Patience

I recently read a post that a friend of mine wrote on her blog about not being able to wait for anything and I was amazed at how much alike we are. My mother used to always say how impatient I was and that I was always in a hurry to grow up. When I was little I guess it made her sad to have me be in such a hurry. She wanted me to stay a little girl as along as possible. I have to admit that my lack of patience has always been my downfall. I am always wanting things to happen on my timetable. Like getting my drivers license (I failed twice before I passed on try number 3 and was 16 and a half before I got it!), or having my first date or first kiss (I won't tell you how old I was for that but let's just say I waited a LONG time!). I couldn't wait to get married but oh how my patience was tried in this department. Not only was I 28 when I got married but I had been dating Ivan for nearly 3 years when it happened. I think he just wanted me to learn more patience on that one.

Then of course came the time for having a baby which again I had to wait for. After nearly a year of trying we finally got pregnant with Lili. I really do have a hard time with this patience thing. I always like to look ahead at what my life will be like when.....(when I'm married, when I have kids, when we are done with school, you get the idea.)

About a year ago I started with this fantasy of what my life would be like when we graduated. I had it all planned out. Ivan would graduate in April, GM would call us a few weeks later and we'd be moving to MI by June. Ivan would start a design job there and we would live happily every after in Sterling Heights. This was my plan. I knew it had to work. Why wouldn't it? Ivan had worked so hard and had impressed a couple of big wigs at GM so why not? So thus far none of my plans have worked out in the least. Instead of getting a phone call from GM we instead lost the job we had. We spent 4 months unemployed and scraping the bottom of the barrel when it came to money. We have had trial after trial of our faith and still, no call from GM. OK, that's not entirely true. We have gotten calls from GM but unfortunately there is just no budget to hire us at this time. During all of this time Ivan has worked overtime on getting his portfolio out and applying for other design jobs. Frustration set in about July I think when we still had gotten no interviews other than an occasional phone contact. Then, it happened, a phone call from a company in San Antonio, TX. They wanted to fly Ivan out for an in person interview. Hallelujah! It wasn't the job we were hoping for but it was something.

Since then we have been anxiously awaiting any news and hoping that something would come of this ONE interview. About 2 weeks ago we got a phone call from Ivan's would be boss saying that an offer letter was on the way. YIPPEE!!! We were so excited to find out what it entailed. Everyday I checked the mail several times but when 5 days had passed and no offer I started to wonder. Again, another phone call. "Um, yeah, sorry, the offer hasn't been sent because it needed to be sign by so and so who is out of town....blah blah blah..., should be in the mail in the next couple of days." Hmm....so again we waited...nothing.....another 6 days had passed and nothing. So today the story was "oh, yeah, um....it hasn't been sent yet because so and so and so and so need to sign it first which won't happen until tomorrow" AHHHH!!! Can we just say that I have definitely now lost my patience. I mean really, does the CEO really have to sign off on a offer for an entry level design job?? OK, maybe he does, but still. I think that this perhaps is another lesson for me in patience. I hate being patient!! Ivan and I watched this movie the other night where God has a role (OK, Morgan Freeman has a role playing God) and he says something like "If we pray for patience, do you think God gives you patience or does he give you the opportunity to be patient?" Only problem is that I never prayed for patience. (I know better than that!!)