on tuesday night, i read a friend’s facebook status and the comments underneath it and had to laugh. i had to comment on it. i said, “i read this sequence while eating taco bell and it felt like old times. way back to last year. times were simpler back then.” it led to some laughs by the friend and the other person involved in the comments.

as much of a joke as that was, it had at least a little bit of truth to it.

i talk a lot on here about growing up, getting older, getting more mature, and all of that good stuff. with those things comes more responsibility. with more responsibility comes more obligations. with more obligations comes less random.

i used to never keep a calendar. i always knew exactly when everything was. i knew when the paper for this class was do, when i had a test for that class, and when i had to go to this place to do that one thing. there were things going on but they were manageable in my head.

that’s not the case anymore.

every night before i go to bed i check my calendar to see what i have to do the next day. every morning when i first wake up i look at my calendar again to see what i have to do that day. i generally keep my e-mail client in calendar mode instead of e-mail mode so that i don’t miss anything.

there’s too much going on to just keep it in my head.

yesterday morning i checked my calendar and it was completely empty. there were no interviews with coaches. there was no class. there was no project that needed working on. i basically had a free day.

when i got into work i started talking to one of the guys i work with about our baseball game at virginia tech. we were talking about our chances and how we thought we would do and everything that goes with that. while we were talking about it i started thinking about how i’d like to go.

i like baseball.

the weather is nice.

and i actually have nothing that needs to get done.

my boss was out of the office so i texted him and asked if he was okay with me going and he was. i rounded up a couple of friends who wanted to go and at 3:30 we jumped in my car and headed the 90 minutes or so over to tech.

it was random.

nothing was planned.

we didn’t even win the game.

but i had an amazingly good time.

one thing i’ve noticed is that i get too wrapped up in my calendar. i have to get this done, then that done, then that other thing, and so on. i haven’t had a full day off to do nothing (meaning no work or schoolwork) in two weeks. i’m not complaining about that by any means, but there are times when i simply need a little bit of unplanned randomness.

on the drive over to tech we didn’t really talk much. in fact, one of the guys fell asleep in the backseat so the two of us that were awake just listened to music and had some small talk and all of that. when we got to tech we parked, found the stadium, and sat down for the game. we talked to some other people while we were there and laughed quite a bit even though our favorite team was losing. on the way home my gps lied to us multiple times while we were trying to find a place to eat but it was funny. after dinner we had some really cool conversations while driving back to lynchburg.

basically, when you boil it all down, we did a whole lot of nothing.

there wasn’t anything spectacular in any of what we did. it was simply a few friends enjoying being around each other. unfortunately we get too busy or too wrapped up in our calendars that we don’t take the time to do this. we focus all of our time on school or work or church or any number of other things and we forget to take a little time for ourselves.

most of the people that read this are college students who have finals coming up in about a month. things are going to get absolutely crazy here in a few weeks. before that happens, find a day or even just an afternoon to simply forget all the things that are going on and go out and do something fun. or maybe even take a day to sit on the couch and relax.

one thing that i forget is that even god took time to rest. he took time out of being god and just relaxed for a day.

if the guy that made us thought that it was important to take some time off, i’d like to think that it’s important for us to do the same.

say your prayers and take your vitamins.

have a nice day.

-jonathan