You know you're a pathetic cog in the corporate machine when...

...the low point in your workday is the realization that they've replaced the bendy straws with regular, straight straws.

Sigh. I am Milton.

keep moving forward

So, I'm up way too late on a school night again, and am feeling the need to update. Here, in no particular order, are some update-y-ish items:

Weight loss: I've lost 16.1 pounds so far. I'm about halfway to my goal. Yay :)

Movies: We saw Meet the Robinsons on Friday. Very cute movie. I walked away from it with some deep thoughts (surprise, surprise...ISTJ/melancholy me thinking deeply about a freaking Disney movie...). One of the themes of the movie had to do with failure--how you view it, whether you choose to dwell in the past or look ahead and move forward. In one of the scenes, the little orphan boy main character has one of his inventions blow up in his face (something which, incidentally, had happened earlier in the movie and resulted in prospective parents rejecting him as an adoption candidate. Talk about having an event trigger memories of rejection and painful feelings about one's self worth!).

The second time this happens, however, the family around him erupts in cheering and applause. I think one of them even says, "You failed!! That's wonderful!!" Being a family of inventors, they had learned from experience that it had taken many failures for them to learn all they needed to learn to finally succeed. And so, from their perspective, failure was a necessary (and even good) part of the whole process. I think I started to tear up during that part, and again at the end when the little orphan boy starts to put the pieces together and see how the "keep moving forward" theme applies to his own little life. His little life that he, at the beginning, views as insignificant, but by the end views very differently.

I've been pondering this quite a bit, as it relates to my own life. My own fears of failure (which have lessened a lot over the past couple years, but are still very much there). My own tendencies to want to quit if something doesn't come easily immediately. My own instincts to run and hide when my weaknesses are displayed for the world to see. I think of Paul, who thanked God for his weaknesses. Who, after decades of painful maturity, finally began to put the pieces together and see his failures as a necessary (and good) part of the whole, wonderful, beautiful process.

I think I want that.

Well, maybe that's all for tonight. I'm not good at bullet points. They always turn into paragraphs.

Grammar, shmammar

So, I just got back from grammar class and my mind is racing like crazy (probably due to the coffee I sucked down before class, in hopes of jolting my sleepy brain. It definitely worked. And then some.). Now I'm just killing time before Lost starts (since I'll apparently have NO trouble staying awake for it tonight).

It's so fun to be a student again! Tonight as Shannon, DeAnna, and I walked into the building, we marveled at how "it even smells like college!" Our teacher is a linguist, so by nature she approaches English more as a "botanist" than as a "gardener" (this is how my college grammar teacher described the difference between a linguist/descriptivist and a grammarian/prescriptivist--one notes observations, while the other makes value judgments). I liked that about her. As much as I love rules and grammar snobbery, life keeps teaching me that there are a lot more shades of gray in the world than I'd like to think, and I'm realizing that it's healthy to approach situations this way. Even situations that seem to be very black and white. Grammar. Spirituality. Etc. (Not that I'm a relativist, by any stretch. Seeing the world as only shades of gray is just as naive, I think.)

Well, that's about all I have the attention span for tonight. I now need to search through my wedding photos to send some to my brother. This is Derek, the artist. (I have three brothers: the rapper, the father, and the artist. Scott, Brian, and Derek, respectively) He's entering a couple of art fairs this summer and wants to paint one of our wedding. How sweet :)

Later, gators.

"What I thought I wanted...

...what I got instead
leaves me broken
yet grateful." - Sara Groves

I remember posting about this song a few months ago, during the whole cubicle-to-pod transition, when I was struggling with unmet expectations.

And now here I am--months later, different situation(s)--and the struggle continues.

Once upon a time, my friend Martha told me, "Sometimes we don't even realize we have expectations until they aren't met and we end up disappointed or frustrated and can't figure out why."

For example, I didn't realize I was missing my dad until he reappeared and I found myself feeling sad and frustrated with him for not being what I wish he could be.

What I thought I wanted...what I got instead...

What I didn't even know I wanted, until I got something else instead.

So where do I go with this? My heart has been feeling pretty broken, but how do you get to the "grateful" part?

I don't know, exactly. Still trying to figure that out. However, even in the midst of looking for answers, God has been gently nudging me back to a truth he's already shown me a hundred different times through a hundred different situations...the truth that only he can meet my needs...that only he can love me perfectly...and the truth that, if I'll throw my chips in and let him prove that to me, I won't be disappointed...and, ironically, my relationships with people will be even more enjoyable and more satisfying than they could ever be when I'm pushing and pulling and demanding and whining.

There's something about this that brings an indescribable sense of relief. And yeah, I guess gratitude.
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On a completely unrelated note...I tried a new tea today--Tazo sweet cinnamon and spice (or something like that). Ick. Stay away. It sounds good, but don't be fooled, unless your favorite type of tea is nas-tea.