some awkwardness for your week

Awkward things:

- Self check-outs at the grocery store. My husband loves them but by the time I'm through with them (that is, if I don't give up and find a real cashier) I want to take a baseball bat to the thing. It's just never the smooth, uncomplicated experience you want. "Place item in bag. PLACE ITEM IN BAG!" I don't like being yelled at by machines; I guess I'm sensitive that way. If someone is being paid to do all that nonsense for me, why not just let them? That's pretty much my life philosophy.

- Eating out with other Christians or, more specifically, saying grace. It's tricky because everyone, I've learned, has their own concrete idea of when exactly this should take place. So every time I eat out with a Christian, I have discern what type they are: the pray before the rolls type, pray before salad and/or appetizers type or, worst of all, the pray before taking a sip of water type. Personally, I think it makes sense to pray before the actual meal (or even afterwards!) But what do I know.

- Finding a paper on marriage I wrote in the seventh grade. It read, "When I'm a wife, I will always be obedient and cook breakfast every morning." Trevor laughed just a little too hard when I read it to him.

- When someone hits my car. Normally I'm the one doing something illegal or idiotic on the road (unintentionally, of course), so when someone hit my car in the library parking lot the other day, I had no idea how to respond.

There I sat in the parking lot, ready to pull out, when this girl starts backing out, oblivious that I was directly behind her. Never having a reason to use it before, I fumbled to find the horn, not quite ready to die (although somewhat pleased that, if it had to happen, it was with a pile of newly checked out books beside me.) It was too late, though, and she bonked into the side of my little Honda.

 I thought maybe I should have been angry? or got her insurance information, perhaps? But when I caught a glimpse of her in her rearview mirror, she looked a lot like me; young, a little ditzy, the type of girl whose nose was always in a book. So, unsure of what else to do, I simply smiled and waved like, "Me too, girl. Me too." I've yet to inspect my car.