's not good enough to know that we are significant and matter, we feel we need to prove it through the things we do, the people we meet, etc. But Os Guinness is so genius in reminding me that "everyone, everywhere, in everything" is not my calling in life. My primary calling in life is to Him, for Him, and by Him. Work matters because God matters. It's not that I will find significance in work, because I never will. But what makes work special is that God is special. I can never fulfill my true calling unless I am able to successfully fulfill both my primary calling and my secondary calling. Being called by God, to God, for God is not enough because God has also called me to everyone, everywhere, in everything. The great thing about the secondary calling is that it changes as I grow in Christ and learn from life. So right now I feel passionate about people and relationships but who knows what I will feel passionate about 5 years from now. But the neat thing is that my primary calling never changes. Oswald Chambers once said, "The one aim of the call of God is the satisfaction of God, not a call to do something for Him." I'm learning this more and more each day.

Once again this week I had to do a reality check on my life. On Tuesday night I returned a phone call from the missionary couple I am suppose to be working with this summer in China. I find out that they will most likely not be returning to China this Januraury. Right away my heart sank and I had flashbacks of what happened in the summer of 2003. That summer I was planning on going to China with the same couple for a 6 week missionary stay. About 3 weeks before the trip the SARS epidemic became too serious and the trip was cancelled. Even now I do not truly understand why God would challenge me and prepare me for a trip that He never had any intention of me going on. As I hung up the phone on Tuesday night the same thoughts ran through my mind. I had never wanted to go on mission trips and even now I often hesitate and am scared to go; but I know that this is what God wants for me to do and just like Jeremiah I feel like I can not shut it up inside of me. That night I learned that I am a very selfish person. A big part of why I wanted to go to China was to get away from my life. I look around me and I see so much materialism and selfish ambitions in my life and I wanted to get away from it so that I can learn to be selfish without materialism and ambition- aka I wanted to "discover" myself. Seriously, nothing is more selfish than that. Discovering myself--what makes me so important that I should be discovered anyway? Well, I came away from my Tuesday night experience and my Wednesday thinking day with an understanding about the root of my selfishness; but one thing still remained- I still feel called to that part of China, my heart still wanted to go there.

Well, God definitely has a sense of humor. The missionary couple calls me back on Thursday morning and we decide that we will meet tomorrow morning at 9am (I know, it's a Saturday!), Unable to contain my curiosity, I ask what they think the plan will be for me. And they said that they are thinking that since they will not be going back this spring that they would like for me to take over some of their teaching roles. Wow! I get to spend even more time with high school girls! This was amazing because I had truly thought that my options would be go with people I don't know and do this thing that I have never heard about or prepared for or prayed about; instead, it looks like I get to dig deeper into an area that I have a very soft spot for. What an amazing opportunity! Although so many things are still up in the air, I am confidant of a few things. What's meant to be will always be and nothing is ever over or complete because God is never over or complete.

I also got my case write up back from my strategic management class on Thursday and I got a 29 out of 30 on it which to me is the equivalent of an A++ since my professor thinks he's literally God's gift to strategy analysis- which he is not, I know people that have googled him and can prove it. Still, it was a nice redemptive day after a STRESSFUL week of writing papers (well, only one paper, but since my TA thinks I am a moron, it turned out to be alot harder than I had anticipated). I suppose I should praise God for Nike and its sweatshop laborers but somehow that seems inappropriate.

More Personal: a dedication to Bec

I was told by a very good friend this week that my blogs aren't personal enough. So I promised her I would be more personal...although there is really nothing personal going on in my life right now, but I will give it a go.
This morning I woke up and did my usual take a shower and get dressed routine (I know, it's 7:30am and already I'm referring to the morning as if it was in the past). I was putting on some pants and noticed that the waistline was really big, which is rather ironic since the pants were tailor made to fit my body. Anyhoo, I put on the pants and put on a belt and notice that I have no butt. Now, this is not some astonishing discovery. I have always known that I lack a posterior, but usually the lack of meat on my behind has never really bothered me but this morning it hit me that instead of not having a behind, I believe my behind actually caves in. I'm hoping its the pants, but I really don't think that all can be blamed on the pants. Now for those with rather large behinds, I know what you are thinking...boohoo for the girl that has no butt, I'd trade mine for hers in an instant. Well let me warn you, not having a butt has many disadvantages. For example, falling on your butt (which I do alot of, especially in the winter) hurts alot more without cushioning. Bottoms of any sort never look on you. And having a caved-in butt makes the previous 2 examples even more painful and ugly. The good news for me and my butt is that heridity is on my side. My mom was blessed with a very nice bubble butt (and she likes to point that out to me every once in a while), so I can only assume that as I age and gain more weight my posterior will fill in nicely like my mom's although she does have this thing now where she only gains weight in the middle of her body, and I would much rather prefer to have the weight spread evenly along my body.
The question now is, what do I do about my lack of a posterior in the meantime? One option is for me to always go back to shopping in the girls section, although dress pant selections are usually limited to flower powered pants, a look that hasn't quite hit mainstream adulthood yet. Or I could shop at the oh-so-hated Abercrombie and Fitch where pants with holes cost over $100 and girls are expected to have a concave behind. I could also stuff my pants like teenage girls do with other articles of clothing. The problem with that is obvious...awkward lumps, although in the winter I often wear long johns which proves that stuffing might be a verifiable option. My last option is to continue with the status quo and not care. This seems to be a good option until mornings like today hits and I remember that no butt often equals no love. So here you go, an insight into my mind, or at least a distorted snipit of an insight.

On a less shallow note, I'm writing a research paper for my politics class and have run across some really cool research on Christianity in China. I will not bore you with all the details of my findings, but one really interesting thing I learned is that there are about 80million underground Christians in China compared with the 14million registered Christians.

And now 3 more hours of work to go.....

Out of batteries

I went to a concert last night to cheer on a friend as she played the saxophone. I brought my camera with me thinking that I could take some pictures as proof that I went to the concert. I see my friend and decided to take a picture only to have the camera tell me that I need to change batteries. "What the heck!" I said, "I just charged the batteries a few days ago and haven't even used the sucker since then." So here is my thought, maybe the reason my batteries drained is because I left them in the unplugged charger. Maybe the charger sucks the life out of the batteries when its not pumping life into them. My reason for this thought is that I usually leave batteries in my camera for weeks even months at a time after charging them and it all still works, but when they magically come out of the camera the life of the batteries gets sucked out in matter of minutes. Lesson: things that give life often times suck out life as well.

Side note, people should not eat nice smelling food at their cubes when its close to lunch time, it makes me hungry and jealous.

Biographies and autobiographies

So I went to Barnes and Noble yesterday to find myself a good book to read. I had a few ideas in mind when I went, but mostly wanted to browse until something inexpensive and intersting caught my eye. Now fair warning, I did go to a rather small B&N by Lake Calhoun, so the subject of my rant may be a little unfair but it's my blog and I can write what I want.
I decided I wanted to see if the store had a book by Deitrich Bonhofer- here we have a fairly famous person talking about a fairly infamous war relating a fairly well-know religion.
So I started in the Religous/Christianity section. No book- however, I did find some interesting Christian romance novels and a shelf of women and their feelings books. Alright, so I'm a women, but I don't find it necessary to read or even browse through a shelf full of self-help books that all deal with the same stuff and offer the same advice. For the record, I already know that my identity is in Christ and that singleness is not the end of my life. For those of you planning on reading one of these books- sorry, I ruined the ending for you.
Next I went to the biography section. No book- in fact I browse through the entire section only to find books on such nonrelevant historical figures like Alan Alda (the guy from Family Ties), Drew Barrymore, at 5 books on Maya Angelou, Warren Baeuty, and countless other biographies on people I've never heard of. I though the whole point of a biography is that it is suppose to be about someone who is interesting, lived through as interesting period, or has interesting insights on life. No dis to Drew Barrymore, but seriously, you are no Dietrich Bonhofer.
Finally, I went to the history and WWII section. No book- in fact everything in this section was filled with colored photos of history and war. What? People who want to learn about history all of a sudden lost their capability to read?
What I must conclude from my trip to B&N is that pop culture today has no taste and no culture. And to make it worse, book stores- the one place where you think you'd find culture, are now part of the cultural trap. You can find a bazillion books on relationships, democrats, and horses, but not one book on something relevant- like Deitrich Bonhofer. Maybe Deitrich is not relevant, but that's just an example. Pick any famous historical person you know (and Brittney Spears does not count) and try going to the book store to find a book on them. Chances are, you won't find them. But you will find a book on horses, dogs, cats, and even one on Wellstone and why he's god. What has the world come to?