Dear Anonymous

Dear Anonymous,

You’ve been on my mind all week. See, I was shocked at your comment, because if you’ve read my blog with any regularity at all, you would know that I DO acknowledge the goodness of God in my life quite often. And even though I invited you to not read my blog, maybe you have been. Seething, at your computer, maybe you’ve been reading my narcissistic self-analysis of this past week. Well, here’s a break for you, just so you can stop worrying your pretty little head about my inability to see the beauty in the world around me.

Because when I was summoned to my journalism lab at 7:20 AM to find that 13 of our iMacs had been stolen, let me tell you, I was not seeing a whole lot of good in the world. I was angry and hurt and panicked. And of course, the first thing that popped in my head was, “I should write a self-serving analysis of how violated I feel.”

Not.

No, the first thing that popped in my head was, well, I can’t really write that here because my mom reads this blog and I like her to believe she raised me better than to say some of the things I was thinking.

But THEN I thought that maybe–just maybe–the library that is always totally booked would be open for my newspaper staff to work. You know, since my journalism lab was now technically a crime scene and all.

So I went to the library and you know what, Anonymous? THE LIBRARY WAS OPEN! You don’t even understand what a miracle this was, because if I’d had newspaper any other hour of the day, I wouldn’t have been able to talk with my staff about the theft, but remind them that we still had a paper to produce and they needed to write. And we spent our time in the library doing relatively normal newspapery things despite the fact that we were all in quite a bit of shock.

You know what else, Anonymous, those kids made me laugh. I nearly cried a couple of times because I was so upset at what had happened, but my amazing newspaper staff made me laugh. Is that enough of seeing beauty in the world around me? Yeah? Well, tough, because there’s more.

There’s the friends I have who, despite my rather cryptic tweet about the rough day, sent back tweets of encouragement, not demanding any explanation for what happened. That’s right: my friends love me so much that they comfort me even when they don’t have a clue what’s going on.

More? Okay. How about my good friends A.J. and A.J. who surprised me with my most favorite beverage: a diet Coke with extra ice in a styrofoam cup? Yep. I didn’t ask for one, but they brought me one anyway because they thought it might make me happy. And it did–not because it fed my diet Coke addiction, but because they knew my day was pretty crappy, what with the rumor-control and the trying to figure out how to run classes and publications with the remaining computers…

Oh, but I’m not done yet. After school, a student stopped by to make sure I was okay, and to tell me she had asked her friends to pray for all of us. And then my friend Becca demanded we go to Old Chicago for half-price appetizers and conversation away from our little town, so I could unwind in a safe place.

There’s still more! I had to go grocery shopping, and had two separate lists–one for Aldi (since I try to save money) and one for Bakers (because sometimes I’m still a bit of a product snob). And you will NEVER guess what happened tonight. Go on. Try.

EVERYTHING ON MY GROCERY LIST WAS AVAILABLE AT ALDI! Can you believe it? Well, certainly, someone like yourself who admonishes people to see the beauty of life around us can believe something like this happening, so I don’t know why I’m asking if you can believe it. But Aldi even started carrying bread without High Fructose Corn Syrup, milk in half-gallon jugs, and artisan lettuces. SCORE! Let me tell you, God was really trying to balance out the absolutely devastating start to my day (and the ensuing stress…we were in triage mode today but now need to figure out how to survive without those computers).

But I saved the best for last. See, I am blessed enough to live in the same city as my parents. So when I left Aldi, and finally was alone, the dam burst. I cried for the first time all day. And I called my parents and spent time with them and when I left I felt so much better.

And since I’m still angry about the theft and don’t have anyone to yell at, I choose to yell at you, Anonymous, because for you to suggest that I don’t do a good enough job of “just being” or “see[ing] the beauty in the world around [me], the good of things around [me] that our Savior created for us” is downright ludicrous. Of course I see all of that. Even on days that start with me having to figure out how to comfort 60 teenagers who are devastated that someone broke into their newsroom and stole their computers.

So, Anonymous, kindly suck it.

Love,

Julie

p.s. Read this. There’s a nice little nugget in there about anonymous Internet comments.