Daily 5 - Year 2, Day 94

Today's Daily 5:

1. Having keys to the building at work, and being able to let myself in, instead of having to beg someone to let me in the way I did the first two days.
2. settling in at my desk for the month, and sipping a mug of pomegranate green tea
3. A smooth bus commute - the bus was sliding all over the icy roads this morning, so it was relieving to get there safely.
4. Blogging/writing via my iphone while on the bus
5. Wearing jeans at work
6. Scarf season - today's was from Kenya (Monday was Morocco, Tuesday was California, tomorrow will be Nepal)
7. wearing a bracelet I like, but rarely wear
8. hemp lip balm from the body shop
9. yoga, and the irony, after some challenging moments today, of listening to the video teacher talk about letting all the problems of the day drain away
10. feeling like my job is something that has a purpose, and isn't self-serving
11. playing games online
12. listening to a large chunk of a fascinating audio book while playing a game online
13. sipping a couple mugs of tea while I puttered
14. a hug from mom
15. a phone call from a dear friend, reminding me that I am loved
16. digging into some of the few remaining Almond Joy bars in the stash I brought home from California
17. chocolate in general was a blessing tonight
18. finding reasons to laugh
19. 2 Corinthians 5, in The Message
20. re-reading "Sidney and Norman: A Tale of Two Pigs"  "First, I love you.  Second, I love you.  Third, I love you."

Maybe it's Just a Season

I feel like I've been writing boring things here.

Quizzes, links, that sort of thing.

Very little personal narrative.

It's because I'm feeling a bit wordless these days.

I write in a number of forums, both public and private, and I just kind of feel wordless.

Not exactly numb, but lacking words that fit around the spaces my body and soul are occupying.

And so I'm posting "boring" things.

I'm thinking a lot about Anne Jackson's book and website "Permission to Speak Freely" these days.  About how that question, "What's one thing you can't say in church?" and Anne's story impacted me when I read it in early September.  Partly because I've walked some of her story.  The addiction pieces, the mental health pieces, the pastor's kid pieces - all of these are things I'm rather intimately familiar with.

Last night I jotted my own answer to that question on a slip of paper.  I may even drop it in the mail.

But in the meantime, the process of journeying through that is leaving me feeling at a loss for words.

So I write "fluffy" posts with quizzes and links.  Nothing I think might stir controversy, because I don't have the mental energy to separate criticism of my position from criticism of me right now.  I started writing a post in my head that I thought might generate discussion, and stopped, because I wondered if it would stir controversy I'd rather not wade through right now.  Fluffy posts, and daily 5 lists.  Lists that are sometimes a desperate grab for sanity, and sometimes just a genuine reflection of things in my day that brightened it, brought smiles and laughter, and gratefulness.

I think it's probably just a season, this wordlessness.  I pray so at least.  I'll be back.  And in the meantime, pardon the fluffy.  It's all I have energy for most days.

Go pick up Anne Jackson's book in the meantime.  You won't regret the read.

Praying through nations

On the weekend I wrote this post.

Three days in, I'm appreciating the exercise in pausing for a few minutes a day to read about a nation and watch the prayer video that's provided.

So far I've prayed for Afghanistan, Austria, and Bosnia.  And I've learned a little something about each.

It's helpful to me, right now, when I'm dreaming of traveling to the nations, to feed that hunger a little by stopping for five minutes or so a day to pray.  It encourages the dreaming, and makes me pause to stop and think about those places, to take notice of them in the news.  To think about people I know with connections there.  (For example, I'm listening to a fascinating audiobook right now about Afghanistan, and a long time friend did mission work many years ago in both Austria and Bosnia.)

And so, I pause, and pray.  Especially when I can attach a face and a ministry.  I pray for those connections, that they will grow.  And I dream of perhaps walking in those places one day.

Daily 5 - Year 2, Day 93

Today's Daily 5:

1. A long hot shower
2. a treatment appointment tonight that helped with my sore neck
3. a good 2nd day of work
4. good news on facebook - things like the fact that a relative who is quitting smoking has made it a full year without a cigarette
5. sipping a big mug of passion tea (the old version, not the new one that starbucks sells, that doesn't taste at all good anymore.  I still buy the old version at a local grocery store.)
6. having an iphone
7. my US social security card arrived today.  good timing, hope for some future plans came in the mail with that card.
8. being able to wear jeans to my new job, on a day that isn't a Friday.
9. laughing over funny moments that remind me that God has a sense of humor.  Things like waking to a terrible snow storm this morning, and thinking longingly of palm trees that grow outside, and then looking up from the blog post I was writing (via my iphone) on the bus, and seeing a life-size papier mache palm tree, and a smaller one besides, sitting in full glory in the back of a pickup truck bed!
10. escapist television while catching up on some online work

Snow

This was the view from my front door this morning.

Snow.

I'm sitting on the bus and watching as it slides sideways every time it brakes.

And I'm realizing that my first order of business in the next couple of days will need to be the purchase of a pair of winter boots. Last year's pair finally gave up, with holes in both soles that made for cold wet feet. And facing a winter of commuting on foot and by bus without boots doesn't seem plausible. So, boot shopping it will be.

At least it's a genuine excuse to buy shoes!