mission.japan

I listened with great tension that crumbled into greater disappointment Tuesday morning as my beloved Stars failed to hang on to a one-goal lead in Game 7 of the conference quarterfinals. Penalty trouble was obviously one of the problems. You can’t give that much talent that many opportunities and expect to keep a clean sheet for long. A missing Zubov didn’t help either.

So it’s a long summer of waiting and preparing for the next season of hockey in Dallas. Funny how an amazingly good season that exhibited the tremendous depth, perseverance, and come-from-behind spirit of this year’s Stars team can grind to a screeching halt in the first round of the playoffs. A lot of things in Japan have been like that—exorbitant quantities of preparation and planning for what seems like minimal return. Many things I designed for the kids’ English curriculum haven’t seemed to help the class flow like I wanted. I never hit my goal of skating a marathon in under two hours (that was probably more mental burnout than anything). I didn’t get to stay for two years (although I’m not saying that’s a negative). In general, a lot of things never turned out the way I thought they would.

But I’ve realized it (things not going according to plan) probably doesn’t matter that much. The world keeps spinning whether or not I get the English classes to the state I want them, or skate a marathon, or stay in Japan forever. It may turn out that the way things ended up was the best possible option. Or perhaps that’s guaranteed…”in all things God works for the good of those who love him”, or something to that effect, right? Not advocating laziness, but affirming that the end result is not in my hands. Kakki~n, bingo! (FLCL reference.) And the dead weight of worrying about the result is suddenly gone. That’s refreshing, isn’t it?