People Watching

The smell is intolerable, the streets are crowded, and the energy is booming; once again I find myself in New York City.  I don't know what it is about this city that is so alluring, when any ounce of logic I have tells me I am nothing but repulsed.  There are so many germs, in the air, in the restaurants, on the streets.  Howie Mandel's worst nightmare.  None of that seems to matter to me when I'm here, though.  Rather than sit and meditate on that, I've just come to accept the fact that I am a city rat, utterly and hopelessly.  *Shrug*

Anyway, staying in the city has afforded me some great opportunities, one of which is the ability to people watch on an unparalleled level, at least in my experience. I find it extremely fascinating, parked here at Starbucks on 43rd and 9th, to watch the different lives that come in and out of these doors.  I can't help but wonder all about these people.  I wonder who cuts their hair, how their morning has gone, where they found the items they are wearing.  If you let yourself think about it long enough, you can really delve into another person's life...even if it is completely imaginary.

For instance, there is a girl here in line (or 'on line' in city speak) who has hair that is beautifully brown and extends about to her mid back.  Let's call her Ms. Coconut Frap.  From the back, she looks like your average 23-26 year old girl.  Muted maroon tee, cargo-tan shorts, and flip flops.  But when she turns to the left, she reveals that the top portion of her beautiful hair, starting at around the brow bone all the way to the nape of her neck, is completely buzzed.  I'm guessing she doesn't 'love' it, because it looks like a fairly fresh cut and she can't stop rubbing it.  This, of course, is indicative of someone who has never had their hair that short, or is nervous about how it looks.  I can't help but wonder: did she sit down at the hair dresser with that haircut in mind?  No.  I imagine she came in with the intention of doing something 'drastic' and her hair dresser wanted to try his/her hand at the latest fad.  Either way, Ms. Coconut Frap is stuck with it now.  

Or how about the guy sitting next to me?  Obviously he doesn't do the NYC Starbucks thing often because he has no headphones.  He was however, smart enough to shark out a table this close to Times Square, so he can't be completely incompetent.  Slow learner maybe.  He's been punished for his ignorance though, as he's been asked about 5 times if someone can sit at his table with him.  Me and Mr. Bose Noise Cancelers behind me on the other hand, haven't been asked once.

Then there are always the Starbucks regulars who aren't exactly patrons.  The guy who is selling some sort of art in front of the door.  He's having a rather unsuccessful day by the look of it, trying to stop all the passerbys who will even throw a glance his way.  Then there is the garbage picker.  A huge bag of used cans and bottles slung over his right shoulder, left hand neck deep in the garbage receptacle right outside my window. I've never gotten that form of lifestyle.  Even with all of those bottles, you can redeem them for like $10 at the most.  Worth repeatedly sticking your bare hand into a public trash can full of possible life threatening terrors?  I can't see the worthwhile. Although, who knows?  Maybe that's enough to sustain him at this point in his life.  $10/day must be a difficult lifestyle to maintain.

Lastly I will scrutinize the 'space invaders.'  I have developed this name for them over the years because that's exactly what they are.  They are completely unaware of anyone else's personal space.  There is currently a lady extending her right arm over my computer, exposing her arm pit and practically allowing it to come into contact with my now completely unappetizing coffee. 'No, please, I love deodorant flavored coffee.'  And then there's the other sort of invader who has no idea how loud they are.  There's one right next to me.  Lucky me.  Even over my ear buds blasting Brian McKnight, I can hear her conversation with her mother, in another language.  If you're going to noise pollute the air space, at least give us something to listen to, honey. 

Since 'Honey' is effectively clearing out the Starbucks of anything resembling human life, I think I will go now too.  And wouldn't you know it, I just got asked to share my table.  Welcome to the city, Jordy girl.

In God We Trust

I have taken a sort of break from the blogging world over the past month or so, not that I've run out of things to say (that’ll be the day), but because I've been a little preoccupied.  Recently, the Lord has been dealing with me on the issue of trust.  It’s not an area I am particularly good at or fond of.  In fact, if I had to gauge my ability to trust others from 1-10, I’d rank right around 2.  Perhaps I have been jaded by life, or maybe it’s just part of growing up, however you slice it, it’s the state of my heart: mistrusting.

In January, the Lord started to pull on my heart strings about trusting others. Those of you who follow my blogs could probably tell, as it came seeping out of just about everything I wrote.  As the Lord revealed more and more of the condition of my own heart to me, I began to feel burdened to change.  He started revealing areas where I had shut people out who could have helped me or vice versa, and as a result, my heart was getting hardened.  Slowly but surely, I was taking my eye from Jesus and moving it to people and their actions.  Because let’s face it, if I had really been trusting God, what people said or did to me would not matter, but it has mattered…in such a big way.

Everybody has their vice, their Achilles’ heel, and I’m not condemning that or them, but what is the point of keeping it?  If you know about a chink in the armor, wouldn’t you want to fix it?  Especially before going into battle?  Here’s the thing: it’s not an easy fix.  It’s not something that you can sit at home, on your couch doing while you watch the news.  No, instead it is an uncomfortable moving and shifting and changing and disconnecting.  It’s awful, really.  You have to go and unhook yourself from every area where you have made room for your malfunction, every lie you have agreed with, every excuse you’ve come up with for not dealing with it.  You have to look failure in the face and admit that you aren’t perfect.  Maybe I’m only talking to myself here, but that last part really gets me, admitting that I am not perfect.

One of my greatest fears in life is/was to end up alone.  Not in a romantic way, but in an isolated way.  I could never think of anything worse than dying alone, so I surrounded myself with people, lots of people.  Yet it never fails, at some point, people step on a landmine that exposes both of your imperfections and one or the both of you gets hurt.  For me, that’s when a wall goes straight up.  ‘That won’t happen to me again.’  Now, that person can’t come any further and I am effectively safe from them…but my safety comes at the price of being completely alone.  Satan has done his homework.  He knows what lies to sell us to get us to buy into his plan.  Here I am thinking I can protect myself by walling myself in and I end up facing the biggest fear of them all, with no one to help.  I am borrowing from Paul to pay Peter, and in the end, I lose, and that’s what Jesus wants to save me from.  Losing.

Once I saw this ridiculous Ponzi scheme I had been a part of, I vowed to begin bringing down walls I had built.  So the Lord obliged and together we started working on one of my biggest walls.  At first I was restless, unrelenting, unwilling to budge or touch certain areas, but as I let Him work on me, I realized that He was pushing me to be more open, trusting, and vulnerable. He was not prodding me so that He could make it hard on me to teach me a lesson, He was undoing damage that had been inflicted long ago.  He was softening a hardened heart so that it could be used again.  That’s the worst thing about a hard heart, you know.  A heart is meant to be soft and pliable.  It’s function as a muscle demands that it pulsates, ebbs and flows.  The harder it gets, the less movement it can actually make.  Eventually, it will stop your blood flow.  The Lord was massaging my heart to revive it.  He was breaking me free from my own prison.  He was giving me freedom, in a way I haven’t experienced before.

I’d love to say that I am finished learning my lesson and I stand here before you, a totally loving, trusting woman of God, but that’s just not true.  I do stand here before you open and honest, and in that way I am taking a huge leap of faith, making myself completely susceptible to the opinions of others, but I’m also making myself completely open to God. I’m restoring my heart to a soft and pliable position, and I’m doing it as much for me as I am for you.  Don’t be alone.  Don’t let Satan offer you counterfeit protection at the cost of something much bigger.  Open your heart to others and trust God with it.  He has promised to never leave you nor forsake you, and that you can take all the way to the bank.  Others will affect you, yes, but when your trust is in God, your heart is protected in the ultimate way.

I hope this helped you as much as it helped me.  Until next time!