Exercise in Futility

Now I know this is blowing your mind, because I have never done two updates in one calendar day, but keep your brains in your head because there’s more to read. So tonight was really something. For those of you who know any interns you may have heard them spouting jargon about how God is “stretching them”, and they are “stepping out of their comfort zone”, and all this may be true, but it was more true to me tonight then it has been in the five or so months that I have spent in Vermilion. WOW, “wonderwall” by Oasis just came on the radio, awesome! Anyway, tonight I had two options, I could either a) go swimming with a couple senior high guys, or b) help with some construction work at the community centre that we are fixing up and opening. Originally my plan was the swimming. I like swimming a lot, and don’t get to go very often also, I wanted to spend some time hanging out with these guys. I was trying to legitimize it by saying I wanted to invest in them, but at the end of the day, I just wanted to hang out and swim, and if I had the opportunity to invest in them, great. Then I talked to Kyle my mentor and I really felt like helping out at the community centre would be a better use of my time, and also it would get me involved in something that I don’t have a ton of involvement it, stepping out of my comfort zone if you will. So I went to the community centre, and was involved in the biggest exercise of futility I have had since my internship began. All the carpenters and electricians and general jack of all trade guys were walking around doing their thing, and I was standing in the room with my hands in my pockets looking silly, and feeling useless. I got involved a bit, carrying some stuff (which I am very good at) and scraping some floor, but for the most part I was just standing around talking to Kyle while we worked. I honestly have never felt more useless in my life, and you know what I think it was good. It showed me that I can’t do everything, and also that I need to try new things. The longer I sit in my perfect little comfort bubble the less I am going to learn and accomplish. I just think it was a good thing for me to do, because it meant that I had to choose to do something that I didn’t want to do. Does that make sense? Even if it doesn’t it doesn’t matter, it humbled me, and I think I needed that. Kyle and I had a good conversation as well, while he worked, we talked about music (mostly 80’s and early 90’s) and relationships and all the crazy things we have done to impress women. We were sad because we can’t use any of our great ideas anymore, so we talked about switching and using each others great romantic ideas that ended up failing. Good times.