phone center freakout!

Okay, so as i write i am sitting at a vacant desk on the fourth floor of Compassion International's Global Ministry Center. I normally work down on the first floor, tucked away in a tiny little third of a cubicle with the rest of my team. It's relatively quiet there in SDP, a fact i normally am not fond of, but today, helping out with the phone center, with people talking all around me, freaked to death out of messing something up, i miss my little quiet production job! honestly, i can almost HEAR my own heart beating! i've taken probably 5 calls, changed the pattern of my questions/verifications every time, and forgot something on 2 of the calls! bah! i'm a pro at talking. what the heck! i pride myself on "hitting the ground running" but jeez oh peas, listening in on 3 phone calls then being given my own headset... i just feel a little under prepared. i'm sure it's just my nerves.

i realized yesterday that i'm getting kind of large group-a-phobic. kaycee asked me to go home to Salida with her family and emily for halloween. first of all, i'm not sure she invited me because i'm wanted there or because i happen to be there when her and Em were talking about the trip, but whatever. that's not the main deterrent to me going. you wanna know what is? the halloween party that's happening over the weekend with a bunch of kaycee's friends. she knows pretty much everyone in that tiny town anyway, or at least everyone knows her. it's just that i've never been a partier. in high school i didn't hang out with a group that partied. they saved that for college, and by that time, i'd moved on to a group whose main social activity was attempting to watch movies or do normal things but somehow always ended in ridiculousness (i.e. jumping off canal bridges, surfing down huge sand hills on old doors, pranking each other's houses, worshiping Jesus for hours at night and into the morning). needless to say, the party scene is simply not MY scene. and now that i've lived by myself for so long, i think i'm just very content to read a book, watch a tv show, go hang out with one of my few friends here and just BE. i feel not only awkward but inundated when i'm in large groups. i know i've got humor and general niceness on my side, but i still feel like the geek in the corner. i turn into a wallflower, and that is so odd. i feel like i'm going to turn into that guy in Can't Hardly Wait, overcompensating for my nervousness by drinking too much, yelling "i have no legs" and singing "Take Me Down to the Paradise City" over and over again!

i have a people problem, and i'm a people person dang it!

new job prayer

Father,  I realized today in chapel that I have the wrong motivations in applying for this new job.  I wish I was always serving You, always wanting to be used more fully and potently by You, but the truth is, I’m just so bored where I am.  I want motion.  I want progression, and for so long I’ve just been here, in this cubicle, bored, frustrated, feeling unused.  I know that’s not the truth.   You’re always using me, if I just allow You, but it simply doesn’t stop that feeling in me! 

 

Really, I think this job will be a good fit for me.  I think I’ll be good at it and will enjoy it.  I think it’ll be a good place for me to learn and help others and ultimately benefit Compassion and the children we help.

 

But I know that You’re pretty unconcerned with how noble my actions look if my heart’s not on board with the nobility. 

 

Please God, change my heart.

 

Even as I pray this I’m asking for change because I think if my heart changes then You’ll allow me to have the position.

 

I hate my stupid, dark heart sometimes.

 

Please help me.  I know You are the only one that changes hearts and minds and circumstances.

 

If it means I don’t get the job.  If it means I’m an “income processing associate” the rest of my life, please make my heart pure.  Please draw me unto You because it’s the only place I feel safe.  Let me know You, Your sufferings, Your joy, Your resurrection and power.  Do whatever it takes because I can’t make anything happen on my own.

 

I’ve tried.  It’s stupid.

 

I love You.  And even though my actions and words don’t always testify to that, please help me love You more, love You better.  Without You, this is all meaningless anyway.

 

Change me.  Make me not so selfish.  Again, only You can do this, because everything in me screams “you deserve it” or “it’s about time”. 

 

You owe me nothing, nothing in this whole world or outside of it.  You love me still.

 

Crazy.

 

i love love, dont ya just love love?

 

“They say you’re really not somebody until somebody else loves you.  Well I am dying to make somebody somebody soon” -Ingrid Michaelson

 

I don’t agree that you’re not “somebody” until someone loves you.  Or maybe I DO agree, but we’re all somebody because from before we were even born, the very Creator of the universe adores each one of us.  Whatever.  The point is, I’ve been feeling very alone lately, the past week in particular. 

 

Alone-ness is NOT the same thing as lonely.  I don’t feel lonely.  That implies sadness or despair or hopelessness in my mind.  I guess what I feel is more of an ache, low, but thrumming and unmistakable. 

 

My good friend Sarah got engaged.  I am beyond happy for her.  It’s the kind of happy that makes me praise the Lord because He’s good, and I realize it more because of the things happening in her life.  She is the kind of beautiful that ugly ducklings envy because it’s humble and understated and supermodels envy because it’s so effortless.  Not to mention she’s enamored with Jesus so wholly, I just don’t know how you get to that constancy.  She’s waited so long, sometimes patiently, sometimes not so patiently I’m sure, for her husband.  She’s been through a lot, and she’s had to listen to His voice, learn to discern His heart in a world that presents and makes appealing all sorts of false loves.  This is so good.  He is so good for her.  They’re going to be super-abundantly, blissfully, sickeningly J happy!  She even asked me to be in the wedding, which I wasn’t expecting at all and am so blessed to accept.

 

All this to explain that I’m crazy happy for her right now, so so much, but it starting this pattern of thinking/feeling in me that I haven’t quite gotten tamed yet.  I hate that I turn other people’s joy into my whining.  But if you can ever whine, it’s on your blog right?  Stop reading now if you want to avoid self pity and questioning confusion.

 

I guess I just go so long without thinking about “the one”, the man I know is waiting somewhere on this earth, to love me like Christ loves the Church.  By the way, the thought of someone “waiting for me”, pining over the woman of God he knows is coming his way, is a romantic idea.  However, I’m pretty sure the kind of man I want isn’t pining.  Sure, everyone thinks about it, but I want my one and only to be an adventurer, making the most of each day, breathing deep of the love and life in every moment, or at least trying to do so.  I want to be the same way, but that’s an ongoing challenge.  Anyway, I go so long pushing these thoughts away from myself, trying not to focus on the have-nots in my life and instead breathe deep, like I said, of my Savior and the love notes HE leaves at my doorstep each day, if I’d just open the door and open them, because when it comes down to it, He’s tipped the scales overwhelmingly with good.  Even the bad He’ll make good if I allow Him.

 

But now that this idea of marriage and mine being nowhere in the foreseeable future has entered my mind, I can’t seem to push it strongly enough to make it shut its snooty little mouth and vacate.

 

It’s just… well… I feel like the 27 Dresses girl.  I know it’s not nearly that drastic, but this will be the 5^th wedding I’ve been in in the past 5 years.  It was a little ridiculous for a while there, 4 of the 5 took place in a two and a half year span.  It’s just starting to feel like “always a bridesmaid”.  I know this is actually a good thing.  It means I have some really good friends, ones who love me enough to want me to be part of their huge, important day, a day they’ve been looking forward to their whole life.  And on that day and most days leading up to the wedding, I’m rife with joy and gratitude toward the Lord on their behalf.

 

Another thing, I’ve always said to people in the past “the one will come when you least expect it, when you’re not looking, when your eyes are completely focused on the Lord, when all you want is Him” etc., and it always seems to turn out that way.  With Ashliegh & Lisa, Kyle, and now Sarah.  Of course there are other cases, like Jesse and Amanda, where they WERE kind of looking, hoping for it to happen.  Amanda may have even been a little boy crazy J (even if only in her thoughts) when Ryan came along.  But here’s the thing, I’m NOT “least expecting it”.  my eyes are wide open looking.  I want the Lord, but I want my husband, too!  the most important love in my life is Jesus, being nearer to Him and knowing Him and making sure He knows I love Him back.  But man oh man do I want to be loved by a human man forever and ever.  My sister said that a few months before she met Josh, her husband of 4 years, she prayed something like “God, I love You, but You’re not here.  I want arms I can feel around me.”  or something like that.  He told her it would happen soon, and a couple months later she reconnected with Josh, an old high school friend/acquaintance.

 

So that’s comforting, knowing someone else has felt that way and prayed that prayer and ended up fine, more than fine, blessed with the perfect mate. 

 

But I can’t help but feel guilty.  I want to not care.  I want to be too busy to let myself slow down and wallow.  But that’s not the truth of the matter.

 

Sometimes I envy the people who go out to bars, who go on blind dates, who are just out to have fun.  It seems like less pressure.  Then again, I know I’m not meant for that, nor do I want to waste my time.  Plus… I’m not a good first impressions gal.  I’m just not.  I always either get quiet, which is NOT a true representation at all, or crazy and obnoxious to the nth degree, which is hyperbole!

 

My sister prayed for God to give me a clue about who I’m supposed to marry.  So far, still clueless.

 

Bleh.

 

Blood Drive Day at Compassion

I get so excited every time blood drive day happens at Compassion. I truly ENJOY giving blood. It just makes me feel so accomplished, blessed, important. I mean, less than 30 minutes of my day will help someone stay healthy, or even alive, later.

I truly believe that God doesn’t give me an excess of anything unless He’s purposed it for His glory or for someone else’s betterment. This is no exception.

I look forward to this day, but I also kind of DON’T look forward to this day. I always end up angry. I know that sometimes there are medical conditions or strange travel happenings (for instance, being in Europe in the 90s when mad cow disease was all over or under certain elevations in Central America in the past 5 years) that prevent you from giving. Also if you’ve ever taken money for sex or drugs, but that’s a whole other arena. But seriously, being squeamish about needles or blood is NOT a good reason. it’s an excuse. An excuse to be selfish, to go on with your day pretending you’ve done all you can for “mankind”. You’ll sleep at night just fine until you or someone you love is rushed to the hospital and needs emergency blood.

I know that I do selfish things all the time. I do things that are so selfish yet go unnoticed by me because they’re so engrained in my psyche that I don’t even realize I’m doing them. Talking over people in conversations, for instance, or just waiting my turn to talk instead of really listening. All the time. It’s shameful.

I know this. I know I shouldn’t point out the speck in someone else’s eye when there’s a huge 2x4 sitting pretty in the inside corner of my right eyeball. But blood drive day always does this to me.

On a not-so-rant-y note, here are some other things I’ve been thinking about this wonderful, 60 degrees +, blood drive, Thursday morning:

My sister, Jesse. Maybe it’s a Taylor thing. Maybe I just copied her interests/feelings, having looked up to her my whole life. But she loves giving blood, too. there was a time when she was considering going to phlebotomy school because she likes it so much. I’m glad she didn’t, as that would’ve changed her path. I like where God’s taken/taking her and Josh, and I’m glad red cross phlebotomy school didn’t prevent any of their choices. Sometimes I feel like this giving blood thing is a secret fetish Jesse and I share. Maybe it’s weird, but at least we share it. and that makes it more comfortable.

Jesus. His blood gave and gives me life. Each moment. I think of the scenario of what I’d be like if He HADN’T offered Himself up on my behalf, paying in full all the debt I owe, the bills upon bills stacked up, written in bleeding red ink: pride, lust, rebellion, hate, murder, self. I think of Him taking back His blood, and I can’t breathe. I need His mercy so desperately. It’s all I have to stand on sometimes. When I admit my dirtiness and find I have nothing good of my own, at least I have His sparkling grace to hold me close, hold me up. I’m blown away. I heard a song last week that said “God is a lover looking for a lover, so He fashioned me”. what. the. heck. As I told Emily, I’m so bad at loving Him. Man.

Also, last and funniest/saddest: vampires. If there were a vampire working at Compassion, I bet they’d have to stay home from work today, like skipping blood typing day at Forks High School.