Benchmarks and Tempations

I am beyond thrilled to say that, after a lot of really hard work, I am now $337.00 away from being debt-free except for my mortgage.  I wanted to wait until I was completely there before talking about it (which will be in a few weeks).  But I’m excited now.  I have a fair emergency fund and a decently-funded 401(k), but I have basically been plugging away at the debt very hard the last couple years.  (Having a roommate also helps.)  Now I can start to save in earnest all that money I’m going to need for school.  Yippee!

 

I’m tempted to actually let myself get financially ahead and be comfortable though: to be one of those people with no mortgage in ten years or less by socking all that money at the loan.  I dream of doing a little redecorating, and overseas travel again (one of my great loves, environmental havoc-wreakers, and debt-creators)… but that’s all stuff that will get in the way of my plans for the next five years or so.  It’s not going to prepare me for a student life, and then a missions life.  I’m not really into acquiring “stuff” but there are still things I dream about… and am tempted by.

 

I’m sure some of this line thought has come about since I had to put off school for a year in order to re-take the LSAT in June.  Which I am dreading… I worked so hard preparing for it the first time that I never want to see the damn thing again.  I’ve given myself until Ash Wednesday to continue relaxing from it and then I must start studying again, and find some tutoring.  But a couple more weeks of mental rest will not go amiss – it’s been a stressful four months between that and work and everything else.  Then I’ll still have four months to study, and also organize my mom’s move which is scheduled for two weeks before the test.  Always an adventure!

Back from Vegas – Thank God

I was engaged to a man who moved to Vegas to play poker for a living.  It didn’t start out that way, but anyway I was going to move there with him and marry him.  I’m glad it didn’t work out.  I’d have gone mad living there.  I saw a scene where, in between the glitz of casino after casino, was a tiny run-down Catholic Charities building trying to do its work in that wilderness of the soul.  That’d have been me.  Though if I’d found others like that and embedded myself that way, I’d have probably been fine, but the marriage would have imploded.

I was there for business – the International Consumer Electronics Show.  How ironic for a minimalist, yes?  But I was there running our presence at the Bellagio.  I did get swept up in the decadence for a day or so, but the amount of waste and everything about it is kind of nauseating.  (I will admit, though, that I enjoyed our expensive hoity-toity dinner at Michael Mina to the very last bite. For a foodie with no budget for that kind of dining, it was a dream come true. My boss took me as a reward for my hard work. I ate every bite so none of it would be wasted. ;-D)

Anyway, I also suffered insomnia for about two weeks – the prep week before and the week in Vegas itself.  I am catching up on my rest now.

Vegas is a very weird place to try and remember Christ.  Perhaps if I’d spent more time on the street meeting people outside the insular expensive casino world.  I’m glad to be home though, where things make some kind of sense.  Now that the insanity of the last two weeks is over I can get back to the gym, my bible, choir and the rest.  Law school preparations.  I’d brought my bible but I didn’t read it very much there.

I’m still a bit out of sorts.

Busy-ness

Started out with a bang and promptly was swallowed by work.  For an anti-consumerist person, it is funny that I leave in a couple of hours to work the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas for the week.  After getting back from New Year, my week was filled with 16-hour days of getting show-ready, no posts, and many challenges to living up to my Christian standards for behavior.  Homicidal thoughts were had and plotted out in detail.  Sometimes I feel like the red-headed step-child of Christ.  Oh, stress, I do allow you to trip me up sometimes. 

Here’s hoping to being able to post a bit from Vegas, but I am basically on-call as concierge for my company’s entire delegation and so it will be hit and miss.  Blessings!!!

Happy New Year 2008! Thoughts

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2008!!!  May it be blessed for each of you.

 

I began my New Year this morning by reading the next chapters from my ongoing informal self-study of Isaiah and Deuteronomy.  I decided I want to become more familiar with the Old Testament, since it does still occupy 2/3 of all the pages in the Bible.  The verses that struck me today are in Isaiah, Chapter 28:

 ^16-17 This, now, is what the sovereign Lord says: “I am placing in Zion a foundation that is firm and strong.  In it I am putting a solid cornerstone on which is written the words, ‘Faith that is firm is also patient.’  Justice will be a measuring line for the foundation, and honesty will be its plumb line.” ^24-25a No farmer goes on constantly plowing his fields and getting them ready for planting.  Once he has prepared the soil, he plants the seeds. 

Here is why I am meditating on this puzzle.  As I stated in my intro, I am preparing to go to law school to work in International Human Rights.  I’m also very scared about this, scared of failure, scared of going back to school at my age, etc.  I was preparing to apply for Fall of 2008, until my LSAT (Law School Admission Score) came back about ten days ago.  I had prepared rigorously for ten weeks but must have freaked out on test day, because I came back with a 155 which is about 8-10 points below my average practice test score.  I decided to put off school for a year so I could re-test and do better.  A higher score (in my previous, consistent average range) would put me in far better running for admissions and scholarships.

 

Is that an example of faith being patient, or of a farmer that plows and plows but never plants?  Or is the farmer in the second passage actually referring to God, not humans?  As I begin a new year of plowing I must consider this carefully.  I have felt a need to prepare better spiritually before entering law school, so I can be strong to focus on what God would have me do vs. the temptations to go where the money is as many law graduates do.  But am I really onto something or am I simply procrastinating?

 

It’s really kind of moot at this point, because it’s too late to apply for Fall 2008 now (I was cutting it close), but I’d like to get this straight in my heart. 

 

Either way, there is important work to be done in 2008.