News from the Great Beyond

Everything That's On My Mind... Newbies and Warm Fuzzies Edition

Right off the bat, let me laugh at my last post when I declared that I'd short circuit the procrastination cycle... while I did procrastinate less on the planning process for my weekly Word blog post, and with my melatonin regimen resumed got back to a normal sleep pattern, astute readers will probably note that I managed not to write my post here at all last week. 

Well, I can't just go cold turkey on the procrastination thing, right?

Anyway, as a result today I have a two-for-one special on links to my Word shared blog contributions:

First up is from Sunday, 2/12, in which I compare and contrast the parting of the Red Sea and the Garden of Gesthemane scene in Matthew.  Ummm... yeah, you'll have to read it to get the picture.  It looks something like this, though:

Click here for Day #43 - Grand Gestures and Silent Suffering

Second is today's post, in which I discuss the consecration of the priesthood in Exodus, how married couples end up ignoring one another, self-righteous religious folk, and Jesus' scandalous behavior in the book of Mark.  I also use the dreaded term "paradigm shift".

Click here for Day #50 - The Letter of the Law

As mentioned here, I've gotten rather involved in playing online mafia.  By that, I do not mean anything like Mafia Wars on Facebook.  This is more of a game of interpreting others' behavior, as well as plotting and manipulation, and I've found it to be thoroughy entertaining.  Here's a flash tutorial on the basic concept, for those who haven't heard of it.

I just finished my first full game a few days ago, and it turns out I've got something of a natural aptitude, which... strangely enough, worked against me.  I made it clear at the outset of the game that I was very new at it, so as to keep expectations low and keep me from feeling utterly self-conscious if I flubbed up or didn't measure up to the standards of the more experienced players.  However, I apparently did so well at my analysis of the other players' actions that they quickly became suspicious that someone was coaching me on what to say... and that would mean I was mafia, if I was able to communicate outside the game thread with someone else giving me suggestions.

It made me laugh, because it was so utterly untrue, at least in one way.  I actually was part of the mafia team, but my teammates provided me next to no help whatsoever.  Two of my three teammates were killed during the first two day phases, and on the third day, there was a sudden rush of people calling for me to be lynched, because they just couldn't believe I was this good at the game as a newbie.

Well, they were right to lynch me, it was just the wrong reason. ;)

This game was themed, and as it was based on something I was not horribly familiar with (the X-men movies), I felt like I was missing out on some of the more subtle hints people were dropping about their characters.  One of the players in that game is set to moderate his own game soon, which will be themed around the TV show Firefly, which I've also never watched.  Lucky for me Amazon Prime members can watch Firefly on streaming video for free.

Anyway, I'm next up to substitute into a game in progress that's a bit more advanced in its setup, and promises to strain my brain in mutiple ways before it's through.

Speaking of newbies and brain strain (look, Bob, a segue!)...  Friday was my last day on the phones for 6+ weeks as I have been tapped yet again as the Subject Matter Expert (read: assistant to the trainer) in our next new hire class.  I've been trying not to rub salt in the wounds of my overworked and stressed-out coworkers, but it's hard not to be a bit jubilant.  I had such a great time working with the new hire class last September. 

I'll be back to working Monday-Friday 8:00am to 4:30pm, which gives me time to get up at a decent hour and hit the gym before I get ready for work.  Technically I could have been doing that for the last several weeks as well, but after catching the creeping crud that was going around the office, I got out of the habit of forcing myself to get up at oh-dark-thirty to exercise.  One change in routine is sufficient for me to commit to another change in routine.  Plus my Kindle has been missing me lately -- with as many "to be read" paperbacks as I have sitting around the house, I refuse to let myself use the e-reader unless I'm traveling or at the gym.

My blog posts here, with the schedule change, are most likely to happen on Saturdays or Sundays for the next couple of months.  I'm still trying to get in at least one a week here, while sticking to my weekly schedule at the Word blog.  Additional creative writing will eventually be worked into the schedule as the muse strikes.

Thanks for stopping by, leave a comment if you will.  Comments give me the warm fuzzies, and we could all use a few more warm fuzzies in our lives.

Everything That's On My Mind... Stress and Sleep Edition

As mentioned last week, the grocery store run to restock on melatonin didn't actually happen.  Regretfully, as it turns out, because by the end of the week, the short supply of sleep apparently started to catch up with me in strange ways.

There's the usual "don't want to get up in the morning" thing, which is hard enough to overcome for me on the best days, and the whole desperate need of coffee to kickstart the brain, which goes along with not being a morning person anyway... but apparently by Saturday, while I wasn't feeling particularly tired or cranky, I was completely stressed out and didn't even realize it.

Saturday afternoon, lunch time.  I wandered by the technical coach on duty's desk on my way out the door to pick up lunch, and decided to ask her for some advice on an escalated issue (read: multiple supervisor calls over the past couple of weeks) that I'd gotten stuck with.  My supervisor overheard the conversation and decided to ask me to give her the basics so she could help clarify things somewhat, as it was partially due to an error on the part of one of our representatives and partially due to the customer's mistaken assumption, and the customer was expecting quite an expensive resolution.  At one point, about 20 minutes after I paused to ask for a quick bit of advice, I realized that I was almost out of time for lunch, and my supervisor, bless her heart, asked me why on earth I was sitting at her desk talking about work on my lunch break instead of taking the time for myself like I ought to.

And yeah, for no apparent reason, I got tears in my eyes, and realized that I was completely overwhelmed. 

It took me nearly 10 minutes to get back to some semblance of control, and then I was ordered to go get lunch and take my full 30 minutes, then send my supervisor the particulars so she could follow up on it, and let it go for pity's sake.  Apparently I am sometimes a little too conscientious for my own good.

Truthfully I was still a little shaky during my lunch break, but I got through the rest of the afternoon without incident and sent my boss an obsessively long e-mail with the details of said escalated issue, at which she half-jokingly chided me for telling her too much information.  She's very much a TL;DR person.

Got home Saturday night after work, and set out to write my Sunday column for the Word shared blog.  And realized the stress was still getting to me, because I had a complete mental block.  What I really needed was a good night's sleep, but I couldn't let myself procrastinate my way out of that commitment, so I pushed through until I got an idea, ran with it, and subsequently collapsed.

Yeah, I realize I forgot to link to the post on Sunday.  It's not my most inspired column yet, but for those who are curious, here it is:

Day # 36 - God of My Father

Sunday I really wanted to sleep in, but was committed to working the church nursery.  Two-plus hours with three toddlers later, I was thoroughly drained.  I had three choices:  1) a Sunday afternoon nap, which might just throw off my sleep schedule further... 2) Coffee, which would perk me up enough to accomplish a few things I wanted to do, but of which I was wary based on last weekend's zero-sleep debacle.... or 3) Iced tea with lunch, then try to wind down for bed at a decent hour. 

I'd tried to swing by the grocery store for that much-procrastinated restock on melatonin but the Super Bowl pre-party shopping was absolutely insane, so I decided on option 3, which didn't so much work as planned.  I felt like a zombie most of the afternoon, got nothing accomplished, perked up a little toward evening, tried to go to bed but couldn't shut off my brain enough to sleep well, and ended up calling in first thing Monday morning to reschedule my overtime hours to Tuesday.

Yesterday I finally said "enough is enough" and went to the store to restock on melatonin, as well as a few other things I needed.  Yeah, I've got enough to last me over a year now.  I know some friends and family who've tried it and didn't really think it did much for them, but apparently I can't do without it right now.  I popped one of those babies last night 'round 8:30 PM, and by 9:30 I was sound asleep.

And woke up at 2:20 AM feeling extremely refreshed.  Too good for being the middle-of-the-damn-night, to be honest, and I knew I'd be miserable without more sleep by the time I needed to be at work at 7, so I tossed and turned a while and managed to drop off again...  AND... overslept, missing my rescheduled overtime shift.  Err, whoops!

Meh.  I'm sure to get hassled a bit for not doing my overtime two weeks in a row, but after my emotional stress-ball scene on Saturday, I think my supervisor will probably be inclined to cut me some slack. 

Today, I'm feeling good.  I feel really rested for the first time in a couple of weeks.  I'm short-circuiting the procrastination cycle on the shared blog by doing my reading today and starting the idea-drafting process.  And I'm going to enjoy this last off-day before my 40 hour work week starts again tomorrow.

Everything That's On My Mind... Obsessions and Questions Edition

Greetings, my fine friends of indubitably discriminating taste.  You are, after all, here to read my blog, and that makes you smarter than the average bear.  Or something...  Well, maybe not.  But thanks for dropping by nonetheless!

Just random things on my mind today, whilst I sit on my afternoon off and do nothing of consequence.  In my defense, I can't do much, I have a kitty sleeping across my left arm.  I do so hate to move the kitty when he's being sweet.

I have mentioned before that I tend to go through phases with my hobbies -- cycles, if you will.  I've just been through a major reading kick, but I've spent less time reading books the last week or two, and more time on my two current time wasters of choice:  Sudoku, and Mafia games.

Other recent time sinks - watching the entire run of Arrested Development on Amazon Instant Video (decided to join Amazon Prime as a trial for now)... and Season 1 of Downton Abbey.  Yes, I missed Arrested Development when it was on the air.   I'm all caught up now.  And Downton Abbey is definitely worth checking out if you haven't, I heard super things about the show, and it lives up to every one of them.  If you can find a way to watch it, I very much recommend it.

I'm also trying to get back to reading more of the blogs that I used to read on a daily basis, but I've lost the habit of checking RSS feeds since Bloglines changed hands and I lost track of my login info.

Recent semi-obsession:  Pinterest. Very useful for keeping track of recipes you want to try, DIY suggestions, craft projects, decorating ideas, etc... with a social network side benefit to allow you to stalk your friends. 

I've been staying up too late the last couple of weeks or so, and not sleeping enough except on my off days... After about 3 years of taking melatonin regularly I ran out of my current supply and decided to see how well I got along without it.  Yeah, not as well as I'd hoped.  I was up all night on Sunday (i.e. after 5 AM Monday), which may be due to drinking half a pot of coffee after lunch, but even without excessive caffeine I've been less able to wind down and call it a night, and decidedly less rested in the morning.  I had to cut my overtime hours on Monday because of the whole zero sleep thing.  I foresee a grocery store run coming up this evening to restock.

Ah, the difficulties of adjusting to a morning person's schedule when you're a definite night person. 

Speaking of things I don't get (see this link for how this connects the dots in my brain), it never ceases to baffle me when people are talking on their cell phone in the restroom at work.  Sure, bring your phone with you and check your voice mail, or text someone if you like.  Nobody else in the bathroom really wants to be forced to listen to your conversation echoing loudly off the tile.  And the person on the other end of the phone doesn't want to hear the toilet flushes and other miscellaneous sounds of restroom usage.  Muting the phone when you're performing your own functions doesn't prevent sound carrying through from everyone else who has the misfortune of being in the room while you're chatting away.  Sheesh.  /end rant

Other things on my mind... Currently in the beginning stages of planning a baby shower for early June with one of my friends (who qualifies as a little sister).  I have web resources and some nebulous ideas swirling about.  Anyone have suggestions on favorite baby shower activities?

I've been tapped as the helper again for our next new hire class starting February 20, so I'll be back to working Monday-Friday, 8:00 AM to 4:30 pm for several weeks.  I had such a great time working with our September class, and while I'll miss my 3-day weekends, the later start time does allow me to sleep an extra hour and still go to the gym, which habit has again fallen by the wayside since I got sick a few weeks ago.  Will have to buy myself a couple of new Kindle books as a bribe to keep me going, as I made a rule that while my paperback to-be-read pile is still towering, I won't let myself use the e-reader at home.  When I have something on the Kindle I'm really interested in, I tend to get on that treadmill much more regularly.  ;)

And, since I've rambled about as much as I can for now, welcome to my new blog theme.  I'm already milling around ideas for the next one.  Feedback always appreciated!

Everything That's On My Mind... Hot Tea and Honey Edition

As the great Charlie Peacock once sang, "Oh, I've got to say everything that's on my mind / I cannot keep it bottled up inside of me..."

I'm sitting here with a mug of chai laced with honey, fighting the inevitable case of winter bronchitis.  A ten hour day of sitting near sick coworkers, and voila!  The cough is developing.  Mucinex and Theraflu got me through last winter, and I suspect I may need to make a restocking run over the weekend.

Weekend.  Normally, this is Sunday, Monday and Tuesday for me, working my 4/10's shift.  Alas, right now is our busiest time of year, and mandatory overtime is in effect to the tune of 5 hours a week.  As I cannot fathom the thought of voluntarily working over 10 hours in a day (tried it once, and eleven was just. too. much.), this means one of my normally brain-dead refuse-to-leave-the-house days is marred by a trip to the office to put in something resembling an effort to be friendly and helpful.  Bah humbug.  This coming week, I'll be working 8 hours on the official company holiday Monday, then 10 hours Wednesday, 6 hours Thursday, 10 hours Friday and Saturday. 

Oh wait, that only adds up to 44.  I'm missing an overtime hour.

OH WELL!

Work is... work. There are days that, no matter what my friend and coworker believes, I struggle to make it sound like I enjoy the job.  I was a theatre minor in college, you know.  I do have a bit of a talent for acting. 

Then there are days when I actually do kind of like it -- believe it or not, these are not always the easy days where everyone is nice.  Sometimes the really difficult calls are an opportunity to prove just how awesome you really are.  I wear my Superman t-shirt, and leap tall customer service hurdles in a single bound.

Take this past Wednesday for instance.

One thing I've learned working for a mail order pharmacy is that insurance plans that require mail order for maintenance medications tend to make people angry.  Mail order required plan, plus a procrastinating customer, stir in a little attitude and sense of entitlement (and a nagging wife in the background who must add her two cents), and you've got a recipe for a difficult call.

Add in a fresh-out-of-training customer service rep's oversight, a doctor's office who does not respond promptly to pharmacy requests, a past due balance for an order the customer denies ever receiving from five months ago (despite UPS package tracking showing it was signed for), and life-or-death liver transplant meds, and you've just enabled EXPERT MODE.

One split order, two mail order overrides, a courtesy credit for the allegedly lost package, a coaching request e-mail for the newbie, and a heck of a lot of apologies later, I handed off the reasonably mollified caller to our specialty pharmacy to deal with an order they were trying to finish up, took a deep breath, and with a huge grin announced to my coworkers around me, "I WIN."

You've gotta take your victories where you can find them.

I've found myself searching for those little victories quite a lot lately, especially where writing is concerned.  After my last posts here on NftGB and on the Word shared blog, I spent an enormous chunk of the day on Sunday and Monday obsessively checking site stats and waiting for comments.

In between refreshes on my Typepad and WordPress dashboards, I did a little playing around with graphics for forum signatures on one of the sites I frequent, and after uploading a couple of new sig prospects for people to review, I spent an inordinate amount of time watching for replies and staring at the "times viewed" counter. It was really quite pathetic.

So I came up with a new banner and color scheme for this site, yet again, and am trying to force myself to wait until February to enable it, just on principle.

Now that she's blogging, I wonder if my mom is experiencing this deep and abiding need for feedback.  I'll say one thing, her second-ever post was a doozy!  She appears to have slipped right into the conversational voice of a good blogger and storyteller.  And what a story.

When my dad was diagnosed with his brain tumor, I was 1500 miles away, and deeply embroiled in the hectic preparations for my wedding that was coming up in six weeks.  I heard and saw only bits and pieces of what he and Mom were going through, and comprehended even less.  It's hard to really fathom that kind of suffering and grief until you've walked through your own... but even if you haven't, Mom's post will inspire you.  Give it a read, see for yourself.

Musings.... On Writing

A couple of weeks ago I woke up sometime before my alarm went off, in the dark with very little sense of what time it was but a sense of urgency clinging to what remained of a dream.  As I tried to drift back to sleep, a single line popped into my head, as if my subconscious was writing a story in my sleep, and it stuck with me.  I posted it on my Facebook wall when I got home that evening, so I wouldn't allow myself to forget it for future use.

"At the end, I was left with just this: Elizabeth dead, and myself out of time to mourn her."

That was all I had, but posting it on Facebook cemented my intention to turn it into something more, especially with comments from friends and family.  Mom asked me about it a few days ago, and I told her I was still mulling it over in my head.  I was slightly afraid that "mulling it over" would be as far as I would ever get, to be honest.

Yesterday I was even thinking about writing this post with a different focus - talking about the difficulty for someone as indecisive as I can be to take just a nugget of a thought and flesh it out into a full story.  

Take my sentence there, for example.  It contained the germ of a story, to be sure, but so many decisions to be made about what it meant.  Obviously it is being told in the first person viewpoint, so one has to determine who "I" am:  male or female?  I have doubts about my ability to write a convincing story from a male viewpoint... but for a while there the story seemed it may demand a male point of view.  Older than the author, or younger? 

And who is Elizabeth to the storyteller?  Wife?  Lover?  Sister?  Mother?  Daughter?  Best friend?  Colleague?  

How did she die?  Car accident? Cancer? Shot by an outlaw of some sort? Peacefully in her sleep at the age of eighty-something?

Even with all those decisions made, arbitrarily, I was going to have to come up with a reason why the storyteller would be out of time to mourn her, and those options seemed to lead me into the realm of a plot that would challenge my ability to write believably.

The results of all these decisions would have a huge impact on what kind of story it would wind up being... I mean, consider the difference between these:  An elderly man on his deathbed recalling his memories and regrets while mourning the passing of his wife of 60 years....  And a secret agent who had (perhaps unwisely) become very close to his or her informant before she was murdered by government assassins and is now running for his or her life.  Both of those stories could contain the line I came up with in my sleep, to very different effect indeed.

And then, while I was coming up with potential examples of the different stories these decisions could lead to, the perfect solution hit me.

A Day in the Life

Due to the wild popularity (snerk) of my 2004 "day in the life" account, I thought it may be interesting to relate what an average day looks like for me right now.   At least, I'll find it interesting.  Perhaps a few of you will be amused or entertained.

4:30 AM:  First alarm goes off.  I reach over to the nightstand and stab the "OK" button on my phone to acknowledge and shut up the obnoxious beeping.  Get up and go to the restroom.  Having not gained full consciousness, I fall back onto the bed and immediately drift off again.

4:50 AM: Second alarm goes off.  Explain to the cell phone alarm just how displeased I am with the fact that I have to wake up when it's still dark.  Sit up in bed and begin stretches.  Stumble around the bedroom in the dark and locate my athletic shoes with socks stuck inside them (easier to do it that way than dig around for socks in the blackness of pre-5 AM with my non-morning-person hazy brain function).  Sit on the bed and put on socks and shoes while continuing to stretch.  Track down location of sports bra and put that on as well.  Whine some more.  Brush teeth, because I cannot stand to leave the house with that morning breath taste in my mouth.

5:05 AM: Grab car keys, phone, purse, and the book du jour (today it was Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood) and get in the car to drive to the gym.  Back out of the garage and hit the garage door remote, which refuses to close the door.  Sigh heavily.  Get out of the car, walk into the garage and punch the wall control for the garage door.  Go into the house through the garage and back out the front door.  Get back in the car and sigh again.

5:07 AM:  Arrive at the intersection of my side street and the major east/west thoroughfare.  Flash high beams at the stoplight to try to trigger it to change.  Pull forward into the crosswalk.  Inch further forward, flashing high beams.  Finally trigger the stupid light change when my front tires are resting on the line at the far side of the crosswalk.

5:12 AM:  Pull up to the gym, a mile from my house. Sigh heavily.  Yawn.  Grab book and purse from the passenger seat, and pop the trunk before locking the car.  Dump purse in trunk.  Go back to car and get the towel from the front seat.  Claim a treadmill and set up the manual program for 20 minutes at a speed and incline that will give me a good heart rate for cardio (the computerized program insists it be able to measure my heart rate by keeping both hands on sensors, which makes it impossible to hold my book... plus it likes to reduce my speed and increase my incline which throws me off my rhythm).  Begin reading the book du jour.  Discover an impending pain in the left calf after 11 minutes and hit the "cooldown" button.  After cooldown, switch to the recumbent bike for 12 minutes.  Use towel to wipe off equipment and dripping forehead.  Return home.

5:50 AM: Park in front of the condo instead of fighting with the garage door opener again.  Round up clothing for the day.  Put athletic shoes with socks stuffed inside for tomorrow back against the closet door to be found in the dark.  Take shower and get ready for work.  Slip cranberry supplements and chromium picolinate in pocket to take with breakfast.  Double check to make sure I opened the chromium bottle and not the melatonin.  Falling asleep at work, not so handy.

6:25 AM:  Leave for work.  Have battle of wills with the stoplight at the intersection near my house again.  Sigh heavily.

Musings... on (un)Common Courtesy

This is so me.  When we first saw this cartoon, Hubby-head and I had a good chuckle recognizing my tendency to stay up late composing rambling blog posts or replies to the blogs and forums I frequent on the Internet.  I just could not rest knowing that there was bad information or an unchallenged viewpoint sitting there overnight corrupting the minds of complete strangers.

These last couple of weeks, though, I've been more likely to rant (internally or in writing) in response to boorish behavior rather than incorrect information.  And on the Internet, and more and more elsewhere in our society, bad behavior is rampant.

For instance, while poking through new threads on a video game forum I occasionally read, I noticed one particular post lamenting how rude and disrespectful people have been within the multi-player game.  Within the first ten responses, people began to insult the original poster's poor choices in how he geared and customized his character, and then justify their obnoxious responses as "explaining" why he gets treated badly in game.  The few people who tried to sympathize with the original poster were brushed aside and laughed at.   When I'd read several pages of this, I finally had enough, and had my rant:

Musings... on Giving

Last year at this time, I was in the midst of my first holiday season without my beloved Hubby-head, learning firsthand all that I had been told about how the holidays are so difficult when you are grieving.

This year, it is my good friend Tom who is in this place, and he and his wife are endeavoring to do something productive and bless others in a tangible way this Christmas.

First - watch this:

Then, go here and see what Tom and Deb are thinking.

Then search your own heart.

What can you do?

What will you do?

Musings.... on Facebook

Rambling post forthcoming... Don't say I didn't warn you!

So... back in the good old days, when I was blogging often and enjoying the back-and-forth with several bloggers (whose sites I still enjoy catching up on now and then), this little Internet phenomenon started turning up.  They called it "MySpace", and while many of my acquaintances began using it, I resisted.  I looked at it as "blog lite" - a place for people who didn't really have much to say.  This here weblog was "my space", and with a little bit of scripting knowledge and persistence, I could make it look just nearly however I wanted.

Hubby-head got sucked into MySpace, at least a little bit.  He had fun customizing his page, although probably as a concession to me, he agreed not to use the blog feature and post his occasional bloggable thoughts here on NftGB.  And he reconnected with some old friends via MySpace, which was pretty cool.  I didn't have any desire to join the herd, but he was happy with it.  All good.

Then after a while, I started getting e-mail notifications that certain friends were trying to get me to join some other new Internet fad called "Facebook".  From what I could gather, it was kind of like MySpace, but with a heavier emphasis on photos.   Well, as I told my hubby at the time, I could upload and share photos on the blog too.  And since there hadn't been a picture taken of me that I actually liked in years, why on earth would I want to join a place that was going to force me to display pictures?  Puh-leeze.

Fast-forward to a few months after the event that changed everything... 

I'm Ready Now

Last summer, before... everything changed... Hubby and I were helping teach the middle school/junior high Sunday School class at our church.  We hadn't exactly volunteered for this duty, mind you - the children's ministry was short of volunteers already, and they were starting this new class to give those in between kids a place.  The ones who were too young for the high school youth group, the cool kids, but felt like the elementary school age curriculum was just too childish.  This group needed teachers, and the pastors decided that until more volunteers stepped forward, they would assign couples who were already in leadership or serving in other positions - worship leaders, deacons, ushers, etc. to cover the schedule.

We were somewhat put out that we'd been volunteered, but decided not to kick up a fuss and when we got our first lesson plan, we talked to the group's organizers to see what we were expected to do.  They told us to make it fun for the kids, toss out anything from the lesson plan that seemed too "childish", the lesson plan was to be a source of ideas if we didn't have anything else to work with.   Hubby and I put our heads together and decided that our niche, and the way we felt most comfortable teaching the kids, was acting.  So, we taught them improv comedy, and used improv games to help get the lessons across.  We loved it, and the kids loved it.

Fast forward to a month or two after... everything changed... and I was informed that the age group of the class I was still on the schedule for had been altered.  My junior high kids had been moved up to the Youth Ministry, and instead I'd be in with 4th, 5th and 6th graders. 

I should tell you that I'm not comfortable with most younger kids, especially in groups.  I don't have kids of my own, I was the youngest in our family until I was 21, and I'm not trained as a teacher.  Until my brother had kids - four of them, mind you - I wasn't ever around them - and even then, I was their aunt and occasional babysitter, I wasn't trying to teach them.  I tried to make sure they were fed, didn't kill each other, and went to bed at some point before their parents got home... and even then I was not always successful.  For me, attempting to communicate something to anyone under 12 years old, unless they're a very bright kid (like my nephew Noah), I'm pretty much at a loss.  My vocabulary isn't geared toward an under-8th-grade reading level.  I say things the way I say them, and if someone doesn't understand it the first time, 9 times out of 10 I can't think of another way to say it.  I'm just out of my element with elementary school kids.  Maintaining control and teaching a group of them is out of the question.

A couple of weeks ago our new youth directors - friends of mine from the worship team, who had just started coming to our church last summer when... everything changed... asked me if I'd be willing to help out with the youth.  My fun junior highers, the ones we bonded with, were there, and some of the older kids I'd spent some time with because either they or their parents were on the worship team.  I thought about it, and decided it would be good for me to get involved with these kids - to have someone to care about and maybe even mentor.  Hearing their heart for the youth of our church stirred up some things in me - it reminded me of what it was like to be their age, growing up in church with a handful of serious kids, but a lot of people who went only because their parents made them.  I wanted more than anything to help some of these kids get grounded enough to keep from turning away and leaving the church once they get out of their parents' house. 

Also, they'd asked me to consider heading up a drama team for them, and that sounded particularly fun, if a bit bittersweet.  Hubby would have loved to be part of this, and it breaks my heart that I'm doing it alone.

That said, last night I joined the group for the youth service and started the process of getting to know the rest of the kids.  During praise and worship, I joined in, but also kept my eyes open to see what we were dealing with.  Out of 17 kids, ranging in age from 12 to 18, I saw 5 or 6 who really worshipped, and a few more that knew the songs and sang along, but weren't really paying a lot of attention.