As I think about 2009 for me I believe I will call it The Year of the Hermit. I don't think that I've ever spent so much time by myself in my apartment as I did in 2009. I know that those of you who have rugrats pulling at your feet long for alone time and are probably jealous of me. I would say don't be, mostly because as I reflect on it, a good deal of it was time misspent.
It started with being in radiation treatments and being jobless. Both of those things tended to keep me to myself. Then came the hours and hours of job hunting. Job hunting has changed dramatically since I did it last, it's all done via the internet and you're lucky if you even have an e-mail exchange with a real person. But, it makes it just as easy to spend time playing mindless computer games as it does seriously look for work. I'd say the job hunting time was about a fifty-fifty split of time well spent and time misspent. Finally in May, a job emerged, but it only contributed to the hermitude (I think I made up a word).
I have a job now where I work from home. So, as I pay down bills and am able to contribute to the family who has so graciously opened up their home to me, I can't say that those hours were not time misspent. I am thankful for my job, even though it is not the desire of my heart. The prospect of being paid for every hour I work brings out any greed I might have in me. It was definitely easier to work at work than work at friendships. It became easy to work tons of hours and drive myself further into hermitdom.
Then there was not quite knowing what to do with myself when it came to church. It's really, really hard to go from being there 24-7 and being in the know, to just being another church member. I chose to remove myself as far as possible. I still went to Women's Bible Study and to services, but I did neither every week. I'm glad that God is faithful regardless of how many times we make it through the door, but it definitely contributed to the Year of the Hermit.
Thank goodness I chose to teach guitar lessons! I think I might have started to look like a hermit, if it weren't for seeing those kids on a weekly basis.
All of this wouldn't have been so bad if I had used my time better. I can't tell you the number of hours I wasted playing computer games or watching re-runs of TV shows that I've seen a million times or Facebook stalking. When I think of how much better I could have used those hours this year, it makes me sad; the songs that could have been written, the blogs that could have been posted, the books I could have read, the exercise I could have done, the time with friends that I could have intentionally spent and most importantly the intentional time in the Word and prayer I denied myself.
So here's to 2010 being the Year of Living. It is a reality of my life that I spend a lot of time alone, but I hereby resolve to use that time better this year. I hope to use it to grow myself, express myself and mostly to love God and those around me.
