Good Things in the Rough Places in the Sacred Kind of Days

By the title of this post, I am either a) terribly confused to the point of bufflement, or b) playing catch up in the world's worst way, or c) all of the above.

Can you tell I have been writing riveting prose such as a syllabus quiz?  It is engaging, I tell you.

I don't know where to start - I may be the only one here, talking to myself, and that wouldn't be entirely unusual.  It would also really be quite alright.  This true blood introvert has operated out of her introverted skin far too much this week, and all my soul keeps saying is, 'Shhhhhh, find quiet somewhere, somehow, even if you have to steal it like a common thief.'

  These last two weeks have been an absolute blur, a streak of action and activity and whirl and late nightness.  I don't think I have YET to experience a more jam-packed beginning to a semester.  EVER. I stood in my kitchen Tuesday night after getting home and slumped over on the counter, completely depleted.  That was day TWO of classes.

I am not necessarily saying it was bad - just so completely overloaded so as to reach the very bottom on only the second day of the semester.  Some of the good things:

• I am always completely caught off guard when returning students come running up to me, calling my name, excited to see me.  I'm that person - turning around to see who they are so rapt to see, until they grab me in a vigorous side hug and find that I am the one they are overjoyed to spot dashing across the grassy yard in my chacos and baseball cap.
• I reminded a poor precious baby freshman MK from Japan, of her mother.  She was my advisee, and she was tasked with making her initial contact with me some time during orientation week.  So she sits in my office, wide-eyed and terrified at the same time, looking around and says, 'You remind me of my Mom.  She loves books.  When we travel, we bring suitcases full, of just books.'  Sweet baby, you just gave me the highest compliment on the planet.'  Incidentally, she came back just two days later, tears rimming and spilling down at her decision to already change advisors because she is leaning in another direction for a major but wants so much to stay.  I reassure her of her courage to be so far away from family, and to be thinking deeply about her path in life- there can be no greater wisdom than to consider your steps.  She's also not experienced much formal education at all, and because of that I said in my heart, 'Run, sweet child.  This profession will eat your sweet soul alive.  You know where you can find me, for anything, even if just to stare at shelves and stacks of books and think of home.'
• Knowing that my Best Girl is settled and on campus and so stinkin' happy and thriving that she is already well-known by fellow freshmen and upperclassmen for her completely open and welcoming personality.  
• Also knowing that just when you're about to completely melt down, God sends little things (and big things, as in six foot four big) sometimes to remind you that He.Is.There.And.He.Sees.You.  Like the swirl of butterflies that seemed to surround my car the other day.  A shooting star when I went out to my car at 5 a.m. to drag my school bag in for the morning class prep.  My daughter and the new fella (but don't call him that yet - no.  Not yet, she says.) to plaster their faces to my office window right at the moment that I was answering the phone just after my Chair had left my office to 'toss out more dates to consider for workshops to attend' right at the moment my brain was trying to accomplish fourteen things at once and I couldn't remember where I had just put down my folder.....and they both came in and rushed me like some sort of soul paramedics, and wrapped me up in a double bear hug (her around me, him around her around me) and prayed for me right there, on the spot.  

So all that (and more) far outweighed the useless meetings that took up valuable time to plan, the extra work we had to take on bringing the seniors back early so we could orient them to the new mandated assessment that they would endure, the THOUSANDS of phone calls and emails and miles I trekked around the neighboring counties to make face-to-face contact with principals, all the first week craziness (drop/add, baby freshmen, more meetings, can't get caught up before it starts...) and a seminar that somehow fell entirely on me to conduct (I guess because I am Placement Director AND the Assessment Cooridnator and it involved both), so while I was supposed to be getting classes up and running, I was preparing to speak/present today to two-sessions, back-to-back to groups of principals, teachers and superintendent.  

Heeeeelllllooooooo and welcome back.

That was today, and now it is evening and I am glad I have the house to myself to hear only the fridge buzz and the clicking on of the air conditioner.  

All in all, it was a good week, but I am glad it's over.

Wonder 'Where've you been' of the Week(s)

Where did I leave off?  I really have no idea.  My absence here has been part self-imposed and part insanity cranking up again to full-tilt.  Came across a blog that pretty much says it all about the wrestling I've done with this cyber hammock, of late (well, much in common except she is a published author and all).  I'll share that link later.

Just in the short time I've slipped from the verdant-tinged ropes of this neglected hammock, the world has seemed to turn upside down.  As an INFJ, I process these things rather deeply, and have been for the better part of several weeks.  I can't seem to fit words over the shape of this pondering yet, like a too-short fitted sheet on an XL dorm bed (ask me how I know).  I just know I have been processing them.  Deeply.  

So where have I been (in case this has been the burning question forefront on your mind, I am sure)?  Hiding.  Retreating.  Walking the edges of the ocean tracing the moon's ghostly path along the shore.  Being thrown full-force back into a world I had been more than glad to have excused myself from just a short time ago.  

So this update from however long it's been since the last one. 

 Writing

Nada, including any of my several syllabi that should be ready by the upcoming Monday.  What am I doing right now?  Not writing.  
Reading


Lately, only emails and bills, assessment guides and text messages.  Then I came across this blog post In which I am retiring 'In which'... by Sarah Bessey, author of Jesus Feminist (love this book).  It pretty much sums up my inner turmoil over this blog.  She has been wrestling too, and she's been doing it ten years.  If you don't have time for her post, here are the highlights (relatable phrases) that connect with my current place:

• not the same woman I was when I started this gig
• trying to figure how how to 'change with the times' and how to stand my ground on what to write
• Her words exactly, except five instead of ten, "Ten years is long enough, I reasoned.  Half the time, I can’t keep up and I don’t think I want to try anymore.

Not sure if I have arrived at her reasons for carrying on, but I could relate, nonetheless.  

Also started reading this tiny nugget of a gem on the beach last week.  I stole it from my son's farewell from his internship gift bag.  He didn't mind.  It is called Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation by Parker Palmer.

This book had me clutching it like a long-lost sibling, and looking up the monastery the author mentions in the book.  This has helped me (so far, not finished) understand my disequilibrium with my job.  

Listening
My previous post details much of what I have been listening to these days.  Penny and Sparrow on repeat, particularly their song, Duet.  
But also this:


Watching

Just watched the movie, Cold Mountain, for the first time last night.  Another movie I would promote.  Another fave.  Another story of love that will walk through shots fired and blinding snow just to get back to the other half of themselves.  
Thinking


All this madness.  This world now feels like we're all existing on a toy glass marble.   I am thinking how absurd it is that there are people looting and rioting and burning down places of business and there are people being terrorized and beheaded in this world, and yet there are still posts upon posts of ice water buckets and whining.  I can hardly take it all in.

Wanting

A meetingless world and just one.more.week. to get prepared.  

I have a feeling this isn't going to happen.

Looking Forward To


This segment is probably going to be increasingly important in the days and months ahead.  Having things to look forward to = sanity.  So - 

         - Possibly going on a whitewater excursion with a dear friend in the next week or so

In Oct - going to see Penny and Sparrow.  Hope they don't mind when I belt out 'Duet' along with them.
         -  Fall break, headed for a short get-away again to the shore.  It is getting to where I almost have to go 
            visit the ocean at least quarterly so that I can inhale a big lungful of that air to keep me alive for the 
            following installment of days.

Needing

Honestly, as mentioned above - just a little more time.  And to go to bed.  It's early but I need to anyway.

Wearing

All gray.  Various and sundry mixed tones of gray.  And purple glasses.

Eating

I am eliminating this category.  I don't care as long as I am grateful for the food I have.  

Drinking

Nightly ice cold mason jar of water.  

'Because I've seen you
and I know you
and I'm not going anywhere.'

This song.

Penny and Sparrow Ten Boom

Wonders of the Week

I'll do this.  This time.  Maybe not for any other reason than the fact that it records my days, in summary.  That is all.

Writing
This.  I am writing this.  Nothing more.

Reading

A pdf on the precursor to the big kahuna assessment that new student teachers must do.

Seriously.

If I had to go through the 42 hoops it now takes to get into education, I'd tend bar.  Simple as that.

Listening

A new one by Ed Sheeran (how I love thee):



What photograph affects you the most?

The lyrics of this song - priceless.

Also, I learned about a new type of music this week:  Trap music.  Thanks to Best Girl.  This is what she likes to work out to.  And drive down the road to go shopping to - loud.  (ask me how I know)

Oh just read about it here:  Trap Music.

So I came across this ditty when I was trying this genre on for size while pumping my iron:



Hence, the creation of a pretty intense hip/core workout routine to this bit.  According to Best Girl, there are great moments when the beat drops - like 1:02 and 2: 51.

Also listening to a whole lotta Jason Upton.  That, for another post.

Thinking

Oh, dear soul, you just don't want to ask, to really ask an INFJ what they are thinking at any given moment.  I mean it - proceed with caution.  After watching the movie I watched, (and getting ready to watch it again), you just don't want to know.

Other than those scrambled, crazy thoughts, I have had my annual, 'here comes the new year' meltdown.  It wasn't pretty.  Be glad you missed it.  This was the scheduled weekend for that to occur.

I can check one thing (of 1,000) off my list.

Moving on.

Watching

'Labor Day'.  Again.  In a row.

Wanting

Still - that kayak.  I drooled over some this weekend, hanging high in a storefront window.  One day.

Looking Forward To

Since the school year is upon me, I have to create moments to look forward to, so I have done that.  I spent the afternoon looking at ways to spend Christmas break and spring break and then next summer when I am done again.  Head down.  Get through it.  Come up for air when you can.  That is my motto.

Needing

A personal secretary.  Know anyone for hire?  Cheap?  I seriously need this.  Someone to keep my life on track.  The piles and 'to-do's' are just too much, anymore. 

Wearing
  
NOT pants.  That is a post for another day, but seriously.  NO PANTS.  I have come to favor the running shorts with the built-in skivs.  This is my go-to summer attire.  That and my yoga capris.  They work great for the 'public' (i.e. the grocery store).  I don't wanna wear pants!

So currently I am sporting those shorts, a tank top and another on top of that with the motif that spells 'LOVE' out of ordinary objects, on the front.  

No pants.  I mean it.

Drinking

Slab Salve (this is a rhyming game - see if you can guess)

Quote of the Week

'True love is not a strong, fiery, impetuous passion.  It is, on the contrary, an element, calm and deep.  It looks beyond mere externals, and is attracted by qualities alone.  It is wise and discriminating, and its devotion is real and abiding.' ~ Ellen G. White.

Movie Recommendation

This doesn't happen very often.  You may want to sit down, or jot this down somewhere, or just be still in this moment - I don't often (like, once in a rarest of rare moon events 'not often') watch or recommend movies.  I just watched one that left me holding my breath.

If you have the chance and an evening to yourself, I highly recommend 'Labor Day' released in 2013, starring Kate Winslet and Josh Brolin, and Tobey Maguire as the older son, and narrator.  I don't recall hearing much about the movie, and despite the naysayers (critics) and their specific condemnation of the story (it.is.a.movie....you know, that thing we watch to ESCAPE reality?), it is quite a stunning piece of art.

Since I don't get 'into' many movies, I certainly wouldn't offer up any spoilers, or even any alerts, but I will say a few things regarding this movie:

• It is rich and raw with so many layers of meaning and tension, and emotion and need.
• If you can get over yourself, and get beyond the 'Danger, Will Robinson' reaction that most of the critics decried, you can embrace the idea that everyone has a story, and until you know that full story, you do not know the person.  
• I never knew peach pie could be so incredibly seductive and epicurean. 

From my account, this movie did not contain one bit of language or lascivious sex.  

The tension, however, is on full tilt. 

The end.  It just grabs that part of you that believes in the kind of love that defies all time, space, gravity, worldly confines, depths and heights and tragedies.  It caused me to hold my breath.   

I have never watched a movie back-to-back.  (I take that back - I did watch a part of 'All of Me' with my Mother-in-Law again right after we'd watched it recently, just so we could cry again.)  I am about to do so.  I want to catch all the threads of meaning and rich story that is this movie.  

I am serious - if anyone watches this, and wants to discuss in more depth, please let me know.  It is not often I can or desire to discuss a movie at length.  This one, I do.

That Kind of Friend

The older I get, the more I realize how rare it is to meet a kindred spirit. ~ Ethan Hawke

I ugly-cried all the way home blazing down the highway from our catching up session.  I couldn't help it - as much as I was bursting with happiness for her, in my selfishness, I mourned my 'loss' of her.  In my heart I knew this wasn't exactly true, but my head already clocked the distance.

My kindred heart, the friend that is the keeper of my secrets here on this earth, was at the time, in the midst of a job possibility that would take her about two hours away.  It isn't far - I've driven six times that in one stint.  Yet it might as well be over oceans and deserts away.

She is that kind of friend that I can be completely myself with and say absolutely anything, and she gets it.  I tried to explain the loneliness yesterday that consumes me often, to Hubs, but I know - she knows.  When I tell her of my misfitedness, it isn't met with blank stares but with empathy.  She is a fellow misfit.

In our catching up, I was explaining the current state of being turned inside out and upside down with church and all, giving her details and examples, and she nailed it.  She got it immediately, and put phrase to my scattered rambling.

"Sounds like you are struggling with the concept of institutions.  It isn't faith or belief you are doubting, but the organized, man-made establishment called 'church'."

Yes.  That's it.  

A big part of it, anyway.  

She found out Tuesday that she got the job.  She will be moving soon.  It really is okay because in this life, there are those few, very rare people that remain your truest friends and loves no matter the distance or time.  We'll create more adventures, and I will just have to point the car south a little more often.  Something to look forward to.