Life Praises

Sooo! A week ago since Easter Sunday 2013. The one and only. :P

I had the Thursday off and the company closed the call centre from Friday to Bank Holiday Monday, giving me a full five days off. It felt like my brain came back to life. :P
Seriously, call centre work is both mentally consuming and emotionally draining. So these five days were a blessed recooperation time, enough to be making plans for the future again. :D

I've been looking into colleges in the USA, as Mom's (and with it, mine in a way) future seems to be stabilising in spite of the problems with the divorce. Doesn't look too likely due to expense, but yah...
I'd love to study English some more, in spite of my O Level qualification already, and also maybe psychology and counselling courses. And I still want to study sign language.

The careers I'm thinking of pursuing - and this may sound a lot, but! I didn't have ANY idea before. Hehe - are music, counselling, gardening, law, air hostess. Quite a variety, I know.
Music - I love singing.
Counselling - I love helping people.
Gardening - I hate being stuck inside an office!
Law - money and intellectual stimulation.
Air Hostess - I really want to travel. There you go!

There's also a chance I may learn to drive in the next 12 months too. That would certainly be interesting.

These were my last five days holiday until June, then I leave for America on June 7th, returning on June 23rd. The three Deans will fly in from Texas around that time to start their tour of Britain and then attend our birthday celebration on June 25th at a restaurant in Stratford. :D

Mom has her second operation then on July 4th, so I'd be appreciating prayer muchly for that. That takes us to the end of August, at which point I'll resume membership of the Air Training Corps as a Civilian Instructor and start really getting into the other charities I'm involved in.

In September, I'm going to try and travel back to Ireland for a weekend, and then if the house (my old family home) is sold by October, I'm hoping to make another hop over the ocean to attend the wedding of two friends, Daniel and Laura, in Washington.

...happy Christmas. XD!

The plans for my five days off didn't go exactly to plan - I wanted to spend time doing hand crafts (knitting and making the wedding veil), tidying up a little, catching up online stuff, booking for OYAN 2013 and cleaning out my fish, Tom and Dick. Some of it I completed, some didn't get done, but overall, it was quite restful. So thankful for the time to relax and start thinking again!

I've been scared of bankruptcy recently due to my heavy debts and unable to pull even with some bills and my wage being uncertain. God gave me a REAL shock when two weeks ago, I was put on a project that landed me NINETEEN ten minute surveys in one day. People were just...doing them!
I got twelve surveys the first day, Sadaf did seven in the morning of the second (I was off that day) then I did nineteen the third.

Because of that, I landed my bonus pay of an extra 50p an hour for the five working days, as I'd then met my weekly target; Sadaf and I were both given an extra two hours' pay because I completed the project that day, instead of going home early, and also, I got entered into the company's new initiative voucher scheme which will run as long as the ESS project runs and won the £50 voucher! Guess who's singing praises! :D

Marcia is the new manager at BMG while one of the old ones is on maternity leave, and a very delightful and lovely lady. I consider her my friend as well as a manager, which isn't something that can always be said for a manager.

I mentioned my Achilles heel in the last blog. It has levels of sinfulness. And I hit a new point in it. God is very gentle with me currently on that - I'm not sure why. I think He leaves my conscience and the knowledge of distance from Him to me, because they punish me sorely.
I went into work the next day after hitting the new point, numb and extremely depressed. I may have said before, but I can be pretty cheerful even when depressed.

Marcia had, the night before, accepted my friend request on FB, so I thanked her for it. She said there wasn't any need to thank her, and then said something to the point of the following:

"You know, I noticed something different about you, so I scrolled through your FB profile to see if I could find something. I didn't want to say anything cause you know people are funny with political correctness and stuff, but then I found I was right, cause you mentioned God on there."

Me: "You're a Christian?!"

Marcia: "Yes, I am. And I just wanted to tell you that you can really see the Light in you. You burn so brightly. You shine."

I was in tears.

Eleanor, one of my (now gone - I'm really sad about that!) fellow colleagues, came up to me straight after and said (in her "cute" voice :D ), "You looked really sad the other day and I noticed, so I've brought you a sticker to cheer you up."

I gotted a unicorn sticker!

It struck me exactly how few people even notice that I was sad - considering I was being happy - and even fewer would care enough to comment and I said so.

Isn't God good? Sometimes sweet and gentle balm to a wound can be more of a loving chastisement than any fearful punishment which I was coweringly expecting to fall while begging Him to deliver me.

The last and not least of my praises was because of Stephen Higgins, my best guy friend at work, going to the Comic Con in Birmingham (the same one Addison went to). He went and spoke to Colin Baker, the Sixth Doctor, who I actually have some episodes of! Apparently Steve spent most of the time telling him what a big Whovian I was, and he even rang me so I could speak to him, but I was asleep! *cries*
Colin Baker, however did personalise and autograph a photo for me, with the accompanying words, "Well, I certainly hope that this makes Sian's day."

:D :D :D :D

Two letters recently came in from sisters Fiona Hanley and Ashley Mayberry, sharing and speaking comfort. God knows how much they meant to me. I admit, I cried again.

I'm such a grumbler. And I wish it wasn't so hard to discount the heavy pressures and griefs and to focus on the joys of living!

Good friends. Encouragement from both Christians and non-Christians. The gentle balm of God on a sore and broken heart that is fearing how heavily His chastisement will fall. His providence for my needs in the hour of pleading.

We serve a living and a powerful God. Keep counting your blessings!

In His mercy,
~Mademoiselle Siân