Ramblings

Last night as I was trying to think about what I would blog this morning, I came up with one subject: Sometimes I feel like I live like a nun. Only I don't wear a habit. I just have habits. Like being so confoundingly responsible and reliable I get walked all over. Which is why I'm sequestered in a corner office not my own this morning all by myself. I'm also not Catholic...but I am single, and I do work inside four walls day in and day out doing the same things over and over again. I guess I could change into black drapery, but its way too hot to give that a second thought...

This morning I had the thought while I was out jogging at 5:30 in the dark, sweating in over 80 degree temperatures that I would entitle this post "Ramblings". Which made my heart sink. For how I would love to ramble right now in a beautiful forest in the cool of the morning, a nip of autumn in the air as September slips in from around the corner. But there are no forests in "Metroplex" Texas - just cement. And even if there were, all the trees would be dead by now because we've had a few hours of rain once in the last three months and our thermometers don't read anything below 100.

I know the east coast is posed for a hurricane forecasters say will be of mass proportions. Lucky them. Most of us in Texas would pay big money for a storm like that. Even though it would cause a lot of damage, knocking down all the dead trees. But Haley and I would be fine. We have a huge pantry right in the center of the house: lots of food and water. We could play Scrabble and Hand 'n Foot for hours!

The clapboards on my dollhouse are coming along. I've got only the narrow parts where the three sections meet and the top half of the tower left. I'll get them cut today in my sequestered corner and need to paint a few more to complete it. It's looking good, but as I was studying it earlier this week it reminded me of a haunted house: windows with no glass, clapboards and no trim. And do you know something? The whole style of that house is very much like the house in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho. Which is a little freaky.

So, why am I in a sequestered corner today? Well, two months ago the floors in our office were supposed to be done. Out would go the green carpet, in comes wood flooring. Well, after waiting and waiting it was suddenly decided yesterday that it would be done today. And if I didn't already know, I am like a postman. Come rain, snow, brutal heat, sleet, hail, hurricanes (so I actually wouldn't be in the pantry with Haley, I'd be at work) the office must be open which means only one thing: Melissa must be there. Because even though my boss put up a fight over the disruption on a Friday, it's perfectly okay because he can move Melissa to a corner in the next door law firm and take the day off. Melissa is reliable. Melissa knows her duty. Heaven and earth will pass away before Melissa doesn't do her job. At camp, they called me "hard core". I think that's another word for pushover.

A friend told me, "Well, it will be something new." But I don't see things that way. I see an office full of strangers who I hope I won't bother. Even in my little corner behind a wall so no one can see me, I feel like I'm in the way. If it were possible, I'd melt into the wall. And the fact that moving over here wasn't even discussed bothers me. For I don't usually mind being reliable, but I hate being presumed upon. And so left alone, holding down a fort that isn't really my responsibility.

But this morning, I think God was laughing at me. For at church on Wednesday I taught from the children's catechism question: "Why did God make you and all things?" Answer: "For His own glory." Which means that everything we do must be for His glory. And my test is today. Can I sit in a little corner, alone and forgotten unless equipment needs to be ordered or a problem solved, and glorify my God? I'd better. For I've got four 4th graders to give an account to.