Just A Little Further?

Hello November,
When you come around, I am normally doing quite well in my work, but you bring so much stress that you unnerve me.  I find myself hesitating about the quality of my work, my level of production, stressed about upcoming final papers and increasingly focused on myself.  This week, 48 hours passed when I only talked to Lawry for about 30 minutes to an hour total.  We both took it in stride, but of course it made me sad, since talking to him helps me with the madness of graduate school.  November, when you are in full swing, I'm often thinking, "I don't know how I can finish this!"
This morning, before you really started to usher in the end of fall, I went on a run.  I meant to run just about 30 minutes, a little over 3 miles out at the cross country training track.  It's really a beautiful course, like a meadow with a wide path running all through and around it.  So, I was really looking forward to the early morning run.  When I got there, people were arriving for a cross country meet.  I like to run, but I'm no super runner, so I quickly got the heck outta Dodge, but then I had to figure out where to run instead.  Long story short, although I could have cut my run really short several times--because I was knocked off my normal course--I ended up running for 50 minutes, and I loved it.  I got tired around 35 minutes, but then I remembered what my sister says about running.  She says, "I figure, if I can push my body to do this, I can better ask my mind to do difficult things, too."
I was listening to worship music while running today. When I got home, I started doing some crunches and Sara Groves "When the Saints" came on.  What a good song; she sings about the sacrifices and actions of the saints.  I hadn't heard it in a while.  I want to spend of myself. On school, on Lawry, on God, on friends, on family, on others, on teaching.  I want to think about when I can choose to go a little bit further.

Oh when the Saints go marching in, I want to be one of them.

Missing home,
MJ

If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath and from doing as you please on my holy day, if you call the Sabbath a delight and the Lord's holy day honorable, and if you honor it by not going your own way and not doing as you please or speaking idle words, then you will find your joy in the Lord, and I will cause you to ride on the heights of the land and to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob.” The mouth of the Lord has spoken.