stairwell accompaniment:Brandi Carlile
left over photographs from Colorado on 35 mm camera:
and one from today. the day for washing the sheets, picnicking, throwing frisbees and baking.
stairwell accompaniment:The Shins
Since being married, I have become more overtly aware of the unusual collection of “ways that I am.” There seems to be a push for people, particularly in the Reformed community, to appoint a specific “calling” as their chief focus. (One might blame this on a largely western need to create hierarchy.) For married women, it tends to go something along the lines of “being a wife/mother is your primary calling…and, well, don’t worry about where everything else fits because you probably won’t have time anyway.” And although I’m not sure what the representational graphic would look like, I’m guessing that people would either go with a stepladder or solar system layout.
However, my personal theories on the role of dreams, vocations and callings for women may not function perfectly as a theologically-correct diagram of relational, vocational, and spiritual calling, it does resonate with me as a quirky representation of my past week. This week, all the colorful, treasured, and sometimes dissimilar strands of what I do and what I love overlapped into a dynamic shower of, well, living.
I read textbooks and expanded my knowledge-base. I studied 1 John, browsed through a new Anne Lamott book and came close to opening Augustine. I made the Dean’s List. I visited the doctor and disregarded her advice. I helped three women give birth. I gave 8 massages. I took pictures and journaled. I opened the windows and slept that way. I cooked meals. I grocery shopped. I visited with good friends. I met a neighbor. I ran three times. I dated my husband. I traveled out of the state. I swept our floors. I folded laundry. I watered the plant and fed the cat.
It was a reasonably typical week, but it felt uniquely full and rich. Perhaps it was the particularly meaningful juxtaposition of helping a woman give birth… and then going home and cooking dinner. Domestic, scholarly, academic, artistic, and relational pursuits compressed into this week. And instead of cracking or elbowing for space, instead of me feeling forced to turn internal switches on and off, all the ways of being added depth and relevance to each other.
It is not orderly, it is not uncomplicated, and it is definitely not easy to unpack. But it is real — incarnational, even — and I want to live like that.
stairwell accompaniment:Radiohead-Kid A
eat.work.josh.sleep.school.wash.rinse.repeat.
run.laugh.read.travel.wash.rinse.repeat.
We’re taking a class together on Global Poverty. I find it enlightening to be students together. My husband the perfectionist. And the valedictorian. And I, the sponge. Albeit the competitive sponge. The material is fascinating and depressing and encouraging and heavy. So we’re reading and thinking and discussing. We’re forced to write more and we’re still thinking big. Beginning with the small things and planning for the large.
We’ve booked another international flight. Traveling to commune with friends and new worlds and inviting adventure. Unfamiliar words, beautifully foreign faces, familiar challenges. Our shoulders aching from fresh immunizations against various diseases with no promise that we won’t be infected with the desire to stay. At the very least, to return. And I’ve renewed my passport to link me internationally with my husband. Or, I suppose, anyone else who had the most common last name in the world.
I’m spending these days with laboring women, laughing families and hopeful expectation. I am finding joy in this continually.
This week we have spend countless hours visiting with friends. Listening to their lives, laughing at their stories, holding their babies. Offering our words, or more often still, our ears. Sharing our joys and dreams and collecting theirs the same.
ready for warmer weather. and sustained sunshine.
This week, once again, I toast to my God who doesn’t tell me to have it all together. dry up all my tears. talk right. sit up straight. act your age. He doesn’t require me to abandon my occasional antisocial tendencies. my small delights. my procrastination. my weird humor. my sentimentalism. He sees my mistakes. my scraped knees. my typos. my insides. my past. present. future.
He’s a God who saves discipline for disobedience and not just falling short. I fall short every day. hour. minute. second. He delights in me. He. delights. in. me.
Cheers and hot tea.
onthestairs 