Classification in Week 14

Only two more ways to organize paragraphs left, including this one!  I never realized how many someone could come up with.  However, I do agree with with those who put the curriculum together that it is good for the students to get this practice.  As you would expect of students writing in a second language they're not totally comfortable yet, their writing tends to be formulaic and vague; hopefully, looking at different ways to organize their thoughts will help them to write more specifically and clearly.  The vagueness was so bad in their last assignment, though, that I think I need to work specifically on that again at some point.

Anyhow, the 14th (out of 16) lesson of the semester was on organization by classification.  Basically, writing about things in categories. I really liked the examples in the book for this one (the examples, to me, seem to be hit or miss; some don't seem to be very clear illustrations, but this week's were): one example began "There are three kinds of book owners. The first..." Another began "Every educated person has at least two ways of speaking hsi mother tongue. The first..."

I began class with the boring lecture part, reiterating the ideas from the book and going over the vocabulary; I had a little bit of nerdy fan by using the four Hogwarts houses as my first example.  I used another example I found online about the sections at the local video store; it was a bit of an ode to a bygone era--it's hard to find a video store now that everyone uses netflix or gets movies online.

To wake everyone up after the lecture, I had them all get up and move into groups; I wrote paragraphs about the groups of students in the classroom as they organized themselves by birth month, home province, and favorite color.  They always enjoy any opportunity to goof around a bit.

Finally, I gave them a simple personality test to fill out; it was the one that divides people into four groups: lions, otters, golden retrievers, and beavers.  The version I used gave personality traits of each in the categories of relational strengths, strengths out of balance (weaknesses), communication style, relational needs, and relational balance (what to do to overcome the weaknesses).  Just to give you an idea, the first part, relational strengths, for each were:

Lion: takes charge, problem solver; competitive, enjoys change, confrontational
Otter: Optimistic, energetic, motivators, future oriented
Golden Retriever: warm and relational, loyal, enjoy routine, peace-maker, sensitive feelings
Beaver: Accurate and precise, quality control, discering, analytical

It turned out to be a good activity for vocabulary; there were several of the adjectives in the questionaire that they were unfamiliar with, so I spent a while explaining terms; once they had finished, I took a poll of how many we had of each type; we had about five lions (including three of the boys), quite a few otters, a good number of golden retrievers (predictably, many of the sweeter girls), and one beaver.  Blare was looking around bemusedly; was she the only one? Of course, she might not have been; when I tallied up the answers there were about three people who never answered.

Their journal assignment, which I gave them the last ten minutes or so of class to start on, was to discuss whether they agreed or not with the results of the personality test; which traits were accurate? which were not?  Of course, I reminded them that a test with only four types was overly simplistic; many would fall somewhere between the types.   Finally, what is the value of having different personality types? How do they work together?

Hopefully, reading this assignment, I'll be able to get to know my students better! Oh, by the way--I took to quiz myself while the students were working on their journals (I don't know why it didn't occur to me to do that ahead of time), and it turns out I'm a  beaver.  Not surprising, really, and now at least Blare isn't alone.

Half a Lifetime Ago

Last week, one of my Chinese friends, Jay, and I were talking about high school.  He was curious about what kind of things American students do in high school--Chinese students don't really have much chance for extracuricular activities.  I tried to explain marching band to him--I think he got the general idea, but it's like nothing they've ever seen here.

Then today, someone I went to high school with posted an old photo of all of us as seniors, in our band uniforms, back in 2001, and someone else pointed out that a video of our freshman show, Liturgical Dances, from 1998, was on youtube.  I wish the rest were, too, but anyhow, here's that one.  I had fun watching and reminiscing a bit.  Then, when I was writing the title for this post, it occured to me that I was fourteen when I marched in the show in the video.  Half my life ago.  It's weird; I'm just twenty-eight, but it seems like since my last birthday I've had a bit of a preoccupation with how old I am.  I guess it's just the realization that you're supposed to have so much fun and do so much while you're "young", and I see the end of my twenties coming fast.  Have I done enough?  Am I where I should be by this point?  Which direction should I go from here?  It's just a little sad sometimes that I don't fit in to "the young people" any more.

I'm Awake

Sometimes I don't realize just how much time I spend alone.  It seems the interactions I do have with people are of the type that take a lot of social energy--teaching, trying to make myself understood in Chinese to shopkeepers and waitresses, lesson-planning and strategizing, trying to find the right words to talk with someone about the most important things, in occasional meetings with colleagues.  It seems like I'm tired after all these interactions, so I don't notice that really each is not too long.  

I've been in a bit of a weird mood these past few weeks; probably just the normal culture shock period kicking in, as it started just over a month in.  I was tired of Chinese food, tired of learning the language ( I don't think I learned a single word in the last three weeks), tired of answering the phone, tired of lesson planning, even tired of traveling, or planning to travel.  Just tired. So, as I usually do, I escaped into the world of stories; it all started with Star Trek on a rainy evening, then wandered into the Narnia series, then on into Harry Potter (still trying to dig my way out--I love it, but goodness, you get pulled into that world, and it's hard to get out again), then into a "How I Met Your Mother" marathon.  I did my work, but in any gaps of time, I didn't think; I tuned out.  I was just living for the next chance to tune out again.  

Anyhow, over the last few days I feel like I've woken up.  Suddenly learning Chinese seems like a worthwhile, nay, necessary pursuit--I'm really tired of the same three dishes I know how to read on the menu.  I've figured out two more just today.  I'm looking forward to next week's lesson; I've got several ideas I can't wait to try.  I want to spend time with people.  I want to get busy figuring out a trip to take during the winter holiday.  I want to let myself think again.  

Culture shock and adjustment is an odd thing.  

The Schedule

I am, and always have been, a terrible procrastinator. Those who knew me well in college can attest, and don't get my mother started on the topic.  I am the type of person who needs a routine and deadlines; I work best under pressure. It's so ingrained by now that I frequently find myself procrastinating things I want to do. 

I know I could be a better teacher, both in class and out of it, if I could be more organized personally.  Every time I've made a major life change over the past five years or so, I've sworn to myself that this time I'm going to make a schedule for myself, and make myself set aside specific times for exercise, Bible study, lesson planning, grading, etc. so that I am more consistent in my self-discipline and less stressed professionally.  I've always gotten by alright, but I know I am capable of so much more if I could only focus.  To tell you the truth, I've been trying for more than just five years--I remember even as a child thinking that 'next year, I'll push myself to read more nonfiction and learn more about subjects I'm interested in than what they teach in school.'  But in the last five years, I've really thought I would actually do it...

When I moved to Milan, I was reading  Gordon McDonald's Ordering Your Private World, and I had grandiose plans about how much I could accomplish once I finally mastered self-discipline.  When I moved to China the first time, it was another chance to start over and do better this time.  When I changed jobs from Lewisburg back to Columbia, I was going to use the extra time in the morning I had spent commuting and do an exercise video each morning.  Of course they all failed. 

And here I am again, starting over in a new place, new job, new responsibilities.  Same need to be more disciplined.  However, I think I've learned some things about myself; when I worked at Campbell Plaza, I was a very organized and productive person.  I had a detailed schedule, and I followed it.  We were busy in the afternoon, but not in the mornings, so I learned to get my work done first thing so I would be available to wait on customers later.  I even exercised more regularly than ever before thanks to a program at the YMCA that the bank offered.  So, I'm trying the same approach here in this life, even though it's a completely unstructured environment, unlike the bank.  I have made a schedule for myself with time slots for exercise, Bible study, grading, lesson planning, and reading (weird I have to schedule in reading--such is the pull of mind-numbing entertainment on the internet that I am way behind in reading all the books that I know would be helpful to me professionally and spiritually). 

Tomorrow is the first day of the schedule.  Already I've had to rearrange some things, as I have to run to the bus station in the morning to buy a ticket, but if I can get up early enough in the morning to get in some exercise first, then it'll be a start.  I want to do more than get by in life; I want to be the productive person I know I could be if only I could get my own willpower to cooperate. 

My (Short) Life as a Morning Person

The first week of adjusting to the thirteen-hour time difference between U.S. Central time and China time is always an education experience for me—I get to see what it’s like to be a morning person, something I haven’t been since sometime around middle school.  My natural rhythm is going to sleep at two and getting up at ten; my normal real-world adjustment is going to sleep around midnight and getting up around seven; but this week I’ve been going to bed around ten and getting up about five-thirty.  And not just getting up—getting up with energy and being productive.  Normally it does me no good at all to wake up early—I accomplish nothing I’m not getting paid for (powerful motivator to wake up, that) until at least noon.  

The last few days, six to nine in the morning has been the part of the day when I was most productive.  Usually, it’s about two to four in the afternoon and eleven until two at night; I can get more done after midnight than the whole rest of the day put together.  Anyhow, it’s nice seeing how the other half of you people live…by next week, I’ll be adjusted and hitting the snooze button four times again.  

Superpowers

The conversations we get into at work…Jo started it.  If you could have a superpower, what would be a good thing to have?   Jo’s first thought was to have a new-and-improved Midas touch—the power to turn objects into cash, but only when you mean to do it, to avoid the nasty side effects King Midas suffered from.  Karen protested that Jo had got the best one, but if she had something like that to make some money, she’d like to travel, so the ability to teleport would be useful—she could see a lot of new places if it didn’t take hours to get there. 

Then they turned to me.  While I was thinking, Latasha made the observation that a lot of people think reading minds would be fun, but that it sounded like a terrible superpower to her.   We all agreed with her reasoning—hearing what people deem appropriate to say out loud is bad enough; we certainly don’t want to know the things they filter. 

I finally decided that if we had the Midas touch and could teleport, then we needed the time to do fun and meaningful things with those abilities—so I would have a bewitched-style power of putting things in order: Twitch! The table is cleared.  Twitch! The laundry is in the washing machine.  Twitch! The shower is sparkling.  More time for travel and money-spending!  Latasha one-upped Jo; she said we should just have the power to get what we needed free, and skip the objects-into-money step altogether. 

The big things taken care of, we turned to fun: I would love to fly, but Jo says she’d be terrified to try it.  Powers can fail, she reasoned.  What if somebody showed up with kryptonite?  Reflecting on Karen’s teleportation travel, I added that the ability to pick up languages instantaneously would be quite useful.  Karen agreed with me, and then told us how, as a child in the Philippines, she and her brothers and cousins would play X-Men, and she always wanted to be Storm.  Her favorite part of the game was standing on a stump, hand raised, yelling, “Storm!” to the gathering clouds.

Yup, the conversations that happen at work…so, which of our superpowers would you choose?  Do you have one to add?

Adult Birthdays...Meh

I celebrated my twenty-eighth birthday in the usual adult style—working 9 to 5.  To make it even more enjoyable, it was my hump day, even though it was Thursday, as I as scheduled to work that Saturday (although I really can’t complain about that, as I do the scheduling…) And what a lovely day it was—one of those days when we were short staffed, I was in charge, and everybody had a problem.  Our favorite (where’s the sarcasm font when you need it?) customer came in an threw a full-on, cursing, insulting tantrum, which is rather unbecoming in a sixty-year-old man, and it was gloomy and gray, which made it uncomfortably cold in the air conditioning. I went to Zumba after work, and then home to fix dinner—Mom had promised me barbecued chicken and broccoli salad for my birthday, but she had self-defense training (“Butt-kicking class,” as she and her friends refer to it), so I got to cook my own birthday dinner.  I made pasta with my two favorite sauces, though—Yay for comfort food.  (Edit: I finally got my barbecue chicken and broccoli salad on August 14th!)

However, my coworkers made up for it the next day. India (whose birthday was three days after mine) and I had a joint celebrations; we all brought food for a potluck snack-fest; I brought more of my favorite pasta, Latasha brought chips and plates, Karen brought chicken nuggets and vegetarian crescent roll pizza, India managed to make edible brownies despite her fame as a non-cooker, and Jo brought her trademark pigs-in-a-blanket and a crock pot full of Rotel dip, enough to feed all of us until we couldn’t move as well as several Kroger employees.  They also gave us a few little gifts; my favorite was lip gloss in the shape of a miniature Mountain Dew can. 

Ever since I graduated college, I’ve felt about twenty-six.  I’m not sure why twenty-six, of all ages; I guess I felt like I was still young, but didn’t feel the urge to be a wild twenty-one-year-old out partying.  Most of my friends that I spent a lot of time with during the period from the time I was twenty-two until, well, the last few months really, were quite a bit older than me; most of them, in fact, were married with children.  However, now twenty-six has come and gone, and I still feel about the same.  I still want to be a carefree twenty-something with plenty of time, but thirty is looming in the near future, and the biological clock ticks pretty loudly sometimes; I wonder how many times I can push the snooze button.    

I’ve loved my twenties; I’ve enjoyed being single and free and able to easily pick up and move to whichever far-flung place I found work to do.  Sometimes it just seems like these years have gone too fast.  There’s a song that my Pandora station plays frequently, with lyrics that go, “We are young, let’s set the world on fire!”  I feel kind of sad when I hear it, although I like it—I feel like I’m no longer part of the youth scene; setting things on fire sounds irresponsible. :)

Ravenclaw!

Okay, I'm being a dork, I know.  I'm twenty-seven, and I just got around to reading all the Harry Potter books, and watching all the movies (only ten years or so late!).  Anyways, I'm not in a very productive mood today, so I was goofing around online, and I found a site that confirmed what I'd already thought: if I went to Hogwarts, I'd have been in Ravenclaw.  I knew that's where I'd want to be ever since I read the description of their common room... :)

The sorting hat says that I belong in Ravenclaw!
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Said Ravenclaw, "We'll teach those whose intelligence is surest."

Ravenclaw students tend to be clever, witty, intelligent, and knowledgeable.
Notable residents include Cho Chang and Padma Patil (objects of Harry and Ron's affections), and Luna Lovegood (daughter of The Quibbler magazine's editor).

Take the most scientific Harry Potter Quiz ever created.
Get Sorted Now!

The Waiting Time

Lately, I've been going back and typing up some old journals and adding them as posts here.  I've got a couple from my first experience living outside the U.S. on a semester abroad in Belgium when I was a junior in college (fall of 2004, if you're looking for the posts).  It took quite a while to click back enough months to put them in their right chronological place in the blog...kind of like watching life fly by.  It'll be eight years this year since that trip. 

I guess everybody struggles sometimes with time passing by.  I'll be twenty-eight this year; sometime I feel near panic at how fast time goes.  There's so much I want to do in life; I want to marry, have children, write, travel, live...and the biological clock is ticking louder and louder insinuating that I had better hurry, I'll run out of time, it'll be too late...

And here I am, living with my parents, working a job that I know is just a time-filler and that, though I once enjoyed, is becoming more and more grating.  I'm in the same place as I was when I was twenty, before and after that grand adventure of being an inexperienced college student thinking I was a great world traveller sitting in coffee shops in western Europe, drinking hot chocolate because I don't even like coffee.  Depression seems to close in sometimes; it has for the past few days; feeling shame at not being on my own, at not having accomplished more, at loosing myself in stories instead of living my own--but i know it's lying.  Yes, I'm in a boring point in my life, but it's only a stop.  I haven't built a great career or started a family or earned more degrees, but the last few years haven't been wasted.  The work I did in Italy and in China was worth the time spent, and the traveling in between has been more of an education that many college classes. 

I'm in a rut right now, and there has been a lot of wasted time.  And I don't just mean time spent with him; even though it didn't work, the relationship and the time spent in it taught me a lot about myself and what I can and can't give up and compromise.  It would have been nice to have learned those lessons in less time, but life is life and there's no point worrying about it now.  And where I am now, this is not because I'm floundering around looking for direction.  I know my direction, but I need to stay here for now and save money to be able to start on the next adventure.  By August, I should be ready. 

It's only my own lack of self-discipline and caving in to depression that makes this period a waste of time.  I have so much to be doing--I have years of photos I've been looking forward to scrapbooking, stacks of books on my to-read list; I need to be working on my Chinese, and studying the Bible with much more discipline and purpose.  I need to write more; I've wanted to write ever since I knew what letters were, but again it's my own self-discipline that's holding me back.  I need to get back in shape so that I can climb mountains again. I have so much I need to do now, before I'm busy teaching and travelling again and won't have the time.  But it seems like I go through too many period like this weekend of accomplishing very little, because I let the boredom and loneliness settle into a great weight around me. 

The last couple of weeks, I've drowned myself in the Harry Potter series.  I'd never read the books before, and I'd seen only one of the movies.  I always thought it sounded like the sort of thing I'd like, but when all my friends were reading them in high school and college, I didn't want to read them because they were too trendy--I, as the cultured English major, didn't want to be reading something just because of the sensationalism around it.  I'd wait and see if they stuck around awhile.  (However, I don't think I'll ever get around to Twilight, no matter how long they stick around.  I value my brain cells).  Of course, once I started reading the Harry Potter books, I couldn't stop.  I read during my lunch breaks, and for a couple of hours every night, and read the entire series in about a week and a half.  Then, I watched all the movies.  I've watched the last two probably three or four time each.  I don't know why this blinding obsession, but I had a hard time focusing on anything else.  This weekend, though, it felt like I was stuck in the foreboding, stress, and uncertainty of the search for the horcruxes; the scene stuck in my head was the one where Harry and Hermione dance in the tent, trying to break a little of the unbearable tension of their lives.  I've watched the last movie twice and read the last half of book seven again to get myself past it.  Weird how a fictional world can pull you in, but I guess I'm particularly vulnerable to getting lost in a fictional world right now as my real life isn't particularly interesting. 

However, getting lost in them also just reinforced the bit of panic about time passing by--in the Harry Potter series, it's now much closer to the "nineteen years later" than the original series.  If it were real, Harry and Ginny's kids would now be seven, six, and four.

I've been thinking lately about the epic stories that capture our imaginations--Lord of the Rings, the Harry Potter series, the Narnia series...and in each, it's children or teenagers who have the bravery to change their worlds...Frodo, Harry, the Pevensie children...I haven't read the Hunger Games yet, but my friends are all screaming at me to do so, but from what I know of that, it's the same thing...now, I know the "coming of age" plot is a staple of literature, but for someone closer to thirty and than twenty it's also a bit depressing sometimes.  I know they aren't real, and that real life doesn't go like stories, but I can't help but wonder sometimes if it's not too late; if I wasn't a child prodigy, is there any chance of being a hero now?  Has anyone else ever felt like that, wanting to read about the "Harry Potter" who is a thirty-year-old single woman?  It seems everything written about people my own age is all about sexual relationships that just emphasize the desperation in the continued wait for Prince Charming to come along and finally usher in a beautiful life. 

You know, that was part of why I wasn't happy with him.  He could offer me that--getting married, having children--that's supposed to be the happily ever after, but I wanted more than that; while I do want that, desperately, having children is not the end of my ambition in life.  I want them, but I want them to be raised as part of something bigger than themselves, as part of work that is more than just muddling through day after day.  I didn't want to have to give up adventure and purpose and feeling alive just to have them, for their sakes as much as mine. 

Indie Travel Week 1: Resolutions

As I mentioned in my last post. to get myself back in the habit of writing regularly, I'm going to do the 2012 Indie Travel Blog Challenge.   This is an idea from Bootsnall, which is one of my favorite travel websites.  It's been a website to daydream on, as it wasn't blocked at work over the past few months.

The first week's topic is resolutions, surprise surprise.  Although not terribly original, I do appreciate that we have a time each year that we think about where our lives are at and what we'd like to improve.  It's too easy to get so busy living that we don't stop to evaluate and check our direction, and besides, we all need a fresh start sometimes.

My first resolution is, obviously, to write this blog about resolutions.  One down!  Well, really, 1/52 down.  I really want to write, but lack of self-discipline is my worst shortcoming.  The challenge involves writing a blog post  each week, so I'm going to keep you all hanging until December to see if I really keep it or not.  Or at least until next week when I forget to post.  No.  I'm going to do this...I will write a weekly post. I will write a weekly post.  I will write a weekly post.  There.  Leave obnoxious comments if I don't. 

My more difficult resolution is the classic one: I've got to get in better shape.  I've blogged before about my very favorite of all my adventures: mountain hiking.  There was Mt. Etna in 2006, the hike up the mountain on the shore of Lake Como to the lighthouse on Pasquetta (the day after Easter, a public holiday in Italy) in the spring of 2007, Swiss Alps around St. Moritz, and then later around the Matterhorn in summer and winter 2007 (well, I took a train/ski life for most of it on both of those), summer camp in the Sibylline Mountains in central Italy in the summers of 2008 and 2009, looking into the crater of Mt. Vesuvius in May of 2009, hiking in the Tatras in southern Poland in 2009, Hua Shan and Huang Shan in China in the summer of 2010, and, well, Rock City on Lookout Mountain in 2011 (well, it was fun, if not quite so exotic as past years...).  But each year the mountains get a little harder on my knees.  Each year the getting-there gets more miserable.  Hua Shan involved a lot of prayer.  The peaks are always worth it, but the getting-there would be a lot more fun, too, if I kept myself in better shape in the meantime.  And my face wouldn't be so red in all the pictures.

After spending this past year entirely in the U.S., with ubiquitous cars, no sidewalks, and too many creature comforts indoors, I especially need to get into some better habits.  I was going to join some exercise classes offered by my job, but they've schedule them to where everyone from my branch can't attend them (still miffed over that one).  Once I get my new computer, I'll download some of my favorite exercise videos again.  I've thought of catching up on actually watching some of my DVD collection while peddling on the stationary bike upstairs. That doesn't seem to really be much of a workout, but I suppose it would be better than nothing.  I'd go for a walk, but it's dangerous to walk along the highway or in the parking lot at work; we've got the woods behind the house, but the summer I'd get eaten alive by bugs.  In the fall, our neighbors all deer hunt. In winter, it's dark by the time I get home.  That leaves a bit of early spring before the bugs come out too bad.   I also need to forget that Little Debbie Brownies even exist; unfortunately, the rack of them is directly within my line of view all day long at work. :(  Why does it seem  like healthy habits are so inconvenient around here?  When I lived in Italy or in China, or even in college, for that matter, you had to walk to get to public transportation.  You had to walk to the grocery store.  There were sidewalks everywhere and large safe parks to walk in.  There were neighborhoods to meander through and explore; there were towers/belfries/hills/domes to climb for the view.  The lack of walking as a part of everyday life is one of my biggest gripes about life in the U.S.  I get too lazy here.  

Getting in shape may not seem like a travel resolution, but I think it is for me--or at least, that's my biggest motivation for it.  I want to be in better shape to make my travel adventures easier and kinder to my knees. 

Now, the resolution I like to daydream the most about is, as it has been for years, to find my mountain for 2012.  I keep hoping that one of these years it's going to be to Everest base camp, or in the Andes to Machu Picchu, or, my ultimate dream, Kilamanjaro, but I don't think that any of those are going to be right for 2012.  I'm not sure what it will be...but somehow I'll find one.

New Chapter in Life

As usual, I've gotten behind on my blog.  I guess the act of writing, especially about traveling, makes me want...more.  When I'm writing, I long to learn, to experience, to grow, to have adventures...and over this past year I was living a life where those thoughts were a bit...dangerous isn't exactly the right word.  Well, thinking too much about traveling, writing, learning, having adventures made me dissatisfied with the life I was living.  It was easier to just not think about those things as I tried to be "normal" and settle in to small-town life.  So I focused my mind on other things, because the days I spent listening to travel podcasts or researching destinations made me feel like a traitor to this life I thought I wanted.

In the end, the dissatisfaction with that life won out.  I don't want to have to avoid what makes me happy, what makes me feel alive, what makes me feel like I'm developing myself as a person, just to be relatively contented in a life that I'm told is "normal" and that everyone around me is happy with.  And so I've left that life, and although I hate that it hurt the person I shared that life with, I can look to the future with excitement again.  I'm still staying in middle Tennessee for a while; I've got a (broken down, unfortunately) car to pay off, a new job, and some life-organizing to do, and besides, I need to save up some money.  But I'm planning.  I'm dreaming.  I'm living my life again, instead of tagging along on someone else's.

And so, I decided it was time to revive this blog.  I've got so many stories I've never told, and now I know there will be stories ahead to tell as well. 

Train to the Future

Today, I am on a train to Rapallo, near Genova.  Matteo and I are going to spend a few days with Nadia and her family at their house by the sea.  I've finally come out from under the clouds that covered Milan, and it is a beautiful evening here in the mountains we're crossing—or, we would be if we weren't mostly in tunnels.   Matteo will stay until Saturday; I will probably return to Milan Wednesday evening or Thursday morning.   I have things I need to work on before going to the convegno in Firenze next week.  It's a little strange—while writing this I keep thinking in Italian and translating back into English. 

I can't get out of my head today the book I just read—A Touch of Betrayal by Catherine Palmer.   It's one of series of four, of which Tammy has and I borrow the second and third.   I read the second first, but the third one I read twice because I wasn't ready to get out of the story yet.  I think the titles of her books are a little overdramatic, but I enjoyed the stories.  The books are Christian romance novels, which I love, even though I don't always want to admit that, being a serious former English major and all, that I like such fluff.  But, it's wonderful just to read for the pleasure and escapism of it, something I just don't do as much as I used to. 

It's wonderful, too, to read books written about people who live in my "real world," –people who follow a code of morality and whose relationship with God is a part of day-to-day life   It's something refreshing to me in today's culture where God and spiritual things are completely left out of popular entertainment.  I wish we were more open to talk about our spiritual lives.  That's probably the most important reason I have for wanting a husband someday—I want someone to be mutually accountable with, someone to pray with, to talk about my spiritual ups and downs, to encourage each other.   I want to raise my children to be truly integrated—not to compartmentalize spirituality from other aspects of life; I know I often have.  Growing up, it seemed we so rarely talked about our faith.  We prayed together at meals, but almost never at any other times.  I want to be more comfortable sharing that part of life together.   I'm hoping things will be different now that Dad also had become a Christian,  We need to take advantage of the spiritual high the family is on now to talk more openly.  It's also something I need to put into my work here in a much bigger way.   I'm more of a project person—I plan things, do thing, teach—but I'm not as good at building deeper relationships.  I get along well with everybody, but often at a fairly superficial level.   I need to find a way to work in more discussion of where people are spiritually and their highs and lows; I need to work towards more meaningful conversation.  It is difficult when I only see most of the church members briefly after the service on Sunday.   I need to make it a priority to find a way to spend more time with individuals outside of church activities; I would like to invited people over to my place for lunch, but I haven't yet as I didn't know if people would really want to come all the way out to my place; it's out of the way for most of my friends.  But, maybe they would. 

Back to the book I mentioned earlier—the series is set in various parts of Africa, and is about three sisters and a brother, as adults; as they find love, find God, etc.  My head has been in Africa all day.  I would love to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro.  Now, there is a motivation to get in shape!  Grant, the man in the story, is an anthropologist living with the Maasai; he is studying their stories and myths, and trying to write down all these important parts of the heritage before the children all go off to the city and the ancient culture is lost.  It sounds like a wonderful work.  I've though the last few years that I would go back to grad school, and then teach English literature.   But, it seems so meaningless in the grand scheme of things, to be wrapped up in the minutiae of academia.  I want to be involved in missions; I would like to study languages, cultures—to travel.  And yet, somehow it seems selfish or unwise to live my life like I want to live it.  What I really want to do is, after next summer when I finish my commitment here in Milan, is to find somewhere else to go to teach English (or whatever other job is available), and learn another language.  I think I could learn Spanish fairly easily, now that I speak Italian—I can already understand it pretty well.  I was reading online the other day that English teachers can earn quite a bit of money in Korea.   However, I really need better certification.   And, I don't know if I'm brave enough to move to Asia, to a country I've never seen, with such a very different culture.   But, somehow, I would like to learn another language, and I want to travel. 

There are people who save up some money, and then just go travel—backpack around the world.   Why not me?  Then I think—it would be more responsible to get a job, earn money, settle down—but why?  You only live once.  The only thing really stopping me is wondering what mom will say.   Everybody will think I'm crazy—but I just want to be free.   And I don't have a husband or children, my parents are still young and in good health—so to who is it irresponsible?  But how do those who backpack find the money to do it?  I, so far in life, haven't been very good at making money.  But it has been worth it—I wouldn't trade the time I've spent doing mission work in Italy for a high paying but lifeless job in an office.   Somehow, I want to see the world.  And then, after a few more years, I do want to marry and have children.  I often feel that biological clock ticking—the older I get, the more I look forward to having children.   I've come across several websites on homeschooling lately—it's something I'm very interested in.  

And then there's finding someone to marry.  Reading these romance books make me wonder if I'll ever find anyone to feel that strongly about to feel that way about me.  I daydream, but in reality—I'm not the type you find in romance novels   I know God has a plan for me, and that he will send the right person into my life, so it isn't something that I spend a lot of time really worrying about.  It's just that sometimes I feel lonely for someone I haven't met yet.   Usually I'm fine—I'm happy being single, and I'm not at a point where I want to settle down.   But sometimes—it seems to be about a month out of the year or so—when it seems I feel lonely more than usual.  It hasn't been too bad yet this year (it was downright depressing last year, around May), but still I want someone to talk to, to tell all those little details of everyday life.  I can talk to Mom about most things, but as close as we are, there are still things she doesn't understand—some, because we are of different generations, and some because I live in a different culture.  She doesn't know the people I know or how they think, or the ups and downs of life as a missionary.  And besides, it's expensive to call the U.S.!