HOW many days until Easter??

I was totally unprepared for the fact that last Sunday was, in fact, Palm Sunday. Plus, it was cold and rainy...and in my brain Palm Sunday should be dry and sunny as the day of Jesus' triumphal entry, when everyone was wearing sandals. And there were palms trees all around.

Maybe I just need a tropical vacation?

Well, spring is springing its way into southeast Michigan, however reluctantly, and I am happy about it. The hubs just returned from a printmaking conference in Philadelphia, and it was SO great to welcome him home! I was excited to have a few days to myself, cleaning obsessively, watching Jane Austen movies... but when he got home I realized how great it is to simply *be* with him.

Which leads me to the next question from the list:

What is one way that you can improve your family life this year?

It is still weird, a year and almost-a-half after my wedding, to think that I have "my own family" now. When I first read this question, I pondered what "family" even means. At a very basic level: me and the hubs. But, for most of my life, it has meant mom, dad, sister, and self. It has meant grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins. Now, it includes in-laws. Nephews. Another person's history is merging with mine into our family story. 

Like anybody else, my family story is complicated, messy, and carries its fair share of scandal. Brushes with wealth that somehow never stuck. Great-great grandma Phoebe wouldn't let my great-grandpa Charles be mentored and adopted by the millionaire art collector Charles Freer, though Freer wanted to leave his fortune to an heir and thought it serendipitous that great-grandpa shared his first and last name...and so my family and I are not art tycoons.

Though the head-slapping moments are many, and though they have continued through time to the present day in many ways, I love my family. I have to. And, I want to. Not always. But I know I can't get out of it. So, I'm thinking that one way I can improve my "family life" this year is to try to practice more compassion towards my family. Starting with my husband...maybe even starting with myself...extending to cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, in-laws. Something has to counter the scandals and goof-ups and rolling-eye-moments, because they keep coming. If I can cultivate compassion toward myself and my relations, our life can only improve...maybe even bloom. 

the fog presides

I feel like I'm in a fog today. 

And I mean that literally AND figuratively. With the drastic warming-up of southeast Michigan, all the snow has magically transformed into a thick, low-hanging draped over the buildings and roads. My brain feels like the enshrouded buildings on campus...I can sort of make out the shapes of my thoughts...but nothing's really clear.

And it's Friday. I'm so glad. I am ready for the weekend (even though I've over-scheduled myself, as usual...) 

And, since it's Friday, and since I'm in a fog, I'm gonna try to at least nail down three main things:

Projects

• I am still working on "the book". It is scary and I feel like I'm just barfing up dumb stuff...but still going. 
• The Bright Ideas conference at MSU is coming up! I have a rough idea what my presentation will look like...
• Grading this weekend! (yay.)

Thinking

I've been thinking a lot lately about next steps. There are big decisions to be made, and yesterday it came really clear to me that my heart is pretty evenly divided when it comes to them. What about you? What do you do when you're faced with a big decision?

Reading

I started The Volcano Lover, by Susan Sontag, over break. It's so smart, and subtle and rich (so far). I'll keep you posted on how it goes!

the funny joke and the squeezing hug

First of all, isn't this tea cups card the cutest?

And since we're asking questions...here's another one for ya:
Do you ever feel like you plan to do something out of one motivation, and then dread it with whole other set of motivations?

I do this to myself all the time. I make contradictory plans, declarations, conceive of and try to live out ideas that don't exist well together, they don't 'play nice'. For instance, I declare, "I want to host a tea party for young women at church," which doesn't necessarily mesh with, "I want to get a massage and chill for the rest of my break."

Or, "I want to write a book," doesn't always seem to go hand-in-hand with, "I want to live in a clean house and grow my own herbs and make photo albums and bake scones from scratch."

I'm not sure why I do this to myself. Maybe, like Liz Lemon, I want to "have it all." Is that even possible? [and, in deference to Natalie Goldberg, who in Writing Down the Bones says, "if you can write a question, you can answer it... immediately go to a deeper level inside yourself and answer it..."(145).] Yes, it's possible, and messy and unpredictable. I can have the orange scones and the midday nap and the written book and the coffee and the tea and the yellow-cratered moon. Maybe not all at once. Maybe not all in the moment that I want it all to be (which is usually all in the same moment for me--I want it all...NOW!). Maybe I need to keep learning patience, and steadily working bit-by-bit on all the things I love. And maybe I need to keep pausing, to drink in the tea parties and the melting snow, the funny joke and the squeezing hug.

how we can be

"Only writing stays with the great vision. That's why we have to go back again and again to books--good books, that is. And read again and again the visions of who we are, how we can be. The struggle we go through as human beings, so we can again and again have compassion for ourselves and treat each other kindly."

           ~Natalie Goldberg, from Writing Down the Bones

shalom

So, my sister got me this book for my birthday

and I started it this morning. It's really good, scholarly yet surprisingly accessible. (I zipped through 24 pgs in like, twenty minutes!) At the outset, Eckert is discussing reasons why women may not feel whole in our society--relational loss; trying to do-it-all and failing; criticisms that we've internalized and begin to believe about ourselves; cultural messages that sexualize and fracture women, relegating them to bodies that sell things, objects of desire; even the church, which, while it is supposed to be a safe community for broken people of all backgrounds and genders to work together, each using their gifts fully, is all too often a place dominated by men, where the concept of who women should be is extremely narrow.

Then, she begins to discuss definitions for wholeness, and I thought you'd be interested in this:

"...the Hebrew prophets [discuss a way to live whole] called shalom: 'in the Bible, shalom means universal flourishing, wholeness, and delight--a rich state of affairs in which natural needs are satisfied and natural gifts are to be fruitfully employed... Shalom, in other words, is the way things ought to be'" (Cornelius Platinga 10). 

So, shalom to you, dear readers. Have a flourishing, rich, delightful day!

Do something impossible

So, the next question to be tackled from the list:

What is one impossible thing that you will believe God for this year?

When I first read this question, my immediate response was, that he'll help me write a book. Why that, out of all the possible things to believe for? Well, because it scares the shit out of me, for one. 

As soon as I thought this, and knew with all certainty that writing a book was the goal for the year--the impossible goal--I got really embarrassed. This is, I'm sure you realize, in comparison with say, solving one or more family crises, or helping people in Haiti. I'm completely selfish. 

Of course, I want to believe God for altruistic things. But this book is particularly significant. It's between him and I. He knows, and I know, that I'm scared to start. We both know I feel paralyzed and yet conflicted about my paralysis, since I feel somewhere in my gut that I am a writer. Well, writers write. So, here we go. I'm going to attempt a record of this effort, which you may follow,  if you like, here.  I'm leaping off the cliff, no net. We'll see where I land. 

Why I Heart Snow

-It is beautiful. Or at least charming.
-It is quiet.
-If there is enough of it, you get a snow day:)
-It comes in different sizes and textures: i.e., wet, floppy, soft, floaty, hard, tiny, gritty, light
-When it falls slowly, it's just magic.
-Two words: Midnight walks.
-Bundling can be cute...


-It is prettier to look out when it's in the teens and see a thick layer of white sparkles, as opposed to dead grass and cold pavement.
-It makes winter holidays all the more fun!
-It smells good.
-It looks becoming snagged on eyelashes.
-It is fun to catch on your tongue.


-It is fun to pack into balls that you launch as projectiles.
-Have you ever made a snow angel????
-Two words: Winter Olympics.


-I hear snow-shoeing is incredible exercise.
-It makes a satisfying smush-crunch under your feet.
-It makes the covers seem cozier.