My Life as an Abstract Painting

I don’t really like abstract art.  I understand that you can say things with shapes and colors, and that sometimes it's easier to express yourself when you don't have to use precise pictures or words because the feelings you're trying to express aren't very precise themselves.  I get it.  It's probably more fun to look like you had a wrestling match on a canvas than to sit for days working on the shading of a single pine needle.  I just find art more accessible when I don't have to do a handstand and cross my eyes to see the hidden message. 

Sometimes I feel like my life is one of those paintings.  It looks like someone got bored and started filling water balloons with paint and chucking darts at them.  (Princess Diaries, anyone?)  Not all the parts are perfectly congruous.  There are lines that don't look like they lead anywhere.  There are smudges.  There are colors that aren't complementary on the color wheel.  There are colors that I don't think even have a Pantone number.  It's sort of a mess.

In my smallish human brain, I think that my life should make a little more sense, have a little more theme, be a little more organized.  I mean, let's take mini road trip through my life… Raised in the country.  Moved around.  Dance class.  Church kid.  Homeschooled.  Two trips to Mexico.  College out of state.  Love theater.  Love music.  Love writing.  Love gardens and dirt.  Love horses.  Summit staff.  Compass Wilderness staff.  Church bookstore staff.  Trip to Morocco.  Year in Australia.  Hate olives.  Love kids.  Get hired 4 days before school starts.  Love people, not good at conflict resolution.  Counseling class.  Love event planning.  End of road trip.

I mean.  What the heck.  I look at those pieces and it looks like a jigsaw puzzle where you put pieces together that you think fit, and then realize don't actually go together.  Psych.  Wouldn't it make more sense if my life went something like this - grow up loving half that many things, get good at one of them, go to college, meet future husband, graduate and get job, turn future husband into present husband, buy puppy, plant petunias, join small group…

Two weeks ago I found out that because of when I was hired, I only have a one year contract, which means I may or may not have my same job next year.  Besides being Little Miss Sunshine, I'm also Little Miss Calculate Her Options.  Should I look at other districts?  Other states?  What if I moved to St. Louis?  Do I want to be a teacher next year?  What if I taught overseas?  Should I get my own apartment?  Sure, I'd like to stay at my school, but maybe I'll be teaching poetry in Bulgaria.  I don't know.  My life doesn't make sense.  I feel like it's sort of one big improv comedy routine sometimes. 

Knowing this makes my life seem more creative than chaotic.  My own life is a page-turner because I don't know how it ends or what happens next.  Every day is a new gift to be unwrapped, an opportunity to walk in those "good works" that God has for us.  It is not my job to wrest the paintbrush out of the Artist's hands and try to make my own paint-y mess of things.  It is my job to walk in faith knowing that someday it will make sense to me, but that day is not today, and that's OK. 

Little Miss Sunshine