ani ruhama

I have a confession to make. Not counting tonight, Battlestar Galactica had aired four episodes thus far in Season Three, and I hadn’t watched any of them. And I could make all kinds of excuses about how I was busy, with friends, studying, or sleeping, but no excuses will do. I’m ashamed of myself.

But now I’ve righted my wrongdoing, having spent 5 hours at Dan’s apartment tonight with Kathy, Nick, Tim, Kevin, Cassie, and Butcher, watching the previous four episodes (minus commercials, hooray), and then watching tonight’s. So now I’m all caught up, and as much in love with Battlestar as ever. We might have to make this a regular Friday night occurence, so I can have some people to watch it with. Scifi’s not quite the same when you watch it alone.

And now Chris can’t complain bitterly to me about how my laziness has cruelly inconvenienced him in not allowing him to talk to me about the episodes. I should be nice to him, since he did burn me the first three episodes. But I won’t mention that.

I’m reminded how life keeps going even when you don’t. The last few days have been a constant struggle against losing control. But really, I think that’s my problem, that I refuse to lose control. I’m not very good at letting go. When my life goes faster than I do, and I feel that ever-loved sense of control slipping away, I guess I panic and try to hold on tighter. And then I’m not only losing control of that part of my life, but I’m losing control of being able to have control, and then I get even more frustrated.

And nothing that I hold onto is inherently bad. Everything is something that I should be responsible for, should care deeply about and follow up on. But in the midst of that I have to recognize that ultimately, it’s not up to me. So I should just expect them to not work out the way I want them to.

Things on my mind:

1- My Lack of a Job Post Graduation. I’ve been stressing about that for a while now, and while I have a pretty resume to show for my efforts, I’ve made absolutely no headway in finding places to send it. Speaking of which…anyone know of social work job openings? I’m extremely competent and just plain awesome, and everyone should want to hire me… So I need to recognize that I don’t have to have a job lined up when I graduate in 6 weeks, and I’m not a failure if I end up going home and living off my parents for a month, if in the long run it means I get to do what I really want to do. I keep changing my mind every day what I’m doing come January. And that’s fine, as long as I know I don’t have to know.

2- My Ex-Boyfriend Situation. Long story short, he and my best friend recently started dating, which is never good under the best of circumstances. And I guess that in my attempts to not hurt my friendships with either of them, I denied myself permission to feel, because I worried that if I admitted how much I was hurt I would react by hurting them instead. Diana gently chastised me last night, telling me I needed to allow myself to grieve, and so I guess that’s my next mission–to stop pretending I’m fine when I’m absolutely not. Because while other people matter, I matter too, apparently.

3- My Current Job. I love my job. I promise I’d say that even if I didn’t know that my boss and my boss’s boss and everyone else in the department reads my blog regularly. I’ve just been getting frustrated with myself and my inadequacies lately. I’m happiest when it’s just me and myself that I have to take responsibility for, because I know my limits and my strengths and I can always trust myself to do what needs to be done. But I’m stuck in charge of everyone else too, whose limits and strengths I’m not altogether familiar with, who I don’t always know I can trust to do what needs to be done, and I usually feel like I have no earthly idea how to make things turn out how they should. And when I’m already frustrated because I’m losing control of things in my life, it makes it worse when I have to try to lead others belonging to the Human Race, which has quite a reputation for producing rebels.

4- God. Yeah…pretty much, I’m glad He loves me no matter what, because I’d have given up on our relationship a long time ago if I were Him. The quiet assurance that He’s still there waiting and loving me, no matter what craziness goes on in my life, has kept me sane. Even when I push Him aside. Which I do a lot…and sometimes, don’t really know how to get back. But every once in a while I remember He’s there holding me.

I should probably go to bed. In case you didn’t notice, it’s been a long day for me, and I think tomorrow will go much better if I allow myself a full night’s sleep. Hmm…if I’m sound asleep within half an hour, I guess I still won’t accomplish that full night’s sleep, since we’re supposed to get 8 1/2 to 9 hours sleep, and I’d only get 7. Sigh. Oh well…good night world.

You can’t hear what I’m not saying
And I can hold out long enough
Treading water, I keep from sinking
I’m not one for reaching

You see that I can play a pretty convincing role
Well I don’t need you
I don’t think I need you

But you see through my forever lies
And you are not believing
And I see in your forever eyes
That you you are forever healing

Dear Sir/Madam,

My sincerest thanks for your anonymous gift.  It cheered my heart to check my mailbox this morning and receive such a thoughtful package in response to my previous post.  I’d love to write more, but I’ve had a long day and think it’s time for a little stress relief.

Gratefully,

Laura

Gotta love it when you’re on the phone with your big little brother, and you end the conversation with “I love you,” and he responds with “Yup.” Makes you feel special.

On another note, I’ve realized that the smell of cigarette smoke doesn’t faze me anymore. Guess I’ve been in one too many client’s homes where the smell permanently resides in every fiber in your clothing by the time you leave. I suppose that’s a useful trait to have acquired.

My roommate is jealous that I haven’t mentioned her in a blog post recently enough. But I suppose this paragraph solves that problem. She’s also jealous that this paragraph only had two sentences, so I’ve added a third and fourth. I disagree with her that it has to have five–deal with it.

“Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. “
-Colossians 4:6 (NIV)

I offer a sincere apology to everyone that’s been sitting on the edge of their seats waiting for me to post, because I’ve consistently disappointed you, posting only once in the last two weeks. My schedule has gotten the better of me. However, I’m here today to make restitution for my wrongs. Hence, a post.

Ben posted rules for making a Soundtrack To Your Life. Then he posted more rules. I greatly admire this fine gentleman (ladies, he’s single!), and I decided I should take his lead and make my very own Soundtrack. So, with no further ado and no apologies on the more potentially-embarassing choices, I present an entirely-by-the-rules Soundtrack To My Life, broken up into a few handy-dandy categories. Enjoy!

To Whom It May Concern:

I use a feed aggregator. It’s my best friend. I don’t have the motivation or organization to check every individual blog I read every day in the hopes they’ve updated; I do, however, regularly check my aggregator which shows me everyone’s new posts. However, just as I become engrossed in reading about your very interesting lives, the post is cut short by an ellipsis, informing me that I have to actually visit your blog to read your post. And I sigh, and dutifully browse to your blog and read it.

Under the WordPress Options, in the Reading section, there’s an option to show the summary or full text of your posts in the syndication feeds. I petition you, by all that is beautiful and good in this world, to show the full text in your feed. Perhaps yours is accidentally set to the summary view. Or perhaps you want more traffic to your page. If it’s the latter, I fully recognize and identify with your longing for increased site traffic.  But in the grand scheme of things, it’s better that your logged site visits diminish if instead you have committed and regular readers. Like me.

Faithfully,
Laura