Through a Glass, Darkly

Yesterday was Bright Sunday at my church. It was the first time we had ever celebrated Bright Sunday, which is the day (usually celebrated in Eastern Orthodox churches) when we dress in bright colors and celebrate with holy laughter the miracle of Christ rising from the dead. This website says that, “The custom was rooted in the musings of early church theologians (like Augustine, Gregory of Nyssa, and John Chrysostom) that God played a practical joke on the devil by raising Jesus from the dead. ‘Risus paschalis - the Easter laugh,’ the early theologians called it.” Our pastor explained it in a similar way. It reminded me of the party that Lauren Winner talked about in Girl Meets God, where everyone met on the Monday after Easter and brought whatever it was that they gave up for Lent so that they could all celebrate together.

In our case, we just wore Hawaiian shirts and other bright colors. It was one of those things where I wanted to tell visitors, “We don’t always dress quite so silly.”

After church, we went out to eat to celebrate a friend’s birthday. Because it was cold and I didn’t want to be dressed like an idiot all day, I had brought along a change of clothes. And by “change of clothes” I mean “my Davidson sweatshirt.” That’s right! I own a Davidson sweatshirt. Because my brother went there. I am totally legit. For the record, Mike put on his UNCG sweatshirt. SoCon represent! (First Mike and I were eerily matchy with our Hawaiian shirts. Then we were eerily matchy with our sweatshirts. We were having one of those adorable couple days. I am not all that comfortable with the matchy matchy.)

While we were on our way to the restaurant, I called my brother to tell him that I was wearing the sweatshirt he bought me in honor of his alma mater’s big game. He said that, in fact, he had worn his own Davidson sweatshirt to church. (I would have worn mine to church if it hadn’t been Bright Sunday. Too bad the sweatshirt is gray. Later on in the day, I saw that my mom’s Facebook status was that she was wearing her Davidson sweatshirt. We were a whole family of matchy matchy!)

But that is not the point of this post. The point of this post is that Davidson (and, you know, Stephen Curry) managed something that I thought was impossible. They got my brother to care about college basketball. Now, I love me some college basketball. March is a wonderful, wonderful time of year. Joseph, however, isn’t all that big on organized sports and that kind of athletic competition. Not that he’s not athletic - he did tae kwon do, he ran track and cross country. He just doesn’t care for the way that sports stars are idolized and overpayed. And he especially doesn’t like how people tie their importance and mood to a team they have nothing to do with. We have had a lot of discussions about this, and while I see his point, I do truly love the game of basketball. I love competition and rivalry. It’s one of those things where we mostly just agree to disagree. So when Davidson kept winning those games, I didn’t call him, because I thought he’d be like, “Well, okay, thanks for letting me know, but you know I don’t really care.” I called my mom instead, and we squealed excitedly about the games, just like we always do.

But then on Sunday, my brother and I were talking about a game! Of basketball! He even knew that, if his team won, they would be playing my team! This is some serious progress, people. You need to root for Davidson in the future so that he and I can continue this emotional closeness.

In all honesty, I was kind of heartbroken at the end of the game. I know that my brother wasn’t deeply invested in the outcome, but it was fun to watch him have something like that to be excited about. I know that people all across the country were rooting for Davidson, but at the same time, it felt very personal, to know, as Mike and I were standing in the middle of the living room watching the last play, that my brother was watching the game at a bar with other Davidson grads, that my mom was watching at her house. All of us in our matching sweatshirts.

I didn’t call him, because I knew he’d say, “Oh, well, no big deal.” But I would have called if they had won. Because I knew he was watching.

Random House is re-releasing the Sweet Valley High series, with updated references (this means cell phones and Elizabeth writes for the website instead of the newspaper) and character descriptions (this means “perfect size four” rather than “perfect size six”). In honor of this glorious event, I would like to share a treasured photo with you. I had the Sweet Valley High board game, you see, and it was a point of contention between me and my dad. I am not completely sure about the details, but I am pretty sure that he did not approve of Sweet Valley High in general (though he did let me read them), and he wasn’t really a board game kind of guy. Card games, yes. Board games, not so much. And, finally, the game required that you steal other players’ boyfriends as you collected all the things you needed for your big date. There was no way he was going to play a game like that.

But. We had a habit of betting things for the Carolina/Duke game. At some point, we made a wager that, if Duke lost, he had to play Sweet Valley High: The Board Game with me. Duke did, in fact, lose that game. He had to play Sweet Valley High with me, complete with boyfriend stealing. And I took a picture of it. With my polaroid camera. Which I now share with all of you.

Stealing boyfriends from other players gave him physical pain. But I made him do it anyway.

Obviously, I was quite excited to read the updated version, if only to revisit good old Sweet Valley High. The Dairi Burger, a site that is rereading and reviewing old Sweet Valley High books, thinks that maybe the 80s yuppie culture won’t translate to today’s audiences. The site specifically talks about the obsession with the rich and how that won’t really translate to today’s youth . . . to which I say, “Have you SEEN how popular Gossip Girl is?” What is Gossip Girl about other than class issues and spying on the lives of rich people? And there’s the Clique series (rich private school girls) and the It Girl series (I don’t know what that one’s about, but I am going to guess people who are rich and/or famous), and . . . you get the idea.

In case you don’t know, the Sweet Valley High series features beautiful twins Jessica and Elizabeth Wakefield, who are 16 and attend Sweet Valley High with their beautiful friends. Jessica is the “bad twin,” who is inconsiderate and selfish and boy-crazy, while Elizabeth, the “good twin,” works on the newspaper (excuse me, website) and is responsible and considerate. (I always liked Elizabeth better.) They like boys and go to parties and there are hints of sex but nothing ever really happens. Well, this one time, Bruce Patman untied the top of Jessica’s bathing suit, which I found racy at the time. But now I look at the things going on in Gossip Girl, and the bikini top seems kind of tame. Because of that, I think it’s a good choice for middle school - it has the high school drama without some of the material that makes Gossip Girl and its ilk inappropriate for that age.

Because the girls at my school love the Clique series, I have read some of them myself, and I was bothered by the way the girls in that series treat each other. When girls ask for it, if it’s not checked in, I have been known to say, “Wouldn’t you rather read a series where the girls are nice to each other?” and give them The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants instead. Because of my discomfort with some of that, I wondered how Sweet Valley High would measure up now that I am a little bit older. After reading Double Love and Secrets, I have to say that they are pretty much just as I remember them. Though Jessica is catty and selfish and conniving, she often gets her comeuppance. Additionally, the presence of Elizabeth balances out the story a little bit more, and I would be much more comfortable giving these to my middle schoolers than the Clique series, where everyone is just mean to each other all the time.

I hope, as they are updating Sweet Valley High, that they give the series more diversity. The Dairi Burger was right in that one of the major themes was class, which was a little bit more applicable in the 80s . . . I hope that can be expanded so that the series also deals with race and ethnicity as well. Overall, though, I enjoyed this trip down memory lane. I enjoyed it so much that I got out the old board game.

Much to Mike’s chagrin. Well, that’s what he said at first, but then he got into the spirit of it. He played as Jessica, the “bad twin,” and he really embodied the character. He took what used to be a simple game and added some serious scheming.

OMG! He stole my boyfriend!

And, uh, then he won. I am filled with shame. I will distract you by posting that picture of my dad again, just because I can.

The rest of the Sweet Valley High pictures are here!

Mike took another huge load to Goodwill yesterday, and the man there was apparently very excited to see him, saying, “You guys donate great stuff!” This has made me unreasonably happy, for I am now justified in believing that my junk is better than everyone else’s junk.

You don’t think he says that to everyone . . . do you?

On Tuesday night, Mike and I went to see Doubt at Triad Stage. We go there a few times a year. This time we got the cheap gallery seats because I have been wanting to see this play ever since I heard about it on NPR back when it was opening. I remember being riveted by the report as I was driving to work, and I was excited to hear that it would be here.

At the center of the story is a question of guilt and doubt and certainty, which the play does not necessarily resolve. (I knew that going in, so I don’t think it’s a spoiler to say that.) I read an article in which the author of the play is quoted as saying that, though the play is only an hour and twenty-five minutes, it’s actually a two-act play. One act on stage and the second when you discuss it afterward. I like that, and as I sat through the play, I changed my mind several times. When it ended, I was dying to know what Mike thought. But, because of a long-ago conversation with Emily, I refrained until we got in the car. (Oddly enough, she mentioned this topic this week. Is it okay if you are supposed to talk about it afterward, Emily? Does that change your opinion at all? hee.)

We missed most of the first “sermon” because this old lady who could not see came in and her daughter was, rather loudly, trying to get her to sit down. I almost went all Juno up on them. But I refrained, because she was old and clearly addled. I did at least give them the evil eye, which they deserved for not getting there on time and being loud and interrupting for a good three to four minutes. Luckily, I found the opening speech here.

I live in a time where it’s much more acceptable to live with both faith and doubt. At the same time, it’s hard to live with ambiguity. I tend to deal with my questions of doubt by putting them in the box marked “mystery.” Oh, isn’t it charming, the way that I embrace the mystery of my faith? Isn’t it wonderful that I allow that we can’t have all of our questions answered? But if I am afraid to deal with those questions because I am afraid I won’t like the answers, how am I any different than anyone who lives with all their beliefs lined up just so? Most of the time, I am not “embracing the mystery” any more than they are. I am putting it away so that it doesn’t hurt me. It’s true that sometimes I am okay with the questions, that I have learned to embrace mystery much more than my former black-and-white self. But other times I know that if I deal with the questions, the why did it have to happen this ways, the did I do the right things, that it will lead me down a path of fear and doubt and bitterness.

In the end, the play is about the balance between certainty and doubt, as we all struggle blindly through decisions that have no clear answer. But if it is true, what Father Flynn says, that doubt can bring people together, can keep them from being alone, maybe that in itself is part of the mystery. The thing that seems to separate me from God can bring me close to others, and the things that those relationships can teach me can, in the end, bring me to a greater faith and understanding.

If you live in the Greensboro area and haven’t seen Doubt yet, you have until the 30th! Mike and I both enjoyed it very much.

I have sometimes dreamt, at least, that when the Day of Judgment dawns and the great conquerors and lawyers and statesmen come to receive their rewards … the Almighty will turn to Peter and say, not without a certain envy when He sees us coming with our books under our arms, “Look, these need no reward. We have nothing to give them here. They have loved reading.” -Virginia Woolf (1882-1941)

We put our house on the market on Tuesday, and we have been cleaning things out because that is what you do when you are trying to sell a house. Would anyone like a nice end table? What about our baker’s rack?

One of my jobs has been to go through all of our magazines that we have stored (it is very hard for me to throw away magazines) and pull out any recipes that I want to keep. Also, I am pulling out book reviews to write the titles down and add them to my list of books to read. I am not going to tell you how many book reviews I have pulled out. I will say, however, that it’s a good thing that I have an entire summer off, and that I will apparently be spending it reading. When I am done with all of the magazines, I am going to take the rest of them to the art teachers at school, who always need more of that sort of thing. May I just say that I am going to try to turn over a new leaf and pull out recipes/write down book titles and discard magazines more quickly? It’s my new resolution. I hope. I am very excited to try some new recipes, though. So at least there is that.

As I was doing all of this, I found the title of this post quoted in Real Simple. My professional opinion is that Real Simple is awfully pretty, but generally a waste of my time. But did I mention that it’s awfully pretty? However, there are occasionally recipes that I find useful, and I like how they use quotes with all their articles. I don’t know where this Truman Capote quote came from, but it does explain a bit of how I am feeling about leaving this house. I love this house so much. Mike did his four years of college in this house. We threw parties here. Friends stayed with us. I remember the last time my dad was here. I learned how to cook in this house, in its wonderful kitchen. I made pies and cookies and took risks. This house has been our refuge. More than anything, though, I think this is the house where Mike and I grew up. We have been here four years, and those four years have been incredibly important ones. We holed ourselves up in this house and really learned about ourselves and our marriage. We moved in with some dreams and some ideas about our future, and, when we leave, we will have put ourselves in a place to make some of those ideas come true. We are both such different people now, having grown in confidence and compassion, having stepped out on our own in ways we hadn’t before. And this house, our first house, will always be a special place to me because of that. These years have not been all sweetness and delight, but our home has been, for the most part, a happy place, and I hope that whoever lives here next will sense that happiness.

People have asked us (a lot) if we have already found another house. The answer to that surprises some people - we haven’t even started looking. The current economy has got us a little bit scared about how long it will take to sell our own house, and we can’t afford two mortgages on one salary, so we are going to wait and see what happens with our house before we get our hearts set on another one. What I keep saying is that we just have to take one step at a time, and then the one after that. I don’t make big, grand plans anymore, because I just don’t know what happens next. In some ways, it’s the opposite of stepping out in faith. I will just take the next step as I have an idea of where, exactly, that might be. But in other ways, I think that it’s a big deal for me, not to have to know where we will be in the future. Just trusting as we take the next step.

This year, our church’s Lenten theme was about restoration. Every week, someone gave a focus on how God has restored some aspect of their lives - a woman who was abused as a child has now become a counselor; a man who spent many years focusing on himself is now married and he and his wife have adopted their nieces and nephews after a tragedy in their family. I knew a little bit about some of those stories, but it was very powerful to hear them spoken.

On Palm Sunday, after the kids marched in with their palm leaves and they had been put in vases at the front of the church (after brushing a little bit too close to one of the candles and almost catching on fire) our pastor preached a sermon about betrayal, which, of course, had more than a little to do with Judas. At one point in the sermon, he was talking about various forms of betrayal, and he said something about parents rejecting you because they didn’t approve of your choice of spouse. One thing I like about going to a small church is that he includes examples from the congregation, that I know that he knows our story. But I was honestly surprised at what he said . . . betrayal? I have always thought of what happened with Mike’s parents as flat-out rejection. I have taken it very personally, this rejection of me. It took a while to get my mind around the idea that it was a betrayal of how parents are supposed to act. (Also, it was probably a good reminder that this, like most things, isn’t really about me.)

On Easter Sunday, after a wonderful church service, we had a big lunch with some friends from church. As our friend was blessing the meal, he thanked God for our families and the families we create around ourselves. While family is very important to me and Mike, we don’t experience certain aspects of that in the same ways that many people do, because Mike’s parents aren’t around. Our friend’s grace was a good reminder of the restoration we see in our own lives: like Naomi, we have felt so empty, but the Lord has filled us up again.

As we moved closer and closer to spring break, it was obvious that all of us needed a few days off. Thursday was the low point of the week, the day it seemed that Friday would never actually arrive. After a frustrating day, I opted not to go to my church’s Maundy Thursday service, instead eating pizza with a few friends from school. I felt like crying all day, and the last thing I wanted to do was to go to church without Mike (who was still on his way back from D.C.) and actually give in to the crying.

Friday, though, had its graces. Many students and teachers were out, which was definitely challenging, but the prevailing attitude was that we just needed to get through the day, and the feeling of solidarity led to it being a pretty fun day overall. A few teachers showed Where the Red Fern Grows, and we had a run on the book in the afternoon. I made some people happy by keeping them updated on the scores (this mostly meant walking around whispering, “Davidson beat Gonzaga!” to certain teachers) and talking bracketology. Mike and I went to our favorite restaurant and the owner said, “You guys look more normal this time.”

It has been difficult for me to celebrate Lent this year - we were out of town and I was sick and we missed a few services here and there. My class on Wednesday nights makes it difficult for me to be at church then, and, for several reasons, the church decided not to have a Good Friday service this year (not to mention that my school system was one of the few in the state that was actually open). I was uninspired about what to give up for Lent. All of this combined has managed to make me feel unprepared for tomorrow’s Easter service. I have so many questions about this victory over sin and death, about how I should live, about missing my dad. I have questions about the future, about whether our house will sell, about this transition to Mike’s full-time employment. I wonder where my place is, as all my friends also seem to be in transition and we keep missing each other. I am glad that we will not only have tomorrow to celebrate with our friends and family, but also a week to regroup, to organize our house and our plans and our minds.

I am running a 5K here in Greensboro in early May, and I have been trying to get in shape for it. Since changing jobs, my exercise schedule has been a little bit off. It’s crazy how much easier it is for me to exercise, though, now that it feels like spring (and now that it’s light in the evenings). Here’s where you come in: I need your favorite running songs. I listen to a lot of slow/sad music, and when I am running by myself, this is fine, but it’s not really going to cut it when I run in a race. I need some music to keep me moving. What’s your favorite I-will-make-it-up-this-hill song? Or, if you’re not a runner, what’s your favorite I-will-rock-out-in-my-car-and-I-don’t-care-who’s-watching song? As much as I love Patty Griffin, I don’t think she’s quite what I need here.

I am not sure whether Anne Rice’s books on the life of Christ are considered heretical or unorthodox . . . since they are from the point of view of Jesus, I am sure that some people find that offensive. I liked what she did with Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, though. It made for a good discussion in my book club, and I liked the (obviously deeply researched) information she put in on the political climate of the time. When the second in the trilogy came out, I was definitely interested to give it a try. And, though I liked Out of Egypt, I loved The Road to Cana.

Christ the Lord: The Road to Cana is about Jesus’ life just before his ministry begins, as he works as a carpenter in Nazareth. The premise of the series overall is that, as Jesus grew as a man, his understanding of his ministry grew as well. When we discussed the first one in my book club, that concept caused some people some problems, because many of them felt that Jesus fully understood what he was doing all along. I don’t think Anne Rice is trying to discount the divinity of Christ in any way . . . I think that this is her way of acknowledging that the question of Christ’s divinity and his humanity is a great mystery. And this is how it might have played out.

I have never read any of Anne Rice’s vampire books, so I don’t know much about her writing, but I thought that passages in this book were beautiful. In my favorite passage, one of the characters asked Jesus why, when he was 12, he didn’t stay at the Temple, why he has been simply swallowed up by the world instead of studying Torah and making a difference. Here is part of his response:

“It’s where I live, my lord,” I said. “Not in the Temple, but in the world. And in the world, I learn what the world is and what the world will teach, and I am of the world. The world’s made of wood and stone and iron, and I work in it. No, not in the Temple. In the world. And I study Torah; and I pray with the assembly; and on the feasts I go to Jerusalem to stand before the Lord–in the Temple–but this is in the world, all this. In the world. And when it is time for me to do what the Lord has sent me to do in this world, this world which belongs to Him, this world of wood and stone and iron and grass and air, He will reveal it to me. And what this carpenter shall yet build in this world on that day, the Lord knows, and the Lord shall reveal it.”

I cried when I read that, because, whether that’s how it really was for Jesus, I think that’s what God requires of us. Not to hole up in our churches and our seminaries, but to live and work in the world and to make a difference there, to use our gifts to do what he asks of us, to take the next step as he reveals it.

I will agree with those who said that the book was better when Rice was filling in the areas where we don’t have a lot of information: What was it like for Jesus to live in Nazareth as a carpenter before his baptism? What did his family think of how he spent his time? But the baptism and his time in the desert also had some beautiful passages, even if the tone was a little bit more stilted than some of the other sections. And it all came together in the end, as Jesus changed water into wine at a wedding that had special significance for him, setting into motion a series of events that would end, not with an army of devoted followers, but, as we celebrated on Sunday, with him riding into Jerusalem on the back of a donkey, facing his own death. I look forward to the third book, to see how Anne Rice interprets the rest of Jesus’ ministry and his crucifixion. It was nice to reflect on the ministry of Jesus just before Easter, especially with a book as powerful as this one.

I went running after work this evening. Which is all well and good, except for the part where dogs kept harassing me. There was the one that was seriously angry with me, growling and barking and pulling its leash to attack me. I was in the road! The road is not this dog’s territory! That dog can just step off, as far as I am concerned. Shut it, dog. (I sound all tough because I am safe, but I really think that dog would have hurt me. It looked like one of those big friendly dogs. Like Lassie. Why did it hate me so much?)

Then there was he one that was so happy to see me that she wanted to run with me. I had to keep her from being killed by pulling her from oncoming traffic. She was cute, I must say, but she jumped all over me. And wouldn’t leave me alone. Go away, Chloe! (I know her name is Chloe because her owner had to physically restrain her from following me. If I had a dog, which I do not, nor do I want one, it would be like Chloe, who was adorable. But also kind of stupid.)

And there were various barking/growling dogs on leashes and behind fences. I only ran two miles. And then I came home, where the neighbors’ dogs howled at me as I walked up my driveway. This is why I will never be a dog person. I’m sticking with Big Bunny.

Thanks to AB Chao’s photo, we drove to Macy’s on Saturday and purchased our very own 7 Quart Martha Stewart Blue Cast Iron Pot. On sale. [ETA: It appears that my pot is no longer on sale. Sorry for bringing it up.]

We had a little discussion about wants vs. needs after purchasing the pot, because I said, “That’s something I have been wanting for a while,” and Mike said, “Earlier you said you needed it.” The implication was that he did not approve of me “needing” a pot. I would like to clarify that I did not need my wonderful new pot in the strictest sense. However, some recipes do require a pot like this, which is what I meant. I would need it, you see, to make certain things. Like rabbit stew. Just kidding. That’s what we threaten to do when Big Bunny is bad. If she could understand what we were saying, I’m sure it would cause her to change her actions. I should put her in the pot and take a picture of it.

For the pot’s inaugural meal, we made 40 Clove Chicken. You can search online - there are a lot of variations. We just did the most basic thing and took a chicken and stuck a lemon in it and seared it in olive oil all the way around, and then put 20 cloves of garlic in the bottom of the pan along with some white wine and some spices. And then we stuck it in the oven for almost two hours. And, oh, it was delicious. And garlicky. We saved all the delicious juices, but I don’t know what to do with them. Are you SURE it would be wrong for me to drink them? (Yes, we ate the garlic cloves. I am so happy to have a husband who enjoys garlic as much as I do.) When we do it again, we will probably use split breasts or chicken quarters for easier serving, but it was very good just the same. We made stuffed mushrooms and green beans to go with it. We always eat so well on Saturdays.

You are wondering, I am sure, why we didn’t use 40 cloves. If we were going to use 20, why not keep going to 40? Well, though garlic is one of our favorite spices, we also have a fear of it based on this one Garlic Pork Incident that occurred at our house. One of us thought it would be a good idea to put garlic in some pork, and this person embedded so much garlic in that pork that there was no pork taste at all. Just the taste of garlic. It was like eating a big old garlic piece of meat. So we were a little bit afraid to do any more cloves, but it wasn’t an overpowering garlic flavor at all. And the house smelled deliciously like garlic. Win-win-win.

I love my new pot. It’s so pretty. Thank you, Martha, for putting it on sale. Now I have to make French Onion soup before Mike reinstates the soup ban. He’s going out of town this week . . . maybe that’s how I should spend my time.

This post by Roger Sutton, the editor of The Horn Book, seems to have upset quite a few people involved with children’s literature and YA literature. People are most worked up about the last sentence: “Whatever whoever chooses to read is their business, of course, but adults whose taste in recreational reading ends with the YA novel need to grow up.” Maybe I am a bad person, but I think I tend to agree with him (especially with his clarifications in the comments of that post).

I read a fair amount of YA literature, because I like how linear it often is, and I like that it’s not afraid to deal with big questions like death and God and the purpose of our lives. I think about those questions a lot myself, and I like to read books that deal with those things. I also like to read to escape, and, since YA fiction often reads so quickly, it can be easier to jump into a YA book and escape than it can be to tackle one of the tomes on my adult reading list. I seriously doubt that Roger Sutton would begrudge me any of those reasons. No, I think that he is pointing out, rightly, that YA literature doesn’t offer the full perspective of life, and if we intentionally reject that other, more developed perspective, we are, in a way, stunting our own growth. I feel that way myself if I haven’t had time for an adult book . . . that I need to get a different perspective. That it shouldn’t be the only thing I read. For all that there is to love about teen literature, it is often very narcissistic, because that’s how teens think. And it’s not good for me to only read books from one perspective, be that age group or gender or race. In fact, I try to go out of my way to choose books that challenge me in all kinds of ways, in addition to reading simply for pleasure and to escape.

I don’t think it’s wrong in the least to read a lot of YA or to enjoy reading YA. But I can’t say that I disagree with the perspective that it’s good to challenge our minds with other reading, too, where the characters have had a little bit more time to grow up. I used to balance my own personal reading with books that might possibly be good for my book club. These days, my not-entirely-for-pleasure reading is for my school library, so I can make good recommendations. I don’t begrudge anyone reading what he or she likes, not by any means. But, in my own experience, it’s not good to read just one thing, whether that’s YA literature or romance novels or theology.

So, go ahead, read what you like. But . . . think about expanding what you like, giving other things a chance. I think that’s what Mr. Sutton meant by “growing up.”

When Mike was still getting up a whole lot later than I was, we put a little travel clock in the bathroom so that I wouldn’t have to open the door and disturb him with bright blinding bathroom light to know what time it was in the mornings. Now that he and I get up at essentially the same time, the clock is somewhat less important. Which explains, somewhat, why I didn’t reset it after the time change in November. Now, suddenly, the clock is right again. It sure used to seem longer between the two. (I know it literally WAS longer, but . . . not THAT much longer.)

This week at my library, I moved things around. This is a shocking turn of events for those who know me, because I never move anything around at my house. Ever. I don’t even understand the motivation to move things around. This is how the furniture fits in this room. I thought it through before I put it here, and here it will stay. End of story. But, no! At work, I am a whole different person, one who moves shelves around (okay, no, before you ask, I did not move a shelf by myself. Or at all. But I had someone else move it for me)! And shifts books! And cleans out old artwork! (By old, I mean the students who created it are now in college!) And hangs up new posters! I rock and roll. People keep walking in the door and then stopping, confused. But, overall, I think it looks great. Don’t worry, though. I won’t be trying it at home.

Earlier this week, I watched No Country For Old Men. The deal was that Mike, who saw the movie when it was in theaters, would warn me before any violent deaths. The problem is that lately, every time we put in a movie, Mike falls asleep almost instantly. While he got me through most of it, he missed the ending. Luckily, I am quite experienced at looking away, so I never saw anything I didn’t want to see (though I probably looked away for about 25% of the movie). It’s not the sort of thing I usually like, but what I did like about it was that, though it was violent, it wasn’t, to me, a movie that was promoting senseless violence. I haven’t read much Cormac McCarthy, but his books seem to be the opposite of that as they deal with themes of life and death. Instead, I think this was a movie about the progression of time and how we as a society seem to . . . almost revel in violence, as evidenced by slasher films. It was like a mirror to the audience, causing us to question the function of violence as entertainment. I also appreciated the treatment of death (it had to be death, because it is, after all, Cormac McCarthy) and how death is coming for us all. Though justice was not served, it did serve as a reminder to accept mortality and not to “blink” (as Tommy Lee Jones said he had) and miss the life that we were given. And while I was writing this, I think I just talked myself into reading the book.

Last night, I was struck by how much more time Mike and I spend together these days. We carpooled yesterday and today, we had dinner at a restaurant close to my school last night and then went to the art sale/show at my school. This week we watched movies and took walks and . . . so much of this is why I switched jobs in the first place. Now it’s time for Friday Night Pizza and the ACC tournament. Life these days? Not so bad.

Seriously, you guys. I have confessed to a lot of quirks here. And those are just the entries in which I was specifically talking about quirks. I think we all know that I have revealed more strange/quirky things than that. Like that time I ate the mint chocolate chip ice cream to keep the peace, or the way I eat pizza rolls and popcorn for dinner when Mike is out of town, or how irate I get when Mike kicks his socks off in the middle of the night and leaves them in our bed. Or how I read while I dry my hair in the morning. Just, you know, some examples.

But, in the interest of friendship, even though Melissa is deserting me to move to Seattle (where, according to this movie I saw, people do not sleep), I will try to come up with seven more strange things about myself.

1. I do not like to answer my phone when I am at home. I like to talk on my phone in the car (I’m a hazard to myself). But when I am at home, I am kind of done with the phone. Usually I do answer it, because I am such a people pleaser. But I often do so with reluctance. (Except when YOU call. I always want to answer when YOU call.) (Please don’t take this personally, anyone. It’s my own issue with needing boundaries, not about not wanting to talk to anyone.) (Look what a people pleaser I am and how hard it was for me to confess that.)

2. My fingernails don’t break. They bend. Under extreme duress, they tear. When I was in middle school, I discovered that this really grossed some people out. I’m still not exactly sure why. And I can’t imagine what it would be like to have really brittle nails.

3. I’m not sure if I have ever talked about our engagement here . . . Mike and I got engaged without ever having been on an official date. Sometimes we discuss this and say things like, “We were so young. What were we thinking?” (In the best possible way, of course.)

4. Mike thinks it is strange that I call wool caps “toboggans.” He thinks that word is reserved for sleds. I also use it for sleds, but AS YOU CAN SEE HERE, MIKE, it is considered American English colloquial to use it that way. So, officially, this should probably not count as a strange thing. But it may garner some discussion, so I am going to leave it.

5. I have never read Of Mice and Men or The Grapes of Wrath. A student asked me the other day, about The Grapes of Wrath, “Was this book good?” and I had to confess to him that I had never read it. I don’t like to pretend that I have read something when I haven’t, because that’s dishonest, but it’s hard sometimes when people assume I have read everything. I have never claimed to have read anything. And, to be honest, there are authors a whole lot higher than Steinbeck on my list. (I did read The Pearl. In case you were wondering. It was fine.) Maybe one day I will post a list of Important Books I Have Not Read And Do Not Plan On Reading just to shock everyone and lose everyone’s respect. Good times.

6. Mike and I talk about poop an inordinate amount. That’s all I have to say about that.

7. It is quite possible that t-shirts are one of my primary love languages. This dates back to my two (TWO!!) Star Trek t-shirts that I wore, without shame, in middle school. I had dozens of band t-shirts in high school and college. And now I wear nerdy/bookish/librarian shirts. I have stopped buying t-shirts for Mike, and instead just send him the link to whatever t-shirt I would buy him except he has a drawer full of shirts I bought him already. Also, he said I am not allowed to buy any more coffee mugs.

I am not tagging anybody. “I take no leave of you, Miss Bennet. I send no compliments to your mother. You deserve no such attention.”

One of my friends is moving to the other side of the country, and I have not taken this news very well. When she told me, I had to get off the phone, because I didn’t want to sound unsupportive, and I knew that I would say something selfish and self-centered if I didn’t stop talking right then. When we talked a little bit later that afternoon, she said, “Are you still feeling a little sick?” I lied and said yes, instead of telling the truth: we hung up the phone and I cried my eyes out, which was why I still sounded a little congested. Perhaps it would have been better to tell the truth. I just hate it when the truth is so self-centered.

She and I have talked about abandonment issues before, and how they can cause people to lash out, or to take things personally that don’t have much to do with them at all. And this whole thing with her has made me realize that I have some abandonment issues, too. Mine aren’t as deep-seeded as some people’s, but they are still there: the former best friend I used to talk so much about, all the brouhaha with Mike’s parents, my dad. Those are all different sorts of leaving - there’s a big difference between outright rejection and pancreatic cancer. But all of it together has all made it harder for me to invest in people, harder for me to trust. I have been working hard at my new school to build friendships and hang out with people, but, at the same time, I don’t have a lot of expectations that those relationships can be very deep. (I am open to being proven wrong. I think.)

Part of this is my insecurities about myself and the choices I have made. I live here, 25 minutes from the town in which I was born, in the state where I have always lived. I haven’t taken a lot of risks in my own life. I love this state, and I love my life, but I wonder sometimes if Mike and I shouldn’t have been a little bit more bold, taken a few more chances. Then we could be the ones moving across the country for some grand adventure. It’s been hard, too, because a lot of women at work have recently had children, are currently pregnant, or are trying to start families. I have still not succumbed to baby fever, but I feel strange telling people that our 8th anniversary will be this summer, and, no, we don’t have kids. In my head, I know that, if we were actually being forced to tally the past 8 years, we would have a great amount of personal growth to show for them. But I also see people look at us a little bit askew when I say how long we have been married without “validating” our marriage with offspring, and sometimes I buy into that.

If it comes right down to it, I can’t understand someone wanting to leave because I want to stay. I want to stay in this state where my family is, where all my childhood memories are. I admire people with a heart for foreign missions, but I am not one of them, because my heart is here, and if I can help anyone, I think it’s here. The day she told me she was going to move, after I had stopped crying, I said to Mike, “I just don’t understand how God could call people away from their friends and family,” and he said, “Um, what about the Great Commission?” Um. Point taken. Although, honestly, I still think that here is where I am supposed to be. Surely I can be excused for wishing my friends and family were supposed to be here, too.

At the end of the day on Friday, my assistant said, “I didn’t think you were going to make it today.” I didn’t think so, either. My back was still very sore, and my head was congested, and my whole body was weary, and I was convinced that I had developed a sinus infection. After work, we drove straight to Scott and Kelly’s house (except for the part where I was driving and I missed a very easy turn . . . and then Mike took over, which was probably for the best), and I am not sure that they thought I was going to make it, either. But, after sleeping in on Saturday, I felt better than I had all week, and we spent the day running errands and learning how to play Settlers of Catan, finishing the day with a basketball game that ended just as I had hoped it would.

The only thing that was difficult for me at all was Saturday night’s church service, which managed to be about one of my hot-button issues. Or maybe hot-button isn’t the right phrase . . . I would say, rather than growing incensed, I put up a wall, and I did not want to deal with this wall in a strange church, surrounded by people I didn’t know. Because the message was about healing, and, despite my protestations to the contrary, I have a lot of confusion and questions about that issue, about praying for healing, and about what kinds of things we can expect. I want to believe in miracles, but life doesn’t seem to be that way most of the time. I don’t know how to deal with those questions, because I am afraid they will give me some answers I don’t want to hear. So I just waited patiently until it was all over.

Whether or not I know exactly how I feel about physical healing, this weekend away restored my soul a little bit. It was nice to have that time with friends, to eat delicious food, to lounge around and sleep in. Mike and I listened to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows on the way home. There are only ten more school days until spring break. I had a Cadbury egg. Today, things seem much more manageable than they did on Friday afternoon.

Yesterday was a really long day, and I have some serious sore muscles to prove it. (Thank you, large cooler, for destroying my shoulders.) But the paperwork and the stress and the frantic organizing of who would be on stage and the panic of not knowing what to do about the bus driver . . . it was all worth it to see them twirling in the spring air and enjoying the sunshine on our afternoon break. Even the sweltering, unairconditioned room was worth it, because of the smiles on their faces at the end of the day. And because of one very serious 6th grader who said, in the most excited voice imaginable, “You made cookies! You make really good cookies.”

I didn’t say very much about it at the time, but Once was my favorite movie of last year, hands down. We went and saw it one Saturday in August, and Mike went and saw it again the next day. And we spent the rest of the fall and winter listening to the soundtrack (actually, I am still listening to it) and counting the days until it came out on DVD. “Falling Slowly” was my favorite movie scene from last year, too - one of those scenes where you know something magical is happening and you are suddenly mesmerized. I was ecstatic when they won the Oscar, because I like to have my opinions validated by others. And because it was such a moving song in such a moving scene that it deserved to be recognized. And I have been sharing my copy of the movie with teachers at my school. I would compare it to a drug, like crack, but drug references are frowned upon.

One of our friends has fallen very ill in the past few weeks, which has been incredibly sad. Even having been through this sort of thing, I am not very good with knowing how to help people who are very sick. So I made pumpkin chocolate chip muffins tonight, his favorite. I want to fix things, or at least to be useful. We took his favorite flowers on Sunday, and Mike worked on his computer yesterday, and he’ll get some muffins tomorrow. I guess that’s not so bad. I just wish that I could put some magical healing mojo into the muffins along with the chocolate chips.

I have been reading a whole lot lately, but I haven’t really written anything up. I even read a graphic novel for my class: American Born Chinese. Overall, I have to say that graphic novels are not really my thing, but it was very good, and had a great message. I also enjoyed Monster by Walter Dean Myers. I ended up liking it a lot more than I thought I would. I have read about the same amount of books as last year, but I have to confess that more of them are young adult books than last year. However, I am also reading articles for my classes. And Entertainment Weekly. Which I seem to mention in every post.

Did you know that Mike is almost done with his student teaching? It’s true. Can you believe that?

Mike has been playing some of the Counting Crows’ new songs, and I have to say, they are not bad. I put a moratorium on the Counting Crows a few years ago and refused to listen to any of their songs. Because they only had four albums. And Mike played those four albums constantly. And I had to put a stop to it. He’s been sneaking them back into our playlist, though. He thinks I haven’t noticed, but I have. And, actually, it’s nice to hear those songs again. I was even singing some Counting Crows last week to myself. I just needed a break. A nice, long break. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, and all that.

Tomorrow is a very long day, so I am going to head to bed very soon.

I always feel as if we should celebrate leap day more. I don’t know exactly what I have in mind, but all Mike and I did was make our regular Friday night pizza, put in The Graduate, and do homework. Well, I did homework. He slept. I had never seen The Graduate before, though of course I knew the famous lines and had seen most of the famous shots. I have wanted to see it ever since I learned that Simon & Garfunkel wrote the soundtrack (which is to say, for quite a long time), but I specifically requested that Mike put it on his Netflix list after I read this article in EW about the filming of the movie. Finally, finally, I have seen it, and I was expecting to like it, but I was really impressed. I tried to wake Mike up to see the famous ending, but he was too far gone. Check another classic off my list.

That’s not to say that the day didn’t have its interesting points. I never know how much I am allowed to say, but Friday alone featured vomiting (not mine, but it did go all over some library books), a pep rally for the 7th grade writing test, and a fire drill, on top of the normal everyday craziness. There is always excitement in a middle school, excitement and chaos and change. I am doing okay with all of that, for the most part. This week is going to be a little bit nuts, but it should be my last crazy week for a while. I hope. The past few weeks have been really up and down, and I have not handled it all that well. I am ready to prove that this week can be different.

And, just so it’s clear, I am having fun. If I celebrated leap day at all, it was with a bunch of other teachers after work. At a bar. (I mentioned the vomiting. And the fire drill. Surely you understand.) We left the tensions of the week behind, ate some serious chips and salsa, and laughed. A lot. I have always wanted a job where there were people I could hang out with. Even if I am too busy to see any of my other friends, I am starting to develop some real, fun friendships at work.