Notes from the Road: Pit Stops, Part I

Good thing I don't have a large readership. This sort of tardy writing would drive them all away. In my defense I've been very busy unpacking my car (which took half an hour), undergoing various interviews to determine my employment future [another post altogether], and spending a lot of time trying to get my 15-month-old nephew to like me best. Updates on that shall be forthcoming.

Depending on different factors (how badly I have to go to the bathroom, whether or not I decide to put real clothes on or do some housework at any given point) this could be a two-parter. I haven't decided (read: I don't have to pee that badly yet).

I left Tulsa on a Sunday, around 7 am. The planned breakdown (actually given my history with road trips that is an exceptionally poor word choice) was as follows:

-Sunday: Tulsa to Columbia, MO (5.5 hours)

-Monday: CoMo to St. Louis (2 hours)/St. Louis to Indianapolis (4.5 hours)

-Tuesday: Indy to Newark, Delaware (12 hours)

-Thursday: Newark to Bloomfield (5 hours)

Wednesday I planned to spend recouping from Tuesday's drive by hanging out with Sharayah and Jason before driving home to Connecticut on Thursday.

Of course I told my family I wouldn't be in til Sunday. SNEAKY.

Anyway, those distances there? I beat all of them except for the last one, and that last one only went over because I had to drive through New York on the Cross-Bronx Expressway. Which I loathe will all my being. There was traffic after the GWB, too, and into Fairfield County. But aside from that last leg, the highways were (mostly) clear and the driving was smooth. Such are the benefits of interstate travel on 4th of July weekend. Hooray for holiday driving!

The best part about this trip (that is already a lie, I can't pick a single best thing) was getting to stop and see friends and family during my non-driving hours. This post is supposed to be a rundown of those breaks. Let's get to it now.

In Columbia I stayed with Mo. Columbia, strictly speaking, is not on the route back to CT, but I always go here first. It's tradition to include Mo in some aspect of a roadtrip. During my college years (still love saying that) I spent countless hours/vacations on the road with her or crashing at her parents' house. PLUS this was my last time seeing her as a Single Lady. Hooray for the impending nuptials!

Impending Nuptials formed the focal point of our all-too-brief time together. After reaching her house and dropping off my things we hit the road again for a whirlwind afternoon of dropping off invitations, meeting with photographers, sample hour at Sam's Club (it's tradition, don't judge), and stopping by the Impending Groom's apartment to pick up/drop off various items. Then followed an evening of making wedding send-off/favors while eating cookies baked by the I.G. and watching BBC's new Sherlock Holmes. In short, it was delightful.

Stop 2 was The Roman Residence in St. Louis. I happened to arrive the day after their one-year anniversary, so lunch was a fairly laid-back affair consisting of Nate's Secret Ingredient Burgers and about three episodes of The Big Bang Theory, Season 3. We vetoed a walk in favor of vegging on the couch. It may be instructive to note that whenever possible I will probably opt for vegging on the couch.

Post-lunch (and post-stop-for-a-caffeinated-beverage) I turned North and East to stay Monday night with my cousins, expectant parents Mike and Meagan. There were plans in the offing to go see fireworks--but Meagan was pregnant and I was wiped after driving. I don't know what Mike's excuse was. We ate grilled cheese sandwiches and played this game, which by some astonishing stroke of beginner's luck, I won. I fell asleep on the couch to the intermittent rumblings of fireworks. It was glorious.

Notes from the Road: On the Radio

[Some notes after my four day drive, beginning in Tulsa, OK, and ending up in Connecticut.]

I frequently hit 'scan' on my radio console to help me stay awake on my solo trek. Five-second blips of song mingled with intermittent bursts of static and raucous dj squawks will do a lot to keep you going without overdosing on caffeine. (That, and turning the ac to its coldest and strongest settings and freezing yourself for thirty seconds.)

With that said, here is a rough rundown of the most overplayed (or overblipped) songs across the radio stations of America:

-Katy Perry, Extraterrestrial (ET), Last Friday Night, Firework (Ms. Perry was far and away the winner of this overplay showdown)

-Black-eyed Peas, Just Can't Get Enough

-Adele, Rolling in the Deep

-Train, Save Me San Francisco

-Britney, some godawful guttural techno that I never figured out the name to

-Ke$ha, Blow

-The Script, Break Even

-OneRepublic, Secrets/The Good Life (only other artist [besides KP] to get two frequently played numbers)

-Bruno Mars, The Lazy Song

-Taylor Swift, Mean

-Ceelo Green, F You

Most of these are wretched. "The Lazy Song." Britney's "music." Anything Ke$ha has ever, ever done, or will do. It was nice to hear Adele getting so much air time, but even so, it got pretty old, pretty fast.

On the other hand, sometimes scans would yield gems:

-WHAM!, Careless Whisper

And that's all I need to say about that.

More notes from the road possibly in the future. For now, I must needs unpack.

Burning bridges

Two people can live through an identical experience and be affected in utterly dissimilar ways.

I grew up with two loving parents, enough food, clothing, and shelter, and a houseful of siblings. Any way you slice it, I have no room for complaining about my childhood, and I don't intend to.

Everyone, however, has bad experiences. Mine came in the form of church leadership. My home church experienced a roller coaster of screwball stuff, but it survived. That church was my world growing up, and the damage done to the congregation went past what it might have in a larger or less involved group of people. By the grace of God the church has become what it was supposed to be: a place full of joy, and laughter, and music, and Christ. But what takes an institution a few office changes (and the power of God) to overcome can take an impressionable child years to shake.

So, I've had my share of baggage. Trust issues. Bad memories and connections. Knee-jerk ideological reactions. But--especially in the past couple of years--I've learned how to uncork some of those memories. I know I don't carry around much of that baggage anymore. The past has weighed me down. Has pushed and pulled me and contributed to making me who and what I now am. I've recognized that--but I have ceased to believe that it's the greatest defining factor of my existence, or of my childhood relationships.

Still hurts to think about, though, and I'm thinking about it today. Especially how differently others who lived out the crazy are now reacting to it. I stumbled on something written by an old and very dear childhood friend and reading what she had to say about the past that we share made me feel as if I'd been given a swift kick to the solar plexus. She's moved on, has created her own idea of what it means to be free of the past. But moving on and healing, while sometimes synonymous, aren't always. Sometimes you have to live with a hurt in order to get better. You have to examine what's wrong. Gangrenous limbs need to be cut off, yes; but a broken arm can be set, made strong again.

Some of the really good memories--the ones with no hurts attached--come from time spent with this friend. I don't want or mean to judge her, or to sound judgmental. Our experiences were certainly not identical, and maybe not even comparable. Maybe for her amputation was the only solution. It's just that someday I pray that she and I can sit down together somewhere, can look each other in the eye, with nothing obstructing the view.

End Times

Back for my last stint in T-town.

I'm ready to move on.

If humans ever really colonized space I would so be down for relocating. (As if we haven't already. I'm looking at you, GOVERNMENT.)

But before I bound about the rocky hills of Mars I think I would enjoy going to Ireland or something. Lots of somethings.

I bought a dress while I was home this past weekend. I wonder what it would be like to just go and buy an article of clothing without having a fight with the price tag first. (At the mall I mean. I have no particular desire to wear anything worth anywhere near as much as, say, my car.)

It's a goodlooking dress. I look good in it. It looks good on me. This is an agreeable state of things. Now to find shoes that agree with the both of us: we'll see how that goes.

I bet that dress would look awesome on me on Mars.

But I've got to get out of Tulsa first.

And another thing

Addendums (addendi?) to previous post:

13. The weather this week has been unseasonably cool for Tulsa in May; it's as though we are having an actual springtime! Which means on my early runs at Lafortune I can smell honeysuckle and cold morning air, which is one of the best of all good things.

14. I have free time to read novels! And have conversations with good friends!

15. I bought shorts today! This is Somewhat Miraculous.

16. I have to change Thad's oil and get him realigned (categorized with packing the apartment and applying for jobs: by adding it to the list I will generate excitement within myself!)!

Things I am excited about

1. SUSAN IS COMING THIS WEEKEND and I can't say how glad I am about that.
2. Going to Chicago! in a week with Leslie and NOT SPENDING THE WHOLE TIME SHOPPING (Last time I was there I was with a group who walked A MILE to get from one H&M to A DIFFERENT H&M. I am still boggled by the incomprehensibility of this)
3. Seeing Adele! in concert while in Chicago (in my head she is going to hear me singing along and ask me to come on stage with her at which point I will (pee myself) blow her and the whole crowd away with my singing prowess and she'll insist that we go on tour together and be best friends)
4. Going HOME! after Adele and Chicago (Adele will agree to reroute the tour through Connecticut)
5. Seeing THE BABIES while I am home and resecuring my title as Favorite Aunt with them ALL
6. The Wedding of the Roommate! The Wedding of the Roommate! The Wedding of the Roommate! It's going to be amazing (especially since Adele is going to agree to sing at it WITH me). My first time as MOH. I hope I do not blow it
7. Packing up the apartment! I don't know why I'm excited about this but I am including it on the list in an attempt to make me that way, and ditto for
8. Applying for jobs! I have some in mind, but I refrain from talking about them til I am more sure of my own inclinations
9. Jenna's Wedding, at which I am the Wedding Singer. I shall wear red lipstick and a fedora.
10. The Epic Summer Roadtrip of 2011 which will consist of me and Thad (my Camry) and all of my worldly goods driving Tulsa to CT with stops including but not limited to CoMo, STL, and possibly Indianapolis. I LOVE ROADTRIPS and this one will be by myself which means I am gonna get me some books on tape and a crapload of mix cds.
11. My cousin's wedding which is on my birthday so you know DOUBLE EXCITEMENT (I told him they need to prepare extra cake)
12. The Wedding of the Stark(e)s, otherwise known as The Day All Was Right With The World. I have been excited about this one for years.

That's four weddings over three months, which has got nothing on last summer. I guess I am excited about that too!

Clocks

I think it is my overwhelming love of narrative that made me a Victorianist in grad school, way back last week when I was in grad school. The thing that I fundamentally and always disliked about Modernism as a literary movement was the en medias res opening which is when an author plunges slap into the middle of someone's mental processes or lunch break or car chase without an ounce of back story. I love back story. In grade school (completely different from grad school but the same in that both are in my past) (I am going to try to stop bringing that up now, the thing about how I'm finished with grad school) I always got annoyed by story problems in math because I never felt like they gave me enough context. In the first place, why is the farmer planting so much corn and so little soy by comparison? Is that all he plants? Does he have a vegetable garden and maybe a cow to supplement his income and feed himself and/or his family? Why diversify his crops at all? What is his name? Is he a lonely, reedy bachelor farmer saving up to propose to the baker's daughter in town? Is he a florid, well-established married farmer with a rosy-cheeked, bustlingly capable wife and a kitchen-table's worth of stalwart sons? Is he a struggling immigrant with many mouths to feed? If I get this question wrong, will he be able to feed his family this winter/propose to Ida Mae/avoid being scolded by capable bustling wife? What are the stakes here? And why is a FARMER asking an ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENT to do his basic math? How good of a farmer are you if you can't compute bushels and acres?

This is also why I have always loved Victorian novels. Four solid chapters about the family background of the heroine detailing her parents' lives before she ever enters the plot at all? Yes please. Meandering description of topographical surroundings with broad regional metaphors? Sign me up. I like to know how a story goes from the beginning, an element I assume everyone I have ever told a story to also appreciates, which drives my friends crazy all my friends absolutely love about me! The more back story, the more detailed, (provided it's well done, of course and always), the more satisfied I and my endlessly questioning imagination will be.

I've recently realized that I try to treat the Internet like a Victorian novel, in that when I find a blog or webcomic or Twitter feed that I like I will go back through the archives to the VERY BEGINNING and read it the whole way through, regardless of inanity, and will continue reading even if it stops being funny or awesome, because I want to know what brought the author/s-in-question to the point at which I encountered him/her/them. I want their back story.

All that to say that I recently read the blog of a woman who blogged her experience with the pregnancy of her now seven-year-old daughter, and it occurred to me that as a 23-just-shy-of-24 year old it would be neither unusual nor illogical for me to get married and have a baby, right now, at my age, and my instantaneous reaction to this realization was a very mature bout of irrepressible giggling at the idea that I have a biological clock and that it is supposed to be ticking. So there goes that theory.

Series Finale

And OH HOLY COW here it is.

The Last Week. Of School. For me maybe ever.

What comes NEXT, I ask you?

(You are probably not the one[s] to ask.)

Well here are some Ideas I've had:

The only idea I have is to make enough money to pay my loans. Foresight!

I would like to stop and consider the view from where I am right now, because in a week I will not any longer have the same one.

Life is whizzing right along. A summer of weddings approaches (no one is surprised) and also of job applications and hopefully interviews and acceptances, et cetera.

I feel sometimes the same way I feel when I'm playing soccer. I'm best on defense. When I play forward I can't figure out where I should be looking. Behind me to see an oncoming pass? Ahead to make sure I'm not offsides? At the ball so that I know where I should be going? All trying to figure this out while running. I can never get it right. When the ball does come my way I'm inevitably looking the wrong way or I can't figure out what to do with it before I run out of time or room.

That's a bit incoherent, but it's how I've been feeling about life. I can't keep my eyes on the ball and on the rest of the field at the same time. I can't figure out how to live in the present and how to effectively consider the future.

At least I haven't learned how yet.

This summer might help, somehow. I'm choosing to think it will.

I get more done when I leave the apartment.

I am having such a productive day. I almost have a whole paper written before 3.30 in the afternoon that I hadn't thought about writing until I began it at 11 am.

This has also been a fundamentally unsettling day: I drank coffee and enjoyed it. After my run this morning (I hydrated with water and Gatorade post-run, and the Gatorade was awful because I brushed my teeth right before my run, but I drank it anyway) I went to Nord's. At Nord's I told the guy three things: I needed caffeine, I wanted something cold, and I wasn't a big coffee fan. He proceeded to make me an iced cold brew something or other that I poured skim milk into and drank with a growing sense of disbelief. Apparently the cold-brew process (which takes eleven hours [ridiculous]) makes the final product less acidic and bitter. It still tasted like coffee, but it was...palatable. A first for me. Normally I only like coffee in two forms: 1. ice cream 2. Seattle's Best Peppermint Mocha Trio (hot minty chocolate with just a smidge of coffee flavor).

He suggested it and I agreed because that's what I do; I agree to things. But I enjoyed it. I still don't know what to think. Am I going to like coffee? Even if I do, I refuse to become addicted. I just won't. I've lasted this long.

(The other unsettling thing about this was the effect that coffee tends to have on my withinsides. Blerg.)

Back to paper-ing. Let's see if I can finish it by 4?

Unsurprising

I can't stop listening to boyzIImen.

School of Hard Heads

Academia is hard because it is an artificial environment that intrudes into the real. It consumes my life.

I don't want it to, so when I'm done with this, I'm getting out. When I'm done. It's not as easy as it sounds--I have only a few weeks left and I can't see my way past them. But we've been over that.

What am I going to do when I don't have school as an excuse anymore? I'm serving my Tulsa church, and I love that I can do that. I'm trying to the best of my poor ability to be available to friends in need, but I'm inadequate, and I know that. Meanwhile I throw the last few minutes of my day towards Christ and I think it's the best I can do, because I'm just so busy. My busyness, examined, yields a different record of the day, the remains of which are idled (idoled) elsewhere; the between-times of tasks that I never quite seem to accomplish.

I've found my need for grace to be overwhelmingly more than I once assumed. I've found His willingness to cover me to be beyond the limits of my presumptions. And I've taken advantage of that.

Where's the line between rejoicing in the ever-presence of Grace, and abusing it? Between security and complacency?

I've spent years and years in school and now, emerging, I'm confronted with my own staggering ignorance.

More than a Mile

So...I didn't get ten pages written. More like eight.

BUT this morning at the park I ran for a mile and a half. I don't think I've ever done that before. And I'm not even in pain. Much.

Off to babysit for the day: I will have to bring a book to read, in case Little Man deigns to nap. Laptop battery and adapter coming this week! Soon I will be a normal computer-toting person, able to do my work on-the-go. Instead of precariously balanced on a chair in my living room, hoping I don't jostle the frayed and cantankerous cord as it juts awkwardly from the socket. Oh get here soon! Neither rain nor snow nor gloom of night shall stay these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds!

(that was from memory; I hope it is correct.)

By Saturday night I will have doubled my current thesis pagery. Ready? GO.

Accountability

I have six weeks to write approximately 70 pages, grade approximately 100 papers and projects, watch five films, and read an innumerable amount of essays and novels.

And then I will be out of school.

*hyperventilation*

I haven't decided yet if my regularity in working out is really just closet procrastination of my scholarly tasks. Regardless, tomorrow I'm going to get up, do my three miles, come home and write this thesis. By this time tomorrow I'm going to have ten viable pages.

*checks clock*

10.54 pm it is. Jesus, take the wheel.

The Best Thing:

1. Coming home after a soccer game, victorious, to an apartment freshly cleaned.
2. Alt. def. Anything with Hugh Jackman (Exception: Kate and Leopold).

I want today to be over now. Can't time do one of those speed-up things it likes to do sometimes?

Susceptible

These days chick flicks do not have any impact on my somewhat downplayed romantic side. Netflixed episodes of Bones, however--

My hair grows fast.

That is, quickly.

After cutting off about 18 inches a few weeks ago it's already tickling past the tops of my ears and swooping over my eyebrows. I'm enjoying the change, though.

There are many changes right now, and more to come in rapid sequence. In the first place, I'm working out consistently and on purpose and under no motivation but my own for the first time perhaps ever. I'm apprehensive about putting it up here because I am (always have been) just slightly superstitious and I can't help but think that bragging is just about the surest jinx there is--but it's true. Even last week when I felt the reverse of good I still managed to do three miles twice. It's not impressive working out--I'm not training for a marathon (idea?), I'm actually just walking (rapidly) the three-mile trail at Lafortune or doing three miles on the treadmill at school. The point is, I'm doing it.

I've always hated running/speed walking/jogging because 1. it's uncomfortable 2. I look ridiculous and 3. I could never focus. Seriously, any time I tried I would get so caught up in how hard it was to breathe and how much it hurt that I'd just give up. Aiming for a set distance never helped--I'd talk my self out of it--and the same thing with a set time. For a brief while one collegiate summer I tried doing that walk-run challenge--where you build up to running through increased intervals on a walk. Over the course of the summer I think I actually did it...three times? So much for that.

These days, if I want to see if I can run, I've figured out how to do it--by songs. I recently inherited an iPod nano. It's changed the workout process. Step 1. Select playlist. Step 2. Walk. Fast. Step 3. Start running at the beginning of a song. Run til the song ends. Step 4. Back to a fast walk. Repeat. The result? I am running. I don't particularly like it, but I can, and that's the difference. No significant weightloss, according to my clothes, but it's only been a few weeks. On a good week (two out of the three so far) I walk/run four days and play racquetball and soccer one day each, respectively. Soccer could soon up to two days a week-- and I keep telling myself I'm going to walk on the weekends. It just hasn't happened yet.

The first few post-workouts are the best. Normally they're the only ones I experience--the first ones. A few weeks in and I don't feel as smug or as exhilarated as I did the first time. I feel leaden and slightly pained. I intend to continue (how I feel, I find, matters less than what I do).

Another change--I'm working on my Master's thesis. This means I'll be out of school soon--very soon. Out of school. The phrase is as yet hollow and meaningless. But not for long.

When I am done with school I know exactly what I am going to do--read all the pointless books I own and NOT THINK CRITICALLY about them.

Who am I kidding. I can't help that.

Some things will not change.

I've always wanted to shave my head

But I can't. Oh social convention.

So a pixie cut is the closest I'll probably ever get.

I am getting my hair cut SHORT tomorrow, and I am currently afraid of looking like 1. a boy 2. a lesbian 3. Kate Gosselin so I really hope the stylist isn't awful.

I have been growing my hair out since I last got it cut short, sophomore year of college. The current length is the longest it's been maybe ever.

But it's been annoying me--and I want to donate it--and if I don't cut it all off now, when will I? I figure now is best. I have no man in my life to object--and I have noticed that guys have Opinions about hair. So since the only person I have to consult here is me, snips away.

oh please oh please don't let me look gross please

And THINK of all the money I'll save on shampoo.

Snow Daze

Ooooh I don't want to have school tomorrow

I absolutely don't

(five hours of student conferences followed by a presentation on Henry James? Let it not be, Dear Lord. Even so, come quickly, Snowpocalypse.)

I'm Every Woman?

This is a rant. This is only a rant. The result of too many videos of windbag preachers with faulty scriptural interpretation clogging up my facebook page and the misinformed and asinine defenses that come with them. This does not apply to many, many, many people, so when I use sweeping generalizations and fail to qualify them, understand that this is a rant.

Sometimes I get so frustrated with people.

Specifically (this is going to come with a lot of qualifiers) with the gender-stereotyped mindset of many of my fellow believers in the evangelical church.

The dynamic of June and Ward Cleaver is an incredibly loaded cultural icon: for some it heralds a Lost World, a harking back to the Way Things Should Be. For others it's a black-and-white reminder of what we have escaped. For still others it represents a cultural hilarity, an amusing artifact of our benighted ancestors. Either way, it is an image that has largely disappeared from the cultural landscape.

Living as my generation is in the midst of third wave feminism, girls [in my general socio-economic stratum] have been raised to believe that we can do anything we set our minds to. We can have the same careers as boys do. What were once closed doors, men-only clubs, are now viable options for a successful and fulfilling future, regardless of sex. This is what we are told; this is what we take for granted. Leaving aside the grandiose childishness of career opportunity, we've also been raised, for the most part, in an economic climate of career necessity. Our mothers worked outside the home because we needed groceries, or rent, or mortgage payments, as much as they did because they were following their dreams, or loved their work.

The point is that many of us were raised by working mothers as well as fathers. This is largely regarded as a necessary evil in the Church, rather than an historic opportunity or a possible good. The shifting gender roles of the 20th century have, in the evangelical church, been blamed on (not explained by) such anathematic movements as Feminism and Women's Lib (never mind the historical movements in gender that go way past Betty Friedan or even the activism of Margaret Sanger and her ilk. As though gender role shifts were nonexistent until their advent.).

At any rate, the churched children of my generation have been raised with a somewhat schizophrenic reading of gender roles: little girls are told to be anything they want to be, while little boys are told that they must, under no circumstances, relinquish the role of primary economic provider within a family structure. Young women are expected to simultaneously believe that careers are an open opportunity for them, and that housekeeperhood (not just mother- or wife-) is the obvious first and best choice, with all other callings, gifts, talents, or dreams becoming necessarily secondary to the undeniable claim staked by her reproductive organs and hormonal functions.

And so the little girls grow up dreaming of careers that they are expected to faithfully forfeit as soon as they wear a wedding band, or as soon as they first ask for maternity leave. While economic necessity forces many mothers to work, many pastors still paint working mothers as at best a worst case scenario (woman who would much rather be a keeper at home needs the income to make ends meet for her family) and at worst absolute selfishness (woman who despises children seeks self aggrandizement in a soulless search for money and prestige). Rarely are we presented any sort of middle ground, and just as rarely do we see a woman who feels a greater call to a particular field of work than to mothering, helpmeeting, or housekeeping, as a figure to admire or emulate.

Far be it from me to malign in any way the godly, holy calling of motherhood. I would never disgrace the insanely difficult, demanding, and challenging job of the stay-at-home mom by suggesting that it is somehow less than a career in itself. I will say, however, that even though women as a gender are built to carry children, not all women are called to be keepers at home. Not all women, despite their ability to carry children, or even their desire to bear children someday, feel called to forego the gifts that God has given them in favor of full-time housekeeping. If you are so called, be blessed. Work hard. Be devoted to that job. But if, like a case I have in mind, you are gifted in, say, languages, and feel called to work in international business, then do that. Do it well.

And--here's the kicker--do it even if and when you have kids. Why is it wrong to ask a man to take a prominent role in the home life of his children? Why does that make him somehow less manly? I am not advocating for stay-at-home dads. I am not saying that wives and mothers should all leave the home and enter corporate America--far from it. But I'm asking for a little reciprocity. I keep hearing the virtues of the "either-or" dynamic. What is so wrong about a "both-and" family? Why is a man providing for his family only considered in economic terms? What about emotionally? Spiritually? Surely a man can do a more fulfilling job as head of the household if he spends more time with his children, even if that means his wife maintains an extra-domestic career of some sort, whatever that looks like. Surely a woman would do a better job of raising her children if she showed them that she had a set of gifts and abilities that she used to make their lives better and to bring glory to God.

I guess what really gets me is the idea that everyone accepts that there is more than one type of man in the world--you have engineers and fighter pilots and dentists and cricketers and midshipmen and lawyers and accountants and professors and musicians. A man can be any of these things and still be considered manly. But too often (see disclaimer above) women who do likewise are not considered womanly enough. And that frustrates me. If a woman is following the will of God for her life, how could she be otherwise than womanly?

Tip

If you can, watch people enjoy eating something you cooked. It's the best.

Why I write; also, Why I don't

Do you know, I have so much terrible poetry stored up in me from my childhood; and, do you know, it still affects me, sometimes, more than some of the excellent poetry I have loved and learned since then?

I have High Ideas about art--I would rather not write at all than not write as well as I want to (I am understanding how stupid that is)-- but they are not right ideas. Is it better to produce something that meets my own personal standards of brilliance or to produce something that affects people, that stays with them, however lowbrow it may be? I can't decide.

On the one hand, I feel personally compelled not to contribute to the mass of terrible writing that is already available for consumption. A recent trip to B&N resulted in an hour of bemused disgust in viewing sequel after sequel of Pride and Prejudice, including but not limited to Mr. Darcy's Sister; Mr. Darcy's Daughters; Mr. Darcy and Me; Elizabeth's Betrothal; The Shades of Pemberley; Mr. Darcy, Vampyre; The Wooing of Elizabeth, equivalent in my mind to a sort of literary prostitution. Poor Jane. Of course you can imagine something that's already been imagined. Of course you can warp what's already been created. If you can't write or imagine or "make up" yourself, that is. I don't think loathing is too strong a word for what I feel for this sort of "literature". I hate it. I think it could all be destroyed and the world would be a better place.

The same is true, to an even greater extent, with fiction marketed as "Christian." I pick on the Jane Austen fanfics because those are currently saturating the market. But as a Christian, and as one who, if not a writer herself, at least appreciates writing, that stuff makes me alternately writhe with rage and howl with laughter. It also makes me squirm with discomfort. My great fear is that if I were to begin writing, really do it, actually attempt the presumptuous act of fictive creation--that it would end up like that writing I judge and mock and scorn.

So I don't write. I know something of my capabilities: I've finished a few short stories and memoir pieces. It is rarely a satisfactory experience. I want to write better than I do, and of course, the way to improve is through writing more. Practice. But some people practice--and practice--and practice--and never achieve anything better than Mr. Darcy's Harem.

On the other hand, however I may rail against them, those books have found an audience. People who read them are entertained. I don't just want to entertain people. Would I be false to my ideals to produce and share writing that I am not proud of? That is not up to my standard of what is Good Writing?

Or, worse--could I stand to produce anything and have it ignored? Could I stand to fail? As it stands, no. I can't. I have, apparently, an imaginary reputation to protect.

It remains to be seen how I will handle this. I have a convenient collection of empty notebooks. Maybe it's time I began to fill them, to see what I'd have at the end of it.

Brittle

O hollow hallowed bones,

So light, and lightly flung

Away, nested in flesh

And feather, fear and fight:

O breathless air,

In calcified traps concealed,

Never to nourish

The red blood, starved--

Where do you live

When flight stops

And the broken laws ascend?

You wait in caverns,

Through echoes of living drums,

For the ringing stillness.

Only rest within these walls.

No explosive without

Is known in sealed serenity.

Unless--fractured--

Exposed, unlocked, maimed--

Done to decay, gentle

After violent life. One fall

For many flights,

O hollowed holy heart-in-hand

You were never known

To live, til life were not.

Credible

Tonight a doctor told me I was one of the most responsible people he's ever met. I'm going to use this to batter the voice in my head that says "you're slacking" for the rest of my life. A real live doctor!

Unrelated Items of the Day

I'm happiest when I'm singing. (not performing.)

In candid, honest self-evaluation, I see that I'm not fiery or passionate. I'm obsequious and careful, looking out to make sure I squeeze through life with as little of the following as possible: 1. effort 2. discomfort 3. mayonnaise (I don't like it).

Started my final semester of school (as far, at least, as I know) today. Taught two classes. Not wide-eyed freshmen this time: cynical juniors and seniors, in varying business majors, who will learn (I will make them) how to write appropriate, clear, coherent emails, memos, and cover letters. Boring? Yes. BUT I made a few of them laugh today (I was younger than they thought I would be) and also I am pretty sure I'm the Hot Teacher. I definitely got checked out. Foolish boys. I will wield my beauty to make you use correct APA formatting. (Ugh, APA formatting.)

Got home tonight and took out the trash and was accosted by my neighbor. Understand this about my neighbors: they are a family of five-- mom, dad, daughters-- who moved here from New York so the parents could attend Bible school. The oldest daughter, 15, is out of control, and the middle one is right there with her. The mom has begun clinging to me and my roommates with a sort of determined desperation, since we are, from her perspective, what she wants her daughters to be.

Lex, Vic and I have all tried to spend time with them. We've prayed with them and for them, hosted movie nights and baking parties. Sometimes more enthusiastically than other times. We're all busy. We all have full-time lives and these girls have problems that go beyond an after-school special sort of fix.

Today the two oldest girls ran away after fighting with their mother. Not the sort of running away that entails planning and packing--they ran out in a snowstorm without coats or shoes. I prayed with Cathy (mom) and washed the dishes and cleaned the bathroom while she waited for the cops and cried. I imagined giving the girls a piece of my mind when they came back home, teaching them to respect their mother, inspiring them to change like in all movies about rebellious or under-privileged high-schoolers ever. Instead I had to leave to pick Vic up from work. As I write this I don't know whether or not they're home yet. I scrubbed the bathtub because I didn't know what else to do, except keep praying.

I can't do anything for this family, even though I can identify several problem spots. The husband doesn't back up his wife on discipline, and her discipline, such as it is, is erratic and tends to be little more than shouting and complaining. Over the past few months she's come over a few times, looking to us for guidance. No parents are perfect, and those girls are theirs. I can't step in and try to fix it. I know some of what needs to change, but I can't dispense child-rearing advice to a woman twice my age. All I can do is pray that those girls come home. That they know the Lord. That they allow Him to change their hearts. And that I allow Him to use me to minister to them in any way I can. To be candid, I would rather not. These sorts of situations make me intensely uncomfortable. But their well-being, and their need, trumps my comfort. Time to get out of the bubble.

I don't know how to get through to them. But I have to trust that the conclusion of my relationship with this family depends on Christ.

Bring them home safely, Father.

Postscript

I say the same kinds of things on here, over and over again. Be original, Colleen.

That can be my final resolution.

2011

Something I thought of tonight:

I'm in my 20s. I will be in my 30s. (God willing.)

And then my 40s.

50s.

60s.

70s.

80s? (If I avoid the hereditary pitfalls of heart disease and cancer.)

23 years of it are gone, and they aren't coming back. I find myself thinking and planning and dreaming of "what I'm going to do when I grow up" as if I'm not here, living it, day by day, minute by minute. That's it. No do-overs.

Sometimes I have thought of this and been uncomfortable, and afraid, but now I am excited. Curious. Piqued. Oddly enough, secure. Not secure in definitions, or plans, but only in the fact that Life is here, and I am in it, and I'm not in control.

This Christmas has been wonderful, if not strictly Christmasy. I'm going back to school tomorrow, to teach classes I'm unprepared for and to pick up my freshly fixed car and to hug my roommates. I'll be finishing my Masters degree and missing out on my nephew's first steps and first words. I'll be helping plan a bunch of weddings and researching Life After School.

I'm not ready for it, but somewhere along the line that just stopped mattering to me quite so much. All I can do is what I know to do; the Lord will work out the rest.

So resolutions?

Discipline (Weddings! also, avoiding heart disease?)

Follow-through (no more using realized hangups as excuses to continue in them)

Prudence (financially. Hello, Sallie Mae, we are going to be friends.)

Welcome, welcome, Newest Year.

(oh and PS. 61 posts for 2010! somewhere around thanksgiving I stopped writing on here, and in my journal, and pretty much everywhere, but I don't even care. final resolution: to write because I wish to write, and when I wish to write, and to neither force nor deny the impulse. huzzah!)