Monday Morning, Year End Musings

On mornings like this, when I am not working, and have stayed up later than normal, I'm grateful that my bedroom window faces south, and looks out onto the apartment building next door.  When I woke this morning, around 8:30 or 9:00 or so, my bedroom was still dimly lit, and conducive to sleep.  Under my door, from the hallway I could see bright light.  This is a sunbeam, from my roommate's east facing bedroom window.  Her bedroom may be larger, but mine stays nice and dark.

Incidentally, I wish my days ran on a different schedule.  My body seems to thrive on slow mornings, and later nights like I've been having because of the holidays.  This is clearly not an option when I need to rise early in the morning to be at work on time, and I regret that.  Some of my most clear thinking and productive hours seem to come in the time after I already need to be in bed when I have to work the next day.

As it is, at the moment I'm still in my pajamas, sitting in bed, eating a banana for breakfast and planning out my day.  I made a call to confirm a massage appointment for later this afternoon (gotta use up that insurance coverage before the end of the year!), and I'm contemplating spoiling myself just a little by going for a manicure sometime today or tomorrow as well.  I need to do some cleaning around our house, but other than that, the day is looking pretty low key.

I got my new calendar/day planner for 2010 a few weeks back, and I made myself save it for this week that I'm off.  I love going through a new calendar and filling in important dates.  Birthdays and anniversaries and other fun stuff.  I love staring at all of the blank dates and thinking of the wonderful possibilities to fill them.  I love dreaming about what might come.  Because the dreams, at least, don't cost anything.  Yes, my budget is tight, but that doesn't need to impede the dreaming.  And the dreaming is the truly fun part anyway - it's a bonus (an extra special one, I'll admit) when the dreams become some sort of reality.

I like looking forward.  I'm thinking about the things I'd like to do in the new year.  Not goals or resolutions persay, but things I'd like to try, or see or do.

So this week, while I putter around the house, and around the city, there's time reserved for dreaming.  For looking forward.  For waiting and hoping and praying.

I'm thinking about some friends down in Mexico this week.  They left on boxing day to make the drive down and spend some time building a house for a family who desperately needs one.  I don't know many on the team, just their leader.  A chaplain at the university I attended who managed to impact my life simply by caring about how I was doing on a day to day basis.  I still enjoy the occasional coffee with him, catching up on things.  He's been leading these teams for years - students from two local post-secondary institutions, Christian or not, and I have at least one friend who met Jesus simply because she was stunned to encounter him in this team of people she'd joined over the Christmas semester break to do something humanitarian.  I'm grateful for people like my chaplain friend, loving on students who really need it, and introducing them to Jesus gently with his life as much as with his words.

And with that, I'd better crawl out of bed and head into the day.  There are at least a few things I should really try to accomplish today, and this week, starting with a list of what needs to be accomplished today/this week!

Hope your day is fabulous!