Ponderings

Having a two hour drive every day gives me a lot of time to think. All in all, it's probably way more time than I ought to have to myself. Add in the fact that at least once a week it seems that my wife is on call and you've got waaaaay too much time for stuff to rattle around in my brain all by itself.

One of the things I've had the distinct pleasure of pondering lately is pride. My own, I will say, more than others. Pride in guys is a funny thing. We probably allow it to run our lives much more than we should, at least I know I do. If anything, it's one of the things I pray every day to be broken of, or at least to put in the proper perspective, and it's probably the thing that punishes me the most. As I said, I have a lot of time to think. My mind operates in many ways like a very cynical DVR operating in endless loop. I will go over my errors and other's errors in endless loops in my mind, especially if they're unresolved. The problem with that is it allows small hurts to grow. Then that grows into anger, and if that remains unresolved, then the pride kicks in. And it's hard to get around that pride. Maybe I'm stuck with it. It feels like I am for right now anyway.

That's not to say that the problems that lead to these feelings aren't real. It's kind of like they say about paranoia....sometimes they really are out to get you. But you can certainly see your own culpability in situations. Then you do something stupid and back yourself into a corner that you don't have the ability (or right) to get yourself out of. Ah well, que sera, sera. I don't really mean that cynically, just realistically. I would expect that the one that should read this will never read it, but all I can say is I'm sorry. And will always be sorry for being stupid.

So if you hung around this long, I'm sorry for all the unloading. Sometimes stuff just needs to go out. I haven't really decided what this blog is going to be for. General chit-chat, deep insights, confessional (I am Lutheran, you know)... So for anyone who's bummed out by the contemplative Jim, don't worry. Superficial, sarcastic Jim will be back tomorrow. Besides, no one beside Julie should really be forced to listen to all the little ponderable thoughts that go through my head. I'll catch everyone at softball for some hitting therapy (btw....Friday, Saturday and Monday???? I'm going to start taking ibuprofen now, my knees are aching just thinking about it)