Life never fails to surprise me, for better or for worse.

Everything has changed again. Events crashed down around me and I was left with only the pieces of myself to glue back together. Actually though, that was the best thing that could possibly have happened to me at the time. I feel like I'm waking up... some days I feel like a child again, my perspective has changed so much. For the first time in years, my heart is oriented solely in the right direction, and I'm finally finding peace with myself and God. It's funny how that filters down into other things. I'm content in my state; I'll stay here unless I'm specifically called elsewhere. It's beautiful. I love to watch the seasons change here. Spring is coming! My job is tolerable, mostly because I'm using it to save up for an apartment. It helps to have a goal.

I still don't know what I'm here for. My purpose at this time is to go to work every weekday and make enough money to move myself and Hazel out of my parents' house. If we can find an apartment, we'll live there until I can pay off my debts and buy either a duplex or a house. Along the way, I'll make new friends and stay in touch with old ones; and there will be opportunities to serve others and spread God's love around. For the first time in quite a few years, I'm becoming content with the idea of living an ordinary life. Many people do it every day. Perhaps I'll have something more specific to do in the future; but for now, this is enough. God is walking with me every moment of my life. All the details will work themselves out in His time.

 
I'm half-alive. There is no way I can do this desk job thing for the rest of my life. I should be grateful that I have nothing to do; but it's driving me crazy. And the really difficult thing is, it's the meaninglessness that eats away at me the most. Even if they did have things for me to do, what am I doing here that is of lasting contribution to the world? I can't have a meaningless job. I'm just not designed that way. I'll go crazy in cubicle-land, fixing machines that will eventually break again anyway and churning through the government system like just one more little termite, chewing away at the base of a California redwood. This is ridiculous. I can't believe people do this kind of thing day in and day out. No wonder we cling to our coffee, our 15-minute breaks and our vacations just to survive. I will NOT live like this long-term. There has to be another way. I'm not a genius but I'm smart; I can go back to school in a couple years and find something else to do. Anything is better than this awful, empty monotony.

 
Wow. If you haven't yet seen Mel Gibson's movie "The Passion," you need to. I still don't have words to properly express how it affected me; I went to see it last night. This movie was special for me because I first came to Christ by watching Him suffer, in a movie I saw when I was eight years old. Not since then have I really understood how suffering could be considered beautiful, or a gift, or whatever... or how death could be life, or pain could be love. Sure, my mind understood. But my heart had forgotten. Now I see... now I know. I came out of that movie more certain than ever that I'm on the right track. Love is supreme... His love... all the other stuff is details.