Just a little weird today...

Strange stuff is going on at the not-for-profit where I'm serving as a not-quite-so-temporary donor-services person. We had a consultant in today, and she kept singing my praises like I was someone's savior - which I am completely aware that I am not. Other interesting things - like being invited to give a five-line report at their board's fundraising committee meeting on Wednesday - keep indicating that some folks think I'm going to be made permanent at this. But nothing explicit has been said - and to be honest, I know enough about their finances to know that they can't afford to hire anyone else, at least not at a salary I could live with. So I'm kind of in a weird in-and-yet-not-of situation there.

So I'll be putting on a suit and tie for the first time in a while to go to this meeting in slightly more than 8 hours, and riding the bus downtown (probably in the snow, to boot). Lovely.

Got some great news - my dear friend Norma, the Methodist pastor of Holt, MO, is engaged! She's been a great friend of mine for years - ever since I first started part-time classes at St. Paul in KC. She's had a number of hard rows to hoe over the years, including the death of both of her parents. So she's about due for some happiness, and I'm really happy for her. (Of course, there was just a twinge of "well, GOD...where's MINE?" But I'm at least fractionally sane enough to know that right now, I couldn't take care of a parakeet...let alone a serious relationship...)

Talked to a friend from KC, who sounded really worried about me. I'm not sure about that - I openly admitted that I'm probably not going to qualify for ordination (at least, not for five or ten years, anyway), and he seemed concerned that I'd somehow lost heart. I guess in some ways, I have - but in others, it's just accepting the things I cannot change (that the church I currently belong to has the right to include, or exclude, whomever they choose from candidacy for ministry), and trying to find the courage to change the things I can (trying to discover what the "next right thing" is for a former corporate geek and former ministry candidate). I guess I've gone from "it'll all work out the way I hoped, somehow" to "it will all work out, somehow" - which sounds to some people like acceptance, and to others like giving up.

If you figure it out, let me know. For now, the "next right thing" for tonight is bed.