Gone for... a Week

Well, in three hours, I will be beyond cell phne range. I will be Southeast of Roosevelt on Federally leased land, and I will have no way to get ahold of anyone. What will keep me from going insane?

1. My Bible, and my prayer life.
2. The prayers of others.
   
3. My Ipod, and specifically season 1 of lost (I trust and hope there will be a few power plugins).
4. Books.
5. Dreaming of being out of debt. One day, I am gonna call the Dave Ramsey show and freak out.

God bless you all, know I love you, and pray for me!

Loneliness

Loneliness.

When I was a kid and I went to camp or moved to a new school, everyone would always talk about loneliness. I never really felt it though, when I was supposed to. Loneliness, I guess, is supposed to hit us the hardest when we don't have the emotional and social mechanisms in place to fight it. In other words, when we're immature. When we're young.

You hear about soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, and we're told that they're homesick. But are they lonely? Probably. Even though they have, in some instances, trained for years with the units they are in combat with, they are as individuals probably lonely.

I came out to Utah to work. I'm going to change my driver's license to a Utah license. I'm going to change my car registration to Utah (unless I live over the border in Colorado, then you change the name of the state). I'm here. I've met several people that will be key in my life.

Pastor D, a nice guy who helped me get a job and is doing a great job ministering in a difficult place. Fernando, my boss, who gave me a job at a great wage. Pat, who has sort of taken me under his wing, gives me advice about the field from how to act on it to what to wear to what to make sure I'm safety conscious about.

But in all of this, I have no permanency upon which to build friendships. I feel lonely, even though it's not rational. I think there is a silly reason for this too. You see, without a place to call home, I'm convinced that a part of me is missing. You see, I am a host. I love to host people, and in people coming over, I find great satisfaction. But a home is also a place where a person can "hide" if they want to. A home is a man's castle, or so the saying goes.

Why am I so lonely? I don't know. Maybe loneliness feels like a lot of things. Maybe loneliness feels like being nervous about doing well at a job; I've never done physical labor, and I am pretty sure I have a better education than the majority of "roughnecks." Maybe loneliness feels like not knowing where I'm going to live when I get back from the oil field. Maybe loneliness feels like a lot of things.

Writing about this makes me feel a lot better, but I know that until I have a place, I just won't be at the top of my game.

Counterproductive

It is counterproductive to heat a room, and then have a regrigerator in that room cooling off your food in the same room.

And the Day Ends with a SCORE!

Today at about 8:00 a.m., Pat called and asked if I would like to go out to a rig. I said yes, I would like to, and we headed out on those bits of Federal Property called roads that make their way through Indian land (incidentally, I saw some houses that didn't look sanitary to live in. That's a nice way to put it). I got to see exactly how these two to three million dollar a week operations run, and meet the guy running this particular rig. Pat also made a lot of phone calls for me to companies to see if they are hiring. When I got back into town, I went around driving to drop off applications at a long list of companies Pat gave me. I didn't find most of them, as I dont' know the area very well. Pat had, by the way, already found me a job that paid like $16.00 an hour, but he said to hold off till next week on that job. After checking into my new hotel, I went out to supper with the pastor of the church I'm going to attend here, and while we were eating, he made a phone call to a Christian (this is Utah, normal people here are Mormon[70%] or heathen [25%]. The rest are Indian or Christian) guy named Fernando who owns a rig. Well, Fernando has two crews. One of his foremen is also a Christian.

To cut to the chase, I meet Fernando at 8:00 a.m. tomorrow, and I'm supposed to show up ready to work. Fernando starts paying people $24 an hour. This is a HUGE answer to prayer. I don't have this job yet, technically, but I am praying that it works out. I have faith that it will work out.

And looking into the future, I see out of this oil job I'm believing to get in the morning a church plant in Boston, MA. I'm encouraged. I'm leaning on God, trusting in him, knowing that yes, now sucks but that he has a plan for me out of this. Thank you, Jesus.

If you're praying for me, pray that:

1. I "get" things out on the rig. One thing I have learned is that this is a whole new language and a whole new way of looking at things.
2. Pray that I stay safe. This is potentially dangerous work.
3. Pray that I find a permanent place... soon.
4. Pray that I can pick up extra work. If I can pick up say, 2-3 extra shifts on my weeks off, that is 1000 bucks I can throw at my debt a month (conservatively).

Thank you for all the people that have been praying for me: Mom, Dad, lil sister Rachel, Nancy, Shawn, Kristin, P. Alan, P. Troy, and anyone else I've forgotten.

Job Hunt Update

So, I'm reviewing my notes on the job hunt, hotel, and housing situation. My thoughts are:

1. The hotels are making a killing. A lot of them are high at 79.99 a night, but get this - that's 79.99 a PERSON! They don't even want to let you diffuse costs!
2. Job services was not really that helpful. Nothing against them. They had me make a resume, and then they gave me the name of four companies. My contact Pat had more names off the top of his head.
3. It's going to suck here if the boom ever ends. Sounds like they are building a ton of housing, which they need due to the lack of availability... but that lack comes from people like me.

I'm going into Patterson in an hour. I want to work for them. Pray that I can work for them.