Through the Looking Glass - What I think the Year 2008 will bring

There are many pundit shows out there that like to make predictions on the current year, and in light of that I wanted to try to make some predictions and see if they actually come true. I figure, why not?

1. The United States economy will enter into a recession.
Actually in terms of this prediction, I think we are already there - the economists just don't want to say that word. The housing market is not going to come back anytime soon - certainly not this year, and most likely not next year. Being in the housing market industry, we will be down 50% in revenues from just two years ago. It is absolutely incredible. We were setting records in terms of our revenues and to go so fast from such an economic boom to a bust has been kind of shocking. A lot of companies in our industry are going out of business now because they can't handle the pressure of the downturn.
The thing that is going to make the US economy go into a recession is the subprime meltdown that occurred this past August. CEOs of major credit companies are being ousted left and right over their failure to make sound financial decisions. The fallout from all of this is that now the job market is being effected. People are being laid off in the thousands, and with the jobs disappearing, the consumer will not be spending money. The fact that gas and energy prices are refusing to come down will also (and has) negatively effect the overall economy and consumer's spending power. The only thing that is keeping us afloat is that the consumer hasn't stopped spending yet. But I predict that that won't last much longer - or it will become much more difficult to pay the bills and spend money on big ticket items.

2. A Democrat will win the Presidential election, unless Mike Huckabee wins the Republican nomination.
The tide has turned in American politics. The scandals and abuse of power that runs rampant on Capitol Hill and in the White House has tired the American public. And the public associates that with just one political party and not politics itself. Honestly, if a Democrat wins the White House, I don't think that much will change in terms of American politics. There will always be abuse of power in the White House, because that is the precedent that has been set - not by Bush, but all the way back to Franklin Roosevelt - who changed the powers of the US Presidency because of the Great Depression. Ever since FDR, each American president has extended the powers of the Oval Office to fit his agenda. Whoever is newly elected will end up doing the same. Republicans and Democrats seem to be like the zebra - one is black with white stripes while the other is white with black stripes - basically, it's the same animal, any way that you look at it.
The only reason I give Mike Huckabee a chance is because he has Chuck Norris in his corner and he was a Baptist minister and I like the things that I've read about him. He seems very likeable.

3. US Troops won't begin to pull out of Iraq until 2010, at the least.
It is foolish to think that the Iraq War will be over anytime soon. From the moment that we invaded the country in 2002, I, a lowly foreign affairs student, knew that we would be in the region for at least a decade. The ethnic factions (and ethnic is probably not the right word) that are there - the Sunnis, the Shias, and the Kurds will all kill each other if we leave - which they do to an extent now. But I feel like if the troops pulled out it would turn into genocide. Trying to establish a democracy with these three factions is so stupid. What needs to happen is that the state of Iraq needs to be demised and changed into three separate countries. But there are two problems in doing that - one, is that if you create a Kurd state, you create a rallying point for the Kurds that reside in Turkey and cause them to rise up in rebellion against the Turks as they try to break off from Turkey and join the new Kurd state. The second is that if you create a Shia state, you give Iran a country to completely go after. They would try to annex that state into themselves, or at the least try to set up a puppet government that they could run. Iran has already tried to do this before, but funny enough, Saddam Hussein stopped that from happening.

4. Into the Wild won't win the Oscar for Best Picture - But it should!
This is the most underrated movie of the year - far better than Atonement. Atonement was actually kind of awful - there is nothing special about it.

5. The Writer's Guild of America will hold out and not settle with the studios in order to save the spring 2008 TV season. The Fall 2008 season might come to fruition, but even that might not happen.
Therefore bad reality shows will dominate the airwaves causing the American public to either lose all their brain cells or turn off their television sets to actually read!

6. The NY Giants will win the Super Bowl.
I actually don't believe this prediction at all - I think the Patriots will destroy the Giants - destroy them with a capital D! BUT I will root for the underdog nonetheless :).

7. Signature's new business venture, Signature WoodCrafters will take off and save lots of jobs at my company!
This prediction I completely believe in. I think there is a whole market out there that we have barely begun to tap and though there are some competitors out there, we can create a niche for ourselves and win! If you know anyone that wants to re-do their kitchen cabinets and countertops or change their carpet-grade stairs to hardwood, let me know!

8. The bright color trend will continue on through the spring and fall fashion seasons.
I love color - I love, love, love it. And I love bright colors. I think that this trend will continue because there are a lot of other people who feel the same that I do!

9. I will end up moving somewhere different.
I only think this because I have moved every year since graduating college. It would be nice to settle down somewhere, but I don't see the reality of that happening anytime soon. But we'll see.

10. None of these will come true.
This is so I hedge all my bets :).

[Insert Creative Title Here]

First, I want to give a shout-out to my buddy Josh Hayden, over at Moments of Recognition. He has been blogging about some really thought-provoking, heavy theological stuff that is apparently been going on in Young Life that I had no clue about. Josh has been great in posting about this issue and though I don't have a complete grasp on what the issues are, I appreciate the discussion and thinking that the discussion provokes. It is always good to examine the reasons behind the things that we do. The way that my brain works is that it necessitates that everything I do have an ultimate purpose behind it - a big-picture view. I can't do things (and often stubbornly resist) without seeing the "why" behind it. Which is why I appreciate Josh's posts - they have been helping me to think through issues that contribute to the big picture of YL ministry in my life. So, many thanks Josh!!

Second, I think I have a serious problem with accepting change in my life. I have always found it difficult to adjust to change - I think the fact that the first big change in my life was so awfully traumatic, it has created this underlying wellspring of resistance to change that I often have to fight against. Like my split personality, I have completely dichotomous feelings towards change - on one hand I love it because it adds new things to my life and keeps things interesting. On the other hand, when things occur that frustrate and stress me out as a result of change, I hate it.

So much change has occurred in my little provincial town life recently and I am having a hard time adjusting to it all. I lost one roommate and added another in the space of a day essentially. And I haven't taken the time to examine how I feel about it all, but I know that there are residual issues lying underneath the surface that I don't want to confront.

I'm losing two teammates and face a complete abscence of volunteers to take their place. I am having a really hard time thinking about adjusting to their loss because of how much they have added to the team.

Work is a plethora of changes - from the acquisition of a stair and rail company, to dealing with the loss of my baseball coworker, to just the day to day changes that must occur in order for our business to thrive. And these changes I have just been dealing with and not really processing either.

I just am having a hard time all of the sudden adjusting to everything that is going on around me. So I want to be like my friend Seth over at Thunder Sword and be depressed about life and how I cope with it. :) Can't things just return to normal? Whatever normal was?

Yikes!!

For the love of the Lord, I did not know that this beginning month of 2008 would be so flippin' congested with everything under the sun. That is kind of a vague statement, but I just need to blog about the craziness of my life right now before I can go back and continue trying to tackle it.

1. Young Life - Two of my teammates are leaving, I want to try to create a small group with girls, we are going to be doing All-Area clubs, I don't know what to do about camp this summer, there is a complete absence of other volunteers, Feb. Banquet, and we need to plan for the semester. It feels like it would be a lot easier if I just volunteered once a month at a soup kitchen. Which I probably should do anyway.

2. Work - Signature: Putting together Powerpoint presentation for our annual Employee of the Year meeting, setting that meeting up, planning for it, coordinating our Awards Banquet, working as a team leader, putting together that powerpoint presentation, helping my boss put together his presentations for those meetings, implementing a new HR system company-wide and conducting training classes, continuing to test the new HR system, creating a new company cultural program - the 4C's of Trust, creating posters for that program, coordinating employee development training, coordinating and putting together meeting arrangements for our Quarterly Business Review, putting together that agenda, finding a way to cater the event, getting the appropriate people to create their presentations. Baseball: Putting together financial statements for the Braves, meeting on Sunday for the Braves, collecting contracts, following up on documents and payments that still need to be turned in, start thinking about fundraising opportunities, coordination of golf tournament for 08, ordering t-shirts for winter campers, putting together a program for the marketing interns this summer, finding the interns, NVTBL financial refunds, requests, turning in documents to start new money market sweep fund, continuing to fill in for our administrator who suffered an aneurysm this fall, set up a meeting for ODL teams, website maintenance, alert and to-do maintenance.

3. Personal - Set up the financing for my new car (which, yes I did buy, and have accomplished one of my 2008 goals, yay!), sell my old car, change registration address on my new car, driver's license, town decals, and register with the Commissioner of Revenue(?). Continue working on my first half of 08 goals.

So much to do (and most has to be done by month's end!) and SO little time! But I'm going to try to make like the ants (thanks analogy that I read last night) and chip away at this a little at a time. Hopefully it will all get done without my hair turning completely gray!

On the road to being a "Meaningful Specific"

Well, now it's time for a more upbeat post, one that has to do with goals.

I still don't have these all figured out, but this is what I'm going to pursue for at least the first half of '08:

1. Buy a new car. I may actually get this one done by this weekend, unbelievably. This is something that I've been thinking about and researching for a while, and I've put the wheels in motion to make it happen, so that's a good start! I've just had it with my car and though my baby has been very, very good to me, it's time for a new one. It's kind of sad to think that my Corolla will be gone, but the vanishing of the fear that my car is going to blow up driving down the road will be most welcome!

2. Start a small group with my YL girls. I think that I've lost sight of what my ministry is supposed to look like. It's not just about the events that we put on on a Monday night. It's supposed to be much deeper than that. It is so easy for me to use busy-ness at work and the craziness of kids' schedule as an excuse to not do anything. So I want to be very intentional and get this started this year.

3. Read More. I am a TV-holic. It is so easy at the end of the day to go home and numb the brain with whatever is on the tube. But there are SO many books out there that I want to read (which if you are a friend of mine on GoodReads, you know this well!).

4. Establish discipline in my life. This is a lofty goal, because it kind of covers at least three subsets:

a. Reading my Bible daily with a daily QT - the most I ever learned in my walk with Jesus was my 4th year in college, when I practiced this. I don't think the correlation between the two is a coincidence. I've waffled in this since moving back to Warrenton, so it's time to really try and stick with it.

b. Exercising - Ugh. It's not that I don't like to exercise, because when I do it, I'm glad that I did it. It's just the fact that in the war that goes on in my head between laziness and exercising, laziness usually wins. I guess I just need to aim for baby steps with this one.

c. Disciplined thinking - My brain goes a million miles a minute, from one thing to another to another. My head often feels like a cluttered mess, with all these "things" crowding and swimming around and it often leads me to do nothing because I'm just jumping from one thing to another. This is particularly bad at work and makes me very unproductive, because when I can't focus on what I need to do, I just end up suffering the internet and reading most every news story out there. So I need to become better at just thinking - organized thinking. Lists, etc.

5. Figure out how to go to Italy and Young Life camp and handle my baseball responsibilities. There's just gotta be a way to do it all.

6. GOLF!! This is one hobby that I really want to get better at. There are at least three golf tournaments that I will participate in this year, and I would like to have fun and hit that ball a long distance, straight and true. So, taking a lesson will definitely be on the docket, as well as using the passes to VA Oaks that my boss gave me as a Christmas present! I'm going to start by practicing how to yell "Fore!"

7. Work - I just need to figure out how to reconcile the two different aspects of my job: Baseball and Signature. I love both and I can handle both, but there might be an opportunity staring me in the face with baseball that I could seize if I want to - being the Northern Virginia Youth Baseball Czarina kind of sounds impressive, but might give me more grey hairs than I can handle! In the end, I just want to be able to be productive at work and start feeling like I'm accomplishing something, which I think will happen once I start down the path of disciplined thinking.

I think that is it for now...those are good goals for the first half of the year, don't you think? (Now to print these out and post them on my bulletin board so that I remember to do them!)

Clipped Wings

Well, instead of posting goals today, I need to vent.

Yesterday, the second day of the new year was absolutely awful and if this is the way that this year is going to start off, I need someone to dig me a hole, so that I can just crawl in it and hibernate until springtime, when at least I have sunshine and beautiful nature all around me to cope with the things that happen in my life.

Not only have I apparently started losing brain cells at the tail end of my 25th year (evidenced by the fact that 1. I locked myself out of the house that I was housesitting last week and 2. I completely forgot my work computer (!) yesterday morning!!), but also everyone seems to be getting the hell out of Warrenton. My dear friend Katie Brazzle left for her grand CT adventure on New Year's Day, and now I find out that my two Young Life teammates, Zach and Aileen Weik, are going to be moving away in two months!! By the end of February, they will be gone!

It's like a literal knife straight to the heart.

Especially when we have had such amazing clubs this semester. Club has been such an encouragement for me, seeing all the new kids that have been coming. And it has been such a joy to be on a such a great, functional, in-sync team, relying on all our different strengths and weaknesses, to pull together and have great clubs. And now with Zach and Aileen leaving, I don't know what we're going to do. I know that God has a plan, and maybe this is His way of making me rely on Him more, especially since I have not been intentional with our relationship, but man oh man. I don't know how to deal with this.

I feel trapped, like a bird stuck in a cage, in her small town. It is my beautiful, wonderful, amazing small town, with beautiful, amazing, wonderful, awesome, supportive friends and community. And it's not like I was thinking of leaving anytime soon - But. But it all feels like a gilded cage. And now I feel like I can't even entertain the option of thinking of moving to another place because of the responsibilities to the ministry and to these kids that are all of the sudden now all mine. I have no idea how I am going to handle camp - I don't even want to go to camp! I absolutely abhor Young Life camp. And I don't know how the hell I'm going to be able to take two weeks off with baseball responsibilities this summer to go to Italy and to YL camp - one of which I'm dying to go and the other, I would rather die than go.

That may be a little dramatic, since I do err on the side of exaggeration, but it's also kind of the truth.

So, here's to 2008 so far - Year, the only thing you have going for you, in your first three days of being, is that there is now a Mr. and Mrs. Tommy Webster in the world. Other than that, you really stink.