Painted Lines on Pavement

So I know what the biggest idols are in my life. That doesn't mean I know how to avoid them, but I know what they are. Control, for one. I want to have a plan for every situation, and if something doesn't go the way I plan I have a really hard time dealing with it. Having a baby around for the past seven months has helped me recognize the ridiculousness of thinking I can control everything. Good thing I have a loving, gracious and forgiving God when I try on my own anyway.

Another idol of mine, I would say probably my biggest one, is the constant need for approval from others. I can't stand the thought that someone might not like me, or even that someone might be annoyed or simply inconvenienced by me. This makes being the manager of an apartment complex occupied by married college students rather difficult at times. It's fun giving a young couple the keys to their first home together, but I'm also the one who has to relay the university's policies concerning the apartments. No you can't have a dog. No you can't have a cat. No we don't have free internet. No we don't have laundry facilities. No we don't provide furniture (many new tenants assume the apartments are just like the dorms from their single days. Sorry folks, you got married. Welcome to life).

Anyway, this past week I had to deal with being the "bad guy" concerning the repainting of the lines in the apartment parking lot. The person hired by the university to do this first said he would be here last Sunday at noon (doesn't keep regular business hours I guess). I sent out two emails to tenants to have them move their cars out of the spaces, but hardly anyone read it or remembered or something, because I saw the guy drive through and leave without painting because there were too many cars in the way. Then he was supposed to come back Monday or Tuesday. We got most everyone out of the spaces and parked along the road, quite a distance from the apartments. Dude didn't show. Then he planned on Wednesday "after 3:30" - didn't show all night. Finally, Thursday morning at 7 a.m. he shows up. Takes maybe half an hour to do the whole lot. I was ticked - partly because I felt he was unprofessional (though I have no idea how much weather played into the times he didn't do it), but mostly because I thought it made ME look bad in front of my tenants. I sent out emails and made phone calls over and over to get people to move their cars, and he kept NOT painting. I was embarrassed.

How insane is it that something as trivial as this would make me feel bad? I did what I was asked to do, it's not my fault the painting didn't get done. So MAYBE tenants might get slightly annoyed about the barrage of emails with no results. Why do I care? Because way too often I don't find my identity in Christ. Rather, I depend on what others think of me to find worth in myself. It's a constant struggle.

The Plan

Chuckling to myself as I accidentally typed the title of this as "The Plant". Imagining a lengthy monologue on the importance of houseplants to our existence. As I'm the staff member at Cedarville responsible for all of the indoor plants, that might not be a bad idea. Kidding.

Anyway, I've been very frustrated lately about not spending my time wisely. Yes, Eva keeps me busy, but now that she's napping for longer stretches at a time (yay), I think I need to rework stuff. I often use that time to eat breakfast or lunch or whatever and think that I'll just watch a little TV or check out Facebook while I eat. Before I know it, she's awake and I'm still sitting there even though I finished eating an hour and a half ago.

I know what I want to do - most importantly spend time in prayer and in the Word, with which I have always struggled, keep the apartment picked up, and freaking work on my senior paper so I can one day finally finish my last class at Cedarville. Oh yeah, and my job. Working from home is great but it's hard to be proactive when I basically make my own hours if I don't have anything urgent to do.

My plan is simple but I think it will be pretty difficult for me. Sunday isn't a great day for sabbath - don't get me wrong, I love being at The Oaks and always think it's worth it - but with the hour drive to get there, not being able to hear the sermon because I have to feed Eva, and usually getting groceries on the way home for the sake of convenience, it's not very restful. So I'd like to take some time on Mondays to relax a bit and refocus. I also want to get any TV or whatever out of my system that day, and not turn it on during the day for the rest of the week. I think this will be especially tough knowing that I can stream movies or, even more dangerous, entire TV series on Netflix.

So with removing TV as an option, when Eva's either asleep or playing by herself, I want to focus on Scripture and prayer first, followed by any work I have to do for my job, and then housework and writing my paper. It sounds easy when I type it out, so why have I been having epic fail in all of these areas? I think in some ways I feel like I can't be perfect in everything, so why even bother? I was really encouraged by Jackie's thoughts on self-discipline; it was kind of a motivator. I like how she mentioned too that self-discipline needed to happen in every area of her life, including food. Definitely for me too - I think food could be a whole other post as this is already too long.

I'm New Here

Hi, it's me. Created a blog thingy, thanks for looking. I didn't start this to write as much as to follow other blogs, mostly to keep up with Oaks folks I don't get to hang out with very often due to the fact that we live an hour away from the church. Hopefully one day that will be remedied. I also don't necessarily need to write a blog as something else to do; having a five month old, plus working at home keeps me pretty busy.

I am also still one class away from finishing my undergrad degree at Cedarville, and I really need to write the 25 page senior paper before I start the class, because by then it will be too late and I won't have enough time to get everything done while I'm taking it. I can take it this fall or next spring, and at the moment I'm leaning toward spring because I haven't even started research on the book I'm writing about (Marilynne Robinson's Gilead). Please feel free to keep me accountable and ask how the research is going.

The title "The Soul in Paraphrase" comes from Renaissance poet George Herbert's "Prayer". It's used as a metaphor for, you guessed it...prayer. I've always thought it was a cool image. Here's the whole poem:

PRAYER the Churches banquet, Angels age,
Gods breath in man returning to his birth,
The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
The Christian plummet sounding heav’n and earth ;

Engine against th’ Almightie, sinner's towre,
Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,
The six daies world-transposing in an houre,
A kinde of tune, which all things heare and fear ;

Softnesse, and peace, and joy, and love, and blisse,
Exalted Manna, gladnesse of the best,
Heaven in ordinarie, man well drest,
The milkie way, the bird of Paradise,

Church-bels beyond the stars heard, the souls bloud,
The land of spices, something understood.


Hope everyone has a good weekend! We're looking forward to my parents and sister coming to visit tomorrow. Any excuse for them to see the grandchild. :)