Well, in my now 3rd update from Guatemala, I'd like to talk about something that can be wonderful, helpful, or very very harmful: silence.
Silence in Guatemala is hard to come by. With roosters crowing, cars honking, children playing and screaming "Lero lero!", as well as the adorable little puppy named Roco that won't SHUT UP, silence can be a golden commodity. Now, as the pickiest sleeper ever, silence is very important to me.
Seriously, I must have complete darkness. And if I can't have complete darkness, I will pull the blankets over my head, but I don't like breathing my own carbon dioxide over and over, so I pull the blankets over my eyes, and leave a place for my nose and mouth. And I must have complete silence. So I use earplugs. Squishy pink earplugs. Yes, I sleep like a weirdo. So what?
Another cool thing about silence is you really get to learn a lot about people. Have you ever just shut up and let the other person talk? That is very rare for me. Its helpful to only understand spanish and be limited in speaking it. Learning people's stories has been very refreshing, rather than me jabbering on about how I haven't eaten in 5 hours and kind of want a cookie.
Now, the thing that will really get you in a bad way with silence is... the silent treatment. I am no stranger to the silent treatment. Having once been a middle-school pre-teen, I have a 3rd degree black belt in silent treatment. But there is something about the silent treatment that I really need to get rid of (besides all of it)...
I give God the silent treatment when I feel I've been treated unfairly. I guess I feel like God purposefully let something bad happen because he doesn't like me, so instead of taking him head-on (like silly boys do), I take the middle-school girl route, I pretend like it didn't phase me and stop talking to him. Yet, when things get good again, God and I are best pals. I am so often a middle-school Christian, fairweather and finicky. Ugggggh, conviction. The bitter taste of conviction. Should probably cut that out now.
Need to go brush my teeth now.
But yeah, lets be silent, in a good way. Hey, Ginger Spice, shut your pie hole and listen to other people, and don't leave God hanging!
I TOTALLY sleep the same way that you do! I have to have COMPLETE darkness. Like, if my laptop is closed but that little light is blinking I've got to put a t-shirt over it or something. I can't sleep with the covers over my head like that either! I have to have a little nose hole out to the fresh air. Hilarious! (Do you hate to sleep with socks on your feet to? B/c if you do that's just freaky!)
ReplyDeleteAlso, another similarity... I'm giving God silent treatment, it's not the exact same way that you do it, but it's kind of convicting for me to read this.
Do you think you could do me a favor...or just humor me?
Could you take this personality test and tell me which one you ended up being? Sorry I know that's probably uber weird. Just chalk it up to me being curious. haha
http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/jtypes2.asp