fastblog's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- day 1: trucker appreciation day don't we all love truckers? today was blindingly sunny. it started out badly -- I was more tired than usual, for no discernable reason, and hadn't gotten as much sleep as I needed. on top of the empty stomach, a well-meaning family member had put my work boots in a pile of household crap in my garage, resulting in twenty minutes of fruitless searching before I finally broke down and called her at work. it was a bad way to start the morning. traffic was lame as usual, and I had to fight the urge to rage at other drivers by praying for strength and trying to focus on a radio program discussing the four paternal leaders of the Old Testament. my Bible reading has been pretty focused in the New Testament since my conversion in February 2004, with a few exceptions of structured Bible studies and school reading. now that I've learned what's expected of me and internalized Jesus' message, I have a deep curiosity and even a need to look at the OT. I read Proverbs and Isaiah earlier in 2006 and started Ecclesiastes last night. The first three chapters of Ecclesiastes was slightly depressing, actually -- basically Solomon talking about how nothing in this world can satisfy us, how nothing under the sun is new, and how even joyful things fade and are replaced. I performed my usual duties with the usual politeness, only this time colder and bored-er than usual. it's just less emotional effort not to care or make conversation. it's even worse when people are intentionally messing with your head, as they often do in my line of work. it's a real test of social/emotional endurance and I'm not always up for it. some of yesterday's encounters with the travelling public left me absolutely shaking with anger, though I didn't resort to rudeness or anything like that. in the busy summer months, I deal with around 500 people a day, which translates into a lot of assholes even if 97% of the travellers are decent. in the meantime, I screwed up two documents in like 15 minutes. I can't decide whether this is a side effect of lack of sleep, lack of food, or if it's just my usual idiocy. in any case, I'm unimpressed with myself. it's one of those situations where I need to be relying on God fully to give me strength, but it's easy to attempt to look to myself for the strength that I obviously don't have right now, especially when my reputation and paycheque are on the line... I suppose it's a lesson to turn to God for everything, to the complete disregard of material gain. another part of my "fast" is abtinence from dating. this is more difficult than it sounds, because even when I'm not dating, I develop crushes and become attracted to people. this is only natural, but at the same time I've realized that it gets in the way of developing healthy, objective friendships with student peers, coworkers and Christian brothers and sisters. I have to keep reminding myself of this. just recently I got all excited when I realized that a certain attractive coworker was going to be returning for the summer... then had to consciously chastise myself for thinking that way. of course, only minutes later I found out he would not be returning to our location. once again, God steps in. it gets boring at work. the only time I miss Most Recent Lame Older Ex (henceforth referred to as Marlowe, an adaptation of the acronym MRLOE) is when the office is quiet and there is a glaring lack of email in my work inbox. this is sad. I don't miss him. breaking up was the correct move, and in fact, I never should have dated him in the first place. more on this later, I have the distinct impression that I should probably be doing work. 12:23 p.m. - 2006-05-06 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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