Life is Fun

Ok, so I know that the purpose of life is not just to have fun...but you gotta admit it, sometimes it's seriously just fun. After living with the flu and a certain amount of depression\oppression for at least a week, living just feels fun right now. The weekend was full and lovely- shopping with my brother, experiencing my first car breakdown (it wasn't lovely, but at least interesting...), getting to go to church again, spending time with friends new and old, becoming president...(I'll get to that later.)

As for the car... the van belt broke for the fifth time while I was driving in the rain at rush hour. I lost power steering and promptly parked on the side of the road on the median. (The wrong side, as I soon found out.) Drivers ed just doesn't help in those situations. Brothers and Dads and cell phones do, though! Connor told me to turn on the hazard lights (I like to think I would have thought of that myself) and then I called Dad on his cell (which I never carry around with me, but we just happened to take. We were only a few miles from the house, so Dad came right away to get us in the pouring rain (I love him!) First, though, I had to get to the right side of the road. Never having experienced this before, I was really paranoid that I wouldn't be able to steer the van over two lanes of traffic to the other side (we were on the highway). I just breathed a prayer for a traffic gap and God answered...there was a perfect letup in the flow of headlights and I got safely across (with Connor's coaching, of course. Sometimes I wonder if its really me doing the driving.) All ended well- I arrived home freezing cold and suddenly famished. (Excitement has a way of doing that to me.) We ended up just cramming in the truck and going to China King anyway. Yum.

Being at church after missing a week was really refreshing. Praise and worship time with "the assembly of the righteous" is a precious thing to me, and I'm excited about the 21 days of prayer starting up at church. Remembering last year, and the time of refreshing that came, I am all the more eager. After going through a tough time spiritually for a little while, I suddenly am feeling revived and ready in some way...ready to fall in love with God and forget the guilt and troubles. Psalm 25 from the service on Sunday was sweet...

"To You, Oh Lord, I lift up my soul..."
"Make known Your ways, Oh Lord; teach me Your paths. Lead me in Your paths and teach me..."
"Who is the man who fears the Lord? He will instruct him in the way he should choose..."

I'm always starving to be shown the way, to be taught... and He says He will teach me. I can't always see his face when I gaze up into it longingly, but I'm assured that I will. Psalm 11:7 says:

"The upright will see His face."

I just believe that. I am so safe with God. You are so safe with God. I'm looking forward to the prayer times because I'm less religious this year. I get so sick of trying to be religious, when what I really want is heart-to-heart. It's great to begin to be free of prayers prayed out of duty or what's expected, but to speak to God from my heart.

As for my presidency...we played Scum a while last night and shockingly I was at the top a good part of the night. And you know what? It wasn't even that wonderful. Its more fun to move to different positions...you have some hope of moving up. It's just as I feared! You get to the top and there's no hope! Aaaaaaa! Ok, so I admit, it was fun. I like winning. I like to be right. But there's also the fear of assassination and all that, and I'm really too emotional for presidency. Plus, people start getting sick of you :) Well, I woke up this morning and I was just me again. What a nice feeling.

Oh. You know what I'm thankful for? I'm thankful that our house didn't float away. We were beginning to feel a bit water-logged down here. The water has drained away after all the rain (and its been really pretty, by the way). I love the ice drops on the bare trees...such a lovely sight. Teeka, I'd better go now.