Once I took an art history class.

Today I painted. While I feel as though my art skills have not improved since I was five, it sure is fun.



TA DA!




currently listening to: Lydia

Purposeful Character

Yesterday I skipped church like a heathen. It's not normally something that I'd do. ever. Since I didn't go, I listened to a podcast of Tim Keller. He was talking about purpose in a way I'd never thought of before.

We like to think that God has made us for a purpose. We like to think that it's glorious and grand. Or at least I do. Tim Keller talked about how in Bible times a man became whatever his father was. Women became wives. They didn't sit around wondering what they were supposed to do. What he was saying was that God's purpose is for us to become people of character.

Tim Keller gave examples of how our Bible heroes really had no control over the situations in their lives, but God gave them opportunities to display character. Joseph, Moses, David. They didn't do anything, God just put them where they could be of the most use to him because they had willing hearts.

We see over and over that God has complete control of what is happening. Sometimes I forget that. And the part that I can control is how I react to the situations I am in.



currently listening to: The Hush Sound

Grammar: use it!

I would just like to prove my point by using an illustration found on thefacebook.com

Girl one: Thanks for the cookies!
Girl two: Yeah! I just ate five of my sisters.

I would to invoke a moment of silence, not only for this gross grammatical error, but for this poor girl's five sisters.

This applies.

"Courage, dear heart"

Greetings from my cat and me.



We can't sleep. Mainly because we worry too much. Perhaps, though, I use the royal we. What cat has worries?

Today I drove to Greensboro for yet another interview. I was hopeful, but they said that the position might get filled by a surplus teacher-- as in someone who had a job last year, but got laid off. So if they get to pick, then maybe I'm in the running. If not, then neither they nor I have a say.

I was driving home, completely stressed and drained from the interview and I decided to go through the drive through Starbucks in Burlington. I tend to get depressed after an interview because I put so much energy into them, so I needed a second cup of coffee. I ordered, drove up to the window, and handed the lady my card, but she wouldn't take it. She explained that the lady before me had paid for my order. When I drove away, I just started crying. I didn't even know what else to do.

I was reminded that God was my provider. He is going to take care of me, even though right now it may seem like he isn't. God, in his small gentle way and with something I would understand, a cup of coffee, reminded me to take courage.





currently listening to: Quelequ'un m'a dit ,Carla Bruni [off of the soundtrack of 500 Days of Summer]

[un]belief.

School starts next week.

I won't be going back. Not as a student, and not as a teacher. This is because I graduated and because I can't get a job. I can't really quite explain how I feel, and when I try people give me trite answers. I've been looking for a job since February, alas, and people don't get what it feels like to spend every day of your summer calling people and sending them emails and sitting in their offices only to be rejected over and over.

AND I'm not really sure what to do with this information. I have some options.

A. curse the economy, curl up in a ball and die.
B. curse my lack of experience, throw myself off a bridge.
C. curse whatever else could have hindered my procuring a job, stay in bed, eat and watch silly movies (like a break up with school.)

But really, viable as those may [not] be, those aren't options.

I am very unsure of what to do next. I never really thought that I'd been in this position. I guess because I thought that I was sure that this was what God had for me, this all would have happened faster. Waiting is painful and confusing.Perhaps, when Mr. Willoughby told me I should just get a waitressing job because the economy was too doomed, I should have listened. I didn't though, because I believed that God had a purpose for my life. I believed that I was good at teaching and that while I might not change the world, I could change English for maybe one kid. I believed that kids needed someone who was on their side, believed that they were capable of succeeding and believed that they were vastly precious. I believed that high school kids were capable of discussion and that they were growing, changing, becoming their own selves and that English would connect them to their souls and help them discover themselves and the world around them.


Here I am though. Unemployed despite all the beliefs.

I confess, it's hard for me to believe that God knows the plans he has for me and that they are good. I dropped Chelsea off at college today and as I drove down Elm St,trees reaching for each other over the street shaded by beautiful buildings, in my summer city of Greensboro, I confess too, that I cried.

[edit: By summer city, I simply mean that the city's my favorite in the city. It brings a lazy, friendly, warm feeling in the summer.]

I love that city. I want to see God at work there. I want to see redemption at work in a way I never have before. Still I have been separated from all that. And I can't seem to get connected to where I have been placed. I know that there's a bigger picture that has to do with God's kingdom and his glory. I just want to know where/if/how I fit in because right now I don't see that I do.

I'm looking for God in all of this.



"I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!" (mark 9:24)


currently listening to: Hanson (shut up; it makes me feel better.)

I wish my life would pan out so I could sleep at night.



currently listening to: fan blades

And so, my Rory Gimoring paid off.

It's a quiet sort of day. I want to enjoy it while I can.

With Rory Gilmore as my inspiration [see season 6, episode 9], yesterday I ran all over God's green earth trying to get a job. I drove to Greensboro only to find that the English position was filled. Then when I got to Durham, I ended up very much out of my element. After I got home I re-checked the website, I found an English position in Elon. So I got back in the car and drove 70 minutes back to Elon. I actually ended up getting an interview, but I sat there for an hour and a half for it. But by the grace of God, this princiPAL knew Marshall Benbow and goes to Grace Community Church. I really felt like we had a good conversation. So even if I don't get the job, I have hope. And as I've had to wait, I've been questioning whether or not I really want to teach, but talking about it to this princiPAL reminded me that I do want to teach.

Here's hoping.



(One of my favorite pictures of all time. I still have the actual paper in my binder.)

currently listening to: Set Free, Katie Gray

Langston captures my sentiments exactly.

Harlem, by Langston Hughes

What happens to a dream deferred?


Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?


Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.


Or does it explode?

---



currently listening to: Oxygen by Living Things

[i hope that i am more concerned with bringing joy to God's heart than anything else.]

Isaiah 40:25-31

“To whom then will you liken Me,
Or to whom shall I be equal?” says the Holy One.
Lift up your eyes on high,
And see who has created these things,
Who brings out their host by number;
He calls them all by name,
By the greatness of His might
And the strength of His power;
Not one is missing.
Why do you say, O Jacob,
And speak, O Israel:

“ My way is hidden from the LORD,
And my just claim is passed over by my God”?
Have you not known?
Have you not heard?
The everlasting God, the LORD,
The Creator of the ends of the earth,
Neither faints nor is weary.
His understanding is unsearchable.
He gives power to the weak,
And to those who have no might He increases strength.
Even the youths shall faint and be weary,
And the young men shall utterly fall,
But those who wait on the LORD
Shall renew their strength;
They shall mount up with wings like eagles,
They shall run and not be weary,
They shall walk and not faint.


---

I am deciding right now that no matter how my interview on Monday goes, that God is good and that he does have plans for me. I will wait for his timing because I know that he will provide for me. [big talk, right?]


currently listening to: Forever Young, Youth Group
currently full because of: ice cream, and lots of it.