Phil’s a nice guy. A nice guy with a messy office. But nice nonetheless. He’s so cool he’s got generic shaving cream cans and aluminum pie pans in his office. So yesterday as I was sitting in Phil’s office looking at a terrible Lipscomb Backlog from 2000, in walks one of those Fisher girls. Megan? Mallory? Moca? Mecca?… ole whatshername. She didn’t exactly acknowledge me initually and the whole moment was sorta awkward. Phil and her made small talk while I acted interested. (Maybe I really was interested in Kenny Smith’s attempt to coach girls basketball, who knows?). So while Phil was trying to find out about some vagrant who had called in a grocery list to the church, I tried to make small talk with her. Not sure what I should say and in general it was just awkward primarily because we didn’t know each other.
It probably is just me. I can’t relate to the high schoolers at church especially if I just recently got to know them. Whereas someone who I’ve known since they were much younger is easier to converse with. This high school class I know very little about.
We’ve been hit with telemarketing with some girl scout from church. Apparently she went down the church directory and called everyone trying to push thin mints and samoas. (She should have used the electronic phone tree; much easier) When we tried to order “just one,” she got frustrated and pushed more of her paraphernalia…(baked goods, you know). We should have told her about the “Do not call list” and the absense of our “prior business relationship.”
Yeah, I got hit up for Girl Scout cookies last night at church. Thank goodness I like the powdered sugar sprinkled variety, or else I would have had to make a little girl cry. I kept asking “Are these made out of real girl scouts?” only to receive blank stares. Even “Are they made BY real girl scouts?” made even less of an impression. If these girls don’t know enough about their products, then maybe they shouldn’t be selling them. I bought 2 boxes worth ($6 bucks) which should be enough to fund any women’s empowerment league.
Then there’s this El Salvador dilemma. Are people leading me down the primrose path in rose colored glasses in order to see me fumble around like a fish out of water? David Shannon tells me to go, without any further explaination. Phil tells me to go…yet tells me how to go and how I should use nice soft Cottonelle toilet paper when I do go. Buddy Pickler says I should leave it in God’s hands. My dad may be going on this same trip, if he can get a decent passport picture. I’m making my decision independent of his. Although I figure if this were a game of Survivor: El Salvador, we’d need to be in separate tribes because I’d vote him out during the first episode.
What would make me want to go is my sense to see the world before I die. Helping people. A promise I made to myself to go on at least one mission trip. What would keep me from going is the inconvienence. Those terrible toilets that even Sissy Pickler is afraid of. The sense that I could never fit in fully with the El Salvador clique. Cold showers. Head lice. It’s all there. Like a bad sequel to Romancing the Stone.
Ugh. I’d rather not get caught up on yet another weeklong adventure that I’m compelled to do year after year. I already do 2 youth camps during the summer. Am I going to be forced always go to Latin America every year? I weened myself off of China after 2 trips. Will Latin America take the same?
So during bible class I asked a handful of the kids what they wanted for Christmas.

• Aaron: 4 wheeler. I later found out this 4 wheeler would be stored at his grandparents’ house in Memphis, so theoretically the corpse of Elvis would stand a better chance of seeing it more often than he would. Better luck next time, kid.
• Matthew: “Surprises.” Apparently Matthew has not learned the real value of asking for specifics. “Mom, Dad, I know I really want this remote controlled car for Christmas, but why don’t you just surprise me?” I did that one time and my surprise was tube socks. Ugh.
• Ray: He sang me a song to the tune of “All I want for Christmas,” which included what he exactly wanted. Apparently some type of Pokemon cards.
• Ryan: When I asked him, he stared at me like I had a 3rd eyeball. Never really found out exactly what he wanted.

It’s good for me to take a pulse ever so often to see just how out of step I am with today’s youth. Surprisingly I had a general idea of what they were talking about. Motorized vehicles have and always will be cool. Pokemon…? Well one of these days when he discovers girls he’ll drop these Pokemon cards all together. If he is lucky, his mom won’t trash his cards and he’ll be able to sell them on Ebay years later to some collector who wasn’t able to put away his childhood.