Typical Night

The young man arrived at home late, hoping to get in a small bit of reading and at last catch up on sleep. Arriving at home, he immediately became aware of the new level of coldness that had taken over the night. Checking the outside temperature on his phone he saw that it was and bone chilling six degrees out. "It's going to be a long night." He went first to the sink to make sure the faucet was dripping. Yes it was annoying throughout the night, but much less annoying than waking up again to a flood from cracked pipes. As he approached the sink, a small brown spider, believed by his untrained eye to be a brown recluse, dropped down right in front of his face, barely missing the top of his head. With almost no fear or surprise, he calmly grabbed to shoes and smashed the spider between the heels. He was surprised at the normalcy of seeing this now. After numerous encounters and bites leaving scars on his body, he almost felt immune to the venom of the small terrors.
Next he checked to see if the propane company had finally filled his tank so that at last he could turn on the heater. After about five strait minutes of trying, he accepted another day of defeat. Due to the amount of cold, the man chose warmth over comfort and decided to leave his full outfit on to go to bed, coat and everything. He much preferred as little as possible, but it was just to risky for tonight. He crawled to his worn down couch to enjoy the new book he was starting. Finally relaxation! To his thrill he also discovered that he had forgotten to turn off the heated blanket he had recently required the night before. A warm bed to crawl into! It didn't take more than ten seconds to realize that indeed it was not warm, but actually as cold as if it had been left outside. He traced the cords, the wires, the plug, and came up with nothing. Of course.
At least he had his trustworthy space heater, his one source of warmth when needed for the last year. It was somewhat melted and not what it used to be, but it still was faithful to put out enough warmth, as long as it was carefully placed beneath his blanket close to his body.
He tried to open his book, but struggled reading. Above the blanket with the heater, it was grimacingly cold, too cold even with clothes to keep his head and arms above and try to read his book. He tried to read from underneath the blanket, but there was not near enough light. He finally gave up, after all this time finally frustration starting to set in by his limitations set by the cold. He decided instead to try to fall asleep to a movie that had perked his interest. After some time his ears and nose were screaming to be placed under the blanket in the warmth, and so his second effort to release his boredom was defeated by the cold.
Finally he gave in, knowing that it was time to go after the thing he really wanted, but knew would be hard to get on this chilly night...sleep. He submerged his entire body under the blanket, placing his freezing hands on the heater to unthaw them, and curled his body into a ball as best he could, carefully make sure that as he did this he did not lift up his blanket even a hair, fearing the rush of cold air that would blow beneath and drown out the warmth. The coat was too much, though warm, it was extremely uncomfortable and quickly removed, soon followed by his jeans. He knew sleep would come faster without the extra discomforts. Finally his body reached the right mixture of warmth and comfort, and his extreme tiredness was finally allowed control of his body. 1:00 a.m. Sleep begins.
It did not last long though, as the man quiets down, the mice decide that its safe to come out. The man was soon awake to the familiar sound of a mouse. This had to be the millionth time to be woken by such noises, and had learned to interpret them very well. Staying under the blanket, he knew the mouse had found a hint of food left out near a metal can. He tried to remember what it could have been. He quickly dismissed it and decided to let it go, it was not worth losing the warmth for. He dozed off again.
The next four hours was a combination of little bits of sleep, and fighting the battle of the cold. Dozens of time he would wake up, realizing he had pulled his face out from under the blanket for air, only to be forced awake by a freezing face. The blanket would need readjusted around his feet, around the heater. The heater would need moved either an inch closer, an inch away. It would need aimed at different parts of his body, but away from where he was breathing. Close would need peeled off, so that the heat would directly hit his skin. It seemed like a hundred times he woke during those short bursts of sleep. At last he woke and felt tiny footsteps scurrying down his leg. Without a hint of surprise, he waited for it to get as close to his foot as possible, and then kicked his leg with all of his might. Cold air whooshed under his blanket, letting his hours of careful work to obtain warmth leave as well. He heard the mouse land with a thud on the ground and he listened careful to see if it scurried away. He heard nothing and had hope that maybe the landing had killed the creature. He was almost proud by the lack of fear or surprise these creepy rodents had on him. It was completely normal now to have this happen, and he had hope he had mastered the kicking technique as well.
Full frustration set in. Again he was cold, and he had a small worry that there were more mice. He could not handle being woke up again. He used his ears, carefully trained by numerously being woken at all hours of the night, to determine what time it was. No voices, no people, no machines, no trains, a car passed on average every fifteen seconds. He computed all of the information his ears gathered and took a guess of 5:35. He reached his arm from under the blanket, subjecting it to the cold to find his phone. Pulling it into the warmth, he looked at the clock for the first time that night. 5:39. A sense of pride again came over him at the trick he had learned from so many nights like this.
The next two hours were spend under the blanket, longing for sleep, but not finding it. Instead all that came were his first hints of bitterness about his situation. This used to be funny, something to laugh about, something to take pride in, something to make him unique. Now it was just a nuisance. He wanted to have energy, sleep, a good nights rest. For the first time he wanted to leave "The Shack".

Ok, so yes this is about my night last night, a very normal night, and yes after all this time I finally have had thoughts about hating this situation. I have been great up until now. I spent a few hours in self pity as I tried to sleep last night. I spent a lot of time thinking of thoughts of what I deserved and why am I here, and how bad I have it. And that's why this blog is all crap. This is probably the worst thing I can think of to write in my life right now. At the same time their is martyrdom, starvation, actual freezing to death, sex slavery, rape, suicide, murder, and a million other evils that people don't have a choice about. I hate that I feel sorry for myself because I am a little cold. I hate that I can type this blog out and know people will feel bad for me. This is nothing. I almost want to live like this, to keep in perspective the life I live, so as not to become entangled with focusing in on such small circumstances, that if we see the tiniest thing go wrong we get mad at God! How dare I ever do that, yet I do daily. I stub my toe, I only have a couple hundred dollars in my account, I can't get a new toy, I have to work a little outside, I have to do something I don't want for money, I don't get that friendship like I want it, that relationship like I want it. America, we have become so focused on our life, that everything about God and love have been determined by how we perceive our minute to minute situation. God give me a world view that is worthy of you, that is not focused on me, that loves others, that is not desensitized to the cruelties and horrors of other countries, and is fully set on things above, not on things of the Earth. God forgive me for selfishness, and put me through more if that's what it takes to get my eyes off of being so only focused on my own life. You alone are worthy.