Moving in...

... just a chemical passing through my head.

Very minor dust storm last night. Been windy the past couple days. Of course, it seems that for here, windy means the leaves rustle a bit, so the fact that there are actually dust storms seems improbable to me often, but they do happen.

The drama stuff is going ok, I guess. I don't think the kids have enough care, I think our venues make it tough to put on a really good show with the other constraints we have, and I personally don't like to put effort into something that is... I guess just not what I wish it would be. Then again, speaking of my efforts...

Is it real, unless it's to the end? What is the end, and is this going to stay until then? I can't count high enough to tally all of my mistakes, and still it seems that I am here. Seems like all I have to get over to you is this rusty tin can and a thin kite string. Everything moves in slow motion, and two tiny seas envelop me. I can't ask, so home just keeps calling until I might hoist the sails.

How's your life? If you haven't e-mailed me for a while, this is a perfect time to let me know how your life is!

I never can tell if it's black or clear.

If you figure out what the title is talking about, I might get hit.

Today, I faced more frustrations with living here. I faced more frustrations with being glue. I faced more frustrations with a new problem, that I think my early-on-set arthritis is really starting to kick in. I've been just sore the last two days. I didn't work out last night, and I think I'm going to skip it tonight too.

Sometimes, I wonder why I'm even here at all. But then I know that someday soon I'll manage to do something right for once. Do you ever feel like the things that you empty yourself into don't pay you back? It seems to me here that the days when I feel most like that, I don't get paid back by those things. I get paid back by something else.

For example... I came back to my office after supper tonight because I didn't get a lot of my real job done today because I was running around trying manage/make happen some stuff for our school drama play that is happening at the end of this week, and then I subbed for the on-vacation computer teacher, and during my free times from both of those things, I had all these 'this needs fixed now' requests. So when I came back, I tried to do some things and found out our internet wasn't working. I did some investigation, and determined that it was the router in the science teacher's house that wasn't working. Went down there to work on it, and after fixing it, they invited me to come back to their house for grilled cheese. They have three kids, and when they asked the kids if it was OK if I came and had grilled cheese with them, the kids all cheered. See, you get paid back, just by different things then took from you.

So, I need to head down and have some grilled cheese. I just wanted to leave you with the reminder that the things that you pour out aren't the things that fill you back up sometimes.

Stuck watching

Well, readers, this blog my be scantily updated in the next week, or it may have lots of posts as I vent. My 'dealing-with-people' module hasn't been working very well recently, for a lot of different reasons. And next week, I'm really going to be working it overtime, as I sub for our computer teacher about half the week, and am the tech guy for the drama club plays, which are off campus at two different locations. It's going to be a long week, and so I don't know if when I come home I'm going to not want to deal with people at all and so I'll blog, or if I'll be so done with dealing with people I won't even blog. The principal, who I say across from at our staff night out tonight, offered to find me a sub for my subbing for a day or two. I probably should take her up on it. One of my friends encouraged me to do it. We'll see how tomorrow goes.

In meeting today, the talk was about the four friends of the man who lost everything and gained it back. The first three all use different aspects of knowledge to criticize their friend at first. The fourth is more controversial, with some people saying he gives good advice, others saying no. A lot to think about, but one thing he talked about struck me. We as humans are kind of like a bottle of water with a layer of settled dirt at the bottom. When the dirt settles, the water looks clean. Shake up the bottle, disturb the dirt, and the water gets cloudy and yucky looking pretty fast. That's us. We can look pure, but the dirt is there. When we get shaken, the dirt shows up. Which do we complain about more, the shaking or our dirt? I'm hoping I can see my dirt in truth soon enough.

The world's doing pretty much OK without me doing anything of any consequence. The Prime Mover wants me to do something of much consequence. Maybe I'll see part of that something this week when I'm tired, stressed, and I don't have anything left to give. Often, I have no idea where my head is at, but I'm sorry for it. Hope you can forgive me for the times that I made mistakes or did things that hurt.

Then You gave

So, I've been working for an hour and a half on a weekend. I should work more, because next week I have to sub for our computer teacher, and be the sound guy/tech head for the two plays our drama club is producing in two different locations on two different nights. But I really don't want to work more. Fact of the matter is, I just want to go back to my room and play my friend's borrowed XBox360 for the rest of the day. I used to do that all the time, play video games. When I do it now, it seems so empty. When I do a lot of things now, they seem empty. I don't know if I just need to wake up, or if there really is something there that I need to find and grab a hold of.

Maybe this is just the regular stresses of a place like this. Maybe it's because I don't really feel like I have a good outlet with any of the people here. Maybe it's because I just refuse to grab hold of real peace. Maybe it's because I just want things to change. Maybe it's the weather. Maybe it's something deeper.

This seems to be the thing that I can't see right now - the long term. I'll get my contract for next year pretty soon, and while I'm confident I'll actually sign it, at times recently, I've thought about not signing it. I know I'm supposed to, but I guess I have more in common with the son of Amittai than I should. Consequences to decisions are less severe than I thought they were, but still, that doesn't mean that I like them. I guess when I get tired of running, the words will come back to my ears, like the prodigal. Doors close, and wanting them to re-open may be human, but that doesn't mean they should reopen, if you can read between the lines and figure that all out.

I just got our calendar for the rest of the school year - almost two months. It seems full as all get out. Yet I know that parts of it will fly by and then I'll wonder where the time went.

I've managed to source myself for some goodies, maybe. We'll see if this happens.

Maybe today is the day where I do something right for once. Maybe not. Either way, I'm useless and more than useless at the same time. How's that for uniformity?

Enough to wake me up and feel it.

Frustrating day. Lots of random, immediate projects that had to get done. Opted not to go to the movie night for singles from meeting. Played video games all night instead. Didn't get all my work done. Trying to figure out things. This week the trend is that I'm struggling to do that, it seems. Way back then it seemed to be easier. Maybe I didn't just see as much then.

Digital Carolingian Dynasties

I was talking, this weekend, to my roommate from last semester, who works for another organization here. He's kind of like me in that neither of us perform jobs that are directly related to the organization's focus, but yet our jobs are necessary for the continued operation of our respective organizations. One thing we decided after we both had taken calls that weren't exactly related to our jobs while we were hanging out is that we're glue, mortar, whatever you want to call it. We do the things that hold the rest of the organization together, you may not notice us because the things we hold together are a lot more attention gathering than we are, but we keep everything running, each in our own ways.

Part of being glue also means that you get to be 'everywhere' all at once. And you get opportunities to do things that other people might not. For example, I got to do some stuff this morning that virtually no one else did, and I got to take pictures to share with you.

Much of the rest of my life seems to be happening like it always has. Work projects keep piling up, and I don't work as much as I perhaps should. I have time to goof off, time that I should probably be investing in other things like work.

The things we leave behind are the things we never really forget, I guess. Vectors and plot points. The things we couldn't forget are the things that probably don't matter in the end. Holes are right where they should be, and the plug that stops the hemorrhaging is the same one that we left behind. Fire in your eyes just makes you blind pretty fast, I think. Some of us flame out quick and bright, others of us glow steadily for a long time. I wonder which I am.

Because the sun stands still.

It is finished.

We had a meeting at sunrise today, then an egg hunt for some of the kids.

He is good.

I could tell you stories for days, but the end of the matter is that not all I could say would ever fill all the books in the world, nor tell of the fullness.

Ransomed.

Forward Motion

We played basketball for three hours yesterday, because they put the surface back on the court (we take the plastic surface off for the winter so it doesn't get destroyed. There were six of us that played, and we had a good time. I'm still not very good, but that's OK.

We're on day 2 right now of a 4 day weekend. Sometimes, I really don't like these breaks, because it feels like I need to be doing something. So I worked a little yesterday, I'm going to work Saturday, and not go to my office today or Sunday. I figure that's OK. If it isn't, oh well.

It's funny that I am here. It's funny that I have a reason to be here. It's the times that I never thought would come in my life, and yet it's here. It's neat that the little things are the big things, and the big things are more real than they ever were before. Weakness in this world is more to be desired than all the glittering, shiny baubles that I wish I had. I find the strength for the day when I realize I am useless on my own.

A place that has always been there.

Don't hear and then forget.

I'm still struggling to stay positive and stable. I'm struggling not to get frustrated when our generator dies, and instead see the positive that I got to go out in the middle of the day and play basketball with two classes because they couldn't work in the lab. I'm struggling not to get frustrated when I do some fancy footwork to get things working, then people don't use them. I'm struggling not to get frustrated when I just get new and exciting things to do that I don't know how to do.

But then again, I find it easier to set aside my petty fear or lack of trust. I find it a little easier to choose to be joyful when I wake up. I find the little things that can make my day better. I find the happiness of doing one little thing that will make things better that no one will ever notice. I find the peace in sticking my headphones in and wearing myself out doing reps in the weight room, in my own little zone even there are other people around. I find the ability to let go of my irritation that people intrude on my alone-shooting-baskets-in-the-dark time.

So, you see, not everything is bad, not everything is good. I get emotional, I get the peace to not let it affect me. I get down, but I won't go away. I won't give up, I won't give in. It doesn't help, it never did.

Transformity, Comformity, Won't Back Down.

(If you're keeping track, this is post #2 today.)

It's odd how things happen sometime. Last night, I really wanted just hang and talk with a buddy of mine. It didn't work out because he had some other commitments, so I kind of bounced around campus, listening to music loud, worked out three times (yes, I am sore today.), and just Talked and processed a lot of different things. Maybe I got some stuff worked through, maybe not permanently but at least for now. I think the alone time was probably as good or better for me than hanging out time would have been.

So tonight, when I got to hang out with my buddy, it turned out that he needed to talk with me, or more accurately, I needed to be there to listen to him. This encourages me more than other encouragement that some people have tried to give me recently, which may seem strange, but it's true. See, I have this dualistic relationship with praise or recognition. I don't like it publicly or directly, but I do want and maybe to see it in other, quiet ways. It's kind of encouraging to know that even though I'm not always the most stable or positive person, I still can be there for someone else. Maybe the whole reason that I am here is to be that stable person for one or two people, one or two times.

Maybe there are other reasons. All I really know tonight is that I helped one person just by being here, one person that probably no one else around here could have helped. Right now, that's what I need. That's enough.

Up again

So, as I walk down the street to get my breakfast this morning, I walk by the guard supervisor (background - the guards have to be in uniform, the supervisor doesn't), and see he's wearing a polo shirt. Didn't exactly think tons of it at first. Then stopped, turned, looked, and he's wearing a polo shirt, with logo, from my dad's workplace in the States. That was weird. He said he bought it here.

Slept more last night. Working out three times helped, I think. Beating on the punching bag let me get some of the stress out, too. Life will soon be back to the normal that it never has been before, because the normal that was will never be back again. Normal is a moving target.

Time to see this - I've got One on my side who is better than those on the other side.

Logic and meetings and the abstraction of loud

Along.

I haven't really slept in the last week or so. I got to sleep at 11:00 or so last night and woke up at three. And had the silly English test this morning. That went fine, even after it sat at 20% downloaded for an hour or so, and then finished the last 80% in 20 minutes. I'm glad it's over. I'm thankful to my friends for caring, including my pal who texted me and said he had been Remembering it.

I need to do something different with the different things that need something. My hand is shaking because after the staff meeting today, I went and beat on the punching bag for a while. Then maxed out on the lifts. I'm probably going to go back and work out again, in hopes that I'll be able to tire myself out enough to sleep.

I hate times like this, because I start to get emotional about a lot of silly things, and then I just start going up and down emotionally, and I start doing dumb things. I should talk to people about stuff, probably, but everyone here deals with so much, I can't be much help to them when I all do is unload my own problems on them. So I just keep it inside, and hope to hide it from people as much as I can. And I just feel like people around here are picking on me. I'm probably just too sensitive, but they had this desperate need to watch the crummy promo video, then do other things to pick on me, then I just didn't care anymore and let them pick on me more. And they picked on me last night, just because they wanted to see me turn red. I just don't like interacting with people around here sometimes.

Don't want any of this to happen how it is. I need to break or be broken. I need to have the little bits I need to lose taken away, ripped off, polished off. Sometimes losing these bits hurts, and I think it's OK to complain about it. Or maybe it's not. Just not OK to forget why that had to go away.

Burn the pages of my own little diary. Walk away and find the newness.

Just a page in the book.

The road

A series of things that have happened in the last couple weeks make me wonder if I really am supposed to be here. I don't know where I would go if I left, but I don't know if I made the right decisions in staying here. I'm just unsure, confused, and lost.

I just want to go Home.

Nearly

It's 3/14. And you know what that means? It's PI day!

I really don't ever want to do this english test again.

Sometimes, I guess growth is realizing how far you have to fall, and how you can't pick yourself back up.

Strong enough to walk in place

Another week in the books. One more, then a four-day weekend. A couple weeks after that, and we have spring break.

One of my best friend's grandpa died yesterday. He was, and I guess still is, a good man. My friend observed that he had figured out that talking to people just to talk to them is as good of a way to spend his time as any. I need to learn a lot of that lesson. Remember the family, it's a tough time for all of them.

I agreed to do this silly English for foreign-language speakers test again on Saturday, so I really should go prep for that this morning while our internet is good. It's just that there is no power in my building, and it's easy to not get out of bed and shower when there's no power. Hah! I just made a rhyme. Go me.

Yesterday after school, I got to eat chocolate ice cream with a couple of my friends. We bought a case of it from the restaurant the other day, and then saved it for almost a whole week. I was afraid I was going to have to lock my freezer to keep it from getting raided. That was a good time. They kidnapped the one girl who wasn't in on it, and blindfolded her. Just silly fun.

Getting out of bed is the hardest thing sometime. So much to do today, so little motivation. So many other things I'd like to do than the work I need to do. Well, here we go.

Don't care where I'd been.

Content.

I watched as my brother took his share one day, left us. I stayed, kept my hand to the plow, never tempted by the road he took. One day, he came back. To joy and celebration that was never given to me.

And I saw that I'm not the grateful son, I'm the rich and spoiled one. So in my life, I could have been more faithful, more trusting, more humble. I could have and should have been more content with the things that I have been given.

Even though my brother left, my father never did. When my brother came back, my father took him and hugged him tight. Even though I left from my father's embrace, he never cared for me any less.

Content.

I awoke this morning to the chorus of mullahs, roosters, generators, and horns. It was early, so I lay awake thinking for a while. A friend of mine is going through some things these days, and he comes in and talks to me about them. I try to give him advice, but it's hard, because some of the things he is dealing with are the same things I struggle with. I wondered why he kept coming in to talk to me, when my advice was so porous and poor. He told me yesterday he thought that I was always happy, never struggled with things. I tried to disabuse him of that notion, but I also realized that one of the reasons we get struggles is so that people can see how we deal with them. So if I am content or joyful despite struggles, I show my Father just as much as I can by many words.

Content.

I don't always take a hold of it, I don't always want to be here. Some days, I want to go Home, for this journey to be done. Soon enough it will be. Until then, I will struggle to be content, I will struggle to be steady, I will struggle to be the renamed and touched Jacob.

Content.

Though Your heart is often rent
Because of my darkness and descent
And from Your presence I am absent
Still You will grant to me to be content

I'm both sons. And no matter what, I see that you don't care where I'd been. You want me to come home.

Behind the skies

The Mr. Newcomer PE Experience has concluded. The new P.E. teacher got here today. I was pretty happy to see him. I'm a little sad to see the whole thing end, from a couple levels, but all in all, it's a good thing. I am looking forward to getting back to my regular job, and not having the stress that some of these classes were for me.

There hasn't been a lot else to report, because I've been just stressed, with P.E., with the lack of progress I had been making on other projects, with things related to life here in a box in a foreign country away from all the familiar things in my life. I am ever so slowly moving forward toward a better perspective on the things I have been given to experience, sometimes I take steps back, sometimes I make strides forward, but the constant is that I Know and Trust that I am being cared for.

Sometimes I feel like I can't breathe here. Not just because of all of the nasty things in the air, but because I'm stressed, over-analytical, anxious. Because I feel constricted and uncomfortable. And sometimes, I feel like I am more free here than I have ever been before. The places I am taken make me seek escape, and know that I am in the only refuge possible for my good. I will follow.

The Morningstar is shining again.

Lead times

Sometimes, the joy of working out for the second and a half time in a day is being able to cool down by eating nearly 500 calories of desert roll, all by yourself, in your room, reading Vinge and grooving to Reality Check.

Only one more day of P.E. Then it will be back to the normality of my regular job. For a while, at least. I have all these things that need to get done, that maybe I should have been putting in extra hours to get done, but there's just something in me that says there will always be more to do, and I have to set boundaries somewhere.

I worked out two and a half times today by doing my morning routine when I woke up, playing ball with the guys after school, working out before supper, then going back and working out a while after supper.

I'm wondering that the communication that I feel like I am not having isn't just my lack of ability to Talk, but if it's a stretching experience where I need to learn to grow despite the feeling of minimal input. Or maybe it's my own inability to Talk. I don't know yet.

Hope. Joy. Peace. They're all there, I just need to take a hold of them. It needs to not be a learned response, not something I have to consciously think about, but just a part of me. Maybe I'll be there someday. Until then, I press on.

The world we see here has an edge. Someday, I'll look over it, and soon enough, I'll be falling off.

Just want to look right

I've been waking up early to call home to find out how my boys have been doing. Both my old basketball teams got third in their brackets at the end of the season tournament, so I'm pretty pumped to hear that. The girls did OK, too.

French Bakery run in a bit! I love fresh croissants in the morning.

Dragons, lions, here I am, send me.

I woke up and was kind of hyper for no obvious reason. I mean, jumping up and down hyper. I called my aunt and found out how the ball teams were doing. I felt good.

I was in charge of the meeting this morning. I volunteered in some hubris of importance, or something. I did such a terrible job. Hopefully, somehow it made a difference to someone, because I felt like a complete moron. At least we had good music, and a good message. Too bad my part was completely meandering and pointless. I felt not good.

I really wanted to go play frisbee today. But when we left late after meeting and then got there, there was no one there. We went out to eat, then. I guess that should have made me feel better, right? It made me just not feel.

I got back and played a game with friends. That made me feel good for a while.

I decided to work out. I moped around while working out. This is an accomplishment, and I would like credit for it. That didn't feel good.

I went outside, and climbed around the various buildings for a while. That made me feel not much.

Then I ate supper. That felt better.

Then I started to play another game. That didn't make me feel any better, and I abruptly left because I'm a rude and mean person.

I shot baskets for a while. I didn't feel anything about that.

The stuff I said last night that I worked through while shooting baskets? Yeah, I didn't work through it at all, apparently. Or maybe I did, and the roaring lion just wants to devour me. I don't know anymore.

I vacuumed my floor. It is clean.

I'm weird, so here is my blog entry for today, concluded.

Light to see

So...

There was a dance party at the embassy tonight. For various and sundry mostly wrong reasons, I signed up to go. Then decided not to. However, most of campus went. Then the couple people I was hanging out with all decided to go. This bummed me out. I wanted to hang out with people so I didn't have to be alone and just go mope for a while. There were some folks watching a semi-depressing movie, and I wasn't in the keep being depressed mood. I didn't know what I was going to do.

Then I decided, I'm not going to mope around! I stuck in my headphones, played Haste The Day, Thrice, Bleach, and some other random stuff while having my own dance party on the basketball court, basically doing whatever I wanted while sort of shooting a basketball, occasionally growling with Haste The Day or singing really loud with Thrice. I did this for about an hour. Then, I decided that I was going to go turn around all the desks in the high school building (as you can tell I was getting rather goofy at this point), when I met one of the teachers, getting stuff out of his classroom. He had been at another activity and had just got back. So we watched a movie.

All in all, my mope-around time turned into a good time. While I was having my dance party on the basketball court, I Talked to my Dad, and we got some stuff worked through that I would have just ignored if I had gone to the party. And then instead of letting me sort of get in trouble like I probably would have for moving all the desks around, I got to hang out and watch a movie for a while.

Then surprise the returners from the party when they got back.

And NOW BE TOO WOUND UP TO GO TO BED, BUT I HAVE TO, SO I'M TYPING IN ALL CAPS TO LET SOME ENERGY OUT!

Time to return.

Let

It rained for a while today.

I spent way too much time in thought.

Muscles get sore after a half-hour work out.

I didn't want to be around some people that I had to be around.

Work got ignored and got done.

Shooting baskets for an hour in the dark seemed comforting and lonely.

Equipment didn't work.

I forget and forgot about the faithfulness and hope.

I felt.

Let.

Rest in the cold.

Well, we have no school tomorrow. Instead, we're working on accreditation. So it means that while I will have some accreditation-related work, most of my day will be able to be spent catching back up. To an extent. I know I won't be able to get everything done, but I should be able to get a good bit of it done, and so feel good about myself and my success as a school employee. Probably a vain hope, but who knows.

I do and I don't want to be here tonight. I know I am supposed to be here. I really want to be back in KS, preparing for the end-of-season basketball tournament that I helped run and coached in for the last five years. Having seen the boys grow and mature all year, and now time for the payoff. Instead, I'm here, running after school basketball for guys I sometimes feel aren't listening when I try to help, don't know anything about basketball, and would get beat seriously if I had my KS guys around. I know I'm supposed to be here, but I really don't want to be tonight.

We had a team meeting tonight, and one of the things we were supposed to do was share with each other some things that were bothering us so we could Remember them. Semi-fortunately, we had just done that yesterday in guys group, and the people in my small group were all guys from the group, so I really didn't have to share lots. But when you're in a big room, and trying to talk quietly so as not to disturb anyone, or be overheard by anyone, you feel secretive even when you're supposed to be open. That was kind of stressful for me, and so after we got done, I tried to disappear as quickly and quietly as I could. I went an shot baskets for a while, then secreted myself to my quiet spot, and sat in Thought for a while.

There are many times that I would truly like to see the outcome of my work here, and I am frustrated that I don't seem to be shown that outcome. But then I know something important, something key. Rmns8-twenty four and five are basically saying that if I see these things, then what hope do I really have? So I am doing my best to have that kind of hope, hope in the promise that it will be fulfilled.

This isn't another dream. I have been Directed here for a reason. I just press on.

I press on. To whatever end.

Yokes, burdens.

I've been waking up early, not on purpose, this week. The benefit of this is that I can check my email and blog, because our internet has been crummy at night. I've got to get the IT guy to fix that. Anyway...

There is much that has been going on recently. I've been slightly more joyful, but also more stringent with the kids. I think I'm managing to do it without becoming mean, but I'm not entirely sure.

In my guys group last night, one of the things we talked about was the idea of Hope, and how that hope doesn't mean something we wish for, something we want to have happen. Rather it's a hope in a promise which we have been assured will come to us. We are to live our lives in the knowledge and expectation of that Hope. The promise will not fail, and the things of this life will falter.

I have burdens, cares, and a failing to switch the yoke that I carry them with. There are times that I go about my life, and I cannot see the coming day because of the darkness of night. But as I have been typing this up, the dawn has begin to break outside my window. I'm going to stop this blog entry so I can take a few minutes to sit at the feet, and to find rest. Take the time in your life to gather near them, and find rest.

Surreptitious

I only have to teach P.E. until next Monday or so. This provokes happiness, and a little odd disappointment, since I had been having a much better attitude about it recently.

Yesterday was a good day. I got to see some of the goofy things young children write about animals for their school assignments, and giggle about them. (Like how earthworths are invertebrate because they "wijel and jijle and don't have a backbone")

Since our internet hasn't been working at night, I've been waking up early to check my mail and blog. This is OK, except then I find it hard to quit to start my day, so goodbye!

Everybody... Start!

Yesterday, when I woke up, I was kind of tired. It had warmed up, and I wanted to lazily abandon the great heater turn on project. I made myself get up and do it anyway. I'm kind of glad I did. First, I know people appreciated it, and I kind of lied to someone by not admitting it was me that turned on their heater when they asked me in the middle of a pack of kids. Second, it made me think while I was working. And I realized that I wasn't really having a good attitude about this P.E. thing, I was kind of just resigned to it but not happy about it. So I decided I was going to be actually joyful about it, and happy. P.E. went much better yesterday than it had almost any other day. I'm going to try to do that again today, be really joyful about it.

This weekend, I discovered that I can make my way to the balcony of my building by climbing, but once I get onto the balcony, I can't get into the building. It was fun. I had to ask the principal, who was walking by, if she could come and let me into my house. Funny.

The picture is of one of the toucans I helped a friend finish from class last week. The class drew and colored the toucans, then we cut them out, glued them together, then stuffed them with paper. I had a good time doing, and they look really good in the rain forest, so I'm sharing a picture with you, since I haven't done any pictures in a while.

I am, while hoping that our fill-in P.E. teacher can get here soon, thankful for the opportunity that I have had to do this P.E. thing, because it really has challenged me to be joyful in all situations, especially as it comes at a time that I'm being challenged in other ways and other ares, at first it felt like one more stress that I had to deal with. And it is another stress to deal with, but that is the point. Fire refines, but that refining process can't be little or have a small flame. It has to be hot, it has to get all of the dross out at once. I'm not saying I'm to be going to be completely pure once this is done, but I will have had some of what I hold on to stripped away, and that will be another step on my journey.

I'm in hopeful anticipation of these steps. And I know where my Hope is.