Detours

"God is the engineer of our circumstances." For some reason, I've been hearing this non-political catchphrase a lot lately. And rather than just thinking it, I'm starting to believe it more and more as time goes by.

I heard the catchphrase on Sunday, in a sermon given by a guest speaker. He was actually the pastor at the church my family and I started attending when I was in first grade. He left shortly after that, and was replaced by another man - who just resigned in August. I know change is ever eminent and ever present, but it was still surprising to watch someone who had a significant presence in my life leave quietly. Anyway, if he hadn't resigned and left, I wouldn't have heard what I did last Sunday. The first pastor I had known at our church nearly 16 years ago returned as a guest speaker, and talked about the in-between times...how a lot of living happens between points A and B. How you know where you're supposed to be going (point A) and actually getting "there" ("there," being point B). I guess it interspersed the "everything happens for a reason" somewhat cliche/not cliche catchphrase into his message, too. I mention all of that because I've realized that I've always tried to live my life at breakneck speed, and get impatient when things get "off track," videlicet, things aren't going according to schedule or my way.

Today was a beautiful illustration of what should have been a tight schedule gone awry. This morning, I had a dental appointment at 11:50 am, and immediately afterward an eye appointment at 1:30 pm. I missed by dental appointment by half an hour on Tuesday because I'd gotten the times mixed up in my head with another appointment earlier on Tuesday morning (had to do with work stuff. Oh yeah, did I mention that I'm moving back to Ann Arbor? I'm moving back to Ann Arbor. That adventure later...) The receptionist graciously rescheduled me for today, since she knew that I'm moving soon. Showed up for my appointment on time today. Five minutes went by. Then 10. I start to get really antsy when I'm idle so I picked up the nearest People magazine, dated August 25, and paged through the whole thing. Twenty minutes had gone by, and I was alone in the waiting room - and dangerously close to missing my eye appointment today (which, I did. But they rescheduled me for 9:00 am Monday morning, ouch!) Found out from the receptionist that there had been three emergencies that needed immediate attention at the office that morning, and that everything in their schedule was backed up.

While waiting, I saw a tiny woman with dark hair emerge from behind the door where the patients' rooms are. A surprised "oh!" escaped from my lips when I realized that it was my Auntie Esther, the wife of my mother's brother. She nodded in my direction to acknowledge my presence, and then hurried past me, saying with a cute and slight Tagalog accent, "batroom!" (in other words, "bathroom"). My aunt doesn't have her driver's license, so she had to call my uncle and wait for him to come pick her up from the dentist's office. Half an hour gone by, still sitting in the waiting room. My aunt was waiting, too, so we sat together and talked until my uncle came. I see my aunt quite often, actually, at numerous family dinners due to the fact that she and my uncle live about a five minute drive from my house. I didn't realize until talking with my aunt today that it's hard to get one-on-one conversation time with people sometimes at our family gatherings sometimes, due to the sheer amount of people present, so I was thankful that we ran into each other. I waited nearly an hour before my dentist actually started working on my teeth.

With my eye appointment canceled, I had a window of time, so I went to wait at my Cousin Christine's (Auntie Esther's daughter) and visited with her, her husband Matt, and baby Emerson. During my hour waiting to pick up Ariele from school, Christine and Emerson fell asleep, passed out cold. Matt and I ended up talking about life, and about me starting this new adventure into working life. He said he remembered where he was when he was almost 23, and has been thinking about how he felt, how I must be feeling now. I appreciated his encouragement, and knew that I wouldn't have been able to spend time holding baby Emerson and indulging in good conversation if my schedule hadn't been a little bit off.

Schedule being off made me late to picking up Ariele, which is usually at 2:50 pm everyday. It ended up working out because we had to pick up a new violin bow for her to try out after 3:00 pm downtown. When I woke up, my day was so set, usually stays set when there's a schedule. The neurotic that I was/am/always have been usually hates detours, but lately I am learning to appreciate them. For example, this "year-off" detour from law school/grad school of any kind. If I'd hopped into school right away, I wouldn't have been able to think about appreciating detours...

Nothing too eventful for today.