Directions to I-90/94?

Life hit me fast today. A knock out blow. You’ve all seen Rocky. Of course, who hasn’t. Isn’t it amazing how Rocky can stand there and take a left hook, a right jab, an uppercut, and another hook and it never phases him. Here I am wallowing in my own pity after one sharp hook. Granted this one was below the belt.

Let me back up. It all started yesterday as my mom dropped me off at the airport in Birmingham. After an amazing three days with my family I was ready to take life head-on again and be out on my own. There was something spiritual about walking through those revolving doors at the Birmingham International Airport, it may have been the tacos from the night before, but whatever it was, it hit me like the Titanic to an iceberg, I was on my own again! For all you high schoolers out there who are so eager to get away from the auspice of your parents overbearing regime, don’t ever forget the day that you will run back with your tail tucked between your legs. The REAL WORLD is scary! It’s full of vicious monsters waiting to devour you at every slip of your footing (Hmmm . . . funny that my blogsite is entitled THE REAL WORLD).

So back to my spritual experience—this recognition that I was once again on my own. Once again I have to think for myself, I have to reason for myself, I have to find my way around by myself, shoot, I have to feed myself (have you ever forgotten to eat a meal because it wasn’t provided for you? haha). Everything goes well until my plane lands in Chicago, where my dimwittedness kicks in. I hop the Airport shuttle to Economy lot Yellow, Stop 12, and hop in my car heading east on Garfield Blvd. I decide that it might be faster for me to follow the signs to “Alternate 90/94” instead of just getting on I-90/94 the way I know how. Guess where the signs led me to . . . NOT 90/94!

So I’m lost in Chicago feeling a little like Kevin on Home Alone. It takes me literally 2 hours to get 30 minutes down the road, and ultimately 4 hours to get to Elkhart, Indiana (2 hours away from Chicago). UNBELIEVABLE! What’s even worse is I can’t hear out of my left ear because of the altitude pressure built up from the plane ride.

Hmmm . . . I could vent about that one for hours and tie some superspiritual conclusion in but I want to get on to today.

People have been asking me how my internship at Daybreak has been going. One word:

NOT LIKE I EXPECTED

Ok maybe that’s 4 words. Seriously, it’s fast paced, it’s intense, it’s high-tech, it’s cutting edge, it’s multidimensional, and it’s dynamic! Wonderful right? Sure, if your making more than $50 dollars a week.

That’s right $50 a WEEK! Today, when I was informed that my money raised had equaled out to be a $50 a week salary, my world came crashing down. I have never felt so dejected, unqualified, devalued, or misused in my life. I put in about 60 hours a week to get paid $50. “Here Davey, let me fill up your gas tank once a week and we’ll call it even. Oh by the way thanks for the work!” Shoot I moved up here knowing no one, leaving everything, with only the crappy weather and the 8 point buck that hangs on the wall of my room at my host home to keep me company. Can I just say that northern people in general are not near as hospitable as Southerners. I probably just made some enemies with that one.

Reality Check. It has been a real a reality check (sorry for being redundant). I was driving to Hudsonville this morning excited, ready to finally get to work on this internship stuff, ready to pour my time, my energies, and my resources into this job. I had dreams, I had hopes—high hopes—I had ambitions. I had a vision of what this internship was going to look like. And now it seems shattered.

For you young ministry students or pastors. How does it feel on the bottom of the totem pole? I saw this cool advertisement in one of the magazines on the airplane and it said: “Don’t you see the pecking order? Oh, look behind you.” Hmmm. What field is that guy in? Cuz I look behind me and see nothing but trash that I was supposed to pick up from all the people in front of me.

Welcome to the Real World, Davey. Maybe this is why so many people lose their dreams and ambitions when they grow older. It’s not the old age, the sensodyne, the tapioca pudding, or the nutragena that does it. It’s the world. It’s the ruthless, insensitive, vicious world that swallows our dreams.

I watched Office Space tonight for the first time. I connected! It was another “spiritual” experience. The Plot: a bunch of guys who hate their jobs because their talents aren’t utilized and they’re not challenged. They’re not fulfilled at all! That may be my biggest fear—to forget why I was put on this earth, to have dreams and never see them come to fruition, to shoot for the moon and blow up like the Challenger. I’M SCARED TO DEATH OF NOT MAKING A DIFFERENCE!

What’s even scarier is that I’m in a line of work that sees no worldly success. If I’m “successful” at my job, I won’t see it. God only knows (not to borrow the cliché).

I feel Lost. Kind of like the television show but more like total blackness. I sat in the dark today just to gain a better perspective on things. It was lonely. No light to comfort my senses, no awareness of what’s going on around me. I’m lost on 106th street in Chicago and I can’t find the entrance ramp to 90/94.