Day 31: Waiting

On one hand,  Fridays have a more relaxed schedule.  On the other,  there are always things I need to try to cram into the limited space. 

Today's mission was ambitious.  I was going to do about an hour of consulting work,  then head over to Sonja to try to get her a login for social security. 

On the surface,  it doesn't seem that ambitious. A little tech support while I wait for Eddie to finish bowling. But setting up an electronic account with SSI is somehow harder than getting clearances at a national lab with a nuclear facility. And honestly,  I'm not exaggerating that much -- when we moved to Livermore,  Ulrich was hired as a scientist at Sandia and yes there was paperwork and beaurocracy but only slightly more than the hoops they were asking me to jump through to set up Sonjas SSI benefit account. 

Today was my third attempt. I started at 9am. We spent about an hour taking pictures of required documents and uploading them into a portal. Then a timer appeared on my phone. I had 1 hour until they wanted to do a video chat with her. 

I quickly drove 20 minutes away to pick up Eddie and head back. Eyes flicking to the phone every few minutes to check on the timer. 

1 hour 5 minutes

52 minutes

47 minutes

42 minutes

30 minutes

As I was on my way back,  it jumped back up to an 1 hour 2 minutes. 

Hmmm... Eddie has music class and I have to be present as an adult. This wouldn't be over before class started. 

I called Sonja and we agreed she could come over when the timer counted down to like 15 minutes. 

I got home and started housework. Always an eye on the timer. Up and down the timer went.  I plugged my phone in to keep it charged. I was so stressed. Life couldn't continue until this timer gave me permission.  

At 16 minutes,  I called Sonja and she headed over with a friend of hers named Vincent. The three of us sat in rocking chairs in my living room talking about kids and health and Jesus.  And we kept watching the timer.

9 minutes. 

6 minutes.

I handed the phone to Sonja just in case it launched a video call without warning. 

We talked about Job. 

Suddenly a large X appeared on the screen the the place if the timer. Sonja handed me the phone

"The name visible on the documents does not match the recipient, please re-upload document pictures."

So again I took pictures of her ID and uploaded it to the portal. 

"Thank you.  We will review these images manually and schedule next steps via email.  Good bye. " 

She left. It was 1 o clock. I spent over half the day looking at that little timer and I didn't know if I was any closer to having a log-in for her.

I'm still waiting for the account but I'm not expectantly waiting. I'm not glancing at my phone,  held captive by a small timer that doesn't actually tell me how long I will be waiting.  I'm doing other things and hopeful an email will show up eventually.   

I find myself sometimes waiting on God as if there were a timer and a pop up video call that will appear when the countdown finishes. I find it hard to do other things because,  I'm waiting on God to do something,  to say something,  to give me a sign and I'm afraid I'll miss it. 

Then there are other times when I am waiting on God but it is more like email -- I go about my day hopeful that God will show up but in the meantime I continue with my ordinary routine. 

We're drawing close to Easter and in this time,  I find myself looking for God,  expecting God to pop out with bold amazing messages. 

I am 💯 the people lining the street of Jerusalem -- waving palms and ready to see God do fireworks. Time for some big time messiah action. 

But Jesus is riding a donkey not a horse. 

His eyes are sad,  not proud. 

I misunderstood.  God is coming. But not the way I hope or want or expect. Not with clear answers or sweeping changes that fixes all the things wrong with the world.  

Dare I follow the donkey to see where it goes?  Dare I follow Jesus and try to understand what God is doing?