The Swing of Things

My first four days of being back at work since returning from Christmas vacation have been much more encouraging and defeating than I expected.

It all started at the airport on Sunday night when the airlines forgot my luggage in St. Louis and my cellphone company suspended my service and I couldn't get in touch with my roommate who was going to pick me up and I had to take a cab home, the driver of which didn't speak English or Spanish but Ukrainian, a language I can't speak at all and didn't give me change back from the $70 I gave him for taking me the 30 miles from LAX to East Los Angeles and making me car sick.

Wow, welcome back, huh?

The good news: I got a Christmas card from a friend from back home who gave me a very generous Christmas present, which made up for the money I'd just spent in getting home and the $15 luggage fee I paid American Airlines to forget my luggage.

Coming to work on Monday was encouraging - everyone was happier to see me than I expected, and I really felt like my presence was missed while I was away.

Most Tuesdays we do meditations with the middle school students, which are really a unique experience considering most schools don't offer the chance to adolescents/young teens to take an hour a week to be quiet and do their best to concentrate on God. Sometimes I dread leading these because (believe it or not) teenagers aren't always willing to actually focus on God and the message and they aren't always forthcoming with their reflections on the experience. But this week, man, the girls in my group had a ton of energy and were engaged in the exercise as well as the discussion. I was blown away at how much thought they put into their answers and how much they wanted to share. That meditation is what has gotten me through the rest of the week.

Tuesday night we had confirmation and, after showing the first 30 minutes of "Field of Dreams" (our theme is "God calling you by name"), we broke up into small groups for discussion. I was pretty excited to hear what the kids had to say until we got into small groups and nobody had anything to say. I tried everything: calling on people; letting them write on the white board; I even gave them the opt-out of "You don't have to say anything - just nod your head for yes, shake it for no"! I know much of the success of any discussion depends on the willingness of the group, but I left feeling like a failure.

Although, I was (once again) encouraged by a kid who stayed after class to help me straighten up. As we were scooting tables across the floor and figuring out where the chairs belonged, he started telling me about what's going on in his life - which is pretty huge considering he's a guy and has a lot of cultural pressure on him to be macho - and he even showed me some of his poetry. I was honored that he chose to open to me, but I couldn't figure out the motivation. Then, as we walked out of the room, he told me that he'd stayed there to keep out of trouble. He and another student had gotten into a bit of a disagreement (the other kid was threatening to throw punches) before class and the kid who stayed after had the wisdom to avoid further conflict.

I was pretty impressed.

Then last night we had a meeting with the kids who have graduated from our middle school and have received scholarships to go to Catholic high schools. It was complete disaster, mostly because my boss and I didn't really plan anything. Why we thought playing Catchphrase with a bunch of 13-14-year olds for an hour was a good idea is beyond me. And we got what we put into it: Squirrely kids who wouldn't shut up or do anything for more than 15 seconds. And that's not even an exaggeration.

Not exactly the most harmonious note on which to end a long day.

But there's hope for them (and us!) and I've definitely learned a lot about energy in and energy out: it's not always a positive correlation. But the more energy you put in, the more you can say, "Well, at least I tried."