Q6: 4&7i

I'll just call them 4 and 7, because that's how old they are.

And taking care of them is going to be my source of textbook, study abroad, and food that isn't caf food money.

So, today, while I'm peeling the muddy shirt off of 4, and he's talking to me, "You know, you're stupid. You are really, really stupid. You're stupid. You're stupid. You're stupid."

I'm like, inside my head, "Textbooks. Study abroad. Food that isn't caf food."

And I'm terrified that 4 and 7 are going to tell their dad, "She's the worst ever we hate her we never want her back."

And I'm like, "4, get inside the house. Now. Take a shower, and then we're going to the park."

And he looks at me. 10 yards between us. He takes a deep breath.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO."

Somehow, 4 gets inside the house. He's taking a shower. Good, I can rinse off their muddy clothes with the hose. And I hear screaming.

So I run inside, to find 4 in the shower, "RAIN, RAIN, GO A-WAY, COME A-GAIN A-NOTHER DAAAAAY."

And then we went to the park.

Oh, we went to the park.

On bikes.

Across a busy street.

4: "NO. My dad says that I do NOT have to wear a helmet on short rides."

Me, after a short and fruitless struggle: (Carries helmet while holding onto bike for dear child's life and hopes that the people in the cars aren't judging too harshly)

But you know what? After we spent about 12 minutes at the park, and I taught 4 some of the rules for tic-tac-toe, and it started almost raining,

4 LET ME PUT HIS HELMET ON HIM FOR THE RIDE HOME.

I'm putting this one down in the books as a VICTORY, folks.

Q5: If my life was like a waterpark...

There would be

1. more nakedness
2. more hair forgiveness
3. more patience
4. less texting
5. more tattoo reading
6. worse inner ear equilibrium
7. more screaming
8. more diverse community
9. more sunburn
10. less sitting

Q4: Confetti

I was walking through the parking lot in front of Panera Bread. A small silver car slid into the front row spot that a woman in a black car had been waiting for.

The woman in the black car honked. Well, she put the full force of her body onto her horn for about 7 seconds. She drove directly behind the silver car, parked, got out, and walked over to the window of the silver car.

"I HAD BEEN WAITING FOR THAT SPOT FOR FIVE MINUTES..."

I gave them a wide berth. You just don't interfere with sacred moments like those.

The woman retreated to her car. She reversed. The silver car backed out and drove away. The woman in the black car claimed her spot.

So I can stand in the Panera line and judge her.

Or realize that I am her. And, given the proper life circumstances and mood, I would have done the same thing.

Or I can judge her.

Or both.

Because grace is like confetti and it gets on everybody. If you're the woman in the black car, the silver car, or the woman looking on.

Q3: Great Expectations

My problems is that my expectations are too high.

We're going to the grocery store? Good, because I've always needed to bump into my future husband while selecting the right avocados...

I'm saving my journals. Good thing, too, because after I'm dead and famous, posterity will really appreciate my thoughts as an adolescent. And as a third grader. Maybe it's all secretly brilliant.

I'm still looking for a summer job? Fortunately, the right one will fall into my lap, and I'll love every second of it. It's going to pave the way to my perfect career. Also, I'll probably meet my future husband.

That is, if things with avocado guy don't work out...

I miss out on things that are good because I want them to be the best.

Maybe good is the best. Which doesn't mean I need to settle. But camping out in the real world for a few months wouldn't be such a bad thing.

There's this great part in 500 Days of Summer. The scene is a party, and the screen is split into two sections: one headed "expectations" and the other "reality."

Rewind to May 4.

Expectations: I walk into the Rockrimmon Public Library and ask about open positions. There's an opening, and I'm offered the job on the spot. I spend my summer shelving books, forging relationships with misunderstood preteens, and organizing things like "Teen Read Week." It looks great on my resume. I'm a cornerstone of the little community, and I'm wildly humble. My motley crew of friends - the old men who come in early to read newspapers, the lady who reserves the whole kitchen sink to her designated section of the holds shelf, the twihards, the stuffy librarians, and the many, many moms - are all sad to see me go on August 16.

Reality: I've spent two weeks sick, lazy, and jobless. My family is good, but we're nothing to brag about in the fall. I've watched lots of television. A couple adventures are thrown in there, but it is all somewhat forgettable.

But this is good. No, it's not what I planned, and I feel some sort of loss. Not about the library. Just about being awesome. Being important. Mattering.

Qlog the Second

A Snapshot: 

It was Kari's idea. 

"I've always wanted to go on a pedestrian bridge! You know, one of the ones over the highway in Denver? Can we please?" 

So, we parked illegally and hiked up the stairs. There were four of us, and we were the only ones on the bridge. Somewhere along the way, we all started skipping. Over eight lanes of traffic and an office park. We skipped right up to the doors on the other side, racing to touch them first. Then, winded, we headed back. The world passed under us and we walked in our own direction. 

A Soundbite:

"My big heresy is that I believe that there will be more people in heaven than we ever imagined possible. Because God is that gracious and that good." - Raleigh Gresham, Sunday morning, 5/19

Qlog 1: Summer

I wanted a quiet summer.

After a busy semester, I justified it. A quiet summer. That's exactly what I need. I'm not going to get another summer like this, so...

I just didn't plan anything.

Last Monday, I was settled on the couch with Netflix and a couple library books when panic set in.

I have nothing to do... I have NOTHING to do... nothing to DO...

What am I going to DO???

I applied to be a teacher's aid for summer schools, and a book shelver at the library, and a tutor at this local math center, and a "College Nannies and Tutors" nanny...

Nothing.

I may have to swallow all my pride and check out the Chick-fil-A applications...

I'm going to blog about summer again. Last summer, it was the Clog (Camp Log)... right now, it'll just be the "Log."

OOOh. The "Qlog"... because it's all about how things were going to be "quiet."

And if I SAY they'll be "quiet," they won't be, and I'll have something to do!

Three cheers for trying to jinx my life through the internet...

Anyway...

I will not be shaken

We had family friends over for thanksgiving. The dad of this family is kind of like our church's philosopher in residence, and he has a wife and four kids. My mom and and his wife are in a prayer group with a few other women from the church. Her name is Mary Ellen.

Two of Mary Ellen's four kids weren't home for thanksgiving. One of the absentees lives in Oregon and works at his uncle's organic farm, and the other lives in a commune in New Mexico with her boyfriend. She comes home sporadically, but she never stays for long. She's a year younger than me.

Mary Ellen and I were getting things ready in the kitchen when she saw a verse that my mom wrote on a piece of scrap paper and taped on the fridge.

"I love that verse!" she said. "I think of it like this - I will not be shaay-ay-ay-ay-ken!" she sings while performing a toned-down version of a shimmy.

Later that day, as in, after I went to bed and was reading The Hunger Games, the power went out. I sat there in the dark, terrified. Someone had cut the power. Someone who wanted to kill me and my family, but mostly me. Soon, I would sense his presence in the corner of my room. He would be brandishing a machete, rusty and already stained with the blood of my mother or one of my brothers.

I started to pray. And then I stopped myself. I couldn't do that! It wasn't going to work - I hadn't done enough for it to work. I sat, curled and tense, on my bed. And then I called my mom.

She sounded almost asleep, but she told me she would come down to the basement with a flashlight. She would come downstairs to give a source of light to her twenty-year-old daughter. This daughter had told her that day that sleeping in the basement was never scary. Well, everybody lies, right?

The power came back on an hour later. I promptly turned off my lamp and went to sleep. This morning, I thought about my prayer. And how I think prayer works only if you put enough oomph into it - it gains significance in the sight of God if you back it up with daily devotions, or good deeds, or healthy relationships or good grades or a good track record or an existence that 1. makes sense and 2. has some sort of net positive impact on the world.

I don't trust God to stay unless I do all the right things.

And I decide what those things are.

And my standards for myself are impossibly high.

And something inside me enjoys berating myself for my failures.

And so I think that God does, too.

Because, in the end, I want God to operate the way I think He operates. Because, in the very very end, I want to be Him.