Something we all ought to do

Without needless explanation, let me justly state that life has not necessarily ventured along the charted course. Or perhaps more accurately, I have not exactly plotted the most enlightened path. So I have found the last 3 years of particular note, the stuff psalms are written of.
In a note of inspiration, a good friend encouraged me to write down all the wonderful parts of life, to help gain perspective. This is written with optimism (which is much more difficult to pull off than cynicism).

A -
B -
C - Chock Full o' Nuts - a coffee tin, sitting on my desk as a pencil holder, which originally held Chocolate Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies from a flirtatious girl from Athens who brought them to my dorm room one night 13 years ago.

D - Deal, as in 'my deal', which is likely the modern equivalent to 'God's will';) Searching these years of dissatisfaction for some clue as to what I am most joyful participating in was a valid pursuit. Gaining clarity here has been a relief and source of energy unknown for a long time prior.

E -
F -
G - Garrett Haoge Bowling - the biggest pain in my tail in my life, who I am finding myself loving like a son. It has been so much harder than anything I could have imagined... set me to spiraling. But as I have asked myself if I would change what I did, I am always met by God, knowing that He has done with me what I have done with Garrett, and if there is one thing in life I know was the right thing to do, this is it. You've got to allow yourself to rest in that.

H -
I -
J -
K -
L -
M - McK - I have a hard time rightly explaining why we do as well as we do. But I cannot imagine my life without her, and dare not even try. All others pale in comparison.

N -
O -
P - Pastor D.E. - for the first time in my life, I swallowed my pride and went to my pastor, asked for help, and allowed him to counsel me. I gave up part of what made me who I was, and gained a great deal in return.

Q -
R -
S -
T -
U -
V -
W -
X -
Y -
Z -

God wants to do in us before He wants to do with us.

Let us start: I am to rest in the mere presence of God.
We'll not pretend this is easy, self-absorbed as we are. Even one who purports himself considerate of others is found the egoist in the vicinity of our maker.
And then, when God is clearly before me,
I am emptied of pride,
Dispossessed of my drive for gain.
Wait.

In His time, He who is beyond time will reveal His direction,
His calling for the days and years upcoming.

Faithful is He who calls you, and He also will bring it to pass.

And after I surrender myself,
after I have let go,
after I wait,
after I hear...

Upon the completion of the time of pausing, in faith, I must trust
that everything that God has called me to do,
he has prepared me to do,
is equipping me to do,
and will lead me to fulfill.

In that time, with the confidence of God before me, I must move.

Where it all began

Ask me whether what I have done is my life.

Some time when the river is ice ask me mistakes I have made,
Ask me whether what I have done is my life.
Others have come in their slow way into my thought,
and some have tried to help or to hurt:
Ask me what difference their strongest love or hate has made.

I will listen to what you say.
You and I can turn and look at the silent river and wait.
We know the current is there, hidden;
and there are comings and goings from miles away that hold the stillness exactly before us.
What the river says, that is what I say

William Stafford, (c) 1977

www.selfinjury.com/the_vent

For those of you blessed to not have experienced the reality of Ma Tech, a bit of insight to help in the description: there is no reality, only theory.

Reality comes later, I've been promised. The professor [insert any one of them here, it matters not] continually advertises how what we are doing now will lead to some very useful tools in the future. I finished last semester's course with the same question from ten years ago: "What did I just learn?"

Three weeks into Hydrology and I'm spending one hour between each class studying material that I'm pretty comfortable with, and 6 hours between each class trying to write a simple computer program to display the material.

Then there's Water Resources, a title that was randomly selected to help ensure students sign up for the course. The best face I can put on the course is that I think that I am being taught something that may help me in high-level computations of something in the future, assuming that I am involved with those computations for some reason. The first homework is a simple problem... except that it cannot be solved without computations... so let us venture into the world of computer programming again. While the general discussion topics are within conceptual grasp, I am 20+ hours into teaching myself MatLab, with not much working and little enery left.

I am hoping, praying, that somehow I both make it through this semester learning a bit of the class information, and (apparently) more importantly, how to program.