Intellectual Vanity

Often when I read mindless entertainment like The Devil Wears Prada, I find myself folding the cover back when in public. I do not do this with titles like Les Miserables or The Corrections.

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Clean House

Whenever I clean a room, a small part of me believes that I've really done it this time, that the room will stay in a perpetual state of clean.

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Dream Lives

I always love when I show up in someone else's dreams. It makes me feel like I'm secretly living extra lives.

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2 Stories Worth Telling

WORDS OF WISDOM, PERSISTENCE.

A friend of Pete's and mine, Dominick, is a helicopter pilot looking for a job, which as you may imagine is difficult in Grand Rapids. A few months back he was driving home and he sensed very clearly from God that he was supposed to turn left on an upcoming street. He turned left, and God pointed out a house that he had never seen before. He heard God tell him to knock on the door, so he knocked on the door. No one was home and Dominick left.

A couple months later, Dominick felt very strongly that he was supposed to go back to the house. This time the man was home, though he was thoroughly confused as to why a young man with a Swiss-German accent was at his doorstep. The owner of the house turned out to be a Christian who believes that God can speak to people like Dominick. He also happens to work for Air Med in Grand Rapids. They had an awkward conversation, and they said goodbye.

After the man shut the door, Dominick knew that something wasn't complete. He asked God, Was that it? And God said, That wasn't it. So Dominick knocked on the door for the third time. This time, the man gave Dominick a number of a contact person, but warned that the company hadn't hired a new pilot in the 15 years that he had worked there. Dominick called the contact person and learned Air Med was officially looking for a new helicopter pilot. His application is in process.

AGAINST THE ODDS?

Some friends of ours are praying for a second child. They were told the first time around that they would not be able conceive naturally, but God blessed them with their beautiful son.

They have been praying and considering In Vitro this time around, and have felt peace through every step of the medical process. At an appointment last week, the doctor reiterated that their chances of conceiving naturally were slim to absolutely none.

"Like I tell everyone in your situation," he said, "I have only heard of one couple who concieved naturally with this particular condition." He rummaged through some files in the back, and returned with wide eyes. "And you were that couple."

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Why would God tell Dominick to knock on the door of an empty house?

And which is further against the odds? Their chances of conceiving a baby? Or: the doctor relaying an impossible statistic, unknowingly, to the one couple who had experienced the impossible.

Vacation

It is important to be hard-working and productive, but I have profound admiration for people who take vacationing seriously. Because it is a serious matter. Vacation requires an entire rearranging of your scheduled life; you must cancel weekly appointments, create special outgoing voice mails, and otherwise arrange for your absence. Vacation requires an understanding that everything can and will go on without you, the way it will when you die. As I said, vacation is a serious matter.

My husband's parents are vacationing role models. When Doug (my father-in-law) was going through graduate school, him and Kathy lived in a double-wide trailer and spent their college loan money on travels. My husband has no early childhood memories of video games (they didn't own a system), but he has seen every state minus Alaska and Washington. He also has been to Disney World 21 times in his 24 years (which, yes, I agree is excessive).

The best thing about spending your time and money on vacations, I think, is this: unlike material things that break or burn or get phased out, you will hardly ever regret a vacation. Even the terrible ones where you get into fights and break your ankle just turn into funny stories. So even though it's more difficult to plan a vacation than buy a new entertainment system, the memories never become out of style, and their value only increases as life moves on and seasons change.

I call that investment, not spending.

Heaven and Birthdays

For my 8th birthday I had a tea party. By noon on December 14, the table was set with a white table cloth, flowers, a platter of pink cupcakes and my mom's eclectic china set. I looked at the beautiful spread, admired my floral dress in the mirror, and threw up on the kitchen floor out of sheer excitement.

I've cooled down a little since then, but I still anticipate things pretty intently, and I enjoy doing so.

Which is why I hate surprises. At least, the kind of surprises when I know something is coming but can't know what it is. It's juvenile, it's silly, but it's true. My husband wanted to surprise me with our honeymoon location, but there was no way I could have let that happen. I annoyed him to a breaking point and never regretted it. We poured over travel books and I bought about a dozen bikinis that I haven't worn since.

I think this is why it's hard for me to anticipate heaven. Heaven is like God saying, "Listen, I'm planning our honeymoon. That's all I'm telling you. Nope - no pictures. Nope - no travel books. I'm not even going to tell you if it's tropical."

He probably figures that if I knew, I would throw up all over the kitchen.

StatCounter

I am so thankful that Sarah Barlow convinced me to get StatCounter, because otherwise I would never have known that people have accessed my site after searching the following phrases on Google:

Living like Anne Shirley

1 Month of Starvation

(and:)

I'm pooping out water whats wrong with me

(Don't worry person who is pooping out water! I can't tell who you are, so you have nothing to be embarrassed about. And I'm sorry that my blog didn't have any information about what is wrong with you; I suggest you eat more fiber and see a doctor.)