Sunday, April 30, 2006

Survey says...



I'm sitting in the library asking some students to fill out a survey that I have generated. It's a beast; it's about 14 in depth questions about your college experience. It seems like I would be getting less glares if I had picked a better time of the semester to finish the survey, but... I have procrastinated like the rest of these people /cringe

I see so many girls walking around with that same stupid pressed-straight hair, big sun glasses, and carrying smoothies or some sort of ground iced latte. This is what they all look like. It's amazing how similar everyone looks once the sun comes out. Even me, I won't lie.

This is a very pointless post; honestly, I'm just wasting time until some other people get done with the survey that I gave them.

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Linguistics


So I'm switching my major to Syntax because I believe in it. I have many aspirations for what this may become, but mostly it has been vindicated time and again by my peers and my professor. I am excited for the change.

Saturday, April 15, 2006

The weight of His lessons


Most people who know me, know that I hate the wind. So having it blow all around me last night as I was taping a bag over the gaping hole that used to be my passenger side window was an experience characterized by "putting salt in an open wound." The bag was flapping all over the place tugging at the tape and threatening to tear away from my car, while my hands were freezing from the wind, and my neck was being assaulted by the freezing drops of rain racing hither and thither because of the stupid wind.
Someone broke into my car and took my school bag because maybe they thought there was money in there. Nope, no money, only my school bags and my tax information I forgot to mail that morning. So some scoundrel has my social security number and my account number.
Ever since I started following Jesus, life has been the hardest thing I have ever had to deal with. I hate my life, and I don't think it should be that way.
The weight of the lessons Jesus has been trying to teach me over the last few years are absolutely crushing me. Last night, I was so frustrated I told him to leave me alone. I can't take it anymore. I need time to put myself back together again.
I hate this. If it's not one thing, it's the other.

Connections of '05 was one year ago today. There was where I got the image of the gospel and how it was for everyone. I wanted to follow Jesus, and I made up my mind that he and his message was worth my time and effort.I get back to Reno and within one week get some message from the ER in Reno telling me that I owe them 300 dollars from my visit to get my UTI taken care of. Not to mention, I was going to be kicked out of the dorms in three weeks, so I had to get a job to pay for living somewhere.
I start working security. I am placed at the most dangerous property my firm was contracted by, and it was my first day on the job. So while all that was happening, I'm still trying to finish that semester, move out of the dorms, move into some place else, make it to my other job, and make it to security for full time overnights.
I finally finish that mess and so begins the worst summer of my life... I'm working two jobs, and never seeing anyone. My friday nights are spent alone recooperating. I am depressed and exhausted and most days I am okay because I think that I will be able to quit security when school starts and I'll be able to use all this money I have saved up. Not quite. At the end of the summer, 5 weeks before I step into my role as a Bible Study leader, I get into a car accident and all the money I had saved up is all put towards buying a new car. My parents say that they can help with half of the car payments, but then my brother gets into two car accidents two weeks within each other and so all the money goes to insurance. I, as I have always been forced, must take care of this alone. So the school year starts with me still working two jobs to pay for my car and my apartment. My classes are hard, but are made worse by my terrible schedule: 18 hour days, 17 hour days, 21 hour days of constant motion. I swear I aged two years in the last six months. Throughout this time I feel like God is putting me through the fire for some reason. Many times the dam breaks and I yell and scream at him wondering why he is making this so hard. Then there was the girl... Once again, God destroyed what I thought was the truth. I got my hopes up and was let down (and cold and alone) again. The semester ends, and I come away with all A's and one B+ (kind of insulting actually), and one of my good friends became a Christian through a mini Bible Study I was doing with him on the side. That was all pretty cool. This semster starts with me losing my Millenium Scholarship because of a messed up grade that read F instead of my well-deserved A. I have no money and have to deal with the sting of an F after all that time and effort. I felt like none of it payed off at all, so now what little morale that I had has been taken away from me and I am now miserable (and poor) again; and I am doing it all on my own (without feeling like anyone gives a damn) again. When it looks like I will finally get my scholarship money back and get back on my feet, I find out that all the time I had been waiting was for nothing because somewhere along the line my change of grade form had been lost. About this time, I found out that I won't be getting any money from my taxes, rather will have to be paying 200 dollars instead. This is, of course, more than I can handle and I am pretty much sick of God at this point. All this time, I am running on nothing, not momentum or adrenaline, my emotions, my spirit and everything else has been completely destroyed because of the last six months -- I had been going without any rest, but still holding onto hope. Getting a simple homework assignment done is impossible and loving God and what He has done is damn near impossible because I can't seem to see past any of what he has brought into my life -- suffering. I remain faithful to my Bible Study leader commitments even though it feels like I'm just going through the motions and I go to Connections. I'm not sure what I hope to learn there, but I know that something should happen because it's such an amazing place and the Holy Spirit loves it there. While I am on the island, my Scholarship money finally gets through and I am able to get back on my feet financially; however, spiritually Connections did not put my back on my feet, it made things worse for me, and I leave knowing that I need to drop out of leadership becase I can't lead anyone with the way God and I are interacting. Connections reveals to me once again just how many problems I have trusting God because of the way I see him. I get back to UNR, and the situation is only worse spiritually for me. I still cannot seem to find God, and I still cannot seem to accomplish anything worth remembering or saving academically. This weekend rolls around and my car gets broken into. My bag is stolen and with it all of my tax info that I had spent time preparing. This is pretty much the last straw at this point. I can't take anymore of this and still feel like God loves me. Why is it the first time I step out in faith, the ground beneath me crumbles and I left with broken legs, but still forced to walk, and wonder, "Is this even worth it? What about all the joy I'm supposed to get? Where's that?"

I'm ticked off at God right now. I start trying to serve him, and all of this happens. It begs the "question" -- Why am I doing this? Am I paying for something I am not aware of? What am I not getting? Am I just being winey, or does all of this suck enough to merit my asking, "Why the fuck is all of this bad stuff happening to me?"

Is this the end of something? I have been praying and holding onto the hope that Jesus is better than all of this. This has been the worst year of my life, and it hasn't been because of things that I did, it's been because of where God has taken me.

He has broken my heart.

I can't deal with anything else. I've been praying the whole time I've been writing this. I've wept and told God that he lied to me and that he hasn't protected me. This goes deeper than the crap that has happened to me this year. I'm also thinking about all the unhappiness that has come from my childhood as well. I find myself wondering why God did all of this to me? My childhood up to this point... somewhere in there I got serious about following Jesus and became a Christian, but then as soon as I act out on that everything goes wrong...



why?