1. Inigo Montoya is the Princess Bride character I am most likely to quote. I am quoting him a lot this week: I hate waiting.
2. I haven't heard about the local job. I don't know when I'll hear about the local job. I hate waiting.
3. I had to drive a couple of hours to get to that other campus, and it was the first time in years I'd traveled alone along that stretch of highway. I drove it every day for a while, first to a clinical placement and later to a short-term job at the same hospital, and what I mostly remember is the stress. WOULD I be able to handle the placement? WHAT IF nobody ever wanted to hire me? WHEN was our '78 Dodge Aspen going to die?
4. Last week I was reflecting on the answers to those questions and thinking about how much needless angst I had wallowed through on those early morning drives. Yes, I handled the placement just fine. Yes, I got a job: first a temporary job at the familiar hospital, filling in for a month for a woman on maternity leave in a setting where I felt free to ask my newbie questions, and then a fantastic permanent job at the hospital in my own town. Yes, our Dodge Aspen would eventually die, but not until after we moved away to Scotland and donated it to a local charity. Why, I wondered, had I been so reluctant to trust God? Why was I so certain that BAD THINGS loomed? Good thing I know better these days, I thought to myself.
5. HA HA HA, I laugh bitterly at the irony.
6. I have been wrangling and wrangling with my anxiety again. WHAT IF my co-workers secretly hate me? WHAT IF they don't hate me but the other candidates are just so amazing that they reject me? WHAT IF WHAT IF WHAT IF?
A funny thing happened on Wednesday. I went into the office at lunchtime to copy an exam, having edited it at home and stashed it in the cloud. When I arrived at my office, the document wasn't where I'd left it. I was very annoyed with myself. I came back at 4, having deputized my 13yo to hold down the fort for half an hour while I got the exams ready for the next morning. My phone rang in the quiet of my office rather than in the chaos of my house after school, allowing me to give the department chair my full attention as she offered me the job. The weirdness of it -- how often have I stored something in the cloud? (often) how often has it totally vanished? (never) -- suggested to me that I should pay attention, that I should remember God's sovereignty over events and their timing. That I should TRUST.
7. If you asked me, I'd say of course I trust God. But given my mental landscape this week, I am dusting off my other favorite Inigo Montoya quote: I do not think that word means what you think it means.
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