a spattering of thoughts

I'm only one week into my doctor-ordered inactivity, and I'm already going stir crazy with boredom...ah me. Three to four days a week of Muay Thai, self-defense and ballet training once upon a time, and now I sit and watch tv and movies all evening. I would write, but my computer is broken, and I would read, but all my books are kind of depressing for some reason. I've definitely got to come up with another plan, because I can almost feel my life wasting away as it gets sucked into that tube of so-called entertainment. There are precious few moments of real, worthwhile entertainment to be had from a television set.

Though, there's something to be said for a season of silence and reflection, but that's a hard, uncomfortable place to go, most times. Which is probably why I should go there. shoot. I'll have to think about that one..

The job isn't so hot right now. I like what I do in and of itself, but lately my position has morphed into something that could only be reasonably handled by two people (which is why I shouldn't be blogging right now). Since I am only one, I'm pretty overwhelmed and frustrated (which is why I am blogging right now). Last night my dad told me that "something is wrong with my job description" if I am ever at a point where I am able to fulfill 100% of my responsibilities. That seems like a jacked-up way of looking at it, but okay. I know this is the "real world," but I still find it strange that people would prefer you to do a bunch of stuff at a mediocre level rather than do fewer things at an excellent level. But that's just me.

Also, I've learned lately (both at and outside of work) that I don't deal with negative people well. As much as I try to shore up myself against the world, I'm still a sensitive person as they say, and have to make a conscious effort not to absorb negativity that is around me. A coworker was, as usual, venting in my office the other day and I told her I couldn't take it anymore and to get out. She thought I was just being funny...I let her think that, but, yeah, I wasn't. hah. I mean, venting is necessary for most of us...but not constantly. yech. I'm thankful most of the people in my life tend more toward the positive....(though I feel compelled to say to my wonderful roommate Emily, I'm sorry you have to bear the brunt of my complaining and whining; I guess I just have to get it out of my system sometimes :P)

One thing Emily and I have complained about regretted together is the lack of community that settles into your life after the undergraduate years. For most of us, college means living 24/7 with constant access to your friends, in some form or fashion...and then suddenly jobs, relocations, marriages and even just laziness get in the way, and before you know it, what was once a simple showing up at your friend's apartment to hang out is now a complex production full of timing issues, rescheduling and cancellations.

I'm surviving just fine without everything else that was great about college...but I do miss the community, I miss the ready fellowship. I'm trying, but it's a difficult thing to recreate.

Annnnd now it's definitely time for me to get back to work! hehe.

When the couch potato dives headfirst into a contact sport...

...there are bound to be some laughs.

Especially when that's all you can do, because you still can't believe it.

As in these days, I laugh all the time (in disbelief/irony/fun/bewilderment) at the fact that I, previously the total non-athlete, have been training in Muay Thai for the past few months, and am loving it.

Prior to that, my physical activity mainly consisted of going to the gym about ten times a year (maybe). I mean, I "played" soccer when I was very little...I did gymnastics (and Jazzercise! yeah!), and tried out for track and volleyball in middle and high school. (Can't really say why, since I hate to run and am no good with a ball...)

And that would be it. Well, that's not totally true - I like walking park trails, I like to play catch with my dad, and my roommate and I are re-learning how to ride our bikes after a decade of un-use...

Hah.

So yeah, every once in a while, I think of how odd it is to find boxing gloves on my hands a few nights a week, and to constantly discover inexplicable bruises and scrapes all over my body.

And being only recently initiated to the active world of which sports-related injuries are a natural part, I find it very strange that this Valentine's day will find me hanging out with an orthopedic surgeon. But, since my right knee is currently quite a different shape from my left knee, that is where I will be.

Not that anyone likes to get hurt, but I have never before been so scowl-on-my-face mad about being injured, because it means I don't get to play for a while...I want to play!!! (er...fight?)

But I'll be back. Muwahaha.

warning: rambling post ahead

GRR, I guess it is just one of those days where you're bound to be in a funk and you just have to be okay with it. Of course, I'm sure I could do something about it if I were, say, on vacation at a luxurious island resort :) But since I'm at the office, I'll have to make do with that.

That didn't make much sense but I don't care too much today!

My brain (or, probably more likely, the human brain) works in such weird ways...last night I finished a book called Marley and Me, a book a journalist published a few years ago about life with his crazy Labrador. I had started the book a few months ago as a lite-lit break from all the heady readings I've been doing lately about social justice and women's issues and such. Anyway, as a fellow dog-lover who has a similarly insane pooch, I unexpectedly ended up loving the book, which is very well written. ANYway, I had been putting off the last chapter for about a month, because I knew what it would contain. And last night I decided that if I couldn't handle it in a book I wouldn't be able to handle it in real life, so I finished it.

And cried my eyes out. Geez. And back to the point about weird-brain-workings, reading about Marley dying (in case you didn't figure that part out) naturally made me think of how much I'll miss my own aging puppy when he leaves us in an inevitably short few years, which made me think and grieve again over my family's loss of my cousin Joanna earlier this year. And continuing into this morning, I'm thinking about the dirty little secrets and disappointing truths about the nonprofit sector that most people outside the NGO world assume don't exist, and about the infuriating (to me) divisiveness that often appears to be the predominant feature of the modern-day Church, and I'm reading about inadequate legislation for labor-and-sex-trafficked victims, and about heartbreaking stories of trafficking, rape and domestic abuse survivors, and non-survivors. And I'm reading the blog update of a little baby girl with frustrating brain tumor treatment, and thinking about the two other women I know fighting the side effects of inoperable brain tumors, and wondering why the husband of one of them--my friend and former pastor--hasn't updated his blog in five days.

Just had to get that out...

The past 12 hours have reminded me of a lesson I learned repeatedly when I worked at the Alliance of AIDS Services - that if you're not careful, you can let yourself get distracted from the good things in life by the seemingly overpowering and overshadowing bad things. It's hard when you're burdened to work for the good, because that often means working in the face of the bad, which can almost seem to sap away your hope sometimes.

But you just can't let that happen; you have to believe with everything you've got that there is always more hope.

(preaching to myself, here.)

Jesus Christ Sold Here!

- from last Sunday's PostSecret: -


I don't really get it, either.

(But I'm sure the folks who manufactured these stickers had no motive other than to seriously impact the world.)

Waste not, want not

So I've been unusually tired of late...yawned my way through an entire meeting this morning (and considering only two other people were part of the meeting, I'm thinking they noticed.)

And a muscle in my right shoulder has been twitching off and on all morning...I can see it jumping maniacally beneath my shirt. I always love it when that happens.

But I'm not buying the "you're getting old" shtick...At seven days shy of my 24th year, I personally think I am barely even approaching my "peak," as depressing people call it. I knowww, everyone says, "once you near 30, you'll understand..."

I doubt that, though. Maybe if I lived in the Middle Ages I would, but come on. Why spend your young years worrying about how they're going to come to an end someday, as if there was something you could do about that?

And to the people who make it sound like your life just goes downhill after age 30 (or 40, or 50), I say: obviously you've not observed enough truly "older" people, because then you would surely see (as I have) that even though some parts of life do get crappier, the parts that get better can more than make up for it. Otherwise, "middle and old age" and "happiness" would be mutually exclusive ideas, which they certainly are not.

On the other end, sometimes I feel pressure to "grow up," to prove that I'm an "adult" (whatever that means). But you know what, I'm a responsible person who contributes to society; so what if I happen to indulge in a little silly girlishness now and then? What is the hurry?

So you can have your regrets and your rushing; I'm not about to waste my youth. Thanks but no thanks.

Don't let your gift cards go to waste!

You know that sometimes you don't get around to using up every last dollar (or any dollars, sometimes!) of all those gift cards...850 Words of Relevant mentioned a neat solution out there:

Gift Card Giver

The National Retail Federation found that 81 percent of Americans received a gift card last year, and TowerGroup says that the gift card industry has become a 45 billion dollar operation. With millions of dollars on gift cards going unspent, GiftCardGiver.com wants to use them to help others. If you have unused gift cards (or cards with just a few dollars left on them), you can write the remaining balance on the card and send it to Gift Card Giver. They’ll distribute them to non-profit organizations that will put them into the hands of people in need.

Resolutions are more like guidelines....

So let's see how I did for the 2007 resolutions I posted in December 2006....

Melinda's 2007 Resolutions

1. actually take care of my car
No; in fact, I have been avoiding my maintenance schedule because I'm afraid of what it will tell me ($). I hope you're not reading this Dad
2. utilize my gym more than once a month
Nope, though with ballet and kickboxing I feel like I started to make up for that (at least in the last few months of 2007)
3. stop being crazy
I at least feel slightly less crazy (the bad kind); I began to embrace the good craziness. There is a difference, my friends.
4. improve my work ethic, at least at work
Reached this in part, if not in full...changing to a job i actually like has helped.
5. find work?
DONE whoo hoo! Why was there a question mark?
6. stop freaking out every time someone gets engaged/married
Pretty much got that one down, maybe.
7. find a way to live in Spain without actually leaving the States
no comment
8. write articles for publications that actually pay
I only wrote one article during 2007, so....maybe 2008 is the year.
9. find a way to take dance lessons again
YES i am a ballerinaaaa
10. really learn to trust in/lean on/listen to the Lord
jury's still out
11. get a loop station and become the next Zoe Keating
got the loop station! have yet to try using it. kind of need an amp first...
12. be a much better friend
oo i think i still have a long way to go
13. learn the constellations
i totally forgot about this one
14. go to Raven Rock at least once
no, dang it
15. own and appreciate the fact that i'm an emotional person
got pretty close I think
16. visit my aunt in New York for Thanksgiving
nope
17. play outside a whole lot more
ahhhh, no
18. learn my cello craft more thoroughly
not so much
19. build and learn to play the hammer dulcimer
uh..
20. visit Portland
right
21. stop pretending I don't care about having "someone special"
actually not sure where I even stand on that any more
22. save $
It probably doesn't count if you foolishly squander it all before you really need it
23. finally decide on a tattoo design
I did get closer, at least
24. learn how to be truly honest
Made a little progress, I hope
25. finish a song i'm proud of
i guess? It's mainly finished.
26. volunteer more
Yes.
27. quit doing brainless things like absent-mindedly poking my thumb into a blade to prove it's dull
um..
28. paint
yes, horrah!
29. live somewhere that is not in the middle of nowhere
YES thank God!!
30. stop thinking of myself as a child instead of a woman
still in progress
31. get "Christmas Shoes" banned from the radio
ha...sorry Mike, wherever you are
32. acquire the art of tact
I don't know how to gauge that....em, Michelle?
33. go on a road trip to somewhere that is not the beach
unless you count going to Charlotte by yourself, i guess not
34. write more letters
not so much
35. visit the mountains
nooo :(
36. finally fix up my bike and see about changing "that one great bike ride memory from 10 years ago" to something a bit more current
fix bike: check! ride bike: I thought about it a lot
37. steadily decrease my need for chocolate, cereal, facebook and desserts and computers in general
I just ate cereal and am currently eating chocolate as I write this. and I already used my computer to look at facebook this morning...so I basically sucked this one up
38. stop buying more home decor than actually fits in my space
yep. moving to a smaller space + running out of $ will do that to you
39. figure out what my book's about
oh....i quit wanting to write a book, so..
40. trip it to DC to see my lovely :)
yep! at least on the side of a business trip, anyway
41. learn how to get the most out of my camera
no, DANG it...
42. somehow finally stage that late afternoon field+cello photo shoot i've seen in my brain for 2 years
no again...dang it.

So, overall, I'm happy that I even did some of these. Perhaps a list of 2008 Guidelines will soon follow...

Enjoy music.

Another take on one of my favorite songs...





I think if I could ever be a part of a song like this, that's as close as I'd come to being able to quit music and live off of that memory forever.

who knew?

I just had an exciting (to me) and potentially important epiphany.

For some odd reason, ever since the sixth grade when I realized I had a modest talent and great love for writing, I have operated under the belief that Writing is this great, monolithic, all-encompassing thing at its core. Either you like "it," you're good at "it," or you're not.

So not true. Duh.

At the spurring on of teachers, I almost considered pursuing a career in journalism, but something always made me hesitate. I always felt that wrapped up in such a career would be many bits and angles that are pretty unappealing to my personality. Probably still true. At any rate, I thought that I could probably do it; I just wouldn't like it.

My day job requires some minor writing for our website, a task I rarely look forward to. That sentiment always perplexed me ("but I love to write!") until, um, this morning, when it occurred to me that nothing's wrong; I just don't like that kind of writing because I'm not good at it...because I don't like it.

I imagine that many years pass before a journalist has the privilege of covering exclusively those topics that he or she really cares about. I can't stand writing about things that don't interest me personally. And so I could never be a journalist, at least not a good one, because I would probably be miserable. Forget perseverance; you can't *truly* excel in something you don't even like. Quality without passion will simply never reach highest quality. At least in my opinion.

My epiphany: There's no shame in that! I used to think that if you called yourself A Real Writer, you should be able to do it all--from news reports to opinion pieces to novels (to poetry, even if just as poetic prose). WHERE did I get such an idea? Let's quash that feeling of inadequacy right there...geez.

Of course, the catch is that if I only ever write about what interests me, that severely limits readership (take this blog for example, or this very post, even...heh). Which means it's unlikely I'll ever get paid a dime for my musings. But I'm okay with that now. It's kind of freeing. :)

bet you can't see it just once

The ONCE DVD is coming out today! Hoorah!

not that you should care. but this is my blog, after all.

So maybe things aren't so shabby these days, artistically speaking...I finally finished the painting I started a year ago, and started another canvas project...I got to have some fun recording in a studio again [I think there are few things as exhilarating and fulfilling as hearing yourself recorded for posterity]...and I'm still on track for making all of my Christmas gifts this year. Can't complain. :)

I came dangerously close to my life becoming boring, though, something that hasn't happened since high school. I've finally reached the point in life where there is no foreseeable "next thing," except the workaday life that will continue on indefinitely (the glamour and excitement of which has worn off since I am no longer really new to this job).

But hopefully I have managed to nip this near-boredom in the bud. I'm going to start kickboxing soon, heck yeah. Ballet and kickboxing, what an odd pair that will make. Maybe I will even put them together and create a new dance craze and make instruction videos.

Melinda's Balletboxing...I can see it now.

come baaaack!

I've said this how many times? Too many, I think, for me to still be able to say it. But I miss the art in my life. It's even more accurate in Spanish, me hace falta -- "it creates a lacking in me." And this vacancy is becoming a serious source of irritation.

My life, especially my creativity, is in danger of being consumed by my job, something which I plan to nip in the bud after this week. Given this is the first job I've ever had that I truly enjoy, I can tell it's something I'll have to be cautious about...which is weird. But what I really care about is getting involved in a church and a home group, and then finding a way to get tapped into--or even better, become a part of--"the artist community" of the United States. Whatever that means. But when you get even the tiniest taste of it, all you want is more. And I want it back. And I definitely want it more.

Racial reconciliation and the Church.

A Voice of Healing

(from 850 Words of Relevant)

The events surrounding what has become known as the Jena 6 case have recently underscored the racial tension in the United States. The story of six African-American high-school students, who were suspected of beating up a white classmate, suddenly became an evening-news fixture as the nation watched the details of the case unfold. Weeks before the fight broke out, several white students hung a noose from a tree at the high school, and tension escalated between the racially divided groups. When prosecutors only brought charges against the African-American youths (and many felt the charges were too severe), protestors took to the streets in the town, and suddenly a racial divide was apparent.

We recently had the chance to speak with Efrem Smith, pastor of Sanctuary Covenant in Minneapolis. Along with fostering a multiethnic community at his church, Smith hosts the Time for Reconciliation radio show and speaks on the topic of racial reconciliation.

What’s the vision of your church?
The vision of our church is a Christ-centered community that is multiethnic, that is urban, that is relevant and that is holistic, and that we would equip people in the city to be salt and light, and to be salt and light in a way that it reaches the hurting and the lost.

What are the biggest challenges the Church is facing right now in order to get to racial reconciliation?
Well, churches have to first—and it starts with leadership—come to the understanding that we live in a racialized society that in many ways is a distraction and goes against the kind of community that Christ makes possible through His death and resurrection. Sociologists say and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said that Sunday morning at 11:00 is the most segregated hour in America. We have to see the Gospel message as wanting to do something about that and as going against that racialized norm of our society.

What are your expectations for the next generation coming up in the Church?
Well, I think that in this generation, in the emerging generation, there is a hunger, a desire, a genuine felt need for something other than what our grandparents and parents grew up in, in terms of a very rigid racial, racialized society rooted in individualism. And I expect this generation of youth and young adults especially to forge new identities and a new reality of what community is, and how we live life in an ever-increasing multiethnic, multicultural world.

What do you think the Church’s reaction should be to something like the Jena 6 case?
I think that the Church needs two things when you look at a situation like the Jena 6 situation. One is, the Church needs to be a voice of healing, of unity, of peace, of forgiveness. We need to uplift those things that I think are the real fruits of the spirit and that really model the work of Jesus Christ when He walked the earth.

The second thing, though, is the Church has to be prophetic and be honest that racism is still an injustice that has not gone away. And I think that there’s a segment—not all, but there’s a segment—of European Americans who live in a place of privilege and don’t recognize that race is still a very important issue in our country.

Is there a way to get that certain segment to recognize what’s going on?
Yes. I think that when we realize that based on Matthew chapter 1, the genealogy of Jesus, that Jesus walked the earth as a multiethnic human being. He wasn’t white. You can’t just make Him all African either, but He walked the earth as a multiethnic human being. When we realize that the first Christian community and church as we know it was multiethnic, and when we also realize and understand that the place we’re going to live eternally, heaven, is multiethnic, then I think we’re able to question, Well, then, why have we lifted up a Christ, a Church and a Gospel that is fundamentally Eurocentric in nature and Westernized? And when you’re not able to acknowledge that and deal with that, putting limits on how we view Jesus and how we view the Church, how we view the Good News, the Gospel message—I think when we understand them, we’ll get a better understanding of why the continued racial tension and issues that we see arise in something like the Jena 6 situation.

How do you think Christians need to react to encounters with racism?
Well, I think the very first counteractive move you can make against racism is to have authentic, deep, meaningful relationships with people of a different ethnicity. That you share meals with them, you share stories with them and you’re engaged in relationships with people that are different than you. That’s the most important move, that you’re truly loving your neighbor across racial lines as yourself. Because really, for that commandment to have meaning—because we’re in a racialized society—we have to say, “Love your neighbor across race as yourself” for that commandment to truly have meaning and power in our world today.

I think from that authentic relationship across race—loving your neighbor—it’s going to develop in you a compassion and a sensitivity to not tolerate racism, whether it’s institutional or individual. I think without a deep friendship, relationship across race, it’s hard to develop the proper sensitivity to speak out and act out against racism, whether it’s individual or institutional.

Author: Harbor Partin

Defenders of the...feminine

I find it very ironic that, as a woman, I have never been passionate about women's issues. I'm certainly not an all-out feminist by modern standards, though by virtue of the fact that I'm a woman, there are naturally certain things I have strong opinions about...but not passionately so, for the most part.

And then this summer, I started taking classes in the Bushido Judo School's Women's Self-Defense program, and all of a sudden I find myself wildly taken up with the cause of women's safety and protection. My instructor, a man of course (it doesn't do much good to practice beating up on a woman), possesses a more acute sense of respect for women than almost anyone I've ever met, and it occurred to me: he's a man! I'm a woman; where's my sense of honor and love towards my fellow woman?

And so I've gotten on a kick (though I hope it's more than that) of advocacy for women's safety...it hasn't paid off too well with the women I already know, sadly. Most of my friends smile and say "yeah, that class sounds like a good idea," but I haven't been able to convey the importance of it yet. I guess it will take time, and understandably. Four months ago I was an ambivalent bystander, more or less, and only signed up for one class because I knew my mom would continue to harass me if I didn't. Hey, if harassment is what it takes to get the women I care about into a place where they better know how to protect themselves, I don't mind the job. And to anyone riding the fence, I'd like to say: you really don't know what you've been missing all this time until you go. Trust me.

In the meantime, I'm considering becoming a volunteer for Interact of Wake County, which "provides safety, support, and awareness to victims and survivors of domestic violence and rape/sexual assault." This is not the garden-weeding, kitchen-cleaning, boutique-fundraiser-cashiering I'm used to doing...this is really investing myself in the lives of people who have been hurt. I'd be lying if I said that doesn't really intimidate me, but to be honest, I think it's time I grow up. I say I want a "better world," and that I want to "share the love of Christ," but playing it safe isn't going to help any of that to happen.

embracing my inner 16-year-old

So lately I have noticed that I have been getting (perhaps in response to a total lack of real candidates in my life?) silly little middle school crushes all over the place these days. And by all over the place I mean three, but three at once is two more at once than ever before, and three more than most times (did you get all that?) No, no identities will be given, since you don't know them anyway -- heck, I don't even know two of them (and never will...trust me. Thus, silly girl.)

Anyway, me and my analytical self have coped with feeling like I've reverted back to the typical girlhood I never actually had by realizing there are valuable lessons to be learned...at least in terms of recognizing what is attractive to me in guys. Well, recognizing isn't perhaps the best word, as I pretty much already knew. Better "reinforcing," maybe--reinforcing the fact that there are some things that attract me no matter how much I wish they didn't, or how glad I am they do.

Basically, and here comes the personal ad, I'm attracted most intensely to men* who are genuinely seeking to thrive in a relationship with Christ above all else. That relationship is the most important thing to me personally, so it follows. That's one of the attractions I'm grateful for, along with: guys who proactively honor and respect women, are patient, have an easygoing and good-natured sense of humor (though the more ironic and witty the better), get along well with all kinds of people, love the outdoors...and that's as far as my brain goes for now..

The rest fall in both the "I'm glad" and "I wish they didn't" categories, because haven't you noticed that what attracts you most in a person so often tends to become expressed in a manner that actually drives you away? Yes: guys who have an artistic spirit (especially in music and/or poetic and prosaic writing...kindred spirit, you know), are self-assured and confident, are slightly smarter than me in some ways, haven't had a perfect life, have strong convictions, are socially conscious, mentally flexible, introspective...and bigger than me (yes, it somehow doesn't seem to happen much and so I sometimes regret that one :P).

So if you meet all of these, you can call me at (919) 60--just kidding.


*(I'm TRYING to learn to say men instead of guys....it's not easy....not to be mean, but it's difficult for me to consider any male under the age of 30 as a "man"...probably because it's difficult for me to consider any female under the age of 30 as a "woman")

Lo Perdido

So I've been exploring and experiencing the concept of loss for a while, both theoretically and practically. One thing I've learned is it's all about perspective - for example, I felt the truly panicky impact of impending financial loss when I impacted the side of my brother's truck into the drive-thru menu at Burger King this weekend. But as I suddenly remember that my cousin would have turned 25 today were it not for the drunk driver who caused her life to end four and a half months ago, I am recalled to a much more profound sense of loss. And even that is more far-reaching than I can imagine, from her fiancee who is trying to pull his life back together to the drunk driver's young child whose mother sits in jail awaiting trial.

Not that I think I should always consider the fact that "it could be worse" -- "it will get better" is a much more rosy approach -- but I'll admit, that's often one way of how I get through things.

Loss is a part of life -- it just happens. How do we deal with it? The answer to that is, naturally, incredibly telling of the person we are at our very core.

And the ruminations will continue next time...

me pregunto...

So I wonder how a person goes about getting a little numb, mainly as it seems that's what I've gone and done. Not totally numb, mind you, but just enough to notice. Just enough to notice that there's nothing really driving me right now except the fact that I have a new job and am soon to have a new place in a (sort-of) new city. And God knows I never wanted anything like that to be "what drives me." And I know I won't stay in that place...but still, it makes me wonder what it's gonna take to leave it.

a word is dead?...

So, back in the days when I felt compelled to spill my guts onto the internet, I longed for the day when I would be too busy with life to be bothered with it.


Now that day has come, I'm not so sure how I feel about it.


I haven't written a blog post, a poem, an article, nothing - in SOO long..
I haven't done any non-wedding-related music in even longer...
I haven't painted anything in about half as long.


I don't know how much more I can bear a schedule that stifles the creative urges....Either something's gotta change, or I'm going to have to resort to caffeine pills and not sleeping. Simple as that.

i'm done, apparently

I just forgot how old I was. Literally -- I just had a moment when knowledge of my age was necessary, and I experienced a few seconds of "twenty-two or twenty-three? twenty-two or twenty-three?"

I thought that wasn't supposed to happen for many, many more years to come.

ON SINGLENESS yeah that's right.

[sparked by that question every woman loves to hear from her mother, "Why don't you have a boyfriend?" Gotta love it.]

In college, dating was by no means something I was disinterested in, but neither was it much of a priority (if you knew me then, I know you're just shocked). I always wondered why I didn't get all crazy and weepy about my lack of a love life, because it seemed like most girls who likewise didn't have one were at least pining for one, but I didn't exactly feel that way. Which was fine with me.

Come graduation, though, that story sure did change - suddenly my friends were getting married, and I wanted to, too! For the first time in my life, I was *not* okay with being alone. I wanted somebody to "share my experiences with" (okay, so part of my motive was honestly just to have someone to cushion the impending blow of the Real World)...plus "everyone" I knew was getting married, and it was contagious. I like weddings...but eventually, after five or six in a year....you start...to..get a little....antsy..

Now a year out, I'm tumbling around somewhere in the middle. Yeah, I'd love to be married four or five years from now, which means dating someone important...like..soon, but I'll admit, I really like being single right now...maybe too much. I don't know. Between work and, well, more work, I feel like I barely have enough time for myself as it is, and the idea of fitting someone else into my life-space doesn't even seem conceivable. And lets face it, boys make girls crazy and I like my crazy at the manageable level it's currently at, thank you. Plus, if ever there was a committment-phobe, I Am She. As in, I have a hard time committing to even just being nice to a guy, much less anything more....stop laughing and nodding, Michelle. Plus...I know everyone has neuroses, but I'm particularly afraid of mine, and am still trying to find a balance between working them out and understanding that I never completely will.

That said, I know about God's timing and all that (so now you can forget that comment you were going to leave), and it just happens that I've never once thought of myself as being one of the rare "called to lifelong singleness" ones - I pretty much know I'm going to be married. It's just a matter of when. 27, 30 or 37? My mid-fifties, never-married aunt looks to be nearing Marriage Land, which is so great! But I really don't want to wait that long.

When my mom popped the question, I gave her a flippantly exhasperated "I don't know, Mom," then backed up with my standard, "because my church and neighborhood consist of college students, at work there are only women and gay men, and basically all my guy friends are married or almost so." Which, of course, paints a picture of it having nothing to do with me or my own choices...which is not the real case. I've played a big role in my current status, for better or for worse.

Funny, I don't really know how to end this. Which is appropriate, I guess.