It's a quarter to 5 in the morning, and I'm on blogger.

So I was lying here in bed, coughing up a lung with a sore throat so bad I can hardly swallow, and I thought to myself: "What would be the best use of my time at 4am on a Saturday when I can't take my Tylenol 3 for another hour and all I'm doing is lying awake? Of course! I can blog!" That is how this little blog entry came about.

Basically, this was one of the worst weeks I've had in a long time. I think it was a combination of factors: I have a terrible cough and sore throat which I found out is laryngitis combined with allergies and possibly something else; I haven't slept through the night for at least a week; it's Toby's end of quarter which means the only time I saw him all week was for our hour of premarital counseling and then a KFC dinner afterwards (don't judge, you know it's awesome); I had a client cuss me out and basically tell me I'm terrible at my job (which I already had insecurities about) and then made me cry nonstop for the next hour or so -- again, emotional week. Not to mention this week was preceded by a weekend in which I decided that my antisocial-ness is becoming a problem and I really need to step out of my comfort zone and start making some friends. Yeah, pretty much, it was a bad week.

BUT, in all the crappiness, some really awesome things happened this week as well. LIKE, on Monday, the Zook ladies threw me a wedding shower/party and I got to spend some lovely time with just them. On Wednesday, I went out to coffee with one of my two friends in MN and we had a really encouraging conversation. On Thursday, I ended up hanging out with that same friend, her college friend, and the friend's roommate - and I had people ask to pray for me right then and there. I don't know why, but that really struck me. It has been a LONG time since someone said "Hey, do you mind if we pray for that right now?" I felt surprised and a little taken aback. And then I felt really sad that I felt that way. I felt like a person on the street being evangelized to - like someone who thinks "Yeah, there's no harm in letting this crazy Christian fanatic pray for my problems to be solved." How sad. I think there was a time when that was a more natural thing for me to say and hear people say, but in the last few years that has just not been something to which I'm accustomed. I don't know exactly why that is, because I was in a very Christian atmosphere in college. I'm guessing it has more to do with me personally than the people around me, and again, I'm not sure why. Anyway, it felt really awesome to hear someone pray for me out loud and then to pray myself out loud. I think I should do it again soon. :)

As you all know, there is another huge thing going on in my life right now...like a big celebration or something coming up. I'm getting married in 3 weeks from today!! Bah! And now it is freak-out time. I've been pretty good about staying calm and decreasing wedding stress, but I don't think there's any way to do that when you have a 4.5 month engagement and your wedding is 8 hours away and you have 3 weeks to make all the final decisions. :) It will be awesome, and almost everyone I'm closest to will be there, so I really can't complain!

I love and miss you Elisa, Hannah, and Kate. You are such incredible friends to me and I appreciate each one of you so much!

Always,

Heathie