Mud Cakes and Waste Surprises

All I can say is, "Wow!" This is a little late, but I'd like to write about my extremely crazy, last day of work. I figured this blog could use a little humor...

For those of you who don't know, this summer I worked at Windsor dorms at Purdue all summer painting, cleaning, moving furniture, multching, scrubbing floors, and more! It was a gloomy, cloudy day and I was kind of hoping my last day would be a memorable one. Little did I know just how memorable it was actually going to be!

So me, David Banke$, and Josue were assigned to do window wells that day. What I mean by this is that we had the privilege to remove the uber heavy grates that cover the wells, drop down into the 7 foot deep well, bush off the windows and walls, scoop up any mud or dirt on the well floor, unclog the drains, and then climb out and put the uber heavy grate back on the window well. It's pretty tiring, but kind of interesting. As the morning went on, we came to a window well about 20 feet long where the drains were so clogged that there was about 4 to 5 inches of water in the well. Supposedly, I was the only person with feet small enough to fit in the wading boots and I wear 10 1/2 size shoes!

So I was sent down into that deep, dark, nasty, dirty place and I soon realized that there was at least one inch of pure mud that also covered the ground. Yuk! My boots were making all sorts of disgusting noises as I sloshed around in the well. My plan at first was to unclog the drains and let the water and some of the mud go into the drain. The only problem was that I had to find the drain. After shoveling lots of mud into buckets and handing them to my assistants, I found one! My assistants handed me my weapon-- an oger-- and I started to twist it into the clogged drain. When I pulled the oger out of the drain, the drain burped and mud splashed all over me. I noticed the mud looked so pure and so brown and so slick. I mean, this stuff was seriously water proof! There was no way I was going to unclog this drain! I tried the second drain in the well but it was just as bad and only made me dirtier.

We went to brake and returned with a new weapon: the shop vac--a high powered vacuum. We had to empty the shop vac two times before we could see the mud at the bottom. I started shoveling mud again into buckets and by this time I've got mud up and down my shorts and shirt and all over my arms and on my face. Then it began to thunder. And then, with almost no warning it started to rain. We went inside and I was actually relieved. I needed the brake. But I didn't get it.

Almost immediately after we went inside, one of our fellow workers started yelling that the new bathrooms were overflowing... yes, I said overflowing. As in poop coming out of the drains. And in no time at all, all of us knew that she was telling the truth because the smell hit like a ton of bricks! We all ran to get gloves (just in case) and then ran to the scene. We were all choking and gagging so only me and David and a couple other student workers ended up helping the full timers. A couple times I thought for sure that I was going to puke.

When the whole situation had been brought under control and we had air circulation taking away the fumes, it was lunch time. A few of us were left on poop patrol and we kept an eye on the drains for half an hour. Then we were relieved and went to lunch. After lunch it had fished raining. So we went back to the window wells. Guess what we found! No really, guess! Come on! Fine, I'll tell you: the window well had filled up with twice as much water as there had been earlier. I was kind of bummed. All that hard work for nothing...

So then before we could even start again it started to rain again so our boss told us to forget it. But don't worry! My last day of work ended on a positive note! We were forced to stay inside and work even though they didn't have anything for us to do inside. So they sent us to clean the many storage rooms in the basement of the dorms even though they didn't need it. We ended up exploring some deep, dark passages while we were cleaning and it was really cool. The passages had pipes all over the walls and ceilings and it was really spooky! We found the water heaters that looked like giant atomic bombs and we found an empty room with a random toilet sitting in the middle of the room.

Anyways, hope you enjoyed that! I sure did! I will never forget my last day of work in my summer of 2006! Have fun with school, and homework and projects and all of that good stuff!

They say just follow your heart
Yeah, but what if it lies?
~pc3

Misunderstanding Jesus in Action

Dude, your killing yourself. In a way you are right when you think that you are alone in a world full of people that don’t understand you but in another way you are right along side them with your beliefs. Will you ever see that it is you who doesn’t understand?

Earlier this week…
“Music is one of my passions,” he said.
“Oh yeah? I love music too,” I replied. “I hope to take a music minor at Purdue.”
“We may have more in common than you think. What kind of music do you listen too?” my co-worker asked me.
I thought as we moved on to the next dorm room where we started to clean the windows.
“I like pretty much anything that is morally correct and shows talent.”
My friend smiled. “I think we might have more in common than you think,” he said for the second time. “I’m actually a man of principles. I may do some things that society doesn’t think is right. But I am a man of principles.”
I wondered what he was trying to say and where he was going with this. He knows that I’m a devout Christian. He must have been trying to tell me that he thinks we have similar believes and values.
“I have a list of the top four priorities for my life,” he continued. “First on my list is the will of God. After that comes money. Then comes music and women.”
We finished up the windows and moved on to the next room.
“I also have a list of things I would never do.” Little by little my friend seemed to be offering himself as an open book. “First of all, I would never do drugs. Second of all, I never break the law. And finally I would never drink alcohol.”
“And why don’t you drink alcohol?” I was trying to gear the conversation toward some epistemology.
“Another thing I never do is talk about alcohol at work.”
Awkward silence.
“What did you study in college?” I asked.
“Philosophy.”
“Really? So if you studied philosophy then you should know all about epistemology.”
He hesitated. “Maybe a little.”
“What would you say is your source of truth that tells you what to do and what not to do?”
Long silence.
“There is an inner person inside me. This person tells me what I should do and what I shouldn’t do. And I have to obey it 100% if I want to be happy.”
I felt very curious. “How did you find out about this person?”
Another long silence.
“I’m a very spiritual person. I’m very passionate about Catholicism.”
I asked, “But if you are very passionate about religion then why don’t you want to discuss it? I‘m also very passionate and extremely interested in religion. But my passion drives me to want to discuss it.”
“Well, I guess my passion drives me to live my religion and not discuss it.”
I nodded. “That’s good that you focus on acting on it. But do you not want to share spiritual truths that you’ve learned with others?”
Another pause.
Then he looked at me. “I’m sensitive.”
“Sensitive?”
“Yes. I take these things personally. And that doesn’t mean I’m gay. This is 2006. A guy can be straight and sensitive at the same time, can’t he?”
“I guess.” Then I replied, “I think I understand what you mean. Religion is personal. It’s a big part of our personal life and affects us personally. So when someone has a different religious opinion than you, you take it personally.”
He smiled. “You’re exactly right!”
I continued, “Yeah, I’ve had that same kind of problem too. Sometimes I take a religious objection personally and it’s not exactly a good thing. It’s something I’ve had to work on and change.”
Later that day, out of the blue, he seemed to add on the conversation by saying, “I don’t make changes in my life until it hurts enough that I have no choice. I don’t want to make life more hard on me than it already is.”
I looked at him. “Are you sure that’s not making it harder? What if you save yourself from this serious pain by changing before it‘s too late?”
He shook his head. “I can’t do that. I have to wait for the pain to give me no choice. That’s just how it works for me.”

Does the decision to either accept truth or reject it have to be so burdensome? It sounds like my friend wants his freewill to go away. I can only pray that my questions have made him think. I tried to meet him where he was and understand his thinking and feelings. I tried to show him that he hadn’t thought through it near enough. But I can’t convince him to change. I’m just a young teenage Christian that continually falls and fails to make the right choice and change time and time again. Everything I did means nothing. All that matters is if the Holy Spirit pierces his calloused heart. All that I can do pray that someday he will get to the point to where he can accept the truth.

Dear friend! Let the signs lead you to the person who can heal those scars of yours and dry those tears of yours for good!