I doubt this is going to be what you hoped to be reading.

Maybe my question is better phrased like this: “If we never put ourselves in places of needing to show love and compassion, are we truly loving and compassionate?”

If I’m perfect and I make sure to stay around only people that are perfect, I can be a wonderful loving person.

I’m learning in life. I’m with a crying elderly woman while she stares death in the eyes. She has no one that cares about her. I hold her hand for a moment, but then I leave.

Something inside me just wants to shut down at all the hurt I see.  Especially since there’s a few easy solutions:

• Avoid hurting people. (on 2nd thought, how many people truly aren’t hurting? The next option is probably better)
• Avoid the hurt when I see it.
• Make myself so busy I don’t have time to help those that are hurting.

Who am I if I try to live my life avoiding helping others? And no, helping is not being nice to someone one time so I feel good, I mean really helping others.  Helping them because I love them. Knowing that they are a person created by God, and that alone drives me to love them.

It’s a whole lot easier to stay closed inside a small world.  with perfect, non-help-needing people.

I think I have a lot to learn in life yet.

Life is a journey. Right now my week includes this:

And this is only a small percentage of the mess. Why did we suddenly decide to deposit the kitchen into the dining room? Not really my choice of ways to have the best week of mine life. However, the end result will be nice.

It’s obviously still under construction. But I’m very excited to have a new kitchen. With more cabinet space.

In other news, this advocate for Keep-yourself-safe-from-the-sun, just fried herself this weekend. It was cold, I even wore a hoodie part of the time. But the 2nd layer of skin peeling off my face doesn’t lie.

Well, I’m hungry, maybe I’ll go rummage around the dining room floor for something to eat. I might be lucky to come across something worthy of eating and a plate at the same time.

Tired of sitting on pillows on the floor? Time to buy a couch. And since this crazy world seems to think that a sofa is worth $1,000, and a multitude of other reasons, the choice of Ikea was made. Like it or hate it, Ikea has cheap furniture that one has to assemble once the huge cardboard box is home. Huge is an understatement. When a sofa comes in a box, don’t expect it to easily fit in the back of your car. 

But it did. Thanks to the help of some friends that we made in the parking lot. 🙂 I think God was watching out for us. The lovely lady said in amazement, “It’s just you 2 girls? Wow. Independent” We laughed. 

Of course now that it’s in the car, the next step is getting it up the stairs at home. (was that a pun?) 

These stairs. Narrow stairs. Some how, we did. Even with declining the elderly neighbor man’s help. 

I won’t bore you with pictures of putting it together. Not to terrible, actually. And hey, feel free to come on over now, I won’t make you sit on the floor anymore! 

I’ve just sent off my request for a permit to hike the Grand Canyon with 3 of my best friends this fall. I can almost taste the adventure….

Well, maybe. Of course I can’t be completely sure yet.

What a journey life is. Here I am, at 1:30 a.m. eating spaghetti. It’s what I do best. No, not eating spaghetti. Being awake till the middle of the night. It’s not really that I want to (ok, stupid comment. who would want to be awake all night?), but yes, I work night shift. At a job that I love. But it’s the curse of night shift, and therefore, I will just be awake at 1:30 on my night off. It happens. On the other hand, I won’t tell you what time I get up in the morning (hint: it’s typically not morning anymore). What could be better?

Ok, so you’re wondering why I’m cocky enough to claim knowledge of what’s wrong with the world. Here’s my story, and it has to do with me being up at all hours of the night.

I started my job about a half year ago. I knew it would be night shift, but what to do? The dreaded economy you know. Ever since then I’ve been going circles with myself, trying to blend my night life with the rest of the world. It’s frustrating to say the least. But night after night, I’d find myself awake at 3:00 a.m., with nothing to do, just wishing I   could imagine I felt tired. Now, of course I had things to do. Who doesn’t. There was a bigger problem. The rest of the world was sleeping. I wish with all my heart I could be sleeping. And I didn’t want to do anything. I was completely unmotivated. I would watch TV. I would think. I would write (Mostly about how I wanted to be able to sleep when it was dark out). And then the truth hit me. I, along with about 99% of all other Americans, am unmotivated about anything that really matters.

Oh we can work and earn money. And we all know that won’t make us happy. The things that make us happy take the actual hard work. Relationships. Organization. Helping people. Being flexible. Serving.

I would rather waste time. Yes, I am completely aware of the fact that Americans are workaholics. (We had 11 Federal Holidays. My company honors 6 of those. Of which I will work 4 this year). You’d think with all our hard work we’d be getting somewhere. We’re not. When we come home from work, what do we do? Waste time. In every imaginable way possible. Ask me, I’m an expert.

But it truly makes me sad. And that’s part of the reason for me writing right now. I don’t want to be just an average American, proficient at spending time doing nothing.

I just spend a month with out watching any TV. No problem.  Ok it was hard. Harder than I’d like. Am I back again to my pre-tv-break amount of watching? Happily no. Could it get back there? Easily.

So when I have a bad habit, I can hardly break it. And this particular problem is what I’m getting at. It’s hard to change.  I deal with it every day. It that list that runs at the back of my mind all the time. Those “I need to do better” things.  I’m pretty good at silencing that voice. Of giving myself excuses. For why I didn’t clean the house. again. Why it’s ok that I ate fast food. again. Why I deserve to waste the evening watching tv. again.

But I want to change. I want to be more motivated. Maybe writing for the world to see will help.

I’m blogging. It’s about time.