Socrates and so forth...

It was Socrates who said:

If all our misfortunes were laid in one common heap whence everyone must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart.

I believe this is pretty much true. As humans I think we tend to peek into other windows and feel like they live much better lives than we do. But this isn't really true, everyone has struggles and trials. We also tend to think that if we could get a different job, move to a different place, get married or make lots more money that we would be much much happier. But these cases aren't neccessarily true either. There are many trials and misfortunes that a person can experience in life: death of loved ones, trials of faith, abuse of various kinds, physical disabilities, infidelity, divorce, to a watch loved one make dreadful mistakes, an inability to have children, poverty and financial hardship, and many others. With all of these struggles that I could be going through at this time, I glad the only one I'm facing now is the trial of being unmarried and the accompanying loneliness that comes with it. Although my plan was to be married by now, things could be worse. And even if I were married, it doesn't mean that I couldn't still have times of loneliness, feelings of inadequacy and sadness.

I guess what I am getting at here is that I really can't think woe is me, I've got to find that silver lining that is always there. I think what I need to do for now is serve more. Get my mind off me and help others that are going through rough times. And I've got to work on my faith and believing that things will work out for the best one day, because Heavenly Father does ultimately have our best interests in mind or he would never have let us go through so many hard times.

I'm just starting to read a book that was recently published. It was written by a former spinster, Kristen M. Oaks and is titled A Single Voice. I hope it will be enlightening or really just comforting. Sometimes it's nice to know that you're not blazing your own trail all the time, but that other people have been through what you are going through. Anyway, I will for sure let you know what I think of it. That's all for now.
-SITC

Everybody Needs a Plan B (although I could use a Plan G!)

I've got some good ideas for a few new posts so keep checking back in the next week or so. But first in response to my nunnery post, my friend sent me a great story about the ideas she and her friends had come up with about their own spinster commune. They have some great ideas, I especially like the one about having a patron to fund the whole thing. So without further ado here is Plan B.

"Ok, so Plan B.
First you have to realize that this was cooked up in the mind of me and my high-school friends who really had nothing better to do with our time.

I think you'll appreciate it though, since it relates to your whole nun topic.

So, to explain. To every one of us, in some form or other, about the same thing had happened: we had gotten the "talk" from a guy that we liked but apparently didn't like us back in that way. You know, the talk that goes something like this:
Guy: You are so great.
Girl: I think you're great too.
Guy: I feel so close to you. You're like a sister to me.
Read: There is no chance ever that we will get together in a romantic way.

So one of my friends had recently gotten that talk from a guy and he actually told her that he thought of her as sort of a secular nun. Meaning, I guess, that he envisioned her as celibate, but not Catholic. Which of course meant that he couldn't see getting together with her.

So all of this spawned an "order" of sorts where we called ourselves the Secular Nuns. And in planning for our future, Plan B was born. Basically it was something that we liked to fantasize about because, again, we had nothing better to do with our time. But I guess it's a way of talking about our fears without really going off the deep end. The secular nuns always planned on wearing fabulous prom dresses as their habits, of course. No blah habits for us.

So the plan is this: our friend T always wanted to be a doctor (which she is now, by the way) and doctors make a lot of money, right? So we figured that if none of us got married, we would just live together in a big house and that was Plan B. It's not unlike your idea of getting together and sharing a place. Here are some of the details:
-- Our mansion is located on the Oregon coast.
-- It's large enough for each person to have her own wing of the house.
-- However, there are some shared facilities that we all enjoy, such as a library.
-- Oh, and did I mention the bowling alley?
-- And the waterslide. The waterslide is actually an enclosed one and it goes through the library. So when you are sitting quietly in the library and reading a book, every once in a while someone comes down the waterslide...
-- I think there was something about each of us having our own servant boy or cabana boy or something, but you can fill in your own ideas about that.
-- Although our rich doctor patroness basically provides for our every need, for pocket change we make little souvenirs to sell on the beach. You know, the ones that are like rocks and shells with googley eyes? Cheap souvenirs like that.

So that is Plan B. Every once in a while we would just sit around and talk about what was going to be in our house and that was our way of having fun. Or commiserating. Or both. :)"

Thank you, dear reader friend for the story. I also love the waterslide idea. Who says spinsters can't have fun!