i should be looking for jobs. i should be applying for jobs i've already found.
but it has been about a month. and i always hit a wall about now.
this being my now third job searching time in well less than 12 months, i am well acquainted with the one month hump. it is easy to maintain hope during those first 4 weeks when the world seems to bow at your feet, offering its seemingly endless fruits of the great American economy. possibilities abounded.
hope reigned.

and then there was nothing.
great
black
empty
silence.

God. where are You.
Your Silence creates a roar.
a roar that weakens me.
i know i said i would wait on You this time.
but i am weak and poor.
and my faith reflects such.
hopelessness threatens to drown me.
God. where are You.

my hands are bound.
my soul is weary.
my heart confused.
on You i wait.

it's funny how i can 'finish' a day utterly exhausted and then give me a few hours of downtime, and i'm not tired anymore.

i spent my saturday morning in a class, and let me tell you, i love class. there is not much that energizes me more than having someone give me information. i love information. maybe because it has been a little lacking in my life as of late. i'm parched.

really i love seeing someone talk about something they are passionate about. and what i love about a classroom setting: there isn't the pressure of a direct response. i can enjoy the pure pleasure of listening and letting my mind process without having to worry about responding. i love just absorbing. i do have to say i listen with greater attentiveness than i did in college, though even then i was an avid listener. i do everything with greater intensity than i did in college. i think that's why i find life so exhausting at times. after all, someone made you take classes in college that you didn't really want to take, so you didn't pay attention. and for better or worse, i never really struggled with school. just floated by on cloud nine.

and today. oh today. today i heard someone speak with such great passion about a life changing project he has begun, not only for himself, but for ALL the students that will pass through the halls of Newark Public Schools. he may not succeed and he is willing to admit that. but he is still willing to try. that i may be so willing. he even was so bold as to declare this was a direction he felt called by God to follow--in the most humble way, mind you. it was incredible.

in the last few years, i have been on a philosophical journey of belief in the paradox of destiny/fate/predeterminism, call it what you will, should it or should it not exist. what i find incredibly refreshing about the work culture i have slowly been immersed in is that while they may not believe that God is in control, they have a drive that says there is something i am meant to do in this world and i am going to find it. even if it is 'only' tutoring these children or teaching at a particular school. with that drive comes the undeniable quality of destiny. for how can you possess such drive without a sense of purpose behind it? then again there are those driven out of guilt or a need to prove--though i seem to find less of them out here than i thought.
aside from the debate of the harm of humanitarianism on our society, the one thing they have impressed upon my soul is the absolute necessity of destiny.

i have not encountered thus far, one person out here, christian or non, who has said to me when they hear the debate of what i should do with my life, make a decision, own up to it, take control. no one tells me i just need to make up my mind and get on with my life. Not one christian has said anything about there not being one thing you're supposed to do, God just works with what we choose. you wanta know why? b.c it's impossible to live in a society in which so many basic factors are beyond your control and live in absolute ignorance of it. ie traffic. instead, again christian and non, express faith, patience, things will fall into place. how does that happen in a society that is so incredibly motivated? i don't know.

but i do have to say, that being out here and the various circumstances i have brought on myself and God has wrought has humbled my view that i am in control; that i have power to make choices; that God just works His will with what we give Him.
no.
God is in control.
and He does have a plan.
and I will follow it.
whatever form it comes in.
I will not settle for anything less.

and because of that, i cannot live in the limbo of God only controls the big things or God works with what we give Him. i have felt what it feels to fight Him and I am feeling what it feels to follow Him. i have witnessed the drive that He gives us to accomplish His will, even in those who have perverted it, yet I will follow. I will have faith.
For He is faithful.

100th blog

this folks, is my 100th blog. i can't decide if that's a good thing--or a bad thing. i've never been able to decide if being a dedicated blogger is a good thing or a bad thing. i find it strange that i feel compelled to post my musings about life for the rest of the world to see, not that the rest of the world actually takes notice which is probably for the best. i can't believe i actually follow through; that, in and of itself, is a mystery. i have a love/hate relationship with this thing called the internet and the information age it has spawned. i love that i, the ever curious intellectual, can figure out just about anything i want to but i hate that i am inunadated by choices that i know i can't possibly choose from and that i waste so much time narrowing it down or even just playing around. and in this world where words mean very little, a book even less, and anyone can have ten minutes of fame, i can't believe that i persist in adding to the flood.
and yet i do.
for what reason, only God knows.

so here i go again...
i really need to investigate better conjunctions. i tend to overuse them.

i am increasingly struck by the absolute conundrum of my situation, particularly following Sundays. every Sunday brings about a whole day of hanging out with a group of people that i just never expected to come into my life. and so quickly. a group of people in various walks of life who make an effort to meet with each other, not just for church but for anything. the community is absolutely astounding. while Christ is the core, the glue that binds it together, it draws people quite literally from all walks of life. i am encountering, for the first time, a group of Christians that are not exclusive. a group of Christians that actually welcome strangers in such a way that it makes it almost impossible to resist. i'm sure if you were really stubborn, you could. and with this, i have begun to see why God brought me out here and ultimately, how i could end up staying here longer. they don't need me; yet i am invited to participate. refreshing.
the community is undeniable.

as i stop fighting, lay my defenses down, and actually live out here, not just survive, i can see how i fit out here, despite the cultural differences. i see the opportunities; how much i can learn; the people that i meet just in passing, each with such different stories from mine, each rich and fascinating. i see God at work. i am catching glimpses of how all of this has changed me, defined me, honed my perspective, and hating is turning into gratefulness for the direction it is pushing me. i am beginning to love where i am at again, spiritually, mentally, emotionally, and physically. and i am finding it impossible to imagine my life without this. it is becoming less and less of a blip, an accident, a freak twist of fate and more and more God at work.
funny how perspective changes with time. especially when you stop kicking and screaming.

do you sense a 'but' coming....

Michigan/Chicago/the Midwest is still my home. there are so many people i love. people i have known for years. people who have known me for years, who really know ALL of me, people who know me in a way that is impossible to know me if you have just walked into my life out here. people that i don't want to just let slip away and yet is impossible to keep close at such a distance. i don't want to be like my parents who moved and left everything behind and never looked back. my heart is still there. and my desires still reflect that culture more than the culture out here. my life is more about people than success, more about experiences than money, more about beauty than efficiency, more time and space than less, more about history and wisdom than the newest, hottest thing on the market.

but comparing the worlds, trying to figure out where i fit in, is like comparing apples to oranges--no like trying to choose between a fantastic italian cappucino with all of its rich complexities and a fresh-baked homemade chocolate chip cookie with its simple, comforting taste. each hold completely different properties and satisfies completely different parts of the palate and psyche. and really you want both. but it seems you have to choose. do you see my conundrum? both fit me for completely different reasons.
so where do i go?
what do i choose?
only God knows.

it's interesting how much one's heart and mind can go back and forth between two polar opposites. wanting, one moment, to run as far away as possible and the next, unable to imagine being elsewhere. how in the world do you discern what you really want/need when what you want, you just can't have? so in fear of never getting even close, running away seems to be the better option. why hold on? why not just forget and live, throwing oneself hopelessly into the present because there is no better place to live. and yet one can't help but hope. don't we all? we hope for something greater than ourselves, or possibly despair, depending on your personality and belief.

I've become much more content in my present for many reasons, largely the work of a Hand much larger than my own. but there is still this nagging, this longing that reminds me that this isn't quite where I want to be. and I wonder how much of that is me adjusting. and how much of that is a call to something else. I wonder how much of that would go away if I just stayed here- or anywhere for longer than 12 months.

that's the problem with my personality. I love a challenge and I'll adapt to anything and I love how going through the process of adapting always, without fail, makes me a stronger person, more comfortable in my own skin. It seems that I could belong just about anywhere. I know it's not true. the last nine months have shown me that. it's a lesson He's had to teach me repeatedly. but my skeptic self can't help but wonder, if He really has somewhere specific He wants me or if just anywhere will do. because if just anywhere will do then let's give up this silly search and settle into life and live in the present. forget that hope, that longing and throw oneself into now. because I love the now and really despise this thing that hangs in the back of my mind.

but if He does have somewhere that He wants me, then I guess I can't give up the wandering, the searching quite yet. only the next few months will tell as I have begun yet again to seek where He wants me. and if it must be away from my home, my hope, my heart; then I pray it won't be long. or that He says good riddance to that ridiculous nagging in the back of my heart and mind.

i've found a job opening....
and it seems to be a combination of everything that i know and love--
youth, outdoors, arts, urban culture, helping others.

yet i hesitate to write this cover letter.
b.c i know if i write the right things, i could really get this job.
and i'm not quite sure that i'm ready to commit to that.

it's funny how once you find what you really want, you become afraid to commit to it. or at least i do.

i have a feeling i'll be the same way when it comes to getting married--if i ever get married. it's kind of been moved lower on the list. it's not exactly of high priority on people's lists out here and the longer you spend out here, the more that makes you just think, oh i guess it can be put off. where in the midwest everybody freaks out by the time they're 25 if they don't have a significant other b.c if it hasn't happened yet well then by golly its never going to happen. and maybe it won't. but that's as much in God's hands as everything else in my life.

but i will write that cover letter by Sept. 7: the deadline. and you know what? i probably won't even get an interview for the job. and all of this fretting will have been for naught.