metal on metal

so there i was walking to my mailbox as i do everyday to check my mail when i'm in town. for some reason, when i put the key in the mailbox, i gagged. i have no idea why i gag, at first. but then it becomes clear when i go into my kitchen later that afternoon to make a salad. i make a salad in a metal bowl. great salad full of wonderful things like lettuce and stuff that doesn't make you full. that's why it's usually a pre-game meal. but for this day, it was a late afternoon snack. so i go to eat the salad with a metal fork and i gag again. i realize that something is terribly wrong. gagging at salads is nothing new. i'm not a huge fan of health foods. but this was a good salad.

so why did i keep gagging? 

welp, i realized something very important about myself. #1 my biggest fear in the world is mayonnaise. please dont use this against me or i will find you and hunt you down. but a new thing, #2 i cannot stand metal on metal. you may not care about this, or maybe you do. but i'm realizing i might as well go ahead and admit the problem. after all, that's the first step. 

so guess what? now that i notice it, it's everywhere. my shower curtain has metal clippee hangee thingees and that slide along a metal rod. PROBLEM. plus, i'm starting to beg complete strangers to check my mail. and i bought a plastic fork to eat my salads with. it's getting out of hand i know. so i'm confessing this to the blog world in hopes of getting my story heard. metal on metal is a serious issue! disclaimer - please always look for sarcasm in my blogs, because it happens to be a spiritual gift of mine.

so now i'm trying to be proactive and force myself to check my own mail. i'm getting good at it. i still gag,  but i'm checking it, and that's a good first step. so now i'm trying to find ways to creatively get over my metal issues. any suggestions? good thing i never chewed on metal pipes when i had braces. 

so where does this leave us? afraid of metal, mayonnaise, and scared. very scared. what if everything becomes metal one day? what if metal is the new internet? the new cool? metal is the new fleece, someone said the other day. scary stuff people. scary stuff. so beware... and if anyone out there is applying for a job to check mail for people who dont like metal keys in metal mailboxes, let me know. 

the good thing about this weird quirk of mine: it reminds me of the good ol' friendship verse in proverbs that says, "As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another." So now instead of freaking out about metal on metal, i'm going to think about how awesome it is that God has put fantastic people in my life to sharpen me and make me look more like Jesus :) or also, we have those occasional friends who make us gag (let's be real), but they are in our lives for a reason as well! they are what some might call sand-paper friends, and they help in sawing off our rough edges, creating patience and gentleness and love within us!