A Moment of Grace in My Workplace

I thought I would share something that happend to me today. It's a little personal but I wanted to share it because I had to make a decision today on how I reacted. Earlier I talked about how I was reading the devotional, "What So Amazing About Grace." Well today it really hit home and I am putting some of that grace into motion.
Before today I had yet not asked for the time off from my boss. In December my boss had a serious heartattack while away on business in Japan. He actually died for 5 min. Thankfully there were 2 doctors nearby who helped to revive him (I believe God put them there, others say there are just so many people in a train station in Japan there's bound to be a few). He had to undergo double by-pass surgery and was kept in the hospital for nearly 3 weeks before he was allowed to fly back home. It will be quite the long recovery for him and he is only able to come in the office for a few hours at a time.
My original plan had been to ask for a leave of absense sometime in the early new year (2008, so now) but after what happened I didn't want to add to his stress (much good and bads going on at my company) and decided to hold off for a little while.
Well of course when you are excited about something as amazing as this tour, you generally have a hard time keeping it to yourself and proceeded to tell a few of my coworkers but asked them to not talk about it as I didn't want it being spread around just yet.
Well, today I found out someone let my boss know. He called me in and said he had heard some things and wanted to know if it was true, that I would be asking for a leave of absense and going away for awhile. I felt horrible, first I was just utterly shocked and hurt that someone had betrayed my trust, that they felt it so important to tell my boss to possibly save their own butt? I don't know and then I felt horrible that he had found out this way. At this point, obviously I was straight up and talked for quite awhile about this and various other issues in the office. I apologized that I had not been able to have been the one to tell him.
During the time I was in his office, thoughts kept going back and forth in my mind about how I felt and how I wanted to react. Was I angry? In a sense it was my own fault and in telling someone else within the office I was kind of asking for it wasn't I?
When I came out, two of my coworkers who knew about the tour (and who had noticed I was missing from my desk) were in my office (one I share it with). They softly mouthed, what was that about? I informed them that someone had let my boss know about my leaving for the summer. They were shocked and I think were half expecting me to spit rage. But already I knew that I had to make it clear that I was not angry, yes I was a little hurt that someone decided to break my trust but I was not angry. There has been a lot of anger going around our office and it can sometimes be easy to be sucked into the drama that has been going on as well, but I knew I had to approach this differently. To not get riled up, so that others would not get riled up and more rumours and words flying around behind eachothers backs. They asked who I thought it could have been, but at this point I decided that I didn't want to know who it had been. I didn't want to become angry with anyone and it wouldn't undo anything so what would be the point.
You see one thing I didn't say was that, there is word of layoffs going around our office and something like this quite possibly has put me up near the top of the chopping list. To lose my job with less then 6 months to go could make things difficult. But you know what, I'm okay with whatever happens because I realized how lucky I am. I have Jesus in my life and I know that God has ALWAYS provided for me and that I don't have to worry. It's not the end of the world for me if I do lose this job, yeah things might be tight for awhile but I know I am in good hands with whatever may occur in the next 6 months. But for some of my coworkers this would be devestating for them. There is no "greener grass on the other side." In a small town there are not many other options for the type of business we are in.
So I am not sure how tomorrow will go. I'm sure a few more people will know what happened in my meeting (it's amazing how word can get around so fast), but I want to make sure that whoever knows that they are the one that I'm okay with it and I am not angry with them. It's going to be hard to try and stay out of the gossip game as I am sure I will be visited by a few who want to know more of the details but I think I need to show that it's all okay, no hurt feelings (well maybe a little inside but none shown outwardly). I am not going to start pointing fingers and bad mouthing anyone. There are other ways to deal with issues: and that is to show grace...even within just your workplace.

It's 2008!

Just under 6 months to go! 173 more days!! I can't wait. I feel like more and more the tour is on my mind and I just can't wait for the time to pass till we go.

Things are starting to get underway. I have my first thousand raised! Only $9,000 more to go. No problem! Especially with God by my side. Family (especially my loving mother ;) ) and friends are helping me with great fundraising ideas that I can implement in the next few months.

Already I have put a letter in my church's mailslot and soon I hope to have a decorated bulletin board up in our Church all about the sea to sea and an opportunity to sign up for a day to be my prayer warrior and financial supporter at $1/km.

Looks like I will also be painting some blank cards to sell as well. I'll post a design once I get one done (though it might be another month or so, so don't get too excited yet) and if you are at all interested in purchasing a set, let me know :)

At the beginning of December, I also took a course to get my certification to become a spinning instructor. Wow that was one intense day, let me tell you. From 9:30am to 5pm and we were on the bike at least half of that time! You can say my legs were pretty wobbly the next day (and here I am thinking I am going to start teaching? lol). My good friend Mari again came to my aid and set me up with some of her teaching techniques and music. I really admire her and her teaching practices and how she really puts her heart into her classes. That's mainly why I decided to become certified, I wanted to be able to share that heart in my classes at the gym I go to. She really encouraged me (along with a number of other friends and family) to get my certification. Definantly boosted my confidence.

Anyhow this past Saturday was my first class and it was very successful! I really enjoyed myself and I felt like those participating did as well. The one nice thing I have going is that I am "one of the group" as I have been spinning with most of them for 2 winters now. So they are really good for feedback and offer great suggestions. Two of the guys in my class are also training for the Paris to Ancaster Bike Race that I will be doing again this year, so I really appreciate input and suggestions from those guys.

I will admit in the beginning being a spinning instructor is definantly a bit time consuming as I really like to choreograph my music with the variation of intervals. So right now I need to get use to my music and the beat and once I have a few routines put in place it should come much faster. Looks like I'll be teaching every sat morning till the end of March for sure. I said we will have to see after that b/c if the weather starts looking nicer I am going to have to take my training back outside.

Oh I also purchased new handlebars for my bike. I bought Easton EC70 Carbon Wing bars. I have yet to put them on my new bike but will get to that soon enough. I am excited about them and sure hope they work out. I ended buying them slightly smaller than my old bars b/c I always felt like they were just a bit too wide. I went from a 44cm to 42cm. This bar should also be a lot kinder to my wrists. I often found before that my wrists became quite sore after a ride but these bars have a nice flat top that is suppose to offer amazing comfort and stability for my hands and of course, it's CARBON! So here's hoping :)