01 | March | 2008 | Paroxysm of Giggles / Critical Mass

Continuing in my avoidance of doing work, I am browsing through some other blogs. One I happen to like a lot is Jen’s “Et tu?” (She has my name, it’s French, she was an atheist who joined the Church on Easter 2007 — same as me, she says a lot of the things that I think, but never have the time to write down or the eloquence to state them as well.)

She wrote this entry on listening to God, instead of falling into despair. He may be answering your prayers when you aren’t paying attention. I have found what Jen has found — that often I’ll have a day, and I’ll open up my Bible or a prayer book, and right there will be something that speaks to my situation. God’s pretty amazing like that. Sometimes, I can see it, but not see it. And sometimes, I need to be whapped on the head. I can be very contrary when it comes to things that are good for me. I can a very stupid sheep sometimes (a lot of the time?).

Here’s one of these moments: yesterday, I went to church after work for the Stations of the Cross. On top of my recent health issues, I have come down with some sort of malaise. Due to the health issues, two friends of mine (a husband and a wife) took me into the chapel after Stations to pray over me. I can’t put into words what that experience was like, being in the presence of the Lord with these two wonderful people. Toward the end, the husband leaned over to me and told me to note which Station we were sitting next to in the chapel. Then he said that he felt that God was telling him to tell me this (and I’ll probably get the quote wrong): that I didn’t have to crucify myself, that Christ had already done that for us. Then he said that he didn’t know what that meant for me, but that it was something that he felt he had to tell me.

After they left, I pondered this for a while. What I finally came up with was a different phrase, but one that I think relates, “Don’t try to grasp at what is being freely given to you.” Kinda goes back to one of my core issues. “Maybe if I am good enough, God will love me.” “Maybe if I do enough things, succeed, my parents will be proud of me.” “Maybe if I am happy and nice, people will love me.” Some action is required on my part to be worthy of love or to have any value at all.

So, “Don’t try to grasp at what is being freely given to you.”

Don’t try to do-do-do to get God/people to love you, He/they love you already.

What a hard thing to me to try and wrap my head around.

You mean…I have inherent worth and value? Other people, certainly, but not *me*, right?

Similar things have been said along this vein to me this weekend, like:

“You should get anointed.”
Jenn: “Isn’t that for really sick people?”
“You need healing. Get the Anointing!”
Jenn: “I don’t know…. I don’t want to make a big thing of this. Isn’t the Anointing on a Friday morning?”
“Any priest can do it at any time. Call Becky. Make an appointment. You will call, won’t you?”
Jenn the stupid sheep: “Mmmm….”
“It’s a sacrament. Sacraments give grace, right?”
Jenn: “Yes…”
“I’m serious — get the Anointing!”

See how Jenn the Stupid Sheep shies away from things that are good for her…. She is amazed she wasn’t hit with a ClueBat. (ClueBat – definition per urbandictionary.com: A metaphorical bat used to ‘beat some sense into’ someone who is blatantly stupid.) Surely, she’s not sick enough for *that*, is she?

And again:

“Do you have a fever?”
Jenn: “I don’t know. I don’t feel as hot as I did yesterday, but I didn’t take my temperature.”
“Do you have a thermometer?”
Jenn: “Yes.”
“Well, you should check. And if you have a fever, you should take a Tylenol.”
Jenn: “Nnnnn. I don’t like taking things. My mom never took anything or gave us anything unless we were nearly dead.”
“You are not your mother. You should get the fever down.”
Jenn: “Nnnnn.” *Jenn feel another ClueBat-ing being scheduled for her….*

Aside: I *did* check my temperature, although I was fairly sure I didn’t have a fever. Normal body temp is 98.6 degrees F. I am currently 97.7 degrees F.

Back to that listening thing….

Okay, it was a short spree. 🙂

I woke up this morning feeling moderately yukki. Definitely worse than yesterday. Which is a good thing. My immune system is working on whatever bug this may be. (Dr. Knol confirmed that it was NOT strep. Perhaps it is something like the African Sleeping Sickness — always a favorite, or Lassa Fever:

There is a range of laboratory investigations that are performed to diagnose the disease and assess its course and complications. ELISA test for antigen and IgM antibodies gives 88% sensitivity and 90% specificity for the presence of the infection. Other laboratory findings in Lassa fever include lymphopenia (low white blood cell count), thrombocytopenia (low platelets), and elevated aspartate aminotransferase (AST) levels in the blood.

Hmm…. I *HAVE* had bleeding issues and flunked my liver tests….)

Anyway….. Getting away from my fascination with virology….

I went to Mass, trying not to share my little virii with everyone (wouldn’t want the Sign of Peace to become the Sign of the Plague); grabbed a Starbucks (completely therapeutic, really); drove to Ann Arbor; taught photography; ran out of and bought more windshield wiper fluid (Ah, here’s where the big spending begins. My brother will be ecstatic to know that my windshield wiper fluid has a drawing of a superhero on it.); went to Our Lady of Grace Bookstore at DF, where I plagued the poor boy at the counter by browsing endlessly, but ended up walking out with 3 items (“Are you [FINALLY] ready to check out?”); drove back to Troy; got a haircut (more on that after this paragraph); came home; made Charred Cheese Sandwich and tomato soup (isn’t that supposed to be Grilled Cheese Sandwich? Yeah, yeah, rub it in, mine had char…); read half of one of the books I had purchased; got a phone call; texted two friends; got bored playing on the internet for a few minutes; danced in the living room until I couldn’t breathe any more and felt that my head was on fire; drank my 6 oz of Gatorade, and stuck the rest in the fridge — wouldn’t want to be hydrated, now would we?; decided to work on some work; decided to check out Amazon.com first; bought stuff on Amazon; thought that I should probably get to that work before it got too late and I didn’t do it; and decided I should post on my blog.

And now you see where I am, neither getting work done, nor resting to get better. Rather, bouncing about the house like a Ping-Pong ball, until I collapse at some point this evening. Ah, well. If it makes you feel any better, I’m also reading about 9 books at the same time. Perhaps I have a little ADHD.

So… $2-3 on wiper fluid, $5 on crack (Starbucks), $20 at OLG, $50 on Amazon, $43 for a haircut — for a grand total of approximately $121. Amazingly, that did not appear to have any effect on my sickness whatsoever. As a small justification, all of my purchases from OLG and Amazon had to do with Theology…. That’s a good use of money, right? (This is where you all agree with me….) And the haircut…. Let’s talk about that expensive haircut….

Okay, I really don’t care about my hair. I have hacked it off, blindly, just before midnight, dry and without looking to make sure that it’s even — about 6 inches that time — gone! It’s been the color of Tang, cinnamon, and back to it’s normal brown/black. If I go somewhere to get it cut, instead of doing it myself, I usually head for the cheapest place I can find. Well, not today. I suppose that even I have to act like a girl every once in a while, particularly when I feel like I could star in a horror flick — as the monster. So, I told the girl that as long as she cut my bangs so that I could see again, I didn’t particularly care what she did with the rest of it.

We talked as she worked, and turns out she was baptized, but hasn’t finished her sacraments, so we talked about RCIA and she may join us in the fall! How cool is that! She walked me out as I left and gave me a big hug and wished me a good rest of the day! 🙂 So, it was an expensive haircut (for me), but totally worth it. I’m glad I decided to go there today.