Spanish class.
Three years. For three years my poor, sweet Spanish teacher had to listen to my constant whining. I hated telling time in Spanish. I hated conjugating verbs in Spanish. I hated present participles in Spanish. Cognates were okay, but for those of you who don't know, that just means its a Spanish word that sounds just like an English word.
The only thing I got really excited about was the fiestas we had. Mmm, sopapillas!
I distinctly remember a time my junior year where things weren't so hot. My grade was getting on the sketch side, and as a result, I would go up after each workbook page and have Senora Buchholz check it. Obviously my teacher loved this idea. (Hah.) Finally, looking at me, she told me something along the lines of, "I want you to learn this. You can do it, and I want you to be able to it with confidence. I'm hear to teach you know so you can do it later, but you need to be able to look at it and know that it's right. Here's how you do that..." Her nice way of saying: Alonnah, you idiot! You know this, stop being lazy and check your own work.
Of course, being the mature 16 year old that I was (sarcasm), I took this the wrong way and sulked, angry at myself for taking a hard class with a credit I didn't need. Angry at Mrs. Buchholz for making me do more work than necessary. And I was also pretty ticked because every one around me spoke English. No necessito hablar Espanol!
Almost exactly a year later, I was on a plane flight to Guadalajara, Mexico.
My amazing Uncle Jason was getting married to his beautiful wife Rosy, and I was flying down with my mom and sister to go to their wedding. I remember the first thing that really hit me was when we landed, looked for our luggage, and I had to ask a lady for help. Looking at me, she shrugged, "I don't know English." Oh.
But you know what? The visit went just fine. Better than fine actually, it was the best trip I have ever taken in my life. At first, I highly relied on my uncle to help us communicate with others. However, during the second morning, before Jason was able to arrive at our hotel, my mom and sister got hungry. We decided to do a little wandering around, and found a taco vendor. I remembered just enough Spanish to order four tacos, and a strawberry smoothie. Thank you Mrs. Buchholz!
She had prepared me.
Guadalajara was amazing. I mean amazing. And I would love to go back. Actually, I'm really ready to go anywhere. I'm getting those itchy feet college students tend to acquire after spending 18 years at home. Especially ones who lived in the same town the majority of their lives. I've also finally applied to a college I would LOVE to go to, and if that works out, I would actually be moving residency in less than a year. If not, and I have to stay at ECC, I'm open to leaving the county after my Associates for a while. I guess I'm just ready for change, and for God to show me some type of direction.
So, Him and I had a little one on one the other morning.
And of course, it was humbling.
I guess I was kind of asking what my next step was supposed to be. I was also complaining to Him about all the work I had to do that week. The answer kind of morphed both of those problems into one.
I felt God remind me that He wasn't killing time with me here. He has a very specific reason that I'm still living at home right now. He's got people for me to talk with, and learn from. It was also a gentle reminder that the things I want to do cost a lot of money, and that someone (Alonnah), needs to be using her time to prepare for these things.
And because this is where God wants me, complaining seems a little trivial.
I was reading in 2nd Samuel, and there's this part where King David is giving thanks to God. There was this one part that just stuck out to me, kind of got me right where it needed to. "He trains my hands for battle." (2Sam22:35)
And that's what I feel like God is doing right now. He's not wasting my time here, He's using this moment, just as He wants to use every moment, to make me grow. To train me. Just like Mrs. Buchholz did.
I guess right now what I'm really struggling with is contentment. Tonight I was reading 1 Timothy and I found something that really helped. Paul's writes in his letter to (young, college aged?) Timothy, "As I urged you when I went to Macedonia, remain in Ephesus so that you may command certain people..."
Remain. As in, stay there, there's work to do.
Even though I am super excited to be out on my own, and I really, really want to see where and to what God is leading me, I am trying super hard to understand that He has reasons for keeping me here. And I need to work just as hard on those as I do with other opportunities that might come up.
I heard a quote once that said, "If you have confidence, you have patience." And that totally makes sense to me. I mean, if I know something is going to happen, I'm not worried about when.
So, that's where I'm at right now. Or, rather, THIS is where I'm at right now. And since I trust God, since I have complete confidence in Him, I trust that this is exactly where I need to be.
"I don't know what the future holds. But I know who holds the future."
Live without pretense. Love. Drink more water. Patience and Contentment. Great gain. #1Tim6:6
A.Diez.
