An English Major Fiesta of Greatness

It’s what you learn after you know it all that counts. 

~Attributed to Harry S Truman

Guess what, kids? 

I'm in graduate school. For the second time, in fact. I earned my MA in 2006 and now, I'm back for another degree.

So far, my graduate experience has been challenging, invigorating, exhilarating, and inspiring.  As a teacher, I am experiencing the classroom in ways I haven't for over a decade.  As a student, I'm feeling confident and purposeful -- adjectives which did NOT describe my first experiences in graduate school almost a decade ago. I'm a nerdy, dorky, easily-excited learner, and that personality (I am finding) works well in school, whether you're at the front of the class or one of its members.  

I think the main reason I'm enjoying graduate school is this:

I no longer harbor any delusions about my own brilliance.  I know I'm smart enough to be there, but I'm not the smartest in the room; I'm not even ONE of the smartest in the room.  So I don't worry about sounding impressive, or trying to seem as though I understand everything being said; I'm not there to try to astound the wanna-be-PhD-intelligentsia or to make sure I say the smartest things in class. I'm there to learn, engage and grow.  I love it when a fellow student makes a good point.  I may-or-may-not have clapped for someone today when they announced they were presenting at a conference this weekend.  Excited-teacher has morphed into excited-student, and I'm allowing myself the freedom to enjoy this oh-so-expensive experience of being a full-time student in my thirties -- because who gets to do that!?! I'm more confident now in who I am and what I'm capable of learning. It's freeing. It's exciting. I'm loving it.

This time around, I've discovered that the classroom is full of my people -- learners and thinkers and pontificate-rs and theorists and humorists and entertainers and book-loving nerds.  We over analyze anything that's not nailed down and we think of ridiculous suppositions and we make mistakes regularly and we quote dead people and we quote living people and sometimes, we even quote them correctly.  It's like an English Major Fiesta of Greatness

I've found my tribe, ya'll.   

Finding Out The Greatness

Jesus, I am resting, resting
In the joy of what thou art;
I am finding out the greatness
Of thy loving heart.

O how great thy loving kindness.
Vaster, broader than the sea!
O how marvelous thy goodness,
Lavished all on me!
Yes, I rest in thee, Beloved,
Know thy certainty of promise,
And have made it mine.

Simply trusting thee, Lord Jesus,
I behold thee as thou art,
And thy love, so pure, so changeless,
Satisfies my heart;
Satisfies its deepest longings,
Meets, supplies its every need,
Compasseth me round with blessings;
Thine is love indeed!

-- Jean Sophia Pigott (1876)

Many Dark Places

“I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.
"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”  
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring 

“The world is indeed full of peril and in it there are many dark places. 

But still there is much that is fair. And though in all lands, love is now mingled with grief, 

it still grows, perhaps, the greater.” ― J.R.R. Tolkien

December 14, 2012

Argh!

Patience is the ability to count down before you blast off. ~Author Unknown

Cookie baking with Faith.
House decorating with Mom.
Shopping with The Sisters.
Lunches downtown with Dad.

Firelight every night.
Family dinners.
Christmas movies.
Kitty time on the back porch.
Books, books, books -- under comfy blankets, while curled on the back porch, with a hot mug of cocoa.
Brothers-in-law making fun of me :)

All things I want to be doing soooo badly, and instead (and until the 18th) I am doing this:

Via Tricia

I've been reading Tricia's blog for two years -- and this post is just worth sharing.  Tricia and I have mutual friends, but we have never met.  She lost her husband unexpectedly two years ago, and I have found her writing to be both moving and beautiful.  This post was just too, too good not to share.  Such truth.

----------------
Joy flows from the discovery of God.
He is in every circumstance where we wish to find him.
The joy comes in finding him,
knowing him,
over and over and over.
-- Tricia Lott Williford

Keep Going

If you're going through hell, keep going. ~Winston Churchill

Defeat may serve as well as victory to shake the soul and let the glory out. ~Edwin Markham

I have a friend who is learning how to live a life of sobriety.  He is new at it; he's only been out of rehab for a few weeks.  His new life is not easy.  Even a small lapse in judgement can have catastrophic results.  Discouragement is compounded by past mistakes.  There is no escape in sobriety; one must face demons by daylight and fight.  Fight.  Fight.

Sometimes I wish that I could trade places with him for one day so that he could experience a day free of the longing to escape into a drink -- so that he could experience "easy" for one day.  It is not easy for an alcoholic to be sober.  It is possible, after treatment, to make the right choices and to see the pitfalls and to plan for them and to attend the meetings and to ask for help and to keep away from triggers and to take thoughts captive and to and to and to and to...

Possible?  Yes.  

Difficult?  Hell Yes.

One of my church friends has been sober for eighteen years; he has a beautiful wife, amazing kids and a great life.  But, he has told me, there are still days when he wants a drink.  Still.  After eighteen years of sobriety, he is still tempted.  He says recovery is a process.  A long process.  And one is never "fixed" or "cured"; one is always in recovery.

It's Christmas time. Almost December.  I have two interesting, insightful parents.  I have four incredible women who consider me both friend AND sister.  I have two brothers-in-law who love my sisters well.  I have a funny, creative, and endearing niece who thinks I'm "crazy, but in the good way" and another little niece who's joyfully expected to arrive in early February.  I have a job I enjoy.  I am able to pay my bills.  I have students who encourage me professionally.  I am a little bit fat but somehow healthy.  I have a church family that supports and loves me. I have friends who help me laugh and allow me to cry.  I have a warm place to lay my head at night and as much electricity and hot water as I need.  I have a reliable car and the resources to put gas in it.  I have books to read, movies to watch, Christmas trees to enjoy (two of them!) and presents to put under the tree for my family.

It is possible for me to live without alcohol or drugs?  Yes.  

Is it difficult?  Hell no.

And for that realization, I am truly and profoundly thankful.

I need to pray faithfully for those around me who are battling demons and facing Goliath-sized foes, and I need to get some perspective.  Rejoice in my wounds and brokenness and difficulties -- because they are so small, in retrospect.  So, so small.  And God doesn't waste pain; He has been my faithful bridge over every moment of it.   

When the Japanese mend broken objects, they aggrandize the damage by filling the cracks with gold. They believe that when something's suffered damage and has a history it becomes more beautiful. ~Barbara

Praise the bridge that carried you over. ~George Colman

The Hope of the Candied Bits

Sister A and I discovered Starbucks gingerbread loaf slices over the Thanksgiving holiday.  Starbucks garnishes the frosting with bits of candied fruit and the result? Surprisingly delightful.

Today, I ordered a piece of holiday gingerbread and savored each bite... but I saved those candied-fruit-laden-smooth-frosting bites for the end.  I like to believe that life may be like a Starbucks gingerbread loaf -- lots of anticipated goodness, but surprisingly enjoyable "best" moments when you may have already stopped looking for them.  Here's to believing my surprise, look-it's-candied-orange-bits days are still ahead of me.

Hope is that thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops... at all. ~Emily Dickinson

So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain,where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf... Hebrews 6:16-20a.

Be My Zamboni

If you want to make your dreams come true, the first thing you have to do is wake up. ~J.M. Power 

One of the secrets of life is to make stepping stones out of stumbling blocks. ~Jack Penn 

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them. ~Henry David Thoreau, Walden, 1854 

2012 has been yucky. Painful and yucky and blech. Heartbreak and heartache and sad endings and deep hurt and painfuldarkplaces. BLECH.  But *he* got married a week ago; The Worst Year is almost over.

Blechy, yucky 2012, I am not sad to see you go.
You crushed my dreams and killed my song.  You have been a beast to overcome.

2013, I welcome you as the Zamboni to my wrecked and icy mess of a heart.
Let's do this new thing.  :)

**I like to make my New Year's appeals a good month before, so that the New Year will be sure to see them. **

Days of Gold

I cannot write of things which even impassioned breath cannot utter. Autumn is coming with its days of gold, its days of reverie and of you—oh, such delightful hours that my heart burns within me at the anticipation. ~Byron Caldwell Smith, letter to Kate Stephens

Honestly I do

My roommate and I are sitting in the living room, watching dvr'd episodes of New Girl and perusing Land's End.  Together.  On our laptops.  As in, sitting side by side and looking at online sweaters.

She points out what she deems to be unwearable, and I tell her how much I love whatever she's pointing to -- honestly, usually I DO -- and we laugh.

Such good times :)

If I had to sum up Friendship in one word, it would be Comfort. ~Terri Guillemets

Regaining Equilibrium

The act of putting pen to paper encourages pause for thought, this in turn makes us think more deeply about life, which helps us regain our equilibrium.  ~Norbet Platt

This semester, I am teaching a course called "Nonfiction Prose and Its Process."

Every week, I gather with nine students to discuss a certain author's writing process and works.  So far, I've introduced them to Donald Miller, Frank McCourt, David McCullough, Jon Krakauer, and Dave Eggers.  The students discuss what they like, what "works"and what they admire or find intriguing; we take turns reading passages aloud.  

Teaching Nonfiction Prose and Its Process has been, in a word, idyllic.   

They read.  They discuss.  They connect.  They engage.     

Every week, we meet in the campus coffee shop and they write.  Together, we've decided what the week's focus/motivation/"jumping off point" will be.  We base the focus on the author we're studying -- so sometimes they've written memoir, sometimes spiritual reflection.  They think about when and how they behave as writers.   They think about process. 

They write.   They are honest.  They are vulnerable.  They are intensely personal.  

Their courage challenges and inspires me. 

And by the way, everything in life is writable about if you have the outgoing guts to do it, and the imagination to improvise.  The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.  ~Sylvia Plath

No, but...

It comes up.

I sort of steel myself for it every semester, as new faces fill the seats and a fresh batch of students are initiated into English 100.

Every fall and spring, they suffer through my corny jokes and big smiles and we write and revise and write and revise and revise and revise again -- and usually, they hate the process but seem to be okay with me...and that's how we learn to be writers, these amazing freshmen and I.

I am fully myself with them because I want them to be fully themselves with me. 

So, it comes up.  The question came this semester during the fifth week. I mentioned something funny that happened to me on a first date, and one of my student athletes stopped chewing her gum and called out "you're not married?" in an incredulous tone which made me love her.

"Nope," I said, wiggling my ring finger at the class.  "See? No ring."

They looked at me, and a few raised their hands to ask more questions, but I blushed and chickened out and distracted them with a corny joke while pretending not to see the hands.  

I wish I had been more honest in my response.  I wish I had said, to these fresh-on-the-cusp-of-life freshmen who are so good to me:

  

Shameful Secrets

I don't exactly know what RSS is, or how one "subscribes" to updates using it.

I'm not precisely sure how to calculate basic entries in an excel spreadsheet... sum total and alphabetizing are all I've got so far.

The green onion has a green part and a white part, and I consider them both to be The Green Onion, but I suspect that I'm mistaken.  Also, are chives just dried up green onion pieces?

Yesterday, I googled the pronunciation for the word "pedagogical" because I'm always a bit confused as to whether it sounds like peda GO gical or peda GOD gical.  Sigh.  I mean, my instincts were correct, but geesh.

The only parts of a car I can name are the lug nuts and the chassis.

I had poptarts for lunch today... and I'm thirty-four years old.

Names That Make the Heart Happy

Hans Zimmer
William Butler Yeats
James Taylor
Nora Ephron
Pablo Neruda
John Williams
e.e. cummings
Jane Austen
Nat King Cole
Louisa May Alcott
J.R.R. Tolkien
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Vince Guaraldi
Alan Silvestri

(thanks to you all)

Answered Prayer; Renewed Hope in His Truth

I wish I had the words to convey how powerfully this essay ministered to my heart this week.

Incredible, thought-provoking, Biblically-centered treatise on singleness and the Christian culture surrounding singleness.

I loved every word.

Grab a cup of coffee and settle in, ya'll.  This is some good stuff:

http://www.critiquebycreating.com/2011/04/the-most-eligible-christian-bachelor/

Six Months Encapsulated...

How long must I pray, must I pray to You?
How long must I wait, must I wait for You?
How long 'til I see Your face, see You shining through?
I'm on my knees, begging You to notice me.
I'm on my knees, Father, will you turn to me?

One tear in the driving rain, one voice in a sea of pain --
Could the maker of the stars hear the sound of my breaking heart? 
One light, that's all I am.
Right now I can barely stand.
If You're everything You say You are, won't You come close and hold my heart?

I've been so afraid, afraid to close my eyes
So much can slip away before I say goodbye.
But if there's no other way, I'm done asking why.
Cuz I'm on my knees, begging You to turn to me...
I'm on my knees, Father will you run to me?

One tear in the driving rain, one voice in a sea of pain --
Could the maker of the stars hear the sound of my breaking heart? 
One light, that's all I am.
Right now I can barely stand.
If You're everything You say You are, won't You come close and hold my heart?

So many questions without answers, but your promises remain.
I can't sleep, but I'll take my chances to hear you call my name...
To hear You call my name.

One tear in the driving rain, One voice in a sea of pain --
Could the maker of the stars hear the sound of my breaking heart? 
One light, that's all I am.
Right now I can barely stand.
If You're everything You say You are, won't You come close and hold my heart?

Hold my heart, could you hold my heart?
Hold my heart.



** Songwriters: Mike Donehey, Phillip Larue, Jason Ingram

Tomorrow I Leave for Spain!

"The world is round and the place which may seem like the end may also be the beginning."

  ~Ivy Baker Priest

Tomorrow, I leave for Spain -- but today, I finish cleaning my nearly-empty apartment and take car loads of "extras" to Goodwill.  God has been moving me a lot lately, both symbolically and literally.  When I leave for Spain tomorrow, I am also saying goodbye to an apartment, a whole lot of stuff I didn't need, and an era of my life :)

I'm hoping this next chapter will be even better than the last.

Soli Deo Gloria

hot damn, it's true

Goodbye, no use leading with our chins,
This is where our story ends,
Never lovers; ever friends.
Goodbye, let our hearts call it a day,
 But before you walk away, I sincerely want to say...

I wish you bluebirds in the spring, to give your heart a song to sing,
And then a kiss, but more than this, I wish you love.
And in July, a lemonade, to cool you in some leafy glade,
I wish you health, and more than wealth, I wish you love.

My breaking heart and I agree that you and I could never be,
So with my best, my very best, I set you free.

I wish you shelter from the storm, a cozy fire to keep you warm,
But, most of all, when snowflakes fall, I wish you love.
I wish you shelter from the storm, a cozy fire to keep you warm,
Most of all, when snowflakes fall,

hot damn, I wish you love.

(Thank you, Jesus, for your peace. You are so very, very good to me.)

God's Delays, Not God's Denials

If one dream should fall and break into a thousand pieces, 

never be afraid to pick one of those pieces up and begin again.

 ~Flavia Weedn

People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are.  I don't believe in circumstances.  The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them.  

~G.B. Shaw

You learn you can do your best even when it's hard, even when you're tired and maybe hurting a little bit. It feels good to show some courage. ~Joe Namath

Never think that God's delays are God's denials. 

 Hold on; hold fast; hold out.  Patience is genius. 

 ~Georges-Louis Leclerc

Joy Comes in the Morning

Iced coffee.

Clean house.

Grocery shopping sans crowds.

"Singers and Standards" on pandora. 

Peaceful feelings of trust and hope in His future for me.

Blissful Friday.  

"Where hope would otherwise become hopelessness, it becomes faith."  ~Robert Brault