Wrecking Havoc

Story time! For months I've been eying Wreck This Journal by Keri Smith every time I walk through the books at Target, thinking to myself, "Self, that looks like fun. You should get one." Then, during this last quarter (possibly the one before it), one of my very dear friends pulled one out of her backpack while excitement dripped from every essence of her being, further perpetuating my notion of fun. Then finally, yesterday, I found myself in Target's books, and I bought one.

For those of you who may not know what Wreck This Journal is, it's a book with a different instruction on each page with the intent to ruin this bound volume. Some of the suggestions include things like ripping out pages and folding them into a paper airplane, or spilling your coffee all over it, or coloring/drawing lines, or making a general mess of things.

I have a problem with liking things beautiful and pristine. I buy notebooks and don't write in them because I don't want to ruin them. But here I have something tangible, telling me to ruin it. It really goes against my nature, but I'm reminding myself that is the PURPOSE of this book. Of course, there are some instructions that I don't think are good ideas at all (licking a page with a candy stained tongue or using a page as a napkin just seems like a recipe for ants...and I overreact to swarms of ants in my room*), so we'll see how I deal with those. But in the meantime, it's liberating to have something that I can exact the inevitable messiness of life upon.

I Peter 5:10 ESV
"And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you."

*In the summer of 2011, I had a package of DumDum lollipops on my desk leftover from Halloween that was found by a massive swarm of ants. They were all over my desk, my computer, the wall, etc. I panicked, and ended up spraying down that whole corner of my room with Raid, I threw away bags and bags of unnecessary "stuff" that lived in my room (major declutter process), and for good measure, I repainted my whole room and reorganized all my furniture. And I love the result. (Seriously, my room is awesome and vibrant now). But to say it was an overreaction is an understatement...