Sunday, October 21, 2007
Forgot
I forgot to mention how Justin always has a knife handy when you need one. And it always seems as though you're gonna need a knife if Justin's around. Weird.
From Roommates to Reminiscing
You know, I never thought I'd say this when we were slamming doors, but I miss having roommates. I miss having somebody else in the house to pester when I'm bored; only it's more than that I suppose, I miss the sense of knowing that someone else is just down the hall when I need them. Even if they don't want to talk to me at the moment, they're there, you know?
I've learned these past couple of months that an honest person ticked off at you and completely aware of all the stupid things you have done and will do, but who will love you tomorrow regardless and knows they will, is worth so much. I'm lucky to have a family and a few friends like that. If we're mad, oh we're mad, but it's a secure kind of mad. We know that in a few days, when we apologize and both realize we're idiots to some degree, we'll still be family and we'll still love each other.
There are those family traditions you know will never die until the people they revolve around die. Like Christmas tree hunting. Or booger juice on birthdays. Or larger than necessary campfires.
There are the quirks and ways of doing things that you'll always remember and they become part of your identity, turn into a 'we do this' instead of a 'they do this'. Like how Dad eats Glosette raisins out of the box. Or how Mom puts each new school picture on top of the old one until there's a twelve or thirteen year record of cute or not so cute school pictures all lined up to rediscover every time a new picture comes in. Or how Mitchell rubs up against the carpeted wall to scratch his back. How Jen waves her arms around when she's mad. And how Robyn's voice takes on that certain tone when she's going to ask for something she probably won't get.
I am so blessed.
I've learned these past couple of months that an honest person ticked off at you and completely aware of all the stupid things you have done and will do, but who will love you tomorrow regardless and knows they will, is worth so much. I'm lucky to have a family and a few friends like that. If we're mad, oh we're mad, but it's a secure kind of mad. We know that in a few days, when we apologize and both realize we're idiots to some degree, we'll still be family and we'll still love each other.
There are those family traditions you know will never die until the people they revolve around die. Like Christmas tree hunting. Or booger juice on birthdays. Or larger than necessary campfires.
There are the quirks and ways of doing things that you'll always remember and they become part of your identity, turn into a 'we do this' instead of a 'they do this'. Like how Dad eats Glosette raisins out of the box. Or how Mom puts each new school picture on top of the old one until there's a twelve or thirteen year record of cute or not so cute school pictures all lined up to rediscover every time a new picture comes in. Or how Mitchell rubs up against the carpeted wall to scratch his back. How Jen waves her arms around when she's mad. And how Robyn's voice takes on that certain tone when she's going to ask for something she probably won't get.
I am so blessed.
Thursday, June 21, 2007
An Interview
They asked me a serious question at my clinical educator interview today. Actually, they asked me about five pages worth of questions, all of the interviewers on one side of the table, firing them off in quick succession. They gave me a can of iced tea, telling me "You might just need it" and then they started. I could tell they were trying to make me feel at ease, cracking jokes and poking fun at themselves and at each other. Some of the questions were completely anticipated, "What is your strength? What is your weakness?" type stuff. Some of the questions were NOT anticipated -- name 3 celebrities you admire and explain why you do so. I could only come up with two celebrities... I'm not a fan of a lot of people. In fact, I'm the antifan. Of course, now I can think of twenty celebrities now that I'm sitting at home. Such is life.
They didn't ask me for my references. Which a) means I kicked it b) means I bit the dust that had a cowpatty on top of it or c) am going to get a second round of interview once they have seen more candidates for the position. Guess I'll know next week.
One question they did ask me though, which prompted this blog, was what my greatest accomplishment was. You know, I had never stopped to contemplate that question. I could name a lot of different things - finishing University, something that I did with prolife or Navs, some momentous career moment... but I almost surprised myself with what I told them in the interview. I said that my greatest accomplishment in life is "to be where I am now... I am a few different things to a few different people and I make a difference in their lives and fill a place that only I could fill... etc." now THAT is an accomplishment. I'm a nurse (and my patients can only get Camille style nursing from Camille), I'm a sister and a friend and a girlfriend and a youth worker and a Christian and the lady at the grocery store who always strikes up a conversation with the teller and the bagboy. And I wouldn't rather be doing anything else right now. Life's pretty good, and every person I meet in any single one of those capacities I really care for. I think that's an accomplishment. I was amazed, and happy that I could say that. It felt great to roll off my tongue.
They didn't ask me for my references. Which a) means I kicked it b) means I bit the dust that had a cowpatty on top of it or c) am going to get a second round of interview once they have seen more candidates for the position. Guess I'll know next week.
One question they did ask me though, which prompted this blog, was what my greatest accomplishment was. You know, I had never stopped to contemplate that question. I could name a lot of different things - finishing University, something that I did with prolife or Navs, some momentous career moment... but I almost surprised myself with what I told them in the interview. I said that my greatest accomplishment in life is "to be where I am now... I am a few different things to a few different people and I make a difference in their lives and fill a place that only I could fill... etc." now THAT is an accomplishment. I'm a nurse (and my patients can only get Camille style nursing from Camille), I'm a sister and a friend and a girlfriend and a youth worker and a Christian and the lady at the grocery store who always strikes up a conversation with the teller and the bagboy. And I wouldn't rather be doing anything else right now. Life's pretty good, and every person I meet in any single one of those capacities I really care for. I think that's an accomplishment. I was amazed, and happy that I could say that. It felt great to roll off my tongue.
Monday, June 04, 2007
Cosmic Fakeout
My favorite patient and God decided to play a game of cosmic PSYCH! with me today. :) Keeps me on my toes. I wasn't even at work for twenty minutes this morning (so it was around 750 or so) and I was just starting to pour my meds for the day (the 730 tylenol and puffers round) when I thought I heard someone call my name. Nah, I thought, just hearing things - they're setting tables in the dining room.
Then I heard it again. Damn. They don't call my name unless they need the charge nurse and they don't call the charge nurse unless there's something they can't handle on their own. Who died and made me charge nurse anyway??
So I went down the hallway and my LPN had a worried look on her face... "It's Bob (name changed so I can keep my liscence and I'm not creative to come up with a better name). He's not responding."
There are three voices going on in my head now:
The nurse voice, appearing in Red Cross Red, which immediately began assessing and narrowing down; this could be a stroke, a hemorrhage, neurological, related to depression, etc. etc.
The good Camille voice, appearing in an angelic color of blue, which was praying and thinking, "No God, not him, not yet. He's a good one. Would you please bring him back? Bring back the smiling little success story who says thank you for caring for me, tries to get all the nurses to read the Bible, and worries about the other patients? Please???"
The not-so-angelic Camille voice, appearing in a devilish green, was saying, "What the hell? I'm not even done swallowing my coffee yet. You couldn't have waited to stroke out on me until I had a free moment, could you? Why me? And the doc's not in the clinic yet and I've got no way to help you but to look at you and wait for him."
He's on the bed, laying with a strange smile on his face. His muscles don't do what he tells them to. His right hand squeezes not so good as his left. His responses aren't complete words and they don't make sense, and when I turn him on his back, he flops back to his right. Vitals are ok, no major abnormalities. I think he stroked overnight. Crap. And he's not under a do not resuscitate order, which means that I have to do my all short of shocking him to get this guy back ASAP. So go call the doc, leave a message for him in three different places, chart the heck out of this guy. No big deal for a nurse anywhere - this sort of thing is commonplace. But it never seems commonplace when you're in it, when you've got five racks of pills (approximately 100 pills to dispense over the next hour and they have to be on time) and your team is counting on you to help with morning care too. At one point I was coordinating tying my shoes with getting a suppository out of the bottom drawer of the med cart to save time. Finally the doc gets here (which in LTC it's an accomplishment to get the doc to call you, let alone come in person); and goes to see the man. We walk in the room, and he's laying on his back, eyes wide open, goofy smile gone, and he says, "Good morning, doctor. How are you today?"
That must have been a TIA, a little ministroke. TIA stands for transient ischemic attack but secretly I think it stands for Time to Initiate an Asskicking on nurses everywhere. He's totally fine. No signs of a stroke. It came, and ten minutes later, it went. Doc is gonna think I'm an idiot. He believes me, I know he does, but frig - you run and you worry and you do everything, and then nothing is needed.
I'm so so glad he's ok... I got my little blessing back. He even got the doctor to take home a tract to read about another missionary doctor.
Dammit, if you're gonna cause me all that stress, at least put on a show for the doc.
And they say nurses don't get paid enough. I beg to differ.
Then I heard it again. Damn. They don't call my name unless they need the charge nurse and they don't call the charge nurse unless there's something they can't handle on their own. Who died and made me charge nurse anyway??
So I went down the hallway and my LPN had a worried look on her face... "It's Bob (name changed so I can keep my liscence and I'm not creative to come up with a better name). He's not responding."
There are three voices going on in my head now:
The nurse voice, appearing in Red Cross Red, which immediately began assessing and narrowing down; this could be a stroke, a hemorrhage, neurological, related to depression, etc. etc.
The good Camille voice, appearing in an angelic color of blue, which was praying and thinking, "No God, not him, not yet. He's a good one. Would you please bring him back? Bring back the smiling little success story who says thank you for caring for me, tries to get all the nurses to read the Bible, and worries about the other patients? Please???"
The not-so-angelic Camille voice, appearing in a devilish green, was saying, "What the hell? I'm not even done swallowing my coffee yet. You couldn't have waited to stroke out on me until I had a free moment, could you? Why me? And the doc's not in the clinic yet and I've got no way to help you but to look at you and wait for him."
He's on the bed, laying with a strange smile on his face. His muscles don't do what he tells them to. His right hand squeezes not so good as his left. His responses aren't complete words and they don't make sense, and when I turn him on his back, he flops back to his right. Vitals are ok, no major abnormalities. I think he stroked overnight. Crap. And he's not under a do not resuscitate order, which means that I have to do my all short of shocking him to get this guy back ASAP. So go call the doc, leave a message for him in three different places, chart the heck out of this guy. No big deal for a nurse anywhere - this sort of thing is commonplace. But it never seems commonplace when you're in it, when you've got five racks of pills (approximately 100 pills to dispense over the next hour and they have to be on time) and your team is counting on you to help with morning care too. At one point I was coordinating tying my shoes with getting a suppository out of the bottom drawer of the med cart to save time. Finally the doc gets here (which in LTC it's an accomplishment to get the doc to call you, let alone come in person); and goes to see the man. We walk in the room, and he's laying on his back, eyes wide open, goofy smile gone, and he says, "Good morning, doctor. How are you today?"
That must have been a TIA, a little ministroke. TIA stands for transient ischemic attack but secretly I think it stands for Time to Initiate an Asskicking on nurses everywhere. He's totally fine. No signs of a stroke. It came, and ten minutes later, it went. Doc is gonna think I'm an idiot. He believes me, I know he does, but frig - you run and you worry and you do everything, and then nothing is needed.
I'm so so glad he's ok... I got my little blessing back. He even got the doctor to take home a tract to read about another missionary doctor.
Dammit, if you're gonna cause me all that stress, at least put on a show for the doc.
And they say nurses don't get paid enough. I beg to differ.
Friday, April 06, 2007
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Irrational Hatred
I have no hate for much of anything. No strong venomous bilous hatred. Except I really don't like the Mountain Crest commercial and I really don't like Mavinder Binhas (or whatever his name is, but you can't even hear it clearly in the commercial).
My beef goes something like this:
- if you're going to sell beer, it should taste like beer
-if your beer doesn't taste like beer, you shouldn't be proud of it
- you can't claim to be part of a proud brewing tradition if you're from Eastern India. I'm not racist, but don't they drink tea there? most definitely not beer brewed from glacier water like the box says.
- if your beer sucks, you shouldn't trot yourself and your unibrow on national television in your own crappy commercial and say, "Hey, I'm the president and founder of my own (sucky) company." If you work and own your own brewing company, logic would have it that you would opt not to be appear in a tie and suit on the commercial. Bill Gates doesn't even wear a tie on his commercials.
-graphics and editing. I know ten year olds who could do a better job. Low budget is one thing, but that's just bad.
- no such thing as a magic record. It doesn't exist except maybe when you mix street drugs with your crappy beer. And it would even be a sucky drug if your hallucination was about a magic record.
-trying to sell crappy beer with crappy sex images. If you're going to try to sell beer with girls, at least use either good looking girls or attempt to do it well. Not that I advocate selling sex, but it's pretty sad if you can't even do the wrong thing right.
-a new slogan would also be excellent. Damn good beer is what the chief on the reserve said like 80 years ago when he was already drunk and then tasted your beer.
I believe I've said it all. I don't want to have to watch that commercial again.
if you haven't seen it, the link is at: http://www.soundclick.com/pro/view/01/default.cfm?bandID=414325&content=videos&vidID=10736
My beef goes something like this:
- if you're going to sell beer, it should taste like beer
-if your beer doesn't taste like beer, you shouldn't be proud of it
- you can't claim to be part of a proud brewing tradition if you're from Eastern India. I'm not racist, but don't they drink tea there? most definitely not beer brewed from glacier water like the box says.
- if your beer sucks, you shouldn't trot yourself and your unibrow on national television in your own crappy commercial and say, "Hey, I'm the president and founder of my own (sucky) company." If you work and own your own brewing company, logic would have it that you would opt not to be appear in a tie and suit on the commercial. Bill Gates doesn't even wear a tie on his commercials.
-graphics and editing. I know ten year olds who could do a better job. Low budget is one thing, but that's just bad.
- no such thing as a magic record. It doesn't exist except maybe when you mix street drugs with your crappy beer. And it would even be a sucky drug if your hallucination was about a magic record.
-trying to sell crappy beer with crappy sex images. If you're going to try to sell beer with girls, at least use either good looking girls or attempt to do it well. Not that I advocate selling sex, but it's pretty sad if you can't even do the wrong thing right.
-a new slogan would also be excellent. Damn good beer is what the chief on the reserve said like 80 years ago when he was already drunk and then tasted your beer.
I believe I've said it all. I don't want to have to watch that commercial again.
if you haven't seen it, the link is at: http://www.soundclick.com/pro/view/01/default.cfm?bandID=414325&content=videos&vidID=10736
Wednesday, February 28, 2007
100%
I am surrounded by newly married and newly engaged people. And I myself am in the throes of studying and praying and waiting in regards to marriage and what that means; and why God would have me learn and wait and grow in these years.
And I am tired of people telling me that I don't know what I'm talking about or can't contribute to the discussion because I'm single. "You cannot understand the temptation I go through." "Your ideas about marriage, about birth control, about sex; it will all change when you get a boyfriend. By the way, when is that going to happen?" "Talk to me when you have a ring on your hand." "You don't know the first thing about the struggle to find purity."
Nothing could be farther from the truth! Pope John Paul II was a celibate and single man. Mary, the virgin Mother of God, was just that, a Virgin. Paul, the apostle, a single man. The priest who cleanses you of your sins and brings you Jesus in the flesh each week, a single man. I am a single woman whose heart is learning to find total communion with God.
The word of God doesn't change, the will of God isn't something that is based on circumstance. The teachings of the Church make up the "foundation and the pillar of the truth". Satan uses the same lies with all of us.
JPII, when he was still a cardinal, starts Love and Responsibility with a foreword that made my throat choke up; where he says that it is because he is a celibate man who is a shepherd of many, that he is perhaps more qualified to speak on the subject. He can objectively look at marriage, and combine all of his counseling experiences and knowledge of God and his Word into true statements that gel and are reinforced by experience.
My heart and my mind and what I know of God (what little bit of faith Christ can grow in me) deserve to be given a place in the lives of people I love; to be given a voice. It makes me ache to know that what I most long to protect in the people I love, in their future families; is ignored.
What I want for my sister, my cousin, my friends, (maybe myself as God wills) is that they would be in a marriage where their bodies and their spirits are given 100% to each other with absolutely nothing standing in the way. That every part of them that represents God, including their fertility and their gender, is given to their wife/husband; that they give and love and cherish and yes, even reproduce, that they make it the goal of their marriage. Not that sex is just something they do for fun or because they can't resist. Having sex is imitating God - God would never hold back from us, he has already given himself completely to us. Holding back in sex by using any kind of birth control or using someone to satisfy an urge for fun without giving yourself totally and embracing them 100% isn't real. It makes the I love you an "I love most of you" or an "I love you" that doesn't follow through in real action; in the most tender and exposed moments of a marriage.
I feel very frustrated about what I feel and know being ignored, and so this comes out as being more than a little bit forceful. Please know this isn't meant to be an attack against anyone - it's just an effort to speak. And it is not carefully edited or super-well-researched, it is just what I have said in the moment. Let me know what you think...
And I am tired of people telling me that I don't know what I'm talking about or can't contribute to the discussion because I'm single. "You cannot understand the temptation I go through." "Your ideas about marriage, about birth control, about sex; it will all change when you get a boyfriend. By the way, when is that going to happen?" "Talk to me when you have a ring on your hand." "You don't know the first thing about the struggle to find purity."
Nothing could be farther from the truth! Pope John Paul II was a celibate and single man. Mary, the virgin Mother of God, was just that, a Virgin. Paul, the apostle, a single man. The priest who cleanses you of your sins and brings you Jesus in the flesh each week, a single man. I am a single woman whose heart is learning to find total communion with God.
The word of God doesn't change, the will of God isn't something that is based on circumstance. The teachings of the Church make up the "foundation and the pillar of the truth". Satan uses the same lies with all of us.
JPII, when he was still a cardinal, starts Love and Responsibility with a foreword that made my throat choke up; where he says that it is because he is a celibate man who is a shepherd of many, that he is perhaps more qualified to speak on the subject. He can objectively look at marriage, and combine all of his counseling experiences and knowledge of God and his Word into true statements that gel and are reinforced by experience.
My heart and my mind and what I know of God (what little bit of faith Christ can grow in me) deserve to be given a place in the lives of people I love; to be given a voice. It makes me ache to know that what I most long to protect in the people I love, in their future families; is ignored.
What I want for my sister, my cousin, my friends, (maybe myself as God wills) is that they would be in a marriage where their bodies and their spirits are given 100% to each other with absolutely nothing standing in the way. That every part of them that represents God, including their fertility and their gender, is given to their wife/husband; that they give and love and cherish and yes, even reproduce, that they make it the goal of their marriage. Not that sex is just something they do for fun or because they can't resist. Having sex is imitating God - God would never hold back from us, he has already given himself completely to us. Holding back in sex by using any kind of birth control or using someone to satisfy an urge for fun without giving yourself totally and embracing them 100% isn't real. It makes the I love you an "I love most of you" or an "I love you" that doesn't follow through in real action; in the most tender and exposed moments of a marriage.
I feel very frustrated about what I feel and know being ignored, and so this comes out as being more than a little bit forceful. Please know this isn't meant to be an attack against anyone - it's just an effort to speak. And it is not carefully edited or super-well-researched, it is just what I have said in the moment. Let me know what you think...
Saturday, December 23, 2006
The Little Mermaid
I am so so sorry that the first time I tried to do this it came out blank. Not sure what happened, exactly, but here it is again. Version 2, slightly less passionate and off the cuff but just as genuinely felt.
The Little Mermaid as Disney makes it is disgusting. It's like subtle mind pornography for kids. OK, that is a little bit of a strong statement, but allow me to elaborate. Follow the plot.
You have a girl who is happy to live underwater with her family and friends. Until she begins to covet something she just wasn't meant to have - legs. I am not suggesting legs are evil, just an unhealthy desire to want something that you can't naturally have. She wants legs to explore the world above. She sees (not even says hello to, just sets eyes on) Prince Captain Charming on his little boat and instantly 'falls in love'. She did a good thing by saving his life, I'll give her that. But in love? Girl, he hasn't even seen you yet.
Then all of a sudden she's willing to literally sell her soul and the things that most identify her, her greatest gifts. Her personality and her voice. She passes them up. Cue a bunch of nude swimming scenes and some highly suggestive rock thrusting (don't know how those shells stayed in place), some dealing in the occult with a sea witch, and she washes up naked on the seashore. A mute chick whose mission is to get the guy to fall in love with her and kiss her based largely on her looks and the fact that he 'has seen her somewhere before'. And her friends don't talk sense to her, they sing 'kiss the girl' until I think the man gave in just to shut the crabs up, seriously.
I'm glad she found her true love. But wow, wrong way to do it honey. :) ;) I guess if I were a mermaid I might want legs too; but I hope I have the strength of character and heart to understand that what makes me me, those good things about me, are not worth the selling just to get some guy I barely know to kiss me. No thanks. Although if Prince Charming comes along in a boat I might be interested, he's gonna have to do more than just look pretty before he wins my heart. lol
Was it worth the wait, this blog? If you doubt it, I'm sorry. But it was so much fun to write. And don't get defensive, Mermaid Lovers. I'm only partially serious, and never pass up a chance to mock Disney. Also, if you happen to be mute I do believe you have personality and can find love. Just wear clothes while doing it.
Christmas y mas
I have always wanted to roast chestnuts on an open fire, ever since the first time I remember hearing the Christmas Carol. Obviously it's a highly recommended experience, the chestnut roasting.
Before delving into a random chaotic story of my life these last few days, let me share what really is in my heart coming up to Christmas. Watch - God is making everything new for me! He's making me new! I am so blessed to see so many things that only point to God doing a new and incredible thing in me and in the people around me, just because he's that good. I heard the best Christmas sermon I have ever heard tonight, about peace. About how even the chaos and restlessness and anxiety of the darkness that is in the world gives way to Christmas. How true is that for me? The restlessness and anxiety of not knowing what my future holds, not knowing the depth of the love of God, and not comprehending the purpose of God for me has given way to the peace of God. That he loves me and that I am lovable, that he has a good and holy and adventuresome purpose for me that's not bound to any one location or group of people, and that in finding that purpose in small things is the greatest joy. Christ's Mass (Christmas) is a renewal, a baby being born is a renewal, a new year... watching my sister get married and start a new family after seeing the death of my grandparents and the loss of family as I knew it... watching God renew old friendships for me long neglected... watching God show me new (and a lot more fun to exercise!) gifts and people to love, and new ways of expressing love... watching youth and people I work with in the church become "oaks of righteousness" before God, and letting me watch God transform them... watching a good friend be born again through baptism... what a time of renewal. Merry Christmas. Here is my firm hope and prayer that God would renew you in your hope and in the desires he has for you that are so good none of us has begun to comprehend them yet.
K, there's my heart. You want my humor?? I started another fire. You heard me. Another fire. Not on purpose, either. I had the garbage in the burning barrel, and there was a gust of wind. It picked up a piece of paper and lifted it - up, up, up - and then down, down, down into the tall dry brown grass behind the fence. FWOOOOOSH. Fire. Lots, and with the wind getting bigger and bigger. And me. Little old me, not big enough or brave enough to stomp it all out. And the trees, closer and closer to the flame. It sucked. 911. For the fourth time in my life I had to dial 911 and answer the operator's questions. Ashamed that it's me calling again. (Granted, twice it was to save other people so those two don't count. But twice in four months for fires that I caused.) The fire went out, mostly because the wind died down. (Good God is for doing quick answers to prayer.) No harm done. Unless you count the black patch of ground that is our section of front lawn.
And out come the fire trucks. Here's the part where I discover that I know two of the firefighters personally. They already know my family name already, because there have been four fires and a fatal traffic accident all in the same family in the last four years. They joked around with me before they left that all the forms come out of the printer now with our last name on default. And my family says I'm never allowed to use matches again. Ah... do I know why this one happened to me? Nope. But maybe it's all about suffering producing perseverance, perseverance, character, and character, hope.
MERRY CHRISTMAS! I LOVE YOU ALL (um, if you're a random stranger cruising blogworld, don't take that last bit about me loving you too too seriously - though I suppose I love you too).
Before delving into a random chaotic story of my life these last few days, let me share what really is in my heart coming up to Christmas. Watch - God is making everything new for me! He's making me new! I am so blessed to see so many things that only point to God doing a new and incredible thing in me and in the people around me, just because he's that good. I heard the best Christmas sermon I have ever heard tonight, about peace. About how even the chaos and restlessness and anxiety of the darkness that is in the world gives way to Christmas. How true is that for me? The restlessness and anxiety of not knowing what my future holds, not knowing the depth of the love of God, and not comprehending the purpose of God for me has given way to the peace of God. That he loves me and that I am lovable, that he has a good and holy and adventuresome purpose for me that's not bound to any one location or group of people, and that in finding that purpose in small things is the greatest joy. Christ's Mass (Christmas) is a renewal, a baby being born is a renewal, a new year... watching my sister get married and start a new family after seeing the death of my grandparents and the loss of family as I knew it... watching God renew old friendships for me long neglected... watching God show me new (and a lot more fun to exercise!) gifts and people to love, and new ways of expressing love... watching youth and people I work with in the church become "oaks of righteousness" before God, and letting me watch God transform them... watching a good friend be born again through baptism... what a time of renewal. Merry Christmas. Here is my firm hope and prayer that God would renew you in your hope and in the desires he has for you that are so good none of us has begun to comprehend them yet.
K, there's my heart. You want my humor?? I started another fire. You heard me. Another fire. Not on purpose, either. I had the garbage in the burning barrel, and there was a gust of wind. It picked up a piece of paper and lifted it - up, up, up - and then down, down, down into the tall dry brown grass behind the fence. FWOOOOOSH. Fire. Lots, and with the wind getting bigger and bigger. And me. Little old me, not big enough or brave enough to stomp it all out. And the trees, closer and closer to the flame. It sucked. 911. For the fourth time in my life I had to dial 911 and answer the operator's questions. Ashamed that it's me calling again. (Granted, twice it was to save other people so those two don't count. But twice in four months for fires that I caused.) The fire went out, mostly because the wind died down. (Good God is for doing quick answers to prayer.) No harm done. Unless you count the black patch of ground that is our section of front lawn.
And out come the fire trucks. Here's the part where I discover that I know two of the firefighters personally. They already know my family name already, because there have been four fires and a fatal traffic accident all in the same family in the last four years. They joked around with me before they left that all the forms come out of the printer now with our last name on default. And my family says I'm never allowed to use matches again. Ah... do I know why this one happened to me? Nope. But maybe it's all about suffering producing perseverance, perseverance, character, and character, hope.
MERRY CHRISTMAS! I LOVE YOU ALL (um, if you're a random stranger cruising blogworld, don't take that last bit about me loving you too too seriously - though I suppose I love you too).
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