Suburban Life: When blessings become liabilities.

I have a love/hate relationship with suburban life.

First, love. I'm fond of having my own place to live, with my own room. I enjoy the comfort of my car, even with all the repairs. I find comfort in feeling safe in my neighborhood. More than almost all the other things, I love showers. Hot showers. Showers that almost burn my skin, but don't. I've heard glorious tales of showers from friends on mission trips, and even a hilarious song which held the refrain, "Take a bath in a bucket / I like it! / And so will you." Honestly, I don't think I'd like a bath in a bucket. I like a shower in a shower. So, there's a sampling of my loves of the suburbs.

The past year has given me new eyes. Upward mobility is an interesting thing. The American Dream is to give to your children better than you had for yourself. I think for the Baby Boomers, this dream was realized like never before. After WWII, things seemed to climb for the better, for a while. More education, housing, jobs and more were available to more people. My parents took advantage of the years. My dad was Air Force and retired early. My parents worked hard, and I had a pretty great upbringing.

Like I said, my parents worked hard. This past year that finally translated for me: My parents worked hard, so I didn't have to. I know they told me to work hard, and taught me to work hard as best they could, but it never really sunk in. I'm clearing them of any responsibility for how I ended up, which for a while has been generally lazy.

There is good news. This past year, I realized I lean toward laziness. Really, I always knew that. This year, I named it. I never learned how to work hard, to fight for anything, to struggle against all odds in order to have victory. I lived a privileged childhood. I rarely tried my hardest in school. Sports weren't going great, so I passed on those. I worked hard at music, but it also came pretty naturally to me. Does that count?

I've mentioned in the past that I've taken on many projects. Most of those are going well, or have already happened, or have been put off until further notice. But overall, things are going well. About a month ago I slowed my roll because I had been putting tons of effort into everything, and I was just tired. I've slowed down enough, though. It's time to step back into things, working hard.

From what I hear, our generation is the first in a long time, if not ever, that doesn't assume we'll have it better than our parents. Financially speaking. We see the economic system is problematic, but we're not sure what to do about it, and not sure anyone can do anything about it.

Even still, there's hope. Our generation is also incredibly service-minded, and globally oriented. We care about people, family, community, global agendas, and more. We realize that everything isn't about us. So, if we have a harder life so someone else can have a better life, we're up for that. At least a little bit. I have yet to sell all my possessions and give them to the poor, and I'm not sure I ever will.

It's tempting to confuse an easy life with a better life. I guess the lesson I've learned is that a good life is a life that's been earned. Working for things helps me enjoy them more, and take pride in them. I didn't appreciate my education as much when I wasn't paying for it. Now I am, and I do. And I can appreciate the work my parents did all along the way.

Now it's time to do my part, to work hard and earn a better life.

The Plate That Is Deliciously Full

I know how to go through a buffet.

When I was little, I thought I knew how to do the buffet. You see what you want, you take some, and then you move on to the next thing you want, right?

Sort of.

If you see some good salad or pasta or soup or processed over-salted meat product, and you get a good amount like a normal meal, you'll fail. You can't get just as much of everything as you always do; you'll never be able to eat it all. The trick, I've found, is to take just a taste of everything that looks good. That way if something's fantastic you can just go get more. And things that aren't that good? Well, you don't have to eat a lot because you only grabbed a little.

I made my friend a list of my current commitments. Doing so, I realized I had stacked up at the buffet. Here are the entrees I am enjoying:

- Leading worship

- Directing a college ministry

- Mentoring 4 students

- Developing a basic intro to the Bible curriculum

- Creating a small group experience on personal Bible devotion/prayer

- Attempting to co-create curriculum/assignments for my grad school class

- Preaching at church

- Training for a quickly approaching half-marathon

And aside from that I want to have a vibrant prayer life, blog meaningful material, play around with music and video software, and participate in life-giving social events.

It's possible I need more than one plate. It could be too much goodness for one trip through the buffet line. Either that, or I need to find the best way to make each of these small bites instead of giant portions.

At this point I've signed up for what I have, and I'm interested to see how it turns out. And honestly, I'm not too concerned.

I think next semester I need to employ the advanced buffet technique learned in the 301 course: Eating the Best Without Blowing Up. Instead of grabbing a plate and heaping up, you bypass the plates, survey all of the options, and pair them up. You don't want to end up with all meats, or all salads, or not have room for dessert. Similarly, I don't want to have a bad balance. I want my activities to complement one another for a healthy balance.

The good news is I am a different person than I was 6 months ago. I don't think I would have taken this much on back then, mostly because I would be afraid of how much effort it would take. I'm interested to see how much I can healthily take on. I'm sure it's more than I've done before, but not sure where the threshold is.

I'm thinking dropping something will be the equivalent of loosening my belt. I'm not anticipating that, but I'd be silly not to think it may be necessary. I hope my friends will keep me healthy and in check. But I'm going to have to make time to allow them to do so. Accountability always has to be allowed for it to work.

Tonight I'll simmer in the possibilities, consider goals, directions, etc. And, more importantly, I'll commit all these ways to the LORD. If I'm not being called to all of them, I can't expect them all to succeed. A man decides his way in his heart; but it is the LORD who directs his steps.

I'll let the LORD fill my plate.

My Job and My Work

I went to my job today.

After almost 8 hours of sleep I snoozed my alarm twice before climbing out and heading to the bathroom only to realize I didn't have time for a shower. No problem. I have thick clothes.

I headed off to my job to serve tables, run food, clean trays and make money. It was a good day, overall. Pastor John came and ate and we talked about sermons and life, and that was awesome.

When I left my job, I thought, "Now it's time to get to my work."

I had a few things in mind. I've got my rural ministry class coming up. I have a list of mentoring/discipleship resources I want to explore. I'm responsible for leading a community of people before a holy God tomorrow morning, and am not entirely ready. I wanted to write a blog. (Check.)

It turns out, my job is different than my work. See, my job is what I do to make a living; my work is what I do to make a life. The cool thing is, at my job, I can still do my work. I can be creative, I can build relationships, and instead of just serving tables, I can serve people.

What's your job, and what's your work?

Hard Work

I got off work an hour ago.

I'm not sure if my posts come up at the right time. I suspect they don't. But I got out at 12:50 a.m. That's pretty late.

What I like about work is the sense of accomplishment I get from working hard. I mean, I was hating it while I was there. (It was a rough night, save for a visit from some friends from the House of Payne.) But, now that it's over, I guess it wasn't so bad. AND all the paper-work was right the first time. Thank God.

What's your favorite part about work?

Apron Full of Stains*

For those of you who don't know, I work at a restaurant. I'm a server. It's great fun most days, depending on the table. I love when people think I do a great job and say things like, "You should get a raise!", because then I can respond with, "That's what I love about serving: You get to give me that raise," and I offer up a huge smile. :D Talk about putting your money where your mouth is, eh?

Every day at our pre-shift meeting we have our "line-up". This is when we all stand before the manager as they check out our uniforms, aprons, bank, pens, everything. We have to be perfect. As you can imagine, not everyone is perfect every day. A common discrepancy is the dirty apron. If you've worked a Friday night, the last thing you want to do before a Saturday morning shift is wash your apron. Over time, everyone has gotten really good at hiding the stains, spots and whatevers. It's a slight-of-hand trick where you can use your server book to cover over them, or do something off to the left so they won't see what's right in front of them. No manager ever knows there's something wrong.

I think there are times when I've noticed that either I or someone else in my life has been playing that slight-of-hand trick, but it's usually not with an apron. It's with life. We line up in front of co-workers, family members, roommates, best friends or who ever else is watching, and we put on a face or talk about the weather because we want to cover up, or at least distract from the fact that not everything is going perfectly.

I think the reason I've seen this play out the most isn't because anyone wants to hide something; there usually isn't any deceptive intent. Rather, I know a lot of people who don't want to mention what's heavy on their hearts because they don't want to weigh anybody else down. It makes sense; no one wants to bring down the mood. But, as I often tell people who do share the heavy things, "That's life." I'm glad to share in the good and bad things.

Being concerned with who you might take down with you probably isn't the best concern to have when you're with real friends, because, really, when you think you're going to bring your friends down, you'll be surprised at how quickly they will be able to help you up. And maybe instead of having to hide your apron, they'll help you clean it instead.

*You get bonus points in the betanarrative if you can name the band who sings this song, without the internet.

The Hunt for Red Oct-job-er

Oh. My. Gosh.

That was the worst heading ever. I should be banned from the internet.

I went to a new "up-and-coming" Buffalo Wild Wings. The building is up, and the restaurant is coming.

They had a big sign that said "NOW HIRING!" in the window. I already have a job, but I'll need a second one over the summer. Bills are ever-increasing, and I'd like to avoid the massive student loans that I took out this past year.

The big sign outside of BWW should have read:

"NOT HIRING ANYTHING YOU WANT TO DO"

since the server and bartender spots are all filled up.

Needless to say (though for some reason we insist on saying things that are needless to say), I did not get a second job there. Which brings me to the point:

Rejection sucks.

One summer I went from place to place looking for a job. I probably applied at 15 places and interviewed at 1/3 of those. The only offer I got was to manage a shoe store. Um... yeah.

I think part of rejection is the feeling that we are not known. "If you knew me, you would do nothing but hire me because I'm one of the hardest workers you'll ever get." And they're like, "Nope. I don't want to know you."

I'm sure the same goes for dating and other areas of life. In general, rejection sucks.

On the flip side, if someone says no to you in one place, you might be able to go find something way better. It's the whole, "when one door closes another one opens" or something cliche that doesn't really make sense.

So, to all the rejects out there, I feel you. Not with my hands, but with my heart.