A young person may find himself running an isolated VISTA project, going alone to a great city for a first job, or locating in unheard-of places far from his usual haunts. He leaves behind him the familiarity of old friends and family and the relative ease of making social contacts in college for a situation where faces and surroundings may seem cold and unfamiliar. At times he can feel lonely, isolated, ready to give it all up.

Yet there is every reason to continue a right project! "Remember," writes Mrs. Eddy, "thou canst be brought into no condition, be it ever so severe, where Love has not been before thee and where its tender lesson is not awaiting thee." ^{The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and Miscellany, pp. 149, 150;} No one need feel alone in a new situation. Man is never isolated from Truth and Love. If an individual's project is a worthy one, he can find fulfillment right where he is.

I learned this after accepting a job teaching in a small, isolated American college. I had looked forward to an unpretentious existence: rural simplicity, intellectual stimulation with down-to-earth colleagues. This would be my own Walden Pond!

But I soon found I had really landed in an academic version of Vanity Fair! Instead of rambles in the countryside, all I was confronted with was an endless round of cocktail parties and social climbing. All conversations seemed to involve faculty housing, a central issue in their elaborate system of status symbols. I was the only Christian Scientist in the whole area, and the nearest branch church was thirty-five miles away.

"Nowheresville," I thought. "I can't bear it!"

In midsemester I was still hearing about faculty housing. The prevailing atmosphere started to weigh on my spirits. I wanted to slouch defiantly through the village streets like young rebels I'd seen in the movies. It was very lonely there, and I seemed to be facing a tedious year.

Then I realized that I had better turn to Christian Science for the solution to this situation. My teaching was going excellently, which indicated that this had been a right undertaking. And yet I wasn't happy. What was the answer?

One evening, as I walked alone through the falling snow (it was always snowing that winter!), the answer suddenly came to me. It was in the words of a hymn by Mrs. Eddy:

That was it! Hard though it was to realize, I really was where God's own children were. And though there seemed few points of contact with these people, I could at least see them as God's children. And furthermore, I could know that my joy came from God, not from persons. I determined from then on to express joy in everything I did.

The words of another hymn came to mind:

I was not really in Vanity Fair! I was in the "atmosphere of Love." I remembered Christ Jesus' words, "He that sent me is with me,"  ^{John 8:29;} and I determined to realize this in all my thoughts.

From then on I began to feel gratitude for the beauty of nature, the chance to range through the classics in the evenings, take long walks, and swim in the college pool. I took joy with me to my classes. I honestly tried to see those about me as God's children. And results came very quickly, although they were not at all what I would have outlined.

My faculty colleagues did not change suddenly and start sitting on the floor talking about the deep things of life, as I should have liked them to do. Instead, my students began asking if they could come visit me in the evenings. Here were people who wanted to talk! Here was the chance to be a friend, to learn of their interests, hopes, and concerns.

From then on there were long talks and new insights. I was invited to parties with hard rock bands, and learned to appreciate the joy and rhythm of this music. Yet breaking down the formalities did not hinder the teacher-student relationship. Later reports indicated that many students' horizons were enlarged by our classroom work.

The year turned out to be delightful, and my friendships with those students remain meaningful to me today.

Everyone has something unique to bring to a new situation. And God is always there before him to fulfill his needs. If his step is a progressive one, it can't lead him to an empty Vanity Fair. "The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose." ^{Isa. 35:1.}

No matter how bleak one's material circumstances may seem, God can show one the way to bless others, and thus to be blessed oneself.