My friend Anne

In order to distract myself from the fact that I am still, after 43 job applications, in job purgatory and that the cable has been turned off today (horror of horrors!), I have been reading some of Anne Lamott's stuff on Salon.com.

I love Anne because she reminds me to "Surrender; give up, breathe, eat. Put your own oxygen mask on first. Pray, even if you think you are an atheist: You cannot know if you really are, until you've had a sick or colicky baby. There is not much fixing, or controlling, or saving people on this earth. There is only listening, seeking wise counsel, trying to help, and rest. There's only now. There's only the exact shape we're in right here."

And that dancing is important. "Last week, when I first came up with this theory -- that conquering this one challenge could lead to small miracles and restoration and to getting our country back from these infidels -- I was in church. The problem is that I often get confused there, and think that truth and beauty always win out in the end; that we cry out for answers, and God gives them to us: Love everyone, breathe, show up, sit outside, dance, stop sucking your stomach in. Try not to kill anyone today. And dance around a little very day. Why? Because it helps. It is part of living: In African Catholic churches, people dance on the way up to communion, even the nuns."

And that hope through the mess is hard but necessary, and that God doesn't take sides.