Lock out

Mood: too lazy to figure it out at the moment
What I'm Reading: The Passion by Jeanette Winterson (about a man in Napoleon's army)

Last night I stood in frustration before the door of my apartment. I had stepped out to take a load of laundry to the basement. Before I had time to react, the wind pushed the door shut behind me and I was locked out. Brilliantly, just moments before I had turned my oven on to bake some bread. Now I stood contemplating how I was going to explain to my neighbors why I had burned down the building or how I would manage to pay more than a month's rent for an after-hours locksmith to come and get me out of this mess.

A few moments later I marshalled my courage and my fledgling German skills to recruit a kindly neighbor to help me break into my room. After 20 minutes futilely spent ramming a credit card in the doorjamb, my neighbor called his brother to the fight. At this point I remembered where to find the fuse box for my apartment and went to cut the power. Within seconds of my return, my apartment was sucessfully broken into. So much for illusions of security.

It was really quite fortunate ''bad luck'', becuause in the process I met 3 neighbors. One of them just moved in 2 days ago and asked if they might join me in a cup of tea. We had a nice conversation, and they offered to help me with my German grammar.

Quote from my current book: ''I can't be a priest because although my heart is as loud as hers I can pretend no answering riot. I have shouted to God. . .but [He has] not shouted back and I'm not interested in the still small voice. Surely a God can meet passion with passion?'' It makes me want to shake the protagonist of this book and tell him what I have come to know of God's passion. The only passion that has ever been deep enough to meet my own, and rather than try to quench the fire in my heart (as those with less strength or love might do), He lovingly directs it, and allows it to grow stronger and more pure with the burning. He gives meaning to it so that rather than consuming me, it allows me to grow. The man in this book seems to miss seeing God because, for all of his talk, he searches for a god too small.