Tuesday, July 19, 2011

We All Sprint for Ice Cream.

Growing up, do you remember those summers that were filled with that creepy lullabye music the ice cream truck would blare? Or did you ever experience that sheer panic while frantically searching the couch cushions for enough money?

I do. Like it was yesterday.

My fastest mile time growing up was around 10 minutes (#porkinforkin) but I'm sure that if someone told me ice cream was waiting at the end...it would have been at LEAST 9 1/2.

Ice cream was what made summer....summer.

Luckily, I work for a company that regonizes this fact, and that is why EVERY Friday afternoon in the summertime, we are offered FREE ice cream. While this suggests we are still young at heart around here, we sure don't act like it when the announcement to "come and get it" is made over the intercom. My co-workers usually finish writing their E-mails, pick up their desk a bit, and even initiate further discussions about how this or that meeting went while they mosey down the hall and up the stairs towards the afternoon's treat.

That's right, I said mosey.

But not I. Ohhhhh nooooo. Not I.

Let me take you back to the first Friday of this summer, before I knew this was the seasonal tradition where I worked.

The only reason the receptionist Georgia (the sweetest lady alive) usually makes intercom announcements for the entire company is when there is a call on someones line, or a visitor upstairs..... and that's about it.

However, this Friday she interrupted my mundane data entry and said there were delicious chocolate milkshakes waiting for everyone in the conference room upstairs.

"WHAT?!" I said aloud.

"Is this a dream?" I thought to myself.

The final, sobering thought to run through my mind was was..... "I'm down stairs and my free delicious treat is a long way away"

Before Sweet Georgia could even begin to finish her sentence about the ice cream, I pushed my rollie chair so hard beneath me it slammed into the wall behind me (the same wall I share with the VP of Sports Operations of course) and began making my mad dash up the stairs. As I sprinted past the "higher-ups" offices....all of which have glass walls by the way....one by one I heard each of them busting into laughter.


Not at ALL concernced with their perception of me, I was the first to reach the conference room and geographically the furthest away.

Successs.

After picking up my chocolate milkshake, out of breath I tried to casually make my way back to my desk.


However, it wasn't that easy.


As I mosied past each office that I had earlier sprinted past, these were the comments that started seeping out behind those glass walls...

"Who knew she could run so fast?"


"Wasn't she wearing heals?"


"Forkin, that was incredible."


Glad that my sanity was NOT one of the things audibly being called into question, I sat back at my desk, laughed at myself, and went back to work


.....not regretting for a single second letting my co-workers know exaclty how I felt about dairy products.

Why? Because for the rest of the day, I left 3 grown men laughing histarically.

I LOVE ice cream. And like when I was a child, I ran to get it.

Forgetting about professionalism, I simply did what God created me to do....

to sprint after these things that give me joy.


and because of that decision, I unintentionally left others in the same type of wake God leaves us in all the time...... one that is filled with random, illogical laughter and.....joy.


Sprint after the things that give you joy and let those around you see and experience you doing so.....it will reveal the Lord to others in ways you never thought.


Please take my unprofessional word for it.


Isaiah 55:12.

1 comment:

mere said...

so great al. and so true. i love ice cream. i love running! and i love joy. great reminder of what we should be running after.