Trooping Along

Heh, this is starting to become a thing, ain't it? Roughly a post a week, give or take a couple of days.

It's cathartic. I cannot claim to completely enjoy it, but it is definitely something that allows me to banish thoughts away from my mind, keeping it less cluttered and thus less headache-inducing.

It also fulfils the secondary aspect of keeping those who want to keep abreast of my happenings updated, without having to undergo the rather awkwardly ``intense'' discussion process that is talking with me directly.

Anyway, August is almost gone. We are down to the last quarter of 2020 to go. At the risk of really jinxing it, I cannot see how much worse it can get.

Wait, the US elections are happening in November. Never mind, let me take back what I said about how I cannot see how much worse it can get. Because I have this feeling that the worse is yet to come.

I pray for the safety of my friends who are living in the US right now. May the Lord bless and protect them through these tough and troubling times.

The last time I wrote something here, I mentioned how Cui was telling me what it was that I was grieving---it was about a future that was lost, the plans that were trashed due to the circumstances and the actions. After ugly crying and then mulling over it for the whole week, I completely agree with her. Already new plans are forming in my head---I know that I am now a believer, but it is my nature to plan ahead. What I am learning is to reconcile my planning through the agency of my free will against the sovereign will of God. It's less about a contradiction that needs resolution and more of a deeper understanding of what it is that God wills of us.

Besides, while in the end only God's sovereign plan matters, it is still important for me to be ready for whatever comes, otherwise I would be doing myself and God a disservice---after all, He had made me with the particular nature I have for His purposes. And as the recent reading on Romans 12:3--8 shows, there is no right/wrong in terms of what nature we have, as long as we have the fear of God within us, since it is through a body of believers that a perfect community may be formed from the contributions of each of our talents.

For now though, the plan is very simple. No more zero days. It's not so much that I had been wallowing so bad that I get zero days, but more like I need to keep on moving so that I don't fall behind long enough to start the wallowing process, a bit of a Red Queen situation too, come to think of it. I know that at some fundamental level, I am somewhat bummed out by all the things that have happened in the past four months, but I just do not know how deep that level of bummed-out-ness is. And frankly, I really don't want to find out.

So I just keep trooping along, doing my best to not look back at the bad things.

Scripture reading and bible study is great and all, but in between all that, I still need to do myself a solid. I can't be off on my next adventure if I keep on getting stuck on thinking about the adventure that I could not complete well. That's the part where my own personal plans come in---no more zero days and just keep on moving.

As to where I move on to, that will be up to the Lord. I'm not even going to bother thinking about whether I will be a bachelor forever or if I will miraculously get married within the next five years---now is not the right time for that. I am just glad that I can keep the connections with the friends that I had made along the way of these thirty-five long years, and maybe make new ones as I progress through the remaining half of my life.

Nothing else to add to this entry for now, and so, I will just stop here. Perhaps I will update again in a week.