Daring to Dream

     I received my latest monthly statement from AGWM and between the new monthly pledges I've raised and the people still supporting me (a couple have stopped support), I'm at $405 in monthly pledges. That's only about $2,200 left to raise! I know God can do this by the end of the year, my goal departure time. (Every time I talk about this departure time, I have to add that I wanted to spend Christmas in Romania, but my children's pastor told me no. :) Love you, friend!) My last blog post I talked about the lies the enemy has been telling me, about no one believing in me or wanting to support me. God has totally blown those lies out of the water; everyone I talk to is supportive and loving and encouraging. I'm not sure I've ever felt this much love in my life. The other night I got to just sit down and fellowship and connect with one of my partners in such a powerful way. We shared life stories, talked, laughed and communed like we were blood relatives. In a way, I guess all members of my faith family are my blood relatives - we're family by the blood of Jesus. That's a nice thought. My church family really is family to me. I wasn't raised around my extended family. I'm a Marine Corps brat. I had already moved about thirteen times when I graduated high school. I'd never lived anywhere more than three years. When I came to Oklahoma, I hadn't attended church in about two years. I started going to Crossroads on September 2nd of 2007 (fun fact, the first weekend in September is my "frienniversary" with my bestie) and except for the fact that the whole worship team and orchestra were dressed in black and made me think of a funeral I loved it pretty much immediately. I've never gone anywhere else since that first Sunday of the month (which, I later found out, was why everyone on stage was dressed in black - outfits were color coordinated by which Sunday of the month it was). In the six years since I've been at Crossroads, it has always been my church, and has since become my family. I don't think I've truly realized, though, until this final season of fundraising, that my church family takes as much ownership of me as I do of them. They love me as much, if not more, than I love them. I don't really know why that surprises me. It's not like I had some unhappy childhood where I was unloved and unwanted, but for some reason, I cannot fully comprehend being loved and appreciated and supported by my church family. It's so strange for me to think that as much as I love and invest in my church, my faith family members want to love and invest in me. For whatever reason, I don't expect that. I expect to have to do things on my own, I seem to expect to be rejected, rebuffed, refused, and whatever other re- words fall into that same category in the thesaurus. Instead, my faith family is just wrapping me up in this huge hug and saying, we love you, we believe in you, we see God moving in your life, we are excited for you, you don't have to try to convince us to support you - we support you, we're going to send you even though we're going to miss you, you're valued and appreciated and most of all LOVED.

     Whoa.

     That's some pretty powerful stuff to someone who hasn't been able to shake the feeling that the only one who really believes in her is God.

     It's been four years since God first put Touched Romania on my heart and called me to this mission field. For the first time in a long time, I'm daring to let myself dream of the day when I will be there, fulfilling His calling on my life. Yes, I've held onto the dream all this time and God certainly hasn't let go of my heart, but it's been a long time since I let myself dream.

     I looked up plane tickets to Bucharest the other day. I imagined boarding the plan, what I'm going to pack, how long of a layover I would have, which airline I wanted to take (Hint: it's not going to be Turkish Airlines with a layover in Istanbul. Methinks their flights are cheap for a reason. I'm leaning towards British Airlines with a layover in Heathrow so I can hub out of the same airport my dad did whenever he went to the Middle East for deployments. He loved the Heathrow airport. Well, probably liked it a lot, maybe not loved, given all the circumstances. A layover is still a layover, after all.), what time I would leave, what time I would arrive, how jet lagged I would be. I actually got a little emotional over the whole thing. I hadn't let myself really think about being in Romania for a long time. Today, I looked up apartments in Bucharest. I had no idea what was a good location or which one was closest to Touched Romania, but I looked and planned, and thought about rent coming out of my budget, and I dreamed. I thought about getting to the maternal center every day and walking through the streets and taking the bus and never taking a Romanian taxi again because that was just scary and what was considered downtown was it by the food market I went to before where I had to buy a denim skirt because I'd managed to leave my pants in Vienna and shown up for three days in Romania with a dress and a top? (Yeah, there's a funny story. Set my jeans aside to pack 'em. Didn't pack 'em. Had to buy a skirt in a place that also sold produce and meat and I still have the skirt and it was just a hilarious experience all around.) I keep thinking about how I'm going to get my comic books to Romania and how am I going to convince my mother to go to my comic book store and pick up new issues for me and ship them to me. (Don't ask. Just know that I am like a strange little Sheldon from Big Bang Theory and move on.) It felt so good to dream. To let myself really believe in the reality of this again. I'm going to be there, I'm going to hold babies and love on them and pray over them and support and encourage and love on teen moms and their babies and be exactly where God wants me to be. When I wake up every day it won't be to go to work and push paper and wait for the weekend where I get to be at the church and minister to kids and fellowship with my family, I will wake up and ministry will be my job, I will be doing what I love and loving what I do and there won't be any such thing as horrible Mondays or longing for the weekend because I'm finally going to be where I'm supposed to be and there's not going to be this whole "job" thing getting in the way of serving because all I have to do is serve. I love this. I can't wait to be there. I can't wait to be on that plane. (Going through London, not Istanbul.)

Up There and Down Here

Well, let's see. My last post I was sick and getting ready to move home. I have since moved home and have settled in nicely, for the most part. Pretty much everything I own (my mother would disagree) is in my storage unit. I have my clothes, posters, bedding, TV, movies, books, and stereo at my mom's place. Oh, I also have my perfumes, which my mother and I disagree on quite frequently - her sinuses take exception to my fragrances. In some ways it's nice to be back at home again, and I appreciate my mom taking me back in for a season, but it has been so hard at the same time. The loss of privacy is something I have felt keenly since returning. I've gotten more used to it, but coming home to mom's place is not the same as coming home to my place. It's only for a season. I know God is the one who gave my missionary, Raegan, the foresight to set my budget up so I can afford an apartment without a roommate. I've had roommates before and I could do it again, but I am such an introvert that I know I will find the most peace going home to a quiet apartment after a day/night of ministry. I won't feel like I have to tiptoe around someone else or entertain someone or be good company. I need a place and space to recharge my batteries and I can't do that as well with people around. Now, once those batteries are recharged, I am ready for my people fix, believe me! I want to be out and doing something, get some fresh air, enjoy conversations and fun times, I just need a break after a while. Anyway, all that to say, I guess, I'm thankful to be back at home and at the same time I'm ready to be out and independent again. My mom told me when I first moved out that I wouldn't want to move back home again. I didn't believe her until now. Those moms. Always knowing stuff. :)
     Speaking of alone time, I have a funny story that's been making me smile all week. My best buddy at church, now age eight and whom I've worked with for six years, found out last week I don't have any kids. His response, "You should go online and find some to adopt." I responded I didn't want to do that right now. "Why not?" he asked. "Everyone loves kids." I told him yes, but I wanted to be married before I have kids. "You don't have a husband?" He couldn't believe it. "You've gotta be killing me! You're all alone?""Well, no," I answered. "I have Jesus." Not good enough for my bud. "Yeah, but He's up there," pointing to the sky, "not down here," pointing to the carpet.
     He's actually got a point. It reminded me of a story my college pastor used to tell about a little boy who was scared and said he needed Jesus "with skin on," i.e., a Jesus who was physically present, not just spiritually. I believe God created us to be relational beings. We thrive on relationships with one another. Yes, our relationships with God should come first and foremost, but look at how many times and ways God uses the people around us to communicate with us, bless us, and guide us. Even though I'm an introvert and crave quiet time, relationships in the down here are still very necessary to me. I may not have as many of them as most people but you better believe they're important to me and I thrive on them - even though I may need battery charging time after engaging in these relationships.
     I think for me part of my trouble in breaking out of that introverted shell is I am afraid. It's what's made calling people asking to set up meetings to share my heart about Romania and see if they'll join me as financial partners so difficult. I am absolutely petrified. The first night I started making phone calls I felt sick to my stomach I was so scared. Why? Why does it terrify me so much?
     I am afraid of rejection. I am terrified to put myself out there because for some reason the enemy has this mindlock on me, making me believe that no one I'm trying to connect with really loves me or cares about my calling or will want to support me. He whispers to me that I won't make it to Romania, that people won't support me, they won't want to give, they don't believe in me, I've been trying to get to Romania for over three years now, I am a failure in everyone's eyes because I haven't done this yet. I am a failure and a disappointment and I have done something wrong because I am still here while everyone else at the 2010 PFO at AGWM headquarters has already gone on, and in some cases, completed their assignments, and I am still here. Literally, verbatim, these are the thoughts and doubts and fears that he has whispered into my mind day after day after day after day after day.
     Do I know that's not of the Lord? Of course I do! I know the promises God has given me and I know He hasn't given me a spirit of fear but a spirit of love, of power, and a sound mind! I know! I. Know. Knowing and feeling are so completely different though. I can know all I want but it doesn't necessarily change the way I feel. Of course the enemy chooses to attack my emotions and my insecurities. He looks for the weak places and stabs his little knife in there, tiny little pricks that may not seem like much on their own until all of a sudden they're everywhere and I'm suffering crippling spiritual blood loss. It's hard. It's hard to be here still and not understand why this has been such a difficult fundraising journey. It's hard to feel rejected and forgotten, unwanted as a missionary. It's hard to feel like the only one who believes in this dream God has given me.
     All of that, all that darkness and despair, all of that worry and fear and doubt and unease is what makes the truth so much sweeter.
     My faith family cares. I've gotten to talk to people on the phone over the past week and set up appointments and I've been met with enthusiasm, excitement, and encouragement. I've been told that people believe in me, they don't even need to meet with me, they've seen how God is working in my life and they believe in me. Me. Me, of all people, they see God working in me and they find reason to believe in me! I had a sweet e-mail come through yesterday that almost made me cry with it's kind encouragement and support. I've learned that I do matter to my kids' ministry team and to the other friends I have at my church. My good friend, and children's pastor, let me come to her house multiple times to work on our church Christmas production. She fed me and listened to my ideas and let me write and made me feel valued as a creator. She told me I couldn't spend Christmas in Romania (my original goal I shared with her recently) it had to be New Year's because she needed me with her. Wow. The responses I've had over the beginning of this last fundraising push have helped renew and refresh my spirit. God has been using my faith family to disperse the lies the devil has been telling me. Now when I call people, I have positive memories to focus on, not just my horrible imaginings of rejection.
     I'm going to spend New Year's in Romania. I only have a little ways to go. This part of the journey is almost over. I'm ready for the next leg of this great adventure. I've got my Jesus up there and He's been showing me all His down here representatives to encourage me and get me ready. Time to saddle up my horse! (Old school Steven Curtis Chapman reference.)

Shorty

     Tonight's post will be very brief as I've been sick since yesterday evening & am about to crawl into bed. Thankfully today has only been filled with nausea, headaches, & stomach pain - very mild compared to yesterday evening. It came on in about five minutes & I was done. I could hardly fall asleep last night I was so sick to my stomach. I can't figure out if it was something I had eaten on Friday or early in the day Saturday or if this was just some random, twenty-four hour virus. To me, right now, the cause doesn't matter nearly so much as the effects. Of course, if this were to continue (Dear Lord, please don't let it) then I would care a lot more about the origin story. At the moment, though, not so much. I would probably care more if I hadn't been dealing with digestive issues since I was about twelve. Since I have, I really don't.
     Today wasn't all about me feeling awful, though. Our first puppet skit for the new summer kids' series at church (which I wrote & performed in - not as a puppet) went well. There was one puppet cue mishap & I left right after my part was done since I felt so awful but we pulled it off smoothly overall! Plus, I had my lines completely memorized & pulled them off without a hitch - I even managed to improvise on a line at said cue mishap. While sitting very still at home, I watched a new movie all the way through, something I don't do at home very often. It wasn't the greatest movie I've ever seen, by far, but it was okay, had a couple of good actors, & was a nice distraction for a couple hours. I did manage to unload my dishwasher & do a couple loads of laundry so I'm fairly pleased with that. Somehow or other I'm going to have to get this apartment packed up so I can move back into my mom's house at the end of the month. I'll be staying with her until I go overseas later this year. That's a whole other bit of heart drama that I've been going through since 2010 that I'm not going to go into right now. I'm focusing on the positive in that situation & how many ways I can see God's perfect timing coming to fruition. Moving home is a step of faith towards this goal. I digress, though. I said this would be a short post, after all. I should keep my promises, even if they're only to myself.
     Goodnight, big, wide world of web & wonder. Goodnight tree in the pretty, dimming light. And, of course, goodnight, moon.

Saturday

     Today has been a good day. True, I slept in far later than I intended and was not nearly (read: at all) productive as I should have been, which I scolded myself for until I felt very guilty.

     I still didn't do anything but I felt very bad about it.     

     The best part of today was this evening, though. I got to go to the birthday party of a very special little boy who turns eight tomorrow. I've known him since he was two. I still remember the first time I saw him smile. He's such a source of joy in my life and I love him so much. His family is so sweet to me, too. His older brother is such an awesome kid and his parents trust me with their boys which is a huge honor. Next month I get to take the boys to the science museum. Our first outing together was to the city zoo several weeks back. One of my favorite days, hanging out with these two boys. I didn't feel so guilty for not doing housework when my buddy was talking to me at his party tonight. All that mattered was getting to be there and that he wanted me there. Kids are picky; when they choose you to be their friend it's a privilege and should be treated as such. His parents told him to give goody bags to his friends who came to the party, meaning the kids who were about to go home. He immediately put a goody bag in my hands. Seriously, huge honor. There are so many awards in life but that was about one of the biggest possible in my mind. This boy said he wanted all his other guests to go except for me, he wanted me to stay and watch him build one of his new Lego sets. Man, I love this kid. If I do nothing else worthwhile in my life, I got to have this friendship with him, and that's huge. I don't think there's been anything that's made me more proud than when he's told me that I'm his best friend or when he says he loves me, or picks me of all his grown up birthday guests to talk to and sit in my lap and want to chat with me. God's used him so much in my life and in my heart. He's my best buddy and I love him.

     I was already okay tonight. I just had to gush about why. :)

     Pretty, random flowers from my mom's place for today's picture.

Valleys

     Today has been fairly lovely. My mom graduated as an LPN today and I couldn't be more proud of her. I had a great rehearsal for our puppet skit on Sunday later in the afternoon. I even managed to memorize my lines - a huge accomplishment for me. I have always struggled with memorization; I used to despair when my music instructors wanted me to memorize pieces. Now, if I can manage to memorize lines for the week when I have more than five lines! :) After practice, I came home, made cabbage and sweet potato (It has no name, I made it up as a twist on another cabbage recipe. Nameless though it may be, it is delicious.) and turned on "Sherlock" on Netflix. I also tweeted my #28thanks, choosing to take a more serious route with today's thoughts, focusing on God's power enduring beyond my momentary feelings.

     Letting my feelings control me is a struggle for me. As you've probably inferred from my first post, I have some mental and emotional health issues. It's not something I talk about very much with very many people. Only a very few know the full story and for now I need it to stay that way. Someday, I want to be able to share my testimony and help others but for right now I still have too many moments where I need help and too many fears of judgement (which I have already experienced from within the church, unfortunately) to feel comfortable being transparent about my health. I'll get there. God will get me there. It's like Eli's "Valley Song."

    

     It's this rock that tells me

     That's what valleys are for

     It's from here that we measure 

     Just how far we must go

     

     I love this song. Eli is actually one of my favorite Christian artists. I'd encourage you to give his music a listen. For a whole now I think I've been in a long valley. I think this blog is a way, not necessarily to escape the valley but to chronicle the walk through the valley. I think a light is coming but I don't want to miss this. I can't appreciate it yet. Some things we have to walk through. Sometimes it's about pressing in and pressing through, touching the garment, wrestling with the Lord, coming face to face with the Divine in the moment of desperation. I don't think we can forget that moment. Did Jacob forget the moment when the Lord touched him? Doubtful. The woman who bled? Unlikely. It is in our darkest moments that we have the opportunity to find our true selves as well as the Lord's true nature. Love eternal. Glory in the midnight hour. Light in the darkness. The soft whisper in the storm. The arms of the Almighty encircling His beloved. Whatever your feelings on the Harry Potter series, take a minute to appreciate this quote: "Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light." That's what my #28thanks tweets are for; they're me, turning on the light. This blog is me grappling with the darkness. Not always, and not always so seriously, I hope, but I can't internalize my thoughts and feelings anymore. I've found my outlet and I think it's going to be good for me. Especially since outlets are used for plugging in lights.

One of *Those* Days

     Today was hard. I was so frustrated and overwhelmed by stress at one point I was ready to cry. It didn't start out that way. I actually had a very productive morning and felt good about where I stood with my workload. My co-worker and I get along very well and had a pleasant morning together, enjoying our hot tea and going over upcoming procedure changes. The key word there is "upcoming." As in, we're still suffering at the moment. Still, we were doing fine in our checkout area, me with my data entry, she with her billing. Then, the whole thing went straight down the toilet.

     I arrive at work at 7:00 and take my thirty minute (an agency wide time allotment) lunch around 13:00 (1:00pm). Today at 13:00 I was asked to cover a lunch at the front desk so other clerks could take the lunches they had not had. I was hungry and, I'll admit it, not very happy about waiting another half hour for my break (I had a feeling the front desk clerk wouldn't come back on time - after already showing up 13 minutes late that morning, delaying my work), but of course I said yes (I don't tell the boss no) and relieved the front desk clerk for lunch. Remember that foreboding I mentioned? Yeah, it's about to get important.

     An hour and twenty minutes later (forty minutes before I was supposed to leave for the day), I had to call my supervisor to see if anyone was available to relieve me at the front desk so I could take my lunch. I was starting to feel sick to my stomach from not eating. Ten minutes later, as my supervisor is coming to se me free, the front desk clerk returns. What did I get to do while the clerk was gone? I got to deal with angry clients complaining about how long they had been waiting to be seen, nurses telling me not to call and ask questions on behalf of clients, told to tell the clients the nurses were too busy for that (they had time to answer the phone just fine), handing clients comment cards begging them to fill them out so we could prove to supervisors the surprise new system implemented Monday wasn't working, and of course apologizing over and over again for things that weren't my fault, I couldn't control, and worst of all, I couldn't fix. It was somewhere in there when I found myself so emotionally frazzled I was ready to burst. I felt so judged by the angry people pacing in the lobby. I wanted to scream out, "It's not my fault!" I wanted someone else there to take the blame but the people to blame refused to arrive. 

     I didn't go to lunch until 14:50, wrung out like a wet dish towel. I was so upset by everything that was happening. My co-worker in the checkout area said clients had screamed at her about the long wait, as well. We couldn't understand what was going on and why no one was doing anything to fix the situation. In all honestly, I don't know what could have been done at that point. I wanted the clerks to stop checking in clients, the nurses to speed up on the clients we had (sitting around with no patients?), and I wanted everyone to get a better attitude (including the clients and myself) and pull together to get things done and make our clients happy again.

     Yeah, none of that happened.

     Now I know I'm not a nurse and I don't know what all they have to do in the clinics, and there were plenty of things going on that probably made other employees even more frustrated than I was. This isn't their blog, though. It's my blog, and quite frankly I've just about written myself to okay this evening by writing the whole story down. 

     Before I left work I went to our wellness center and go through a thirty minute yoga routine. Normally I'll ride the exercise bike for at least half an hour but I had no energy for it today. The yoga was exactly what I needed. I walked out of work feeling drained but calm, tired but relaxed. For the drive home, I rolled down my windows and listened to an iPod genius playlist with Joshua Radin and other soothing artists. I opened my blinds at home, put my feet up on the couch and read a magazine cover to cover. I ate dinner while watching BBC's on Netflix. Now I'm sitting on my balcony listening to my wind chimes enjoying the breeze, the sunshine, and the view:

     I had been planning to go to a girls' life group tonight but I couldn't do it after the madhouse of today. I'm an introvert to begin with and dealing with so much face to face conflict today had given me all the social interaction I could handle on one night's sleep. I was much slower on Tweeting my #28thanks for today - I still haven't finished. I have time, though. It's only 19:30 and I have plenty of my evening left to enjoy now that the recovery process has come to an end. I've written myself to okay.

28 Thanks & Panic Attacks

O     I've been inspired by my friend Brittney to start keeping a blog again. It's been so long since I've done this the words feel rusty in my head. I think I need a place, though, where I can put my thoughts and give myself some sort of catharsis at the end of the day.

     Thoughts for right now: my #28thanks project on Twitter (@LG_Abroad). Inspired, again by the bestie Brittney as well as my friend Kara, my goal is to tweet 28 things I'm thankful for every day for a year. At the end of the year I'll have listed 10,220 reasons to praise and thank God. Their (Brittney's and Kara's) inspiration came from the song "10,000 Reasons." For the record, I did the math to see how many thanks I'd need each day to reach exactly 10,000 at the end of he year, but since there's not a way to send 27.397 tweets a day I'll have to stick with 28. Oddly enough, 27 tweets per day would only bring in 9,855 thanks - it seems like such a big difference from 10,220. Normally I'm not a numbers person (I have an English degree) but for whatever reason I found all of this this fascinating.

     I had made it up to thanks number 14 when I realized I was at the edges of serious anxiety. The agency I work for is having a health fair today and instead of working all the employees are attending. I don't struggle a lot with panic attacks but as people arrived and the building became more crowded I could feel myself growing nervous. I didn't know anyone (I was hired in March) and I didn't know what to do with myself. Vendors were still setting up and in the auditorium where I was I felt I had no safe place to turn. I started longing for a corner to hide in, where I could shrink down and be unobserved, back against the wall so no one could sneak up on me. I felt exposed and threatened - for no good reason but anxiety, I think, is rarely rational. It was like the feeling I always imagine animals have when they're being hunted on camera for the Discovery Channel. I fled (not literally of course) the auditorium and breezeway until I found the empty boardroom. As soon as the door shut behind me I could breathe easily again. No one had seen me duck in so I felt safe and secluded. My own little hidey-hole. A little big for a hidey-hole honestly, but there was a chair at the back of the room (back to the wall, remember) and the view was gorgeous. 

     I love rain. My favorite part of getting ready this morning was listening to the rain from my cozy bed. So while not quite the tiny closet my nerves might have preferred, the view of the rainstorm was worth the extra space that rejected an adjective of cozy. I could also listen to the rain tiptoeing across the roof from this space, a more soothing sound to focus on than the booms of voices from the hallway. My fear dissipated quickly and I sat down and sat still, enjoying myself to no end.

     I didn't emerge for half an hour until my best friend, the aforementioned Brittney, arrived on the scene. Strength in numbers - I had a new herd member to help me and give me strength. I sat with her, chatted with people she knew but I did not, and even participated in the health fair, visiting tables, gathering freebies, entering drawings, getting massages (Yes, plural, and wasn't I oh so happy?), and setting up a free chiropractor appointment. By this time, another hour had passed, Brittney had left for other assignments, and I decided to make my way back to my boardroom. I was much more calm now (thank you, massage therapists) and could face the people passing in and out of the room in preparation for our meeting in half an hour, even admitting to a couple of them I don't enjoy crowds and had sought out a quiet corner for myself. An understated description of my earlier anxiety attack at best, but it was the one I was willing to share. 

     While writing this post I think I decided this blog will be a lot more personal than I originally thought it would be. I didn't know what I was asking for when I first dreamt of a catharsis at the beginning of the post. I will say, though, it feels good to get my thoughts out, to express my feelings and share the experience. I don't do a lot of that in my normal life. Most of the time I wind up apologizing for talking about myself. I don't want to do that, I don't want to apologize for expressing myself and sharing my thoughts and rambling on until I decide I'm done and I'm okay. So I think that's what this blog will be, me writing until I'm okay.