Through a Glass, Darkly

I’ve been reading Acedia & Me by Kathleen Norris, which is very good. Acedia is a sort of listlessness and despair. It was originally one of the “eight bad thoughts” but never made it onto the list of “seven deadly sins.” One of the points that she makes that I need to ponder is that we as a society have bought into the idea that in order to make good art, it ought to come out of some kind of melancholy. We talk about tortured artists, and I have heard people say that the best art comes from some kind of depression. It’s part of a much larger problem that I will talk about when I write about the book, but I will just say now that it is certainly an enlightening read. I know that I buy into that idea at least a little bit. Maybe even more than a little bit. I tend to think that the things I write here are better when I am melancholy. It’s hard work to be down all the time. It’s not healthy, and sometimes I feel as if I have to create drama in order to create better art or to be more interesting, as if that makes sense at all.

Lately I haven’t felt very creative or interesting. I see people around me who are “light and bright and sparkling,” and I don’t feel anything but flat. I have met some new people lately, and I felt as if I made a horrible first impression. Why should anyone be attracted to someone as blah as I am feeling? I have been so busy that I barely have time for my friends. I have been sick twice this school year, so I’m feeling pretty run down as it is. And taking two graduate level classes on top of working is, honestly, a little bit too much. We did fun things this weekend: a cooking class, The Great Pumpkin Party, The Duchess. But I still don’t feel like myself. I felt a bit as if I was watching everyone else have fun from the outside. I took the weekend off from homework, and it was the right thing to do. But it wasn’t enough.

Last week, Emily asked why it is that people write online. I don’t want this to turn into blogging about blogging, but I write because I think the discipline of crafting something is important. Not that I always take the time to craft something, but when I do, it feels good. One paragraph leading into another until I have said what it is that I wanted to say. Pushing the “post” button makes me feel as if I have accomplished something, and that’s why I have continued. When Emily was at my house on Saturday, we talked briefly about a conversation that was an offshoot of that one, a conversation in which I had offered some advice but then said, “Of course, you probably shouldn’t take my advice since I only have about 12 readers.” I like all 12 of you a whole lot, and I am thankful and humbled that you care about what I have to say. At the same time, I struggle a lot with wanting to be liked. So it’s hard not to feel as if it would be nice to be liked and understood by lots of people. I don’t see that happening any time soon, so it’s not something I worry about a whole lot. I don’t have the time or the energy (especially right now) to do anything about it. At the same time, it seems a symptom of a larger problem – my flatness, my inability to commit to my friends, my escapism and despair. Perhaps you could call it acedia. Whatever it is, I am not sure that I would hang around me, either.

I think, though, that worrying so much about approval is not being faithful to the writing itself. Mike keeps trying to tell me this, but I can be a little hardheaded about this sort of thing. I might never write a great novel, or even a mediocre novel. But I still learn through what I write, even if it’s just throwing it up on the internet and seeing if anything comes out of it. Writing things in a funny way has taught me to laugh at myself. Taking the time to think through my indignation sometimes gives me more compassion. And writing through melancholy has shown me that I want more than hollow introspection for myself. Even if I don’t write for connection, I worry that stopping would leave me even more disconnected than I already feel. I don’t have time for my friends as it is. At least this way they know if I saw a funny yard sign while I was out. (Today I saw a sign that said “Tina Fey 2008.” LOVE.)

I don’t know what I have to offer the world, especially the internet world. I am not a mom, and I don’t make crafts. I’m not into decorating my house, and I don’t even own a hot glue gun. (God help Mike if I did – I would undoubtedly hurt both myself and our house.) I’m not into fashion or art or photography. I don’t really like to shop. I’m a reader, and that’s not exactly the most dynamic hobby that there is. But as part of my battle against my own acedia, I am trying to reclaim a bit of who I am rather than trying to be something I am not. Kathleen Norris would say that choosing faith and life are the keys to fighting acedia. Engagement, then, is the key to fighting my listlessness. This is also at the heart of what Mike keeps trying to tell me when he tells me he wants me to keep writing. Sometimes I think that keeping my body healthy is enough – exercising, eating vegetables, taking vitamins – when it’s my soul that needs the cure. My soul feels a little battered this fall. Work has been hard. Things have happened at church that have left me in tears and needing a little time to recover. I haven’t figured out how to carve out time for my soul. I haven’t made time for my friends or read very many books or talked to my mom very much on the phone. The book I am reading, the conversations I am having, and the weekend I just had are good steps in that direction. Those small graces aren’t melancholy at all. The key is processing them in ways that I haven’t necessarily done before.

If acedia is a “bad thought,” then I suppose the key to overcoming it is “good thoughts.” Melissa tells me this a lot - it’s about believing truth rather than believing lies. I have never been very good at fighting lies with facts. Those lists of who God says that I am never seem to make a dent in the wrong things that I believe. Facts don’t really do it for me, because there’s a difference between facts and knowledge, much like the difference between facts and truth. I don’t know that I know what it looks like to be more engaged at this point, what it means to embrace truth and pursue good. But like Sara Zarr said, it’s so helpful to know that some of the ways that I have felt for years are real and have a name and that people have been writing about them for centuries.

(I still have more about the actual book, believe it or not, but I have to finish it first.)

O Lord, mercifully receive the prayers of your servant who calls upon you, and grant that I may know and understand what things I ought to do, and that I also may have the grace and power faithfully to accomplish them; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. -taken from The Divine Hours, Prayers for Summertime

My copy of The Divine Hours for summer got packed at the very end of May, so I didn’t have it until we unboxed the books last weekend. Meaning I missed all of June. Which was kind of a downward spiral for me with the class I was taking, the stress of things possibly falling apart with the house, the end of school, and, oh, yeah, packing. Now that I am able to sit on my couch and drink my coffee and read my prayers, I can see how it might have been a good thing for me to have that in my routine, to read those words and say those prayers with so many other people. To have something solid to stand on when I was floundering in my own lack of belief. Because those are big prayers. That up there? That’s a big prayer. That cuts to the heart of many of my prayers: What am I supposed to do? Why is it that particular thing? There are times when I know what I ought to do: I should forgive, because it is one of the cornerstones of my faith. I might even understand why I am supposed to forgive: Because I have been forgiven, and because it will actually make me feel better not to be carrying those things around. Just to name a few. But sometimes I don’t understand how it’s possible, and I think that’s the kind of understanding this prayer is crying out for. Help me know what to do. Help me understand how to do it.

It resonated particularly with me this morning, because last summer we had an unprecedented streak of days over 100 degrees, something I can never remember happening before. It was miserable and unbearable, but, caught up in my haze of summer discontent, I continued to go to my car every day at lunch and read. I would read the Midday Office in The Divine Hours, and I would read my novel. You can look at last year’s list to see which books were read in July and August and then imagine me sweating it out in my car. I parked in the shade, don’t worry. And I drank a lot of water.

I remember talking to Andrea on the phone one day, talking about how I was so desperate to have the summer off, but I didn’t know what to do. There were so many classes I needed to take, and I didn’t really know how to get in the school system. I don’t remember praying this prayer particularly, but I must have, this same week, last year. Mike and I want a different sort of life, one where we are closer to our friends and where we have more time to be together. I do not think I can work another summer without going completely stir-crazy. I know what we want, but I don’t know how to get there. Help.

And now, I sit in my new house, with five more weeks of summer vacation. I have felt for so long that everything was piling up around me and I could not relax. But I am beginning to feel that relaxation settle in, that the restlessness that prevailed last summer is finally dissipating. There are many areas of my life where I still don’t know what to do and how to do it. But I can look back over the past year and feel as if we were guided in each of those difficult steps: applying for a new job, taking the new job, taking classes, putting our house on the market, and, finally, moving. I know that this prayer isn’t just about me and my own life, but also about God’s greater work in the world and how we can participate in it. But those are the things that were on my heart last summer, and (most of the time) I believe the things that are on my heart are part of the things that God cares about. I was lonely and restless, I believe, because he created me to be in community and to want to have time to spend with my friends and family. I can breathe deeply now, in a way I haven’t in a long time, because I have that time to rest, because Mike and I have time to work on our house and go on vacation. Because I have friends within walking distance (and one whose place of employment can be seen from my sunroom). Because I can see my mother and my brother more often. Because I was given the grace to take the next step. Because I can sit here in my sunroom with my coffee and feel as if many of my desperate prayers from the past few years have been answered.

Eef Barzelay’s new CD has a song called “I Love the Unknown,” which was also on the Clem Snide CD Your Favorite Music. We are big Eef fans in this house, and I have been listening to his new CD a lot. As I was singing “I Love the Unknown” in the shower one morning, I had to laugh at myself. I am about as far from loving the unknown as any person can be, and even Eef Barzelay can’t trick me into throwing caution to the wind and taking a bus to “the place with the most allure,” wherever that might be. I like my ordered existence, and I like lists and plans, and I happen to think that’s a perfectly acceptable way to live. The unknown is a scary place, full of . . . things that are unknown. Let me get my calendar out and we can schedule some things instead. The past few weeks have been particularly bad specifically because many, many things have been up in the air.

But then, there’s the end of the song, the part that goes like this:

The doctor asked him what he was afraid of,
just what was he running from?
He said, “It’s not a fear of success, nor of closeness,
but of going through life feeling numb.”

Well, that might be a little bit Fight Club, but maybe the man does have a point there. As much as I like my ordered existence, my routine, sometimes I feel as if life is passing me by and I am not paying attention. There is always something to get through, something we must do that we would prefer not to do, and so we count the days away rather than embracing the time that we have.

I learned a lot of things from my dad: how to drive a stick shift, how to change the oil in my car, how to hammer a nail. Those are all useful, but he also taught me about life and about shaking things up. I have talked before about how he would take us out of school to have a day with him at the mall or at the fair or just on his delivery route. I certainly value those days spent with him in his truck more than I would have remembered whatever I missed that day at school. When you have a family, it’s hard to say that you love the unknown, because you are looking out for more than just yourself. But my dad would never have advocated going through life being numb. He loved fiercely, he cared about people, and he wanted more for me than feeling bogged down by the life going on around me, wishing the days away until the next milestone.

When I took my new job, I wasn’t sure that my dad would have approved. He saw how hard my mom worked as a teacher, and he did not want the same for me. But I know he would have approved of some of my reasons, including wanting to be able to spend more time with my friends and family, especially in the summer. This is my first chance to catch a breath in a while, and as the calendar of our summer stretches out in front of us, so many days left to fill, I have to admit that I don’t mind that sort of unknown quite as much. I appreciate this summer more than I did when I was used to having summers off all the time. I am going to do my best to make it count.

Did you think maybe we would make it through this summer without any Harry Potter entries? Surely you are not quite that naive!

My plan was to reread the series this summer, but since they are packed, Mike and I have been listening to them instead. The other day, I paused the iPod and said, “A year ago we still did not know how it ended.” It took me back to those desperate feelings of needing to know how it was all going to end. To the night we saw J.K. Rowling at Carnegie Hall. To reading the book in our pajamas all day on July 21st. To the release party, complete with a fantastic setup of snacks, pizza, and my brother frantically reading in the corner, trying to finish Half-Blood Prince before midnight.

And it took me back to one of my favorite moments from the whole Deathly Hallows release experience, one that I didn’t mention at the time, but that I would like to talk about now: the day that the books came into the library.

It was just after lunch on July 11. My coworker stepped into my office, saying, “There’s a box that has Harry Potter written all over it. Should you come look at it?” I nearly tripped as I rushed over to the boxes, and, indeed, sitting right on top, there it was. Do not open before July 21.

The night before, I had dreamed that it was Harry Potter Day, and I was so happy. We hadn’t been spoiled. We were going to make it. I woke up, and, no, it wasn’t Harry Potter Day. It was just a regular old Wednesday. It technically was Harry Potter Movie Day, but Harry Potter Movie Day didn’t really mean all that much to me.

We opened the invoice and I reiterated to my coworker the importance of keeping and processing them in a secure environment, not opening the box before absolutely necessary, not reading it, not posting on the internet. All the things we’d promised in order to get the books. This was it. This was the last book. It was Right. There. It would not be an exaggeration to say that I kind of hugged the box. I was so excited. Finally, the book was within my reach. Finally, it was almost time to read it. First I hid it behind my trashcan. Then I hid it under my desk. Go ahead and imagine all of that. I’ll wait.

You back? Have you stopped laughing? All right then. I tried frantically to call Mike, who was actually watching the movie (which I did not know at the time), and therefore did not answer his phone. I debated telling some of my friends. There was the gloating factor “guess what is under my desk” aspect vs. the pressure I knew they’d give me. “Why don’t you just open it?” they’d say. “Why don’t you take it home and read it? I’d never be able to do that.” I did not need any encouragement to be weak. I was feeling very weak. I just wanted to know what was going to happen. I just wanted to know. I had so many questions. But I had given my word, I had signed all the papers, so I kept my mouth shut and the box under my desk. I tried to call Mike again. I sent him emails with LARGE CAPITAL LETTERS. I sat at my desk for a while, and I realized that I did not want to spend the next ten days with it that close to me.

I’ll be honest with you — it surprised me how hard it was to have them so close. When Half-Blood Prince came in, I had no problem being strong. I had no problem waiting to get and read it at midnight like everyone else. I didn’t even look at the back cover. With Deathly Hallows, though, my fear of spoilers made me really anxious, and it was hard to have the “solution” to that anxiety right under my desk. In my mind, the spoiler situation was elevated to a “severe threat” level, which made it much easier to think about cheating. To protect myself. Ah, justification. Let me wrap myself in your arms.

And so I locked them in a closet, both for the safety of the books and for my own sanity. I locked them in a closet as if I was trying to make a bargain with God. “If I do the right thing, could you please work it out so I don’t get spoiled? Could you please make other people do the right thing, too?” Life doesn’t work like that, I know. And bargaining with God is always a bad idea. But instead of taking the book home, breaking the law, breaking my word, I did the right thing. The other 20 copies came in on July 17th. Again, I locked them immediately in a closet. I did hold one in my hand this time, but I didn’t even crack it open to look at the title page. It felt good, to hold it in my hand. I let that be enough.

There was some discussion that week of what kind of person would intentionally spoil a book for other people. I put forth the theory that it was a power trip. I felt uniquely situated in the discussion, because, as my boss said, “I am not keeping you from the book. Your own conscience is keeping you from it.” (I told him he’d better put that in my performance evaluation: “Shows integrity even under extreme pressure.”) While I never would have spoiled it for anyone, I understood the draw of letting other people know that I had it, even if I wasn’t going to read it. As I said before, at first I couldn’t handle the pressure of people knowing, but later in the week, after the spoilers were out, I started to see things differently. When Half-Blood Prince came into my office four days before the release date, I gloated. I didn’t read it early, but I wanted them to know I had it. Since then, I have come to see that as somewhat sad. I don’t need to get my identity from having the book before other people, as if I am part of some special group and they aren’t. What would be the point of that? And so, for the most part, I managed not to tell people. I discussed the paperwork I had to sign, and perhaps people inferred that we had it, but all in all, I think I was much better behaved than when Half-Blood Prince came out. I hope it meant that I had grown a little in the two years between the two books, behaving like a reasonable adult rather than being tacky and immature.

And in the end, it worked out. I got to work on the morning of the 20th, I processed the books and got them ready for checkout the next day. (Actually processing the books was HARD. I had to TOUCH THEM and put JACKETS ON THEM and NOT READ THEM.) We had our party and there were no spoilers and Mike and I spent a frantic 21 hours reading it out loud. And all of that was wonderful, and I won’t forget it. But, for me, the moment when I saw the box was one of the most exciting experiences of the whole crazy ride, and I am incredibly proud to say that I had it and I locked it away.

(I saved one of the boxes, because I thought it was awesome. But this picture is from July 20th, the day we opened the boxes to process them. And, yes, my hands did shake a little bit. Stop laughing at me! I was kind of excited!)

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.

I don’t know anything about Tullycraft, but one evening I was listening to the radio station that Mike DJed for over the summer, and I heard this beautiful haunting song. I made Mike call the station and find out what the song had been, and it turns out that it was “The Lonely Life of the UFO Researcher” by Tullycraft. Now, sure, that’s a silly title, and in some ways it’s a silly song. I kept finding reviews that said that very thing. But, in my humble opinion, those people are missing the point. This is a song about faith and doubt, about believing in what is not seen, about questions and needing to know the truth. All of those things are set in the context of UFOs, but don’t be deceived. I experience these same emotions all the time, belief and unbelief forming an uneasy truce in my heart. Feeling misunderstood by people who don’t share my same faith. Desperately wanting a sign that I’m not wasting my time.

Antenna towers, and distant hopes
I’ve measured happiness with telescopes
Well, I’ve been face to face with what my future brings
The reels they turn recording blips and pings
Through the white noise and distortion
There’s a message I can feel
Just give me one sign that you’re real

Please give me one sign that you’re real

This year, our Lenten theme has to do with restoration, and I thought on Sunday about what Mike and I were like five years ago, how much we had managed to hurt each other and how, little by little, we have grown up and grown from those mistakes. If I am needing some sort of sign from above to confirm God’s existence, I only need to look at my husband, who faced his fears about college and grades and intelligence and returned to school, coming out of his shell and developing an incredible confidence in himself and his abilities. And not being satisfied with bettering himself, he has wholeheartedly embraced a profession that allows him to help other people.

There are so many ways that Mike encourages my faith, but none more than the way that he has quietly allowed God to work in his heart and give him the courage to change. This is what I picture when we talk about God restoring the years that the locusts have eaten: I think about how I will feel on May 16th.

At church on Wednesday, they said that the Ash Wednesday service is next week. Ash Wednesday? It’s almost Lent already? How did this happen?

I was doing yoga that night, and at the end there is a position called Savasana, which I believe is called the “corpse pose.” I have been told that we do this pose both to rest our bodies and slow down after yoga, but also that it has a deeper meaning, something having to do with embracing death. So usually when I am in that pose, at the end of yoga, I pray a little bit and I rest a little bit and I think a little bit about death. Mostly when I think about death, I think about my dad. Sometimes everything that happened seems so long ago, like something that happened in another life or to someone else. And sometimes the smallest thing will bring tears to my eyes. It’s strange to think about all the things we have done without him, strange to see how our family looks now. These days, I just feel baffled that he isn’t here.

One of the classes I am taking is a young adult literature class, and for that class I wrote an evaluation of A Ring of Endless Light by Madeleine L’Engle (arguably my favorite of her books, and the one I return to most often). When I was younger, a lot of the lessons that it teaches about embracing death as a part of life went over my head, but when my dad was sick, I thought of that book more than any other. I have been thinking about Vicky Austin this week, about affirmations of life in the face of death. I have been feeling sad and lonely the past few weeks, so it’s been a good reminder to me to reach out to the people around me rather than retreating into my own shell. And yesterday was an encouragement, as I got to know some of the teachers at school a little better, as we watched a documentary and drank wine with some friends (aren’t we pretentious? Don’t you envy our yuppie existence? There was not just wine but also cheese).

I don’t really know what it means to embrace death, but I am glad that we practice it every year. I am glad for a chance to try again to learn with those around me as we enter into Lent. And that is what I will be doing next Wednesday, when my head is marked with ashes and I am told, “Memento mori.“

And thus ends the longest vacation that Mike and I have had together since our honeymoon. Of course, we didn’t go anywhere, or do much of anything, which was one reason it was so glorious. We had a lovely Christmas, and after that, we spent the rest of the break sleeping in, enjoying the sales, watching movies we’d been given (Once, Waitress) or that we wanted to see (Juno, which was very good) . . . just relaxing. About halfway through our time off, Mike said, “We’re going to have to come up with ideas for things to do in the summer.” Too true. All we did was sit around. We aren’t used to having so much time for activity. What do people do? Also, how is anyone going to convince us to have kids after all this wonderful sleeping in? I hear all you parents complaining about the lack of sleeping in all the time. Go ahead, try to convince me. I will be having some quality time with my flannel sheets.

One very nice thing is that, while we didn’t agree on everything, we didn’t bicker. It used to be that when we spent a lot of time together, we’d end up sniping at each other a little bit, but even the stress of the holidays didn’t turn us on each other. It’s a nice thing to be able to take note of, especially since our schedules are going to basically be the same.

Some people believe in ending the old year the way you’d like the new year to go - fresh haircut, full tank of gas, full pantry. We did that to some extent, cleaning things on New Year’s Eve, making a lot of soup to freeze, making a grocery store run. Our Christmas decorations always come down on the 1st, and Mike, who gets projects in his head and is unstoppable, reorganized our upstairs, cleaned out his side of the closet, and went to Goodwill with all our unwanted stuff that had been piling up. I, um, ironed. And read a book. I did help with the Christmas stuff! I feel ready for the year ahead, which promises some exciting things, namely Mike’s graduation (he can tell you how many days, exactly, if you are wondering). I didn’t feel much like reflecting on the past year, mostly because it took some unexpected turns at the end that I am still adjusting to, but I am thankful for a chance to make a fresh start.

When we went to see Juno, four girls came in during the previews and sat on the row right behind us. They proceeded to talk and talk and talk. One of them said, “Is this the commercials?” and her friend responded, “Yeah, it’s the trailers.” This concerned me, because I realized that it meant that they had no problem talking through the entire movie, and I didn’t have any of these. And, indeed, they did proceed to chat through the first part, until I turned around and said, “I didn’t pay good money to listen to you talk through the entire movie.” They were moderately more quiet after that. On the way home, Mike and I talked about that situation. I asked him if he had been planning on doing something. His plan? Move to the row behind them and kick their seats. You see the difference between us. He asked me why I didn’t just say, “Please stop talking,” and, you know, I have no idea why I didn’t say that. This is my problem - I get so worked up that I just blow my top and say rude things. If this is how I end the year (and it wasn’t just this one time), I can’t help but think that it’s a sign that this is something that needs some attention in my life.

I don’t make resolutions, especially public ones, but it is nice to face a new year (fresh with no mistakes in it) and imagine the ways that you can learn and change and grow. I hope that, at the end of this year, I’m a little further along, a little bit more patient and kind. And I hope I remember not to holler down the stairs when I want to talk to Mike. Seriously, that is such a bad habit.

On Wednesday morning, Mike and I got up and went for a walk. For months and months, I have been asking him to walk with me to an old graveyard that is close to our house, and he finally agreed to go with me. We put on sweatshirts and took our coffee and headed over. It was older than I had thought it would be, with graves back to the 1850s, and we were both moved to see that some of the families had lost a lot of children in a short span of time. This might sound strange, but the graveyard was such a pleasant place to spend an hour that morning. Not so much the newer, fancier part, but the older part, with the headstones that were obviously hand-carved, with the people’s ages represented in years, months, and days . . . it was sweet. And real. It might not be the normal way to spend time on Thanksgiving weekend, but this was a weekend where a lot of things I have been thinking about death and sharing life and really living all kind of came together, so it ended up being one of the best things we could have done, to go to a place where life and death are honored in such a tangible way.

Before Thanksgiving, Mike and I watched Pieces of April, as we do every year. (I am honestly not sure whether we watched it last year. I can’t imagine that I was like, “Sure, we should totally watch a movie about the black sheep of the family hosting Thanksgiving. While her mother is dying.” But maybe we did, since it is our tradition.) It was different to watch it this year. I had a completely different perspective on what April was probably feeling, and the ending struck me in a completely different way. Before this year, I had always felt like they probably just ran out of money, and that’s why the ending was so abrupt. But now I feel like the ending was in small moments and snapshots because that’s what they will remember about their mother’s last Thanksgiving. They won’t remember it like a film. It will be in bits and pieces. Knowing what my own holiday recollections are like, it seemed much more realistic and appropriate than everyone having the right words. It was everyone trying, and we (the audience) saw that, and that was enough.

What really struck me, though, was when, at some point, April was talking about Thanksgiving and said that it was important because it was a day when everyone realized they needed each other. At my grandma’s house on Thursday, I felt that, too. I guess a visual representation of that is the meal, how each person brings a few dishes . . . and then suddenly there’s an entire meal (and then some) on the counter. I felt it in the conversation, in the way the men in my family come together to take care of my grandma’s needs, and, yes, in the food. I don’t see my relatives all that often, and I don’t always know exactly what we have in common, but . . . they are willing to eat my pie and tell me they enjoyed it. That means something to me, you know? It means something that I have people I can bake for, and it means something that I can trust my family enough to try recipes out on them.

On Friday, after our Christmas decorating, I read Story of a Girl by Sara Zarr. I did, in fact, read the whole book. I couldn’t put it down. (And, to be honest, earlier that day I finished The Golden Compass, so I finished two books that day. I also finished two books on Saturday. It was quite a productive reading weekend.) I wanted to read it because of it being a finalist for the National Book Award, and because I have read the author’s blog and she seems wonderful. And the book, though I don’t think I will write it up, was also wonderful in ways I am not sure I can articulate. Though my life is very different from that of the main character, there was a scene in the book where she was sitting at a table with her friend, her best friend, and she was absolutely unable, because of her own junk, to be the kind of friend she knew she was supposed to be. She was not able to say the right things. She was not able to offer a hug. Instead, she sat there and ripped a hole in the plastic booth she was sitting in.

Oh, how I know that girl. I think I am not completely her anymore, but I still find, from time to time, that I don’t always say the things that are on my heart or offer to hug someone because I don’t know how to say them, because I am afraid. Afraid of being rejected, of being too emotional, of people thinking I’m weird, of it being the wrong response. But I don’t want to dwell on that, either, because I do see how far I have come, that I am much better at reaching out to people and risking my heart. Even a small thing, like making a pie, has, in the past, been fraught with peril. But I can remember specific things that have happened this year where I stood at a crossroads, and instead of playing it safe, I chose to offer the hug to someone I don’t normally hug. I chose to try the difficult recipe. I chose to say what was on my heart. I haven’t done it all of the time, but the memories of trying are like stones in my pocket, and I run my fingers over them from time to time to remind myself of what I am capable of.

One of the books I finished on Saturday was a book of poetry by Mark Jarman that I worked on for a few weeks. I have been trying to read more poetry, and I have been trying to really take it in when I do read it. One of the poems in that particular book was, oddly enough, about sharing your heart with people. It closed with the line, “You can’t take it with you. Why not leave it with me?” It was such a reminder for me of all the things I have been learning: to make the move and extend the hand, to make decisions that allow me to spend time with friends and family, to be wise about where I invest myself. That last one is pretty important, too, because I have spent a lot of time worrying about the opinions of people whose opinions really shouldn’t matter. I still do, to some degree, but it’s another area where (I hope) I have made some progress.

This is all kind of a mess, I know, but in my head there is a thread connecting it, and I hope you can see glimpses of it here and there. I have learned a lot in the past year and a half about friendship, about choosing the people who really matter, and about opening myself up because life can be so short. It has looked like different things - entering a chili contest that I didn’t win, entering a Scholastic contest that I did win (well, Mike did, anyway). Standing in the sanctuary and hugging my friend. Learning how to bake. Making the phone call that was hard for me. Choosing to enter a friend’s grief rather than focusing on my own. Taking another job. Joining a book club with people who impress and intimidate me. I want to honor my dad by really living life the way he did, and I want to honor God by making the most of the life that he gives us here on earth.

In the end, that’s what I am most thankful for this year: that I am here, that I have a chance to keep on trying to get it right with the people I love. Maybe one day I won’t need a specific Thursday in November to help me remember that.

Since this summer, I have been reading The Divine Hours. No, I don’t do it every day, and, no, I don’t do it at all the prescribed times. But it’s been helpful to have the readings and prayers set out for me. I like saying these things over and over, because the more I say them, the more I believe them. I believe that God cares about peaceful nights, that it means something to say The Gloria every day, that the Psalms don’t have to just be old poetry that I can memorize.

I think the best part of those prayers, for me, is compline, because of the part where, every day (that I remember to do the reading), I ask forgiveness for what I have done and what I have left undone. It’s those things I’ve left undone that are the most likely to keep me awake at night: the apology I didn’t offer, the hand I didn’t extend, the kind word not spoken. I like acknowledging that it’s not just what I do that hurts people (and myself), that what I choose not to do (or don’t bother to do) can be the wrong thing, too. I like it because it’s so different from the idea of sins as lists of things to stay away from. I can’t just check “love thy neighbor” off on a list . . . it’s a way of life. I don’t have to get it right all the time, but it’s better to acknowledge that fact, because if I think about it, I might just be able to choose differently tomorrow.

This quarter’s compline has included this familiar prayer:

Watch, O Lord, with those who wake, or watch, or weep tonight, and give your angels and saints charge over those who sleep. Tend your sick ones, O Lord Christ. Rest your weary ones. Bless your dying ones. Soothe your suffering ones. Shield your joyous ones, and all for your love’s sake. Amen.

I won’t swear to it, but I think my first introduction to this prayer was through Madeleine L’Engle, and I’m fairly sure that it was one of her books that pointed out my favorite part of the prayer: to shield the joyous. When I pray that part, I always feel as if I am praying for a bride on the night before her wedding, as she is glowing with the excitement and anticipation of getting to share her life with the man she loves. I would love to be able to protect this imaginary bride from the things that will come, the pain and heartbreak that are part of sharing our lives with those around us, so that she might be that joyful forever. I want the Lord to protect that feeling as much as I want him to heal the sick and bless the dying. The truth, though, is that my idea of healing the sick might not be what the Lord has in mind, and that for many dying people, death itself is a blessing. So it is with joy, too . . . untested, it cannot reach the same depths of joy that has struggled and won. I would not go back to being that bride, because the years between, though they have been challenging, have brought something more substantial. But I will pray for her just the same. I will go on praying for the sick, the weary, the suffering, the dying, and the joyous. I will pray because I believe that it makes a difference, that thinking of others helps me be more mindful of them, that I might not leave my own care for them undone tomorrow. And I will go on praying because it helps me believe in a God who cares for us, no matter which of those categories we find ourselves in.

If you’ve been around here at all to hear me talk about my high school days, you know that the thing that made them bearable was the Quiz Bowl team. Those hours spent in my school library shaped me in so many ways, and I look back on them with pure pleasure. There’s not much else from high school that was pleasurable, so this is kind of a big deal.

I still have the shirt we made my senior year, the one that says, “There was never an age in which useless knowledge was more important than our own.” I wear it sometimes for working out, though I am always afraid to wear it too much because I want it to last, as if that piece of cotton is some kind of talisman and I can’t risk ruining it. More than that, too, it reminds me of where I’ve come from. These days I am pretty comfortable in my own skin, but back then I needed a t-shirt to explain to the world who I was. A nerd. (As if they couldn’t tell.) I wore it with my yellow shoes (of course), and I wore it in college until I decided it was too childish and put high school behind me. (It took more than relegating a t-shirt to a Rubbermaid container to actually put high school behind me, but it was a valiant effort on my part.)

(Honestly, t-shirts are still one of my love languages. I have stopped giving Mike silly t-shirts because his t-shirt drawer overfloweth, but I am still happy to receive clever t-shirts for myself.)

It has taken me a long time to feel that I have friends, that I am capable of sustaining friendships, that I don’t have to apologize for my values and interests and opinions. Part of what my high school media specialist did was start me on that path . . . by being loudly and proudly nerdy herself. I wouldn’t go back to middle or high school myself for anything, but I am excited to go and work with them now that I have something to give.

I start the new job tomorrow, and if you were wondering why, I have a t-shirt I’d like to show you. It’s not the entire reason that we made the decision, not by any means. But it’s the reason I think I can do it.

‘Tis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be free,
’Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,
And when we find ourselves in the place just right,
’Twill be in the valley of love and delight.

I have to admit that it made me a little bit uncomfortable on Sunday to be talking about simplicity at church. It was a great message, that simplicity is about what drives our decisions, our hearts. It’s okay to appreciate the things we have here, to spend our money on things we enjoy. But those shouldn’t be the things that guide us. This is something Mike and I have been talking about a lot, making sure that our decisions are in line with what we value. Making sure we actually value what we claim to value. Trying to choose family over finances. So it wasn’t that the sermon made me uncomfortable in that sense. It was, in fact, very encouraging. Instead, it was hard to come home and see the pictures of my sponsored child, Stephen, that came in the mail on Saturday, and to think that we need to talk about simplicity at all. Stephen is from Kenya, where over half of the population is poor, and where 700 people a day die from HIV/AIDS.

I don’t want to romanticize Stephen’s situation, though. I know a lot of people love Andrew Peterson’s song about his own sponsored child, “Land of the Free,” but it has always made me uncomfortable, to be honest. In it, he claims he’s “just a little jealous of the nothing that she has,” which . . . goes too far for me. I think that it’s better for me to try to put the blessing/curse of The Land of Plenty in the correct context in my own life without claiming to be jealous of people who have less than I do, as if it’s inspiring to wish to live like they do. Rather than assuming that these people see the sun and think of heaven, or that they never complain about the rain, I should simply remember that all of life has its advantages and its drawbacks. Maybe it seems that people who struggle with much more basic needs than I do can be more focused on God, but poverty isn’t beautiful or romantic, and it’s insensitive of me to act as if it is. The song never rings true to me, because the people he is singing about are just that: people. They aren’t object lessons. It’s easy for me to sit on my cushy couch in my air-conditioned home and say, “Oh, if I was unfettered by wealth, I’d be able to appreciate God more.” My guess is that it has more to do with personality than circumstances, because, for many people, worrying about where dinner is going to come from may not leave energy to spare on the things of heaven.

On Sunday, besides singing “Simple Gifts,” we sang “’Tis So Sweet to Trust in Jesus,” a simple song about faith that I cannot sing without hearing my grandmother’s voice. “Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him, how I’ve proved him o’er and o’er. Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus, oh, for grace to trust him more.” There’s nothing simple about faith and trust in light of what we see here on earth, and yet, in the end, sometimes we make it more complicated than we have to. The song “Simple Gifts” perhaps gets it right –there is great freedom in joy in choosing humility and simplicity. That seems rather different than envying those caught in the trap of poverty.

I guess I will close with one more song, my favorite of all of the wonderful lyrics by Rich Mullins: “Nobody tells you, when you get born here, how much you’ll come to love it and how you’ll never belong here.” I think that this is probably what Andrew Peterson was trying to say, that where we live has so many benefits that we have to remind ourselves that it’s not our true home. I listened to this song last night on the way home, with the windows rolled down and the stars in the sky.

I think we can get caught up in the idea that simplicity means following a certain set of rules: moving to certain neighborhoods, going without certain things. That road, as far as I can tell, leads to dissatisfaction and discontentment. I think, instead, that, like much of Christianity, the joy comes when we choose to take on the idea of what our culture tells us is true about wealth and status, opting instead for the freedom to live generously out of the wealth God has given us, whether that’s emotional or material. I shouldn’t envy anyone, not those who have more than I do or those who have much, much less. I should worry, instead, about placing God before the possessions in my life, caring more for his ways and his people and his priorities. And what a gift it is to be able to choose to do that.

When true simplicity is gained,
To bow and to bend we shan’t be ashamed.
To turn, turn will be our delight,
‘Til by turning, turning we come round right

When Melissa and I were first becoming friends, one of the things that we ran into was that I have this need for physical space. I am not a very touchy person. I couldn’t tell you why that is, but I have never been one of those girls who plays with other girls’ hair or snuggled up to friends on the couch. Melissa and I have now worked through this issue. This means I let her touch me occasionally. Look, here is an example of how far I have come:

I am practically couch-snuggling with Kelly in that picture. I’m a whole new woman.

I am like this with my emotions, too. I think I can be pretty open when I share how I am feeling, but you have to let me be the one who makes that decision. When I feel like my emotional boundaries are being assaulted, I kind of freak out. Sometimes I accuse Mike of being hard to pin down, but then I will be in a conversation with someone and realize that I am doing exactly the same thing that he does to me . . . wriggling and squirreling my way out of having to give details.

A lot of it is that I am so afraid of being laughed at. I think I’m better at that than I used to be, much more confident, but . . . I fear I will never get over it completely. I cannot handle being made to look stupid, or being thought the butt of a joke. If there’s something I think you are going to use against me or, worse, laugh at me about, I will do everything I can to keep from telling you about it. And if you turn me into the butt of a joke, especially if you do it in a room full of people, I am not going to forget it.

So one of my buttons definitely has to do with that. I see people (like my husband) navigate similar situations without it being stressful for them, and I can’t understand it. How does he just let that sort of thing roll off his back? Why doesn’t he mind all the questions? Of course, I could also ask: Why does traffic make him so uptight?

When I think about other people and situations that have pushed my buttons, a lot of it has had to do with disrespect. Disrespect of my opinion (or, you know, anyone’s but your own), my intelligence (hey, I’m a reasonably smart cookie), my emotions (perhaps you shouldn’t publicly insult me merely weeks after my dad died), my effort, my boundaries. These aren’t bad things to oppose, but when they happen, my fears of looking stupid and being laughed at, combined with the disrespect, make it hard for me to function. I shut down. I get abrupt or even surly. I can’t make eye contact. I practically will my body to curl into itself. I do believe this is the worst version of myself. Unfortunately, there are some people who only know this version, because I feel belittled to the point that I completely lose the sense of who I am around them.

Lately, much to Oprah’s chagrin, I have not been living what I consider to be my best life now. My buttons have been pushed, and in some situations, I am functioning at a level that is considerably lower than normal.

The advice I have been getting is to pray about this, to pray about my responses and trust that God will move. And I do believe that he can help me make some changes, but this is a McDonald’s culture, and I want change to happen now, even if it’s never really happened that way in the past, and how in the world is it reasonable for me to expect character flaws to correct themselves in a week’s time?

So I am relegated to patience, to taking my temper on one phone call, one risky emotional situation at a time. At least I know that when I lose hope, I can sit on Melissa’s couch and let her put her arm around me. To be able to take comfort in that is a reminder that, from time to time, I do actually make a little progress.

This time of year, I find the seduction of cool nights (finally, cool nights) impossible to resist, and you are likely to find me and my iPod outside. I love running on nights like that, though my soundtrack tends to be a little too melancholy to inspire running at a very admirable pace.

Mike listens to sad music in the fall, too. Well, he listens to sad music all year. For someone so upbeat, he really likes wallowing in sorrow, especially in the fall. And now that it’s September, he’s put in his official autumn soundtrack: August and Everything After. It’s been a while since I’ve heard it, and I found myself humming “Anna Begins” as I transferred the laundry to the dryer last night. I am so easily swayed. My music, though, definitely switches in late summer. I started a playlist in early August that was called “Kari is tired,” and I’ve been listening to it for the past six weeks or so. The “Summer 2007” playlist (usually my playlists have pretty boring names) was a whole lot more upbeat. A lot of “Kari is tired” songs are going on a CD I am making for a CD circle, and I should probably warn them that the mix I have so far is pretty much a downer. I told Mike I needed a few more upbeat songs, and he said, “No, put some more sad songs on there, really push them over the edge.” And you thought he was the optimistic one.

I appreciate that the rhythm of the church calendar gives us space to grieve, instead of asking us to be “up” or “peppy” all the time. This year, especially, I have appreciated that the rhythm of the seasons does the same thing. In spring, I celebrated new life and rebirth and the miracle of the resurrection. Now, autumn means that the world is beginning to die, that we are heading into winter. It’s another Lent, in a way: memento mori. After this past year, I think that autumn will always be a time to grieve, and I like that the earlier sunsets and cooler evenings help me learn to make room for that. And make room for me to learn it.

The truth is that I don’t know how to make room for my own grief, let alone other people’s. I don’t know how to be patient with myself or others when it comes to grieving. I have never been good at dealing with strong genuine emotion. I take refuge in sad music and big plans. I want some kind of process, some steps to follow. I want to make things manageable. For now, the slow decline into winter is going to have to be enough.

Over the weekend, Mike helped me navigate a stressful situation that involved theft, blood, and drama. I had warned him that I would need his assistance, but that turned out to be quite the understatement. He was a calming presence throughout the afternoon, handling some things so I could do others, giving me confidence in my decisions, and emphasizing the things that were going well.

It took longer than I thought for us to get used to each other again when he came back from Costa Rica. We’re not used to living so much life without each other (I lived life! It’s just that it mostly involved doing laundry and planning meals), so it was hard to get on the same page again. And that doesn’t even take into account the changes that a trip like that can bring into someone’s life – seeing sea turtle hatchlings, zip lining in the rainforest, white water rafting. Boy does my laundry seem dull in comparison. The chocolate cake I made, however, was not boring at all.

I am not one to believe that (or live like) I need Mike to be my everything. I have great friends and a great family, but when it comes down to it, Mike is my best friend because I spend the most time with him. I love experiencing life with him, and he’s undoubtedly the person with whom I experience the majority of things. I think that it was hard for us to get used to each other again because I hadn’t been able to tell him the little stories of the day - the silly website I visited, the recipe I want to try, the strange encounter at the grocery store. We worked very hard to reconnect over the weekend, spending time with our rabbits, seeing a wonderful movie, and then, with the theft, blood, and drama, sliding back into a bit of normalcy with our familiar teamwork.

This whole thing was quite a learning experience for me. It had been a while since we were apart from each other for quite so long, especially without being able to talk at all, and our relationship is so different these days than it was back then. The last time he went away for over a week, I hadn’t gone from thinking of myself to thinking of us, even though we were married. The past few years, we’ve gone from just being “fun” to encouraging and challenging each other through some difficult times. It’s gotten easier to see us as a team, which made it harder when my partner wasn’t here.

Though I think we are still pretty fun. I was inordinately pleased to be able to call him last night about a bumper sticker, and happy to have him call this morning and report his latest musings on flavored coffee. I laughed during our, “What are we going to have for dinner?” discussion that turned into silliness. More than anything, I love our conversations that are grounded in the holy ordinary.

“In the end, I think the relationships that survive in this world are the ones where two people can finish each other’s sentences. Forget drama and torrid sex and the clash of opposites. Give me banter any day of the week.” -Hey Nostradamus! by Douglas Coupland

Was this what being a parent was going to be like? A life of anxiety, of fretting about little things? Have a child and give a hostage to fortune; yes, but have any human link, any friendship, and a hostage was given . . . A few minutes earlier she had thought of the giving of hostages. Well, she said to herself, I’ve just given another one.

I just don’t want to go on and on anymore about Alexander McCall Smith’s books. I mean, I always read them, I always love them, what else do you want to know? Today I read the newest in the Isabel Dalhousie series, The Careful Use of Compliments. I really enjoyed it. I know you are shocked.

In this book, Isabel, who is in her 40s, has recently had her first child, and, in the quote above, she considers the idea that loving people is a little bit like being held hostage by fate - things are going to matter to you more because of that. You are going to care more and be more affected by things when you love other people.

While I see that perspective, especially from Isabel, who has lived alone for quite a long time, I think I feel quite the opposite. For me, loving people and letting them into my life has been more like the giving up of hostages. Here I let go of my need to be “together” all the time. There goes my need to be right, out of respect and love for my friend. Watch as I say farewell to the walls that keep me from believing people actually care about me.

I wonder if we’ll see Isabel, in later books, change her mind about what it means to open up to people. She has grown quite a lot in that area over four books, choosing to risk her emotions when she could play it safe. It’s been interesting to see her navigate her relationships as she makes those choices.

Or maybe I am wrong about all of this, since I’m not a parent. Maybe parenting really is like being held hostage.

The first sunrise I remember seeing was when we lived in Gibsonville, which means I was probably 4 or 5. I remember my mom drinking her coffee, but I don’t remember if anyone else was there or why I was up. The sun was red that morning as it slipped over the horizon. In middle school, when I was at the beach with a friend, she always wanted to get up and watch the sun rise. In college, even though I consider myself a morning person, there were times I’d stay awake until almost sunrise. I never really see the appeal of watching the sun come up, to be honest. As much as I like mornings, seeing the sun just means that you’re awake really early. I prefer evening - watching the stars come out.

I don’t know the last time I was out driving by myself before sunrise. We left to take Mike to the airport at 4:30 this morning, and as I drove home, drinking my coffee (my only task this morning was to make sure there was coffee) and listening to my Gilmore Girls playlist, I watched as the eastern sky started growing brighter, ever so slightly. While I am thrilled for Mike that he gets to go to Costa Rica and play with sea turtles, I have not been thrilled about this trip in general, mostly because I won’t be able to be in touch with him. Our relationship was formed in an age of email and cell phones, so the idea of not being able to talk to him until he comes back next Sunday night is a little overwhelming. I worry both about something happening to him and something happening here while I can’t get in touch with him. I worry about the fragility of life. As I confessed to him last night, even when he’s here I worry almost every time I answer the phone that something has happened to him or to someone I love. This trip also means that the summer is pretty much over, and that he’ll be starting his final year of school. We have a lot of changes ahead.

But, as Grant Lee Phillips sang this morning, “Ain’t nothing that stays the same / I won’t ask it of you.” Last night I did try to convince Mike to stay, but we both knew he couldn’t. And I wouldn’t really ask him to. This trip, this time without contact is something new for us. We have a lot of new things ahead in the coming months. I want to enjoy this time to myself, take advantage of it. This morning, that meant not going back to bed, but staying up and reading the paper (which was here when I got back), making plans for the day.

I tend to want things to stay the same. It’s good that I’m married to someone who doesn’t feel that same way, who gets excited about our new adventures. This week he’s off on his great Sea Turtle Adventure, but I hope to have some adventures of my own.

(And also to get some more sleep. Getting up at 4:00 is not my favorite.)

It’s hard to live a life filled with wonder. I get glimpses of it when we play with kids, when summer nights stretch out hot and humid in front of us, at Christmas, when I eat something that tastes amazing, when something I have been looking forward to finally happens. But most of my life isn’t like that. I get caught up in my regular routine: getting to work, cracking open a Diet Coke, processing books, going home, making dinner, cleaning the house. It’s hard to find a day of rest in the midst of all that has to be done at work and at home, and it can be hard to remember to be excited about life in the middle of summer when you’d rather be relaxing by the pool.

When I think about people in my life who have taught me about wonder, I think about my dad. It’s a well-documented fact that he was the one who was most excited on Christmas morning, but he lived like that, too, I think. He would take us out of school to go shopping for Mom’s birthday, or to the State Fair, or just to go with him to school (when he was in school after some health problems). I think he was trying to teach us about taking time for what’s important. He certainly always tried to emphasize that there were things he wanted for us much more than good grades, no matter how proud he was of our good grades (and he was very proud of them).

When it came to faith, what I got from my dad was a sense of gratitude that he was allowed to participate at all. I am sure that shaped the way that I think about faith – I am a person who likes to have answers, but when it comes to my faith, I’d rather not try to spell out each theological point. I am much more comfortable with embracing the mystery, being thankful that we can be a part of something so much bigger than ourselves.

When my dad was sick, one of the things he said was that some people see the glass as half full, some see it as half empty, but, as for him, his cup runneth over. I would like, someday, to embrace life like he did, rather than just living.

Waterdeep is a band I always associate with my dad. I have no idea if he ever heard their music at all, but I think he would have liked them, their jangly sound and their take on life. I think he and Don Chaffer could have been friends, actually, and I think he would have thought their music was pretty great. Their new song, “Good Good End,” makes me think of my dad: “I’m amazed by life, and it’s amazed by me / We’re a strange old pair, me and eternity,” is not something he would have said, but I think he would have agreed with the sentiment. What a blessing that we’re here. What a mystery that life doesn’t stop here. What a miracle that, in the end, Jesus will be waiting for us. I miss my dad, but I am thankful he has found his good good end.

You can leave right now
You can ring a bell
You can tell ‘em you think I ain’t doin’ too well
But when I stood like you
I eventually fell
So you can leave right now
Go on and ring your bell

I’m amazed by life
And it’s amazed by me
We’re a strange old pair, me and eternity
It don’t make good sense
It ain’t easy to see
But I’m amazed by life
And it’s amazed by me

It’s a long hard road
With a good, good end
And if I keep on walking on past the crooked bend
I will meet my Maker
I will meet my Friend
It’s a long hard road
With a good, good end

After months and months of thinking about it, the invitation to my tenth high school reunion came on Friday. Mike taunted me by telling me that interesting things came in the mail that day, and, to his credit, I did have interesting things. But one fewer than he had declared, because the last interesting thing was simply an invitation to my high school reunion. Ten years, which is hard to believe. I looked at it and, after months of vacillating, quickly decided that I didn’t want to pay to spend money with people I wasn’t friends with the first time around. I spent a long time being bitter about that, but now I see that it’s okay that we weren’t friends. We shouldn’t have to pretend friendship just because we lived in the same town, went to the same high school. It reminds me of when I figured out that I didn’t have to be friends with someone just because he or she is a Christian. That doesn’t actually mean we have things in common, things on which to build a relationship. I didn’t get to know the things inside their hearts that make them who they are any more than they found out mine. Not to mention that I’m not the same person I was back then. I hope they aren’t, either.

The invitation was full of the sentiment and nostalgia you’d expect, and I’m sure the committee worked hard on it. But I think you have to be a different sort of person to look forward to your high school reunion. You have to be the sort of person who looks back at high school with some affection, who was positively affected by what went on there. And while I don’t claim to have hated every day of high school, I feel instinctively that the people who would attend our reunion probably aren’t the people I hung out with in the library during break. I worry about the things I would say to the people there, the grasping, needy parts of me that would come out in that situation.

There’s a part of me that would like to go and be successful and have a smart, good-looking husband, but those aren’t parts of myself that I like to encourage. If I’m going to go to a reunion in order to prove something, I’m going for the wrong reasons. Why should I feel the need to prove anything at all?

I have thought about this for a lot of years. The end of high school was much better than the rest of it, but the whole experience left a bad taste in my mouth. I wondered if I needed to go, to wear a fantastic dress, to have some kind of redemption. I think, though, in the end, not needing to go is the redemption I wanted after all.

A few years ago, I read Ordinary Losses: Naming the Graces that Shape Us by Elisa Stanford. The title of the book, the concept, really grabbed me (as well as the fact that the forward was by Lauren Winner). This is a book about the small losses in our lives, the kind we all experience – a friend moving away, a change in routine – and what those mean to us.

Lately I have been thinking about those ordinary kinds of losses myself – the end of a favorite TV show, a friend moving away, what our routine will look like when Mike is done with school . . . even the end of Harry Potter. Those aren’t good things or bad things, really. They’re just life marching on.

It’s the little things that fell me sometimes. I can get my mind around the questions, “What will I do on Tuesday nights now that Gilmore Girls and Veronica Mars are gone?” and, “When will I see my friend again?” I can’t even begin to form questions about the big losses. And so I cry over the end of my show, I cry about my friend, but I still don’t know what to do to help myself grieve those big things.

After a farewell dinner for my friend last night, I sent out an email that probably sounded like I’d had too much wine. I hadn’t had anything to drink – if I was drunk on anything, it was the comfort and companionship that these friends have offered me over the past few years. In my email, I tried to say that when I met them, I didn’t have much of an idea of how to be myself. I didn’t feel very likeable, or that I knew how to be a good friend. These women (as well as many of my other friends) have accepted me as I am, have supported me over the past year, and I have finally started to be more comfortable in my own skin. I have had some conversations about that lately, about how confidence and forgiveness have worked their way into my heart and how it’s a visible change. So many friends have helped me take those steps, and it’s such a precious gift.

So, naming that loss, that friend moving away, is to affirm why it’s important – we’ll all still be here, of course, and we’ll be able to go on without her, but it’s only right to acknowledge what her friendship has meant to me. Hence the drunk-on-friendship (and possibly chocolate and cheese) email. I think, I hope, that learning how to say, “I am really going to miss you,” is practice for the bigger kinds of grieving. So I throw a party for the end of a television show, I make plans for Harry Potter, I talk and dream about what our lives will look like after Mike graduates, because I believe that those things teach me how to live in the abundant life that we have been blessed with here on earth, how to grieve things both big and small.

On Good Friday, I sat in the pew and I told God that I knew that I was being too controlling, but, please, if we could just get through Easter Sunday, I promised to deal with it then. And it’s true. I have been trying to control things. Everything has seemed so out of control that I have been managing everything, trying to make things okay for my family, stuffing my emotions, setting a high standard for myself and forcing myself to live up to it. On Good Friday, as Mike and I were driving to the zoo after the service, I said, “I know this isn’t a way to live, but I don’t know how to stop doing it.” His advice? “You should stop doing it.”

It’s not really working, either - there are all kinds of things that are outside my control, and when something happens, I occasionally melt down. All my efforts aren’t getting me anywhere at all. I haven’t been living in a constant state of freak-out, though, because I keep putting things away, pushing them to a far corner deep within my mind - “I am not going to deal with that right now.” I haven’t been blogging about anything but books, because when you don’t feel (or deal with) anything, you don’t have much to say about your life. You can only talk about what you are doing. And what I’ve been doing is what I usually do - read. I’ve been plowing through books with more resolve than usual, because it keeps me occupied. I’m sorry it’s been so boring. I am still learning how to grieve appropriately.

On that topic, in Sunday School last week, we talked about whether it was appropriate to have the Lenten services be a little bit more “down” than services at other times. I said yes, because the Bible isn’t a book that’s always happy, our lives aren’t always happy, and I think the rhythm of the Christian year should represent all the different aspects of our lives. I was taught and still believe that abundant life doesn’t just mean a happy life. It’s about the full spectrum of emotions. Christians aren’t that great with grief, but we’re never going to get better at it if we insist that our worship services all be upbeat.

So, now that I made it through the darkness of the Tenebrae service, the sorrow of the Good Friday service, and the joy of Sunday’s Easter service, where does that leave me?

On Sunday, I sat on stage (I was liturgist, reading the call to worship, the scripture, and the prayers) and watched as we took the black drapery (that is so not the word I am looking for) off of the cross and brought the brass candlesticks and lit candles back into the sanctuary. Rejoice! For he is risen! And, oh, I am so thankful that we have hope that there is life beyond this. It helps to know that one day I can see my dad again. I am sure that there was quite an Easter celebration in heaven. But I stuffed those feelings and made it through the service, doing my job, not wanting to think about what the hope of eternal life means to me this year. We had lunch with friends, we visited my family, and when we got home I was so tired that my whole body hurt.

I wasn’t going to post poetry again so soon, but when I was looking for an appropriate Easter-ish poem, I found this Madeleine L’Engle poem, too.

“Go Away. You Can’t Come In. I’m Shutting the Door.”

Go away. You can’t come in. I’m shutting the door.
I’m afraid of you. I’m not sure who you are anymore.
I’m closing the door. I’m staying safe and alone.
Batter against it all you like. This house is built on stone.
You can’t come in. I’ve shuttered the windows tight.
You never say who you are. If it’s You, then it’s all right,
But you might be the other, the beautiful prince of this world
Who makes my heart leap with his cohorts and banners unfurled.
I could be unfaithful with him without any trouble
If I opened the door. He could easily pass for your double.
I’ve buried my talents. If put them to use
I could hurt or be hurt, be abused or abuse.
I wish you’d stop blowing. My whole house is shaken.
I’ll hide under the covers. Be gone when I waken.

What’s that light at the windows, that blast at the door?
The shutters are burning, there’s fire on the floor.
Go away. I don’t know you. My clothes are aflame,
My tongue is on fire, you are crying my name;
I hear your wild voice through the holocaust’s din.
My house is burned up.
What?
Oh, welcome! Come in!

I haven’t been burned up. God hasn’t been forcing me to let him in, knocking down any doors. But, in a way, I do feel burned up. Like I don’t know what to do next. And I don’t. I guess this year’s Lent, if it was about anything, was about bringing me to the end of myself. I’m going to try to remember how to be a human again, to feel things and to let myself be sad or happy or confused, if that’s what I am. I don’t want to do this, because I don’t want to be a mess. But I think it’s better to be a mess than to keep on doing something that isn’t working.

For a long time, my friendships were relationships in which the other person pursued me first. If they liked me enough to pursue me, we could be friends. This wasn’t because I saw myself as some great prize, but because I am basically, in many ways, a shy person, and also because I struggled/still struggle with a lot of insecurities which make it hard for me to put myself out there and face (soul-crushing) rejection. For many years, I have seen myself as much lower on the social ladder than most other people, and I wouldn’t want to presume to be on their level, so I have to let them be the ones to make the first move. It’s something I’ve been working on, but I’m never going to be as welcoming and gregarious as many people are, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to pursue other people without worrying at all about rejection.

This is, I think, the reason that one relationship never took off. I have been told that I share a lot of interests with this woman, and that we would get along. When we have been places together, I tried to make a bit of conversation, but when she didn’t seem engaged, I let it go, afraid of either being a bother or of putting myself out there and being rebuffed. So, what I am wondering is whether she is also the type that likes to be pursued and I quit too soon, or whether she simply wasn’t interested. And if she wasn’t interested, why do I care so much? Why does it hurt me?

In thinking about this, I articulated to Mike that I think I have wasted a lot of time worrying about being included by people who don’t really care about me. I have, in the past, thought a lot about “inner circles” and how I might find myself in one. I probably hurt people by being so focused on the people who were “above” me instead of cultivating the relationships that were already around me. I know I hurt myself, selling myself short by desiring relationships with people who weren’t interested in me just so I could be cooler by association.

It’s better these days, partly because I am more comfortable with who I am and partly because social circles change. I guess that’s something I’d like to say to my former self: “Yes, you will come to a place where you are able to let people like you for who you are instead of feeling the need to perform for them.” But it’s something I need to say to my current self, too, since thinking about some of that rejection can still bring me to tears.

This is a tangentially related thought, but, in thinking of old relationships, it’s come up as well. I have wondered lately about forgiveness in terms of letting people change. If someone behaved inappropriately, made me extremely uncomfortable, and hurt a lot of people around me, what is my obligation now, years later, when that person appears to have changed? I say I believe in a God who brings about change, I believe that, through God’s grace, I have changed, but I don’t know what it looks like to believe that for someone else. Can I believe that this man, a commitment-phobe, has finally settled down? Can this womanizer really change his spots and have healthy relationships with women? Has this woman actually learned that other people have valid perspectives?

I guess all of this is tied up togethe