1)  "School stops people from learning."  Institutions often do the opposite of what they intend.  Ask Ivan Illich.
2)  I am foolish in how I compare myself to others.
3)  I am beginning to find the idea of being a mother and deeply involved in community building at the grassroots level beautifully appealing.
4)  I wonder how often I work against myself without realizing it.  I need to gain some confidence.  I wish I understood myself better.
5)  I wish I had more time to create things.  Correction: I wish I gave myself more time to create things.  I still struggle to find the balance between time for personal pursuits and time spent with friends. 
6)  I love my friends.
7)  I'm incredibly thankful to my family for modeling good relationships.  Especially to all the men, for how greatly they love their wives. 
8)  I wonder if I'm missing out on something I'm supposed to be doing. 
9)  I need to shower now... they finally finished redoing our shower and tub!

I think, that if I could quit my job and work full time on the Brookside Initiative or something similar, I'd be terribly, terribly tempted.  I want to feel like I'm IN it, getting to know people, connecting to them, grounded in a place so deeply that the successes and failures of the neighborhood feel like MINE - something I have ownership over.  Not solely, not in a way that makes me the hero, but as part of a team and an effort and a group of people that are changing their circumstances for the better.  I know I'm supporting people who are doing that but... call me selfish, but I want to be doing that.  I know I'm helping by being part of the Friday evening bible study - I just feel like there's so much to do, and not much I have time for.  I've been thinking about starting to help with Kids Church again, but Matthew and I have our weekends booked for the next month... We'll see.  We'll see...

Lately I've felt like our apartment is one big museum of our lives.  It's not just a place that we live and cook and eat - it's a storage room of all the work we were proud of in high school and college, an exhibit of pictures of our romance, a library of the writings we were proud of in high school and college.  I'm just wondering when we'll part with it - I've found myself starting to trash things, but it's always such a slow process.

Rachel and I decided that the awards given out in middle and high school should all be made of re-giftable or recyclable materials.  What do I do with the Band Award I won in 8th grade?  Proudly display it behind my desk at work?  Put it on the mantle next to my kids awards?  I appreciated it at the time, but I think I've been carrying it around for too long now...

So, if you'd like to see the exhibits, feel free to stop by.  Hopefully, some of them will turn out to be traveling exhibits... from apartment to the trash.  If, that is, I can get my sentimental self to separate from them.