Back in Santa Barbara

I got back to Santa Barbara late last night. I had a great time over Christmas seeing lots of family. I don't really know what to say about it, so instead here is a list of few things that were different about being at home, relative to being here in Santa Barbara.

1. I kept trying to open the wrong side of the fridge.

2. I couldn't find the magnet used to operate the child-proof (cat-proof) locks for the doors under the sink.

3. It turns out there aren't child-proof locks installed, so the magnet didn't matter anyway.

4. A car that didn't have a clutch, no matter how often I tried to press the clutch.

5. A car with 2nd gear where I'm used to 1st gear being.

6. The cats don't respond to the name Sasha... Never mind, Sasha doesn't either.

7. A cat that will stay in your lap longer than you are willing to provide a lap.

I think that'll do it. There were certainly other things, but these things are probably more amusing to me than they are to the rest of you.

Merry Christmas 2004

I've been thinking a lot about gifts fit into Christmas. Thoughts have come from a variety of different places. Every bit of it is relevant to me personally, so to anyone reading this, please don't take this as criticism aimed specifically at you. Although I hope you find it insightful for your own life, it is based around my experience and what I am learning.

The gift of Christ is the Christmas gift. So I don't think gifts, in and of themselves, are a bad thing to be giving at Christmas. In fact, I think they have the potential to be expressions of God's love for us. I think our approach to gifts is where we have gone wrong. I think we can learn a lot from looking at Jesus, the true Christmas gift.

First, why are they given? I think that for most of us, gifts are given out of obligation. We know that it is expected of us to give gifts to certain people around Christmas time. Although there is often love in the relationship, that is not the driving force behind the gift. Furthermore, we give these gifts regardless of whether or not we actually come up with something worth giving. Neither of these is a trait of God's gift giving. He had no obligation in giving the gift of His son. Jesus is given to us for our salvation as a gift of love. Furthermore, Jesus is the perfect gift. He is the one thing we desperately need above all else. I think we would do well to follow God's lead if and when we give.

Second, how do we receive them? Have you ever been given a gift by someone you didn't expect to receive a gift from? Perhaps you expected a gift, but didn't expect it to be as costly as what you actually received. What is your first reaction? Is it thankfulness or an uneasiness because you now feel indebted to them? For many of us, I think it is the latter. If I can't be thankful for gifts from people whom I can see, how can I possibly be thankful to God whom I cannot see? I think many of us have a lot of growing to do in our ability to truly be thankful for each gift given to us.

Third (and largely related to the second point), when you give a gift, how does the attitude of the receiver affect you? Whenever I give a gift, I tend to look anxiously to see their reaction. I hope desperately that they will enjoy and treasure my gift. My fear is that they will reject my gift, either outright or just in their emotional reaction to it. On the other side, what do we do to each other by our attitude as receivers? Every year I receive gifts I'm not immediately sure what to do with (and often these gifts later end up being far better than I had originally imagined). Yet no matter how much I would like to hide it, I'm sure my hard, unthankful heart comes through in my attitude toward the giver, hurting them in spite of their often thoughtful gift. How much more does this happen with God? Can anyone claim to truly understand the extent of the gift that was given in Jesus? How often do we reject the joys of Christmas rather than thanking God for them? God has given us Jesus, and He has given us an abundance of other gifts too. Is it not right that in this season our attitude should be one of thankful humility for everything God has given us?

Anyway, I hope that you had a blessed Christmas and were able to thank God for the gifts in your life.

Blessed in my Travels

On Wednesday I flew from Santa Barbara to Portland with a transfer at LAX. I didn't realize how tiny the Santa Barbara airport was, and arrived way too early. It actually turned out to be a good thing. I used it as an opportunity to call some people and talk. I did the same thing again during my layover at LAX. I talked to Ethan (college friend and roommate), Ron (friend from my home group at Church), Rachel (team member for Kolkata trip), and Brian (another friend from college).

On my flight from LAX to Portland I was blessed by the couple I got to sit next to. They were on their way back to Portland after a two-week trip in China where they had just adopted a one-year-old daughter from an orphanage. It was great to hear about their trip, particularly their experience at the orphanage. They also told me about why they chose to adopt. It was so encouraging to see a couple with such obvious love for world beyond their immediate surroundings.

I'll Be Home for Christmas

After work today I'm flying home to spend Christmas with my family. I'm lucky enough to work a few miles away from the airport, so I'm going to leave my truck at work and not have to pay the small fortune for airport parking.

I'm pretty excited to get home and see people. God has shown me a lot about thankfulness during the past three months in Santa Barbara. One thing I am definitely thankful for is my very supportive family, both immediate and extended.

Early Christmas Present

Traffic on my way to and from work has been amazingly light this week. It seems like for some inexplicable reason less people are going to work this week.

On an unrelated note, there have been noticeably less cars in the parking lot at work this week. I can only assume that more Toyon employees are using alternate forms of transportation to come to work.

Whatever the reasons, I am very thankful for the light traffic and not having to squeeze my giant truck in and out between two other vehicles.

I Just Dodged a Bullet (Figuratively of Course)

While I was writing the last post, I heard a familiar sound. It was the sound of a cat about to vomit. I looked over to see Sasha standing on carpeted floor, with her head over a pair of shoes. I jumped up, grabbed her, and nearly dove to get her over the nearest section of tile floor. It started coming out before her feet hit the ground. If I had been even half a second slower, then I probably would have been cleaning the carpet or the couch (the quickest path to the tile was over the couch).

Ian Was Right About Sasha

Ian is already gone for his Christmas vacation, leaving just Sasha and I in the apartment for a few days. Ian has mentioned to me several times that Sasha always uses the litter box right after new litter is put in. Tonight I changed her litter box for the first time. I dumped the old stuff out and put some new litter in. Right away she went and used it, even before I could open the next bag to finish filling it. After she was done, I finished filling the litter box. As soon as I was done, she used it again. (And yes, she did in fact use it both times.)

I was tempted to keep dumping it and filling it to see how many more times she could keep this up. I decided against it.

Posada

The Posada celebration with Kid's Club took place last Friday. It was absolutely crazy, but also a lot of fun. I left work early to go help set up, and stayed late helping with the clean up. I really enjoyed being part of that. There's something about working together with a bunch of other people towards a common goal that is very satisfying.

For the event itself, we had the kids sing a couple songs for the parents, then we went down the street singing the traditional Posada song, and gathered back up to do the Christmas pageant. Then came the food. It took a long time to get 150 (my personal guess) people through the line, but it did happen eventually. The rest of the time was largely unstructured social time while people ate. We did have a couple pinatas during that time. One was for kids seven and under, and the other one was for kids eight and up (and no, I did not get in line to hit that one).

Kid's Club X

Quick Note: The X either means that this was the tenth week of my going to Kid's club, or I lost count and decided to use a variable instead. If anyone decides to do the math and figures it out, I'd love to hear which one it is.

Yesterday was our last meeting of Kid's Club prior to our Posada celebration. Therefore the bulk of our time was spent preparing for that. I was helping with the kid's who were going to play the animals in the pageant. I'm not sure they were any worse than any other group, but it certainly wasn't easy to keep their focus on the pageant.

At the end we fed them pizza as always. Trisha, one of the women who helps with Kid's Club, was telling a story from that session. One of the kids had told her she should marry Jason, a man that helps out with Kid's Club. Fortunately Trisha had the excuse that Jason was already married to Nancy, one of the primary Kid's Club leaders.

Five minutes later one of the girls walked up to me and asked me if I was married. I told her I wasn't. She smiled and told me I should marry Trisha. She then went back to Trisha and informed her that she (Trisha) was mistaken and that I was not married. I convinced the girl that I couldn't marry Trisha because I am going to India so soon and Trisha has to stay here and finish school. Now the girl wants us to get married as soon as I get back from India. Hopefully she will have forgotten about that by June.

After all of the kids were gone, a bunch of us went and picked up stuff from the Church to use for the Posada. We loaded a dozen tables into my truck (It was so nice to use the truck for stuff that actually required a truck). When we got to our destination and started unloading them, I noticed some damage on a few of the tables. In retrospect, we probably didn't think things through while loading. Usually I would expect myself to kind of freak out and worry about the way we should have loaded them. Instead I had an amazing sense of calm. I realized that they were just tables, and the damage wasn't even that bad. It really wasn't anything worth worrying about.

Special Features Have Gotten Out of Hand

At first I thought the 10-disk Ultimate Matrix Collection was a joke. It turns out that this is real. Fortunately the 100-disk Final Ultimate Complete Matrix Collection is a joke.

The Lord of the Rings: Extended Edition already has a 12-disk set, I'm wondering how large its "Platinum Collector's Extended Uncut Home Marathon Edition" will be.

Home Group Christmas Dinner

My home group finished off our study of Matthew last week. Since we were without a planned study, one of the couples hosted a dinner last night. I could get into the details of the delicious food, or the beautiful house they have, but that wasn't what made the night so great. It was great simply because of the people I was with.

Towards the end of the evening we all gathered in the living room to share what we were going to do for Christmas, and sing Christmas carols. It was late enough in the evening that the kids were getting tired, and I was lucky enough to have Sierra (Diego's older sister, previously mentioned here, although not by name.) cuddle up with me on the couch and go to sleep. She never completely woke up, so I just carried her out to the car when everyone started leaving.

On the way back I had a choice: I could either leave the way I came, which would go the wrong direction for a bit because I came straight from work, or I could go the general direction of home. I decided to brave the unknown and head straight for home. This might have worked if I had known the area, but instead I found myself driving down a lot of long winding roads until I looped back on somewhere I had already been five or ten minutes earlier. At that point the mile detour to get back to known territory didn't seem so bad.

An Answer to the Question You Never Asked

Actually I'm posting an answer because someone did ask me. Perhaps there are more people out there looking for this answer. First, the question:

Q: Since you are at 75% of your budget, does that mean it's time for people to slow down on their contributions?

A: No! I still have a good chunk of money left to raise. In addition to that, if I raise extra funds, then it goes towards other team members that haven't raised enough. In particular, I have a specific team member with a lot of fund raising to do very quickly. In fact, if you'd like to give specifically to her, I'd be happy to give you the information to do so. Just send me an email.

Child Care II

I had child care duties again this Sunday. This time I was serving during the first service, which is aimed more at families in terms of child care. This basically means that things are segregated by age, and there are a lot more kids. They placed me with the toddlers, so once again I got to play with Diego! There were a lot more kids than adults there, so I ended up playing with quite a few kids, as well as just holding some of them while they cried. I really enjoyed my time there. Some of the other adults commented that I was a human jungle gym. I would let them pull me to the ground and climb all over me. At times I had four kids on top of me. Most of them tried to keep me down. One girl was nice enough to keep helping me up, although I think it was just so that I could give her a ride on my back.

Afterwards, I was talking to Jonna (a woman in my home group), and she mentioned something about me being a father someday. It really clicked for me when she said it. I guess I have been thinking about kids a lot recently. I certainly hope that someday I'll have at least one child of my own. However, there are a few other things that need to happen first...

Another Diego Story

When I arrived at home group on Thursday night, Diego (the same Diego as Wednesday's post) greeted me with a hug, and I in turn lifted him up into my arms. While I was holding him, he informed me that he needed a diaper change. Furthermore, he wanted me to do the honors. Heidi (his mother), however, decided that it would be best for her to handle the job. I couldn't help but smile. Kids are such an amazing blessing from God!

Offer #1 is on the Way

I had a talk with my boss at Toyon yesterday. He said that they are planning to make me a job offer for when I get back from Kolkata. I'm not sure how quickly they'll want an answer, or when the actual offer will come. I also don't know if or when Honeywell will make me an offer. For that matter, I don't know where I will want to be or what I will want to do after I return. Please be praying that God will give me clarity as I make decisions about my future.

And Then There Were... Six

My Kolkata team is back up to six members. Word Made Flesh added a new member to our team, putting us back up to six members (plus our leader). She (The new member) is from Texas, and that's about all I know for now. Hopefully I'll hear from her soon so I'll know more.

Child Care

All of the Home Groups at my Church take turns helping out with child care during the services. My home group got / gets our turn last Sunday / this upcoming Sunday. Last Sunday I was in the nursery during the second service. There were about the same number of adults as kids, so it freed us up to focus on a specific kid or kids. If not for our numbers, we probably wouldn't have stood a chance against them.

I really enjoyed spending time with the kids. Some of them were crying, some wanted the toy that another kid had, and some just enjoyed whatever was in front of them. I spent a lot of the time with Diego, the two-year-old son of a couple in my home group. I absolutely love him! We built a tower out of blocks (which he promptly knocked over). I pushed him around on a toy car that wasn't actually meant for movement. Later he ended up sitting down in a flying chair. We even "took turns" giving each other rides on our backs.

Eventually I settled into watching a video with a few of the kids. I chose a show that I remembered watching back when I was a kid, McGee and Me. Unfortunately, what I didn't remember was that this show is aimed at a mature audience, ages 5-12. There was one part in the beginning that was a bit too scary for the kids watching. About that time a parent walked in and suggested that I put something else in. By the time the new video was going, the kids had lost interest and went to another room in the nursery.

I can hardly wait to help out again this Sunday!

75%

I received another update on my Calcutta fund raising today. The woman updating me was out of the country for a few weeks, so the last one I got was about three weeks ago. Thank you so much for your generous gifts and for your prayers.

Alternate Units of Time

I recently hit my third pad of paper at work. I just use them for my
random scribblings about the stuff I work on. It led to the
semi-interesting thought that I had been at Toyon for two pads of
paper. I guess a pad of paper is equal to about 1.2 months. In other
units of measurement, I've been at Toyon for a bit more than half a
pen.

Weekend at Honeywell

I went down to Torrance to interview at Honeywell this weekend. The interviews seemed to go pretty well, and it seems like Honeywell would be a good place to work. The type of work would probably be more along the lines of Electrical Engineering than my current work at Toyon is. However, if it comes down to a choice between Honeywell and Toyon, there may be other factors that play into my decision. For now, I'll just wait and see what comes.

I spent the rest of the weekend with various friends I don't get to see nearly enough of anymore. Amazingly enough it was a mutually exclusive list from the people I saw when I was down in LA last weekend.

Just Read It

I finished The City of Joy yesterday. It was an amazingly eye opening book for me. I highly recommend it to everyone else out there. It isn't a light book, but it will give you a glimpse of a part of the world most Americans never see.