Saturday, March 8, 2008

The Dirty Second Hands

Springing forward for daylight savings time means losing an hour of the day. Lately, I haven't had any to spare. I haven't blogged since the beginning of January, and this hasn't been from a lack of motivation.

Aside from the 50-55 hours a week I put in at the office and in my company truck, I often spend my evenings and early mornings analyzing data for my telecommunications job. Being management (and salary, not hourly), I haven't taken a full weekend off yet this year. Occasionally, Kathy mans the laptop and helps me with some of the work that my former secretary, Kathi, performed before her contract ran out.

Ministry, my primary calling, gets done in my "spare time." I study and plan youth lessons/ activities at every chance I get, although students are often at our apartment to watch movies and hang out. That is, when I am not taking them hiking, Jeep off-roading, or to youth group functions.

The limited time I spend alone with Kathy is often fragmented. My dual cell phones (one for work and the other for personal life/ ministry) are always on, and my job requires me to regularly monitor my email accounts, invoicing system, and Instant Messaging communication. Teenagers text my cell phone throughout the day and night. Even my daily quiet time with the Lord is subject to interruptions.

Faith, a woman whom I've been consulting throughout my ministry credentialing process, seems alarmed by my hectic schedule. She says that I won't be able to maintain this pace for too much longer.

She may be right, but I'm not quite sure what to do about it. My time management skills have, for survival purposes, improved considerably during this period in my life. If only I had more time to manage…

1 comment:

Garth Hamilton said...

A few people have asked me about the seemingly random title of this entry. It's actually a song from Switchfoot's latest disc, "Oh Gravity." The theme of "The Dirty Second Hands" fit really well into my mindset when I wrote this entry a few months ago.