John and I had a wonderful time at the John Butler Trio concert at Lincoln Hall in Chicago on Monday night. Our friends, Billy and Jeff, were great company, and we enjoyed having thai food with them and chatting in the alley as we stood happily despite the cold after such a great show. Billy mentioned that he was surprised at how disrespectful some of the audience was, and I agreed. John Butler was speaking about serious issues such as suffering in Haiti and corrupt politics in Australia, and many of the fans were either chatting or yelling irrelevant absurdities. Billy was so kind to give me a ticket to the sold out show instead of selling it, and we were so blessed that John was able to buy a ticket from someone who didn't need it for only $40 when people were trying to sell them on Craig's List for $90. We drove the 5 1/2 hour drive home at about 1:00am after having some carne asada and horchata at a nearby Mexican vendor and got home around 6:00 just in time to get ready for school. I was tired by the end of the day, but my conference went well with my student and his mom as we discussed ways for him to succeed. Needless to say, we went to bed around 6:30 last night and slept until 6:30 this morning to catch up on our lost hours of sleep. Chloe was a wonderful helper and put the kids to bed at 7:45. She's quite the 8 year old. We had a great Girl Scout meeting tonight. I taught the girls about the importance of having a mission/vision statement about how we want to live so that it will help us when we make decisions because we will keep it near us and ask ourselves if that decision is alligned with our vision. We made little dolls of ourselves out of recycled plastic bottles, wooden spoons, and cloth, and tucked our mission into a pocket on the doll. Our friend, Tutugirl, from Liberia, joined us and made one too. Tonight we wanted to go to church because it is the first day of Lent, but we hadn't gone to First United Methodist the last week to know what time their service was tonight, and when I called nobody answered, so God told me to call First Friends, and they answered and said they'd love to have us, and we went and learned a lot, met new friends, and felt very welcomed and that our time was wisely spent. Kalika taught Chloe's class, and she learned that God blesses us all with peace and grace, brings us truth and good news, mercy, forgiveness, unity and new life. I went to a study with a lovely 87 year old named Helen, and we discussed letting our lives speak and not being afraid to share God's calling with others just as Noah Webster did when he was called to write a dictionary. I felt that this really correlated with my Girl Scout lessons, and with our observations of people at the concert, and how we can choose to be a beacon of light or we could choose to believe like John Dewey did that there is no God and no soul and be completely miserable and because of that lack of morality, be disrespectful and dark instead of uplifting and light. Today in the copy room, a friend and coworker, Lana Flickinger, was a great beacon of light and shared about how blessed she feels that God helps her so that she doesn't feel too overwhelmed and that she sees people and things that she knows are God things everyday. Lana speaking out about how God helps her when without Him, she may not be strong enough to deal with struggles professionally or personally, coincides well with the sermon tonight about God helping us carry our burdens just like a farmer paired his biggest, strongest, oldest, wisest ox with the youngest smallest ox so that the wise one would teach and help the young one. God is that strong ox that helps us when we feel weak. Sometimes I feel emotionally weak because of small things like coworkers in my department ordering lunch together and not inviting me or when I hear so many students in the hallways speaking such hurtful words or when I saw a young man named Mark Butler from Indiana at the concert being physically and verbally abusive to his girlfriend, but I am so blessed to know that I can call on God to help. I am glad that God gave me the courage and compassion to step between that couple and tell that beautiful but broken young lady that she deserves to be treated well and that she should not allow him to treat her that way. I pray that she leaves him and realizes that she is worthy of a loving man, and I pray that he learns how to treat a woman. I am so grateful that I have such a wonderful husband, so glad that Lana has a wonderful boyfriend in NE, so glad that Desiray and family returned safely and everyone's health is improving, so glad that Jae is in my department and is a great model of professionalism and passion for her profession, and glad that Craig Marshall is a friend and a model of morality in our school. I was so happy today that I received an email saying that I received a full scholarship to attend a Young Professionals Summit in Omaha on March 4th where Blake Mycoskie, founder of TOMS shoes, is the speaker. So happy that Mara went right into the preschool Bible study tonight, a room full of strangers, with confidence and courage. Also so proud of Mara that at Pizza Ranch she went right up to the lady who did the church service at Grandview and said "Hi there. Do you remember me from the nursing home?" and gave her a big hug. Later during dinner, an emplyee dropped some plates, and Mara got right up and went over and asked if she needed some help. So happy that TJ was so grateful for his birthday gifts and so happy that he and John and Grandpa Freddy are out fishing together again tonight. I pray that my family and I let our lives speak of our love for God and for humanity and peace, and that others see this through our actions. I wrote on facebook last week that I admire John Butler and Michael Franti because I feel that they walk their talk, they practice what they preach, and a man who I have only met a few times and don't know real well, wrote to me that he remembered me saying that "you can't fake genuine" one time, and that he took that as a lesson and thinks about it when he meets people and tries to get to know the real them and uncover what their mission statement might be. I pray that people could see my mission statement in my pocket through my actions in my everyday life. I pray for a student named Juan Perales who I feel is facing troubles and that I have the patience and genuine concern to visit him at his home, treat him to lunch in my classroom, or write him a note about my hopes for him. I gave up using the home computer for social networking during the Lenton season because I feel that a lot of my time is wasted there, and I hope that the time that I would have spent on here is used for more purposeful and personal things such as working on relationships face to face. I pray that I make time to visit Gill, Marty, Charlotte, Desiray, and old friends whom I've lost touch with like Angie, Tawnya, Jill, Kathy, and Christina. I pray for my friend, Ruth, and her mom who is recovering from surgery, for Kathy who works at Grandview and the Dollar Tree, and other families who are facing burdens and that they turn to God to help carry the yoke.
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