One exhausted mom!!! A 3 hour tour, 3 hour tour… No not shipwrecked but I purposely drove here, beautiful weather.
A three hour college tour with my youngest gave true understanding of the dynamics and dimensions of the student life and culture of cultured care, really not coddled but pretty close to that in this college-equivalent to adventure camp. I just hope that they get to class and not just the thousand activities that are available, really crazy fun is available for these 18 to 20 somethings. WOW.
What seemed impossible a year ago in furthering education is now probable as well as profitable and palatable. I could imagine the experience, but like all things, we are not yet AT the future – and it’s not my future, it’s the next generations go-to future. College is for “helping”, in all ways towards maturity, including especially making the move to mom not making all the decisions anymore. Let us all pray for good decisions. The ability to let the next folks choose is a great opportunity for their growth and us to keep our mouths shut when we can, yet guide… We did raise kids, now “we are raising adults”, I now say.
Honestly here I don’t think there is a bad decision to be made, crazy volumes of career choices in this mix. This place is trade-school in a college setting. So this is the practical application of knowledge so needed by the trades. This level of college structure with deep folds of possibilities would be buzzing like a beehive, I imagine, with SO MANY students. I would not wonder that some students would be overwhelmed. And yet, you don’t want to prevent anyone who is energized by the possibilities to not get that opportunity to buzz in the swarm.
Whew, the three hour tour really was so complete. Mary, our tour guide was SO accommodating and encouraging. Her career path interesting and a good example to these incoming students – whether this year or next (we are planning for 2026 possibly). There were nooks and crannies completely unexplored in the 3 hour tour. Just like life – there is always more in our future – and keep exploring!!!
Faith in the Future! “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11
Keep the faith and see the future!
(and get plenty of rest, you are going to need it)
It is a joy of math, yes math… I’m a forever nerd of course, loved math club in high school and the awesome topics in a club format was a no pressure tickling of the mind, fun from fractions to fractals… Get your pens and pencils out… Protractors and straight edges. That was 40 years ago now, wow. I just used basic math, just now, to figure out how long ago from my age. Basic math of figures, different than the basic math of figuring out life.
Can we figure out life? (And I’m not talking about the number 42 from the hitch-hikers guide to the universe, nerds)… Life tells us things but Jesus says “Don’t worry” – even about the math…
But math is something you do, you need, you figure out with teaching tools AND RULES. So when my youngest started to get serious interested in furthering education, I started grinning ear to ear, heart string to apron string. It’s not about cutting an apron string but myself being strung along on this adventure to further education to jump into life – to have a future. But oh I have to take this ONE DAY AT A TIME, I’M REMINDED BY THE LORD, take life one day at a time. AND it is NOT my college experience but theirs. (and they have to take it one day at a time too!)
SO, before I can jump in delight on any upcoming trip(s) to visit the place(s) or rush to buy my college mom sweatshirt, first we must do math! Oh, there’s a math placement test. OH MATH!!!!
My youngest asked for my help to brush up on learning. I’ve never been SO HAPPY to be a mom-nerd, nerd-mom in my life. It’s like I can’t help you in teaching you how to cook but I CAN discuss fractions and show the old school basic division AND all the tricks of the trade to simplify fractions and do algebraic equations. But the basic truths I’ve applied mathematically, that I would have learned from years and years of nerd-time, like flipping a fraction when dividing became not good enough of an answer to “WHY” not just “HOW”. Hmmm, a high school grad’s question from something they never absorbed but was rote memorization for me, that is tough to teach. And 40yrs later I can’t remember half the why’s (thank God for Google), and only a part of the hows.
Do we feel like we have been relearning the how? In math and life? We all are. Sometimes one just has rules to KNOW and apply. Sometimes we just live life in the basic figuring out of being blessed without understanding all aspects of God’s complex plan.
Figuring out life is more than basic math, it is complex, we don’t always know the HOW. BUT WE DO KNOW THE WHO!!!
THE WHO IS GOD!!!!
Not “WHO is God?” but “God is WHO”. God Himself, who is a mathematician too (of course He is looking at how complex and rule-following patterns are like swirls in a sunflower), God is in charge and will take care of us – not to worry. Need to figure out life? Just rely on God – LOVE is the answer – the solution for the problems. Love was there from before time – and before math.
Math done for real life is everything from money to cutting an pizza. It comes down to figuring out money often as one of the life skills we apply. We do need to pay the rent and put food on the table, yet we worry obsessively over things and not the basics.
Jesus said don’t worry about the basic math of life, just live it.
Jesus said JUST LOVE – don’t hate – Just live – don’t die – be still and still be.
Jesus says “Don’t worry” – even about the math of life…
I urge the reading of Matthew 6:19-34 NIV – where JESUS KNOWS THE MATH AND MEANING OF TREASURES OF LIFE OF LOVE – JESUS KNOWS THE HOW AND WHY AND ‘DON’T WORRIES’ OF IT ALL.
We number our days – and count on HIM…
Amen
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“So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom”. Psalm 90:12
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Matthew 6 – Jesus teaches:
Treasures in Heaven “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
“The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are unhealthy, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!
“No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.
Do Not Worry “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?
“And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Debbie Upper 