Communication Breakdown

I came across a quote by Robert McCloskey the other day:


"I know you believe you understand what you think I said, but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant."


It made me smile, because I had found myself in exactly such a situation about a week ago. Mind you, it was not exactly a a happy smile, but a wry smile of familiarity. In the course of what I thought was a conversation between friends, I said something that made the my friend clam up and walk away. I didn't realize this at first because it happened while at work. Conversations there are fragmented, secondary things. Our first priority is the work at hand, the care and safety of the dear little children as they play on the playground. Our playground conversations, if we're even able to have them, are subject to numerous interruptions and postponements if we want to chat a bit about our lives. I found out later on, when I decided to see if the proverbial chill in the air was in fact a chill, that I had pushed a button, touched a nerve, and otherwise made a person mad. Then I got chewed out.

I think that I have been in ministry long enough to suppress the usual first reaction we have when confronted, and that is to just defend oneself. I usually go a little too far the other way, and I'm hard on myself. I rake my conscience to see if I was a fault and somehow offended one of the folks God has placed in my path for care and ministry. The bible says we are servant-leaders, and ambassadors for Christ. Though, I thought I was wearing the "friend hat" that day, more than the "ministry hat" I know that I am always on duty as a minister's wife.

After some thought and consideration I believe a word I chose was what set my friend off. What I thought I was conveying to my friend was sympathy and understanding. However, I used a word in passing, to describe the situation, that is wrought with (prejudicial) meaning for her. Hearing that word describe her situation, was all it took to upset her, regardless if the speaker was using it to convey sympathy or criticism. All she heard was a word that made her see red.

Anyway, she apologized since then, and that makes me even more relieved I did not try to "fight back" in any way. Let go and let God.

Random

I came across this unusual resume, found here. That is exactly the kind of resume an artistic person ought to have, and I am inspired! I think and hope that for the kinds of jobs I'm interested in, employers would enjoy this kind of resume, and take it seriously despite it's whimsy. Potential employers that were turned off by this sort of resume would be weeded out because [we] wouldn't be compatible.



Big Daddy bought us some new coffee cups and I like them very much. We are down to our last jumbo mug from our old set, we have broke them all over the past several years. Of course our old set is discontinued, though I could find some things on ebay. I was mulling over this in my procrastinating kind of way, and making Big Daddy drink from a regular sized (read SMALL) coffee mug because I was using the last large one for myself. To be fair to myself, I am usually the first one up and you know that saying about the early riser getting the primo coffee mug. Should I order the old kind from ebay, after all we have the matching dishes and bowls still, and we like them; OR should I find something new? It has to be large and somehow funky, colorful, etc., like our previous set. All the while, putting it off and not doing anything. Big Daddy saved the day and just went ahead and ordered. He opted for large and simple and it really works! Mmmmm...
~
Every once in awhile, I just think to myself, what if today (or tonight) is the day that Zombies take over? Maybe I should be doing more cardio? Are the doors secure? Where's my baseball bat? Do you ever have crazy-silly random thoughts like that?

Along those same lines of thought, but of course more seriously, what if today is the day Jesus returns? Wouldn't that be nice? If Jesus was to come, say 5 minutes from now, what do you think you would like to have done? And conversely, what do you wish you'd left undone?