The 1st Day of Surprises

Surprise Me! that's the book that caught my attention on the library shelves. In my usual skimming fashion I pulled it out, judged it by it's cover, then sped read the back of it before deeming it interesting enough to actually use up space in my brain to think about. The first sentence of the back paragraph sparked my imagination. It read;

"'Surprise me, God.' What if you started the next thirty days with this simple prayer? No agendas, no plans other than waiting on God with eager anticipation of what is about to happen next."

 The 30 day challenge part was what I was interested in. It reminded me of how I wanted to start doing monthly challenges and blog about the various results. What better way to start then with this?

So for the next thirty days I will be waking up each day and asking God to surprise me, for better or for worse. At the end of the day, I'll write a short summery on here of what I found (as well as journaling about it in depth in my own private journals.)

Day 1

Walking from the library, hood pulled over my head in the December weather, I ponder the idea of this thirty day challenge. Across the street I see a lady pulling out her garbage can. She looks familiar to me, but living in a small town, just about everyone looks familiar. I've learned not to waste too much time trying to figure out why. It's always because I saw them at some church event, or school event, or sports event. As I pass by, however, I am startled to hear her speak. "Hey! Is that you?" I turn and pull my hood back a little so she can see me better. "Oh, I thought you were someone else! I'm sorry!" I quickly assure her that it's fine and walk on, amused and wondering who she mistook me for.

Later, at home, as I journal in my room, I look up and am surprised by the sunshine. Just this morning I looked out on a dreary grey world and contemplated how the outside felt like my inside. Nowadays even happy things look greyed to me. But as I look up from my writings I find sunlight warmly washing over my highly decorated walls, making everything glow with vivid colors. Looking at it I felt... happy.

A simple spontaneous idea of something to order online for Christmas turned into a much bigger ordeal that took all night. After finding the item I was looking for, two other gift ideas pop into my head. Adding them to my shopping cart I find I can get free shipping if I get up to $35! After adding a couple other items I find some are not eligible. Rising frustrations and over electronicized eyes put the test on my patience. After finally getting enough qualified items in my cart I go to check out and am unpleasantly surprised to find the item that started the whole thing was at least $15 shipping! It was too perfect to give up, however. I reluctantly decide to spend the extra cash.