Interesting days here. On the surface, things would appear either normal or actually more boring than normal. I spend time working on our big landscape project, reading, running the dog ragged (or is it the other way around?), and trying to be out in the community talking to folks with the Kingdom in mind. Below the surface, though, there's a lot going on. Michelle's got two job interviews in the next eight days - one with a big big pharmaceutical company and one with a small start-up type pharmaceutical company.

Meanwhile, I'm trying to figure out my role in vocational ministry - it's the time of year when I'm supposed to be doing my annual application for denominational funding for the church start work, and I'm thinking I may not do it. Instead, I've begun firing off resumes for regular jobs. There's a tension there, whether to pursue work that relates to my grad degree in counseling, or to pursue a higher level career type track at Starbucks. I'm good at both, and both have their up-sides, but I'm wanting to have as much missional impact with my work as possible. And then there's always the possibility of going back on staff with a regular type church . . . lots of mixed feelings on that one.

Change is something that I neither avoid nor run into. I'm fairly conservative when it comes to major life change decisions, and yet I do like the adventure of going into a new direction. Change is inevitable, though, so it's all a matter of how severe the change should be.

My mother-in-law is experiencing change in a painful way these days. Less than a year ago, she lost her thirty-plus year home to fire, and she's had a couple of address changes as a result. She's also had the change of a cat dying and as of yesterday, a dog dying. To many people, that might bum them out a bit, but animals are a HUGE deal to Marge, and she grieves for them when they suffer and die. I admire that - mainly because all too often I'm one someone who fails to value God's amazing creation in all its forms. She helps me appreciate God's beauty. I wish things weren't so hard for her right now.

The losses are big and small. Michelle and I were talking about going to Disneyland as kids - back in the days before one price of admission would get you on all the rides and attractions you wanted to go on. You had to have tickets for each of the rides - the best rides were the "E" ticket ones. As we talked, Michelle remembered that her father still had some "E" tickets stuck in a drawer somewhere, and he could probably sell them on eBay . . . except for the fact that the tickets also burned in the fire, as did wedding photos, Michelle's wedding dress, the urn in which the ashes of a beloved canine friend were kept, etc., etc., etc.

This post seems to be a rambling list of melancholy thoughts. I'm pretty sure there's a theme to all of this, but I can't put my finger on it just yet. I do know this much (and this isn't related to the theme, it's just plain random): I'm glad football season is back, and better yet, I'm glad I'm married to someone who likes football and gets into watching the games with me. We're not fanatics, but we did watch a lot of pigskin yesterday. Good stuff.